the
glorious cathedral, to the old house in the Callo del Candilejo, where the
witch-woman looked out and saw King Don Pedro fighting his duel. I don't
believe any other place could make up to me for Seville."

By the side of the two-thousand-years-old-aqueduct ran a modern electric
tramway; and one of the graceful arches made by Roman hands had been
widened to let pass the railway line for Madrid. Farther on, Moorish
houses with lofty miradors and beautiful capped windows were tucked
between ugly new buildings, and across the shaded avenue of a green park
was flung an extraordinary, four-winged spiral staircase of iron. I
groaned at the monstrosity, saying that Pedro himself had never
perpetrated an act more cruel; and the Cherub excused it sadly, by saying
that it was convenient for the crowds to pass from one side of the street
to the other, as I should see if I stayed beyond the _Semana Santa_ for
the _feria_.

"Look at the Giralda, and you'll forget the iron bridge," said Pilar. My
eyes followed hers, and lit like winging birds upon a beautiful tower
soaring delicately against the sky. So light, so fragile in effect was it,
I felt that it might lean upon a cloud. In the golden light of afternoon
the little pillars of old marble, the carved lozenges of stone, the arches
of the horseshoe windows, the dainty carvings of the balconies, and all
the marvellous ornamentation that broke the square surfaces of the tower,
were rosy as if with reflections from a sunset sky. Its beauty was a
Moorish poem in brick-work, such as no other hands save Moorish hands have
ever made.

I looked back until I lost sight of the Giralda, except the glittering
figure of Faith on the top (strange symbol for a weather-vane), while
threading through tortuous streets, mere strips of pavement veiled with
blue shadow, and walled with secretive, flat-fronted houses, old and new,
pearly with fresh whitewash, or painted pale lemon, faded orange, or a
green ethereal as the tints of seaweed. Even at first sight the quaint
town was singularly lovable, in its mingling of simplicity and mystery,
and as Spanish in this mixture as in all things else.

The tall, straight palms, with their tufted heads like falling fountains,
clear against the sky, were Oriental, and seemed scarcely kin to the palms
of Italy and Southern France. Nor were the narrow streets, through which
we pounded over cobbles, like the narrow streets of Italian towns. They
were Spanish