I experienced much grave kindness and simple hospitality from the good people of Villa Seca during my sojourn amongst them. I had at this time so won their hearts by the “formality” of my behaviour and language, that I firmly believe they would have resisted to the knife any attempt which might have been made to arrest or otherwise maltreat me. He who wishes to become acquainted with the genuine Spaniard must seek him not in seaports and large towns, but in lone and remote villages, like those of the Sagra. There he will find all that gravity of deportment and chivalry of disposition which Cervantes is said to have sneered away; {198} and there he will hear, in everyday conversation, those grandiose expressions, which, when met with in the romances of chivalry, are scoffed at as ridiculous exaggerations. I had one enemy in the village—it was the curate. “The fellow is a heretic and a scoundrel,” said he one day in the conclave. “He never enters the church, and is poisoning the minds of the people with his Lutheran books. Let him be bound and sent to Toledo, or turned out of the village at least.” “I will have nothing of the kind,” said the _alcalde_, who was said to be a Carlist. “If he has his opinions, I have mine too. He has conducted himself with politeness. Why should I interfere with him? He has been courteous to my daughter, and has presented her with a volume. _Que viva_! and with respect to his being a Lutheran, I have heard say that amongst the Lutherans there are sons of as good fathers as here. He appears to me a _caballero_. He speaks well.” “There is no denying it,” said the surgeon. “Who speaks _so_ well?” shouted the _herrador_. “And who has more formality? _Vaya_! did he not praise my horse, ‘The Flower of Spain’? Did he not say that in the whole of _Inglaterra_ there was not a better? Did he not assure me, moreover, that if he were to remain in Spain he would purchase it, giving me my own price? Turn him out, indeed! Is he not of my own blood, is he not fair-complexioned? Who shall turn him out when I, ‘the one-eyed,’ say no?”