I Hear Copper Coin
Falling On The Pavement, And Antonio, Who Is Not Of A Very
Christian Temper, Reproving Him For Not Having Brought The Proceeds
Of The Sale In Silver.
He now asks for fifteen more, as he says
the demand is becoming great, and that he shall have no difficulty
in disposing of them in the course of the morrow, whilst pursuing
his occupations.
Antonio goes to fetch them, and he now stands
alone by the marble fountain, singing a wild song, which I believe
to be a hymn of his beloved Greek church. Behold one of the
helpers which the Lord has sent me in my Gospel labours on the
shores of the Guadalquivir.
I lived in the greatest retirement during the whole time that I
passed at Seville, spending the greater part of each day in study,
or in that half-dreamy state of inactivity which is the natural
effect of the influence of a warm climate. There was little in the
character of the people around to induce me to enter much into
society. The higher class of the Andalusians are probably upon the
whole the most vain and foolish of human beings, with a taste for
nothing but sensual amusements, foppery in dress, and ribald
discourse. Their insolence is only equalled by their meanness, and
their prodigality by their avarice. The lower classes are a shade
or two better than their superiors in station: little, it is true,
can be said for the tone of their morality; they are overreaching,
quarrelsome, and revengeful, but they are upon the whole more
courteous, and certainly not more ignorant.
The Andalusians are in general held in the lowest estimation by the
rest of the Spaniards, even those in opulent circumstances finding
some difficulty at Madrid in procuring admission into respectable
society, where, if they find their way, they are invariably the
objects of ridicule, from the absurd airs and grimaces in which
they indulge, - their tendency to boasting and exaggeration, their
curious accent, and the incorrect manner in which they speak and
pronounce the Castilian language.
In a word, the Andalusians, in all estimable traits of character,
are as far below the other Spaniards as the country which they
inhabit is superior in beauty and fertility to the other provinces
of Spain.
Yet let it not for a moment be supposed that I have any intention
of asserting, that excellent and estimable individuals are not to
be found amongst the Andalusians; it was amongst THEM that I myself
discovered one, whom I have no hesitation in asserting to be the
most extraordinary character that has ever come within my sphere of
knowledge; but this was no scion of a noble or knightly house, "no
wearer of soft clothing," no sleek highly-perfumed personage, none
of the romanticos who walk in languishing attitudes about the
streets of Seville, with long black hair hanging upon their
shoulders in luxuriant curls; but one of those whom the proud and
unfeeling style the dregs of the populace, a haggard, houseless,
penniless man, in rags and tatters:
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