traditional Charlies of the reign of George III. These broken down and dilapidated old fellows promenade the streets, or stand and gossip at the corners in a strangely imbecile fashion. They cry the hour and the state of the weather just as our old watchmen used to do-Las dos y sereno, or las cinco menos un cuarto y lluvioso: "Two o'clock and a fine night," or "Quarter to five and a rainy night." As fine serene nights in Spain are numerous, out of all proportion to rainy ones, the cry of sereno has given to the watchmen the name by which they are universally known.

The suburbs of Madrid are very pleasant. The Prado, the fashionable drive and promenade of the city, begins at the Puerta de Recoletos, and extends to the Puerta de Atocha, a distance of between two and three miles. It has avenues of noble trees, shady walks for promenaders, and a broad well-kept road for carriages. As every Spaniard spends his As every Spaniard spends his evenings in the open air, and as he is generally willing to practise the most rigid parsimony at home in order to keep up a good appearance abroad, the Prado presents a most brilliant spectacle. Scarcely can Hyde Park or the Bois de Boulogne make a finer show of equipages or company. A lady's judgment, however, upon a point

of this kind will have more weight than that of one belonging to the ruder sex. Let us hear the fair authoress of Cosas de España.

"We made our way to the 'Prayo' this afternoon, at the witching hour which assembles all the beauty and fashion of the capital in a moving crowd on this singular and world-famed promenade. The weather was brilliant, and the sight a most inspiring one. The company was numerous, and consisted of cavaliers and cavalières, handsomely dressed, and mounted on magnificent horses; señoras and fascinating señoritas, with argus-eyed duennas, lazily reclined in open carriages; and graceful, veiled and mantled women with their be-cloaked male relatives, treading with that light step and graceful movement peculiar to the daughters of the Peninsula, the umbrageous walks:

"Illam, quicquid agit, quoque vestigia flectit
Componit furtim, subsequiturque decor."

Mounted guards were stationed at fixed intervals on the broad avenue, and rode backwards and forwards until they met each other, along the two-mile length of this busy scene. The dresses were very rich, and we observed great luxury in the bonnets worn by the fair Matritenses, who, in their rage for something foreign, rob themselves of the most attractive ornament of their costume. This 'outlandish' head-dress is as yet, we were glad to see, limited to the upper ten thousand; and the middle-class damsels, who have the good taste to adhere to their bewitching natural accessories, gain immensely by their forbearance. We had not as yet seen the arch and matchless Sevillanas, in whom those coquettish Spanish characteristics, almost irresistible in a Madrileña, are multiplied and intensified; and, to our unpractised eye, the Prado presented

a scene of enchantment to which nothing seemed wanting. It was so unique a vision, that we ceased to wonder at the romances which it is not surprising it should have suggested to a vivid imagination; indeed, the incidents in which it seemed to abound might well form the woofs of some of the most intricate webs of fiction."

The Madrileños are especially proud of the fountains which adorn the Prado. They are eight in number, and are certainly very fine. Those of Cybele, Neptune, and Apollo are the most admired.

The

Not very far from the Prado is the famous Church of the Atocha. Virgin, to whom it is dedicated, is the tutelar saint of Madrid, and, in an especial degree, the patroness of the Royal Family. The shrine is hung round with flags and banners, the trophies of many a battle-field in which the Spanish arms were victorious, and the Virgin itself is almost hidden from view by the mass of votive offerings-wax-figures, tresses of hair, crutches, clothes, etc.—which have been suspended there by votaries. The Queen used to go to this church every

Sunday afternoon in an open carriage drawn by eight fine mules, and accompanied by her husband and children. She presented to it her wedding and her coronation robes, the dresses she wore on festivals, especially that of the Epiphany, and her "best clothes" in general. A fabulous antiquity is claimed for the image, which is quite black, perhaps from age and the smoke of innumerable candles.

The etymologists here, as everywhere in Spain, have run wild in devising derivations for the name Atocha. Some deduce it from Antioch, alleging that it was consecrated by St. Peter, in a church in that city; others contend that it is a corruption of theotokos, and that miracles were wrought by it in demonstration of orthodox doctrine during the Nestorian controversy. These are but specimens of the wild and baseless conjectures in which Spanish philologists delight. Miracles even more base

FATHER CLARETE.

less and incredible are ascribed to the Virgen de Atocha. It gave speech to a dumb beggar, who immediately exclaimed-Da me un cuarto: "Give me

a farthing." It stopped a mason in mid-air who was falling from a roof. The list of its pretended miracles would fill a volume. It failed, however, to do anything for its especial devotee, Isabella II., though she lavished upon it gold, silver, jewels, fans, court-dresses, and embroidered slippers, which made this ugly black doll the most sumptuously dressed person in Madrid. The Queen, with her councillors, Father Clarete and the Sor Patrocinio, have had to escape from the anger of an indignant people, and to seek safety in exile.

serve

The Church of the Atocha may to illustrate the superstition, If we visit another suburb

obscurantism, and idolatrous worship of the papacy.