This is the gayest and most lively part of the day at Granada. The shops of the _aguadores_ and sellers of ices in the open street are illuminated by a multitude of lamps and lanterns; the street lamps and the lights placed before the images of the madonnas vie in splendour and number with the stars, and this is saying something: if it happens to be moonlight, you can easily see to read the most microscopical print. The light is blue instead of being yellow, and that is all. Thanks to the lady who had saved me from dying of hunger in the diligence, and who introduced us to several of her friends, we were soon well known in Granada. We led a delicious life there. It would be impossible to receive a more cordial, frank, and amiable welcome than we did; at the end of five or six days we were on the most intimate terms with every one, and according to the Spanish custom, we were always called by our Christian names; at Granada I was Don Teofilo, my friend gloried in the appellation of Don Eugenio, and we were both at liberty to designate the ladies and young girls of the houses in which we were received, by the familiar names of Carmen, Teresa, Gala, &c.; this familiarity clashes in no way with the most polished manners and the most respectful attention. We went to _tertulia_ every evening from eight o'clock till twelve; to-day at one house, to-morrow at another. The _tertulia_ is held in the _patio_, surrounded by alabaster columns and ornamented by a jet of water, the basin of which is encircled with pots of flowers and boxes of shrubs, down whose leaves the water falls in large beads. Five or six lamps are hung up along the walls: sofas, and straw or cane-bottomed chairs furnish the galleries, with here and there a guitar. The piano occupies one corner, and in another stand card-tables. Every one, on entering, goes to pay his compliments to the mistress and master of the house, who never fail to offer you a cup of chocolate, that good taste tells you to refuse, and a cigarette, which is sometimes accepted. When this duty is over, you retire to a corner of the _patio_, and join the group which has most attraction for you. The parents and old people play at _trecillo_, the young men talk with the young girls, recite the octaves and the decastichs they have composed during the day, and are scolded and forced to do penance for the crimes they may have committed the evening before; such, for instance, as having danced too often with a pretty cousin, or cast too ardent a glance towards a proscribed balcony, with numerous other peccadilloes. If, on the contrary, they have been very good, they are rewarded for the rose they have brought with the pink in the young girls' breast or hair, and their squeeze of the hand is replied to by a gentle look and a slight pressure of the fingers, when all go up into the balcony to listen to the Retreat beaten by the troops. Love seems to be the sole business of Granada. You have only to