had rather an infantile fantoccini puppet
character, as if she had done it when rather
young and frivolous.  Side by side with the
highest ladies in Granada, crawled hideous
cripples, their dirty crutches lying beside
them, like so many monsters at the Beautiful
Gate, returning thanks to God for recent
miraculous cures; or, are they real Lord
Aldboroughs and Bishops of Jamaica,
recently healed by some Spanish advertising
quack?

"Caridad, caridad, per l'amor de Dios,"
said a subterranean toad-voice at my feet.

"Charity, charity, for the love of God!"
I repeated, with a sigh.  "But where to find
it, my poor woman?"

She was a crippled old devotee, with no
mantilla, and her handful of grey hair was
drawn back into a sort of Tartar-knot.  She
was seated humbly on the ground, her worn
crutches were under her lean, naked arms.
She got her living by lifting up the great
quilted, leather curtain—greasy and black-
brown—for those worshippers, true or false,
who wanted to pass from the nave of the
great cathedral to the inner Virgin's
chapel.

A priest passed through, muttering "Ave
Maria purisima," bowing and crossing
himself five times, as he caught a glimpse,
through golden smoke, of the distant altar of
the mass.

"Sin pecado concebida " (Conceived
without sin), replied the woman, muttering the
religious countersign in an earnest but
mechanical underbreath.

I think it was "Demonio!" the priest
exclaimed, as he set his dapper foot
unconsciously on the end of one of the crutches,
and it flew up angrily and hit his fat
paunch.

"Charity," says the woman again, replacing
the crutch with a deprecating smile.
Perhaps it was "God bless you!" the priest
replied.

Instantly, the organ burst out, with its
exulting quire.

Good woman!  how she fell to at her
beads.  Here is one of a religious race, and
so are those poor market-women, who,
coming in and kneeling beside their baskets
of sweet herbs, snatch an earful or two of
the musical mass.

"Charity, for the love of Heaven, Señor!"
droned out the woman again.

I gave her a cuatro.  She held out her
skinny palm for more, and shook and waggled
her grey head mockingly.

I remembered the old Ford specific, and
bowing, exclaimed, "Perdoname, hermana
mia, per l'amor de Dios" (Pardon me, my
sister, for the love of Heaven).  She bowed as
I reluctantly slipped a peseta in her hand, in
gratitude for her moral lessons; she heaped
what I thought were blessings on me.  When
I got home I unpacked my memory,
consulted the Dictionary, and found what the
good old woman had really said was, "Quede
usted con diablo, Don Fulano" (May you
remain with the devil, Don Thingumbob).
"Calavera atolondrado" (Empty noodle).
"Mucha bulla para nada" (Much ado about
nothing).  "A los pies de mi señora"
(My respects to your wife).  "Viejo rey
Wamba" (Old King Wamba).  "Venida
en batea" (Looking as if you came on a
waiter).

O the dreadful old woman!

How I did look about that cathedral for the
Don!  In the parroquia, or parish church,
which opened out of it, and which had a
snug clique service all to itself; in the royal
chapel, where Ferdinand and Isabella lie
praying eternally for Spain that so much
needs their prayers; at the broad marble
water stoup, where the true believers dipped
their brown fingers, and crossed themselves on
brow and breast, quick as a juggling pass; in
the silent unused choir, where the dark-carved
thrones of the seven deadly sins were, and
where the blazoned books lay open for the
simoniacal bishop to intone out of.  The Don
stood not at the vacant lecterns, nor was he
(for I inquired) up-stairs, looking over the
organist's shoulder in the dusty organ-loft.
He was not in the stone recess of a pulpit;
he was not behind the gilded purclose railing,
or behind the reredos, with the rows
of church militant saints drawn up on
parade in niche and on shelf.  He was not
looking at the Virgin, gay in opera satin and
tinsel crown; nor at that Saint Sebastian, of
the lively buff-colour, smeared with red from
the arrow-wounds.

"Where is he?" I said, half aloud, and an
hotel-waiter behind me replied, "Perhaps,
señor mio, at the Fonda Europa."

I replied, I thought not, and went peering
about again.  There, where the crowd was
thickest round the chapel rails, and where
the ministering shaven-headed priest in the
white satin robe, with the great cross of
gold tissue on his back, stood with a sinister-looking
deacon to hold the enormous
winged book, and troops of white-clad
acolytes to light and snuff out candles, to
ring soulless, unfeeling bells, to bow and
kneel according to receipt.  There is Guzman,
my landlord, a little, mean, bill-broking
Jew, whose looks tempt you to beat him;
and there is my lean guide in the Marselles
jacket, and round black cap.  I am
afraid they have come to get joint absolution
for having cheated me.  There is Quesada
(not Quixote) kneeling and sitting back on
his own legs; watching that young votary
who is passing out through the beggar crowd
at the door.  His eye—perhaps his mind
—wanders.  But, being just in the shadow
of this great picture of the Crucifixion, by
Murillo, let us be charitable, and not act
as witnessing spirits against our weaker
brothers.

I hurry back nervously for fear I should