"So few young men are here. Most of them have gone away and will come back _Americanos_ when they have made money."
[Illustration: MARY LEE WAS SNAPPING HER FINGERS AND TAKING HER STEPS.]
"Yes. They go to Buenos Ayres, to Mexico, to Venezuela, and when they come back they do not wear any more the _aldeana_ dress, and they are always called _Americanos_."
"And what are we?" Nan put the question, a little puzzled to know how she and her sister would be distinguished. If they were not Americans what could they be?
"Oh, you are _Inglesas_," Mercedes told her.
"Because we speak English, I suppose." Nan was not quite sure that she liked this method of classification.
"Oh, yes, that is why, certainly," returned Mercedes. "See there is a man over there wearing the Asturian cap, the old man with a long peaked cap which hangs down one side."
"And so you don't call us _Americanos_," Mary Lee returned to the subject, after looking at the man with the peaked cap.
"I always forget there is any America but the United States," said Mary Lee, "but of course South Americans have just as much right to be called so as we have. Dear me, do see that poor deformed creature, and there is another." She stood appalled and again Mercedes smiled.
"They always come to the _fiestas_, and they are not so deformed as they appear though they must be truly so, and must show that they are else they might be taken for impostors." She stopped to give each of the supplicants a copper coin. "The big coppers are _perronos_ or the big dogs," she explained, "the little ones, _perrinas_, or little dogs," and each of the Corner girls took a _perrono_ from her purse to put into the outstretched hands.
"Ah, there are the Gallegos; you will like them." And Mercedes hurried them forward to join a crowd gathered around two women, one with a guitar, the other with a tambourine. They were saucy, mirthful looking creatures who turned knowing eyes upon the strangers and after whispering to one or two of the nearest bystanders, broke forth into a fresh song which caused much amusement.
"What are they saying?" asked Nan, as she saw all eyes turned in her direction.
Mercedes laughed. "They are singing about you. They say you are like a _clavel_ with your pink cheeks, and that Mary Lee is a golden bird. They say you should be in the queen's court and that your husbands will be sure to occupy high places."