La Gaviota

At this moment a noise was heard; it was the commandant pursuing at a quick pace the thief Morrongo, who had deceived the vigilance of his master and ran off with the stock fish.

“My commandant,” cried out Manuel to him, laughing, “the sardine which the cat carries will not come to the dish except late or never, but I have here a partridge in exchange.”

Don Modesto seized the partridge, thanked him, took leave of the company, and went away, inveighing against cats.

During all this scene, Dolores had given the breast to her nursing infant; she tried to hush him to sleep, cradling him in her arms and singing to him:

“There high on Calvary, in their fresh retreats,
Woods of olives, wood of perfume meets;
A nightingale – four larks – whose breath,
Would warble forth a Saviour’s death.”

For those who suppress the circulation of poetry of the people, as the child crushes with its hand the feeblest butterfly, it would be difficult to say why larks and nightingales warble the death of Christ; why the swallow plucked out the thorns of his crown; why the rosemary is an object of veneration, in the belief that the Virgin dried the swaddling-clothes of the infant Jesus on a bush of this plant? Why, or rather how do they know that the willow is a tree of bad augury, since Judas hung himself on a branch of this tree? Why does no misfortune ever happen in a house if it has been perfumed with rosemary during Christmas eve? Why in the flower which is called the passion-flower are found all the instruments of the passion of Christ? In truth, there are no answers to these questions. The people do not possess them, nor demand them. These beliefs have accumulated like the vague sounds of distant music, without research into their origin, without analyzing their authenticity.

“But, Don Frederico,” said Maria, while Stein was occupied with reflections on the proceedings, “you have not told us how you find our village.”

“I have seen nothing,” replied Stein, “save only the chapel of our Lord of Good-Help.”

“Miraculous chapel, Don Frederico. Hold,” pursued the old woman, after some instants of silence, “the only motive why I am not as much pleased here as in the village is, that I cannot follow out my devotions. Yes, Manuel, thy father, who had not been a soldier, thought like me. My poor husband! – he is in heaven – my poor husband was brother of Rosaire of the dawn; Rosaire who went out after midnight to pray for souls. Fatigued with a long day’s work he slept profoundly; and precisely at midnight a brother rang a bell, came to the door, and chanted:

‘Here is then the faithful bell!
It is not she the warnings tell;
Of thy parents ’tis the voice!
The cross’s foot then make thy choice;
Raise thee, my son, so full of zeal,
And prayerful in the chapel kneel.
On thy knees in the holy place,
For parents supplicate God’s grace.’

When thy father heard this chant, he felt no longer fatigue nor need of sleep. In the twinkling of an eye he got up and followed the other brother. It seems to me I yet hear him singing in the distance:

‘The Virgin raised the Sovereign crown,
And meekly laid the sceptre down;
Presenting them to Christ was seen,
Exclaiming – I no more am Queen.
If not held back thy wrath from o’er the human race,
Then is thy crown divine with too just rigor placed.’

Jesus answered her:

‘My mother!
Without thy grace so pure, and thy sweet hallowed prayer,
The thunderbolt had hurled the sinner to despair.’ ”

The children, who love so much to imitate what they see as at all great or remarkable, undertook to sing in a beautiful tone the couplets of the aurora:

“Hark! how the trumpet’s shrill-blast clarion sounds!
The voice of the Angel through Heaven resounds:
Jerusalem! within thy walls,
An infant’s foot triumphant falls;
What was the people’s homage in that hour?
What grand equipments decked the kingly bower?
The all-powerful whom Heaven had sent,
Rode on an ass which men had lent.”

“Don Frederico,” said Maria, after a moment’s silence, “in the world which God has made, is it true that there have been men without faith?”

Stein was mute.

“Can you not cure the blindness of their intelligence, as you have cured the eyes of Momo?” replied, with sadness, the good old woman, who remained altogether pensive.

CHAPTER VII

THE following day Maria set off for the house of the invalid, in company with Stein and Momo, foot-equerry to his grandmother, who travelled mounted on the philosophic Golondrina. The animal, always good, gentle, and docile, trotted on the road, the head lowered, ears depressed, without making a single rough movement, except when he encountered a thistle in proximity with his nostrils.

When they were arrived, Stein was astonished to find, in the middle of this arid country, of a nature so dry and so sterile, a village so leafy and so coquettish.

The sea had formed, between two great rocks, a little circular creek, and surrounded by a coast of the finest sand, which appeared like a plateau of crystal placed on a table of gold. Several rocks showed themselves timidly, as if they wished to repose themselves, and be seated on the tranquil shore. At one of them was made fast a fisherman’s bark; balancing herself at the will of the waves, she seemed as impatient as a horse reined in.

On one side of the rocks was elevated the fort of San Cristobal, crowned by the peaks of wild figs, like the head of an old Druid adorned with green oak-leaves.

The fisherman had constructed his cabin with the wrecked remains of his vessel, which the sea had thrown on the coast; he had based all against the rocks, which formed, in some sort, three stories of the habitation. The roof was horizontal, and covered with aquatica, the first layer of which, rotted by the rains, had given growth to a great quantity of herbs and of flowers; so that in the autumn, when the dryness disappeared with the heat of summer, the cabin appeared covered as with a delicious garden.

When the persons just arrived entered the cabin, they found the fisherman sad and cast down, seated near the fire, opposite to his daughter; who, her hair in disorder, and falling down on both sides of her pale face, bent up and shivering, her emaciated limbs enveloped in a rag of brown flannel. She seemed to be not more than thirteen years of age. The invalid turned, with an expression of but little kindliness, her large, black, and sullen eyes upon the persons who entered, and instantly sank down anew in the corner of the chimney.

“Pedro,” said Maria, “you forget your friends, but they do not forget you. Will you tell me why the good God has given you a mouth? Could you not have let me known of the illness of the little girl? If you had let me known of it sooner, I had sooner come with this gentleman, who is such a doctor as is seldom seen, and who in no time will cure your daughter.”

Pedro Santalo rose brusquely, and advanced to Stein; he would speak to him, but he was so overcome with emotion that he could not articulate a single word, and he covered his face with his hands. He was a man already advanced in life, his aspect sufficiently rude, and his form colossal. His countenance, bronzed by the sun, was crowned by a gray head of hair, thick and uncombed; his breast, red as that of an Ohio Indian, was also covered with hair.

“Come, Pedro!” said Maria, from whose eyes the tears began to flow at the sight of the poor father’s despair; “a man like you, big as a church, a man they believe ready to devour infants uncooked, to be discouraged thus without reason! Come! I see here nothing but what appears solid.”

“Good mother Maria,” replied the fisherman, in a feeble voice, “I count, with this one, five children in their tombs.”

“My God! and why thus lose courage? Remember the saint whose name you bear, and who threw himself into the sea when he had lost the faith which sustained him. I tell you that, with the grace of God, Don Frederico will cure the child in as little time as you could call on Jesus.”

Pedro sadly shook his head.

“How obstinate are these Catalans!” said Maria, with a little anger; and passing before the fisherman, she approached the invalid: “Come, Marisalada, come; rise up, daughter, that this gentleman may examine you.”

Marisalada did not stir.

“Come, my daughter,” repeated the good woman; “you will see that he will cure you as by enchantment.” At these words, she took the girl by the arm, and wished to raise her up.

“I have no desire,” said the invalid, rudely disengaging herself from the hand which held her.

“The daughter is as sweet as the father; ‘he who inherits steals not,’ ” murmured Momo, who appeared at the door.

“It is her illness that renders her impatient,” added the father, to exculpate his child.