These admirable friends were part of the system which has made travel as
safe throughout Spain as it is in Connecticut, where indeed I sometimes
wonder that road-agents do not stop my Boston express in the waste
expanse of those certain sand barrens just beyond New Haven. The last
time I came through that desert I could not help thinking how nice it
would be to have two Guardias Civiles in our Pullman car; but of course
at the summit of the Sierra Morena, where our _rapido_ was stalled in
the deepening twilight, it was still nicer to see that soldier pair,
pacing up and down, trim, straight, very gentle and polite-looking, but
firm, with their rifles lying on their shoulders which they kept exactly
together. It is part of the system that they may use those rifles upon
any evil-doer whom they discover in a deed of violence, acting at once
as police, court of law, and executioners; and satisfying public
curiosity by pinning to the offender's coat their official certificate
that he was shot by such and such a civil guard for such and such a
reason, and then notifying the nearest authorities. It is perhaps too
positive, too peremptory, too precise; and the responsibility could not
be intrusted to men who had not satisfied the government of their
fitness by two years' service in the army without arrest for any
offense, or even any question of misbehavior. But these conditions once
satisfied, and their temperament and character approved, they are
intrusted with what seem plenary powers till they are retired for old
age; then their sons may serve after them as Civil Guards with the same
prospect of pensions in the end. I suppose they do not always travel
first class, but once their silent, soldierly presence honored our
compartment between stations; and once an officer of their corps
conversed for long with a fellow-passenger in that courteous ease and
self-respect which is so Spanish between persons of all ranks.