_Gypsy Mother_.—Then return to your own country, my _Caloró_, the _chabí_ can cross the _pañí_. Would she not do business in London with the rest of the _Caloré_? Or why not go to the land of the _Corahai_? In which case I would accompany you; I and my daughter, the mother of the _chabí_. _Myself_.—And what should we do in the land of the _Corahai_? It is a poor and wild country, I believe. _Gypsy Mother_.—The London _Caloró_ asks me what we could do in the land of the _Corahai_! _Aromali_! I almost think that I am speaking to a _lilipendi_. Are there not horses to _chore_? Yes, I trow there are, and better ones than in this land, and asses and mules. In the land of the _Corahai_ you must _hokkawar_ and _chore_ even as you must here, or in your own country, or else you are no _Caloró_. Can you not join yourselves with the black people who live in the _despoblados_? Yes, surely; and glad they would be to have among them the _Errate_ from Spain and London. I am seventy years of age, but I wish not to die in this _chim_, but yonder, far away, where both my _roms_ are sleeping. Take the _chabí_, therefore, and go to _Madrilati_ to win the _parné_, and when you have got it, return, and we will give a banquet to all the _Busné_ in Merida, and in their food I will mix _drao_, and they shall eat and burst like poisoned sheep. . . . And when they have eaten we will leave them, and away to the land of the Moor, my London _Caloró_. During the whole time that I remained at Merida I stirred not once from the house; following the advice of Antonio, who informed me that it would not be convenient. My time lay rather heavily on my hands, my only source of amusement consisting in the conversation of the women, and in that of Antonio when he made his appearance at night. In these _tertulias_ the grandmother was the principal spokeswoman, and astonished my ears with wonderful tales of the land of the Moors, prison escapes, thievish feats, and one or two poisoning adventures, in which she had been engaged, as she informed me, in her early youth. There was occasionally something very wild in her gestures and demeanour; more than once I observed her, in the midst of much declamation, to stop short, stare in vacancy, and thrust out her palms as if endeavouring to push away some invisible substance; she goggled frightfully with her eyes, and once sank back in convulsions, of which her children took no farther notice than observing that she was only _lilí_, and would soon come to herself. Late in the afternoon of the third day, as the three women and myself sat conversing as usual over the _brasero_, a shabby-looking fellow in an old rusty cloak walked into the room. He came straight up to the place where we were sitting, produced a paper cigar, which he lighted at a coal, and taking a whiff or two, looked at me: “_Carracho_,” said he, “who is this companion?”