At the city gate the troops were met by a number of the Spanish nobility and their attendants on horseback, followed by crowds of the citizens, who received them with loud acclamations. The alcaldes, headed by the governor, El Medico, a fierce guerilla chief, appeared at the archway, attired in their robes of scarlet, and attended by halderdiers and alguazils dressed in short black cloaks and doublets, and wearing broad hats, from beneath which their long hair hung down on their jagged lace collars. Numerous bands of ecclesiastics, chanting as they came, and bearing banner, cross, and smoking chalice, were likewise in attendance. Above their dark masses were borne aloft the dressed-up images of the Virgin, Santa Casilda, and San Ildefonso, of whom so many legends are told in Toledo. These affairs, fluttering with rich drapery and blazing with jewels, displayed all that singular mixture of mummery, religion, and _effect_, which is so much studied in the rites of the church of Rome. In the name of King Ferdinand of Spain as his representative, and of the alcaldes and citizens of Toledo as their governor, El Medico welcomed Sir Rowland Hill and the soldiers of the _fighting division_ to the ancient capital of Spain, in a speech of wonderful length and pomposity. As the brigades marched through the city, the joyous acclamations of the people, the tolling of bells, the chant of the priests, the din and uproar, the reiterated cheers and shouts of "Long live Ferdinand the Seventh! Long live the brave British nation! _Viva, Don Rowland Hill, viva!_" resounding on all sides, almost drowned the music of the bands and tramp of the marching feet. Even Ranald-Dhu, the piper-major of the Gordon Highlanders, with his six colleagues, had to blow their bags up with might and main before they could make themselves heard. The martial, yet wild-looking garb of the 92nd attracted great attention, and a dense crowd of staring Spaniards squeezed along on the flanks of the regiment, accompanying it through all the streets. The Highland garb was a new sight to the citizens of Toledo, who, although they had heard of the bare-kneed Scottish regiments, with whose valour all Spain was ringing, they now beheld one of them within the walls of the city for the first time. The remarkable appearance of Dugald Mhor, with his snowy tresses and blue bonnet, marching close to the colonel’s side, elicited many a shout of wonder; but the old Gael was too much accustomed to be distinguished thus, and cared nothing about it as he strode on with his long claymore swinging at his thigh, and his brass target slung on his back. What the latter with its brass studs and steel pike could be, it was impossible for the Spaniards to conjecture; but they imagined it to be some unmeaning badge of office, like the gold stick of the Guards, and concluded that Dugald was some very important personage among the strangers. The windows and terraced tops of the