uin of which is all that now remains.

Of the inhabited portions the external walls alone remain. The cloister
is almost entire, and the church has only lost its roof. The rich
tracery surrounding the doorways, and the sculpture in all parts of the
interior, consisting chiefly of repetitions of the founder's armorial
bearings--in imitation or satire of the profusion of similar ornament in
San Juan de los Reyes--are entire, and appear as though they had been
recently executed. The church is designed after the plan of San Juan,
but the style of its ornament is much more elegant. The cloister is,
however, very inferior to that of Toledo, and the whole establishment on
a smaller scale.

Every traveller in search of the picturesque knows in how great a degree
his satisfaction has been increased whenever the meeting with a scene
deserving of his admiration assumes the nature of a discovery. For this
reason, the chapters of tourists should never be perused before a
journey--independently of their possessing more interest subsequently to
an acquaintance having been made with the country described. Strictly
speaking written tours are intended for those who stay at home.

But the most favourable first view of a highly admirable building or
landscape, is the one you obtain after the perusal of tours and
descriptions of the country, in none of which any notice is taken of
that particular object or scene. The village of Torijos is approached
under these advantageous circumstances. Every step is a surprise, owing
partly to the above cause, and partly to one's being inured to the
almost universal dreariness and ugliness of the villages and small towns
of this part of Spain. The appearance under these circumstances of a
beautiful Gothic cross and fountain, of an original and uncommon design,
outside the walls of the place, and the open tracery of the tall windows
of the ruined monastery at the other side of a green meadow, creates an
agreeable surprise, and adds considerably to the pleasure which would be
derived from the same objects, had expectation been already feeding on
their beauties. Imagine, then, the discovery, after leaving behind these
monuments, (sufficient for the immortality of a score of Castilian
villages,) of the facade of the principal church, consisting of one of
the richest and most exquisite specimens of Gothic decoration in Spain;
and, a street further on, of a second ornamental portal of a different
sort, but G