The best posada in Lorca I found worse than might have been expected in a city containing twenty-five thousand inhabitants; and it was so dirty,--certainly not a common fault in the posadas--that I breakfasted in the yard. It chanced to be market-day at Lorca; and immediately after I had breakfasted, I strolled through the town, and into the market-place. Here I found many things new to me; for, as I have observed before, the provinces of Spain differ greatly from each other in dress, usages, &c. All the women wore a large square white woollen shawl, thrown over the head like a mantilla; the men were seen with short white drawers, untied at the knees, and reaching about two inches lower; they had no stockings; upon their feet were sandals, made of rope; and in place of the smart Spanish hat, they wore tapering black caps, fitting close to the head, with a small rim turned up all round: others, from the higher countries, were enveloped in blankets, generally of gaudy colours,--some of them nearly approaching to tartan. All sorts of things were exposed for sale: I saw an immense quantity of dried and shell fruits; cloths and calicos of Catalunian manufactory; shoes, especially rope sandals; quantities of the Esparto rush, and baskets made of it; beads, rosaries, images, and trinkets; and, in short, every thing that one either eats, or wears in the province of Murcia. In a street in the neighbourhood of the market-place, the pig market was held. I never saw a finer shew; for nowhere in the world, is the pig to be found in so great perfection as in Spain--fed, as it is, in the woods, upon the ilex nut. I asked the price of an enormous animal, weighing one hundred and eighty-five lbs., and found it to be two hundred and forty reals (about 2_l._ 8_s._); for a sucking-pig, they asked fourteen reals. In Lorca, there is little beef; mutton sells at twelve quartos; a fowl costs 1_s._ 8_d._, a hare 10_d._, bread 1½_d._ per lb. The price of labour in the vale of Lorca, is five reals, nearly 1_s._ I walked into the cathedral, but saw nothing worthy of notice, except proofs of the liberality of the Archbishop of Carthagena, who has published so great a number of indulgences, that the Catholics of Lorca and other places in his diocese, may pray themselves out of purgatory before they get into it. I saw one indulgence of forty days for every paternoster, and an ave, said before the shrine of St. Francis; and another of forty days for an ave, and a paternoster, said to St. Jago, St. Anthony of Padua, St. Domingo, and St. Nicholas: but I saw nobody taking advantage of these indulgences. The cathedral contains some tolerable pictures by pupils of Murillo.