wretched inns without chimneys, where no
one but a muleteer can get anything to eat,
to the smiling valleys and rich farms of
the lower Minho. Here the cottages are mere
stables, their gojas run over with corn and
wine.

No one who has ever been to Spain will
forget the stolid, litigious, stubborn groups
of emigrant Gallicians whom he meets on the
decks of the coasting steamers—whom he sees
land at Corunna, or disembark at Vigo.
They look like Irishmen without their sparkle,
fire, or wit—Irishmen with the soul out—
Irishmen stupified to helots—Irishmen grown
prudent, churlish, and industrious. There
they sit silent and absorbed, leaning on their
great black-handled umbrellas, the crooks
under their beardless chins, wrapped in their
heavy great coats: they sit dismal and
forlorn, their penury and hard frugality not
unalloyed with selfishness, the black shadow
of prudence. How glad we were to clear the
decks at Vigo and cart them off—blankets,
bedding, and all—in that little green bay of
Vigo. Now for the Asturias, the Wales of
Spain, leaving Compostella, the shrine of Saint
James, Corunna and its fertile coast, even
the old thin egg merchant from that city,
who told me he helped to bury Sir John
Moore, and, hey presto, with my kaleidoscope
to the Asturias.

FOURTH SHAKE.

I SEE a tract of cloudy mountains, where
once the Goths took shelter from the Moors,
high up among the eagles. I see the barrier
of hills that divide it from Leon, and the
northern range that borders the Bay of
Biscay, and serves these Asturians for another
frontier. I see fir-woods and green turf,
and breathe again after those dusty plains of
Leon, those fiery hot valleys choked with
orange trees of Gallicia. I see hill and dale,
meadow, wood, and river, spread out as on a
map. I see mountains ten thousand feet
high, helmeted with perpetual clouds that
make the country mild and damp as
England.

No turbans of Andalusia, or open jackets
here, but white felt caps, turned up with
green, and close, warm jerkins. No Gallician
clumsy sabots, but leather shoes. No
Gallician ponies, but stout, hardy cobs. No red
velvet bodices for the women, but yellow
and green ones; dark serge and black
mantles, with garnishings of coral necklaces
and gold lacings. No bull-fighting here; but
sturdy skittles and single-stick, more cider, too,
than wine. These are the kind, civil people,
who emigrate to become the cooks and valets,
and penurious, cheating small traders of
Spain. They are active, hardy, honest,
industrious, and mercenary as the Swiss. Like
them, they have the goître and home-sickness.
Like the Welsh, they are proud of
their cheese and their pedigrees. There is
no road in the Asturias, and there is not one
good one in Gallicia. Here you can fish
and shoot till you are satisfied; for there
are no game preserves, and no gentlemen
poulterers.

But I long for another shake of my toy, and
want to get to Castille, where all the bluest
blood of Spain is, and must leave the chesnut
woods, maize-fields, babbling torrents and
stormy sierras of the Asturias. What we
want is the mountain-girt table-land of the
Castille.

FIFTH SHAKE.

I AM aware of mountains, and barren, dusty
treeless table-lands. All Castille is like the
bit the kaleidoscope shows you, for I am not
going to shake the toy again, to bring up
Madrid. The hamlets are all mud houses.
Nowhere do you see hedges, enclosures, or
landmarks. You hear no bird. You see no
crops, but patches of corn, peas, and saffron.
The men wrapped in rugged brown cloaks,
are proud, unobliging, not so chatty and
witty as the quick Andalusian or crafty
Valencian, less stern, but less wrathful and
treacherous. As one who knew them well
said: " The Castillian is not addicted to low
degrading vices, although proud, ignorant,
prejudiced, superstitious, and uncommercial.
He is true to his God and king, his religion
running often into bigotry, his loyalty into
subserviency."

SIXTH SHAKE.

I AM in the Basque Provinces. Here is
Bilboa; yonder San Sebastian; and I see
over there the mountains where neither
Goth, Moor, nor Roman could ever keep
foothold. These Basques are poor, proud, fiery
people; intensely national, and quaint
enough, with their strange hats, their sandals
and brogues, cudgels, curious dances, and
strange Tartarian language. Whether on
mountain, valley, or seacoast; whether on the
slopes, where the oak and chesnut woods
are, or in the orchards and maize-fields of
the lower plains; whether in the green hills
above their town, or the castle fortress-looking
barred-up houses with shields over the
doorways, I observe as I give the glass just the
suspicion of a shake those blue-capped men
with queer bandages round their legs and rude
sandals, fresh from the iron mine perhaps,
wending up to that little village with the
domed belfry and whitewashed houses, half
hid in green copses and groves of chesnut.
"Going home from work, I suppose?" say
you. O, no; I see it is Sunday, and there is
going to be a wedding and a feast. Here
comes a man with the national bagpipe, and
here others with fifes, tambourines, and
flageolets. Jubilant will be the harmony,
hideous the clamour. There will be street
dances and firing off of guns as the Moors
used to do. There will be offerings of corn
and bread (in a pagan way) to the bride's
ancestors' manes. Here come the men in