“‘Las cinco y medio y sereno’ is what he says,” added the surgeon. “‘Half-past five and pleasant weather’ is the translation of his cry. When it rains he calls the hour, and adds ‘fluvioso;’ when there is a fire he informs the people on his beat of the fact, and gives the locality of the conflagration, which he gets from the fire-alarm. In some of the southern cities, as in Seville, the watchman indulges in some pious exclamations, ‘Twelve o’clock, and may the Virgin watch over our good city!’ It used to be the fashion in some of the cities of our country, for the guardian of the night to indulge in these cries to keep himself awake; and I have heard him shout, ‘One o’clock and all is well’ in Pittsburg.”
“I have walked about the Puerta del Sol in the evening; but I have not seen a watchman,” added Sheridan.
“Probably they do not use the cry early in the night, in the streets where the people are gathered; at least, there seems to be no need of it,” replied the doctor. “But I suppose there are a great many things yet in Madrid that you have not seen. For instance, did you notice the water-carriers?”
“I did,” answered Murray. “They carry the water in copper vessels something like a soda-fountain, placed upon a kind of saddle, like the porters in Constantinople.
“Some of them have donkeys, with panniers in which they put kegs, jars, and glass vessels filled with water. These men are called ‘aguadors,’ and their occupation is considered mean business; the caballero whose house we visited would be too proud to be a water-carrier, and would rather starve than engage in it.”
The tourists left the omnibuses, and took their places in the cars. As soon as the train had started, as it was still too dark to see the country, the doctor and his friends resumed the conversation about the sights of Madrid.
“Did you go to the Calle de la Abada?” asked Dr. Winstock.
“I don’t know: I didn’t notice the name of any such street,” replied Sheridan; and Murray was no wiser, both of them declaring that the Spanish names were too much for them.
“It is not unlike Market Street in Philadelphia, twenty years ago, when the middle of the avenue was filled with stalls in a wooden building.”
“I saw that,” added Sheridan. “The street led to a market. All the men and women that had any thing to sell were yelling with all their might. They tackled every person that came near.”