rticular affection, believing them upon the
whole to be about the most worthless, heartless, and greedy set of
miscreants to be found upon the whole wide continent of Europe. These
gentry, we have reason to know, look with a by no means favourable eye
upon these far-famed publications of Albemarle-street. 'They steal away
our honest bread,' said one of them to us the other day at Venice, '_I
Signori forestieri_ find no farther necessity for us since they have
appeared; we are thinking of petitioning the government in order that
they may be prohibited as heretical and republican. Were it not for
these accursed books I should now have the advantage of waiting upon
those _forestieri_'--and he pointed to a fat English squire, who with a
blooming daughter under each arm, was proceeding across the piazza to St.
Marco with no other guide than a 'Murray,' which he held in his hand.
High, however, as was the opinion which we had formed of these Hand-books
from what we had heard concerning them, we were utterly unprepared for
such a treat as has been afforded us by the perusal of the one which now
lies before us--the Hand-book for Spain.

It is evidently the production of a highly-gifted and accomplished man of
infinite cleverness, considerable learning, and who is moreover
thoroughly acquainted with the subject of which he treats. That he knows
Spain as completely as he knows the lines upon the palm of his hand, is a
fact which cannot fail of forcing itself upon the conviction of any
person who shall merely glance over the pages; yet this is a book not to
be glanced over, for we defy any one to take it up without being seized
with an irresistible inclination to peruse it from the beginning to the
end--so flowing and captivating is the style, and so singular and various
are the objects and events here treated of. We have here a perfect
panorama of Spain, to accomplish which we believe to have been the aim
and intention of the author; and gigantic as the conception was, it is
but doing him justice to say that in our opinion he has fully worked it
out. But what iron application was required for the task--what years of
enormous labour must have been spent in carrying it into effect even
after the necessary materials had been collected--and then the collecting
of the materials themselves--what strange ideas of difficulty and danger
arise in our minds at the sole mention of that most important point! But
here is the work before