This modest pedlar was on her way to Montserrat to dispose of her stock-in-trade—not to the monks, who could have no interest in housewifes and pocket-mirrors, but amongst the visitors. A humble peasant, with an honest, upright look in her dark eyes; a certain patient resignation in their expression which often comes to those who live from day to day, uncertain whether the morrow will bring fast or feasting. She sat at the end of the large square carriage, under the short bit of roofing. Here the magnificent surroundings were less seen, but what mattered? She was of those to whom the realities of life mean much more than the beauties of nature.
Next came a military policeman duly accompanied by his gun and cocked hat, on his way to a three months' duty at Montserrat.
Thus the carriage contained a poet, who could be on occasion a Napoleon; a man of letters, though apparently of letters limited; an armed Government official of more or less exalted rank; a lady-merchant representing the great world of commerce; and a humble individual who, like Lost Lenore, shall be "nameless here for evermore;" all personally conducted by a paid menial who neglected his duty and jeopardised the lives of his passengers. No merit to him that the journey passed without accident, but a great escape for ourselves.
Of this small group of Catalonians, our postman alone was of the higher type and by far the most interesting.
"I see you are not of our country, señor," he remarked after exchanging letter-bags at the last station. "Your interest in the journey proves you unfamiliar with it. You may well marvel at this stupendous miracle of nature."
"We marvel at everything. The whole scene is overpowering. And, if we may venture to say so, you are yourself an enigma. In England we have a proverb which speaks of a round man in a square hole; might it not almost be applied to you?"
"In other words, you pay me the compliment of saying that I magnify my office," quickly returned the postman. "Well, it is true that I was not born to this, but it is not every one who has the wit to find it out. My father was an officer in the Spanish navy, and in the navy my first years of labour were spent. And now I am playing at postman—to such base uses do we come. Yet is my calling honourable.
"You would ask how I fell from my high estate, and politeness withholds the question. In reply I can only quote the old saying, cherchez la femme. They say that a woman is at the bottom of all mischief, and I believe it. On the other hand, there is no doubt that at her best she is a divinity. No, sir; I perceive what you would say; but I have nothing questionable to disclose; no intrigues or complications, or anything of that sort.
"My father died when I was twenty. He had been made admiral, and lived to enjoy his rank just four months. Unfortunately, all Admiral Alvarez had to bequeath to his son was his good name. Of fortune he had none. You will say that a good name is the greatest of all inheritance, and so it is; and a young man with health, strength, and a noble profession before him should be independent of fortune. I quite agree with you. But there are exceptions, and the exceptions are those who are born under a conjunction of stars against which there is no fighting. If I had lived in the days of the Egyptians I should have been an astrologer, for I believe there is something in the science. Right or wrong, it possesses a mysterious fascination.
"At twenty-one I married, apparently with discretion. The lady I chose was young, handsome, and owned a fortune. Without the latter matrimony for me would have been a dream. My lieutenant's pay, which hardly sufficed for one, would have reduced two to the necessity of living upon love, air, or any other ethereal ingredient that may be had for nothing.