Note {30-1} — Front matter
Reading edition
Page 30.—1.{30-1} For the life and works of Alarcón, see page xii of the Introduction. The text of La Buenaventura is taken from the Obras de D. Pedro A. de Alarcón (in the Colección de Escritores Castellanos), Novelas Cortas, Madrid, 1905. La Buenaventura describes the conditions that existed formerly in certain parts of Spain. Then the sparsely populated districts were infested with highwaymen. To-day, chiefly through the efforts of the Civil Guard, a select body of Spanish police, one is as safe in the highways and by-ways of Spain as in those of any other civilized country.