Don Francisco de Paula Benavides, the young bishop of Siguenza, preached the sermon. Taking his text from St. Paul, "Being dead he still speaketh through faith," he proceeded with the panegyric of the great-souled poet and soldier, and of all the illustrious dead who have honourcd Spain by their writings. He did not neglect to interest the nuns, who were listening with all their might behind their lattices. Their order had been instrumental in restoring the brave Saavedra to his country, and to their exertions Spain and the world were in part indebted for the Don Quixote and the Exemplary Novels. They possessed the remains of the poet in their house, and thus bound to his memory they must not omit the care of his salvation to their prayers. The delivery of the discourse, according to M. Latour, was marked with a noble simplicity, and a manner combining sweetness with vigour.
Next morning he returned to the convent, hoping to be gratified with the sight of Cervantes' tomb. Alas! he learned that when the remains were transferred from the old house, sufficient attention was not paid to keep them apart from those of others who were removed along with them. So, though it is morally certain that the present convent of the Trinitarians guards all that remains of the body, once so full of life and active energy, they are now undistinguishable from the relics of the nameless individuals who had received interment in the same building.
The Modern Novel:
Donna Caecelia De Faber.
We are not to imagine Spain insensible to the merits of her living gifted sons and daughters, and ever employed in shedding tears over the tombs of her Cervantes, her Lope de Vega, or her Mendoza. No. She possesses living writers whose names are not only known from Andaluçia to Biscay, but are even spoken of in Paris salons. The most distinguished among these is the lady who chooses to style herself Fernan Caballero, her real name being Caecilia de Faber, her birthplace Alorges in Switzerland, and her father, M. Bohl de Faber, a Hamburgh merchant, and consul for that city at Cadiz.
She has been married more than once, and thus enabled to combine experience with natural ability in her pictures of life and manners. Through the favor of the queen she holds apartments in the Alcazar of Seville, and the splendid old Moorish city could not possess a writer better qualified to paint the manners of the little-doing, much-enjoying people of that southern paradise, Andalulçia, and the delights of the happy climate, where life is not only supportable, but enjoyable at very small expense.
Besides happily seizing and vividly sketching what takes place among the aristocracy of Seville in their Patios [Footnote 4] and Tertulias (reunions in their salons), this authoress has made herself thoroughly acquainted with the circumstances and characters and peculiar customs of the country laborers and shepherds. Melodramatic situations abound in some of them, and perhaps these are more relished by her Spanish readers than others whose chief merit consists in truthful and picturesque tableaux of the order of things among which they are placed, and which consequently possesses no novelty for them. We can readily conceive how French and English students of her novels and romances would prefer this latter class for their entertainment. Who would not rather listen to a couple of Andaluçian peasants discussing the clime and people of Britain than to some terrible, exciting though undignified, domestic tragedy? (A. is dissuading B. from making the voyage to Britain.)
"A. The earth is there covered with so deep a crust of snow that people are buried in it.
"B. Most Blessed Mary! But they are quiet folk, and do not carry stilettoes.
"A. They have no olives, no gaspacho, [Footnote 5] and must put up with black bread, potatoes, and milk.
"B. Much good may it do them.
[Footnote 4: The Patios are the interior flagged courts surrounded by colonnades from the roof of which lamps are suspended. In the centre of the court is a fountain surrounded by shrubs in fruit or flower. Seated on sofas in the corridor, or on carpets near the fountain, the princely owners enjoy an elysium during hot weather.]
[Footnote 5: Soup made up of olive oil, vinegar, spices, etc.]