Nasal Cadence 



ested parties, and at last had to give up looking for it, and 

 take up with the San yose^ which we stumbled upon in our 

 fruitless search for the one recommended by Ford. Before 

 the gateway a swaggering carabineer demanded our pass- 

 ports. We said he had no business to be in such a hurry, 

 and that at night they would go in the proper way to the 

 jefe politico (political chief) ; but he began to bluster vio- 

 lently, and be very troublesome, and evinced himself to be 

 the worse for liquor ; so we told him he was an impudent 

 borracho (sot), and went to the stables, leaving him in the 

 courtyard to vent his offended military dignity on the land- 

 lady, who seemed rather afraid of him. In the stables we had 

 a parallel scene of dissension between the Moor and another 

 horse. Afterwards, with much trouble, we got some sar- 

 dines for supper, and I helped the posadera to salt and flour 

 their shiny sides for the frying-pan. 



Next morning we were off early, though the weather was 

 not very promising, and rode along heavy sandy shores in a 

 drizzling rain (I in my Moorish jillabiah^ with the hood up, 

 which kept me pretty dry), with nothing to enliven the road 

 except a wearisome succession of watch-towers, at about 

 two miles' distance from one another. The weather 

 cleared up. 



I had made a paper cigar, and had dropped the rein on 

 the Moor's neck, to strike a light, when he suddenly started 

 off, and plunging down a steep place, threw me on my face. 

 My nose was considerably bruised, though I fell only on 

 sand. If it had been anything harder, I don't think I should 

 have got up with any nose at all. 



At Fuengirola we baited at a new clean posada^ whose 

 master spoke to us in English ; he was a brisk little man 

 from Gibraltar, and had a most melancholy-looking blind 

 wife. I was rather tired, and lay down on the sanded 



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