The Humour of Spain (1894)

= 0O = CO Icvj CD 'C\J M_ .1 NTERMATIONAL O WSM ^nm VA K&) ^ > -^ £) rv \^ I k$£ Er*» fcf-">: T HUMOUR SERIES Edited by W. II. DIRCKS THE HUMOUR OF SPAIN ALREADY ISSUED FRENCH HUMOUR GERMAN HUMOUR ITALIAN HUMOUR AMERICAN HUMOUR DUTCH HUMOUR IRISH HUMOUR SPANISH HUMOUR BLACK EVESs. —P. olS. fHILE YOUfi DAUGHTER WALKS OVT WITH HER ^ HUM SELECTED, WITH AN IN- TRODUCTION AND NOTES, BY SUSETTE M. TAYLOR: ILLUSTRATIONS BY H. R. MILLAR LONDON WALTER SCOTT 1894 LTD LIBRARY S\ fK \» m ,,. — 1opo Hi" '• CONTENTS. Introduction ....... My Cid pledges two Cokfres full of Sand to the Jews Rachel and Vidas — Twelfth Century The Cowardice of the Infantes of Carrion when the Lion breaks loose— Thirteenth Ce7itury . The Cat turned Nun—Fourteenth Century . The Madman in the Bath—Don Juan Manuel The Naked King—Don Juan Manuel "Not even the Day of the Mud?"—Don Juan Manuel The Taming of the Shrew—Don Juan Manuel A Long Tale—Fifteenth Century Ei.ectio Nulla Debet Esse in Malis --/•>'/ n cuth Century The Biter Bit— Fifteenth Century 23 Calisto is smitten with Melibea's Charms—Rodrigo Cot, Love and Death ..... The Eaten Pancake—Lope tie Rueda 53 The Fair Celibate— Gil Vicente 3<i — CONTENTS. "The Table-Book and Travellers' Joy" — The Rustic and the Lackeys 38 The Contrary Wife 40 An Affectionate Wife . 42 Chastise with Good Words 42 The Accommodating Farmer 44 The Accommodating Lord 44 Diamond Cut Diamond . 44 The Best Hour to Dine 45 The Best Wife in the World 45 A Pious Wish 45 "The Book of Jokes"'—Travellers' Tales 54 Tales of Rogues— Lazaro declareth whose Son he was—Hurtado de Mendoza ....... 57 How Lazaro serves a Blind Man—Hurtado de Mendoza 58 Lazaro is Servant to a Priest—Hurtado de Mendoza 60 A Tailor would fain learn of Guzman to write his Name, or to make Firma, or Mark, and the Reason why—Mateo Aleman 70 Episode of the Officious Physician—Mateo Aleman . 7i Of the Pleasant Life Guzman led among his Brethren, and an Account of his Visit to Gatea— Mateo Aleman ..... 7- Of the Wicked Old Housekeeper, and the first knavish pranks Paul played at Alcala— Quevedo 79 Estebanillo acts on the Cardinal's Birthday ! Este- banillo Gonzalez ...... S6 CONTENTS. IX l'AGE The Ingenious Gentleman, Don Quixote of La Mancha —Miguel Cervantes . .90 — . The Lovers' Ruse Lope de Vega . 12S Aunts—-Jacinto Polo . 131 The Miser Chastised—Dona Maria de Zayas . 132 — The Market of Ancestors Velez de Guevara . 139 Vision of the Last Judgment— Gomez de Quevedo . 141 The Revenge of Don Lucas—Francesco Rajas de Zorrilla . 155 The Mayor of Zalamea— Calderon de la Barca . .160 The Simple Grooms—Santos . 17S Portuguese Epitaphs and Sayings — Seventeenth Century . 1S0 ' La Tarasca and the Carriers—Santos . 181 Pedigree of Fools—Seventeenth Century . 183 The Famous Preacher, Friar Blas . 1S4 The Musical Ass— Yriarte . .187 The Bashful Shepherdess—Iglesias . 1S9 The Bear, the Ape, and the Pig— Yriarte . 1S9 The Frog and the Hen— Yriarte .... 190 Mariquita the BAi.v—Jua/i Eugenio Harlzenbusch . .191 PULPETE AND BALBEJA ; OR, AN ANDALUSIAN DUEL— Eslc- banez Calderon ...... 207 Seville—/^' Zorrilla . -213 After the Bull-Fight— Mesoncro Komanos . 213 Delights of a Madrid Winter — Wenceslao Ayguals de I 216 In the Earlier Days of Photography—M, Ossorio y Bernard . , 2l8 The Old Castilian — MarianoJosS de Lar/ a . .221 A Demagogic Journalist— Antonio Maria Segovia . 233 X CONTENTS. A Cat Chase during the Siege of Gerona —Perez Gakios 238 A Well-won Dish of Cherries—Perez Galdos 242 First Love—Emilia Pardo Bazan 246 The Account Book—Pedro Antonio de Alarcon 254 Sister Saint Sulpice—A. Palacio Valdes 261 Pepita—-Juan Valera .... 275 If She could only Write— Campoamor 2SS Doctor Pertinax—Leopoldo Alas 291 A Few Thoughts on Light—-Jose Selgas 300 Epigrams ..... 302 Folk-Tales ..... 305 Miracles of St. Isidro, Patron-Saint of Madrid 309 The Wedding-Night .... 313 Father Cobos' Hint—Juan Martinez Villergas 316 Popular Songs ..... 3i8 Proverbs ..... 3 21 Anecdotes ..... 325 Eccentricities of Englishmen—A. Ribot y Fontset 329 Newspaper Humour ..... 332 Humorous Advertisements . 338 At the Theatre .... 34i Notes—Critical and Biographical . 345 INTRODUCTION. CERTAIN mysterious charm clings to the A Spanish people, by reason of the long domain of more than seven hundred years of the Moors over the Peninsula, and consequent intermingling, to some degree, of race, and considerable Oriental influence on the national life and characteristics. The chief sport of the Spaniards, the bull-fight, is of Moorish origin ; their popular dances and songs raise recollections of Indian Nautch-girls and the choruses in Moroccan coffee-houses ; their pre- dominant sentiment, the jealousy over their women, points back to the strict seclusion of the harem. To divert to another paramount influence, Spain, to this day the most Catholic country in the world, is in history of awful interest as the country in which the dread Inquisition took root most firmly : here alone 32,000 persons were condemned to the auto- da-fe ! Gloominess, pride, and reserve have for centuries been the reputed qualities of the Spaniards. Oriental races are not mirthful ; it is difficult to make the dignified Moor smile, much less laugh : the influence of the Moor, therefore, and the absolute power of the Church as little, x ii INTRODUCTION. could scarcely be conducive to merriment. And yet Spanish literature is illumined throughout with bright flashes of humour, like the silver lining to the dark cloud of the history of the people—a humour which shows itself in almost every phase of the national literature, from the twelfth to the nineteenth " century: from incidents in the " Poema del Cid which tickled the rough sense of humour of the warriors of the Middle Ages, to the delicate and subtle irony of Valera in " Pepita Jimenez" — quaint and naive in the ballads and collections of tales, sprightly in the drama, boisterous in the " Novela Picaresca," inimitable in " Don Quixote." A humour, moreover, not laboured, not purely literary (though the latter kind is not lacking), but spontaneous, and embodying the salient features of the national life and characteristics. It is both unnecessary and invidious to descant upon " Don Quixote," par excellence the work of Spanish Humour. The death-blow to the chivalrous literature throughout civilised Europe (in Spain more rankly luxuriant than elsewhere, and where it perhaps reached its climax of absurdity), this marvellous work spread rapidly from land to land, and was first put into English in the year 1612. It is here given from the latest and most scholarly trans- lation, the labour of love for eighteen years of Mr. H. E. Watts. It may be as well, however, to draw attention to the special phase of Spanish life round which Spanish humour collected in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries—namely, the life of rogues " in the " Novela Picaresca — to which a section of this volume has been devoted, and the influence of which INTRODUCTION. xiii is traceable in other authors (such as Guevara and Santos) not included in that section. This peculiar taste, called El Gusto Picaresco (picaro = rogue) owes its origin, according to Ticknor, to the condition of certain portions of society in the reigns of Charles V. and Philip IL, and it has ever been in popular favour. Le Sage boldly imitated it in his famous "Gil Bias"; 1 and Fielding, Smollet, and other English authors show its influence upon English literature. This typical rogue, who generally starts in life as a servant, has his counterpart on the stage in the Gracioso (the valet), prototype of the Barbier de Seville of Beaumarchais, and Moliere's Scapin. As this collection is not intended to be compre- hensive, no apology need be made for omissions obvious perhaps to Spanish scholars. Among other works, such as those of the Archpriest of Hita, of Castillejo, Forner, Pitillas, and Moratin, the " Gato- maquia" (see Notes) and "Mosquea," burlesque epics after the pattern of the " Batrachomyomachia," are " not represented ; nor yet the famous Murciliego Alevoso " (in which is displayed a humour not unlike Pope's) of Gonzalez, and the celebrated periodical El Padre Cobos. 2 That the drama, however, the richest in Europe, and original and characteristic as only either the Greek or the English drama, should be so little represented is due to the fact that the fun of a Spanish comedy generally lies in the plot and in comic situations. With regard to the tales and anecdotes (both ancient and modern), the difficulty is any certainty ' See note on Isla. See note on V Humour. ; XIV INTRODUCTION. of their origin, though this applies to the literature of all countries. The story of the cook and the crane is a common chestnut (with us the crane is a goose), the travellers' tale of the huge cauldron and the cabbage is perhaps too familiar to please but they are here of interest as from Spanish Table- books of so long ago as the sixteenth century. To come to the nineteenth century, our English periodical essayists of the eighteenth — Addison, Steele, and Johnson—will be recognised as proto- types of Figaro, El Curioso Parlante, El Solitario, &c. These Spanish Tatlers and Spectators are, however, on the whole, no servile imitators, and are justly held in high esteem by the Spaniards, though little known outside the Peninsula. 1 The nineteenth- century novel, in which critics see the continuity of the Spanish genius, is here well represented by Valera's " Pepita Jimenez," and " Sister Saint " Sulpice of Valdes ; other novelists, the rightly popular Alarcon, and the distinguished authoress, Emilia Pardo Bazan, have contributed short tales.

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