The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1898-08-17

| 10 nGT-duQ L ll4AAh NA4lS Af46AAy SL6h44A
cant-the mark of a plebian quality. Hel
own expansiveness is thing withou
Emit Pretty, beautiful even. when time
| mood, and dress are favorable, She IN
| hcsitatingly eclipses her Possibilities. or
occasion, under shabby clothes, in ar
needy relative and is sparing Of neithel
time, nor fatigue. nor money in the ser
vice of innumerable pensioners, friends
in trouble, and proteges in distress.
Warm-heartedness so Spontaneous, SYM
pathy so genuine, generosity so Astounding
| it were hard to find. That her duickness
| to take offence the unreasonableness Of
her outburst of fiery temper. are in pro-
| accompany Conchita on one Of her rounds
Of mercy Is TO gain a notable insight
into the moral conditions, so to say, OF
Spanish charity-into the attitude alike of
those who give and those who receive.
She has visited families. more than once,
brother or husband or son welcomed her
with subdued and dignified courtesy, and
took with unabashed readiness-but not
in the least with beaming alarcity-the
small parcels in grocer's paper which she
concealed under her cloak. One such per-
son was an elderly man of distinguished
hands with paternal and anecuonate
gravity when she made her little offer
ings; then pace the floor with detached
and reflective stateliness, while his poor
wife, who was quite crushed. and sat
always in wrapper and uncoiffed hair
in an armchair by the window, poured
forth her griefs and cares. There were
many children, the eldest girl an inva-
lid.
1t was clearly the duty OF all those
who knew about them TO give assistance.
and in such acts Of charity one accumu-
lated for ones self the merits Of good
works, and If there were some trouble
and sacrifice involved. why. "be it for the
standpoint of the old Catholic nobility,
according to which you might almost say
some amount of pauperism was divinely
ordained not to be removed by individual
industry or effort in order that, TO the
faithful, there might be given the oppor-
tunity Of winning the salvation of their
souls through the bestowing of aims.
Conchita means TO save her soul II
she can. She has peculiar devotion TO
the Virgin of Loreto. print of whom
is always in her bed-chamber, and to
iItt cuO Ildht1o lIpulSiN6 NOWS-dIu III
this she is the Spanish bourgeoisie, again
not to eat sweets for six months. year,
if delivered from any impending calam-
fly, or danger. And how hard is the
keeping of these vows-kept with how
many slipsi For Conchita has the true
Spanish woman's fondness for dulces;
that fondness that helps prodigfously the
coarsening process to which 50 early sue
cumbs the charming pretiness of the
young girls.
Such coarsening will assurediy not
come to Guadalupe-whom her intlmates
call Dupita- She Is a grave young per-
son modest, and sweet and rare, and love
ly, and interesting, with pair of wonder
full eyes. She gives the sense of finish and
cultivation with really the slenderest
foundation of knowledge. But whatever
she knows, she knows well, and her mind
Is serious and poetic. It is charming to
hear her recite in melipea some melodious
lines of her favorite poet. The Span
iards think much of the melopea-a SOFT
Of sustained chant with an instrument
accompaniment.
Lupita has a love affair, but there are
difficulties in the way. They are such
difficulties as an American girl would
make short shrift of; but Lupita is
young Spaniard out of the pages Of Valera
or Acorn, or Echegaray, in whom the
tender passion is compound of many sub
tleties Of sentiment and duty, and religi-
Gus scruple, and complications, and timldi
ties generally. and altogether far less
matter-of-fact thing than it is with the
young woman of the United States. It is
to ba forseen that in Lupita's love affair
all may not end happily. She is of thero-
mantle type that tends from excess of emo
ton to elf-abenegation rather than
fruition. And 1t is a pity; for. soft-eyed
and altogether attractive maiden as she
now is, one does not like to imagine her
passing, in time. into the type of the
elderly. unmarried Spanish devotes. her
pretty, shy modesty turning to stiffness,
not tosay sourness.
There are saints among those ladies,
but it cannot be forgotten by anyone who
knows Spanish life that 1t is from their
ranks also that are chiefly recruited those
prim, insignificant figures that sit in the
row of women at social entertainments,
speaking little but eternally watchfuI of
any girl whom the young man makes
tirelessly weave around both an intermin-
They could not be called busy-bodies,
exactly. they are too silent and con-
strained for that They are like in
sidious acids circulating in the Spanish
social system. and were 1t not that I'M
occupied, idle women, disappointed in
youth, develop the same misunderstanding
propensities everywhere one might say
that the much talked-of and much taken
for-granted national cruelty, from which
the Spanish women are no more supposed
to be exempt than the men, might be par
ticularly pointed TO in connection win
them. So ever present and active is
their Interference that one wondered how
any love affair among two Spanish young
people ever gets itself transacted at all
Echegaray's great play Eel Gran Cal
veto" is entirely ineligible only TO those
familiar with the gallery, so 20 speak. /
relations or any sort Of relations. be-
tween the two members of the different
sexes must always unron themselves The
system OF American firta-
ton is utterly unknown 20 Spain and
seems horribly banal TO a SpanIard. There
must be no advances at all unless one
intends 10 be completely serious. And
rs the Spanish interest in SUCH matters
is unparalleled, and a girls friends and
acquaintance. TO the third and fourth
generation, are abundandy informed as
20 each and every fiuCtuation in the tide
of her romance, II is easily 20 see what
scope there is for 'murmuriugs" which
in Spanish. by a most picturesque coin
ciGence, muraciou-calumni-
Gus gossip.
one IS inclined 70 return 70 that charge
OF national cruelty. Thinking Of Con-