The ingenuity of these gipsies in getting up a bargain, trusting to be able to turn it to their own account, was marvellous. Mingling among the farmers, and engaging them in conversation on indifferent subjects, they would at length bring them back to the favorite theme of asses, and eventually persuade them to take a look at theirs. "Here is one," measuring the height of an individual with his staff, "which will just suit you;--what will you give for him? Come, you shall have him for half his worth, for one hundred reals--only five dollars for an ass like this," looking at him with the admiration of a connoisseur in the presence of the Apollo; "truly, an animal of much merit and the greatest promise--_de mucho merito y encarecimiento_--he has the shoulders and breast of an ox; let me show you the richness of his paces," said the gipsy, his whole figure and attitude partaking of his earnestness, and his eye dilating and glowing with excitement. He had brought the unwary and bewildered countryman, like a charmed bird, to the same point as the eloquent shopkeeper does his doubting customer when he craves permission to take down his wares, and does not wait to be denied. Vaulting to the back of the animal, he flourished his staff about its head, and rode it up and down furiously, to the terror of the by-standers' toes, pricking it on the spine with his iron-pointed staff to make it frisky, and pronouncing the while, in the midst of frantic gesticulations an eloquent eulogium on its performances and character, giving it credit, among other things, for sobriety, moderation, long suffering, and the most un-asslike qualification of chastity. To add to the picturesque oddity of the scene, an old monk stood hard by, an interested spectator of some chaffering between a young woman and a seller of charms and trinkets stationed beneath an awning, and no accessory was wanting to render the quaint little picture complete.