Away sped Jose. Returning, he gave Antonio the flute, keeping the violin. Then for an hour the brothers played, not by note but by ear, the simple, sweet melodies of the country-side. The Portuguese people are lovers of music as of flowers. Each farmer, peasant, shepherd and charcoal-burner has his guitar or violin, his pipe or flute.
Jose's violin notes were true and liquid. The old violin--it had been his grandfather's--was rich-toned. Presently Antonio laid aside the flute and listened to the little brother's playing.
"If all the year were playing holidays, To sport would be as tedious as to work." --_William Shakespeare._
JOSE and Antonio, Malfada and Joanna worked side by side those busy days of the next two weeks. They gathered and trod the grapes. They cut and carried through the threshing-floor great sheaves of maize and of bean-stalks, leaving them to dry there in readiness for the threshing. The girls were active and willing, strong and cheerful. Both girls and boys worked with the eager purpose of helping the invalid father and the mother so wearied with constant care of the sick man and the young child.
After the grapes were gathered, and the maize and beans harvested, the hard work was over for a time. The gourds and watermelons, which had been planted between the rows of maize and beans, now open to the sunshine, were gaining in mellow color.
There was some free time for the Almaida family in the afternoons of these October days. Jose drew his engine and cars back and forth on the terrace, Carlos barking after him. Sometimes Jose played with Malfada around the water-works, and swam oranges in the streams still running from the endless chain of buckets. The mother and Joanna worked in the flower garden. Antonio wandered off on the hillside with his flute.
At the maize-husking season in Portugal there is many a gay assembly. The threshing-floor is the social gathering-place for old and young. Antonio, Joanna, Malfada and even little Jose had already been to the _Decamisadas_, or husking, on neighboring farms, when the work and the dancing had lasted until late into the evening. Now Antonio had, in turn, invited their neighbors to a maize-husking.
On the afternoon set, eager troops of men and boys, most of them carrying some musical instrument, came in holiday costume of homespun trousers, white linen shirt with a large gold or silver stud at the neck, a red sash bound around the waist, broadcloth or homespun cloak hung over one shoulder, and newest hat of black felt or cap of knitted yarn. Eager troops of girls came also, in full short skirts, in bodices of dark red or yellow worn over white waists, the large sleeves newly starched and ironed. Each girl had a gay-colored cotton or silk kerchief over her shoulders, and almost every one wore handsome filigree gold earrings.