Commencement of Journey 



I put on my Calanies hat, which is about the shape and 

 size of a small cheese or a large skittle-ball, and my coarse 

 capa (cloak) of panno pardo (brown cloth) turned up with 

 scarlet, under the ample folds of which I carried my little 

 linen bag of movables, and sallied forth. I found the 

 marques (also got up for the country in the national cos- 

 tume) seated in a very red and yellow calesa^ and we jogged 

 slowly out of the town by the gate of Triana. 



This gate is exactly on the opposite side of the town 

 from our direction ; but we took it because the streets are 

 in that direction passable, which those towards the Caiios 

 de Carmona scarcely are. 



Having made half the circuit of the city outside the 

 walls, we turned towards the open country by the road 

 which skirts the ancient Moorish aqueduct [cams) which 

 supplies the city with water. The famous Guadalquivir 

 supplies it only with a limited navigation and unlimited mud. 



The roads were very bad, and we went along at a foot- 

 pace, till, passing the Cruz del Campo, we came to Torre 

 Blanca, where there is a white tower (from which the place 

 takes its name), a toll-bar, and a venta. Here we descended 

 to drink a glass of manzanilla and eat a little round sponge- 

 cake whitened with sugar outside, which the ventero in- 

 formed us were " muy buenos, de Alcala." At Torre 

 Blanca we left the camino real^ and struck off on the old 

 arrec'ife (by-road) de Carmona ; and the dark green orange- 

 groves, interspersed with still darker cypress spires, which 

 had lined the approach to Seville, changed into the bushy 

 dehesa^ or wilderness. 



The narrow track was lined with wild olives and palmitas^ 

 and here and there the aloe lifted its gigantic spikes. 



The road did not improve, being in places hidden by long 

 pools of water. The day was beautiful, and we went along 



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