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The former dislike of England was forgotten. The Juntas of Asturias, Galicia, and Andalusia sent appeals to us for help, to which Canning generously responded; and, on July 4th, we passed at a single bound from war with the Spanish Bourbons to an informal alliance with the people of Spain. Napoleon now began to see the magnitude of his error.

It was agreed at length that Don Fernando should tell the servants of Don Luis who he was, and that it was his desire that Don Luis should accompany him to Andalusia, where he would receive from the marquis his brother the welcome his quality entitled him to; for, otherwise, it was easy to see from the determination of Don Luis that he would not return to his father at present, though they tore him to pieces.

The mountains of New Andalusia, half-veiled by mists, bounded the horizon to the south. The city of Cumana and its castle appeared between groups of cocoa-trees. We anchored in the port about nine in the morning, forty-one days after our departure from Corunna; the sick dragged themselves on deck to enjoy the sight of a land which was to put an end to their sufferings.

Small wonder if such girls felt like shrieking too, sometimes. Not over petty victories, and with joy; but when their hearts broke because the bells of memory called to them from away in the barred windows of Spain, or in walled gardens, or with the shepherd lovers of Andalusia.

You see that we have at last left Andalusia, and are here in what is like a bit of Paris, shops, dress, carriages, and now and then the smell of asphalt pavement being renewed. Still, mantillas are the coverings for the female head, and peasants in costumes drive mules and donkeys through the crowds in the busy streets, and one is still in Spain.

Milk is excellent in the provinces of New Andalusia, Barcelona, and Venezuela; and butter is better in the plains of the equinoctial zone, than on the ridge of the Andes, where the Alpine plants, enjoying in no season a sufficiently high temperature, are less aromatic than on the Pyrenees, on the mountains of Estremadura, or of Greece.

As Africa, distracted by the long war of the Almoravides and the Almohades, was unable to offer any opposition to the progress of the Christians in Spain, these last, availing themselves of this condition of affairs, continued to extend their conquests in Andalusia.

Yet it wanted an hour of unmasking time when a Bedouin led a gipsy maiden from Andalusia into the deserted library, where the darkness was broken only by blazing logs on an open hearth. When they were alone he turned to her anxiously. His voice was freighted with appeal. Her face, now unmasked, wore an expression of stunned misery. "Dear," he asked, "how are you?"

Yet she was almost beautiful when she was not angry or in a hurtful mood. The dark complexion was as smooth as a perfect peach, and tinged with warm colour, and her eyes could be like black opals, and no woman in Spain or Andalusia could match her for grace of figure and lightness of step. Others came after in the long train.

After carrying the branches in processions through the streets and into the churches and cathedrals, people hang them on the balconies of their houses, where they remain until the fresh palm branches of the next year replace them. The most colorful celebration of Holy Week is held in Seville, a city in sunny Andalusia.