The _Novena_, which was to avert the infection from the village, would have been inefficient without the presence of the _Eagle_ patroness, to whom it was dedicated. The image was, accordingly, brought down to the parish church in a solemn procession. The eldest _Missionary_--for such priests as preach, not for a display of eloquence, but the conversion of sinners, assume that title among us--having a shrill, disagreeable voice, and being apt, when he addressed the people, to work himself into a feverish excitement approaching to madness, generally devolved that duty on his brother, while he devoted himself to the confessional. The brother is, indeed, cast in the true mould of a popular preacher, such as can make a powerful impression on the lower classes of Spain. His person is strong, his countenance almost handsome, his voice more loud than pleasing. He has, in fact, all the characteristics of an Andalusian _Majo_: jet black passionate eyes, a shining bluish beard darkening his cheeks from within an inch of his long eye-lashes, and a swaggering gait which, in the expressive idiom of the country, gives such as move with it, the name of _Perdonavidas_--Life sparers, as if other people owed their lives to the mercy, or contempt of these heroes. The effects of his preaching were just what people expect on similar occasions. A Missionary feels baffled and disappointed when he is not interrupted by groans, and some part of the female audience will not go into hysterics. If he has a grain of spirit about him, such a perverse indifference nettles him into a furious passion, and he turns the insensibility of his hearers into a visible proof of their reprobate state. Thus it often happens, that, the people measuring their spiritual danger by the original dulness or incomprehensibility of the sermon, the final triumph of the missionary is in exact proportion to his absurdity. To make these wild discourses more impressive, as well as to suit the convenience of the labouring classes, they are commonly delivered after sunset. Our orator, it is true, omitted the exhibition of a soul in hell-flames, which a few years ago was regularly made from the pulpit in a transparent picture; but he worked up the feelings of the audience by contrivances less disgusting and shocking to common sense. Among others he fixed a day for collecting all the children of the town under seven years of age, before the image of the Virgin. The parents, as well as all others who had attained the age of moral responsibility, were declared to be unworthy of addressing themselves in supplication, and therefore excluded from the centre of the church, which was reserved for the throng of innocent suppliants.