o could have no interest in
housewifes and pocket-mirrors, but amongst the visitors. A humble
peasant, with an honest, upright look in her dark eyes; a certain
patient resignation in their expression which often comes to those who
live from day to day, uncertain whether the morrow will bring fast or
feasting. She sat at the end of the large square carriage, under the
short bit of roofing. Here the magnificent surroundings were less seen,
but what mattered? She was of those to whom the realities of life mean
much more than the beauties of nature.

Next came a military policeman duly accompanied by his gun and cocked
hat, on his way to a three months' duty at Montserrat.

Thus the carriage contained a poet, who could be on occasion a Napoleon;
a man of letters, though apparently of letters limited; an armed
Government official of more or less exalted rank; a lady-merchant
representing the great world of commerce; and a humble individual who,
like Lost Lenore, shall be "nameless here for evermore;" all personally
conducted by a paid menial who neglected his duty and jeopardised the
lives of his passengers. No merit to him that the journey passed without
accident, but a great escape for ourselves.

Of this small group of Catalonians, our postman alone was of the higher
type and by far the most interesting.

"I see you are not of our country, senor," he remarked after exchanging
letter-bags at the last station. "Your interest in the journey proves
you unfamiliar with it. You may well marvel at this stupendous miracle
of nature."

"We marvel at everything. The whole scene is overpowering. And, if we
may venture to say so, you are yourself an enigma. In England we have a
proverb which speaks of a round man in a square hole; might it not
almost be applied to you?"

"In other words, you pay me the compliment of saying that I magnify my
office," quickly returned the postman. "Well, it is true that I was not
born to this, but it is not every one who has the wit to find it out. My
father was an officer in the Spanish navy, and in the navy my first
years of labour were spent. And now I am playing at postman--to such
base uses do we come. Yet is my calling honourable.

"You would ask how I fell from my high estate, and politeness withholds
the question. In reply I can only quote the old saying, _cherchez la
femme_. They say that a woman is at the bottom of all mischief, and I
believe it. On the other hand, there is no doubt t