Saragossa: A Story of Spanish Valor

by Benito Pérez Galdós

"Good-night, Señor de Araceli," said Montoria to me. "I am going to see if I can get a little wine and water for this poor orphan."

CHAPTER XXX

Horrible nightmare, leave me! I do not wish to sleep. But the bad dream which I long to fling from my remembrance returns to distress me. I wish I could blot from my memory the melancholy scene. But one night passes, and then another, and the scene is not blotted out. I, who on so many occasions have faced great dangers without winking an eyelash, I tremble now, and the cold sweat comes on my forehead. The sword bathed in French blood falls from my hand, and I shut my eyes in order not to see what passes before me. In vain I hurl thee away, dreadful vision! I expel thee, and thou dost return. Thou art fast rooted in my memory. No, I am not capable of taking the life of a fellow-being in cold blood, though inexorable duty commands it. Why did I not tremble in the trenches as I tremble now? I feel a mortal chill. By the light of lanterns I see sinister faces, one above all livid and sullen, that shows a terror greater than all other terrors. How the barrels of the guns gleam! All is ready, and but one word is lacking, my word. I try to pronounce the word, and I bite my tongue. No, that word will never come from my lips!

Away from me, black nightmare! I shut my eyes. I draw my eyelids closer, better to exclude thee, and the closer they are shut the plainer I see thee, horrible picture! They all wait with anxiety; but nothing is comparable to the state of my soul, rebelling against the law which obliges it to decide the end of another's existence. Time passes, then eyes which I wish I had never seen disappear under the bandage. I cannot look at the scene; would that they had put a bandage over my eyes also! The soldiers look at me, and I frown to hide my cowardice. We mortals are stupid and vain even in supreme moments. The by-standers jested at my state, and that gave me a certain energy. I unglued my tongue from my palate, and cried,—

"Fire!"

The accursed nightmare will not go, and torments me to-night as it did last night, bringing again before me that which I do not wish to see. It is better not to sleep. I prefer wakefulness to this. I shake off the lethargy, and dread my vigil as before I abhorred the dream. Always the same humming of the cannon. Those insolent brass mouths do not cease to talk.

Ten days pass, and Saragossa has not yet surrendered, because some madmen are still persistent in guarding for Spain that heap of dust and ashes. The houses go on falling; and France, after establishing one foot, wastes armies and quintals of powder in gaining ground on which to set the other. Spain will not give up as long as she has one paving-stone to serve as a lever for the immense machine of her bravery. I am almost lifeless. I cannot move. Those men I see passing before me do not seem to be men. They are languid and emaciated, and their faces would be yellow, if dust and powder had not blackened them. Eyes gleam under blackened eyebrows,—eyes that do not yet know how to look without taking aim. Men are covered with unclean rags, and cloths are bound about their heads. They are so filthy that they seem like the dead raised from that heap in the Calle de la Imprenta, to show themselves among the living. From time to time among the smoky columns these dying ones come, and the friars murmur religious consolation to them. Neither the dying understand, nor the friar knows what he says. Religion itself goes half mad. Generals, soldiers, peasants, priests, and women are all overwhelmed. There are no classes or sexes. The city is defended in anarchy.

I do not know what happened me. Do not ask me to go on with the story, for there is nothing more to tell. That which I see before my memory does not seem real, the true things being confused in my memory with those dreamed.

I was stretched out in a gateway of the Calle de la Albarderia, shaking with cold, my left hand wrapped in a bloody, dirty cloth. The fever burned me, and I longed for strength to hasten to the front. They were not all corpses beside me. I reached out my hand and touched the arm of a friend who was still living.