But modern Spain had also its historical associations for the English traveller. In our own youthful days the war of the Peninsula and the crowning victory of Waterloo were the prominent themes in popular thought; and so William Nelson naturally turned from the exquisite remains of Arabian art to muse on the battlefields of Talavera and Albuera. After surveying the fortifications of Badajoz, he writes to his friend Captain Chester: “I could not help asking myself, What good came of all the blood shed on those two terrible battlefields, and of all who perished in the frightful siege and assault of Badajoz? Why should British blood have flowed like water for such a country and such a people as the Spaniards?” He visited Gibraltar, and passed on to Tangier; and as he notes the width of the strait and the features of the great fortress, he considers its retention by England as no longer desirable. He thus writes to his friend Captain Chester: “I took care by the way to take a good look at that so-called _precious jewel_ of the British crown, Gibraltar, wondering to myself what can be the use to us of this gigantic fox-trap. The popular idea is that it commands the straits; but these are about twenty-two miles in width, there is deep water to the opposite coast, and the gun has still to be invented that can carry to such a distance. They are just now engaged in mounting a one hundred ton gun in a little fort that has been expressly built for it; but where will ever be the enemy that will allow its ships or ironclads to be brought within range of such a monster? There are to be four guns of this calibre erected on the fox-trap.” He next discusses its value as a coaling-station, and thus proceeds: “We have no fewer than seven thousand troops of one kind and another immured within the walls; and there is nothing for the common soldiers in the way of amusement. Time hangs heavy on their hands, and they hate ‘Gip’ with a perfect hatred.... I am unpatriotic enough to say that the fortress ought to be given up, as it has never been, and never can be, I am convinced, of any use to us. It cannot be said that it does more than merely command the ground on which it stands and points that can be reached by its guns.”