cloaks, and lie on the mantas of their mules and horses, with a saddle or a pair of alforjas for a pillow. We passed several days at Malaga, where we experienced great attention and hospitality from our consul, Mr. Barrell, to whom you had given me a letter. I was much pleased with h him; he appears to be a frank, amiable, and worthy man. I wish he had a more profitable post. He desired me when I should write to you to remember him to you very particularly. From Malaga we took the circuitous route to Gibraltar by the mountains of Ronda, among which we encountered the only bad weather we have met with in the course of our tour. For three days that we were in the Serrania, we were drenched by frequent and heavy rains, but were in some measure compensated by the grand effect of mingled storm and mist and sunshine on the wild and stupendous scenery around us. The people of these mountains are the finest that I have seen in Spain, and the contrabandista of Ronda is the knight errant of the Spanish vulgar. We remained four days at Gibraltar, overwhelmed by hospitality, which, on the part of the military messes of the British regiments, is in the jovial and tempestuous style of the old school; for the officers confined to the rock, where there are few resources of general society, prolong the conviviality of the table. Sir George Don, the Governor of Gibraltar, is a fine compound of the veteran soldier, the keen sportsman, and the old English country gentleman. He keeps up strict order in the garrison, all the military works are admirably perfected and maintained; he has turned the slopes and skirts of this once sterile and glaring rock, into a delicious oriental garden, while at his little country retreat of St. Royal, about two leagues distant, he lays by the military and puts on the |