Identifier: meccasofworldpla01cran (find matches)
Title: The meccas of the world; the play of modern life in New York, Paris, Vienna, Madrid and London
Year: 1913 (1910s)
Authors: Cranston, Ruth
Subjects:
Publisher: New York, John Lane company
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: Sloan Foundation

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e, and scarlet while she dances. Her fine longfeet are arched and curved into a thousand differentposes; her body the mere casing for a spirit of flameand mystery; her face the shadow curtain of infiniteexpression, infinite light. And while her castanets are sounding every shadeof rhythm and seduction, and her white long armsare swaying to and fro—in the ancient Jota, or theOle AndaluZj or perhaps in the Sevillana, or theMalaguena—the dance of her particular city; whilemens throats grow hoarse with shouting bravos andwomens eyes dim with staring at such grace, therelives before one not La Goya, La Argentina, PastoraImperia—not the idol favourite of the hour, but some-thing more wonderful and less substantial: the ghostof old Spain. It flits before one there, in its proudglory; its beauty, its passion, and its power; baringthe soul of half of it—the woman soul, that is. And when one looks beyond her fire and lovelydignity, over her shoulder peers the cool, dark face ofa torero.
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Ill ONE OF HIS BIG SCENES Twenty-eight years ago Alfonso XII died, leav-ing a consort whom the Spanish people regarded withsuspicion, if not with actual dislike. She was MariaChristina of Austria, the second wife of the king;and six months after his death ht^ son, Alfonso XIII,was born. Sullenly Spain submitted to the long regency ofa foreigner; and Maria Christina set about thedesperate business of saving her son to manhood.From the first he was an ailing, sickly child, and hismother had to fight for him in health as well as inpolitical position every inch of the way. She wastireless, dauntless, throughout the struggle. Timeafter time the little kings life was despaired of; shenever gave up. Every morning during his childhood the boy wasdriven to the bracing park of La Granj a, where heate his lunch and stayed all day, only coming back toMadrid to sleep. In this and a hundred other ways itwas as though his mother, with her steel courage,literally forbade him to die. And to-day, for h

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