Clarence King 



moved on into a hollow of the empty 

 land and disappeared. 



Later, at the same slow pace, and 

 without a sound of footfall, followed 

 a brown and spare old shepherd, with 

 white, neglected hair falling over a 

 tattered cloak of coarse homespun. 

 His face wore a strange expression 

 of imbecile content. It was a face 

 from which not only hope but even 

 despair had faded out under the 

 burning strength of eternal monotony. 



A few short, jerky, tottering steps, 

 and he too was gone, with his crust 

 of bread and cow's horn of water, his 

 oleander-wood staff, and his vacant 

 smile of senile tranquillity. 



Then an old, shriveled parrot of a 

 woman, the only other inhabitant of 

 the posada, came from I never knew 

 where, creeping in through the open 

 portal, heavily burdened with an 

 earthen jar of water for our beasts. 

 " Buenos dias I " fell in a half-whisper 



