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Mare Nostrum (Our Sea) A Novel By: Vicente Blasco Ibáñez (1867-1928) |
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( OUR SEA ) A Novel By Vicente Blasco Ibanez AUTHOR OF "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse,"
"The Shadow of the Cathedral,"
"Blood and Sand,"
"La Bodega," etc. Authorized translation from the Spanish by Charlotte Brewster Jordan Translator of "The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" 1919 CONTENTS
CHAPTER I CAPTAIN ULYSSES FERRAGUT CHAPTER II MATER AMPHITRITE CHAPTER III PATER OCEANUS CHAPTER IV FREYA CHAPTER V THE AQUARIUM OF NAPLES CHAPTER VI THE WILES OF CIRCE CHAPTER VII THE SIN OF ULYSSES CHAPTER VIII THE YOUNG TELEMACHUS CHAPTER IX THE ENCOUNTER AT MARSEILLES CHAPTER X IN BARCELONA CHAPTER XI "FAREWELL, I AM GOING TO DIE" CHAPTER XII AHPHITRITE!... AMPHITRITE!
Mare Nostrum CHAPTER I
CAPTAIN ULYSSES FERRAGUT His first gallantries were with an empress. He was ten years old, and
the empress six hundred. His father, Don Esteban Ferragut third quota of the College of
Notaries had always had a great admiration for the things of the past.
He lived near the cathedral, and on Sundays and holy days, instead of
following the faithful to witness the pompous ceremonials presided over
by the cardinal archbishop, used to betake himself with his wife and
son to hear mass in San Juan del Hospital , a little church sparsely
attended the rest of the week. The notary, who had read Walter Scott in his youth, used to gaze on the
old and turreted walls surrounding the church, and feel something of
the bard's thrills about his own, his native land. The Middle Ages was
the period in which he would have liked to have lived. And as he trod
the flagging of the Hospitolarios , good Don Esteban, little, chubby,
and near sighted, used to feel within him the soul of a hero born too
late. The other churches, huge and rich, appeared to him with their
blaze of gleaming gold, their alabaster convolutions and their jasper
columns, mere monuments of insipid vulgarity. This one had been erected
by the Knights of Saint John, who, united with the Templars, had aided
King James in the conquest of Valencia. Upon crossing the covered passageway leading from the street to the
inner court, he was accustomed to salute the Virgin of the Conquest, an
image of rough stone in faded colors and dull gold, seated on a bench,
brought thither by the knights of the military order. Some sour orange
trees spread their branching verdure over the walls of the church, a
blackened, rough stone edifice perforated with long, narrow,
window like niches now closed with mud plaster. From the salient
buttresses of its reinforcements jutted forth, in the highest parts,
great fabled monsters of weather beaten, crumbling stone. In its only nave was now left very little of this romantic exterior.
The baroque taste of the seventeenth century had hidden the Gothic arch
under another semi circular one, besides covering the walls with a coat
of whitewash. But the medieval reredos, the nobiliary coats of arms,
and the tombs of the Knights of Saint John with their Gothic
inscriptions still survived the profane restoration, and that in itself
was enough to keep up the notary's enthusiasm. Moreover the quality of the faithful who attended its services had to
be taken into consideration. They were few but select, always the same.
Some of them would drop into their places, gouty and relaxed, supported
by an old servant wearing a shabby lace mantilla as though she were the
housekeeper. Others would remain standing during the service holding up
proudly their emaciated heads that presented the profile of a fighting
cock, and crossing upon the breast their gloved hands, always in black
wool in the winter and in thread in the summer time. Ferragut knew all
their names, having read them in the Trovas of Mosen Febrer, a
metrical composition in Provençal, about the warriors that came to the
neighborhood of Valencia from Aragon, Catalunia, the South of France,
England and remote Germany. At the conclusion of the mass, the imposing personages would nod their
heads, saluting the faithful nearest them... Continue reading book >>
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