The plain truth is, that almost every one the traveller comes in contact with is, in some way or other, interested in spreading these reports to create alarm. The _Ventero_[68] has a natural disinclination to part with a good customer, and hopes either to persuade his guest to hire additional horses and guides, or to detain him whilst he seeks for further information. The guide finds it his interest to alarm his employer, if only _pour faire valoir ses services_ in piloting him clear of these reported Scyllas and Charybdises. The Contrabandista tries to frighten the stranger, that he may learn which road he is travelling and what is his business; the Arriero simply for his amusement.
The peasant alone has no purpose to serve in deceiving the traveller, neither has he any intention of so doing; for he himself implicitly believes all the stories he hears, and repeats them with the usual notes and addenda of a second edition. He never stirs out of a circle of a league and a half from his dwelling--that is, beyond the range of his herd of goats, or the nearest market town--and he hears these tales repeated night after night, at the venta chimney-piece--each arriero trying to outdo his brother in the marvellous and horrible--until he becomes convinced of their veracity, and repeats them as well authenticated facts.
The state of the country is also such, that when a robbery actually is committed--and such crimes will be perpetrated in the best regulated countries--the traveller hears of it from so many different people, but related with such various attendant circumstances, and stated to have occurred in so many different places, that he naturally multiplies it into a dozen at least. It is in this way that foreigners, who in general know but little of the language, and still less of the topography, of the country, become dupes to this system of deception, and adopt in consequence a most unfavourable opinion of Spanish honesty; regarding every fierce-looking fellow, with piercing black eyes, a three days' beard, and a long knife stuck in his sash, as a robber; and every Cross on the road side as the _memento mori_ of some waylaid traveller. Whereas, in point of fact, if this mountainous and intricate tract were peopled by our own more highly educated and civilized countrymen, I fear--in spite of our vigilant and, it must be confessed, admirable police--we should be liable to have our pockets picked in a much less delicate and unobtrusive manner, than is now practised in the streets of London.