The person thus described, and almost as soon introduced, was no other than the far-famed Jozé Almeida Alcantaro de Castreballos, half-brother to the celebrated Louiranna well known in Lisbon. A man, who as he himself jocosely said, had taken many a British officer by the nose. He was, in fact, neither more nor less than a common barber, who gained a livelihood by shaving, bleeding, and physicking his customers. The Portuguese barbers are like those of other countries, great retailers of scandal, and amply stocked with a fund of amusing conversation. They know everything, or seem to know everything, which, to nine-tenths of those they meet, is the same thing! This fellow told us all the news of the day, and added to it a thousand inventions, which his own fertile imagination supplied. He described the retreat of Wellington from Talavera as one caused by the want of the Portuguese army to co-operate with him: and if his account was to be given credit to, the whole world put together did not contain such an army as that of Portugal. He said that General Peacock, who commanded in Lisbon, invented stories every day, and that no intelligence from the army ought to be considered sterling, except what emanated from his (the barber’s) shop. But then, said he, shrugging up his shoulders, and in broken English. “It is not one very uncommon ting, to see one Peacock spreading a tail!” He laughed at his pun, and so did we; but I have since heard that the merit of it did not belong to him. “But, gentlemen,” resumed the barber, “I come here as a professional man, not as a wit, though for that matter I am as much one as the other—but to the point, gentlemen! you seem to have suffered, and I am the man, able, ready, and willing to serve you. Look here,” said he, holding up a white jar, having a superscription on the outside to the following effect: “_bixas boas_” (good leeches): “I am none of your quacks, that come _unprepared_! I do not want to write a prescription that will cost my customers a mint of money! Well did I know what you stood in need of when you sent for your humble servant. Within the last ten days, that is to say, since the arrival of the fleet of transports from Portsmouth, I have given employment to one thousand leeches in this very house. This hotel has made my fortune, and now, with the blessing of God and the Virgin Mary, I’ll add to the number, already made use of, one hundred more, on the faces of those to whom I have the honour of addressing myself.”