when you meet with your fair friends, to let them infer who was their unknown benefactor. It was sometimes rather dangerous to accompany an extravagant Andaluza out shopping, á las tiendas, as a well-bred man of the old Spanish school was bound never to allow her to pay for anything. This custom, however, has got somewhat obsolete.
All Spaniards are prodigal to each other in cheap names and titles of honour; thus even beggars address each other as Señor y Caballero, Lord and Knight. The most coveted style is Excellencia, your Excellency, or, as it is pronounced, Vuesencia: it only belongs to grandees and men in highest office. The next is Vuestra Señoria, your Lordship, of which the abbreviated form is Usia; this belongs to titulos de Castilla, to men who are titled, but not Grandees. It is, however, very seldom used, except by the lower classes, who, when they want to toady an Englishman, will often say, Por vida del demonio mas sabe Usia que nosotros—“By the devil’s life, your Lordship knows more than we do;” which, if a traveller has this Handbook, is very likely to be the fact, as the natives generally know nothing. The common form of You is Usted; vuestra merced, your grace. It is generally written simply V., or in older books Vmd. If you do not know a Spaniard’s Christian name, it is well-bred to insert the de, the German Von. Thus Señor de Muñoz is the appellation of a gentleman; Senor Muñoz that of a nobody. When the Christian name is used with the title Don (Dominus, Lord), this Don becomes exactly equivalent to our knightly Sir, and never must be prefixed to the patronymic by itself. Thus you must say Don Hernando Muñoz, and not Don Muñoz, which sounds as ridiculous and ignorant to Spanish ears as Sir Peel or Sir Murchison would to ours.
Whilst discussing Spanish names we would call especial attention to the Spanish custom of affixing to the patronymic the maiden name of the mother, coupling the two with a “y.” Take, for example, a man of the name of Juan Garcia y Rubio: his son by a lady of the name of Blanco (if baptized in the Christian name of the father) would become Juan Garcia y Blanco, whilst his son by a lady of the name of Gonzales would become Juan Garcia y Gonzales. In addressing a man in conversation it is usual to say, “Don Juan Garcia,” dropping the mother’s patronymic, but when writing his name his full paternal and maternal name must be given.
Spaniards, when intimate, generally call each other by their Christian names, and a stranger may live among them and be known to all the town as “Don Ricardo,” without half-a-dozen persons in it being aware of his family name. The custom of tutear—the endearing tutoyer, unusual in England except among Quakers, although common in Germany and France—is very prevalent among familiar friends, and is habitual among grandees, who consider each other as primos, cousins.
The forms of letter-writing differ also from ours, The correct place of dating from should be de esta su casa, from this your house, wherever it is; you must not say from this my house, as you mean to place it at the disposition of your correspondent; the formal Sir is Muy Señor mio; My dear Sir, is Muy Señor mio y de todo mi aprecio; My dear
