One Hundred Years of Solitude

them. The war, which until
then had been only a word to
designate a vague and remote
circumstance, became a
concrete and dramatic reality.
Around the end of February
an old woman with an ashen
look arrived in Macondo
riding a donkey loaded down
with brooms. She seemed so
inoffensive that the sentries
let her pass without any
questions as another vendor,
one of the many who often