never been in Madrid--here was the cause of
his failure to understand the riddle: what things are learned in
Madrid! "So now it's proper to say--"

"In the ancient style, man! This country's not yet cultured! In the
ancient style, _Filipinas!_" exclaimed Gomez disdainfully.

The corporal, even if he was a bad philologist, was yet a good
husband. What he had just learned his spouse must also know, so he
proceeded with her education: "Consola, what do you call your damned
country?"

"What should I call it? Just what you taught me: _Felifinas!_"

"I'll throw a chair at you, you ----! Yesterday you pronounced it
even better in the modern style, but now it's proper to pronounce it
like an ancient: _Feli_, I mean, _Filipinas!_"

"Remember that I'm no ancient! What are you thinking about?"

"Never mind! Say _Filipinas!_"

"I don't want to. I'm no ancient baggage, scarcely thirty years
old!" she replied, rolling up her sleeves and preparing herself for
the fray.

"Say it, you ----, or I'll throw this chair at you!"

Consolacion saw the movement, reflected, then began to stammer with
heavy breaths, "_Feli-, Fele-, File--_"

Pum! Crack! The chair finished the word. So the lesson ended in
fisticuffs, scratchings, slaps. The corporal caught her by the hair;
she grabbed his goatee, but was unable to bite because of her loose
teeth. He let out a yell, released her and begged her pardon. Blood
began to flow, one eye got redder than the other, a camisa was torn
into shreds, many things came to light, but not _Filipinas_.

Similar incidents occurred every time the question of language came
up. The corporal, watching her linguistic progress, sorrowfully
calculated that in ten years his mate would have completely forgotten
how to talk, and this was about what really came to pass. When they
were married she still knew Tagalog and could make herself understood
in Spanish, but now, at the time of our story, she no longer spoke any
language. She had become so addicted to expressing herself by means
of signs--and of these she chose the loudest and most impressive--that
she could have given odds to the inventor of Volapuk.

Sisa, therefore, had the good fortune not to understand her, so
the Medusa smoothed out her eyebrows a little, while a smile of
satisfaction lighted up her face; undoubtedly she did not know Tagalog,
she was an _orofea!_

"Boy, tell her in Tagalog to sing! She doesn't understand me, she
doesn't understand S