The road between Cadiz and Gibraltar has long been notorious for its difficulties and danger: it is altogether a mule track, lying partly through the outposts of the Sierras of Xeres and of Ronda, and partly along the sea-coast, and totally impassable during rainy weather, both on account of the swampy nature of the soil, and of the numerous streams which a mountain storm may convert in a few hours into impetuous and impracticable torrents. The accommodations too, are of the worst kind. Between Chiclana, which lies near Cadiz, and Algesiras, opposite to Gibraltar, a distance of nearly eighty miles, there is only one town, and the ventas are of the most miserable description:--but these are difficulties only; the dangers are still more formidable. From the middle of last June, till the middle of August in the same year, no fewer than fifty-three travellers had been robbed upon this road: many of these robberies had been attended with violence; and, in some instances, the travellers had been taken into the mountains, and long detained in the hope of ransom. More than two months had indeed elapsed since these robberies had been committed, and the danger was therefore less; the regular band under Don José had been broken up, and twenty-one of their number were at that time under sentence of death at St. Roqué; but the road was still considered unsafe--the post from Malaga had been robbed only the day before, and I was strongly counselled to go to Malaga by sea. It is frequently, however, such roads as these, that are most worthy the attention of the traveller; and as my object was to see Spain, I concluded a bargain with a man who had the reputation of being honest, for three horses and his own attendance; for which I agreed to pay twenty-one dollars.