NOTES
Reading edition
TITLE
*Contigo pan y cebolla*: the Spanish version for 'love in a cottage' has many parallels. Cf. for example two such widely different sources as Prov. xv, 17: "Better a dinner of herbs where love is…," and Omar Khayyam's "A book of verses" etc.
*sillas de paja vieja*: 'worn-out cane (or reed) chairs.'
ACTO PRIMERO, ESCENA PRIMERA
*se habrá usted estado leyendo*: 'you must have been reading.' The future of possibility, with the corresponding conditional to express possibility in the past, occurs very frequently in this play.
*Pero hombre, que estás ahí charlando sin saber*: 'but, man alive, there you are' etc. The redundant que as employed by the various characters in the play would make a profitable study in idiomatic Spanish speech.
*Papamoscas de Burgos*: a popular carved figure that forms part of the mechanism of a clock in the famous cathedral at Burgos, Spain. The *papamoscas* comes out at certain hours just as do the figures in a cuckoo clock. The term *papamoscas* is also familiarly used for *papanatas* (gullible person). Since the stories about the *Papamoscas* are, to the sophisticated, pure inventions, to speak of the niece of the *Papamoscas* is from Bruno's point of view, at least, to indicate the highest degree of improbability.
*se indigestan*: 'are hard to digest' (cf. English "are hard to swallow").
*San Juan de Dios*: reference to the clock in the neighboring tower of the monastery of St. John of God. (An excellent book of reference that gives details of the monuments and streets of old Madrid is "El antiguo Madrid," by Ramón de Mesonero Romanos, Madrid, 1861.)
ESCENA SEGUNDA
*se vuelve agua de borrajas*: the correct expression is *agua de cerrajas* 'nothing at all,' 'shucks' (*cerraja* meaning the common sow-thistle). As the flower of the borage is used to induce perspiration, Bruno is misled by the similarity of sound between *cerraja* and *borraja*.
ESCENA CUARTA
*como un tronco de dormido*: 'sleeping like a log.'
*Malibrán*: Marie Félicité Malibran (1808-1836), singer, of Spanish blood, born in Paris; by Spanish maiden name María Felicia García.
ESCENA QUINTA
*Mande usted*: stock reply of servants, children, etc. when called by their superiors in station or age. Cf. other stock expressions used in the play on other occasions, as Matilde's *beso a V. la mano* and don Pedro's *a la disposición de V.*
ESCENA SEXTA
*qué me sé yo*: 'what do I know about it?' Note the redundant reflexive.
ACTO SEGUNDO, ESCENA PRIMERA
*qué pero le puede poner la señorita*: 'what fault can the young lady find with.'
ESCENA SEGUNDA
*geringonza*: cf. vocabulary, *jerigonza*.
*hágame decir: hágame el favor de decir.*
ESCENA TERCERA
*Ya las quisiera yo de tres y media*: 'I'd rather have them of three and a half.' Three and a half yards is the regulation quantity of material needed for making a man's shirt.
ESCENA SEXTA
*el día de los innumerables mártires de Zaragoza*: April 16, the feast-day of the eighteen martyrs condemned to death in Saragossa in the time of the emperor Diocletian.
*si usted podía ser dichosa*: note the imperfect indicative in an unreal condition.
*Sacedón*: watering-place in the province of Guadalajara, Spain.
*Nueva Holanda*: Australia.
*Isla de Francia*: Spanish form for the old French name of the island Mauritius, to the east of Madagascar. It is now an English possession.
Pablo y Virginia: Paul and Virginia (cf. vocabulary under *Domingo*).
ESCENA SÉPTIMA
*qui pro quo*: French *quiproquo* 'misunderstanding' (by taking one person or thing for another); from medieval Latin *quid pro quod*, the blunder of using one grammatical form for another. Contrast English *quid pro quo* 'equivalent.'
*Dominus tecum*: medieval superstition required the pronouncing of a blessing when a person sneezed, because of a belief in the presence of a demon. The custom survives in many countries as a form of courtesy.
*Herodes el Ascalonita*: 'Herod of Askelon'; Bruno's mind, which works in a fashion similar to the working of Sancho's brain in Don Quixote, is searching for a case of extreme cruelty, and he here probably recalls the slaughter of the innocents at the command of Herod.
ACTO TERCERO, ESCENA TERCERA
*velis nolis* (Latin): 'willy-nilly.'
*no sea que salga: para que no sea que salga.*
*dispensa*: in this case, permission from the bishop or other dignitary to waive the formalities preceding a wedding in the Catholic church.
*Ofelia, Malvina, Etelvina, Coralina*: heroines of the various books *de forro colorado* that Matilde has been reading.
*que conservo en polvo*: 'that I keep although there is nothing left of it but dust' (or ashes).
ESCENA CUARTA
*como quien dice*: 'as you might say.'
*Hace que se va*: 'pretends to go.'
ESCENA QUINTA
*el mismo que viste y calza*: 'fine and dandy'; 'as big as life.' The correct expression is *vestido y calzado*.
ESCENA SÉPTIMA
*A buena hora, mangas verdes*: 'nice time for that.' Cf. the similar expression *buenas son mangas después de pascua* 'it's high time, but better late than never.'
ACTO CUARTO, ESCENA CUARTA
*ha caído un rayo en Santa Bárbara*: Mesonero Romanos in "El antiguo Madrid" mentions the convent of Santa Barbara at the end of the *Calle de Hortaleza*, a well-known street in Madrid, but states that the building has been removed to make way for private residences.
*y lo que cae*: 'and with what he can pick up.'
*me parece usted pieza*: 'it strikes me you're something of a wag.'
*todas las colegialas de Loreto*: 'all the girls who attend the convent of Our Lady of Loreto.' The convent was so named in honor of the Virgin Mary, an image of whom, called *Nuestra Señora de Loreto*, had been brought from Rome and set up in the adjoining church of the same name. The school at first was for poor children; but later Philip IV established here a convent for orphan girls of good family.
ESCENA QUINTA
*las Salesas*: convent of the nuns of Our Lady of the Visitation. Mesonero Romanos ("El antiguo Madrid," p. 253) writes of it: "El convento puede llamarse un verdadero palacio regio."
ESCENA SEXTA
*ello ninguna tenía: ello es que ninguna tenía*; 'it is a fact that not one of them had.'
*vamos allá*: 'no one else will.'
ESCENA SÉPTIMA
*Algarbe*: Algarve, province in the extreme south of Portugal.
ESCENA OCTAVA
*soy la Nicolasa*: definite article frequently used with a woman's name in a slightly depreciative sense or to express familiarity.
*me irá muy bien*: 'will be very becoming to me.'
*como dijo el otro*: colloquial expression used after what the speaker considers a pat remark. Cf. English "as Shakespeare says."
ESCENA DÉCIMA
*casa donde no hay harina*: the correct version of the proverb is *donde no hay harina, todo es mohina* ('ill humor' or 'bickering'); "love flies out of the window when poverty enters the door."