“There was scarce a pretty face or a striking figure that I daily saw, about which I had not thus gradually framed a dramatic story, though some of my characters would occasionally act in direct opposition to the part assigned them, and disconcert the whole drama.  Reconnoitring one day with my glass the streets of the Albaycin, I beheld the procession of a novice about to take the veil; and remarked several circumstances which excited the strongest sympathy in the fate of the youthful being thus about to be consigned to a living tomb.  I ascertained to my satisfaction that she was beautiful, and, from the paleness of her cheek, that she was a victim rather than a votary.  She was arrayed in bridal garments, and decked with a chaplet of white flowers, but her heart evidently revolted at this mockery of a spiritual union, and yearned after its earthly loves.  A tall, stern-looking man walked near her in the procession:  it was, of course, the tyrannical father, who, from some bigoted or sordid motive, had compelled this sacrifice.  Amid the crowd was a dark, handsome youth, in Andalusian garb, who seemed to fix on her an eye of agony.  It was doubtless the secret lover from whom she was forever to be separated.  My indignation rose as I noted the malignant expression painted on the countenances of the attendant monks and friars.  The procession arrived at the chapel of the convent; the sun gleamed for the last time upon the chaplet of the poor novice, as she crossed the fatal threshold and disappeared within the building.  The throng poured in with cowl, and cross, and minstrelsy; the lover paused for a moment at the door.  I could divine the tumult of his feelings; but he mastered them, and entered.  There was a long interval.  I pictured to myself the scene passing within:  the poor novice despoiled of her transient finery, and clothed in the conventual garb; the bridal chaplet taken from her brow, and her beautiful head shorn of its long silken tresses.  I heard her murmur the irrevocable vow.  I saw her extended on a bier; the death-pall spread over her; the funeral service performed that proclaimed her dead to the world; her sighs were drowned in the deep tones of the organ, and the plaintive requiem of the nuns; the father looked on, unmoved, without a tear; the lover—­no my imagination refused to portray the anguish of the lover—­there the picture remained a blank.

“After a time the throng again poured forth and dispersed various ways, to enjoy the light of the sun and mingle with the stirring scenes of life; but the victim, with her bridal chaplet, was no longer there.  The door of the convent closed that severed her from the world forever.  I saw the father and the lover issue forth; they were in earnest conversation.  The latter was vehement in his gesticulations; I expected some violent termination to my drama; but an angle of a building interfered and closed the scene.  My eye afterwards was frequently