spears of palm and cypresses; here and there a fountain sparkled like a diamond. The Guadalquivir, dazzling in the sunshine, winds idly through the grassy plain; the sierras, every shade of violet, from the palest lilac to the deepest plum-color, show their sharp white teeth against the effulgent sky. The doves and hawks, which make their nests peaceably in nooks of the tower, flew to and fro on their errands; the sound of the city rose sleepily, like the hum of a great hive, as if its only occupants were bees feeding on the blossoms which filled the air with perfume. It was my last look at Seville: that night I turned my face northward, leaving her asleep under the still, warm moonlight, like a bride in her white robe and wreath of orangeflowers.

And the fair, and the museum, and the other sights and shows of the town, is there nothing to say about them? A great deal might be said, but it would be superfluous, as the greater contains the less, and there is nothing so beautiful and wonderful in Seville as Seville. The fair was more correctly a cattleshow, and its chief local peculiarity was a smell of frying, which quenched the fragrance of the groves and gardens for half a mile around, and which proceeded from the production of millions of fritters like little doughnuts, called bunuelos. The pictures are delightfully and fitly lodged in an ancient convent. The entrance is through a cloister, with a fine carved red cedar roof, and two courts, one containing an old well such as aquarellists love, the other a maze of orange and pomegranate trees. The collection has only about two hundred paintings, but among them are some of the noblest Murillos in the world and the best Zurbarans. There are things which the stranger pays to see and stare at in Seville as elsewhere, but they are swallowed up by the great composite spectacle of the city itself, and leave no separate recollections.

It was three o'clock in the morning when I reached Cordova, and I had never supposed that even at that hour a town could be so silent. It seemed to be uninhabited. The moon had not set, and as we drove through a network of narrow streets there was not a light to be seen. The only living things we met were a man shrouded in a cloak and the donkey he bestrode; he had to squeeze himself into a doorway to let the carriage go by, and then went on, casting a Doresque shadow on the white walls, in which man and beast were indistinguishable. The sun was high before I was up and on my way to the cathedral. The city was almost as deserted by day as by night: the streets were empty; nobody went in or out of the houses, which were for the most part only a story high; there were no open doorways, as at Seville; the few patios of which I had a glimpse were simple courtyards, with a few flower-pots. Following the guidebook map, I found my way to a sort of narrow plaza bounded by a blank wall of great height, fortified with square towers embattled in the Moorish style with tongues of flame. The sun beat down from a cloudless sky on the cobble-stones of the pavement, and glanced back from the shadowless walls with midsummer fierceness, although it was but the end of April. The walk seemed very long before I reached a lofty tower, heavily crowned with a belfry and cupola, and a great triple gateway, through which I descended by several steps into a spacious inclosure planted with immense orange-trees. A round-arched colonnade follows the walls on the inner side. Men were lounging, women drawing water, and children playing beside a large fountain, and eating the fruit which fell from the great glossy-leaved orange-trees, said to be as old as the caliphs. Of the exterior of the sacred building I have no recollection. I walked across the grove, which is acres in extent, absorbed in the contemplation of

mutability. Here, in ancient times, stood a temple of Janus; early Christians built a basilica on its site; the Moors took the city, and bought the ground of the conquered Christians for good gold to build a mosque, permitting the priests to depart with the honors of war, carrying away their sacred objects undesecrated. For five hundred years the mild Moslem reigned and worshiped here, with large tolerance of Jews and Christians. Then the followers of the Lamb came back and cast forth all unbelievers. The crucifix stands again on the high altar, and the missal has replaced the Koran; but as I crossed the threshold I exclaimed to myself, "This is Islam!" It was like entering a new land, a new world. On every side, far as the eye could reach, arcades opened before me intersected by other arcades, innumerable smooth, slender columns supporting double Moorish arches, one above the other, with an open space between, — a labyrinth of parallel pillared avenues constantly crossing other avenues. As I walked on, looking right and left, seeing no end, no exit, nothing but successive colonnades of many-colored marble shafts, porphyry and jasper, with waving palm-branches and feathery tree-ferns for capitals, and horseshoe arches of broad alternate bands of red and white interminably repeated, a dark vaulted roof overhead in a summer twilight obscurity, a sensation half-strange, half familiar, made me wonder in what dream I had paced these aisles before. Then I found myself thinking of the rows of a great field of Indian corn in which I had lost myself when I was a child. The effect of sameness and endlessness is almost identical; the impression on the imagination is of a vast plantation of palms turned to stone. There are in fact a thousand pillars, once there were many more, and the ground plan is four acres ; the roof is forty feet high, but is lowered to the eye by the absence of soaring lines and long curves, the

The

Moorish arches, tier on tier, being united above by upper rows of pillars and pilasters springing from the capitals of the lower columns. As one advances into this mysterious marble forest the apparent uniformity disappears: there is great variety of detail in the pillars, although they are nearly of the same size; they are Greek, Roman, Lombard, as well as Moorish. Penetrating further, one espies grotto-like chapels, where the Moorish architect has given his fancy freer play than in the adjacent aisles. Here the lavish decoration abounds in new caprices and combinations. arches bend into curves, such as are sometimes formed for a moment in a thick silken sash, or a long, narrow pennon waving in the wind; but as the resemblance strikes one the interlacing folds stiffen, and present only a series of scallops or semi-rosettes diversified with arabesques. These were the hallowed places of the Mohammedan; and here are enameled tiles, gilding, variegated colors, inscriptions from the Koran in letters like heavy lace, glittering Byzantine mosaics sent from Constantinople by one of the Cæsars of the Lower Empire, and cupolas of cedar and ebony carved and inlaid. At length the heart of the fane is reached, and enormous columns, which might uphold a mountain, open the way into a great Renaissance cathedral: the roof is gold and white; the choir can seat a hundred priests; the pulpits are piles of dark wood carving and wrought brass; the marble floor is covered with gorgeous Turkish carpets. It is a fine monument of mundane devotion. Authorities differ as to whether this interloping church was built upon a central open court or on a space torn from the mosque itself. Most people follow the emperor Charles V. in bewailing the disfigurement of an ancient and unique edifice for the sake of a comparatively modern one, by no means the best of its kind. The cathedral, however, is very handsome in

its way, spacious, imposing, and rich enough in ornament to hold its own beside the Moslem temple at its elbow. The very disparity is a great element of interest, and enhances the effect of the Moorish architecture, adding a spell to the strange, mythical influence of the whole. Mutilated it may be in its present condition, but it is more than ever a wonder of the world. I was told that the Moors of Africa still cherish the recollection of their splendid rule in Spain, and that their poetry commemorates the glories of Cordova and the delights of Grenada after five hundred years' return to the soil whence they originally came. The exiled Jews, of whom many were transported to Morocco, cling to the memory of Andalusia as of old they remembered Zion by the waters of Babylon. A curious story was told to the present Duke de Frias, by his father, of a Jewish family in Africa, in which the tradition had been handed down from generation to generation that at a certain time, known only to the head of the house, the family should return to their home in Toledo. The probation expired during the lifetime of the late duke. The Hebrew father confided the family secret to his eldest son, giving him a key which had been treasured for centuries, and bade him go to Toledo and destroy a wall in a situation which he minutely described; a door would thus be disclosed, which the key would open, and the Jew would have access to the home of his ancestors, which had been lost to sight and to the memory of all men save one since they were driven out, in the days of Ferdinand and Isabella. The Jew went, and found the wall, the door, the keyhole, and the concealed house, but what more he found the deponent saith not.

Two or three hours slipped away as I wandered among the pillars, trying to guess the date and nationality of some of them, or to disentangle the devices of the arabesque tracery, and I would

gladly have idled as many days there; but in my pocket there was a couponticket, as fatal in its nature as Balzac's peau de chagrin ; each pleasure curtailed its surface, and warned me to make the most of its limited capability. So I took the afternoon train for Madrid, glad of a chance to see the country over which I had previously passed at night. The day was cloudless, and earth and sky wore the vernal smile of a newcreated universe, although the temperature was that of June. At first we glided through gardens, orange-groves, and olive-orchards, inclosed in straggling hedges of huge cactus or aloes. Here and there a small white house gleamed amidst cypresses, myrtles, and a tangle of roses; so small that it could hardly be more than a laborer's cottage, so pretty and elegant that it had the air of a miniature villa. By degrees the gardens and groves gave place to grain fields of vivid green, and meadows where the grass was hidden under sheets of flowers, plots of yellow, pink, light blue, dark blue, or all mingled; there was a warm purple species which I saw several times set in a border of white, with the most splendid effect. As the afternoon wore on, a few clouds drifted slowly across the sky, and their shadows, followed by sweeps of sunshine, made the flowery fields sparkle like beds of jewels laid bare to the light. The railway banks blazed with poppies; in the distance there were low, fawn-colored towns, with embattled walls; at long intervals a ruined castle on a hilltop. The river wound through the landscape red as blood. The sun was sinking when we passed Javalquinto, the site of a great battle with the Moors. The emerald meadows in the foreground rolled gently upward as they receded, hiding the Guadalquivir; beyond lay a zone of land, striped like a tiger-skin, at the foot of steep heights covered with dull green cork forests; above them towered the peaked and serrate mountain ridge, first

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the color of amethyst, then changing to a delicate pink, finally glowing with a deep peach-color, while the ravines were veiled by shadows too soft for a name. The aloe hedges were no more to be seen, but here and there a single gigantic plant brandished its spiked, swordlike leaves and uplifted its tall flower stem, which in form and color recalls the golden candlestick of the temple at Jerusalem. The lovely hues and velvet down of springtime softened the severity of the outlines, which, as in all the Spanish landscapes that I saw, were stern and grand rather than beautiful; it was a scene never to be forgotten. In a few moments the sun had set; before an hour was over the last vestige of tropical vegetation had vanished, and we had drawn nearer to the mountains, so that their rugged sides and broken pinnacles were visible through the gathering gloom. For a short time there was darkness; then a glorious full moon rose above the rocky gorge of the Despeñaperros just as we plunged into the first of eight long tunnels, which robbed us of half the savage grandeur of the pass. Emerging for a brief time, we saw far above us tremendous natural embrasures and battlements of dark crag against the clear, pale night sky, black masses of foliage clinging to the walls of the cliffs, and below us flashed the swift rush of a mountain torrent. It was the Gateway of the Lost Dogs, so called from a retreat of the vanquished Arabs, and it is the passage between Andalusia and La Mancha. As we is sued from it we found ourselves in a different region; wide, uninhabited, treeless plaius, strewn with rocks, opened before us for long hours, lying as clear as day under the tranquil moon. temperature grew colder constantly, until I was obliged to walk to and fro in the railway-carriage to avoid becoming thoroughly chilled. From midnight until daybreak the country offered only a spectacle of the most despairing sterility

The

and desolation, increased by the pallid light of the setting moon in her struggle with dawn. Suddenly, across the dreary waste, a dark expanse of woodland came in sight, and presently we began to pass fine groups of oaks, elms, and beeches, reminding one of an English park, intersected by wide, straight avenues and formal canals and ponds, emptying into two pretty streams winding about this sylvan realm. The noble forms of the trees were undisguised by verdure, but their branches and twigs were fringed by bursting buds and tiny leaves, making a dark lace pattern against the sky, which was now beginning to redden; through the boughs we caught glimpses of stately buildings and monumental gateways. The place had a royal and storied aspect befitting its name, for it proved to be Aranjuez. The trees were brought from England by Philip II., and have been witnesses to three centuries of historical romance, from the days of Schiller's Don Carlos and that oneeyed Venus the Princess of Eboli to the more recent adventures of the ex-Queen Isabella. It has been deserted of late years, and is not open even to the people of Madrid, for whom it would make a delightful holiday resort. The Tagus kept us company for a little while after we left the groves and brooks of Aranjuez; then bent its course away, and left us to traverse the stony wilderness which surrounds Madrid. In an hour more the city rose above the horizon, and my Spanish trip was at an end. The remaining days of the month were but as the last sands of an hour-glass, and my Cook's ticket gave me leave to go back to Paris, with no further privilege than to stop at the frontier.

I have a word or two of advice for readers who have followed me through these pages, and who may some day fol low in my footsteps. As luggage is charged very high in Spain, the amount allowed to a first-class passenger scarcely reaching the weight of the lightest

trunk, it is well to travel with as little as possible. Books are burdensome coinpanions, as I found to my cost, having taken a traveling library for reference, - Augustus Hare, Gautier, and Amicis, besides Murray's guide-book. Gautier's letters, although written forty years ago, are so true to-day that there can be no better proof how little the country has changed; but in this volume he is only the most brilliant and original of newspaper correspondents, and his information about ways and means is valueless, as he traveled before the days of railways and hotels. His Voyage en Espagne is a book to read before going to Spain, or after coming back, or by all means if you do not go at all, but not to take with you. Amicis, although he went to Spain very lately, traveled in Gautier's track, and his Spagna is scarcely more than a free translation of

Gautier's book, with the addition of a few whimsies and personal adventures and much verbiage of his own. Hare, who begins his Wanderings in Spain with a lengthy introduction and itinerary of what he meant to see, made the most cockney tour; keeping to the beaten track, and scarcely visiting a place of capital interest not mentioned by Gautier. He, too, cribs unconscionably from the Frenchman, and pads his poor book with ill-translated quotations from French letter-writers of the seventeenth century and trite legends or historical anecdotes. It is stale, flat, and unprofitable, and bad English into the bargain. Murray's guide-book is a full, entertaining, and accurate manual, as far as my experience goes, and that, or O'Shea's, is the only one needed on a journey where every ounce must be taken into

account.

I.

THERE was a tradition that his mother had been a "yaller free nigger." The children who lived in Jail Alley were seldom provided with fathers of any

color.

Dinky and Spot were comrades. They were always seen together, and shared alike the scraps thrown them by the neighbors. During the daytime they roamed through the city, going where they pleased, and accountable to no man. When the days were warm and sunny they rejoiced in the gladness of nature, and leaving behind them the hot bricks and dusty houses of the city the two vagabonds would wander off to the green, untenanted fields, and lie for hours under some leafy shelter, blinking up in the sky, or sleeping the summer

hours away. When aroused by hunger they stole if they could, and if there was nothing to steal, Dinky would beg for food; but this he hated to do, and never importuned save where the houses were small and their inhabitants almost as poor as himself. During the chill and cheerless days of winter - which, thank Heaven, are but few and far between in Richmond on the James — Dinky and Spot kept close together in their home; for Jail Alley, that narrow and ill-smelling beehive of human misfortune, was the only home the two friends knew.

Aunt Sally, who lived in the tumbledown hovel at the corner, might have been called their patroness, for it was beneath her broken and trembling shed that they were permitted to sleep in peace during the winter months. It