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Updated: May 13, 2025
Some idea of the social life in Madrid at this time can be obtained from the following charming description of an afternoon ride in one of the city parks, written in September, 1853, by Madame Calderon de la Barca: "This beautiful paseo, called Las Delicias de Ysabel Segunda, had been freshly watered.
"Thou dost not ask of the races, O thou indifferent one! What is the trouble, my Ysabel? Will no one bring the pearls? The loveliest girl in all the Californias has said, 'I will wed no man who does not bring me a lapful of pearls, and no one has filled the front of that pretty flowered gown. But have reason, niña.
"'At Santa Ysabel del Mar, where your feet would often pass." The priest repeated this final sentence aloud, without being aware of it. "Those are the last words he ever spoke," said the stranger, "except bidding good-bye to me." "You knew him well, then?" "No; not until after he was hurt. I'm the man he quarrelled with." The priest looked at the ship that would sail onward this afternoon.
The men begged the governor Dona Ysabel Barreto to take them out of the country. All agreed to embark, and by the mercy of God, we left this port on Saturday, the eighteenth of the said month, and sailed southwest by west toward the island of San Cristoval or rather in search of it, to see whether we could find it or the almiranta, in accordance with the governor's orders.
"She sent me word by Doña Juana that she could not make herself ready in time to come with me, but would follow with my good friend, Don Antonio, who of course had to wait for her. Her gown was not finished, I believe. I think she had done something naughty, and Doña Juana had tried to punish her, but had not succeeded. The old lady looked very sad. Ah, here is Doña Ysabel now!"
They came and went, resided in the populous kennels, or lived obscurely in the recesses of the house after the fashion of Toots, the Japanese pug, or Ysabel, the Mexican hairless, strange creatures that rarely put nose out of doors or set foot to ground.
At Santa Ysabel del Mar the season was at one of those moments when the air rests quiet over land and sea. The old breezes were gone; the new ones were not yet risen. The flowers in the mission garden opened wide; no wind came by day or night to shake the loose petals from their stems. Along the basking, silent, many-colored shore gathered and lingered the crisp odors of the mountains.
But she drew back and shook her head. He exclaimed impatiently, but would not release her hand. "Thou meanest that, Ysabel?" "We shall be married soon wait." "I had hoped you would grant me that. For when I tell you where I got those pearls you may drive me from you in spite of your promise drive me from you with the curse of the devout woman on your lips.
At Santa Ysabel del Mar they whispered, "The padre is getting sick." Yet he rode a great deal over the hills by himself, and down the canyon very often, stopping where he had sat with Gaston, to sit alone and look up and down, now at the hills above, and now at the ocean below.
"Señorita," he said, as he led Ysabel out to the sweet monotonous music of the contradanza, "did you see the caballero who rode with me to-day?" A red light rose to Ysabel's cheek. "Which one, commandante? Many rode with you." "I mean him who rode at my right, the winner of the races, Vicente, son of my old friend Juan Bautista de la Vega y Arillaga, of Los Angeles." "It may be.
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