convulsions and impregnable calm; the germs of all good and all bad in
her; a woman sublimated. Every husk of tradition has fallen from her."

Once, as she passed Estenega, her eyes met his. They lit with a glance
of recognition, then the lids drooped and she floated on. He left the
room; and when he returned she sat on a window-seat, surrounded by
caballeros, as calm and as pale as when he had commanded her to dance.
He did not approach her, but, joined me at the upper end of the sala,
where I stood with Alvarado, the Castros, Don Thomas Larkin, the
United States Consul, and a half-dozen others. We were discussing
Chonita's interpretation of El Son.

"That was a strange outbreak for a Spanish girl," said Señor Larkin.

"She is Chonita Iturbi y Moncada," said Castro, severely. "She is like
no other woman, and what she does is right."

The consul bowed. "True, coronel. I have seen no one here like Doña
Chonita. There is a delicious uniformity about the Californian women:
so reserved, shrinking yet dignified, ever on their guard. Doña
Chonita changed so swiftly from the typical woman of her race to an
houri, almost a bacchante,--only an extraordinary refinement of nature
kept her this side of the line,--that an American would be tempted to
call her eccentric."

Alvarado lifted his hand and pointed through the window to the stars.
"The golden coals in the blue fire of heaven are not higher above
censure," he said.

Doña Modeste raised her eyebrows. "Coals are safest when burned on