liged to alight
and lead his horse up and down the steep and jagged ascents and
descents, resembling the broken steps of a staircase. Sometimes the road
winds along dizzy precipices, without parapet to guard him from the
gulfs below, and then will plunge down steep, and dark, and dangerous
declivities. Sometimes it straggles through rugged barrancos, or
ravines, worn by winter torrents, the obscure path of the
contrabandista; while, ever and anon, the ominous cross, the monument of
robbery and murder, erected on a mound of stones at some lonely part of
the road, admonishes the traveller that he is among the haunts of
banditti, perhaps at that very moment under the eye of some lurking
bandolero. Sometimes, in winding through the narrow valleys, he is
startled by a hoarse bellowing, and beholds above him on some green fold
of the mountain side a herd of fierce Andalusian bulls, destined for the
combat of the arena. There is something awful in the contemplation of
these terrific animals, clothed with tremendous strength, and ranging
their native pastures in untamed wildness, strangers almost to the face
of man: they know no one but the solitary herdsman who attends upon
them, and even he at times dares not venture to approach them. The low
bellowing of these bulls, and their menacing aspect as they look down
from their rocky height, give additional wildness to the savage scenery
around."

(From _The Alhambra_, or _New Sketch Book_, to which we propose to
return in a _Supplement_ in a fortnight.)

* * * * *

ANECDOTE GALLERY.

* * * * *

THE UNLUCKY PRESENT: A TALE.

A Lanarkshire minister (who died within the present century) was one of
those unhappy persons, who, to use the words of a well known Scottish
adage, "can never see green cheese but their een reels." He was
_extremely covetous_ and that not only of nice articles of food, but of
many other things which do not generally excite the cupidity of the
human heart. The following story is in corroboration of this
assertion:--Being on a visit one day at the house of one of his
parishioners, a poor lonely widow, living in a moorland part of the
parish, he became fascinated by the charms of a little cast-iron pot,
which happened at the time to be lying on the hearth, full of potatoes
for the poor woman's dinner, and that of her children. He had never in
his life seen such a nice little pot--it w