Madrid stands in a flat uninteresting country, devoid of scenery; fields of tillage encompass the city up to the mud wall that surrounds it, and the rivulet that meanders round it is in summer so insignificant as to be barely able to supply the few baths on its banks with a sufficiency of water; nevertheless this side of the town, which is next the Grand Park, and the regal cottage called Casa del Campo, is far from uninteresting, and as the Park, which abounds with game of all sorts, was open to the British officers, we had abundance of sport when we wished to avail ourselves of it. The streets are wide, and the principal ones, generally speaking, clean, but the part of the town possessing the greatest interest is the great street called Puerto del Sol. Some centuries ago it was the eastern gate of the town, but as the city became enlarged from time to time, it is now, like the University College of Dublin, in the heart of the metropolis, instead of at the verge of it. Half a dozen or so of the principal streets empty, in a manner, their population into this gangway, where the Exchange is held, and all public business carried on, so that any one desirous of hearing the news of the day, the price of the funds, or any other topic discussed, has but to station himself here and his curiosity will be satisfied, as almost the entire of the population of Madrid pass and repass under his eye during the day. Merchants, dealers, higglers, charcoal venders, fellows with lemonade on their backs, girls with pannellas of water incessantly crying out “_Quien quiere agua?_” all congregate to this focus, where everything is to be known.