About an hour after I arrived, the supper which had been bespoken, was placed before me; and having myself superintended the cookery, I had the satisfaction of sitting down to fowl and bacon, without either oil or garlic. The host told me, that upon the La Mancha side of the Sierra Morena, there was little danger of robbery; but that the moment I set foot in Andalusia, I might consider myself in constant jeopardy. The band of Don José, he said, was then scouring every part of Andalusia; and on some roads, scarcely any traveller escaped robbery. I afterwards found, that in this information he was correct; but just about the same time, the band of Don José was dispersed; upwards of twenty were made prisoners, and the leader, and about fifteen followers escaped to Portugal. After dinner, it still wanted an hour of sunset; and this interval, and nearly another hour added to it, I spent in a ramble among the outposts of the Sierra. All the lower part of the mountain on this side is covered with a thick carpet of shrubs, and with millions of aromatic plants. Wild olives grow profusely over the lower acclivities; but higher up, and in the defiles, ilex and pine throw their deeper and broader shadows upon the mountain side. The silence of the hills is felt in its fullest extent on the Sierra Morena, because it is not broken by the music of mountain rills, whose playful gush, and varying tone, often go far towards neutralizing the character of solemnity which naturally belongs to mountain scenes. Almost all the waters of the Sierra Morena descend on the southern side, and flow towards the Mediterranean. I caught some fine mountain images before darkness forced me back to the venta. Sunny slopes, strewed with pale olives; and dark hill sides scattered with crooked ilex; golden peaks, and dusky ravines; milk-white goats descending the steeps, and the goatherd, such as he whose whistle startled Don Quixotte and his squire; small trains of mules, with their bells, and their muleteer, winding down the road towards the venta; and the broader shadows, and the fading light, and the dusky mountain, and the dark outline, piled against the unclouded heaven of Andalusian skies.