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Updated: June 24, 2025
They were awaiting Señor Orense, but if he did not hasten it was thought events so important would eclipse his arrival that, when he did come, the Madrileños would pay as small heed to him as the Parisians did to Hugo when he surveyed the boulevards anew after years of exile. They would honour him with a procession, and no more.
It is this habit of constant smoking that makes the Madrilenos the thirstiest people in the world; so that, alternating with the cry of "Fire, lord-lings! Matches, chevaliers!" you hear continually the drone so tempting to parched throats, "Water! who wants water? freezing water! colder than snow!"
The stage, or rather the theater, is said to be truly a passion with the Madrilenos, who go every night to see the whole or the part of a play and do not mind seeing the same play constantly, as if it were opera. They may not care to see the play so much as to be seen at it; that happens in every country; but no doubt the plays have a charm which did not impart itself from the printed page.
So that the Madrilenos may be pardoned for spending the day napping, and swarming into the breezy Prado in the light of moon and stars and gas. The Prado is ordinarily the promenade of the better classes, but every Spanish family has its John, Paul, and Peter, and the crowded barrios of Toledo and the Penue-las pour out their ragged hordes to the popular festival.
The old race-course of that time lay somewhere in the low ground outside Madrid on the course of the Manzanares; many a good gallop I have had on it, though it was abandoned and forgotten long ago by the Madrileños. A good idea of Spanish horses may be gained by a visit to the Royal Mews in Madrid.
In the reign of Alfonso VI., during one of the many war-like operations of this King, he wished to take an important and difficult fortress, and had collected all his forces to attack it the Madrileños alone were late; it was, in fact, only the day before the assault was to take place that they arrived upon the scene.
In the Madrid coffee-houses, when a dirty table was to be wiped, the cry was invariably for a Trapani, instead of a trapo, the Spanish word for a dishclout or rag used for the most unclean purposes. Since then, the Duke of Montpensier has come in for his share of insulting jests. The Madrileños got all unfounded notion that he was short-sighted, and made the most of it. Mr.
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