that of being rather too high-minded; hence they have entertained, at different times, the most extravagant conceits.”... “Their cloaths are usually of a very dark colour, and their cloaks almost black. This shows the natural gravity of the people.”... “There are no soldiers in the whole world braver than the Spanish.” Reclus, in his estimate of the Spanish, has boldly allowed the contrasts and contradictions of Spanish character to stand side by side. They are “apathetic in daily life, but of a quick resolution, persistent courage and unwearying tenacity. They are vain, but if any one has a right to be so, they have. In spite of their pride they are simple and pleasant in their manners. They esteem themselves highly, but they are equally ready to recognize the merit of others. They are very swift and keen to lay a finger on the weak side or the vices of other people, but never bemean themselves by despising them. They have a great store of seriousness, a rare firmness of character. They are contented with their lot and are fatalists. A mixture of superstition and ignorance, common-sense, and subtle irony; they are at times ferocious, though naturally of a magnanimous generosity, fond of revenge, yet forgetting injuries, fond of equality, yet guilty of oppression.” The verdicts of modern Spanish thinkers have been mostly pessimistic.[5] Spaniards in the twentieth century have been busily occupied with analytical introspection, the result of their national misfortunes and injured pride. They prefer to speak atrociously of themselves than that foreigners should speak of them only moderately well. Señor Mallada holds[6] his countrymen to be “idle, unpractical dreamers.” In Spain, says Ángel Ganivet,[7] “there are many who have no will, _hay muchos enfermos de la voluntad_”--there is a lack of concentration, that is of persistent concentration, and a lack of proportion, of the power to consider more than one idea, more than one aspect of a question. So _Azorín_ complains that “there is plenty of insight and rapid vision, but no co-ordination of ideas or steady fulfilment or will.”[8] In a book by Ricardo León[9] we read that the Spanish are hostile to their rulers, whoever they may be, and of the evils of _el Caciquismo_. But the author sees little hope of change in a country where men live between two extremes, “two fires, two fanaticisms,” either reactionaries or demagogues; where the currents of activity and passion are unregulated, where thought is either stagnant or enmeshed in a gossamer woof of subtle distinctions, and the golden mean of common-sense is not attained. The inhabitants of Alcalá are “strong, hard, brave, and stubborn, rigorous in their virtues and their vices, violent in their loves and hates, tenacious alike of good and of evil.” To counterbalance their clear intelligence, greatheartedness, quick imagination and eloquence they have serious defects, “and especially a certain unrestfulness of spirit, a nervous irritability