The Devil’s Rosebush

The Devil’s Rosebush
(El rosal del diablo)
by Pedro Escamilla

– I –

If we are to credit old legends and local traditions, Germany is one of the countries the devil visits most.

This is not to attack the goodness of its inhabitants; the Spirit of Darkness no doubt has his preferences, which we need to respect.

Indeed, there’s hardly a German legend without the devil playing the protagonist. And it’s said that this is a country that holds to its traditions.

In some legends, he’s seen acting out a comedy with humble mountain people; at other times, an epic romance with the inhabitants of ancient castles.

The devil is everywhere.

A Ripper of Yesteryear (Parts III and IV)

A Ripper of Yesteryear
(Un destripador de antaño)
Parts III and IV
by Emilia Pardo Bazán

(Read Part II here)

– III –

In that back room of the apothecary shop, where, according to the authoritative account of Jacoba de Alberte, no human being entered, Don Custodio was in the habit most nights of having a chat with a canon of the Holy Metropolitan Church, a fellow student of pharmaceutical arts, an older man, dry as a piece of kindling, with a ready smile and a great fondness for tobacco. He was the constant friend and intimate confidant of Don Custodio, and if the horrendous crimes that the common people attributed to the apothecary were true, no one would be more appropriate to keep the secret of such abominations than the Canon Don Lucas Llorente, who was the quintessence of mystery and of concealment from the masses.

A Ripper of Yesteryear (Part II)

A Ripper of Yesteryear
(Un destripador de antaño)
Part II
by Emilia Pardo Bazán

(Read Part I here)

– II –

One day more dismay than ever fell upon the millers’ shack. The fatal deadline had come: the end of the lease, and either they paid the landlord, or they would see themselves evicted from the property, with neither a roof to shelter them nor land to cultivate the cabbage for their soup. And both the good-for-nothing Juan Ramon and the diligent Pepona alike professed for that parcel of land the mindless affection that they would hardly profess for their son, the fruit of their loins. To leave that place seemed to them worse than going to the grave; for the latter, in the end, must happen to all mortals, while the former doesn’t occur save for the unforeseen hardships of bad luck. Where would they find the money? There probably wasn’t in all the region the two onzas that amounted to the rent for the place. In that year of misery, Pepona calculated, one wouldn’t find two onzas except in the poor box or St. Minia’s collection plate. But the priest surely would have two onzas, and plenty more, sewn into his mattress or buried in the vegetable garden.

A Ripper of Yesteryear (Part I)

A Ripper of Yesteryear
(Un destripador de antaño)
Part I
by Emilia Pardo Bazán

The legend of “The Ripper,” the half-sage, half-sorcerer assassin, is a very old one in my homeland. I heard it at a tender age, whispered or chanted in frightful refrains, perhaps by my old nursemaid at the edge of my cradle, perhaps in the rustic kitchen, in the gathering of the farmhands, who told it with shudders of fear or dark laughter. It appeared to me again, like one of Hoffman’s phantasmagoric creations, in the dark and twisted alleys of a town that until recently remained tinged with medieval colors, as if there were still pilgrims in the world, and the hymn of Ultreja still resounded below the vaults of the cathedral. Later, the clamor of the newspapers, the vile panic of the ignorant multitude, made the story spring forth again in my imagination, tragic and ridiculous as Quasimodo, hunchbacked with all the humps that disfigure blind Terror and infamous Superstition. I will tell it to you. Enter valiantly with me into the shadowy regions of the soul.

The Convalescents’ Tea

The Convalescents’ Tea
(El té de las convalecientes)
by Emilia Pardo Bazán

They were still a bit frail, with a touch of haze in their dull eyes; but already they were eager to jump back in the ring and enjoy their youth. They had seen the terror of death up close, and it seemed miraculous to have escaped its clutches.

They were young ladies of the best society, with laughing and lively futures of unlimited promise, surprised in the middle of their lives of pleasant frivolities and hopes of love and happiness by the terrible epidemic, which chose its victims from those in the prime of life, as if it scorned the elderly, death’s sure and soon prey. Some had suffered bronchopneumonia, with its delirium and cruel suffocation; others had vomited blood by the mouthful; yet others began to show symptoms of meningitis….

And just as it seemed they were about to cross the black door and the mysterious river that sleeps between banks lined with asphodel and henbane, whose waters fall from the oar without any echo, the evil began to recede, normality was reappearing. The interesting little patients bloomed again, so to speak — not with all the vitality that one would want, but like those languid and drooping roses that slowly revive in a tall glass of water.

Godmother Death

Godmother Death
(La madrina)
by Emilia Pardo Bazán

When his second son was born, puny and barely breathing, the father looked down at the child in fury, for he had dreamed of a lineage of sturdy sons. And when the boy’s mother exclaimed — optimistic, as all mothers are — “We must find him a godmother,” the father growled:

“Godmother! Godmother! Death will be his godmother… if he lives!”

Convinced the baby would not survive, the father allowed the baptism day to arrive without stopping his wife from bringing their son to the font. In such cases, it’s good luck to invite the first person who comes along to be the godparent. So that’s what they did, when at dusk of a December day they went to the parish church.

Thrasyllus and Charite

Thrasyllus and Charite
Lucius Apuleius
From The Golden Ass, Book VIII
Translated by A. S. Kline

Mad Desire

At cockcrow, a young man, apparently a servant of Lady Charite, she who had shared my suffering among the robbers, arrived from the nearby town. Sitting beside the fire amongst a crowd of his fellow-servants, he had a strange and terrible tale to tell, of her death and the ruin of her whole house:

‘Grooms, shepherds and herdsmen too, our Charite is no more: my poor mistress, and not alone, has joined the shades, in a dreadful disaster. I want you to know all, so I’ll relate what happened, in order: events that deserve to be recorded by some historian, more gifted than I, whom Fortune has blessed with a more stylish pen.

In the town nearby lived a young man of noble birth, whose wealth was equal to his status. But he was a devotee of the taverns, spending his time each day whoring and drinking, consorting with gangs of thieves and even staining his hands with human blood. Thrasyllus was his name. Such were the facts as Rumour relates.

Murder in Chaeronea

Excerpt from Cimon

Peripoltas the prophet, having brought the King Opheltas, and those under his command, from Thessaly into Boeotia, left there a family, which flourished a long time after; the greater part of them inhabiting Chaeronea, the first city out of which they expelled the barbarians. The descendants of this race, being men of bold attempts and warlike habits, exposed themselves to so many dangers in the invasions of the Mede, and in battles against the Gauls, that at last they were almost wholly consumed.

There was left one orphan of this house, called Damon, surnamed Peripoltas, in beauty and greatness of spirit surpassing all of his age, but rude and undisciplined in temper. A Roman captain of a company that wintered in Chaeronea became passionately fond of this youth, who was now pretty nearly grown a man. And finding all his approaches, his gifts, his entreaties, alike repulsed, he showed violent inclinations to assault Damon.

Tales of Mysterious Dreams

Two Dream Tales from Cicero

Excerpt from On Divination, Book I

And who, pray, can make light of the two following dreams which are so often recounted by Stoic writers? The first one is about Simonides, who once saw the dead body of some unknown man lying exposed and buried it. Later, when he had it in mind to go on board a ship he was warned in a vision by the person to whom he had given burial not to do so and that if he did he would perish in a shipwreck. Therefore he turned back and all the others who sailed were lost.

The second dream is very well known and is to this effect: Two friends from Arcadia who were taking a journey together came to Megara, and one traveller put up at an inn and the second went to the home of a friend. After they had eaten supper and retired, the second traveller, in the dead of the night, dreamed that his companion was imploring him to come to his aid, as the innkeeper was planning to kill him. Greatly frightened at first by the dream he arose, and later, regaining his composure, decided that there was nothing to worry about and went back to bed.

A Virtuoso’s Collection

A Virtuoso’s Collection
by Nathaniel Hawthorne (1842)
Annotated

The other day, having a leisure hour at my disposal, I stepped into a new museum, to which my notice was casually drawn by a small and unobtrusive sign: “To Be Seen Here, A Virtuoso’s Collection.” Such was the simple yet not altogether unpromising announcement that turned my steps aside for a little while from the sunny sidewalk of our principal thoroughfare. Mounting a sombre staircase, I pushed open a door at its summit, and found myself in the presence of a person, who mentioned the moderate sum that would entitle me to admittance.

“Three shillings, Massachusetts tenor,” said he. “No, I mean half a dollar, as you reckon in these days.”

While searching my pocket for the coin I glanced at the doorkeeper, the marked character and individuality of whose aspect encouraged me to expect something not quite in the ordinary way. He wore an old-fashioned great-coat, much faded, within which his meagre person was so completely enveloped that the rest of his attire was undistinguishable. But his visage was remarkably wind-flushed, sunburnt, and weather-worn, and had a most, unquiet, nervous, and apprehensive expression. It seemed as if this man had some all-important object in view, some point of deepest interest to be decided, some momentous question to ask, might he but hope for a reply. As it was evident, however, that I could have nothing to do with his private affairs, I passed through an open doorway, which admitted me into the extensive hall of the museum.