"Wouldn't you like a ride, Mr Brand?" exclaimed Gerard, looking towards them. He had not to look twice before the whole _posse commitatus_ of men and boys rushed forward, and seizing us _vi et armis_, carried us off in triumph towards their sorry-looking beasts. Which party would have us seemed a question. Who ever heard of sailors who didn't want to ride? Ride we must; but as there were thirty or more beasts, and only three of us, it was difficult to say which of them should have the honour of carrying us. The _arrieros_ got one of Cousin Silas's legs put on the back of a horse, and another on that of a mule, while a little wicked donkey began kicking and plunging directly under him. At last he sprang on to the back of the horse, and Gerard and I found ourselves somehow or other on the saddles of two mules, when their respective owners, catching hold of their long tails, and giving them a prong with their iron-pointed sticks, away we started from out of the crowd, who all hallooed and shouted after us, till we had shot some way up one of the steep rocky heights over which the bridle-paths of the island lead. "Arra burra--arra, arra, arra!" sung out the crowd. "Arra, arra, arra!" repeated our _arrieros_, goading the unfortunate animals with their sticks--"Arra, sish, sish!" It is hopeless to imitate the sounds emitted by our drivers. Up we shot like pellets from popguns, through the narrow rock-strewn gorges which are called roads. Up, up, up the animals scrambled. They seemed to enjoy the fun, or, perhaps, wiser than men, they felt a pleasure in performing their daily duty. We, too, enjoyed the magnificent views we got over vineyards, and fields, and orange-groves, and olive-plantations, with often deep precipices below us, and the blue sparkling sea in the distance. We passed several buildings, once convents and nunneries; but when the constitutional government was established in Portugal, the monks were turned out of their habitations to gain an honest livelihood as best they could, though the nuns were in some instances allowed to remain in their abodes, on condition of their admitting no fresh novices. Thus, by this time the greater number of professed nuns are old women. They employ themselves in fabricating artificial flowers of shells and feathers, baskets and ornaments of various sorts, as well as in making dried fruits and sweetmeats. As Cousin Silas observed, it might have appeared hard to turn the poor monks adrift in the world; but as ill weeds grow apace, it was necessary to eradicate them, lest a fresh crop should spring up where they had for so long taken root.