hard to part with
anything in Ronda. Yet we made the break, and instead of ruining over
the precipitous face of the rock where the city stands, as we might have
expected, we glided smoothly down the long grade into the storm-swept
lowlands sloping to the sea. They grew more fertile as we descended
and after we had left a mountain valley where the mist hung grayest and
chillest, we suddenly burst into a region of mellow fruitfulness, where
the haze was all luminous, and where the oranges hung gold and green
upon the trees, and the women brought grapes and peaches and apples to
the train. The towns seemed to welcome us southward and the woods we
knew instantly to be of cork trees, with Don Quixote and Sancho Panza
under their branches anywhere we chose to look.

Otherwise, the journey was without those incidents which have so often
rendered these pages thrilling. Just before we left Ronda a couple,
self-evidently the domestics of a good family, got into our first-class
carriage though they had unquestionably only third-class tickets. They
had the good family's dog with them, and after an unintelligible appeal
to us and to the young English couple in the other corner, they remained
and banished any misgivings they had by cheerful dialogue. The dog
coiled himself down at my feet and put his nose close to my ankles, so
that without rousing his resentment I could not express in Spanish my
indignation at what I felt to be an outrageous intrusion: servants, we
all are, but in traveling first class one must draw the line at dogs, I
said as much to the English couple, but they silently refused any part
in the demonstration. Presently the conductor came out to the window
for our fares, and he made the Spanish pair observe that they had
third-class tickets and their dog had none. He told them they must get
out, but they noted to him the fact that none of us had objected
to their company, or their dog's, and they all remained, referring
themselves to us for sympathy when the conductor left. After the next
station the same thing happened with little change; the conductor was
perhaps firmer and they rather more yielding in their disobedience. Once
more after a stop the conductor appeared and told them that when the
train halted again, they and their dog must certainly get out. Then
something surprising happened: they really got out, and very amiably;
perhaps it was the place where they had always meant to get out; but it
was a great t