emarked the
head-gear they were depicted with. The flowing lace adornment, reaching
from the head to the shoulders, and from thence thrown in graceful folds
over the back and one arm, is called the "mantilla," and is the
characteristic costume of the ladies of Spain. Each carries a fan in her
hand--no lady is dressed without it--which they use, not so much for the
purpose of cooling themselves as to convey the subtle emotions of the
Spanish female mind. It seems to do the duty of eyes, though they
possess very beautiful eyes, too. What I mean is, that whereas we in our
colder climate generally indicate love, passion, or melancholy by means
of the eyes principally, and through the facial muscles generally, these
ladies interpret all this through the agency of the fan. So skilled are
they in its use, that there is scarcely an emotion, it is said, which
they cannot render intelligible by this means.

To say that we passed them without an impertinent stare is to confess at
once that we are not sailors. This want of manners, or seeming want, is
excusable, I think, insomuch that in our everyday life we see so little
of them, that when we do fall across "the sex" we regard them more in
the light of curiosities than tangible flesh and blood like ourselves. I
see, too, that some of the more susceptible of our party are looking
behind them. "Remember Lot's wife," and remember, too, the blue-eyed
girls of your village homes whom you parted from so recently; for the
Spanish maids, with all their charms, will scarcely bear comparison with
our bonnie English lasses.

We have said something of the "_senoras_," now a word for the
"_senors_." The dress of the men is as picturesque and gaudy as that of
the ladies is not; in the particular, indeed, the sexes seem to have
usurped the other's rights. Young Spanish swells, in colored velvet
breeches and tastefully embroidered leggings, scarlet silk sash around
the loins, and irreproachable linen, with, here and there, one with the
far-famed guitar, improvising amorous nothings for the ear of some
susceptible damsel, abandon themselves to the luxury of the hour in true
Spanish style.

But what is this? Whither has the crowd conducted us? Surely the fairies
have been at work! In other words, we have wandered into the Alameda, or
Public Gardens. I beg to recall a statement which I fear I made somewhat
rashly a few pages back, in which I said that Gibraltar could not
possibly yield any green