skeleton of a man, covered all over with blood, dirt, the marks of stripes, and tangled masses of real red hair? or is it to render more intense the dislike with which we regard his persecutors? These individuals are represented belabouring their unfortunate victim with cudgels considerably larger than their own bodies, which have the most revolting appearance from deformity and disease, enormous tumours being generally appended to their throats. In the midst of these delectable horrors, and placed on a large plate, is a painted wood-carving of the decapitated head of St. Paul, with which any amateur executioner may regale himself to his heart's content. So faithfully rendered is the last look of horror in the half-closed glass eyes, that one cannot help doubting, when he first glances at it, whether it is only a model. We were glad to escape from this religious Madame Tussaud's into the bright sun and open air, where we could dismiss the fancies inspired by such horrible sights. We felt quite relieved when we found ourselves again in the great square, alive with dark-skinned men and women, with their gay dresses and sonorous voices. The jingling mules even were a pleasant sight to us, and we gazed with delight on the white walls, reflecting with such dazzling brilliance the rays of the sun, and on the universal dust, which almost half choked us, not to speak of the blue sky and the green acacia trees. In fact, the very odour of garlic was not so detestable to us as it used to be. Certainly those vast, prison-like convents standing on the outskirts of the town, are most fitting places in which to immure for life young men and women--fitting for their purpose, that is, inasmuch as there is nought to be seen from the grated windows to tempt them back to the world they have left. They may strain their dimming eyes as much as they please through the bars, they will see no stirring crowds in pursuit of business or pleasure, no happy pairs, no manly form or sweet face, to make the still warm heart thrill with joyful memories; they will see nought but wild tracts of desert, and yellow plains fading into the hot horizon, and spreading away like a burning ocean. We have by chance upon rare occasions caught sight of faces at convent gratings, and their glance fell like an icicle on the heart--faces which, though young in years, were aged in sadness, and perchance with the remorse--most probably with the regret--that comes too late. I saw, on one occasion, two young girls, pale from confinement within the yellow walls of a religious prison at Valladolid, and the bloodless cheek rendered the dark blaze of the gazelle-like eyes almost unnaturally bright with a false lustre, the lustre caught from the soul loosened by the partial decay of its prison-house, and struggling to be free. How strange that so much young, ardent life, so much beauty, so many loving hearts, and so much generous energy should choose to rot uselessly away in such