At another
bookstore, I found one of those local histories which I was always
vainly trying for in other Spanish towns, and I can praise the _Historia
de Ronda par Federico Lozano Gutierrez_ as well done, and telling all
that one would ask to know about that famous city. The author's picture
is on the cover, and with his charming letter dedicating the book to his
father goes far to win the reader's heart. Outside the bookseller's a
blind minstrel was playing the guitar in the care of a small boy who was
selling, not singing, the ballads. They celebrated the prowess of Spain
in recent wars, and it would not be praising them too highly to say that
they seemed such as might have been written by a drum-major. Not that I
think less of them for that reason, or that I think I need humble myself
greatly to the historian of Ronda for associating their purchase with
that of his excellent little book. If I had bought some of the blind
minstrel's almanacs and jest-books I might indeed apologize, but ballads
are another thing.
After we left the bookseller's, our little guide asked us if we would
like to see a church, and we said that we would, and he took us into a
white and gold interior, with altar splendors out of proportion to its
simplicity, all in the charge of a boy no older than himself, who was
presently joined by two other contemporaries.
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