At length one morning at daybreak they reached the city of Seville, where the owl, who hated the glare and bustle of crowded streets, halted without the gate, and took up his quarters in a hollow tree. The prince entered the gate, and readily found the magic tower, which rose above the houses of the city, as a palm-tree rises above the shrubs of the desert; it was in fact the same tower standing at the present day, and known as the Giralda, the famous Moorish tower of Seville. The prince ascended by a great winding staircase to the summit of the tower, where he found the cabalistic raven,--an old, mysterious, gray-headed bird, ragged in feather, with a film over one eye that gave him the glare of a spectre. He was perched on one leg, with his head turned on one side, poring with his remaining eye on a diagram described on the pavement. The prince approached him with the awe and reverence naturally inspired by his venerable appearance and supernatural wisdom. “Pardon me, most ancient and darkly wise raven,” exclaimed he, “if for a moment I interrupt those studies which are the wonder of the world. You behold before you a votary of love, who would fain seek your counsel how to obtain the object of his passion.” “In other words,” said the raven, with a significant look, “you seek to try my skill in palmistry. Come, show me your hand, and let me decipher the mysterious lines of fortune.” “Excuse me,” said the prince, “I come not to pry into the decrees of fate, which are hidden by Allah from the eyes of mortals; I am a pilgrim of love, and seek but to find a clue to the object of my pilgrimage.” “And can you be at any loss for an object in amorous Andalusia?” said the old raven, leering upon him with his single eye; “above all, can you be at a loss in wanton Seville, where black-eyed damsels dance the zambra under every orange grove?” The prince blushed, and was somewhat shocked at hearing an old bird with one foot in the grave talk thus loosely. “Believe me,” said he, gravely, “I am on none such light and vagrant errand as thou dost insinuate. The black-eyed damsels of Andalusia who dance among the orange groves of the Guadalquivir are as naught to me. I seek one unknown but immaculate beauty, the original of this picture; and I beseech thee, most potent raven, if it be within the scope of thy knowledge or the reach of thy art, inform me where she may be found.” The gray-headed raven was rebuked by the gravity of the prince. “What know I,” replied he, dryly, “of youth and beauty? my visits are to the old and withered, not the fresh and fair: the harbinger of fate am I; who croak bodings of death from the chimney-top, and flap my wings at the sick man’s window. You must seek elsewhere for tidings of your unknown beauty.” “And where can I seek if not among the sons of wisdom, versed in the book of destiny? Know that I am a royal prince, fated by the stars, and sent on a mysterious enterprise on which may hang the destiny of empires.”