breakfast; it inaugurated my day with felicitous omens. I took my breakfast in the garden of the Fonda, while Pépé improvised some appropriate melody upon the guitar, amid the fragrance of aromatic shrubs, and with the breeze of the Sierra fanning my cheek. The nicest of linen, the cleanest of garniture, were accompanied by the whitest bread, the most savory trout, and the sweetest butter, with vino tinto con agua as an accompaniment, and coffee or chocolate, richest of flavor, with purest of cream, as a crowning mercy. Noctes cœnæque Deûm, you can't compare with such breakfasts! To say nothing of the fruit-grapes, melons, fresh figs, prickly-pear, which I could always command, and never pretermitted!

I would pass the morning and the hours before siesta in reverie. To exist under such an atmosphere is happiness-sensation is the sole excitement you require. The hours flow uncounted by. Homer tells us that when Minerva came down to assist the Greeks, she harnessed the hours to her chariot, to denote the swiftness with which she moved. We drove the same team in Andalusian Grenada, and seldom stabled our steeds. This calm voluptuousness of existence, reposing upon the romantic associations around you, soothes the heart, while it gives full play to the imagination. The Moorish ruins, the Christianized mosques, the sparkling costumes, the splendid paintings before so unfamiliar, the gorgeous hierarchy with their rich processions and frequent festivals; the tertullias, the theaters, alamedas, bull-fights, and bailes-do not these afford ever fruitful subjects for fits of musing-the dolce far niente of the mind?

I never had an idle moment in Spain-for thought is no more idleness than a cup and balls is occupation. My body might be in a state of repose, but my mind

HISTORY OR ROMANCE.

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was active: if not intent upon the present, yet ruminating upon the past. And what nation can boast of a past more diversified or more glorious! of annals more ancient or more picturesque? From the time of Tubal, grandson of Noah, who is supposed first to have settled it, down to the accession of the House of Bourbon, or even to the present day, it seems impossible to say whether its history is romance, or its romance history, so strange and yet seemingly so well-authenticated are its annals. The Iberians certainly occupied it, for their names and blood have reached us through centuries. The Celts as certainly followed-the foremost wave of that raging sea of Asiatic population that finally submerged Europe. These two, after years of bloody and almost exterminating contests, formed a national combination which under the name of Celtiberian, first made Spain known to then civilized Europe. Up to this period Spain had been only accessible over the Pyrenees; but the Phenicians demonstrated that intervening bodies of water, so far from separating, brought countries, however remote, into contact. They conquered and colonized portions of the sea-coast, and in process of time were themselves supplanted by their colonists, the Carthaginians, who in their turn gave way to the all-conquering Roman. No province of that universal empire cost so much in the acquisition. Two centuries elapsed before even its nominal subjugation was accomplished, though the whole force of the empire was brought to bear down upon it. Cæsar fought his most desperate battles within its territories, and gained victory only at the extreme peril of life. During the best days of the empire it flourished in arts and arms: gave orators, poets, rhetoricians, Emperors, to Rome; but it followed its fortunes in adversity no less than in prosperity. The Franks, the Vandals, the Alani, and

it

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the Suevi, all invaded and wasted it in turn—and all gave way to the mightier Góths, the most generous and least barbarous of the hordes that inundated imperial Rome. These inhabited and cherished Spain; confirmed its Christianity and improved its laws-so that the two nations, conquerors and conquered, became amalgamated in language, institutions, and sympathies. So, two centuries or more later, the Arabs, the most singular and picturesque people of history, found them. During their occupation of the country, history would indeed seem to have gone masquerading; the Thousand and One Tales of the Princess Scherazede might have been borrowed from the realities of Arabian Spainso gorgeous, so chivalric, so perhaps fantastic were many of the circumstances of their domination-and the struggle of centuries that succeeded between the followers of the Crescent and the Cross has all the varying fortune, the splendid courtesy, the romantic achievement of Ariosto's Epic.

Long before the advent of our Saviour, as well as often since, Spain was the battle-field of Europe. It has been overrun, conquered, inhabited by nations the most dissimilar in language, institutions, and character, not one of which but has impressed something idiosyncratic upon its destiny. Its language is composed of many tongues; its character is formed from various habits; its integrity springs from numerous nationalities. Its history is emblazoned by exploits the most romantic, is scarred by wars the most exterminating, and ensanguined, alas! by crimes the most revolting.

CHAPTER XXXII.

THE MOOR FROM TANGIER-HIS DRESS-THE FORMER GLORIES OF THE ALHAMBRA -THE MOSLEM AND CHRISTIAN RELIGIONS COMPARED.

ONE evening, as after dinner I was musingly strolling through the halls and corridors of the Alhambra, I encountered a Moor. He was looking from the balcony of the Hall of the Embassadors upon the magnificent prospect beneath him. The noise I made on en tering caused him to turn round. He was a striking personage in appearance, and I took him for a Santon from Barbary. He wore a snow-white turban, and the haik, or white flannel wrapping-plaid which, gracefully gathered around the body, swathed the upper part of the head, and fell in a knot on one side. His legs were as bare as a private's of a Highland regiment, and his stockingless feet were cased in large yellow slippers, curiously worked. A majestic beard, white as the turban, and more than a foot in length, carefully combed and perfumed, rested on an ample breast. His features, with the exception of the eye, which was too small, were noble, and his deportment dignified and commanding. Impressed with rather a reverential sense of his appearance, I made a low obeisance-touching, after the Moorish fashion, my forehead, mouth, and breast. He returned the salutation in a manner, though civil, a little condescending; which, however, neither offended my amour propre, nor national sensi.. tiveness. He accosted me in Spanish, which he seemed

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to speak with ease; told me he was from Tangier, which he had left to visit the home of his ancestors. Four centuries had elapsed, he said, since they had been despoiled of their possessions in Grenada. They were awaiting patiently their restoration, which was sure to take place." God is great.”

I spoke of the former glory of his people while in possession of Spain-of their great proficiency in the arts of peace and war, and of this gorgeous palace, the like of which eye had not seen.

"A thing of paint and whitewash !" he said, with indignation. "A painted sepulcher, compared with what it was! The walls and the marble remain, but the delicate tracery has been obliterated, and the beautiful fretwork is gone forever. Oh! but recall it in the days of Boabdil, with its costly decorations, its rich gildings, its lavish purple! Think of its beautiful violet relief, its precious mosaics, its luminous inscriptions, and its borders of scarlet, fresh, brilliant, and sparkling! Nay, recall its glorious occupants, with their picturesque and dazzling costumes-the gallant Abencerage, and the haughty Zegri, cased in rich and shining armor, whose martial tread and clanking sabers yet reverberate through the desolate halls. Bring back the harem and the perfumed baths, and the loveliness that graced them-Fatima, Ayeshah, and her well-called 'the Morning Star! But alas," he continued, "why dwell upon these departed glories. We fell, not from the power of our enemies, but our own civil dissensions. While the infidel was battering our gates, the Alhambra was steeped in revelry, and the Albaycin was red with the blood of Moors, shed by fraternal hands. Allah il Allah! There is no God but His decrees are eternal. The Moors won and lost Spain through civil feuds."

one.