bottle, which was of portly dimensions, filled to the neck with choice Valdepeñas wine. As this was a munition for our campaign more important than even his trabuco, we exhorted him to have an eye to it; and I will do him the justice to say, that his namesake, the trencher-loving Sancho himself, could not excel him as a provident purveyor. Though the alforjas and bota were repeatedly and vigorously assailed throughout the journey, they appeared to have a miraculous property of being never empty; for our vigilant squire took care to sack every thing that remained from our evening repasts at the inns, to supply our next day's luncheon.

What luxurious noontide repasts have we made, on the green sward by the side of a brook or fountain, under a shady tree! and then what delicious siestas on our cloaks, spread out on the herbage!

We paused one day at noon for a repast of the kind. It was in a pleasant little green meadow surrounded by hills covered with olive-trees. Our cloaks were spread on the grass under an elm-tree, by the side of a bubbling rivulet; our horses were tethered where they might crop the herbage; and Sancho produced his alforjas with an air of triumph. They contained the contributions of four days' journeying, but had been signally enriched by the foraging of the previous evening in a plenteous inn at Antequera. Our squire drew forth the heterogeneous contents, one by one, and these seemed to have no end. First came forth a shoulder of roasted kid, very little the worse for wear; then an entire partridge; then a great morsel of salted codfish wrapped in paper; then the residue of a ham; then the half of a pullet, together with several rolls of bread, and a rabble rout of oranges, figs, raisins, and walnuts. His bota also had been recruited with some excellent wine of Malaga. At every fresh apparition from his larder, he would enjoy our ludicrous surprise, throwing himself back on the grass, and shouting with laughter. Nothing pleased the simple-hearted varlet more than to be compared, for his devotion to the trencher, to the renowned squire of Don Quixote. He was well versed in the history of the Don, and, like most of the com

mon people of Spain, he firmly believed it to be a true history.

"All that however, happened a long time ago, señor ?" said he to me one day, with an inquiring look.

"A very long time," was the reply.

"I dare say more than a thousand years?" still looking dubiously.

"I dare say, not less."

The squire was satisfied.

As we were making the repast above described, and diverting ourselves with the simple drollery of our squire, a solitary beggar approached us, who had almost the look of a pilgrim. He was evidently very old, with a grey beard, and supported himself on a staff, yet age had not bowed him down; he was tall and erect, and had the wreck of a fine form. He wore a round Andalusian hat, a sheep-skin jacket, and leathern breeches, gaiters, and sandals. His dress, though old and patched, was decent, his demeanour manly, and he addressed us with that grave courtesy that is to be remarked in the lowest Spaniard. We were in a favourable mood for such a visiter; and in a freak of capricious charity, gave him some silver, a loaf of fine wheaten bread, and a goblet of our choice wine of Malaga. He received them thankfully, but without any grovelling tribute of gratitude. Tasting the wine, he held it up to the light, with a slight beam of surprise in his eye, then quaffing it off at a draught, "It is many years," said he, " since I have tasted such wine. It is a cordial to an old man's heart." Then, looking at the beautiful wheaten loaf, " bendito sea tal pan!" "blessed be such bread!" So saying, he put it in his wallet. We urged him to eat it on the spot. No, señors," replied he, "the wine I had to drink or leave; but the bread I must take home to share with my family."

Our man Sancho sought our eye, and reading permission there, gave the old man some of the ample fragments of our repast, on condition, however, that he should sit down and make a meal.

He accordingly took his seat at some little distance from us, and began to eat slowly and with a sobriety and de

corum that would have become a hidalgo. There was altogether a measured manner and a quiet self-possession about the old man, that made me think he had seen better days his language, too, though simple, had occasionally something picturesque and almost poetical in the phraseology. I set him down for some broken-down cavalier. I was mistaken; it was nothing but the innate courtesy of a Spaniard, and the poetical turn of thought and language often to be found in the lowest classes of this clear-witted people. For fifty years, he told us, he had been a shepherd, but now he was out of employ, and destitute. "When I was a young man," said he, "nothing could harm or trouble me; I was always well, always gay; but now I am seventy-nine years of age, and a beggar, and my heart begins to fail me."

Still he was not a regular mendicant: it was not until recently that want had driven him to this degradation; and he gave a touching picture of the struggle between hunger and pride, when abject destitution first came upon him. He was returning from Malaga without money; he had not tasted food for some time, and was crossing one of the great plains of Spain, where there were but few habitations. When almost dead with hunger, he applied at the door of a venta or country inn. "Perdon usted por Dios hermano!" ("Excuse us, brother, for God's sake!") was the reply the usual mode in Spain of refusing a beggar. "I turned away," said he, "with shame greater than my hunger, for my heart was yet too proud.

came to a river with high banks and deep rapid current, and felt tempted to throw myself in : 'What should such an old, worthless, wretched man as I live for?' But when I was on the brink of the current, I thought on the Blessed Virgin, and turned away. I travelled on until I saw a country seat at a little distance from the road, and entered the outer gate of the court-yard. The door was shut, but there were two young señoras at a window. I approached and begged: 'Perdon usted por Dios hermano!'. and the window closed. I crept out of the court-yard, but hunger overcame me, and my heart gave way I thought my hour at hand; so I laid myself down

--

at the gate, commended myself to the Holy Virgin, and covered my head to die. In a little while afterwards the master of the house came home: seeing me lying at his gate, he uncovered my head, had pity on my grey hairs, took me into his house, and gave me food. So, señors you see that one should always put confidence in the protection of the Virgin."

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The old man was on his way to his native place, Archidona, which was close by, on the summit of a steep and rugged mountain. He pointed to the ruins of its old Moorish castle: "That castle," he said, was inhabited by a Moorish king at the time of the wars of Granada. Queen Isabella invaded it with a great army; but the king looked down from his castle among the clouds, and laughed her to scorn! Upon this the Virgin appeared to the queen, and guided her and her army up a mysterious path in the mountains, which had never before been known. When the Moor saw her coming, he was astonished, and springing with his horse from a precipice, was dashed to pieces! The marks of his horse's hoofs," said the old man, are to be seen in the margin of the rock to this day. And see, señors, yonder is the road by which the queen and her army mounted: you see it like a riband up the mountain side; but the miracle is, that, though it can be seen at a distance, when you come near it disappears!"

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The ideal road to which he pointed was undoubtedly a sandy ravine of the mountain, which looked narrow and defined at a distance, but became broad and indistinct on an approach.

As the old man's heart warmed with wine and wassail, he went on to tell us a story of the buried treasure left under the castle by the Moorish king. His own house was next to the foundations of the castle. The curate and notary dreamed three times of the treasure, and went to work at the place pointed out in their dreams. His own son-in-law heard the sound of their pickaxes and spades at night. What they found nobody knows; they became suddenly rich, but kept their own secret. Thus

the old man had once been next door to fortune, but was doomed never to get under the same roof.

I have remarked, that the stories of treasure buried by the Moors, which prevail throughout Spain, are most current among the poorest people. It is thus, kind Nature consoles with shadows for the lack of substantials. The thirsty man dreams of fountains and running streams; the hungry man of ideal banquets; and the poor man of heaps of hidden gold: nothing certainly is more magni ficent than the imagination of a beggar.

The last travelling sketch I shall give, is an evening scene at the little city of Loxa. This was a famous belligerent frontier post in the time of the Moors, and repulsed Ferdinand from its walls. It was the strong-hold of old Aliatan, the father-in-law of Boabdil, when that fiery veteran sallied forth with his son-in-law on their disastrous inroad, that ended in the death of the chieftain and the capture of the monarch. Loxa is widely situated in a broken mountain pass, on the banks of the Genil, among rocks and groves, and meadows and gardens. The people seem still to retain the bold fiery spirit of the olden time. Our inn was suited to the place. It was kept by a young and handsome Andalusian widow, whose trim basquiña of black silk, fringed with bugles, set off the play of a graceful form and round pliant limbs. Her step was firm and elastic; her dark eye was full of fire; and the coquetry of her air, and varied ornaments of her person, showed that she was accustomed to be admired.

She was well matched by a brother, nearly about her own age; they were perfect models of the Andalusian Majo and Maja. He was tall, vigorous, and well-formed, with a clear olive-complexion, a dark beaming eye, and curling chesnut whiskers that met under his chin. He was gallantly dressed in a short green velvet jacket, fitted to his shape, profusely decorated with silver buttons, with a white handkerchief in each pocket. He had breeches of the same, with rows of buttons from the hips to the knees; a pink silk handkerchief round his neck, gathered through a ring, on the bosom of a neatly-plaited shirt; a sash