d up again;
and while some of the members gave their lofty minds to the delights of
monte, others read the newspapers, while the majority discussed in the
coffee-room subjects of the various kinds, such as the politics, horses,
bulls, or the gossip of the place. The result of every discussion was
the renewed conviction of the supremacy of Orbajosa and its inhabitants
over all the other towns and peoples on the face of the earth.

These distinguished men were the cream of the illustrious city; some
rich landowners, others very poor, but all alike free from lofty
aspirations. They had the imperturbable tranquillity of the beggar who
desires nothing more so long as he has a crust of bread with which to
cheat hunger, and the sun to warm him. What chiefly distinguished the
Orbajosans of the Casino was a sentiment of bitter hostility toward
all strangers, and whenever any stranger of note appeared in its august
halls, they believed that he had come there to call in question the
superiority of the land of the garlic, or to dispute with it, through
envy, the incontestable advantages which nature had bestowed upon it.

When Pepe Rey presented himself in the Casino, they received him with
something of suspicion, and as facetious persons abounded in it, before
the new member had been there a quarter of an hour, all sorts of jokes
had been made about him. When in answer to the reiterated questions of
the members he said that he had come to Orbajosa with a commission to
explore the basin of the Nahara for coal, and to survey a road, they
all agreed that Senor Don Jose was a conceited fellow who wished to
give himself airs, discovering coalbeds and planning railroads. Some one
added:

"He has come to a bad place for that, then. Those gentlemen imagine that
here we are all fools, and that they can deceive us with fine words. He
has come to marry Dona Perfecta's daughter, and all that he says about
coalbeds is only for the sake of appearances."

"Well, this morning," said another, a merchant who had failed, "they
told me at the Dominguez' that the gentleman has not a peseta, and that
he has come here in order to be supported by his aunt and to see if he
can catch Rosarito."

"It seems that he is no engineer at all," added an olive-planter, whose
plantations were mortgaged for double their value. "But it is as you
say: those starvelings from Madrid think they are justified in deceiving
poor provincials, and as they believe that her