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THE CATHEDRAL, TOLEDO
ROMANTIC LEGENDS
OF SPAIN
ByGUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER
TRANSLATED BY
CORNELIA FRANCES BATESAND
KATHARINE LEE BATES
NEW YORKTHOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO.
PUBLISHERS
{ii}Copyright, 1909
By THOMAS Y. CROWELL & COMPANY
{iii}
DEDICATED
TO
A SHINING MEMORY
PREFACE
A WORD regarding the circumstances under which this translation was madewill be pardoned by all children of dear mothers.
Mrs. Cornelia Frances Bates (1826-1908), a graduate of Mount Holyoke inthe days of Mary Lyon and the widow of a Congregational minister, tookup the study of Spanish at the age of seventy-one. Until her death tenyears later, the proverbial ten years of “labor and sorrow,” her Spanishreadings and translations were a keen intellectual delight. Her SpanishBible, from which she had committed many passages to memory, was foundat her death no less worn than her English one. Even a few hours beforedying, she repeated in Spanish, without the failure of a syllable, theShepherd’s Psalm and the Lord’s Prayer.
So youthful was her spirit that, of the various modern Spanish workswith which she became acquainted, nothing fascinated her so much asBecquer’s strange, romantic tales. The wilder they were, the brighterwould be the eager face, under its soft white cap, bent over thefamiliar little green volumes and the great red dictionary. Seeing thepleasure she took in these legends and learning that no complete Englishtranslation existed, I suggested that we unite in a “Becquer Book.” Her{vi}full share of the work was promptly done; mine was delayed; and thevolume—whic