: 
~ Englis 
O4 
‘bers of sheep: the environs of Tarazona, 
however, are fertile and well cultivated. 
This is an ancient town, having been 
known to the Romans. by the name of 
Turiaso, and by them was endowed with 
the privilege of coining money, as early 
‘as in the time of Augustus. The town is 
now much decayed, but fraginents of 
columns, pedestals, &c. attest its former 
splendour: indeed, few oman remains 
can well be expected at Tarazona, as it 
was besieged aud entirely overthrown by 
the Moors, about the year 723. The 
cathedral, a venerable gothic structure, 
and the bishop’s palace, are the only 
buildings worthy of notice. 
From Tarazona, the road continues in 
fhe same easterly direction for the other 
five leagues to Mallen, situated about a 
couple of miles south from the Ebro. 
The first half of the road lies over an un- 
even, uncultivated tract, like that on the 
west side of Tarazona, and then enters 
the yast plain of the Ebro, naturally 
much more productive, but very thinly 
inhabited. Mallen is « small place, with 
an ancient castle belonging to the Order 
of Malta, of which it is a commandery. 
The castle forms a quad-angle, with a 
court in the middle, and square towers 
at each corner: it is now used for the 
courts of justice, and the prison of the 
Surrounding district. 
~ From Mallen, I travelled six leagues 
still eastward to Alagon, situated on the 
west bank of the river Xalon, the ancient 
Salo, which rising in the mountains se- 
garating the kingdom of Arragon from 
that of Old Castille, flows northerly by 
Calatayud, the representative of the an- 
cient Bilbilis, the birth place of the Epi- 
grammatist Martial, and discharges it- 
self into the Ebro, a mile below Alagon. 
_ About two leagues before arriving at 
Alagon, I came upon the great canal of — 
Arragon, or of the Ebro, which takes its: 
rise on the south side of that river near 
Tudela, and is continued down the vale 
below Saragossa, but not nearly comple- 
ted to rejoin the Ebro, before it falls into 
the Mediterranean, as was originally in- 
tended by a course of about one hundred 
thiles. This canal was begun under the 
Emperor Charles V. in 1528; but the 
work made little progress until the reign 
of the late King Charles II. The depth 
of the water is to be no less than ten 
feet; but the canal has hitherto 
been very little used for navigation, the 
chief use of the water having been for 
irrigation of the vast fertile plain, be- 
tween the canal and the Ebro, For the 
Account of recent Travels in Spain. 
; [Aug. I, 
purpose of drawing off the water from the 
canal, sluices are constructed at tlie dis- 
tance of about a mile asunder, and the 
water is conveyed to the grounds in 
small channels. For the use of this 
water, the inhabitants were to pay to the 
king, a rent equal to the tenth part of 
that paid to the proprietors of the soil: 
but from the contrasted appearances of 
the lands below, and of those above the 
canal, the contribution to government 
seemed to bear but a very small propor- 
tion to the vast benefits received from the 
water. . i. 
Before entering Alagon, the canal 
crosses the road, running southward for 
a mile up the west bank of the narrow 
valley of the river Xalon. This valley 
the canal traverses from west to east, on 
an elevated ‘aqueduct, the middle of 
which is a bridge of three arches for the 
ty c oF ae > i. : 
passage of the Xalon, flowing briskly 
under the canal, from south to north. 
After this passage of the valley, and 
river, the canal is carried along the edge 
of the high grounds, bordering the vale 
of the Ebro, and is no morale by the 
x heleimal Saragossa; altliough its be- 
neficial effects on the plain are. easily 
discernible. ° 
From Alagon, to Saragossa, is a course 
of four leagues, over the same flat vale of 
the Ebro, now better peopled and more 
carefully cultivated than the tracts gone 
over. 
The productions are corn, with a large 
proportion of wine and oil; and the ap- 
pearance of the inhabitants and their 
dwellings gradually improves, on ap- 
proaching Saragossa, which presents a 
magnificent prospect of a's and stee- 
ples, seated.in the mids 0 Fthe plain, 
Saragossa, oras it is written in Spanish 
Zaragoza, the capital of the kingdom of 
Arragon, and an_archbishop’s see, is si- 
tuated on the south or right bn the 
river Ebro, in the concave part of a. 
bend.of the river, which there forms the 
segment of a Jarge circle to the north. 
ward, so that the buildings along the 
sYiver, are but partially seen, from any 
one point. “The Ebro is large, but na- 
vigable in general only for small boats, 
on account of the many sandbanks in its 
hed, which frequently change their po- 
sition, Over the river is a stone bridge - 
of six arches, and about six hundred feet 
in length, communicating with a suburb 
on the north side: and a little, lower 
down is a wooden bridge, for fdot pas- 
sengers. The town is above 4 mile long, 
by three quarters of a mile in its greatest 
‘breadth, 
