“When the Portuguese labourer has done his long day’s work, he does not lean against a post and smoke a pipe, nor does he linger in the wine-shop; but if it be a holiday or a Sunday, and in a rural district, he puts on a clean shirt, with a large gold or silver stud as a neck fastening, and his newest hat, varying in shape according to locality, but always of black felt, and of the kind one sees in pictures of Spanish life. He throws over his shoulder a black cloth cloak with a real gold or silver clasp. He takes his favourite ox-goad in his hand, as tall as himself, straight as an arrow, well-rounded, and polished, and bound with brass. He slings his mandolin round his neck, and makes his way to the nearest fashionable threshing-floor--the peasant’s drawing-room. As he passes along, strumming careless chords and humming snatches of strange airs, the girls and lads stop their labour and accompany him, lovers will interrupt their love-making to follow too, or continue their courting to the rhythmic tinkling of the mandolin. When the music and its following arrives at the dancing place, and the partners are all ranged in a circle, the dance will begin, with the strangest, slowest, most old-fashioned steps, the like whereof has not been danced under a civilized roof for centuries. The musician, or the three or four of them whose mandolins make the orchestra, dance in the round with the others, and, when the time arrives, turn and set to their partners like the other dancers.” The above is taken from the writings of an Englishman who spent many years of his life in Portugal, and knew the country well. There is still a great deal of superstition among the peasants, and some of the quaint legends of vampires, spirits, and fairies in which they firmly believe are most strange. Stories of Moorish maidens are very general. If, wandering through the forests, a man happens to hear an echo of his own voice, he thinks it is that of a Moorish maid, and, being a good Roman Catholic, crosses himself devoutly to keep off harm. In one place they tell of a huge and terrible dragon, who did all sorts of dreadful things, and terrorized the entire neighbourhood. At last a brave and chivalrous youth set out to try and destroy it, but while he lay in wait for the monster in the heart of a dark wood, he was overcome by sleep, and awoke, to his horror, to find himself in the coils of the monster itself, and the horrible creature in the act of kissing him on the lips. But as it did so the spell was broken, and instead of a dragon, he found he was being embraced by a most beautiful Moorish maiden, with whom he fell in love on the spot, and they were married, and lived happily ever after.