work into three main epochs. The first has love for its keynote; and here we find El Seductor, Sobre el Abismo, Punto-Negro, Loca de Amor, De Carne y Hueso, Duelo a Muerte, Impresiones de Arte, Incesto, La Enferma, De mi Vida, Amar a Obscuras, Bodas Trágicas, Noche de Bodas, El Lacayo, and Memorias de una Cortesana. The second epoch deals with death and mysteries, the future life, religion. (Zamacois is religious in the sense that so much of the young blood of the Latin world is religious—negatively. They think more clearly than we Anglo-Saxons, in some way, these Latins!) El Otro, El Misterio de un Hombre Pequeñito and some others fall into this epoch. The third is characterized by a wider vision, a more complete realization of the essential tragedy and irony of human life, and is tempered by the understanding that comes to all of us when graying hair and fading illusions tell us we are no longer young. Here we find Años de Miseria y de Risa, La Opinión Ajena and stories of the type of those in the present volume. Surely El Hijo and El Collar are cynical enough to rank with masterpieces of cynicism in any tongue.

Zamacois' plays are distinguished by the same dramatic, often mystic, elements that make his novels and short stories of such vital interest. The more important titles are: Teatro Galante, Nochebuena, El Pasado Vuelve, and Frio.

"Spain still dominates the whole of Spanish literature," says Zamacois. "The Latin new world has had but slight influence thereon. And Spain is fast becoming liberalized. Resurgimiento is the pass-word, all along the line. Even our women are becoming liberalized—or we are beginning to emancipate them, a little. That is highly revolutionary—for Spain! The war has flooded Spain with new ideas, not only abstract but concrete. We are getting free speech and a free press—is America winning more latitude, or shrinking to less?—and we are enforcing education. We are reviving physically. Athletic sports are coming in. These are all signs of the Renaissance, just as the new school of writers is a sign. I suppose most of the new blood is indifferent to religion. Spain has a small body of religionist fanatics, a strong minority of non-religious, intellectual élite, and a vast body of indifferent folk, slowly making progress toward enlightenment.

"Spain's misfortune is this—that you foreigners have seen in her only the picturesque, the medieval, the exotic. Spain has scientific, engineering and literary triumphs to be proud of now, as well as ivy-grown cathedrals, bull-rings and palaces. Under her old, hard carapace, new blood is leaping; it leaps from her strong heart, across half the world.

"Our real rebirth took place after the Spanish-American war, when our colonial system collapsed and we had to roll up our sleeves and support ourselves by hard work. Defeat was to us a blessing in disguise. Spain is to-day a much different and better land than it was twenty years ago. For one thing, we use more soap, these days. As the church declines, bathtubs multiply. ¿Tendré que decir más?

"A new spirit and a new life are to-day stirring in ancient Iberia. A splendid artistic and literary renaissance, vast commercial undertakings and enormous manufacturing enterprises are all developing hand in hand. Spain's past is glorious. Her future is both glorious and bright."

George Allan England.

12 Park Drive, Brookline, Mass.

CONTENTS

THEIR SON

I

AT about the age of thirty, tired of living all alone with no one to love, Amadeo Zureda got married. This Zureda was a stocky fellow, neither tall nor short, dark, thoughtful, and with a certain slow, sure way of moving. The whole essence of his face, the soul of it—to speak so—was rooted in the taciturn energy of the space between his eyebrows. There you found the man, more than in the rough black mustache which cut across his face; even more than in the thickness of his cheek-bones, the squareness of his jaws, the hard solidity of his nose. His brow was somber as an evil memory.

One after the other you might erase all the lines of that face, and so long as you left the thick-tufted brows, you would not have changed the expression of Amadeo Zureda. For there dwelt the whole spirit of the man, reserved yet ardent.

His marriage rescued Rafaela, whom he made his wife, from the slavish toil of a work-woman. Rafaela was just over eighteen, a buxom brunette with big, roguish, black eyes. Her breath was sweet, her lips vivid, her mobile hips full and inviting, like her breasts; and she had a free-and-easy,