Vastly less picturesque than Blasco Ibanez, he is nearer the normal
Spaniard--the Spaniard who, in the long run, must erect a new structure
of society upon the half archaic and half Utopian chaos now reigning in
the peninsula. Thus his book, though it is addressed to Spaniards,
should have a certain value for English-speaking readers. And so it is
presented.

H. L. MENCKEN.




PROLOGUE

ON INTELLECTUAL LOVE

Only what is of the mind has value to the mind. Let us dedicate
ourselves without compunction to reflecting a little upon the eternal
themes of life and art. It is surely proper that an author should write
of them.

I cultivate a love which is intellectual, and of a former epoch, besides
a deafness to the present. I pour out my spirit continually into the
eternal moulds without expecting that anything will result from it.

But now, instead of a novel, a few stray comments upon my life have come
from my pen.

Like most of my books, this has appeared in my hands without being
planned, and not at my bidding. I was asked to write an autobiographical