All that he does is characterized by
scholarship
and a rich culture.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v26 - Tur to Wat
Somewhat later Gonzalo,
sad and downcast, is about to leave the house. As he extends his hand to
the door, he notes that the cord that draws the latch is gently agitated from
above. ]
»
(
He stood a moment immovable. Again he reached towards
the latch, and again the mysterious motion from above was re-
peated. He went back and glanced up the staircase: from the
top landing a pretty blonde head smiled down at him.
"Do
you want me to go up ? ” he asked.
"No," she replied, but with an intonation that clearly meant,
“yes. ”
He immediately mounted the stairs on tiptoe.
“We can't stay here,” said Venturita: “they may see us.
Come along with me. ” And taking him by the hand, she led
him through the corridors to the dining-room.
Gonzalo dropped into a chair, but without loosing her hand.
“Why has my mother got to mortify me at every instant, and
before company ? ” she exclaimed. “If she thinks I will stand
it she is very much mistaken. There is no consideration in this
house except for that scapegrace brother of mine. ”
“Sweetheart, sweetheart, don't fly out at me.
precisely because you have a will and a temper of your own. I
have no fancy for women made of flour and water. ”
“I guess it's because you are one of that stuff yourself. ”
“Not so much as you may think. ”
"I can never imagine your getting angry with anybody. ”
“Oh, very well; if I am of that sort then it is very proper
that I should like amiable and tranquil women. ”
“Not at all, not at all,” she exclaimed, suddenly changing her
ground. « The blonde complexion likes the brunette, the fat the
thin, and the tall the short. Confess now, isn't it because I am
so little, and you so tall, that I please you?
“Yes, but by no means for that alone,” he said, laughing and
pulling her nearer to him.
I like you
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ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
15215
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“For what else ? ) with one of her siren looks.
“Because you are so — homely. ”
-
“Thanks,” she replied, her whole fair countenance illuminated
with vanity.
"I suppose there is not a homelier one than you in Sarrió, or
in the entire world. ”
Still, you must have seen some homelier than I in your
travels abroad? The Virgin save us! what a monster of ugliness
I must be. ” And she laughed with all her heart at the flattery
contained in his reversed hyperboles.
“We are not — comfortable here,” said the young man nerv-
ously. “Some one might enter, or — even Cecilia. And what
excuse could I give ? ”
«No matter what excuse: that is the least thing to consider.
But if you are uneasy, we can go back to the drawing-room. ”
“Yes, let us go.
“Wait here an instant: I will go and see how the land lies. ”
But then, stopping at the door with a new idea that just entered
her head, she turned back and said, "If you would promise to be
very proper and formal, I would take you to my room. ”
« Word of honor,” he promised eagerly.
“No attempted kissing, you know, or silly nonsense of any
kind. ”
« Not a bit. ”
“You swear it ? »
“I do. ”
« Then stay here a little, and come up after me on the tips of
your toes. Good-by for about two minutes. ”
He took her hand at this brief parting, and kissed it.
“There, you see, you break your promise even before we
begin," she complained, affecting displeasure.
“But I didn't think that hands counted. ”
"Everything counts,” she retorted severely, but her eyes still
smiled at him.
(
»
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— а
[The young girl's room is described, - a marvel of daintiness, luxury, and
good taste, personal to herself. Gonzalo exclaims:-)
« Oh, how much better this is than Cecilia's room ! »
« You have seen hers ? »
## p. 15216 (#160) ##########################################
15216
ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
(
“Yes: a few days ago she showed it to me, with its bare
walls, poor pictures, bed without draperies, and most common-
place bureau. ”
"Be good enough to sit down: you have grown tall enough. ”
“You did wrong to let me come up here,” he said.
«Why? what do you mean? ” and she affected surprise, open-
ing and shutting her bright eyes many times in succession, so
that the effect was like that play of heat-lightning that is observed
in the warm evenings of summer.
“Because I feel that I am ill. ”
« “You are ill? truly ? ” And now she opened her blue eyes
widely; without, for all that, succeeding in giving them an inno-
cent look.
"Yes, that is-yes, a little. ”
“Do you want me to call assistance ? »
“That would do no good, as it is your eyes that are making
all the trouble. ”
Oh, then I will shut them up,” she said, laughing merrily,
«Don't shut them up, don't shut them up, I beg of you. If
you do, I shall be infinitely worse. ”
«I see it is best, in that case, that I should go away. ”
"And that would simply be to have my death at your door.
Do you know why I think I am taken so ill ? Because, I sup-
I
pose, I cannot kiss down the lovely eyelids above those eyes that
stab me through the heart. ”
“Oh, indeed ? how badly off you are! ” she rejoined, mocking
him with the gayest laughter. "Well, I am sorry I cannot cure
“
(
you. ”
»
“Then you will allow me to die ? »
“Certainly, if you wish to. ”
But you will first let me imprint a kiss upon your delightful
hair, at least?
No indeed. ”
Your hands, then? ”
2
“No, not my hands either. ”
"Nothing of your belongings ? Oh, see how you make me
suffer, what fatal harm you are doing me. ”
“Here is a glove you may kiss, if you want to,” and she
tossed him one of her own that lay upon the dressing-table.
He pressed it to his lips repeatedly, with glowing ardor.
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ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
15217
Disloyal, weak, a repellent character, as the critics like to say
of the personages in novels who are not monumentally heroic and
gifted with all the talents. But suppose the reader himself to be
placed in that position, face to face with the younger Señorita
Belinchon, receiving the meteor-like glances of her blue eyes,
and hearkening to a voice with both grave and honeyed inflections
that moved the very fibres of the soul, and suppose she should
toss him a glove of hers to kiss,- I should very much like to
hear in what severe terms he would decline the honor.
«Now let us speak seriously [said Venturita]; let us talk of
our situation. In spite of what you promised me three days
ago, I have not heard that you have yet spoken with mama or
papa, or even written to them. Quite the contrary, in fact: not
only you let the time pass, while every day makes things worse,
but you seem to show yourself even more devoted to Cecilia than
before. ”
Gonzalo denied this with a shake of the head.
« But I have seen you. If you do not love her, this conduct
towards her is very bad; and if you do love her, then your con-
duct towards me is infamous. ”
"Are you not yet sure that my heart is yours alone ? ” he
asked, his impassioned glance fixed upon her face.
«No. "
“Yes, yes, yes, it is; a thousand times yes. But I cannot be in
Cecilia's company and be harsh and indifferent with her. That
would be too dreadful. I would rather tell her what has hap-
pened and have done with it, once for all. ”
“Tell her, then. ”
«I dare not. ”
"Very well, don't tell her, then. You and I will break off all
that is between us. It will be better so, anyway,” said his fair
young companion tartly.
“For God's sake, Venturita, don't say that; don't talk that
way. You frighten me; you will make me think you don't
love me. You must understand that my position in all this is
strange, compromising, terrible. On the very point of marrying
a most estimable girl, without any fault on her part, without any
falling-out to serve a pretext, or any circumstance whatever
to forewarn her of such a thing, I am suddenly to say to her,
All is over between us, because I do not love you, and never
have loved you. ' Could any conduct be more brutal and odious ?
XXVI-952
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as
## p. 15218 (#162) ##########################################
152 18
ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
And your parents, - how are they going to take my conduct ?
Most likely, after indignantly scoring me as I shall deserve, they
will order me out of their house, and never let me set foot in it
again. ”
"Very good, very good: then marry her, I say,- and I wish
you joy of her,” said Venturita, springing up very pale.
“Never! that will never be. I shall either marry you or
nobody else in all the wide world. ”
« Then what are we going to do ? ”
“Oh, I don't know, I don't know;” his head drooping in
abject sadness
A silence fell upon them for a moment, broken by Venturita,
who said, tapping lightly on his bowed head, “Rack your brains,
man; invent something. "
"I'm trying and trying, but nothing comes of it. "
"You are good for nothing. Come, you must go now. Leave
the thing to my charge. I will speak to mama. But you must
write a letter to Cecilia. ”
« Oh, for heaven's sake, Venturita! ” he protested in anguish
of soul.
« Then don't do it, and what is the next step on the pro-
gramme, tell: do you think I am going to serve as a plaything
for you? ”
" "If I could only dispense with writing such a letter,” he
responded, cringing with humility. “You cannot imagine what
violence it does to my whole nature. Would it not do, instead,
if I should cease coming to the house for some days? ”
“Yes, yes, it would. Off with you now, and don't come back,”
said the girl, herself moving towards the door to depart. But he
restrained her, by one of her braids of hair.
“Don't be offended with me, my beautiful one,” he entreated.
"Well you know that you have enchanted me, that you tread me
under the sole of your pretty foot. In the long run I shall do
whatever you want me to, even to jumping into the sea if you
desire it. I was only trying to spare Cecilia suffering. ”
“Conceited fellow! I'll wager now you think Cecilia will die
of love for you. ”
"If she gives herself no great concern, so much the better;
I shall thus escape enduring remorse. ”
Cecilia is cold; she neither loves nor hates with any warmth
of feeling. Her disposition is excellent; selfishness has no part
(
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ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
15219
in it; you would find her always exactly the same,- that is,
neither gay
gay nor sad.
She is apathetic, incapable of being
wounded by any disappointment, - at least, if she is, she never
shows it. What are you doing there? ” she broke off, rapidly
whirling around to face him.
"I was trying to unbraid your hair. I wanted to see it loose,
as you let me see it once before. There is not a more beautiful
sight in the world. ”
“I don't know that I object, if it is your whim to see
it,” replied the maiden, — who was proud, and with reason, of her
wealth of shining hair.
“What loveliness! it is one of the wonders of the world. ”
He touched the flowing locks gently; weighed them in his hands
with delight; then, taken with a sudden enthusiasm, he cried, “I
must bathe in them; let me bathe in this river of molten gold. ”
(
>
»
[At this moment one of the sewing-girls, sent after some patterns, chanced
to enter the room. Gonzalo looked up, paler than wax; the servant colored
violently with confusion. Venturita alone kept her calmness. First managing
to make her finger bleed by an adroit blow against the wardrobe, she said
coolly:-)
1
“O Valentina, won't you do me the favor to tie up my hair.
I cannot do it myself, on account of having hurt my finger”
(showing it). "Don Gonzalo was just going to try, but he would
make very awkward work of it. ”
.
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4
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15220
JUAN VALERA
(1827-)
BY WILLIAM HENRY BISHOP
JUAN VALERA was born in 1827, at Cabra, a village of the
Department of Cordova. He has identified himself greatly
with his delightful native district of Andalusia, in the scenes
of his novels; but personally he has led for the most part a life far
from rural scenes,- - a life of great capitals, long residence in for-
eign lands, active political as well as literary movements, and high
honors and emoluments. It is a kind of life calculated to sharpen
the natural intelligence, and confer ease and distinction of manners.
His friend and admirer, Cánovas del Castillo, the late premier of
Spain, accordingly said of him, as bearing upon the accuracy of his
descriptions of social matters: “Mas hombre de mundo que Valera no
le hay en España” (More man of the world than Valera there is not
one in Spain). His father was a rear admiral, his mother the noble
Marchioness Paniega. He was educated at two religious schools,-
one at Malaga, the other on the Sacro Monte at Grenada, the same
quarter that still contains the gipsies in their rock-cut dwellings. He
very early entered upon the career of diplomacy. He was secretary of
legation successively at Naples, Lisbon, Rio de Janeiro, Dresden, and
St. Petersburg; and later has been Spanish minister to the United
States and some other countries. He has also been at various times
deputy to the Cortes, high official in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, Director of Public Instruction,
and is now a life senator and a member of the Council of State.
He was one of the eight eminent Spaniards commissioned by the
nation to go and offer the crown to Prince Amadeo of Italy, after
the overthrow of Isabel II. in 1868. As a political writer, he collab-
orated with the group of talented men, under José Luis de Alba-
reda, who conducted El Contemporáneo (The Contemporary), a liberal
review which overturned the ministry of Marshal O'Donnell. The
same Albareda, later, founded La Revista de España (The Spanish
Review), in which a good deal of Valera's work has appeared.
Valera has been also a professor of foreign literatures, and he is
a member of the Spanish Academy. He has attempted many varie-
ties of literary work, and been eminent in all. It might fairly be as-
sumed from his smooth, harmonious, polished style, that he had written
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JUAN VALERA
15221
11
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18
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verses; and such is the case. Of his collected Poems) (1856), "El
Fuego Divino' (The Fire Divine) is esteemed as among the best;
a composition of thoroughly modern touch, yet in the vein of the
mystical Fray Luis de Leon of the sixteenth century. His poetry
comprises many paraphrases or translations from the Portuguese, the
German, and the English,— excellent renderings of Whittier, Lowell,
and W. W. Story, being found among the last. He is above all
things a scholar and a critical essayist; a considerable number of his
published volumes consist of collected essays or discourses before the
Spanish Academy, covering such subjects as “The Women Writers of
Spain,' (St. Teresa,' and the like, — not the moderns; (Studies of the
Middle Ages? ; Liberty in Art'; and The New Art of Writing Novels,'
- largely a discussion of French Naturalism. Cartas Americanas)
(American Letters) is a small volume, with a kindly touch, devoted
to an inquiry into the merits of the current literature of the Spanish
Americas.
All that he does is characterized by scholarship and a rich culture.
He himself confesses that he wrote his first novel, Pepita Ximenez,'
1874, without knowing that it was a novel. In fiction, his achieve-
ment is summed up in the having produced this one really great
book, universally adinired, Pepita Ximenez,' and a number of others
of far inferior merit. He holds that the object of a novel should be
the faithful representation of human actions and passions, and the
creation, through such fidelity to nature, of a beautiful work; and he
considers it a debasement of a work of art to attempt, for instance,
to prove theses by it, or to reduce it to any strictly utilitarian end.
Pepita' is a novel of character, not of action. It has been com-
plained that there is almost as great a lack of adventure in some of
our modern fiction as there was a superabundance of it in the older
sort; but no intelligent mind can fail to be carried along with the
development of this most impressive and charming moral drama,
slow, contemplative, and philosophic though the stages be by which
it seems to move. How thoroughly, how exhaustively, are the situa-
tion and the problems of character worked out! This completeness
and steadiness of attention are a very modern trait in fiction, as con-
trasted with the old picaresque stories, otherwise equally natural,
upon which it is based. In that day, the scene, the personages, had
to be continually changed, as for an audience that could not keep
its mind fixed upon anything more than a few minutes at a time.
In Gil Blas,' the robber cavern alone was material enough for a
full volume; yet there it was but an episode, quickly giving place to
an interminable succession of others.
In 'Pepita Ximenez,' Valera is fortunate enough to have an almost
elemental passion to treat,-a subject like some of those of Shake-
speare: the moral crisis of a young ecclesiastic, torn between earthly
1
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15222
JUAN VALERA
(
and heavenly love. Don Luis, the son of a worldly father, comes
home to the family estate in Andalusia for a short vacation, prepar-
atory to taking orders. A handsome, well-built young man, he has
been devoutly reared by his uncle, the dean of a cathedral in a dis-
tant town; and his head is full of the sincerest dreams of religious
self-sacrifice, of exile, and even perchance martyrdom, in the Orient.
His father wishes him, rather, to marry and inherit his wealth. It is
not quite clear just what part of the final result is due to the affec-
tionate machinations of those nearest him in his family, and what
to unaided nature and the delightful fascinations of Pepita. She is
a very young widow, of but eighteen, the widow of a rich old man
who had been very kind to her. It is springtime in flowery Anda-
lusia; and Pepita's discretion and reserve of character, her high-bred
charm, her beauty, soon take hold upon Don Luis. The story is told
chiefly in his letters to the dean. « The worst of it is,” he writes,
«that with the life I am leading I fear I may become too worldly
minded. ” Soon it is : «He that loves the danger shall perish in it;)
and finally an agony of appeal: “Oh, save me! Oh, take me away
from here, or I am forever lost. ” What was Pepita's part in it ?
Was she in some sense the ally of his father, — who gave out that he
wanted to marry her himself,— or did she love the handsome young
theological student from the first? She loves him madly at last; and
it is due to her own quite desperate persistence in the end that he is
lost to the Church, and gained to secular life.
The author has not the gift of facile conversation: his characters
rather dissertate to one another than talk. They incline to discuss
at great length abstract questions of morals, theology, or taste; the
pretty women only refrain from this at the cost of not talking at all.
Even at the supreme moment of their probable parting forever, Luis
and Pepita speak set orations. Still these orations are full of thought
and have an innate interest.
In "Doña Luz' (1878) we have again the same beautiful, high-bred
kind of a woman as Pepita. She is like a sun at its zenith. As
she passes in the street, the bystanders murmur with the exaggerated
Andalusian gallantry, «There goes the living glory itself. ” And
again there is an interesting young priest; but all passes platonically.
Doña Luz marries a brilliant man of the world, but he has sought
her only for her fortune; she lives apart from him, and finds solace
in her child.
(Las Ilusiones del Doctor Faustino' (The Illusions of Doctor
Faustus: 1876) is the most ambitious of Valera's novels, but not cor-
respondingly successful. It is a reminiscence of Faust; undertaking to
show in the career of the poor and haughty young patrician, Mendoza,
the many changes of purpose, belief, and fortune, the philosophic
doubts and baffled aspirations, that may attend the life of man on
u
>>
## p. 15223 (#167) ##########################################
JUAN VALERA
15223
earth. His own mother asks, "Para que sirve ? » (Of what use is he? )
An apparition who calls herself his "Immortal Friend” fits across
his career from time to time; he falls among bandits; he has many
love affairs in which he does not appear to advantage; and he finally
commits suicide. Pasarse de Listo' (Overshot the Mark), 1878, is
an account of Inesita and the young Count de Alhedin, who, with
excessive circumspection, manage to involve in the appearance of
the flirtation they two are really carrying on, Beatriz the married
sister of the young girl; with the tragic result that the husband of
Beatriz is led to jump off the Segovia Street Viaduct at Madrid, and
kill himself. This book has been translated by Clara Bell, under the
title of Don Braulio. '
(El Commendador Mendoza' (Commander Mendoza), 1877, is a
story of the last century, though nothing archaic in its form would
distinguish the time from the present day. The Commander, come
back with a fortune from Peru to his native village, finds there an
old flame of his from Lima, Doña Blanca; and her daughter Clara,
who is also his daughter. Doña Blanca, rigidly repentant and devout,
desires that Clara should enter a convent, that she may not by mar-
rying divert the wealth of her putative father into an illegitimate
channel. The Commander performs prodigies of ingenuity and gen-
erosity to save the amiable Clara; and by stripping himself entirely
of his property, gets her happily married to the man of her choice,
without the public ever being cognizant of their secret.
He is re-
warded by securing for himself the hand of Lucia, a charming young
friend of his daughter's. She is represented as much preferring an
elderly to a youthful lover; and such a lover is celebrated in a poem
in which it is said that “The spirit burns undimmed beneath the snow
with which the persistent labor of the mind has crowned his brow. ”
Other books are Currita Albornoz,' 1890; La Buena Fama' (Good
Name), 1894; El Hechicero' (The Sorcerer), 1895; and Juanita la
Larga' (Tall Juanita), 1895. Tall Juanita, the latest, is the history
('
of the true affection which a man of fifty-three succeeds in inspir-
ing in a young peasant girl of seventeen. A scapegrace character in
it goes to Cuba.
It is represented that he proposes to take part in
filibustering schemes, then become an American citizen, get a large
claim for damages allowed against Spain, give four fifths to the legis-
lators who have assisted him, and with the other fifth live in luxury
on Fifth Avenue, New York. This is very far indeed from the idyl-
lic charm of 'Pepita Ximenez. '
William Henry Bishop
## p. 15224 (#168) ##########################################
152 24
JUAN VALERA
The following translations are from the original Spanish, by William
Henry Bishop, for (A Library of the World's Best Literature. )
YOUTH AND CRABBED AGE
From Pepita Ximenez)
W"
HEN Don Gumersindo was close upon his eightieth year,
Pepita Ximenez was only about to complete her six-
teenth. He was rich and influential in the community,
she was without means or the support of powerful friends.
Indeed, from the ethical point of view, this marriage is open
to question. Still, so far as the young girl is concerned, if we
recollect the entreaties, the querulous complaints, nay, even the
positive commands, of her mother; if we take into account that
she designed by this step to secure for her mother a comfort-
able old age, and to save her brother from disgrace and even
infamy, acting in this affair as his guardian angel and earthly
providence, - then it must be confessed that there is room for an
abatement of the censure - if censure be the feeling aroused in the
spectator's mind. Furthermore, who is to penetrate into the inti-
mate recesses, the hidden depths of heart and mind, of a tender
maiden, brought up most likely in extreme seclusion, and wholly
ignorant of the world ? who is to know what ideas she may have
formed to herself of matrimony? Perchance — who knows? -
have thought that to marry that venerable man
merely to devote her life to taking care of him; to be his nurse;
to sweeten with her presence his last days; to rescue him from
solitude and abandonment, where in his infirmities he would have
had no aid but from mercenary hands: in a word, like an angel
that takes on human form, to cheer and illumine his decline
of life with the winsome and mellow glow emanating from her
youth and beauty. If the girl thought somewhat of this or all
of this, and in the innocence of her heart never dreamed of
going on into any further aspects of the case, then indeed is
her act not only free from blame, but must claim admiration as
showing the warm benevolence of her nature.
However this may be, and now putting aside this line of
psychological examination, - which I really have no right to
attempt, since I possess no personal acquaintance with Pepita
Ximenez, — what remains certain is, that she lived in an edify-
ing state of harmony with the old man for three years; that
her venerable partner appeared happier than he had ever been in
she may
was
## p. 15225 (#169) ##########################################
JUAN VALERA
15225
all his days; that she nursed him and entertained him with an
admirable conscientiousness; and that in his last painful illness she
waited upon him and watched over him with the tenderest and
most unwearied affection,- till at length he died in her arms,
and left her heiress to a large fortune.
10
PEPITA'S APPEARANCE AT THE GARDEN PARTY
From Pepita Ximenez)
EPITA XIMENEZ, who, through my father, had heard of the
,
.
invited us to visit one that she owns at a short distance
from the village, and to eat the early strawberries that grow
there. This liking of Pepita's to show herself so gracious to
my father, who is a suitor for her hand, while at the same time
in that capacity she will have none of him, often seems to me to
savor not a little of a coquetry worthy of reprobation. But when
on the next occasion I see her so natural, so perfectly frank and
simple, the injurious fancy passes; and I feel that she must do
everything with the most limpid purity of mind, and that she
has no other purpose than to preserve the friendly feeling that
unites our family to hers.
Be that as it will, the day before yesterday we paid the visit
to Pepita's garden.
By quite a sybaritic piece of refine-
ment, it was not the gardener, nor was it his wife, nor his son,
nor indeed any other person of the rustic sort, who waited upon
us at the luncheon; it was two pretty girls, confidential servants
as it were of Pepita, dressed in the usual peasant costume, yet
with consummate neatness and elegance. Their gowns were of
a bright-colored cotton stuff, short in the skirt, and trimly fitted
to their figures; they wore silk handkerchiefs crossed over their
shoulders, and in the abundant black tresses of each one
showed a fresh sprig of roses.
Pepita's gown, except that it was of rich quality, was equally
unpretentious. It was of black wool, and cut in the same form
as those of the maids; without being too short, its wearer had
taken care that it should not trail, nor in slouchy fashion sweep
up the dust of the ground. A modest silk handkerchief, black
also, covered her shoulders and bosom after the fashion of the
country; and on her head she wore neither ribbon, flower, nor
## p. 15226 (#170) ##########################################
15226
JUAN VALERA
gem, nor any other adornment than that of her own beautiful
blonde hair. The only detail in Pepita's appearance in which I
noticed that she departed from the custom of the country peo-
ple, and showed a certain fastidiousness, was her concern to wear
gloves. It is apparent that she takes great care of her hands,
and prides herself with some little vanity on keeping them white
and pretty, and the nails polished and of roseate hue. But if
she has so much of vanity, it is to be pardoned to human weak-
ness: and indeed, if I recollect aright, even St. Theresa in her
youth had it also; which did not hinder her from becoming the
very great saint she was.
In fact I quite understand, though I do not undertake to
defend, that particular bit of vanity. It is so distinguished, so
high-bred, to have a comely hand; I even frequently think it has
something symbolical about it. The hand is the minister of our
actions; the sign of our innate gentility; the medium through
which the intelligence vests with form the inventions of its art-
istic sense, gives being to the creations of its will, and exercises
the sovereignty that God conceded to over all created
things.
A NOONDAY APPARITION IN THE GLEN
From Pepita Ximenez)
M
Y FATHER, wishing to pay off to Pepita the compliment of
her garden party, invited her in her turn to make a visit
to our country-house of the Pozo de la Solana.
We had to go in the saddle. As I have never learned to ride
horseback, I mounted, as on all the former excursions with my
father, a mule which Dientes, our mule-driver, pronounced twice
as good as gold, and as steady as a hay-wagon.
Now
Pepita Ximenez, whom I supposed I should see in side-saddle on
an animal of the donkey species also, - what must she do but
astonish me by appearing on a fine horse of piebald marking,
and full of life and fire. It did not take me long to see the
sorry figure I should cut, jogging along in the rear with fat Aunt
Casilda and the vicar, and to be mortified by it. When we reached
the villa and dismounted, I felt relieved of as great a load as if it
was I that had carried the mule, and not the mule that had car-
ried me.
## p. 15227 (#171) ##########################################
JUAN VALERA
15227
1
1
3
Bordering the course of the brook, and especially in the
ravines, are numerous poplars with other well-grown trees, which
in conjunction with the shrubbery and taller herbs, form dusky
and labyrinthine thickets. A thousand fragrant sylvan growths
spring up spontaneously there; and in truth it is difficult to im-
agine anything wilder, more secluded, more completely solitary,
peaceful, and silent, than that spot. In the blaze of noonday,
when the sun is pouring down his light in floods from a sky
without cloud, and in the calm warm hours of the afternoon
siesta, almost the same mysterious terrors steal upon the mind
as in the still watches of the night. One comprehends there the
way of life of the ancient patriarchs, and of the heroes and shep-
herds of primitive tradition, with all the apparitions and visions
they were wont to have, - now of nymphs, now of gods, and now
of angels, in the midst of the brightness of day.
In the passage through those dusky thickets, it came about
at a given moment, I know not how, that Pepita and I found
I
ourselves side by side and alone. All the others had remained
behind.
I felt a sudden thrill run over all my body. It was the
very first time I had ever been alone with that woman; the place
was extremely solitary, and I had been thinking but now of the
apparitions — sometimes sinister, sometimes winsome, but always
supernatural — that used to walk at noonday in the sight of the
men of an earlier time.
Pepita had put off at the house her long riding-skirt, and now
wore a short one that did not hamper the graceful lightness of
her natural movements. On her head she had set a charmingly
becoming little Andalusian shade-hat. She carried in her hand
her riding-whip; and somehow my fancy struck out the whimsical
conceit that this was one of those fairy wands with which the
sorceress could bewitch me at will, if she pleased.
I do not shrink from setting down on this paper deserved
eulogies of her beauty. In that wild woodland scene, it seemed
to me even fairer than ever. The plan that the old ascetic saints
recommended to us as a safeguard, - namely, to think upon the
beloved one as all disfigured by age and sickness, to picture
her as dead, lapsing away in corruption, and a prey to worms,
- that picture came before my imagination in spite of my will.
I say "in spite of my will,” because I do not believe that any
such terrible precaution is necessary. No evil thought as to the
1
-
1
1
## p. 15228 (#172) ##########################################
15228
JUAN VALERA
material body, no untoward suggestion of a malign spirit, at that
time disturbed my reason nor made itself felt by my senses or
my will.
What did occur to me was a line of reasoning, convincing at
least in my own mind, that quite obviated the necessity of such a
step of precaution. Beauty, the product of a divine and supreme
art, may be indeed but a weak and fleeting thing, disappearing
perchance in a twinkling: still the idea and essence of that
:
beauty are eternal; once apprehended by the mind of man, it
must live an immortal life. The loveliness of that woman, such
as it has shown itself to me to-day, will vanish, it is true, within
a few brief years; that wholly charming body, the flowing lines
and contours of that exquisite form, that noble head so proudly
poised above the slender neck and shoulders,- all, all will be but
food for loathsome worms; but though the earthly form of matter
is to change, how as to the mental conception of that frame, the
artistic ideal, the essential beauty itself? Who is to destroy all
that ? Does it not remain in the depths of the Divine Mind?
Once perceived and known by me, must it not live forever in
my soul, victorious over age and even over death ?
>
THE EVENINGS AT PEPITA'S TERTULIA
From Pepita Ximenez)
A
s I have mentioned to you before, Pepita receives her friends
every evening at her house, from nine o'clock till twelve.
Thither repair four or five matrons, and as many young
girls of the village, counting in Aunt Casilda with the number;
and then six or seven young men who play forfeits with the
girls. Three or four engagements are already on the carpet from
this association, which is natural enough. The graver portion of
.
the social assembly [tertulia), pretty much always the same, is
composed of the exalted dignitaries of the place, so to speak; that
is, my father who is the squire, with the apothecary, the doctor,
the notary, and his Reverence the vicar.
I am never quite certain in which section of the company I
ought to place myself. If it is with the young people, I fear my
seriousness is a damper on their sports and their flirtation; if
with the older set, then I am constrained to play the part of a
## p. 15229 (#173) ##########################################
1
*
1
JUAN VALERA
15229
(
'M
to
1
mere looker-on in things I do not understand.
The only games
I know how to play are the simple ones of "blind donkey,”
(wide-awake donkey,” and a little tute or brisca cruzada.
The best thing for me would be not to go to the tertulia at
all. My father, however, insists that I shall go; not to do so,
according to him, would be to make myself ridiculous.
My father breaks out in many expressions of wonderment at
noticing my complete ignorance of certain things; such as that I
cannot play ombre, - not even ombre. This strikes him simply
with bewilderment.
«Your uncle has brought you up in the gleam of a twopenny
rushlight,” he exclaims. « He has stuffed you with theology,
and then more theology still, and left you wholly in the dark
about everything that it is really important to know. From the
very fact that you are to be a priest, and consequently cannot
dance nor make love when you go out in society, you ought to
know how to play ombre. If not, what are you going to do
with yourself, you young wretch ? just tell us that. ”
To this and other shrewd discourse of the sort I have finally
had to give in; and my father is teaching me ombre at home,
so that as soon as I know it I can play it at Pepita's receptions.
He has been anxious furthermore to teach me fencing, and after
that to smoke, and to shoot, and to throw the bar; but I have
not consented to any of these latter propositions.
«What a difference between my youthful years and yours! ”
my father likes to exclaim.
And then he will add, laughingly:-
“However, it's all essentially the same thing. I too had my
canonical hours, but they were in the Life Guards barracks: a
good cigar was our incense, a pack of cards was our hymn-book;
nor was there ever lacking to us a good supply of other devo-
tional exercises all just as spiritual as those. ”
Although you, my good uncle, had forewarned me of this
levity of character in my father, - and indeed it is precisely on
account of it that I passed twelve years of my life with you,
from the age of ten to that of twenty-two,— still my father's
way of talking, sometimes free beyond all bounds, often alarms
and mortifies me. But what can I do about it? At any rate,
though it is not becoming in me to censure it, I shall never
show approval nor laugh at it.
## p. 15230 (#174) ##########################################
15230
JUAN VALERA
PEPITA'S EYES
From Pepita Ximenez)
A
s I must have told you in former letters, Pepita's eyes, though
green like those of Circe, have a most tranquil and exem-
plary expression. One would decide that she was not con-
scious of the power of her eyes at all, nor ever knew that they
could serve for any other purpose than simply that of seeing with.
When her gaze falls upon you, its soft light is so clear, so can-
did and pure, that so far from fomenting any wicked thought,
it appears as if it favored only those of the most limpid kind.
It leaves chaste and innocent souls in unruffled repose, and it
destroys all incentive to ill in those that are not so. Nothing of
ardent passion, nothing of unhallowed fire, is there in the eyes
of Pepita. Like the calm mild radiance of the moon, rather, is
the sweet illumination of her glance.
Well, then, I have to tell you now, in spite of all the above,
that two or three times I have fancied I caught an instantane-
ous gleam of splendor, a lightning-like flash, a devastating leap of
flame, in those fine eyes when they rested upon mine. Is this
only some ridiculous bit of vanity, suggested by the arch-fiend
himself? I think it must be. I wish to believe that it is, and I
will believe that it is.
No, it was not a dream, it was not the figment of a mad im-
agination, it was but the sober truth. She does suffer her eyes
to look into mine with the burning glance of which I have told
you.
Her eyes are endowed with a magnetic attraction impos-
sible to explain. They draw me on, they undo me, and I can-
not withhold my own from them. At those times my eyes must
blaze with a baleful flame like hers. Thus did those of Amnon
when he contemplated Tamar; thus did those of the Prince of
Schechem when he looked upon Dinah.
When our glances meet in that way I forget even my God.
Her image instead rises up in my soul, victorious over every-
thing Her beauty shines resplendent beyond all other beauty;
the joys of heaven seem to me of less worth than her affection,
and an eternity of suffering but a trifling cost for the incalcu-
lable bliss infused into my being by a single one of those glances
of hers, though they pass quick as the lightning's flash.
When I return to my dwelling, when I am alone in my cham-
ber, in the silence of the night, - then, oh then, all the horror of
## p. 15231 (#175) ##########################################
JUAN VALERA
15231
my situation comes upon me, and I form the best of resolutions
but only to break them again forthwith.
I promise myself to invent a pretext of sickness, or to seek
some other subterfuge, no matter what, in order not to go to
Pepita's house on the succeeding night; and yet I go, just as if
no such resolution had been taken.
Not alone to my sight is she so delectable, so grateful, but
her voice also sounds in my ears like the celestial music of the
spheres, revealing to me all the harmonies of the universe. I
even go to the point of imagining that there emanates from her
form a subtile aroma of delicious fragrance, more delicate than
that of mint by the brook-sides, or than wild thyme on the
nountain slopes.
THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN THE INTERESTS OF HEAVEN
AND EARTH
From ( Pepita Ximenez)
DON
on Luis was of a stubbornly persistent, obstinate nature; he
had what, when well directed, makes that desirable quality
called firmness of character. Nothing abased him so much
in his own eyes as to be inconsistent in his opinions or his
conduct. The plan and aim of Don Luis's whole life, the plan
which he had declared and defended before all those whom he
associated with, --- his moral ideal of himself, in fact, which was
that of an aspirant to holiness, a man consecrated to God and
imbued with the sublimest philosophy of religion,- all that could
not fall to the ground without causing him great distress of mind;
as fall it would if he let himself be carried away by his love
for Pepita. Although the price to be received was an incompara-
bly higher one, he felt that he was going to imitate the improv-
ident Esau of Holy Writ, and sell his birthright for a mess of
pottage.
We men in general are wont to be but the poor plaything
of circumstances; we suffer ourselves to be borne along by the
current, and do not direct ourselves unswerving to a single aim.
We do not choose our own destiny, but accept and carry on that
which blind fortune assigns to us. With many men the kind of
occupation they follow, the political party they belong to - pretty
?
## p. 15232 (#176) ##########################################
15232
JUAN VALERA
much all the circumstances of their lives, turn upon hazards and
fortuitous events; it is not plan but the whims and caprices of
fortune that settle it.
The pride of Don Luis rebelled against such an order of
things with an energy that was disposed to be titanic. What
would be said of him above all, what must he think of himself
- if his life's ideal, if the new man whom he had created within
his being, if all his praiseworthy reachings out towards virtue,
honor, and holy ambition, were to vanish in an instant, consumed
by the warmth of a look, a passing glance from a dark eye, as
the frost liquefies in the yet feeble rays of the morning sun ?
These and yet other reasons of a like egotistical sort, in
addition to considerations of real merit and weight, contended
against the attractions of the young widow. But all his reason-
ing alike put on the garb of religion; so that Don Luis himself,
not able to distinguish and discriminate clearly between them,
would mistake for the love of God not only that which was really
love of God, but also his own self-love. He recalled, for instance,
the lives of many of the saints who had resisted yet greater
temptations than his own; and he would not reconcile himself
to be less heroic than they. He remembered especially that nota-
ble case of firmness shown by St. John Chrysostom; who was able
to remain unmoved under all the blandishments of a good and
loving mother, deaf to her sobs, her most affectionate entreaties,
all the eloquent and feeling pleas that she made to him not to
abandon her and become a priest. She led him, for this inter-
view, even to her own room, and made him seat himself beside
the bed in which she had brought him into the world; but all in
vain. After having reflected upon this, Don Luis could not en-
dure in himself the weakness of failing to scorn the entreaties of
a stranger woman, of whose very existence he had been ignorant
but a short time before, and of wavering still between his duty
and the allurements of that charming person; whose feeling, fur-
thermore, for all he knew, was but coquetry, instead of real love
for him.
Next, Don Luis reflected on the august dignity of the sacer-
dotal office to which he was called; in his thoughts he set it high
above all the other institutions, above all the poor thrones and
principalities of the earth; and this because it was never founded
by mortal man, nor caprice of the noisy and servile crowd, nor
through any invasion nor inheritance of power by barbarous
## p. 15233 (#177) ##########################################
JUAN VALERA
15233
rulers, nor by the violence of mutinous troops led on by greed;
nor had it been founded by any angel, archangel, or any cre-
ated power whatever, but by the eternal Paraclete himself. How!
was he indeed yielding to the charm of a giddy girl,—to a tear
or two, perhaps feigned at that, -- was he for such a motive to
belittle and put aside that greatest of dignities, that sacred au-
thority which God did not concede even to the very archangels
nearest his throne ? Could he ever be content to descend to
the common herd, to be lost among them? Could he be merely
one of the flock when he had aspired to be its shepherd, tying
or untying on earth what God should tie or untie in heaven,
pardoning sins, regenerating souls by water and the Spirit, teach-
ing them in the name of an infallible authority, and pronouncing
judgments which the Lord would then ratify and confirm in high-
est heaven ?
When Don Luis reflected upon all this, his soul flew aloft
and soared high above all the clouds into the farthest empyrean;
and poor Pepita Ximenez was left behind there, far below, scarce
visible, as one might say, to the naked eye.
Soon however would his winged imagination cease its flight,
his spirit return to earth. Then once more he would see Pepita,
so gracious, so youthful, so ingenuous, so loving; and Pepita com-
bated within his heart his most inflexible determinations. Don
Luis dreaded, with but too much reason, that in the end she
would scatter them all to the winds.
HOW YOUNG DON FADRIQUE WAS PERSUADED TO DANCE
From Commander Mendoza)
WHEN
THEN a child, Don Fadrique used to dance the bolero very
creditably. Don Diego - for such was his father's name -
had pleasure in seeing the boy exhibit his grace and skill
whenever he took him about to pay visits with him, or when he
received visitors at his own house.
On a certain occasion Don Diego, with his son Don Fadrique,
went to the little city,- I have never been willing to give any
name to it,- distant about two leagues from Villabermejo, in
which little city the scene of my novel 'Pepita Ximenez' is
laid.
XXVI–953
## p. 15234 (#178) ##########################################
15234
JUAN VALERA
At that time Don Fadrique was thirteen years old, but un.
usually tall for his age. As visits of ceremony were to be
made, he had put on a crimson damask coat and waistcoat, with
burnished steel buttons, together with white-silk stockings and
buckled shoes, a costume in which he was like the midday sun,
for the fine and becoming effect of it.
Don Fadrique's well-worn traveling-suit, much spotted and
patched, was left behind at the inn, as were their horses as well.
sad and downcast, is about to leave the house. As he extends his hand to
the door, he notes that the cord that draws the latch is gently agitated from
above. ]
»
(
He stood a moment immovable. Again he reached towards
the latch, and again the mysterious motion from above was re-
peated. He went back and glanced up the staircase: from the
top landing a pretty blonde head smiled down at him.
"Do
you want me to go up ? ” he asked.
"No," she replied, but with an intonation that clearly meant,
“yes. ”
He immediately mounted the stairs on tiptoe.
“We can't stay here,” said Venturita: “they may see us.
Come along with me. ” And taking him by the hand, she led
him through the corridors to the dining-room.
Gonzalo dropped into a chair, but without loosing her hand.
“Why has my mother got to mortify me at every instant, and
before company ? ” she exclaimed. “If she thinks I will stand
it she is very much mistaken. There is no consideration in this
house except for that scapegrace brother of mine. ”
“Sweetheart, sweetheart, don't fly out at me.
precisely because you have a will and a temper of your own. I
have no fancy for women made of flour and water. ”
“I guess it's because you are one of that stuff yourself. ”
“Not so much as you may think. ”
"I can never imagine your getting angry with anybody. ”
“Oh, very well; if I am of that sort then it is very proper
that I should like amiable and tranquil women. ”
“Not at all, not at all,” she exclaimed, suddenly changing her
ground. « The blonde complexion likes the brunette, the fat the
thin, and the tall the short. Confess now, isn't it because I am
so little, and you so tall, that I please you?
“Yes, but by no means for that alone,” he said, laughing and
pulling her nearer to him.
I like you
(
((
## p. 15215 (#159) ##########################################
ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
15215
1
((
10
10
11
.
»
-
C
“For what else ? ) with one of her siren looks.
“Because you are so — homely. ”
-
“Thanks,” she replied, her whole fair countenance illuminated
with vanity.
"I suppose there is not a homelier one than you in Sarrió, or
in the entire world. ”
Still, you must have seen some homelier than I in your
travels abroad? The Virgin save us! what a monster of ugliness
I must be. ” And she laughed with all her heart at the flattery
contained in his reversed hyperboles.
“We are not — comfortable here,” said the young man nerv-
ously. “Some one might enter, or — even Cecilia. And what
excuse could I give ? ”
«No matter what excuse: that is the least thing to consider.
But if you are uneasy, we can go back to the drawing-room. ”
“Yes, let us go.
“Wait here an instant: I will go and see how the land lies. ”
But then, stopping at the door with a new idea that just entered
her head, she turned back and said, "If you would promise to be
very proper and formal, I would take you to my room. ”
« Word of honor,” he promised eagerly.
“No attempted kissing, you know, or silly nonsense of any
kind. ”
« Not a bit. ”
“You swear it ? »
“I do. ”
« Then stay here a little, and come up after me on the tips of
your toes. Good-by for about two minutes. ”
He took her hand at this brief parting, and kissed it.
“There, you see, you break your promise even before we
begin," she complained, affecting displeasure.
“But I didn't think that hands counted. ”
"Everything counts,” she retorted severely, but her eyes still
smiled at him.
(
»
(
1
— а
[The young girl's room is described, - a marvel of daintiness, luxury, and
good taste, personal to herself. Gonzalo exclaims:-)
« Oh, how much better this is than Cecilia's room ! »
« You have seen hers ? »
## p. 15216 (#160) ##########################################
15216
ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
(
“Yes: a few days ago she showed it to me, with its bare
walls, poor pictures, bed without draperies, and most common-
place bureau. ”
"Be good enough to sit down: you have grown tall enough. ”
“You did wrong to let me come up here,” he said.
«Why? what do you mean? ” and she affected surprise, open-
ing and shutting her bright eyes many times in succession, so
that the effect was like that play of heat-lightning that is observed
in the warm evenings of summer.
“Because I feel that I am ill. ”
« “You are ill? truly ? ” And now she opened her blue eyes
widely; without, for all that, succeeding in giving them an inno-
cent look.
"Yes, that is-yes, a little. ”
“Do you want me to call assistance ? »
“That would do no good, as it is your eyes that are making
all the trouble. ”
Oh, then I will shut them up,” she said, laughing merrily,
«Don't shut them up, don't shut them up, I beg of you. If
you do, I shall be infinitely worse. ”
«I see it is best, in that case, that I should go away. ”
"And that would simply be to have my death at your door.
Do you know why I think I am taken so ill ? Because, I sup-
I
pose, I cannot kiss down the lovely eyelids above those eyes that
stab me through the heart. ”
“Oh, indeed ? how badly off you are! ” she rejoined, mocking
him with the gayest laughter. "Well, I am sorry I cannot cure
“
(
you. ”
»
“Then you will allow me to die ? »
“Certainly, if you wish to. ”
But you will first let me imprint a kiss upon your delightful
hair, at least?
No indeed. ”
Your hands, then? ”
2
“No, not my hands either. ”
"Nothing of your belongings ? Oh, see how you make me
suffer, what fatal harm you are doing me. ”
“Here is a glove you may kiss, if you want to,” and she
tossed him one of her own that lay upon the dressing-table.
He pressed it to his lips repeatedly, with glowing ardor.
((
»
## p. 15217 (#161) ##########################################
ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
15217
Disloyal, weak, a repellent character, as the critics like to say
of the personages in novels who are not monumentally heroic and
gifted with all the talents. But suppose the reader himself to be
placed in that position, face to face with the younger Señorita
Belinchon, receiving the meteor-like glances of her blue eyes,
and hearkening to a voice with both grave and honeyed inflections
that moved the very fibres of the soul, and suppose she should
toss him a glove of hers to kiss,- I should very much like to
hear in what severe terms he would decline the honor.
«Now let us speak seriously [said Venturita]; let us talk of
our situation. In spite of what you promised me three days
ago, I have not heard that you have yet spoken with mama or
papa, or even written to them. Quite the contrary, in fact: not
only you let the time pass, while every day makes things worse,
but you seem to show yourself even more devoted to Cecilia than
before. ”
Gonzalo denied this with a shake of the head.
« But I have seen you. If you do not love her, this conduct
towards her is very bad; and if you do love her, then your con-
duct towards me is infamous. ”
"Are you not yet sure that my heart is yours alone ? ” he
asked, his impassioned glance fixed upon her face.
«No. "
“Yes, yes, yes, it is; a thousand times yes. But I cannot be in
Cecilia's company and be harsh and indifferent with her. That
would be too dreadful. I would rather tell her what has hap-
pened and have done with it, once for all. ”
“Tell her, then. ”
«I dare not. ”
"Very well, don't tell her, then. You and I will break off all
that is between us. It will be better so, anyway,” said his fair
young companion tartly.
“For God's sake, Venturita, don't say that; don't talk that
way. You frighten me; you will make me think you don't
love me. You must understand that my position in all this is
strange, compromising, terrible. On the very point of marrying
a most estimable girl, without any fault on her part, without any
falling-out to serve a pretext, or any circumstance whatever
to forewarn her of such a thing, I am suddenly to say to her,
All is over between us, because I do not love you, and never
have loved you. ' Could any conduct be more brutal and odious ?
XXVI-952
1
11
(
(
as
## p. 15218 (#162) ##########################################
152 18
ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
And your parents, - how are they going to take my conduct ?
Most likely, after indignantly scoring me as I shall deserve, they
will order me out of their house, and never let me set foot in it
again. ”
"Very good, very good: then marry her, I say,- and I wish
you joy of her,” said Venturita, springing up very pale.
“Never! that will never be. I shall either marry you or
nobody else in all the wide world. ”
« Then what are we going to do ? ”
“Oh, I don't know, I don't know;” his head drooping in
abject sadness
A silence fell upon them for a moment, broken by Venturita,
who said, tapping lightly on his bowed head, “Rack your brains,
man; invent something. "
"I'm trying and trying, but nothing comes of it. "
"You are good for nothing. Come, you must go now. Leave
the thing to my charge. I will speak to mama. But you must
write a letter to Cecilia. ”
« Oh, for heaven's sake, Venturita! ” he protested in anguish
of soul.
« Then don't do it, and what is the next step on the pro-
gramme, tell: do you think I am going to serve as a plaything
for you? ”
" "If I could only dispense with writing such a letter,” he
responded, cringing with humility. “You cannot imagine what
violence it does to my whole nature. Would it not do, instead,
if I should cease coming to the house for some days? ”
“Yes, yes, it would. Off with you now, and don't come back,”
said the girl, herself moving towards the door to depart. But he
restrained her, by one of her braids of hair.
“Don't be offended with me, my beautiful one,” he entreated.
"Well you know that you have enchanted me, that you tread me
under the sole of your pretty foot. In the long run I shall do
whatever you want me to, even to jumping into the sea if you
desire it. I was only trying to spare Cecilia suffering. ”
“Conceited fellow! I'll wager now you think Cecilia will die
of love for you. ”
"If she gives herself no great concern, so much the better;
I shall thus escape enduring remorse. ”
Cecilia is cold; she neither loves nor hates with any warmth
of feeling. Her disposition is excellent; selfishness has no part
(
(
## p. 15219 (#163) ##########################################
ARMANDO PALACIO VALDÉS
15219
in it; you would find her always exactly the same,- that is,
neither gay
gay nor sad.
She is apathetic, incapable of being
wounded by any disappointment, - at least, if she is, she never
shows it. What are you doing there? ” she broke off, rapidly
whirling around to face him.
"I was trying to unbraid your hair. I wanted to see it loose,
as you let me see it once before. There is not a more beautiful
sight in the world. ”
“I don't know that I object, if it is your whim to see
it,” replied the maiden, — who was proud, and with reason, of her
wealth of shining hair.
“What loveliness! it is one of the wonders of the world. ”
He touched the flowing locks gently; weighed them in his hands
with delight; then, taken with a sudden enthusiasm, he cried, “I
must bathe in them; let me bathe in this river of molten gold. ”
(
>
»
[At this moment one of the sewing-girls, sent after some patterns, chanced
to enter the room. Gonzalo looked up, paler than wax; the servant colored
violently with confusion. Venturita alone kept her calmness. First managing
to make her finger bleed by an adroit blow against the wardrobe, she said
coolly:-)
1
“O Valentina, won't you do me the favor to tie up my hair.
I cannot do it myself, on account of having hurt my finger”
(showing it). "Don Gonzalo was just going to try, but he would
make very awkward work of it. ”
.
1
4
1
4
1
1
## p. 15220 (#164) ##########################################
15220
JUAN VALERA
(1827-)
BY WILLIAM HENRY BISHOP
JUAN VALERA was born in 1827, at Cabra, a village of the
Department of Cordova. He has identified himself greatly
with his delightful native district of Andalusia, in the scenes
of his novels; but personally he has led for the most part a life far
from rural scenes,- - a life of great capitals, long residence in for-
eign lands, active political as well as literary movements, and high
honors and emoluments. It is a kind of life calculated to sharpen
the natural intelligence, and confer ease and distinction of manners.
His friend and admirer, Cánovas del Castillo, the late premier of
Spain, accordingly said of him, as bearing upon the accuracy of his
descriptions of social matters: “Mas hombre de mundo que Valera no
le hay en España” (More man of the world than Valera there is not
one in Spain). His father was a rear admiral, his mother the noble
Marchioness Paniega. He was educated at two religious schools,-
one at Malaga, the other on the Sacro Monte at Grenada, the same
quarter that still contains the gipsies in their rock-cut dwellings. He
very early entered upon the career of diplomacy. He was secretary of
legation successively at Naples, Lisbon, Rio de Janeiro, Dresden, and
St. Petersburg; and later has been Spanish minister to the United
States and some other countries. He has also been at various times
deputy to the Cortes, high official in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, Director of Public Instruction,
and is now a life senator and a member of the Council of State.
He was one of the eight eminent Spaniards commissioned by the
nation to go and offer the crown to Prince Amadeo of Italy, after
the overthrow of Isabel II. in 1868. As a political writer, he collab-
orated with the group of talented men, under José Luis de Alba-
reda, who conducted El Contemporáneo (The Contemporary), a liberal
review which overturned the ministry of Marshal O'Donnell. The
same Albareda, later, founded La Revista de España (The Spanish
Review), in which a good deal of Valera's work has appeared.
Valera has been also a professor of foreign literatures, and he is
a member of the Spanish Academy. He has attempted many varie-
ties of literary work, and been eminent in all. It might fairly be as-
sumed from his smooth, harmonious, polished style, that he had written
1
1
## p. 15221 (#165) ##########################################
JUAN VALERA
15221
11
1
>
)
18
H1
.
verses; and such is the case. Of his collected Poems) (1856), "El
Fuego Divino' (The Fire Divine) is esteemed as among the best;
a composition of thoroughly modern touch, yet in the vein of the
mystical Fray Luis de Leon of the sixteenth century. His poetry
comprises many paraphrases or translations from the Portuguese, the
German, and the English,— excellent renderings of Whittier, Lowell,
and W. W. Story, being found among the last. He is above all
things a scholar and a critical essayist; a considerable number of his
published volumes consist of collected essays or discourses before the
Spanish Academy, covering such subjects as “The Women Writers of
Spain,' (St. Teresa,' and the like, — not the moderns; (Studies of the
Middle Ages? ; Liberty in Art'; and The New Art of Writing Novels,'
- largely a discussion of French Naturalism. Cartas Americanas)
(American Letters) is a small volume, with a kindly touch, devoted
to an inquiry into the merits of the current literature of the Spanish
Americas.
All that he does is characterized by scholarship and a rich culture.
He himself confesses that he wrote his first novel, Pepita Ximenez,'
1874, without knowing that it was a novel. In fiction, his achieve-
ment is summed up in the having produced this one really great
book, universally adinired, Pepita Ximenez,' and a number of others
of far inferior merit. He holds that the object of a novel should be
the faithful representation of human actions and passions, and the
creation, through such fidelity to nature, of a beautiful work; and he
considers it a debasement of a work of art to attempt, for instance,
to prove theses by it, or to reduce it to any strictly utilitarian end.
Pepita' is a novel of character, not of action. It has been com-
plained that there is almost as great a lack of adventure in some of
our modern fiction as there was a superabundance of it in the older
sort; but no intelligent mind can fail to be carried along with the
development of this most impressive and charming moral drama,
slow, contemplative, and philosophic though the stages be by which
it seems to move. How thoroughly, how exhaustively, are the situa-
tion and the problems of character worked out! This completeness
and steadiness of attention are a very modern trait in fiction, as con-
trasted with the old picaresque stories, otherwise equally natural,
upon which it is based. In that day, the scene, the personages, had
to be continually changed, as for an audience that could not keep
its mind fixed upon anything more than a few minutes at a time.
In Gil Blas,' the robber cavern alone was material enough for a
full volume; yet there it was but an episode, quickly giving place to
an interminable succession of others.
In 'Pepita Ximenez,' Valera is fortunate enough to have an almost
elemental passion to treat,-a subject like some of those of Shake-
speare: the moral crisis of a young ecclesiastic, torn between earthly
1
#
## p. 15222 (#166) ##########################################
15222
JUAN VALERA
(
and heavenly love. Don Luis, the son of a worldly father, comes
home to the family estate in Andalusia for a short vacation, prepar-
atory to taking orders. A handsome, well-built young man, he has
been devoutly reared by his uncle, the dean of a cathedral in a dis-
tant town; and his head is full of the sincerest dreams of religious
self-sacrifice, of exile, and even perchance martyrdom, in the Orient.
His father wishes him, rather, to marry and inherit his wealth. It is
not quite clear just what part of the final result is due to the affec-
tionate machinations of those nearest him in his family, and what
to unaided nature and the delightful fascinations of Pepita. She is
a very young widow, of but eighteen, the widow of a rich old man
who had been very kind to her. It is springtime in flowery Anda-
lusia; and Pepita's discretion and reserve of character, her high-bred
charm, her beauty, soon take hold upon Don Luis. The story is told
chiefly in his letters to the dean. « The worst of it is,” he writes,
«that with the life I am leading I fear I may become too worldly
minded. ” Soon it is : «He that loves the danger shall perish in it;)
and finally an agony of appeal: “Oh, save me! Oh, take me away
from here, or I am forever lost. ” What was Pepita's part in it ?
Was she in some sense the ally of his father, — who gave out that he
wanted to marry her himself,— or did she love the handsome young
theological student from the first? She loves him madly at last; and
it is due to her own quite desperate persistence in the end that he is
lost to the Church, and gained to secular life.
The author has not the gift of facile conversation: his characters
rather dissertate to one another than talk. They incline to discuss
at great length abstract questions of morals, theology, or taste; the
pretty women only refrain from this at the cost of not talking at all.
Even at the supreme moment of their probable parting forever, Luis
and Pepita speak set orations. Still these orations are full of thought
and have an innate interest.
In "Doña Luz' (1878) we have again the same beautiful, high-bred
kind of a woman as Pepita. She is like a sun at its zenith. As
she passes in the street, the bystanders murmur with the exaggerated
Andalusian gallantry, «There goes the living glory itself. ” And
again there is an interesting young priest; but all passes platonically.
Doña Luz marries a brilliant man of the world, but he has sought
her only for her fortune; she lives apart from him, and finds solace
in her child.
(Las Ilusiones del Doctor Faustino' (The Illusions of Doctor
Faustus: 1876) is the most ambitious of Valera's novels, but not cor-
respondingly successful. It is a reminiscence of Faust; undertaking to
show in the career of the poor and haughty young patrician, Mendoza,
the many changes of purpose, belief, and fortune, the philosophic
doubts and baffled aspirations, that may attend the life of man on
u
>>
## p. 15223 (#167) ##########################################
JUAN VALERA
15223
earth. His own mother asks, "Para que sirve ? » (Of what use is he? )
An apparition who calls herself his "Immortal Friend” fits across
his career from time to time; he falls among bandits; he has many
love affairs in which he does not appear to advantage; and he finally
commits suicide. Pasarse de Listo' (Overshot the Mark), 1878, is
an account of Inesita and the young Count de Alhedin, who, with
excessive circumspection, manage to involve in the appearance of
the flirtation they two are really carrying on, Beatriz the married
sister of the young girl; with the tragic result that the husband of
Beatriz is led to jump off the Segovia Street Viaduct at Madrid, and
kill himself. This book has been translated by Clara Bell, under the
title of Don Braulio. '
(El Commendador Mendoza' (Commander Mendoza), 1877, is a
story of the last century, though nothing archaic in its form would
distinguish the time from the present day. The Commander, come
back with a fortune from Peru to his native village, finds there an
old flame of his from Lima, Doña Blanca; and her daughter Clara,
who is also his daughter. Doña Blanca, rigidly repentant and devout,
desires that Clara should enter a convent, that she may not by mar-
rying divert the wealth of her putative father into an illegitimate
channel. The Commander performs prodigies of ingenuity and gen-
erosity to save the amiable Clara; and by stripping himself entirely
of his property, gets her happily married to the man of her choice,
without the public ever being cognizant of their secret.
He is re-
warded by securing for himself the hand of Lucia, a charming young
friend of his daughter's. She is represented as much preferring an
elderly to a youthful lover; and such a lover is celebrated in a poem
in which it is said that “The spirit burns undimmed beneath the snow
with which the persistent labor of the mind has crowned his brow. ”
Other books are Currita Albornoz,' 1890; La Buena Fama' (Good
Name), 1894; El Hechicero' (The Sorcerer), 1895; and Juanita la
Larga' (Tall Juanita), 1895. Tall Juanita, the latest, is the history
('
of the true affection which a man of fifty-three succeeds in inspir-
ing in a young peasant girl of seventeen. A scapegrace character in
it goes to Cuba.
It is represented that he proposes to take part in
filibustering schemes, then become an American citizen, get a large
claim for damages allowed against Spain, give four fifths to the legis-
lators who have assisted him, and with the other fifth live in luxury
on Fifth Avenue, New York. This is very far indeed from the idyl-
lic charm of 'Pepita Ximenez. '
William Henry Bishop
## p. 15224 (#168) ##########################################
152 24
JUAN VALERA
The following translations are from the original Spanish, by William
Henry Bishop, for (A Library of the World's Best Literature. )
YOUTH AND CRABBED AGE
From Pepita Ximenez)
W"
HEN Don Gumersindo was close upon his eightieth year,
Pepita Ximenez was only about to complete her six-
teenth. He was rich and influential in the community,
she was without means or the support of powerful friends.
Indeed, from the ethical point of view, this marriage is open
to question. Still, so far as the young girl is concerned, if we
recollect the entreaties, the querulous complaints, nay, even the
positive commands, of her mother; if we take into account that
she designed by this step to secure for her mother a comfort-
able old age, and to save her brother from disgrace and even
infamy, acting in this affair as his guardian angel and earthly
providence, - then it must be confessed that there is room for an
abatement of the censure - if censure be the feeling aroused in the
spectator's mind. Furthermore, who is to penetrate into the inti-
mate recesses, the hidden depths of heart and mind, of a tender
maiden, brought up most likely in extreme seclusion, and wholly
ignorant of the world ? who is to know what ideas she may have
formed to herself of matrimony? Perchance — who knows? -
have thought that to marry that venerable man
merely to devote her life to taking care of him; to be his nurse;
to sweeten with her presence his last days; to rescue him from
solitude and abandonment, where in his infirmities he would have
had no aid but from mercenary hands: in a word, like an angel
that takes on human form, to cheer and illumine his decline
of life with the winsome and mellow glow emanating from her
youth and beauty. If the girl thought somewhat of this or all
of this, and in the innocence of her heart never dreamed of
going on into any further aspects of the case, then indeed is
her act not only free from blame, but must claim admiration as
showing the warm benevolence of her nature.
However this may be, and now putting aside this line of
psychological examination, - which I really have no right to
attempt, since I possess no personal acquaintance with Pepita
Ximenez, — what remains certain is, that she lived in an edify-
ing state of harmony with the old man for three years; that
her venerable partner appeared happier than he had ever been in
she may
was
## p. 15225 (#169) ##########################################
JUAN VALERA
15225
all his days; that she nursed him and entertained him with an
admirable conscientiousness; and that in his last painful illness she
waited upon him and watched over him with the tenderest and
most unwearied affection,- till at length he died in her arms,
and left her heiress to a large fortune.
10
PEPITA'S APPEARANCE AT THE GARDEN PARTY
From Pepita Ximenez)
EPITA XIMENEZ, who, through my father, had heard of the
,
.
invited us to visit one that she owns at a short distance
from the village, and to eat the early strawberries that grow
there. This liking of Pepita's to show herself so gracious to
my father, who is a suitor for her hand, while at the same time
in that capacity she will have none of him, often seems to me to
savor not a little of a coquetry worthy of reprobation. But when
on the next occasion I see her so natural, so perfectly frank and
simple, the injurious fancy passes; and I feel that she must do
everything with the most limpid purity of mind, and that she
has no other purpose than to preserve the friendly feeling that
unites our family to hers.
Be that as it will, the day before yesterday we paid the visit
to Pepita's garden.
By quite a sybaritic piece of refine-
ment, it was not the gardener, nor was it his wife, nor his son,
nor indeed any other person of the rustic sort, who waited upon
us at the luncheon; it was two pretty girls, confidential servants
as it were of Pepita, dressed in the usual peasant costume, yet
with consummate neatness and elegance. Their gowns were of
a bright-colored cotton stuff, short in the skirt, and trimly fitted
to their figures; they wore silk handkerchiefs crossed over their
shoulders, and in the abundant black tresses of each one
showed a fresh sprig of roses.
Pepita's gown, except that it was of rich quality, was equally
unpretentious. It was of black wool, and cut in the same form
as those of the maids; without being too short, its wearer had
taken care that it should not trail, nor in slouchy fashion sweep
up the dust of the ground. A modest silk handkerchief, black
also, covered her shoulders and bosom after the fashion of the
country; and on her head she wore neither ribbon, flower, nor
## p. 15226 (#170) ##########################################
15226
JUAN VALERA
gem, nor any other adornment than that of her own beautiful
blonde hair. The only detail in Pepita's appearance in which I
noticed that she departed from the custom of the country peo-
ple, and showed a certain fastidiousness, was her concern to wear
gloves. It is apparent that she takes great care of her hands,
and prides herself with some little vanity on keeping them white
and pretty, and the nails polished and of roseate hue. But if
she has so much of vanity, it is to be pardoned to human weak-
ness: and indeed, if I recollect aright, even St. Theresa in her
youth had it also; which did not hinder her from becoming the
very great saint she was.
In fact I quite understand, though I do not undertake to
defend, that particular bit of vanity. It is so distinguished, so
high-bred, to have a comely hand; I even frequently think it has
something symbolical about it. The hand is the minister of our
actions; the sign of our innate gentility; the medium through
which the intelligence vests with form the inventions of its art-
istic sense, gives being to the creations of its will, and exercises
the sovereignty that God conceded to over all created
things.
A NOONDAY APPARITION IN THE GLEN
From Pepita Ximenez)
M
Y FATHER, wishing to pay off to Pepita the compliment of
her garden party, invited her in her turn to make a visit
to our country-house of the Pozo de la Solana.
We had to go in the saddle. As I have never learned to ride
horseback, I mounted, as on all the former excursions with my
father, a mule which Dientes, our mule-driver, pronounced twice
as good as gold, and as steady as a hay-wagon.
Now
Pepita Ximenez, whom I supposed I should see in side-saddle on
an animal of the donkey species also, - what must she do but
astonish me by appearing on a fine horse of piebald marking,
and full of life and fire. It did not take me long to see the
sorry figure I should cut, jogging along in the rear with fat Aunt
Casilda and the vicar, and to be mortified by it. When we reached
the villa and dismounted, I felt relieved of as great a load as if it
was I that had carried the mule, and not the mule that had car-
ried me.
## p. 15227 (#171) ##########################################
JUAN VALERA
15227
1
1
3
Bordering the course of the brook, and especially in the
ravines, are numerous poplars with other well-grown trees, which
in conjunction with the shrubbery and taller herbs, form dusky
and labyrinthine thickets. A thousand fragrant sylvan growths
spring up spontaneously there; and in truth it is difficult to im-
agine anything wilder, more secluded, more completely solitary,
peaceful, and silent, than that spot. In the blaze of noonday,
when the sun is pouring down his light in floods from a sky
without cloud, and in the calm warm hours of the afternoon
siesta, almost the same mysterious terrors steal upon the mind
as in the still watches of the night. One comprehends there the
way of life of the ancient patriarchs, and of the heroes and shep-
herds of primitive tradition, with all the apparitions and visions
they were wont to have, - now of nymphs, now of gods, and now
of angels, in the midst of the brightness of day.
In the passage through those dusky thickets, it came about
at a given moment, I know not how, that Pepita and I found
I
ourselves side by side and alone. All the others had remained
behind.
I felt a sudden thrill run over all my body. It was the
very first time I had ever been alone with that woman; the place
was extremely solitary, and I had been thinking but now of the
apparitions — sometimes sinister, sometimes winsome, but always
supernatural — that used to walk at noonday in the sight of the
men of an earlier time.
Pepita had put off at the house her long riding-skirt, and now
wore a short one that did not hamper the graceful lightness of
her natural movements. On her head she had set a charmingly
becoming little Andalusian shade-hat. She carried in her hand
her riding-whip; and somehow my fancy struck out the whimsical
conceit that this was one of those fairy wands with which the
sorceress could bewitch me at will, if she pleased.
I do not shrink from setting down on this paper deserved
eulogies of her beauty. In that wild woodland scene, it seemed
to me even fairer than ever. The plan that the old ascetic saints
recommended to us as a safeguard, - namely, to think upon the
beloved one as all disfigured by age and sickness, to picture
her as dead, lapsing away in corruption, and a prey to worms,
- that picture came before my imagination in spite of my will.
I say "in spite of my will,” because I do not believe that any
such terrible precaution is necessary. No evil thought as to the
1
-
1
1
## p. 15228 (#172) ##########################################
15228
JUAN VALERA
material body, no untoward suggestion of a malign spirit, at that
time disturbed my reason nor made itself felt by my senses or
my will.
What did occur to me was a line of reasoning, convincing at
least in my own mind, that quite obviated the necessity of such a
step of precaution. Beauty, the product of a divine and supreme
art, may be indeed but a weak and fleeting thing, disappearing
perchance in a twinkling: still the idea and essence of that
:
beauty are eternal; once apprehended by the mind of man, it
must live an immortal life. The loveliness of that woman, such
as it has shown itself to me to-day, will vanish, it is true, within
a few brief years; that wholly charming body, the flowing lines
and contours of that exquisite form, that noble head so proudly
poised above the slender neck and shoulders,- all, all will be but
food for loathsome worms; but though the earthly form of matter
is to change, how as to the mental conception of that frame, the
artistic ideal, the essential beauty itself? Who is to destroy all
that ? Does it not remain in the depths of the Divine Mind?
Once perceived and known by me, must it not live forever in
my soul, victorious over age and even over death ?
>
THE EVENINGS AT PEPITA'S TERTULIA
From Pepita Ximenez)
A
s I have mentioned to you before, Pepita receives her friends
every evening at her house, from nine o'clock till twelve.
Thither repair four or five matrons, and as many young
girls of the village, counting in Aunt Casilda with the number;
and then six or seven young men who play forfeits with the
girls. Three or four engagements are already on the carpet from
this association, which is natural enough. The graver portion of
.
the social assembly [tertulia), pretty much always the same, is
composed of the exalted dignitaries of the place, so to speak; that
is, my father who is the squire, with the apothecary, the doctor,
the notary, and his Reverence the vicar.
I am never quite certain in which section of the company I
ought to place myself. If it is with the young people, I fear my
seriousness is a damper on their sports and their flirtation; if
with the older set, then I am constrained to play the part of a
## p. 15229 (#173) ##########################################
1
*
1
JUAN VALERA
15229
(
'M
to
1
mere looker-on in things I do not understand.
The only games
I know how to play are the simple ones of "blind donkey,”
(wide-awake donkey,” and a little tute or brisca cruzada.
The best thing for me would be not to go to the tertulia at
all. My father, however, insists that I shall go; not to do so,
according to him, would be to make myself ridiculous.
My father breaks out in many expressions of wonderment at
noticing my complete ignorance of certain things; such as that I
cannot play ombre, - not even ombre. This strikes him simply
with bewilderment.
«Your uncle has brought you up in the gleam of a twopenny
rushlight,” he exclaims. « He has stuffed you with theology,
and then more theology still, and left you wholly in the dark
about everything that it is really important to know. From the
very fact that you are to be a priest, and consequently cannot
dance nor make love when you go out in society, you ought to
know how to play ombre. If not, what are you going to do
with yourself, you young wretch ? just tell us that. ”
To this and other shrewd discourse of the sort I have finally
had to give in; and my father is teaching me ombre at home,
so that as soon as I know it I can play it at Pepita's receptions.
He has been anxious furthermore to teach me fencing, and after
that to smoke, and to shoot, and to throw the bar; but I have
not consented to any of these latter propositions.
«What a difference between my youthful years and yours! ”
my father likes to exclaim.
And then he will add, laughingly:-
“However, it's all essentially the same thing. I too had my
canonical hours, but they were in the Life Guards barracks: a
good cigar was our incense, a pack of cards was our hymn-book;
nor was there ever lacking to us a good supply of other devo-
tional exercises all just as spiritual as those. ”
Although you, my good uncle, had forewarned me of this
levity of character in my father, - and indeed it is precisely on
account of it that I passed twelve years of my life with you,
from the age of ten to that of twenty-two,— still my father's
way of talking, sometimes free beyond all bounds, often alarms
and mortifies me. But what can I do about it? At any rate,
though it is not becoming in me to censure it, I shall never
show approval nor laugh at it.
## p. 15230 (#174) ##########################################
15230
JUAN VALERA
PEPITA'S EYES
From Pepita Ximenez)
A
s I must have told you in former letters, Pepita's eyes, though
green like those of Circe, have a most tranquil and exem-
plary expression. One would decide that she was not con-
scious of the power of her eyes at all, nor ever knew that they
could serve for any other purpose than simply that of seeing with.
When her gaze falls upon you, its soft light is so clear, so can-
did and pure, that so far from fomenting any wicked thought,
it appears as if it favored only those of the most limpid kind.
It leaves chaste and innocent souls in unruffled repose, and it
destroys all incentive to ill in those that are not so. Nothing of
ardent passion, nothing of unhallowed fire, is there in the eyes
of Pepita. Like the calm mild radiance of the moon, rather, is
the sweet illumination of her glance.
Well, then, I have to tell you now, in spite of all the above,
that two or three times I have fancied I caught an instantane-
ous gleam of splendor, a lightning-like flash, a devastating leap of
flame, in those fine eyes when they rested upon mine. Is this
only some ridiculous bit of vanity, suggested by the arch-fiend
himself? I think it must be. I wish to believe that it is, and I
will believe that it is.
No, it was not a dream, it was not the figment of a mad im-
agination, it was but the sober truth. She does suffer her eyes
to look into mine with the burning glance of which I have told
you.
Her eyes are endowed with a magnetic attraction impos-
sible to explain. They draw me on, they undo me, and I can-
not withhold my own from them. At those times my eyes must
blaze with a baleful flame like hers. Thus did those of Amnon
when he contemplated Tamar; thus did those of the Prince of
Schechem when he looked upon Dinah.
When our glances meet in that way I forget even my God.
Her image instead rises up in my soul, victorious over every-
thing Her beauty shines resplendent beyond all other beauty;
the joys of heaven seem to me of less worth than her affection,
and an eternity of suffering but a trifling cost for the incalcu-
lable bliss infused into my being by a single one of those glances
of hers, though they pass quick as the lightning's flash.
When I return to my dwelling, when I am alone in my cham-
ber, in the silence of the night, - then, oh then, all the horror of
## p. 15231 (#175) ##########################################
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15231
my situation comes upon me, and I form the best of resolutions
but only to break them again forthwith.
I promise myself to invent a pretext of sickness, or to seek
some other subterfuge, no matter what, in order not to go to
Pepita's house on the succeeding night; and yet I go, just as if
no such resolution had been taken.
Not alone to my sight is she so delectable, so grateful, but
her voice also sounds in my ears like the celestial music of the
spheres, revealing to me all the harmonies of the universe. I
even go to the point of imagining that there emanates from her
form a subtile aroma of delicious fragrance, more delicate than
that of mint by the brook-sides, or than wild thyme on the
nountain slopes.
THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN THE INTERESTS OF HEAVEN
AND EARTH
From ( Pepita Ximenez)
DON
on Luis was of a stubbornly persistent, obstinate nature; he
had what, when well directed, makes that desirable quality
called firmness of character. Nothing abased him so much
in his own eyes as to be inconsistent in his opinions or his
conduct. The plan and aim of Don Luis's whole life, the plan
which he had declared and defended before all those whom he
associated with, --- his moral ideal of himself, in fact, which was
that of an aspirant to holiness, a man consecrated to God and
imbued with the sublimest philosophy of religion,- all that could
not fall to the ground without causing him great distress of mind;
as fall it would if he let himself be carried away by his love
for Pepita. Although the price to be received was an incompara-
bly higher one, he felt that he was going to imitate the improv-
ident Esau of Holy Writ, and sell his birthright for a mess of
pottage.
We men in general are wont to be but the poor plaything
of circumstances; we suffer ourselves to be borne along by the
current, and do not direct ourselves unswerving to a single aim.
We do not choose our own destiny, but accept and carry on that
which blind fortune assigns to us. With many men the kind of
occupation they follow, the political party they belong to - pretty
?
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JUAN VALERA
much all the circumstances of their lives, turn upon hazards and
fortuitous events; it is not plan but the whims and caprices of
fortune that settle it.
The pride of Don Luis rebelled against such an order of
things with an energy that was disposed to be titanic. What
would be said of him above all, what must he think of himself
- if his life's ideal, if the new man whom he had created within
his being, if all his praiseworthy reachings out towards virtue,
honor, and holy ambition, were to vanish in an instant, consumed
by the warmth of a look, a passing glance from a dark eye, as
the frost liquefies in the yet feeble rays of the morning sun ?
These and yet other reasons of a like egotistical sort, in
addition to considerations of real merit and weight, contended
against the attractions of the young widow. But all his reason-
ing alike put on the garb of religion; so that Don Luis himself,
not able to distinguish and discriminate clearly between them,
would mistake for the love of God not only that which was really
love of God, but also his own self-love. He recalled, for instance,
the lives of many of the saints who had resisted yet greater
temptations than his own; and he would not reconcile himself
to be less heroic than they. He remembered especially that nota-
ble case of firmness shown by St. John Chrysostom; who was able
to remain unmoved under all the blandishments of a good and
loving mother, deaf to her sobs, her most affectionate entreaties,
all the eloquent and feeling pleas that she made to him not to
abandon her and become a priest. She led him, for this inter-
view, even to her own room, and made him seat himself beside
the bed in which she had brought him into the world; but all in
vain. After having reflected upon this, Don Luis could not en-
dure in himself the weakness of failing to scorn the entreaties of
a stranger woman, of whose very existence he had been ignorant
but a short time before, and of wavering still between his duty
and the allurements of that charming person; whose feeling, fur-
thermore, for all he knew, was but coquetry, instead of real love
for him.
Next, Don Luis reflected on the august dignity of the sacer-
dotal office to which he was called; in his thoughts he set it high
above all the other institutions, above all the poor thrones and
principalities of the earth; and this because it was never founded
by mortal man, nor caprice of the noisy and servile crowd, nor
through any invasion nor inheritance of power by barbarous
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15233
rulers, nor by the violence of mutinous troops led on by greed;
nor had it been founded by any angel, archangel, or any cre-
ated power whatever, but by the eternal Paraclete himself. How!
was he indeed yielding to the charm of a giddy girl,—to a tear
or two, perhaps feigned at that, -- was he for such a motive to
belittle and put aside that greatest of dignities, that sacred au-
thority which God did not concede even to the very archangels
nearest his throne ? Could he ever be content to descend to
the common herd, to be lost among them? Could he be merely
one of the flock when he had aspired to be its shepherd, tying
or untying on earth what God should tie or untie in heaven,
pardoning sins, regenerating souls by water and the Spirit, teach-
ing them in the name of an infallible authority, and pronouncing
judgments which the Lord would then ratify and confirm in high-
est heaven ?
When Don Luis reflected upon all this, his soul flew aloft
and soared high above all the clouds into the farthest empyrean;
and poor Pepita Ximenez was left behind there, far below, scarce
visible, as one might say, to the naked eye.
Soon however would his winged imagination cease its flight,
his spirit return to earth. Then once more he would see Pepita,
so gracious, so youthful, so ingenuous, so loving; and Pepita com-
bated within his heart his most inflexible determinations. Don
Luis dreaded, with but too much reason, that in the end she
would scatter them all to the winds.
HOW YOUNG DON FADRIQUE WAS PERSUADED TO DANCE
From Commander Mendoza)
WHEN
THEN a child, Don Fadrique used to dance the bolero very
creditably. Don Diego - for such was his father's name -
had pleasure in seeing the boy exhibit his grace and skill
whenever he took him about to pay visits with him, or when he
received visitors at his own house.
On a certain occasion Don Diego, with his son Don Fadrique,
went to the little city,- I have never been willing to give any
name to it,- distant about two leagues from Villabermejo, in
which little city the scene of my novel 'Pepita Ximenez' is
laid.
XXVI–953
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At that time Don Fadrique was thirteen years old, but un.
usually tall for his age. As visits of ceremony were to be
made, he had put on a crimson damask coat and waistcoat, with
burnished steel buttons, together with white-silk stockings and
buckled shoes, a costume in which he was like the midday sun,
for the fine and becoming effect of it.
Don Fadrique's well-worn traveling-suit, much spotted and
patched, was left behind at the inn, as were their horses as well.
