ains a day indeed, and a
speed of fifteen miles an hour! People shook their heads and told you that
Spain was no country to motor in. Well, it was certainly no country to
travel in by rail, unless you wanted to forget where you were going before
you got there. He wished he were a managing director; or no, on second
thoughts, the thing he'd prefer would be to improve the future of the
motor industry. Why, there was a fortune to be picked up by some chap with
a little go, and a little capital. Look at these roads, now; not so bad,
any of them, as far as we had seen; some, as good as in France; others,
only rough because science hadn't been employed in making them; after rain
they got soft and muddy, and then hardened into ridges. But a few
thousands of dollars, well laid out, would change that. Then, with a good
service of automobiles, see what could be done in the way of conveying
market produce and a hundred other things. What was the matter with
Spaniards that they didn't fix up some scheme of this sort?

The Cherub, listening politely to Dick's remarkable Spanish, and
understanding perhaps half, answered mildly that it would be a great deal
of trouble, and Spaniards didn't like trouble.

"But I suppose Spaniards like getting rich, don't they?" said Dick, who
was resting, and letting Ropes drive, while he made a fourth in the
tonneau.

"They are not anxious. It is better to be comfortable," murmured the
Irish-Spaniard. "Besides, it is vulgar to be too rich, and makes one's
neighbours unhappy. It is a thing I would not do myself."

"That is true," said Pilar. "It isn't what you call sour grapes. Papa
could be rich if he liked. We have copper on our land, much copper. Men
came and told papa that if he chose to work it he might have one of the
best copper mines in Spain."

"And he wouldn't?" asked Dick.

"Not for the world," said Colonel O'Donnel, with a flash of pride in his
mild, brown eyes. "I do not come of that sort of people. I am an officer.
I am not a miner."

"But," pleaded Dick, bewildered by this new type of man, who refused to
open his door and let money, tons of money, roll in, "but you could sell
the land and make an enormous profit. You could keep shares, and--"

"I have no wish to sell," replied the Cherub.

"Well, you might let others work the mine for you."

"But I prefer living over it. It's beautiful land. I would not have it
made ugly. My ancestors would rise from their graves and cry out a