resque than the Neapolitan
_corricolo_; it is all ribs and bones, and is much given to inward
groaning as it jerks and jolts along. Such a trap we took; the driver
lazily clambered on the shafts, and away hobbled our lean steed.

The road to Lady Blanche's Castle is like that to Jordan in the nigger
songs; it is "a hard road to travel"--a road full of holes and quagmires
and jutting rocks; and yet the driver told me it had once been a good
road, but that was in the reign of Queen Isabella. Everything seems to
have been allowed to go to dilapidation since. On the outskirts of
Puerto we passed an English cemetery; I am glad to say it is almost
uninhabited. If there is an English dead settlement there ought to be a
live one, I reasoned, unless those who are buried here date from
Peninsular battles. The first part of the road to Blanche's Castle is
level, and bordered with thick growths of prickly pear; there is a view
of the sea, and of the Guadalate, spanned by a metal bridge--a Menai on
a small scale. Farther on, as we get to a district called La Piedad, the
country is diversified by swampy flats at one side and sandy hills at
the other. Blanche's Castle was a commonplace ruin, a complete "sell,"
and we turned our horse's head rather savagely. As we were coming back,
the little American shortening the way by Sandford and Merton
observations of this nature--"Prickly pear makes a capital hedge; no
cattle will face it; the spikes of the plant are as tenacious as
fish-hooks. The fibres of the aloe are unusually strong; they make
better cordage than hemp, but will not bear the wet so well"--a sight
caught my eyes which caused me to stare. A tall young fellow, with his
trousers tucked up, was wading knee-deep in the bottoms beside the road.
He wore a suit of Oxford mixture.

"Who or what is that gentleman?" I asked the driver.

"An English engineer," was the answer.

I stopped the calesa, hailed him, and inquired was he fond of rheumatic
fever. He laughed, and pronounced the single word, "Duty." A little
word, but one that means much. A Spanish engineer would never have done
this; they are great in offices and at draughting on paper, but they
seldom tuck up their sleeves, much less their trousers, to labour out of
doors as the young Englishman was doing. I made his acquaintance, and he
willingly consented to show me over the works in which he was engaged,
which were intended to supply Cadiz with water. In England water is t