Poor Folk in Spain. Jan Gordon

a momentary hesitation we went in. The room, lit by one dim lamp, was crowded with gipsies and workmen. It was long in shape and an alcove almost opposite to the door was partitioned off as a bar. At one end was a table upon which three gipsies with dark, lined Spanish faces were sitting, and the audience had formed itself into rough, concentric semicircles spreading down the length of the room. Most of the men were swarthy with the sun, clad in the roughest of clothes, some with tall hats on, others with striped blankets flung over their shoulders. The inn looked like what the average traveller would describe as a nest of brigands.

      We murmured a bashful "buenos noches," bowed to the company and crept into the background. A few returned our greeting, but with delicacy of feeling the majority took no overt notice of our presence.

      The man on the table who held the guitar began to thrum on the instrument. A tall gipsy, whose face was drawn into clear, almost prismatic shapes, and who might have stepped out of an etching by Goya, put his stick into a corner, slipped off his blanket and, standing in the open space before the table, began a stamping dance, snapping his fingers in time with the rhythm. A workman standing near to us said:

      "That man does not play the guitar very well, the other one plays better."

      He went out and in a short while returned with his wife, a laughing woman whom he placed next to me. There was no drinking of wine. The alcarraza, an unglazed, bottle shaped drinking vessel, full of water, was handed about. It has a small spout, and from this the Spaniard pours a fine stream of water into his mouth. But beware, incautious traveller—ten to one you will drench yourself.

      Though the audience apparently took no notice of our presence, in reality they were extremely conscious of us. One by one, as if by accident, gipsy women clad in red cottons came into the already crowded room. Soon a girl was urged to dance. She demurred, giggling. At last she was pushed into the open space, and with a gesture of resignation she began to dance. We are not judges of Spanish dancing: we had been looking for atmosphere, and had plunged into the thick of it. This was no café in Madrid or Seville got up for the entertainment of the traveller. This was the true, natural, romantic Spain. Opportunity again had blessed her disciples. One of the women pushed her way out of the door, and in a short while returned, dragging with her a child about nine years old. The little girl's face was frowning and angered, the sleep from which she had been roused still hung heavy on her eyelids.

      "Aha!" exclaimed the audience. "She dances well."

      The man who was reputed the better player roused himself from the table and sat down on a chair. They put castanets into the child's hands. The man struck a few chords and slowly the music formed itself into the rhythm of a Spanish measure.