The chief fault of honest Mateo is an
over-anxiety to be useful. Conscious of having foisted himself into my
employ, and that my simple and quiet habits render his situation a
sinecure, he is at his wit's ends to devise modes of making himself
important to my welfare. I am, in a manner, the victim of his
officiousness; I cannot put my foot over the threshold of the
palace, to stroll about the fortress, but he is at my elbow, to
explain every thing I see; and if I venture to ramble among the
surrounding hills, he insists upon attending me as a guard, though I
vehemently suspect he would be more apt to trust to the length of
his legs than the strength of his arms, in case of attack. After
all, however, the poor fellow is at times an amusing companion; he
is simple-minded, and of infinite good humor, with the loquacity and
gossip of a village barber, and knows all the small-talk of the
place and its environs; but what he chiefly values himself on, is
his stock of local information, having the most marvellous stories
to relate of every tower, and vault, and gateway of the fortress, in
all of which he places the most implicit faith.
Most of these he has derived, according to his own account, from his
grandfather, a little legendary tailor, who lived to the age of nearly
a hundred years, during which he made but two migrations beyond the
precincts of the fortress. His shop, for the greater part of a
century, was the resort of a knot of venerable gossips, where they
would pass half the night talking about old times, and the wonderful
events and hidden secrets of the place.
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