rrible agents
of destruction; leaving marks of their devastation everywhere. Not
content with stealing many unequalled works of art, they often wantonly
destroyed what they could not conveniently take away with them. In the
tomb of Ferdinand and Isabella, at Grenada, they pried open the royal
coffins, in search of treasure; at Seville they broke open the coffin of
Murillo, and scattered his ashes to the wind; Marshal Soult treated the
ashes of Cervantes in a similar manner. War desecrates all things, human
and divine, but sometimes becomes a Nemesis (goddess of retribution),
dispensing poetical justice; as when Waterloo caused the return to Spain
of a portion of her despoiled art-treasures.

The bull-ring of the capital will seat eighteen thousand spectators.
Here, on each Sunday of the season, exhibitions are given to
enthusiastic crowds, the entertainments always being honored by the
presence of the state dignitaries, and members of the royal family. The
worst result of such cruelty is that it infects the beholders with a
like spirit. We all know how cruel the English became during the reign
of Henry the Eighth. Sunday is always a gala-day in Madrid, though the
attendance upon early mass is very general, at least among the women. It
is here, as at Paris and other European capitals, the chosen day for
military parades, horse races, and the bull fight. Most of the shops are
open, and do a profitable business; especially is this the case with the
liquor and cigar stores and the cafes. The lottery-ticket vendor makes
double the usual day's sales on this occasion, and the itinerant
gamblers, with their little tables, have crowds about them wherever they
locate. The gayly dressed flower-girls, with dainty little baskets rich
in color and captivating in fragrance, press button-hole bouquets on the
pedestrians, while men perambulate the streets with cakes and candies
displayed in open wooden boxes hung about their necks. In short, Sunday
is made a holiday, when grandees and beggars come forth like marching
regiments into the Puerto del Sol. The Prado and public gardens are
crowded with gayly dressed people, children, and nurses, the costumes of
the latter being of the most theatrical character. No one who can walk
stays within doors on Sunday at Madrid.

The cars will take us forty miles hence to Toledo, where the rule of the
Moor is seen in foot-prints which time has not yet obliterated. It seems
like realizing a mediaeval