_hidalgo_, who does not allow the modern use of matches in his household, and who, from the experiences of his own poverty, is not easily misled, when he visits a neighbouring _hidalgo_, by the excuses for “my wife and daughter at church.” “I see through you,” says Don Robustiano to himself, “no doubt they are hidden away in some corner of the house for lack of clothes.” But especially is the sketch entitled _El Amor de los tizones_ admirable and worthy of Cervantes. It is a description of a rustic gathering or _tertulia_ in the kitchen of one of the poor houses of a mountain village. The peasants--each of them a clearly defined character--enter one by one with the greeting, “Dios nos acompañe” or, “Dios sea aquí,” and round the log fire, the flicker of the flames lighting up their faces against the immense smoke-blackened chimney, they pray a _rosario_ for the dead, or tell stories of brigands, and witches, and enchantments. “Los hombres de pró” (originally published with “Bocetos al temple”) and “El Buey Suelto” (written in 1877) are still collections of sketches, the first of a canvassing for an election in rural parts of Spain, the second, of the miseries of bachelors, and the scenes in both are touched with Pereda’s vividness and humour. Pereda, as a novelist proper, begins with “Don Gonzalo González de la Gonzalera” (written in 1878), which describes the effects of the revolution of 1868 on a small village of the Mountain, with “De tal palo tal astilla” (1879), an answer to Pérez Galdós’ “Doña Perfecta,” “El Sabor de la Tierruca” (1882) and “Pedro Sánchez” (1883). “El Sabor de la Tierruca” (Savour of the Soil) is a whole-hearted book of the _Montaña_; its serenity is scarcely disturbed by the frequent village fights and rivalries in which the weapons are stout sticks cut from the mountain-side. The book is filled with a fresh and acrid smell of the earth and autumn scents, and has the peace of still days when not a leaf stirs, and there is no movement in the ripe and yellow maize-fields. It is a life lived and felt by the author and not superficially observed, so that there is no trace of artificiality or false sentiment in the descriptions. Cumbrales and Rinconeda are rival villages, Cumbrales lying high among orchards, Rinconeda lower down on the edge of the plain, in thick oak and chestnut woods. Rinconeda rejoices when the raging _ábrego_, the south wind, sweeps in furious gusts from the hills and ravages Cumbrales; Cumbrales rejoices when the rain turns every street of Rinconeda into a rushing torrent. The characters of the inhabitants of Cumbrales are drawn with all Pereda’s skill; Juanguirle, for instance, a rich, hard-working peasant, the simple, sensible Mayor of Cumbrales; Baldomero, who “cannot understand how doing nothing, thinking of nothing, troubling about nothing, can be unpleasant to any sensible person”; his father, Don Valentín, “hero of Luchana” and worshipper of Espartero, who, after a frugal meal, says to