Carmen

9

The costume usually worn by peasant women in Navarre and the Basque Provinces.

10

Pintar un javeque, “paint a xebec,” a particular type of ship. Most Spanish vessels of this description have a checkered red and white stripe painted around them.

11

Yes, sir.

12

Field, garden.

13

Bravos, boasters.

14

All Spanish cavalry soldiers carry lances.

15

Alcala de los Panaderos, a village two leagues from Seville, where the most delicious rolls are made. They are said to owe their quality to the water of the place, and great quantities of them are brought to Seville every day.

16

Good-day, comrade!

17

In most of the houses in Seville there is an inner court surrounded by an arched portico. This is used as a sittingroom in summer. Over the court is stretched a piece of tent cloth, which is watered during the day and removed at night. The street door is almost always left open, and the passage leading to the court (zaguan) is closed by an iron lattice of very elegant workmanship.

18

Manana sera otro dia.—A Spanish proverb.

19

Chuquel sos pirela, cocal terela. “The dog that runs finds a bone.”—Gipsy proverb.

20

Sugared yolks of eggs.

21

A sort of nougat.

22

This king, Don Pedro, whom we call “the Cruel,” and whom Queen Isabella, the Catholic, never called anything but “the Avenger,” was fond of walking about the streets of Seville at night in search of adventures, like the Caliph Haroun al Raschid. One night, in a lonely street, he quarrelled with a man who was singing a serenade. There was a fight, and the king killed the amorous caballero. At the clashing of their swords, an old woman put her head out of the window and lighted up the scene with a tiny lamp (candilejo) which she held in her hand. My readers must be informed that King Don Pedro, though nimble and muscular, suffered from one strange fault in his physical conformation. Whenever he walked his knees cracked loudly. By this cracking the old woman easily recognised him. The next day the veintiquatro     in charge came to make his report to the king. “Sir, a duel was fought last night in such a street—one of the combatants is dead.” “Have you found the murderer?” “Yes, sir.” “Why has he not been punished already?” “Sir, I await your orders!” “Carry out the law.” Now the king had just published a decree that every duellist was to have his head cut off, and that head was to be set up on the scene of the fight. The veintiquatro got out of the difficulty like a clever man. He had the head sawed off a statue of the king, and set that up in a niche in the middle of the street in which the murder had taken place. The king and all the Sevillians thought this a very good joke. The street took its name from the lamp held by the old woman, the only witness of the incident. The above is the popular tradition. Zuniga tells the story somewhat differently. However that may be, a street called Calle del Candilejo still exists in Seville, and in that street there is a bust which is said to be a portrait of Don Pedro. This bust, unfortunately, is a modern production. During the seventeenth century the old one had become very much defaced, and the municipality had it replaced by that now to be seen.

23

Rom, husband. Romi, wife.

24

Calo, feminine calli, plural cales. Literally “black,” the name the gipsies apply to themselves in their own language.

25

Spanish dragoons wear a yellow uniform.

26

Me dicas vriarda de jorpoy, bus ne sino braco.—A gipsy proverb.

27

The Saint, the Holy Virgin.

28

The gallows, which is the widow of the last man hanged upon it.

29

Flamenco de Roma, a slang term for the gipsies. Roma does not stand for the Eternal City, but for the nation of the romi, or the married folk—a name applied by the gipsies to themselves. The first gipsies seen in Spain probably came from the Low Countries, hence their name of Flemings.

30

A bulbous root, out of which rather a pleasant beverage is manufactured.

31

The ordinary food of a Spanish soldier.

32

Ustilar a pastesas, to steal cleverly, to purloin without violence.

33

A sort of volunteer corps.

34

One-eyed man.

35

“The idiots, they take me for a smart lady!”

36

Name applied by the Spanish populace to the British soldiers, on account of the colour of their uniform.

37

To the galleys, or else to all the devils in hell.

38

My “lover,” or rather my “fancy.”

39

Navarro fino.

40

Or esorjle de or marsichisle, sin chisnar lachinguel. “The promise of a dwarf is that he will spit a long way.”—A gipsy proverb.

41

La divisa. A knot of ribbon, the colour of which indicates the pasturage from which each bull comes. This knot of ribbon is fastened into the bull’s hide with a sort of hook, and it is considered the very height of gallantry to snatch it off the living beast and present it to a woman.

42

Maria Padella was accused of having bewitched Don Pedro. According to one popular tradition she presented Queen Blanche of Bourbon with a golden girdle which, in the eyes of the bewitched king, took on the appearance of a living snake. Hence the repugnance he always showed toward the unhappy princess.

43

It has struck me that the German gipsies, though they thoroughly understand the word cale, do not care to be called by that name. Among themselves they always use the designation Romane tchave.