_Dolóres._ "With the greatest pleasure, _Caballero_, if José will play the guitar. No one plays like José, but he is tired, having travelled all day with his mules from Lanjarón." _José._ "No, señor, not tired, but I have no soul to-night to play. This morning they asked me to bring medicine from the town for Carmen, but when I reached the house she was dead. I find myself very sad." _Dolóres._ "Pero, si ya tiene su palma y su corona?" ... = but as she already has her palm and her crown? _José._ "That is true! Bring the guitar and I will see if it will quit me of this _tristeza_!" Next morning the snow prevented our leaving; and the day after, while riding away, we met some of the villagers carrying poor Carmen to the burial-ground on the mountain-side. The body, plainly robed in white, was borne on an open bier, the hands crossed and head supported on pillows, thus allowing the long unfettered hair to hang down loose below. It was an impressive and a picturesque scene, and as I rode on, the rejoinder of Dolóres came to my mind, "Ya tiene su palma y su corona." CHAPTER XXXI IN THE SIERRA NEVÁDA (_Continued_) ITS BIRD-LIFE IN SPRING-TIME The long snow-lines of the sierra had vanished behind whirling cloud-masses, black and menacing. The green avenues of the Alhambra seemed gloomier than ever under a heavy downpour, while troops of rain-soaked tourists belied the glories of an Andalucian springtide. [Illustration: "UNEMPLOYED" Bee-eaters on a wet morning.] Serins sang in the elms, and wrynecks noisily courted, as we set forth with a donkey-team for the sierra. On former occasions we had explored northwards up the Darro towards Jaën, another year up the Genil, this spring we had selected the valley of the Monachil. Hardly had we entered the mountains than thunder crackled overhead, and then a rain-burst drove us to shelter in a cave. Next day broke ominous enough, but we rode on up the wild gorge of the Monachil, and after seven hours' hill-climbing reached the alpine farm of San Gerónimo, to the guarda of which we had a recommendation. The house nestles beneath the serrated ridge of the Dornájo, 6970 feet.