you will
hear how she corroborates my tale."

He led the way, this singular old priest, whom we found not only
appreciating the beautiful, but brimming over with humour: one of those
delightfully simple, self-unconscious men, who are all sympathy and
amiability. We could but follow: down a small narrow street into a
quaint sort of _cul-de-sac_, where we came upon an exquisite trace of
Old Zaragoza.

A small fifteenth-century house, with a quaint Gothic doorway, and a
window guarded by magnificent iron-work. Touching a hidden spring, this
door opened and admitted us into a panelled passage that apparently had
not been touched for centuries. Then he turned into a wonderful old
room, black with panelled oak, some of which was vigorously and
splendidly carved.

"This is my living room," he said, "and here I am happy. I live in the
past; the fine old fifteenth-century days when men knew how to produce
the beautiful and were great in all their ideas. Here I live, and here I
hope to die."

He went to the door.

"Juanita!" he called. A distant voice answered, and in a moment a quaint
old woman dressed in black appeared upon the scene.

"Juanita, is my breakfast ready?" asked the old priest.

"Si, el canon."

"What have you prepared?"

"Two fried eggs, canonigo, flavoured with sweet herbs; bread, butter and
coffee at discretion--as usual."

"You see," laughed the priest. "There is no collusion here! Would that I
could ask you to share my frugal meal; but it is emphatically only
enough for one--and that an abstemious old canon. Now if you will come
and see me this evening or to-morrow, I shall be delighted to receive
you. I would even ask you to come and dine with me, but my dinner is as
frugal as my dejeuner. Well, for the moment we part; but you will come
again."

As we said good-bye, Juanita appeared with her fried eggs, and steaming
coffee served in a chaste silver pot that must have been at least a
hundred and fifty years old; and the old priest accompanying us to the
door, speeded us on our way with true courtesy and an old-fashioned
blessing.

[Illustration: TOWER OF LA SEO: ZARAGOZA.]

We passed from this delightful atmosphere into the modern streets of the
city, thinking how little remained of its former traces. For it goes far
back in history, even to the days of the Romans, when it was called
Caesarea Augusta; a name that in course of ages was transformed to
Zaragoza. Early in the first century it w