civilly enough conceived, and uttered in the same deep-chested, and

yet indistinct and lisping tones, that had already baffled the
utmost niceness of my hearing from her son. I answered rather at a

venture; for not only did I fail to take her meaning with
precision, but the sudden disclosure of her eyes disturbed me.

They were unusually large, the iris golden like Felipe's, but the
pupil at that moment so distended that they seemed almost black;

and what affected me was not so much their size as (what was
perhaps its consequence) the singular insignificance of their

regard. A look more blankly stupid I have never met. My eyes
dropped before it even as I spoke, and I went on my way upstairs to

my own room, at once baffled and embarrassed. Yet, when I came
there and saw the face of the portrait, I was again reminded of the

miracle of family descent. My hostess was, indeed, both older and
fuller in person; her eyes were of a different colour; her face,

besides, was not only free from the ill-significance that offended
and attracted me in the painting; it was devoid of either good or

bad - a moral blank expressing literallynaught. And yet there was
a likeness, not so much speaking as immanent, not so much in any

particular feature as upon the whole. It should seem, I thought,
as if when the master set his signature to that grave canvas, he

had not only caught the image of one smiling and false-eyed woman,
but stamped the essential quality of a race.

From that day forth, whether I came or went, I was sure to find the
Senora seated in the sun against a pillar, or stretched on a rug

before the fire; only at times she would shift her station to the
top round of the stone staircase, where she lay with the same

nonchalance right across my path. In all these days, I never knew
her to display the least spark of energy beyond what she expended

in brushing and re-brushing her copious copper-coloured hair, or in
lisping out, in the rich and broken hoarseness of her voice, her

customary idle salutations to myself. These, I think, were her two
chief pleasures, beyond that of mere quiescence. She seemed always

proud of her remarks, as though they had been witticisms: and,
indeed, though they were empty enough, like the conversation of

many respectable persons, and turned on a very narrow range of
subjects, they were never meaningless or incoherent; nay, they had

a certain beauty of their own, breathing, as they did, of her
entire contentment. Now she would speak of the warmth, in which

(like her son) she greatly delighted; now of the flowers of the
pomegranate trees, and now of the white doves and long-winged

swallows that fanned the air of the court. The birds excited her.
As they raked the eaves in their swift flight, or skimmed sidelong

past her with a rush of wind, she would sometimes stir, and sit a
little up, and seem to awaken from her doze of satisfaction. But

for the rest of her days she lay luxuriously folded on herself and
sunk in sloth and pleasure. Her invincible content at first

annoyed me, but I came gradually to find repose in the spectacle,
until at last it grew to be my habit to sit down beside her four

times in the day, both coming and going, and to talk with her
sleepily, I scarce knew of what. I had come to like her dull,

almost animal neighbourhood; her beauty and her stupidity soothed
and amused me. I began to find a kind of transcendental good sense

in her remarks, and her unfathomable good nature moved me to
admiration and envy. The liking was returned; she enjoyed my

presence half-unconsciously, as a man in deep meditation may enjoy
the babbling of a brook. I can scarce say she brightened when I

came, for satisfaction was written on her face eternally, as on
some foolish statue's; but I was made conscious of her pleasure by

some more intimatecommunication than the sight. And one day, as I
set within reach of her on the marble step, she suddenly shot forth

one of her hands and patted mine. The thing was done, and she was
back in her accustomed attitude, before my mind had received

intelligence of the caress; and when I turned to look her in the
face I could perceive no answerable sentiment. It was plain she

attached no moment to the act, and I blamed myself for my own more
uneasy consciousness.

The sight and (if I may so call it) the acquaintance of the mother
confirmed the view I had already taken of the son. The family

blood had been impoverished, perhaps by long inbreeding, which I
knew to be a common error among the proud and the exclusive. No

decline, indeed, was to be traced in the body, which had been
handed down unimpaired in shapeliness and strength; and the faces

of to-day were struck as sharply from the mint, as the face of two
centuries ago that smiled upon me from the portrait. But the

intelligence (that more precious heirloom) was degenerate; the
treasure of ancestral memory ran low; and it had required the

potent, plebeian crossing of a muleteer or mountain contrabandista
to raise, what approached hebetude in the mother, into the active

oddity of the son. Yet of the two, it was the mother I preferred.
Of Felipe, vengeful and placable, full of starts and shyings,

inconstant as a hare, I could even conceive as a creature possibly
noxious. Of the mother I had no thoughts but those of kindness.

And indeed, as spectators are apt ignorantly to take sides, I grew
something of a partisan in the enmity which I perceived to smoulder

between them. True, it seemed mostly on the mother's part. She
would sometimes draw in her breath as he came near, and the pupils

of her vacant eyes would contract as if with horror or fear. Her
emotions, such as they were, were much upon the surface and readily

shared; and this latent repulsion occupied my mind, and kept me
wondering on what grounds it rested, and whether the son was

certainly in fault.
I had been about ten days in the residencia, when there sprang up a

high and harsh wind, carrying clouds of dust. It came out of
malarious lowlands, and over several snowy sierras. The nerves of

those on whom it blew were strung and jangled; their eyes smarted
with the dust; their legs ached under the burthen of their body;

and the touch of one hand upon another grew to be odious. The
wind, besides, came down the gullies of the hills and stormed about

the house with a great, hollow buzzing and whistling that was
wearisome to the ear and dismally depressing to the mind. It did

not so much blow in gusts as with the steady sweep of a waterfall,
so that there was no remission of discomfort while it blew. But

higher upon the mountain, it was probably of a more variable
strength, with accesses of fury; for there came down at times a

far-off wailing, infinitelygrievous to hear; and at times, on one
of the high shelves or terraces, there would start up, and then

disperse, a tower of dust, like the smoke of in explosion.
I no sooner awoke in bed than I was conscious of the nervous

tension and depression of the weather, and the effect grew stronger
as the day proceeded. It was in vain that I resisted; in vain that

I set forth upon my customary morning's walk; the irrational,
unchanging fury of the storm had soon beat down my strength and

wrecked my temper; and I returned to the residencia, glowing with
dry heat, and foul and gritty with dust. The court had a forlorn

appearance; now and then a glimmer of sun fled over it; now and
then the wind swooped down upon the pomegranates, and scattered the

blossoms, and set the window shutters clapping on the wall. In the
recess the Senora was pacing to and fro with a flushed countenance

and bright eyes; I thought, too, she was speaking to herself, like
one in anger. But when I addressed her with my customary

salutation, she only replied by a sharp gesture and continued her
walk. The weather had distempered even this impassive creature;

and as I went on upstairs I was the less ashamed of my own
discomposure.

All day the wind continued; and I sat in my room and made a feint
of reading, or walked up and down, and listened to the riot

overhead. Night fell, and I had not so much as a candle. I began
to long for some society, and stole down to the court. It was now

plunged in the blue of the first darkness; but the recess was redly
lighted by the fire. The wood had been piled high, and was crowned

by a shock of flames, which the draught of the chimney brandished
to and fro. In this strong and shakenbrightness the Senora

continued pacing from wall to wall with disconnected gestures,
clasping her hands, stretching forth her arms, throwing back her

head as in appeal to heaven. In these disordered movements the