terioration in the royal
manufacture of cigars, and, more than either, "by the tardiness of
military promotion." This last grievance was the sting. "If justice
had been done," exclaimed the new-feathered warrior, rising in his
stirrups, and waving his hand, as if he was in the act of cleaving
down a Moor, "_I_ should long since have been a general. If I had been
a general, the armies of Spain would long since have been on a very
different footing. Men of merit would have been placed in their proper
positions; the troops would have emulated the exploits of their
forefathers in the age of Ferdinand and Isabella; and, instead of
receiving a king from France, we should have given her one; while,
instead of seeing a French emperor carrying off our princes, as the
hawk carries off pigeons, or as a gipsy picks your pocket under
pretence of telling your fortune, we should have been garrisoning
Paris with our battalions, and sending a viceroy to the Tuileries."

I laughed; but my ill-timed mirth had nearly cost me an "affair of
honour" with the little regenerator. His hand was instantly on the
hilt of his sword, and every wrinkle on his brown visage was swelling
with wrath; when my better genius prevailed, He probably recollected
that he was sent as my protector, and that the office would not have
been fulfilled according to his instructions, by running me through
the midriff. But, with all his pomposity, he had the national
good-nature; and when we sat down to our chicken and bottle of Tinto
in one of those delicious valleys, he was full of remorse for his
burst of patriotic temper.

The day had been a continued blaze of sunshine, the road a burning
sand, and the contrast of the spot where we made our halt was
tempting. The scene was rich and _riant_, the evening lovely, and the
wine good. I could have reposed there for a month, or a year, or for
ever. It would have been enough to make a man turn hermit; and I
instinctively gazed round, to look for the convent which "must lie" in
so luxurious a site. My companion informed me that I was perfectly
right in my conjecture, that spot having been the position of one of
the richest brotherhoods of Spain. But its opulence had been unluckily
displayed in rather too ostentatious a style in the eyes of a French
brigade; who, in consequence, packed up the plate in their baggage,
and, in the course of a tumult which followed with the peasantry,
burned the building to the ground.

Yet, t