The city of the discreet

THE CITY OF THE DISCREET
THE BORZOI SPANISH TRANSLATIONS
COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY ALFRED A. KNOPF Published October, 1917 PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
IN San Sebastián, a beautiful watering place on the northern coast of Guipúzcoa, Spain, Don Pío Baroja y Nessi was born on the 28th day of December, 1872. There, wandering among the foothills of the Pyrenees, listening to the talk of the hardy Basque peasants, playing on the beautiful crescent of the playa , sailing about the pretty land-locked harbour, he spent his childhood. In those early days he became thoroughly conversant with the Basque tongue—that mysterious and impossibly difficult language of whose true origin students are still in doubt.
His father was Don Serafín Baroja. Born in San Sebastián in 1840, Don Serafín was a well known mining engineer, and enjoyed no small amount of fame as a writer. As far as literature is concerned, he is perhaps best known for his songs and ballads written in the Basque tongue. He composed the libretto of the first Basque opera ever produced, the music of which was by Santesteban. He is said to have been responsible for the libretto of one other opera—a Spanish one.
His son, Don Pío, decided to take up the study of medicine, and he went to Valencia for that purpose. He received his doctorate in 1893, when he was but twenty-one years of age.
He practised his profession in Cestona, in the Province of Guipúzcoa. Life in that small, provincial town proved very dull indeed, and he decided that the medical profession was not his proper sphere. After two years in Cestona, he moved to Madrid. There he tried his hand at several kinds of business. He even set up a bakery in partnership with his brother Ricardo, a painter and engraver of no mean ability! We do not hear of his return to the practice of medicine. Evidently he had proved to his own satisfaction that he was not suited to it.
After he had failed in several attempts at business, he began writing for the newspapers. He succeeded in obtaining positions on El País , El Imparcial , and El Globo . His success in this line of work inspired him to further effort, and, from that time on (1900), he devoted himself entirely to literature.