you think it is so very amusing to be robbers? We are obliged to work like negroes, and undergo all sorts of hardships." "Very well," replied the traveller; "I will engage to procure you your pardon, on condition that you set us free." "Agreed," replied the captain. "Return to Madrid; there is a horse, some money for your expenses on the road, and a safeconduct, which will ensure our comrades allowing you to pass without molestation. Come back soon; we will be at such and such a place, with your companions, whom we will entertain as well as we can." The gentleman went to Madrid, obtained a promise that the brigands should be allowed to take the benefit of the _indulto_, and then set out again to seek his companions in misfortune. He found them seated tranquilly with the brigands, eating a Mancha ham boiled in sugar, and taking frequent draughts from a goatskin filled with Val-de-Peñas, which their captors had stolen expressly for them--a most delicate mark of attention, certainly! They were singing and amusing themselves very much, and were more inclined to become robbers, like the others, than to return to Madrid. The captain, however, read them a severe moral lecture, which brought them to their senses, and the whole company set out arm in arm for the city, where both travellers and brigands were enthusiastically received, for it was something truly uncommon and curious for robbers to be taken prisoners by the travellers in a diligence. CHAPTER IX. EXCURSION TO TOLEDO. Illescas--The Puerta del Sol--Toledo--The Alcazar--The Cathedral--The Gregorian and Mozarabic Ritual--Our Lady of Toledo--San Juan de los Reyes--The Synagogue--Galiana, Karl, and Bradamant--The Bath of Florinda--The Grotto of Hercules--The Cardinal's Hospital--Toledo Blades. We had exhausted the curiosities of Madrid; we had seen the Palace, the _Armeria_, and the _Buen Retiro_, the Museum and the Academy of Painting, the _Teatro del Principe_, and the _Plaza de Toros_; we had promenaded on the Prado from the fountain of Cybele to the fountain of Neptune, and we began to find the time hang somewhat heavily on our hands. Consequently, in spite of a heat of thirty degrees,[8] and all sorts of stories, sufficient to make our hair stand on end, about the insurgents and the _rateros_, we set out bravely for Toledo, the city of beautiful swords and romantic poniards.