From The Spanish.

In an empire whose name history has failed to record, there lived in a miserable stable a poor laborer and his wife. Juan and Ramona were their names, though Juan was better known by the nickname “Under present circumstances,” which they gave him because in season or out of season that phrase was continually dropping from his lips. Juan and Ramona were so wretchedly poor that they would have had no roof to cover them unless a laborer of the province of Micomican had taken pity upon them, and given them a hut to live in, which in other days had served as a stable, and was now his property.

“We are badly enough off in a stable,” said Juan: “but we ought to conform ourselves with our lot, since under present circumstances God, though he was God, lived in a stable when he made himself man.”

“You are right,” replied Ramona.

So both worked away, if not happy, at least resigned—Juan in going out day after day to gain his daily reward of a couple of small pieces of money, and Ramona in taking care of the house, if house be a proper term to apply to a stable.

The emperor was very fond of living in the country, and had many palaces of different kinds in the province of Micomican. One day Juan was working in a kitchen garden near the road, when far away he saw the carriage of the emperor coming at a rate almost equal to that of a soul that the devil was trying to carry off.

“I'll bet you,” said Juan, “that the horses have escaped from his majesty, and some misfortune is going to happen! It would be a great pity, for under present circumstances an emperor is worth an empire.”

Juan was not mistaken. The emperor's horses had escaped, and the emperor was yelling:

“God take pity on me! I'm going to break my neck over one of those precipices! Isn't there a son of a gun to save me? To whoever throws himself at the head of these confounded horses, I'll give whatever he asks, though it be the very shirt on my back.”

But no one dared throw himself at the horses' heads; for they tore along at such a furious rate that to rush at them was to rush into eternity.

Juan, enraged at the cowardice of the other workmen, and moved by his love for the emperor as well as his natural propensity to do good without looking at the person to whom he did it, threw himself at the horses' heads, and succeeded in stopping the coach, to the admiration of the emperor himself, who at that moment would not have given a brass farthing for his life.

“Ask whatever you like,” said the emperor to him, “for everything appears to me small as a recompense to the man who has rendered me so signal a service.”

“Sire!” said Juan to him, “I, under present circumstances, am a poor day laborer, and the day that I don't gain a couple of pesetas my wife [pg 123] and I have to fast. So, if your majesty will only assure me my day's labor whether it rains or whether it is fine weather, my wife and I will sing our lives away in happiness, for we are people content with very little.”

“That's pretty clear. Well, go along, it's granted. The day that you have nothing to do anywhere else, go to one of my palaces, whichever you like, and occupy yourself there in whatever way you please.”

“Thank you, sire!”

“What! No; no reason for thanks, man. That is a mere nothing.”

The emperor went on his road happy enough, and Juan went on his, thinking of the great joy he was about to give his wife when he returned home at night, and told her that he had his day's work secured for the rest of his life whether it rained or was fine weather.

In fact, his wife was greatly rejoiced when he carried her the good news. They supped, and went to bed in peace and in the grace of God, and Juan slept like one of the blessed; but Ramona passed the whole night turning about in the bed like one who has some trouble or desire that will not let him sleep.

“Do you know what I have been thinking the whole night long, Juan?” said Ramona, the following morning.

“What?”

“That yesterday you were a fool to ask so little from the emperor.”

“Indeed! What more had I to ask?”

“That he would give us a little house to live in, something more suitable and decent than this wretched stable.”

“You are right, woman; but now there is no help for it.”

“Perhaps there may be.”

“How?”

“Look here; go and see the emperor, and ask him.”

“Yes; now is the time to go on such an errand!”

“Go you shall, and quickly, too!”

“But, woman, don't get angry. My goodness! what a temper you have! Well, well; I will go, and God grant his majesty does not send me off with a flea in my ear, although, under present circumstances, he is a very open-hearted, outspoken gentleman.”

Well, Juan set out for the palace of the emperor; and the emperor granted him an audience immediately on his arrival.

“Hallo, Juan!” said his majesty. “What brings you this way, man?”

“Sire!” replied Juan, twirling and twirling the hat which he held in his hand, “my wife, under present circumstances, is as good as gold; but, you see, the stable that we live in is gone to rack and ruin, and we wish to get it out of our sight. So she said to me this morning: ‘If your majesty, who is so kind, would only give us a little house, something better than the one we have, who dare sneeze at us then?’ ”

“Does your wife want nothing more than that? Well, it's granted. This very moment I will give orders that they place the little white house at her disposal. Go into the dining-room, and take a mouthful and a drop of something; and, instead of going afterwards to the stable, go to the little white house, and there you will find your wife already installed.”

Juan returned thanks to the emperor for his latest kindness, and, passing on to the dining-room, filled himself with ham and wine.

Our friend commenced his journey home, and, when he arrived at the white house, his wife rushed out to receive him with tears of joy.

And indeed it was very natural [pg 124] for poor Ramona to find herself so merry, for the little white house was a perfect jewel. It occupied the summit of a gentle acclivity, whence the whole beauty of the plain was spread out before it. A large Muscatel vine covered the whole of the porch, and beneath it there were seats and little plots of pinks and roses. The apartments of the house were a little drawing-room, very white, and clean, and pretty, with its chairs, its cupboard, and its looking-glass; an alcove with its bed, so soft and clean and beautiful that the emperor himself might have slept in it; a little kitchen with all its requirements, among which were included the utensils, which shone like gold; and a little bewitching dining-room, with four chairs, a table, and a sideboard. To the dining-room there was a fairy entrance, adorned without by an arc of flowers, and through this entrance you passed into a garden, where there were fruits, and flowers, and vegetables, and a small army of chickens clucked; and every egg they laid was as big as Juan's fist.

When night came on, Juan and Ramona took their supper like a couple of princes in their little dining-room, and soon after laid them down in their beautiful bed. They both slept well, particularly Juan, who stirred neither hand nor foot the whole night through.

Ramona began to find fault the very next day, and Juan noticed that every night her sleep was more disturbed.

“Woman, what the devil is the matter with you, that all night long you are twisting like a reel?” asked Juan, one morning. “Why, there are no fleas here as there were in the stable.”

“Fleas hinder my sleep very little.”

“Well, then, what hinders it, woman?”

“What hinders it? Your stupidity in asking the emperor so little hinders it.”

“In the name of the Father, and of the Son!... And you still think it little that I have asked, and he granted us?”

“Yes, indeed I do. This little house is so small that one can scarcely turn in it; and if to-morrow or some other day we have children, what shall we do with them in a hut like this?”

“Say what you like about it, there is no help for it now.”

“Perhaps there may be.”

“And how, I should like to know?”

“Going back and seeing his majesty, and telling him to give us a larger house, of course.”

“Go to Jericho, woman. You don't catch me going on an errand of that kind!”

“Well, go you shall, then; or we'll see who is master here.”

“But, wife, don't you see that my very face would drop from me with shame?”

“Now, that's enough of talk on the matter. All you have to do is, run along to the palace as fast as you can, if you care to have a quiet time of it.”

“Well, well; since you wish it, I'll go.”

Juan, who did not possess an ounce of will of his own—a thing which is the greatest misfortune that can befall a husband who is not blessed with such a wife as God ordained for him—set out once more on his road towards the palace of the emperor.

“Indeed,” said he to himself, with more fear than shame, “it is very possible he will send me down-stairs head foremost, because it is only natural that this abuse of his good-nature will prove too much, even for him. [pg 125] And it will serve me right for my unfortunate weakness of character.”

Juan's fears were not realized. So soon as he sought an audience with his majesty it was granted, and the emperor asked him, with a smiling face:

“How goes it at the little white house?”

“Not badly, sire!”

“And your wife, how does she find herself there?”

“Not badly, sire, but your majesty knows what the women are. Give 'em an inch, they'll take an ell. My wife, under present circumstances, hasn't a flaw in her; but she says that, if to-morrow or the day after we have youngsters, we shall all be crowded there like bees in a bottle.”

“You are right. So she wants, of course, a house a little larger?”

“You've just hit it, sire!”

“Well, turn into the dining-room till they give you a snack of something; and, instead of returning to the white house, go to the Azure Palace, where you will find your wife installed with the attendance befitting those who live in a palace.”

Juan returned the emperor thanks for his great goodness, and, after stuffing himself till he looked like a ball in the dining-room, off he set, as happy as could be, to the Azure Palace, which was one of those that the emperor had in that district.

The Azure Palace was neither very large nor furnished with great wealth; but it was very beautiful and adorned with becoming elegance. A servant in livery received Juan at the door and conducted him to the apartment of the lady. The lady was Ramona, whom her maid had just finished dressing in one of the beautiful robes which she found in her new dwelling. Juan could do nothing but open his mouth and stare in amazement at seeing his wife in such majestic attire.

Juan and Ramona feared they would go mad when they found themselves lords of a palace, well fitted, elegant, and waited on by four servants: namely, a coachman, a footman, a maid, and a cook.

“Take off that clown's dress,” said Ramona to Juan. “Aren't you ashamed to show yourself in such a trim before our own servants?”

“This is a new start,” said Juan, astonished at the sally of his wife. “So I, who, under present circumstances, have passed all my life in digging the earth, and things even worse than that, must feel ashamed of the clothes I have worn all my life long!”

“But, you stupid head,” replied Ramona, “if you have costume corresponding to your rank, why didn't you put it on?”

“My rank!... Come, this woman's head is turned.”

“Juan, go to your apartment and change your things, and don't try my patience so much, for you know already that my temper will not stand too great a trial.”

“Well, there's no need to put yourself out, woman. Here I'm going now,” said Juan, turning to the room from which he saw Ramona come out.

“Blockhead!” said she, catching hold of him and showing him another room, “this apartment is mine, and that is yours.”

“Hallo! this is another surprise. So my wife's room is not mine also?”

“No; that is only among common folk; but in people of our rank no.”

Juan gave up the dispute, and, entering the room which she had pointed out as his, found therein a wardrobe with a quantity of fine [pg 126] changes befitting a gentleman, and came out again transformed into a milord.

There passed fifteen days since Juan and Ramona came to live in the Azure Palace, and Ramona grew day by day more captious, and slept less and less every night.

“What the deuce ails you? One would think the ants were at you,” said Juan to her, one morning.

“What ails me is that I have the biggest fool for a husband that ever ate bread.”

“Hey for the sweet tempers! So you are not yet content with the sweet little fig that your husband gathered for you?”

“No, sir, I am not. One must be a dolt like you to content herself with what we have, when we might have much more only for the asking.”

“But, woman alive, have you lost your senses? Can the emperor grant us more than he has granted us, or do we need more to make us happy?”

“Yes, he can give us more, and we need it.”

“Explain yourself, and the devil take the explanation, for you're going to drive me mad with your ambition.”

“Explain myself! I'll explain myself, and very clearly, too; for, thank God, there are no hairs on my tongue to prevent me speaking to anybody, even to the emperor himself. To make you happy, all that is wanting is what common folk want—a good table where you may stuff yourself with turkey all the day long; but for us who have higher aims, we want something more than chunks of meat and wine that would make an ox dance a hornpipe. You can swell yourself out and look big when you walk out here, and hear them calling you Don Juan; but as for me, I could eat myself with rage when they call me DoÑa Ramona.”

“Well, and isn't it better for them to call us that than Juan and Ramona, as they used to call us before? What more do you want, woman?”

“I want them to call me lady marchioness.”

“Have you lost your ears, Ramona? Now I tell you, and tell you again, that that wicked ambition of yours has deprived you of your senses.”

“Look here, Juan, you and I are not going into disputes and obstinacy. You know me well enough already, or if you don't you ought to, to be certain that it doesn't take long for my nose to itch. I want to be no less than the Marchioness of Radishe and the Countess of Cabbidge, who at every turn fill their mouths with their grand titles, and, when they meet one, don't seem to have time to say with their drawling affectation, ‘Adios, DoÑa Ramona.’ Now, since the emperor has told you, when you saved his life, that you might ask him even for the shirt that he had on his back, go and see him, and ask him to make us Marquises.”

“Go and ask him if he has a head on his shoulders, why don't you say? But there's enough about it. Even in fun I don't like to hear such nonsense.”

“Juan, don't provoke me; take care that I don't send you with a flea in your ear.”

“But, woman alive, however much of your husband's breeches you may wear, could you even imagine that I was going to agree to this new start of yours?”

“I bet you, you will agree.”

“I tell you I am not going again to see the emperor.”

“Go you shall, though you have to go on your head.”

“But, wife, don't be a fool—”