forgetting the ghostly concerns of his patient, never omitted to add a certain dose of _Agnus Castus_ to every ounce of the syrup; a practice to which, he once told a friend of mine, both he and his uncle most religiously adhered when attending young nuns, with the benevolent purpose of making their religious duties more easy. LETTER IX. _Seville, ---- 1806._ As, in order to help my memory, I have been for some time collecting notes under different heads, relative to the customs, both public and private, which are most remarkable in the annual circle of _Sevillian_ life, I find myself possessed of a number of detached scraps, which, though affording abundant matter for more than one of my usual dispatches, are much too stubborn to bend themselves into any but their original shape. After casting about in my mind for some picturesque or dramatic plan of arrangement, I had, most cowardly, I confess, and like a mere novice in the art of authorship, determined to suppress the detached contents of my common-place book, when it occurred to me that, as they were no less likely to gratify your curiosity in their present state than in a more elaborate form, a simple transcript of my notes would not stand amiss in the collection of my letters. I shall, therefore, present you with the following sample of my _Fasti Hispalenses_, or Sevillian Almanack, without, however, binding myself to furnish it with the three hundred and sixty-five articles which that name seems to threaten. Or, should you still find the title too ambitious and high-sounding for the mere gossip and prattle of this series of scraps, I beg you will call it (for I have not the heart to send out my productions not only shapeless, but nameless) MEMORANDUMS OF SOME ANDALUSIAN CUSTOMS AND FESTIVALS. JANUARY 20TH. SAINT SEBASTIAN’S DAY. Carnival has been ushered in, according to an ancient custom which authorises so early a commencement of the gaieties that precede Lent. Little, however, remains of that spirit of mirth which contrived such ample amends for the demure behaviour required during the annual grand fast. To judge from what I have seen and heard in my boyhood, the generation who lived at Seville before me, were, in their love of noisy merriment, but one step above children; and contrived to pass a considerable portion of their time in a round of amusements, more remarkable for jollity than for either show or refinement; yet unmixed with any grossness or indecorum. I shall give a specimen in a family of middle rank, whose circumstances were not the most favourable to cheerfulness.