The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1898-08-07
AS Lowell Saw the Dons.

President Hayes honored his admins
tration and benefited literature by
making James Russell Lowell minister
to Spain, where he served from 1877 to
1880, and until transferred to the court
of ST. James. Mr.. Lowell was discreet
enough to conf1ne his Impressions Of
the people among whom he mingled,
and whose traits he observed with
shrewd, observing Yankee eye and COM
mented upon with Yankee eagacity, to
his letters to his personal friends, and
their publication to a date after his
death. This was a precedent Mr., Han
mis- Taylor might better have observed.
Now that our touch with the Spaniard
has been closer than it has been since
Gen. Jackson bullied him in Florida
and brought Spain into a mood to sell
that possession rather than endure the
constant annoyance, Mr.. LowelPs de-
scriptionS Of the Don become more in
terestipg than when he was merely an
abstraction to u.s. In all the books
there is nothing more entertaining, by
the way, than are these letters Of a
man whom we are getting to see was
New England's best gift to the nation
in this century.
Describing life in Madrid "the moi
siest city, he ever dwelt in, with its in
cessant street cries, he says, "The first
sound in the morning is the tinkle Of
the bells on the necks of the she asses
that come in to be MIXED at the GUS
toners door foc surety" and adds with
a cut that is cruel, II know not who
1>,,t
many If there be any truth in the
vulgar belief that children take after
their nurses" Just now, with the i'm
patient Yankee temperament chatting
Under the delays made by Sagasta in
the progress Of the peace negotiations,
this from a letter to Prof. Child is
illuming:
There is something Oriental in my own
nature which sympathizes with this "Iet
her slide" temper Of the hidalgos. They go
through all forms of business, as they do
of religion, without any reference to the thing
itself, just as they offer you their house
S dating g their notes to you DE su casa
friendly and willing to be helpful where they
can. They are unenterprisng and unchange-
able. The latest accounts Of them are just
faith In DR.. Manana-he will cure everything
or, If he can't, 1t doesn't signify.
We can understand better the at
titude of Blanco and Toral and Ger
vera today, when Lowell tells us that
the Spaniards still fancy themselves
always In the age of Charles ", and
the perfect gravity with which they
assume the airs Of great power is not
without a kind Of pathetic dignity. We
all wink at the little shifts Of decay
ed gentleman, especially when he is a
Don Quixote, as this one certainly u.s."
If one recalls the sensations following
absorbed attention in some work of
fiction dealing with middle-age life as
the story ends and the book is closed
and the reader comes back to present
day life, one can appreciate the sem
sations that came to Lowell in this
transfer from busy, bustling, pushing
commercial New England life to q
land where today is an annoyance and
manana the comforting retreat These
sensations he describes in a letter to
William Dean Howells:
You can't imagine how far am away from
the world hereI mean the modern world
Spain is as primitive in some ways as the
books of Moses, and as Oriental Spaniard \
have, believe. every possible fault-aud vet
l love the jades for a. that! They find them
selves In the midst of a commercial aca
poor devils! with as little knowledge of book
keeping as the grand Turk. But there "a
something dne In this impeustrabiIity Of