We felt the charm and incongruity of it all. The men crowded within a few yards of us, delighted at being taken by the small camera, interested at finding themselves reflected on the object glass, unhappy that we could not there and then present each with a photograph duly printed and mounted. Such a machine surely performed miracles.
"You all look very happy," H. C. remarked, for more carelessly contented faces were never seen--a mixture of types good and bad.
"As happy as kings," they answered. "We eat, drink and sleep well. Clothes and lodging are found us and we never have any fighting to do. We should like a little more money for tobacco--but one can't have everything."
Finally, we stayed so long answering questions, satisfying curiosity, lingering over the beauty of the cloisters, that the colonel himself appeared upon the scene in full uniform, sword and all. No lover of architecture, he could not understand how any one bestowed a second glance on these old outlines. Were we trying to worm military secrets out of the men with the intention of starting another Peninsular war? The worthy colonel who had so freely given us permission to enter was now anxious for an explanation. Pointing out the charm and merit of the cloisters--the pity they should have transposed the order of things and turned pruning-hooks into swords--he declared he could not agree with us.
"I discover no great beauty in these old corridors," he said, "and would infinitely rather see them filled with brave soldiers than with a parcel of effeminate monks and priests."
We argued the fitness of things--a time and place for everything.
"If there were once more a siege of Gerona I would turn our very churches into barracks," laughed our colonel, clanking his sword and looking fierce as a fire-eater. "And who knows? As far as I am a prophet we are not anywhere near the days of the millennium. There are more signs of universal war than of eternal peace."
We had left the cloisters and were standing almost within touch of the west front of what had been the church. The colonel caught our "mild regretful gaze," laughed and clanked his sword again.
[Illustration: MILITARY CLOISTERS: GERONA.]
"What will you?" he said. "After all, I would not have been the one to do it myself; but finding it done, I use it without prickings of conscience. See," pointing to the crowd below, "we must have room for our recruits. Poor Spain is not England. Our resources are limited. Yet you, sirs, monarchs of the world notwithstanding, had your days of desecration under Cromwell. Opportunity given, and all evil is possible as well as all good."