The writer beguiled the two-hours interval in interviewing a wild gipsy-eyed girl of twelve, whose name was Joséfa Aguilár, and whose vocation in life to attend a herd of swine. Throughout Spain, whether on mountain or plain, one sees this thing--a small boy or girl spending the livelong day in solitary charge of dumb beasts, goats or pigs, even turkeys--and the sight ever causes me a pang of regret. Probably I am quite wrong, but such hardly seems a human vocation--certainly it leads nowhere. In intervals of pelting her recalcitrant charges with stones, Joséfa told me she lived in a reed-hut which was close by, but so small that I had overlooked its existence; that she never went to school or had been farther from home than Zahara, a village some few miles away. She asked if I was from Grazalema, and on being told from England, she repeated the word "Inglaterra" again and again, while her bright black eyes became almost sessile with wonderment. Joséfa's frock was hanging in tatters, torn to bits by the thorny scrub. I gave her some coppers to buy a new one, and with a little joyous scream Joséfa vanished among the bush. [Illustration: LAMMERGEYER ENTERING EYRIE] Darkness was closing in ere L. returned; then great thunder-clouds rolled up, obscuring the moon, and oh! what we suffered those next three hours, scrambling over rock and ridge, through forest and thicket--all in inky darkness and under a deluge of rain. On returning to this remote ridge (having ascended from the opposite face), we soon renewed our friendship with the lammergeyer--when first seen, it was being mobbed by an impudent chough. Then it sailed up the deep gorge below us, passing close in front, and after clearing an angle of the hill, wheeled inwards and with gently closing wings plunged into a cavern in the crag. We felt we had our object assured; yet on examining these mighty piles of rocks--a couple of hours' stiff climbing--it was evident we were mistaken, for no nest, past or present, did they reveal. It was on yet a third stupendous crag, quite a mile from the alternative site first discovered, that this year these lammergeyers had fixed their home. The nest was in quite a small cave in the rock-face; more often (as described in _Wild Spain_) the lammergeyer prefers a huge cavern in the centre of which is piled an immense mass of sticks, heather-stalks, and other rubbish--the accumulation of years--and lined with esparto-grass and wool. The eggs always number two and are richly coloured, whereas the griffon lays but one, and that white. Although laying takes place as early as January, yet the young are unable to fly before June. Our principal object this year was to sketch the lammergeyer in life, and in this several rough portraits serve to show that we succeeded--so far as in us lies. * * * * *