some coveted treasure. It may be an ordinary toy, a drum, a horn, or
it may be a Holy Manger, Shepherds, The Wise Men, or even a Star of
the East.

It is hard to keep one's purse closed among such a surfeit of tempting
articles, and everywhere money flows freely from hand to hand,
although the Spanish are usually very frugal.

As the bells clang out the hour of midnight, you will hurry to join
the throng wending its way to the nearest church, where priests in
their gorgeous robes,--some of them worn only on this occasion and
precious with rare embroidery and valuable jewels,--perform the
midnight or cock-crow mass, and where the choir and the priests chant
a sweet Christmas hymn together. What if it is late when the service
ends? Christmas Eve without dancing is not to be thought of in Spain.
So you go forth to find a group of Gipsy dancers who are always on
hand to participate in this great festival; or you watch the graceful
Spanish maiden in her fluffy skirts of lace, with her deep pointed
bodice, a bright flower in her coal-black hair beside the tall comb,
and her exquisitely shaped arms adorned with heavy bracelets. "Oh,
what magnificent eyes! What exquisite long lashes!" you exclaim to
yourself. See her poise an instant with the grace of a sylph, one
slippered foot just touching the floor, then click, click, sound the
castanets, as they have sounded for upwards of two thousand years and
are likely to do for two thousand more, for their inspiriting click
seems necessary to move Spanish feet and give grace to the uplifted
arms. At first she may favor you with the energetic _fandango_, or the
butterfly-like _bolero_, but on Christmas Eve the _Jota_ is the
universal favorite. It is danced and sung to music which has been
brought down to the present time unwritten, and which was passed from