The behaviour of this king’s page afforded me much entertainment: he occupied four chairs; sitting upon one, his legs upon another, and the two others occupied by his arms. He had two soldiers to wait upon him, and their services were in constant requisition: one presented him with a cigar, another fetched a light; one he employed in polishing the hilt of his sword, the other held his watch open, while he looked into it. Sometimes he sent for his dressing-box, which was opened and held for him, while he examined its contents; and then he sent for a case of pistols, or a small portmanteau; and, in fact, made himself be served as he had served the king, his master. Below St. John’s Hill, the banks of the Guadalquivir become flat, and are covered with immense herds of horses. The country is here entirely pasture land, but the grass is coarse, and the soil apparently wet and poor. Scarcely any houses are to be seen, excepting where an orange grove, breaking the monotony of the view, fringes the river; and the house of the proprietor is generally embowered in his orangery. At every orange grove, there is a wheel and buckets to raise water from the river, and carry it to the trees. The horses and cattle had generally selected these shady spots, to shelter themselves from the sun; and standing, or lying in the river, they gave a character of picturesqueness to the landscape, which it would not otherwise have possessed. About six leagues below Seville, the banks again rise; and villages, and churches, and convents are scattered upon the heights which rise about a mile from the river; but soon after this, every elevation disappears, and the Guadalquivir flows through a boundless level, covered with scanty herbage, scattered with numerous herds of horses and cattle, and dotted here and there with long mud houses, meant as a shelter to the animals, from the noonday heats. I observed here for the first time in my life, that delusion of which I had often heard--leading the traveller of the desert to expect a lake, where there is only burning sand. The whole interior of the plain appeared like an immense sea; I distinctly saw the shadows of trees and houses seemingly in the water; but this was entirely a delusion;--the interior of the plain is sand, partially covered with very coarse grass. This plain stretches more than two leagues upon either side of the river, and it was with no small satisfaction, that I saw before me, though still far distant, the spires and buildings of St. Lucar. Owing to the state of the tide, however, we could not proceed so far as St. Lucar, but stopped at Bonanza, which is a league short of it. It was now nearly eight o’clock, and quite dark, excepting the star-light, and it became a question whether, and how to proceed. It had been announced that next morning at seven o’clock, an escort would leave St. Lucar for Port St. Mary; for, in this neighbourhood, an escort is considered necessary; and