The worthy musician, who was as fat as a hog and as red as a beet, was
slowly digesting his breakfast, while his lethargic gaze slowly wandered
over the magnificent panorama of the Mediterranean,--the Straits of
Gibraltar, the accursed rock from which they take their name, the
neighboring peaks of Anghera and Benzu, and the distant snows of the
Lesser Atlas--when he heard hasty steps on the stairs and his wife's
silvery voice crying joyfully:

"Bonifacio! Bonifacio! A letter from your uncle! And a heavy letter, too!"

"Well," answered the Chapel-master, turning around like a geographical
sphere or globe on the point on which his rotund personality rested on the
seat, "what saint can have put it into my uncle's head to remember me? I
have been living for fifteen years in this country usurped from Mohammed,
and this is the first time that Abencerrage has written to me, although I
have written to him a hundred times. Doubtless he wants me to render him
some service."

So saying, he opened the epistle, contriving so that the Pepa of the
postscript should not be able to read its contents, and the yellow
parchment, noisily unfolding itself, greeted their eyes.

"What has he sent us?" asked his wife, a native of Cadiz, and a blonde,
attractive and fresh-looking, notwithstanding her forty summers.

"Don't be inquisitive, Pepita. I will tell you what is in the letter, if I
think you ought to know, as soon as I have read it. I have warned you a
thousand times to respect my letters."