with ripeness; melons, green and yellow, rough and
smooth; tomatas; scarlet and pulpy; grapes in glorious bunches of gold
and purple; cackling poultry and passive rabbits; the whole intermingled
with huge heaps of vegetables, and nose-gays of beautiful flowers, were
displayed in wonderful profusion to the gaze of the admiring soldiers,
who soon thronged to the scene of bustle. As the morning advanced,
numerous maid-servants, trim, arch-looking damsels, with small
neatly-shod feet, basket on arm, and shading their complexion from the
increasing heat of the sun under cotton parasols of ample dimensions,
tripped along between the rows of sellers, pausing here and there to
bargain for fruit or fowl, and affecting not to hear the remarks of the
soldiers, who lounged in their neighbourhood, and expressed their
admiration by exclamations less choice than complimentary. The day wore
on; the stalls were lightened, the baskets emptying, but the market
became each moment more crowded. Little parties of officers emerged from
the coffee-houses where they had breakfasted, and strolled up and down,
criticizing the buxom forms and pretty faces of the peasant girls; here
and there a lady's mantilla appeared amongst the throng of female heads,
which, for the most part, were covered only with coloured handkerchiefs,
or left entirely bare, protected but by black and redundant tresses, the
boast of the Navarrese maidens. Catalonian wine-sellers, their
queer-shaped kegs upon their backs, bartered their liquor for the copper
coin of the thirsty soldiers; pedlars displayed their wares, and
_sardineras_ vaunted their fish; ballad-singers hawked about copies of
patriotic songs; mahogany-coloured _gitanas_ executed outlandish, and
not very decent, dances; whilst here and there, in a quiet nook, an
itinerant gaming-table keeper had erected his board, and proved that he,
of all others, best knew how to seduce the scanty and hard-earned
maravedis from the pockets of the pleasure-seeking soldiery.

But, as already mentioned, the hour of noon now approached, and
marketing was over for that day. The market-place, and its adjacent
streets, so thronged a short time previously, became gradually deserted
under the joint influence of the heat and the approaching dinner hour.
The peasants, some of whom came from considerable distances, packed up
their empty baskets, and, with lightened loads and heavy pockets,
trudged down the streets leading to the town gate