Saragossa. Benito Pérez Galdós
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of the second siege of Aragon. As I did not see it at close quarters, and can only give the story of what was told me, I am moved not to be prolix, because there are so many and such interesting adventures which I must narrate. This makes a certain restraint necessary in the description of these sanguinary encounters. It is enough now to know that the French believed when night came that it was time to desist from their purpose, and they retired, leaving the plain covered with bodies of the dead. It was a good moment to follow them with cavalry; but after a short discussion the generals, I am told, decided not to put themselves in peril in a sally which could only be dangerous.
CHAPTER VII
Night came, and when a part of our troops fell back upon the city, all of the people hastened to the suburb to look at the field of battle from near at hand, and to gladden their imaginations by going over, one by one, the scenes of heroism. The animation, the movement, the clatter of noise in that part of the city were immense. At one side were groups of soldiers singing with feverish joy, on the other bands of merciful people carrying the wounded into their houses. Everywhere was hearty satisfaction, which showed itself in lively dialogues, question, joyous exclamations—tears and laughter mingling with the rejoicings and enthusiasm.
It was, possibly, about nine o'clock before my battalion broke ranks; because, lacking quarters, we did not permit ourselves to leave the position, although there was no danger.
Augustine and I ran to Del Pilar, where a great crowd was rushing. We entered with difficulty. I was surprised to see how some persons jostled and pushed others in order to approach the chapel of the Virgin del Pilar. The prayers, the entreaties, and the demonstrations of rejoicing, taken all together, did not seem like the prayers of any class of the faithful. The prayers were like talks mingled with tears, groans, the most tender words, and other phrases of intimate and ingenuous affection, such as the Spanish people are wont to use with their saints that are most beloved. They fell upon their knees; they kissed the pavement; they grasped the iron gratings of the chapel; they addressed the holy image, calling it by names the most familiar and the most pathetic of the language. Those who could not—because of the crowd of people—come near her were talking to her from afar off, waving their arms wildly about. There were no sacristans to stop these wild ways and seemingly irreverent noises, because they were themselves children of this overflowing delirious devotion. The solemn silence of sacred places was not observed. All there were as if in their own house, as if the house of their cherished Virgin, their mother, their beloved, the queen of Saragossans, were also the house of her children, her servants and subjects.
Astonished at such fervor which the familiarity made more interesting, I fought my way to the grating, and saw the celebrated image. Who has not seen her, who does not know her, at least by the innumerable sculptures and portraits which have reproduced her endlessly from one end of the peninsula to the other?
She was at the left of the little altar which is in the depth of the chapel in a niche adorned with oriental luxury, a little statue, then as now. A great profusion of wax candles illuminated her, and precious stones covered her clothing and crown, darting dazzling reflections. Gold and diamonds gleamed in the circlet about her face, in the votive bracelets hung upon her breast, and in the rings on her hands. A living creature would have given way under so great a weight of treasure. Her garments, falling without folds, stretched straight from head to feet, and left visible only her hands. The child Jesus, sustained on her left side, revealed a bit of his brown little face between the brocade and the jewels. The face of the Virgin, burnished by time, is also brown. A gentle serenity possesses her, symbol of her eternal blessedness. She looks outward, her sweet gaze scanning constantly the devoted concourse. There shines in her eyes a ray of the clearest light, and this artificial gleam seems like the intensity and fixedness of the human gaze. It was difficult when I saw her for the first time to remain indifferent in the midst of that religious demonstration, and not to add a word to the concert of enthusiastic tongues talking with distinct voices to the Señora.
I was watching the statue, when Augustine pressed my arm, saying—
"Look, there she is!"
"Who, the Virgin? I am looking at her now."
"No, man, Mariquilla! There, in front, close to the column."
I looked, but I saw only a great many people. We immediately quitted our place, looking about for a way to get through the multitude to the other side.
"She is not with Candiola," said Augustine, joyously. "She has come with the servant." And, saying this, he elbowed his way to one side and the other to make a road, punching backs and breasts, stepping on feet, matting down hats, and rumpling clothing. I followed behind him, causing equal destruction right and left. At last we came to the beautiful young girl, and it was really she, as I could see at once with my own eyes.
The enthusiastic passion of my good friend did not deceive me. Mariquilla was worth the trouble of being extravagantly, madly loved. Her pale brunette skin, her deeply black eyes, her perfect nose, her incomparable mouth, and her beautiful low forehead attracted attention to her at once. There was in her face as in her body a certain light and delicate voluptuousness. When she lowered her eyes, it seemed to me as if a sweet and lovely mist surrounded her. She smiled gravely; and when she approached us, her looks revealed timidity. Everything about her showed the reserved and circumspect passion of a woman of character, and she seemed to me little given to talking, lacking in coquetry, and poor in artifices. I afterwards had reason to confirm this, my early judgment. There shone in the face of Mariquilla a heavenly calm, and a certain security in herself. Different from most women, like few among them, that soul would not readily change, except for just and righteous reasons.
Other women of quick sensibility pour themselves out like wax before a small fire; but Mariquilla was made of the best metal, yielding only to a great fire, and when that came she was of necessity like molten metal that burns when it touches.
Besides her beauty, the elegance and even luxury of her dress attracted my attention. Having heard much of the avarice of Candiola, I supposed that he would have reduced his daughter to the utmost extremes of wretchedness in matters of dress. It was not so. As Montoria told me afterwards, the stingiest of the stingy not only permitted his daughter some expenses, but now and then made her some little present which he looked upon as the ne plus ultra of mundane splendor.
If Candiola was capable of letting some of his relations die of hunger, to his daughter he gave a phenomenal, a scandalous amount of pocket-money. Although he was a miser, he was a father; he loved his girl very much, finding in his generosity to her perhaps the only pleasure of his arid existence.
Somewhat more must be said in regard to this, but it will appear little by little in the course of the story. And now I must say that my friend had not yet spoken ten words to his adored Mariquilla, when a man approached us abruptly, and after having looked at the two for an instant with flashing eyes, spoke to the young girl, taking her by the arm, and saying, with a show of anger—
"What is going on here? And you, good Guedita, what brought you to the Pilar at such an hour? Go to the house, go to the house immediately!"
And pushing before him mistress and maid, he carried them both off towards the door and the street, and the three disappeared from our sight.
It was Candiola. I remember him well, and the remembrance makes me tremble with horror. Further on you will know why. Since the brief scene in the church del Pilar, the image of that man has been engraven on my memory, and certainly his face was not one which would let itself be quickly forgotten. Old, bent, of miserable and sickly aspect, crooked and disagreeable, lean of face, with sunken cheeks, Candiola roused antipathy from the first moment. His nose, sharp and hooked like the beak of a bird, his chin, peaked also, the coarse hair of his grizzled eyebrows, the greenish eyes, the forehead furrowed as if by a ruler with deep parallel wrinkles, the cartilaginous ears, the yellowish skin, the metallic quality of the voice, the slovenly clothes, the insulting grimaces—all his personality from head to foot, from his bag wig to the sole of his coarse shoe, produced at sight