On the next day we pursued our journey, a dreary one, for the most part, over bleak and barren plains, interspersed with silent and cheerless towns and villages, which stood at the distance of two or three leagues from each other. About midday we obtained a dim and distant view of an immense range of mountains, {310b} which are in fact those which bound Castile on the north. The day, however, became dim and obscure, and we speedily lost sight of them. A hollow wind now arose and blew over these desolate plains with violence, wafting clouds of dust into our faces; the rays of the sun were few, and those red and angry. I was tired of my journey, and when about four we reached ---, {311} a large village, halfway between Palencia and Leon, I declared my intention of stopping for the night. I scarcely ever saw a more desolate place than this same town or village of ---. The houses were for the most part large, but the walls were of mud, like those of barns. We saw no person in the long winding street to direct us to the _venta_, or _posada_, till at last, at the farther end of the place, we descried two black figures standing at a door, of whom, on making inquiry, we learned that the door at which they stood was that of the house we were in quest of. There was something strange in the appearance of these two beings, who seemed the genii of the place. One was a small slim man, about fifty, with sharp ill-natured features. He was dressed in coarse black worsted stockings, black breeches, and an ample black coat with long trailing skirts. I should at once have taken him for an ecclesiastic, but for his hat, which had nothing clerical about it, being a pinched diminutive beaver. His companion was of low stature, and a much younger man. He was dressed in similar fashion, save that he wore a dark blue cloak. Both carried walking-sticks in their hands, and kept hovering about the door, now within and now without, occasionally looking up the road, as if they expected some one. “Trust me, _mon maître_,” said Antonio to me, in French, “those two fellows are Carlist priests, and are awaiting the arrival of the Pretender. _Les imbeciles_!” We conducted our horses to the stable, to which we were shown by the woman of the house. “Who are those men?” said I to her. “The eldest is head curate to our _pueblo_,” said she; “the other is brother to my husband. _Pobrecito_! he was a friar in our convent before it was shut up and the brethren driven forth.” We returned to the door. “I suppose, gentlemen,” said the curate, “that you are Catalans? Do you bring any news from that kingdom?” “Why do you suppose we are Catalans?” I demanded. “Because I heard you this moment conversing in that language.” “I bring no news from Catalonia,” {312} said I. “I believe, however, that the greater part of that principality is in the hands of the Carlists.”