Great, indeed, is the debt they owe to the stirring events that have immortalized these regions, for they are anything but romantic. Nothing can be less picturesque;--all the flatness of Holland, without the cultivation, and the numerous well-peopled villages, which diminish the monotonous effect. On the right are seen at some distance the wooded hills of Xeres; but for scores of miles, on the opposite side, all is either marsh, or half-inundated pasture, with here and there some thinly-scattered olive trees, and herds of oxen for its sole living occupants. At a few leagues from Seville, the increased frequency of the olive grounds--a few villages and convents, and at length the darker green masses of the orange groves, give rapidly strengthening indications of approaching civilization; and you are landed a short distance below the town, to reach which, it is necessary to traverse the Christina Gardens. The cathedral occupies this southern extremity of the city; and on your way to the inn, you may make an estimate of the length of one side of its immense quadrangular enclosure. Immediately beyond this you are received into the inevitable labyrinth of crooked lanes, peculiar to an Arab town. The steam trip from Cadiz is so easy a day's journey, that no necessity for repose or refitting interferes with the impatience of those who arrive to explore the external town. You speedily, therefore, sally forth, and thread a few of the mazy streets; but without venturing too far, on account of the evident risk of losing your way. Should you chance to stumble on the Plaza Mayor,--called Plaza de San Francisco,--you are at once rewarded by the view of the _ayuntamiento_, one of the most elegant edifices in Spain: otherwise the extreme simplicity of the bare, irregular, but monotonous white houses, will create disappointment--you will stare about in the vain search of the magnificence, so much extolled, of this semi-Moorish capital, and discover, that nothing can be plainer, more simple, more ugly, than the exterior of the Seville habitations. At length, however, some open door, or iron grille, placed on a line with an inner court, will operate a sudden change in your ideas, and afford a clue to the mystery. Through this railing, generally of an elegant form, is discovered a delicious vista, in which are visible, fountains, white marble colonnades, pomegranate and sweet lemon-trees, sofas and chairs (if in summer), and two or three steps of a porcelain staircase.