CHAPTER XXIII 



ViLLARTA, April 12. 



On leaving La Torre, our road lay through Cozar, and 

 then across a plain covered with young wheat. Towards 

 noon we reached Cubillas, a very ruinous village. Entering 

 it, we asked our way to the posada ; and as we went on, we 

 heard one of the persons we had asked say to the other, 

 " There go two Andaluzes." This is the first time we have 

 been taken for Spaniards after opening our mouths. Here 

 we baited, and ordered a potato-omelette. In cooking it, the 

 old posadera^ not having sufficient nerve to toss the omelette 

 (a dexterous manoeuvre, by which it performs a somersault 

 in the air and lights in the frying-pan the other way up), 

 appealed to her daughter. 



This young lady, who was one or the most beautiful 

 women we have seen in the Peninsula, set down the tambour- 

 frame, on which she was embroidering some fine linen, rose 

 with that majestic and queenly air which the supremacy of 

 loveliness seldom fails to give a woman of whatever rank, 

 and tossed it quite in a manner to give one an appetite. 

 She had a fine figure, rather tall ; delicately regular features, 

 large dark-fringed eyes, and a splendid mass of hair looped 

 up in glossy folds behind her neck. 



Both Harry and myself fell in love at first sight. We 

 ate our luncheon, and then I seated myself beside her in 

 the chimney-corner. 



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