How pleasing would it not be to find the original of some dubiously-figured chimera! What then to discover a living representative of a race that has left behind it an undying name and immortal ruins? Such was to me that solitary figure. The Assyrian bowed his back to the burthen and his neck to the yoke, and the first of conquerors became the meanest of slaves. The Mede served in his turn, and so the Persian. The Egyptian, the first and greatest, became the outcast of nations. The Macedonian and Attic conquerors of the East were bondsmen at Rome. The Roman was a hewer of wood and a drawer of water, at the door of the Gothic hut and the Vandal tent. In all times, in all climes, the conquered have dwelt as Helot bondsman or slave with the conqueror. This wild man, this Moor, alone has followed no conqueror’s car, and served no master’s bidding. Vanquished, he has departed--disappearing from the land which ceased to own him lord. He has not by familiarity worn out the terrors of his name, nor the indignation of his heart; and there he stands to-day, not yielding to facts his reason, nor to fortune his fate. But to compare the old Moor of Spain with the African Moor of to-day, might appear like comparing the British of to-day with their (assumed) naked ancestors. It, however, seems to me doubtful whether the old light be all extinct. Look at the Moor! Is there not dignity in his deportment--grandeur in his costume? The produce of the looms of Morocco to-day equals in beauty and taste, if it does not surpass, that of any country. At Tetuan the Mosaics are now made which adorn the Alhambra. Science has departed, but is that an essential of greatness? When a nation sinks to the barbarism that follows light, it is indifferent to honour: it hates itself more than its foe or conqueror. The Moor is not such. The Moors at home are more wedded than any Mussulman people to their usages; more fanatic, more abhorrent of all intercourse with strangers. When they come to Europe they make themselves at home. They are seen at Gibraltar, in the streets, on the battlements, sauntering in the public walks, as if they entirely belonged to us. The civil magistrate represents them as orderly and peaceable: the police-court may be said to ignore their existence: legal practitioners declare that the cases of litigation chiefly arise from their being overreached. They are an example of sobriety, industry, and integrity. Their community at Gibraltar is neither small nor select, nor composed solely of those in easy circumstances: they come and go, and many are flying destitute from war and persecution. No one has heard of a Moor being a drunkard, or a swindler: no one doubts a Moor’s word: no one fears either his vengeance or his ferocity.