Yet let it not for a moment be supposed that I have any intention of asserting, that excellent and estimable individuals are not to be found amongst the Andalusians; it was amongst _them_ that I myself discovered one, whom I have no hesitation in asserting to be the most extraordinary character that has ever come within the sphere of my knowledge; but this was no scion of a noble or knightly house, “no wearer of soft clothing,” no sleek highly perfumed personage, none of the romanticos who walk in languishing attitudes about the streets of Seville, with long black hair hanging upon their shoulders in luxuriant curls: but one of those whom the proud and unfeeling style the dregs of the populace, a haggard, houseless, penniless man, in rags and tatters. I allude to Manuel, the—what shall I call him?—seller of lottery tickets, driver of death carts, or poet laureate in gypsy songs? I wonder whether thou art still living, my friend Manuel; thou gentleman of nature’s forming—honest, pure-minded, humble, yet dignified being! Art thou still wandering through the courts of beautiful Safacoro, or on the banks of the Len Baro, {262} thine eyes fixed in vacancy, and thy mind striving to recall some half-forgotten couplet of Luis Lobo; or art thou gone to thy long rest, out beyond the Xeres gate within the wall of the Campo Santo, to which, in times of pest and sickness, thou wast wont to carry so many, gypsy and Gentile, in thy cart of the tinkling bell? Oft in the _réunions_ of the lettered and learned in this land of universal literature, when weary of the display of pedantry and egotism, have I recurred with yearning to our gypsy recitations at the old house in the Pila Seca. Oft, when sickened by the high-wrought professions of those who bear the cross in gilded chariots, have I thought on thee, thy calm faith, without pretence,—thy patience in poverty, and fortitude in affliction; and as oft, when thinking of my speedily approaching end, have I wished that I might meet thee once again, and that thy hands might help to bear me to “the dead man’s acre” yonder on the sunny plain, O Manuel! {263} My principal visitor was Dionysius, who seldom failed to make his appearance every forenoon: the poor fellow came for sympathy and conversation. It is difficult to imagine a situation more forlorn and isolated than that of this man,—a Greek at Seville, with scarcely a single acquaintance, and depending for subsistence on the miserable pittance to be derived from selling a few books, for the most part hawked about from door to door. “What could have first induced you to commence bookselling in Seville?” said I to him, as he arrived one sultry day, heated and fatigued, with a small bundle of books secured together by a leather strap.