This log-cabin had a loft¹, where we boys slept, and in the loft were stored in barrels the books that had now begun to overflow² the bookcase. I do not know why I chose the loft to renew my long-neglected friendship with them. The light could not have been good, though if I brought my books to the little gable window that overlooked the groaning³ and whistling gristmill I could see well enough. But perhaps I liked the loft best because the books were handiest there, and because I could be alone. At any rate, it was there that I read Longfellow’s “Spanish Student,” which I found in an old paper copy of his poems in one of the barrels, and I instantly conceived for it the passion which all things Spanish inspired in me. As I read I not only renewed my acquaintance with literature, but renewed my delight in people and places where I had been happy before those heavy years in Dayton. At the same time I felt a little jealousy⁴, a little grudge⁵, that any one else should love them as well as I, and if the poem had not been so beautiful I should have hated the poet for trespassing⁶ on my ground. But I could not hold out long against the witchery of his verse. The “Spanish Student” became one of my passions; a minor⁷ passion, not a grand one, like ‘Don Quixote’ and the ‘Conquest of Granada’, but still a passion, and I should dread⁸ a little to read the piece now, lest I should disturb my old ideal of its beauty. The hero’s rogue⁹ servant, Chispa, seemed to me, then and long afterwards, so fine a bit of Spanish character that I chose his name for my first pseudonym

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