We are now coming down into the region of the aloe, the olive, the orange, and the vine. Since we have crossed the Sierra Morena, the climate has softened. At this season of the year (February), the vegetation is not far advanced, but the leaves of the olive are always green, and the orange and the lemon bear leaves and fruit and flowers at the same time. The orange should, in some climates, like this and the south of France, remain on the tree, after it appears to be ripe, for two years, before it is sweet. Much of that delicious fruit which we have in our country is too sour to be good, because gathered and sent to market before it is fully ripe. Here, and all over the southern parts of Spain, it is a _glorious_ fruit. It is very large, very yellow, and very sweet; and being abundant, is very cheap. A cent of our money will buy the largest, and the natives get them much cheaper than that. Sweet lemons are also common. But they are not agreeable. They seem to me a miserable attempt to be an orange. And the good sour lemons grow to an enormous size. I got one in Cordova to measure, and my hat would hold one lemon only! The skin was at least an inch thick; the juice not so acid as of the lemon generally, and there was no more of it than in one of ordinary size. These large lemons are used in preserves, the skin being the only available part of the fruit. We are now on the plains, in sight of the graceful hills of ANDALUSIA. In the soft sunlight of this warm winter’s day the hills appear to be sleeping and enjoying their repose. All nature, even now, invites to rest. We begin to feel the languor of the clime. There are no trees but the olive. No birds are singing, or we should know that summer is nigh. We stop frequently at little stations, to leave and take the mail. The letters and papers are tied up in a packet with a string, and are handed from the mail-car to a boy or a woman on hand to receive them. The letters _from_ the place are delivered to the mail-agent in the same way. No bag, no box, no lock or key, not even a wrapper around the letters protects them. It is the way they do things in this country. Over these wide plains there are few or no habitations to be seen. The peasants must travel many miles to their daily work, for they live in villages far away from the lands they till. Few cattle are to be seen; now and then a flock of sheep. More black sheep than white ones were in sight, and many of the blacks were singularly marked, having but one white spot on them, and that at the tip of their tails. [Illustration: CORDOVA.] CHAPTER VIII. CORDOVA.