Our Little Spanish Cousin

she did not like to think of his being away from her nearly all day. However, she was told that Fernando was a big boy now, and that before long she would be having a gove

sed himself very neatly, for he had first to be looked over by his aya, and then inspected by his mamma, to see if he could pass muster, and was clean and neat as a little Spanish gentleman should be. Mamma being

ws all about the city, and he is willing to take Fernando any place he wishes to go, provided it is a fit place for a boy of rank. He knows just where the marionettes are playing, and if there is a gay crowd on the square, a trained bear or a funny little monkey, he will be sure to have heard about it, and take Fernando to see it. If there is no special excitement, Manuel takes him to the paseo, where all the boys of the town gather. Here they play in mimic battles and bull-fights, and Fernando enters into everything with delight, until Manuel thinks it is time for the se?ora, his mother, to pass by in the carriage. How delighted the little boy is

nando well, and scolds terribly in most unchurchly language every time he approaches the cage. The French poodle, too, does not greatly care for a visit from Fernando, for the boy cannot help teasing, and the fat, stupid dog, his Aunt Isabel's darling, does nothing but lie around on silken cushions and eat comfits. Fernando likes animals, and would

wounded foot, and feed the puppy. That was all the boy dared at first, but the next day he found the dog in the same place and fed him again. Every day after that the little tramp followed him to school, and when school was over his yellow-haired dogship awaited his benefactor. Manuel winked at the friendship, and allowed Mazo, as Fernando called him, to have many a good meal at the garden gate. Manuel was a great stickler for the proprieties, but he had been a boy once, and there were some things that Fernando's lady mother would not at all have comprehended

must be mad!" and she had seemed anything but reass

entlest of beings, and he can whip any dog in the paseo,

e that his comfort depended not at all upon himself, but upon the humour of those about him. With the outside world his look was wary. With the family of his master he was apologetic. His brown eye seemed to say: "I place myself at your feet, most noble se?ors; I pray you excuse me for living." But with Fernando, while it was tempered with respect, his air was one of good-fellowship alone. Even the se?ora herself, the head of the house and authority in chief, as is the case in all Spanish households, came to regard Fernando's