The Distant View 



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We then perceive, perhaps too late, how much more 

 great, and excellent, and beautiful that was, than those 

 paltry intervening things which screened it from our eyes 

 so long." 



Near the foot of the hill, the cam'im real turned to the 

 left, so I followed a bridle-road which ascended it more 

 directly. This way, which deeply scars the steep hill-side 

 with several channels, seems as if it must have been worn 

 by the footsteps of many ages, and was probably once the 

 principal road ; but it is now almost deserted, the great 

 road, which slants more easily, having drawn the old traffic 

 away. 



From the brow there is a fine view of Seville the Mar- 

 vellous, with her hundred graceful spires, gathered, as in a 

 drawing-room of churches, around their giant and majestic 

 queen. A silvery bend or two of the river gleamed, folded 

 on the purple bosom of the plain. I sat down, partly 

 because I wanted to take a sketch, and partly because I was 

 out of breath with toiling up the rise, and felt a slight pain 

 in my lungs. However, I managed to draw my breath 

 better than my landscape. But the pain in my lungs had 

 reminded me I was mortal, and liable to accidents ; and, 

 indeed, when one is alone, and far away from help, a very 

 slight ailment is sufficient to act upon the imagination. 

 So, before proceeding further, in order to be prepared for 

 the worst that could happen, I wrote, as legibly as I could, 

 a short notice in the fly-leaf of my pocket-book, setting 

 forth, in a proclamatory style, " who I was, and what was 

 to be done with my body, in case it should be found 

 by well-disposed persons, who would be handsomely 

 rewarded," &c. 



Proceeding a little along the road, I came to a small 

 village, where I inquired my way to Castilleja de la 



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