estern Europe
with the Spanish Arabs. But perhaps the most curious achievement
attributed to them is, that spiders, flies, and other insects, shunned
their apartments at all seasons."

"What!" exclaimed Lady Mabel, "had they attained that perfection in
the art of building? Could they exercise those hordes of little
demons, lay a spell upon them and turn them out of doors? Had you told
me this yesterday I would have been less impressed by it. But, after
last night's ordeal, I venerate the Moor. Almost I regret the
expulsion of his cleanly superstition, since it has carried with it
into exile so rare an art."

Mrs. Shortridge, too, seemed fully to appreciate the value of the lost
art, and said, "these Moors must indeed have been a very comfortable
people."

"And they crowned their comfort in this world," said L'Isle, "by
inventing an equally comfortable system for the next."

"Is it not strange," said Lady Mabel, gazing on the building before
them, "that the production of two races, each so skillful, should be
so utterly incompatible. Classic and Saracenic art, both beautiful,
united make a monster."

"Not so strange," L'Isle answered, "as the simplicity of the
Mohammedan faith, amidst all that is fantastic in arts and letters--a
grotesque architecture, a wondrous alchemy, the extravagant in poetry
and the supernatural in fiction; or the purity of classic art,
characterized by simplicity and proportion, yet drawing its
inspiration from a wild and copious mythology, made up of the sportive
creations of fancy."

"They were a wonderful people, these Romans, as even this obscure
corner of Europe can witness," said Lady Mabel, her eyes dwelling on
the beautiful colonade, and tracing out the exquisite symmetry of the
shafts, and the rich foliage of the Corinthian capitals.

"Were these Romans Christians?" asked Moodie, who had hitherto looked
on in silence.

"No," she answered, "they worshipped many false gods."

"Then they were just like all the Romans I have known," said he dryly,
and turned his back on the temple.

"Come," said Mrs. Shortridge, "let us take Moodie's hint, and look for
something else worth seeing."

As they continued their walk, L'Isle remarked, "In many a place in the
peninsula we find a Roman aqueduct, a Moorish castle, and a Gothic
cathedral standing close together, yet ages apart. How much of history
is embraced in this? We have just been gazing upon the mouldering
remains of two phases of