three hours, we obtained a view of the bay of Coruna, in which, even at the distance of a league, we could distinguish three or four immense ships riding at anchor.  “Can these vessels belong to Spain?” I demanded of myself.  In the very next village, however, we were informed that the preceding evening an English squadron had arrived, for what reason nobody could say.  “However,” continued our informant, “they have doubtless some design upon Galicia.  These foreigners are the ruin of Spain.”

We put up in what is called the Calle Real, in an excellent fonda, or posada, kept by a short, thick, comical-looking person, a Genoese by birth.  He was married to a tall, ugly, but good-tempered Basque woman, by whom he had been blessed with a son and daughter.  His wife, however, had it seems of late summoned all her female relations from Guipuscoa, who now filled the house to the number of nine, officiating as chambermaids, cooks, and scullions:  they were all very ugly, but good-natured, and of immense volubility of tongue.  Throughout the whole day the house resounded with their excellent Basque and very bad Castilian.  The Genoese, on the contrary, spoke little, for which he might have assigned a good reason; he had lived thirty years in Spain, and had forgotten his own language without acquiring Spanish, which he spoke very imperfectly.

We found Coruna full of bustle and life, owing to the arrival of the English squadron.  On the following day, however, it departed, being bound for the Mediterranean on a short cruise, whereupon matters instantly returned to their usual course.

I had a depot of five hundred Testaments at Coruna, from which it was my intention to supply the principal towns of Galicia.  Immediately on my arrival I published advertisements, according to my usual practice, and the book obtained a tolerable sale—­seven or eight copies per day on the average.  Some people, perhaps, on perusing these details, will be tempted to exclaim, “These are small matters, and scarcely worthy of being mentioned.”  But let such bethink them, that till within a few months previous to the time of which I am speaking, the very existence of the gospel was almost unknown in Spain, and that it must necessarily be a difficult task to induce a people like the Spaniards, who read very little, to purchase a work like the New Testament, which, though of paramount importance to the soul, affords but slight prospect of amusement to the frivolous and carnally minded.  I hoped that the present was the dawning of better and more enlightened times, and rejoiced in the idea that Testaments, though but few in number, were being sold in unfortunate benighted Spain, from Madrid to the furthermost parts of Galicia, a distance of nearly four hundred miles.

Coruna stands on a peninsula, having on one side the sea, and on the other the celebrated bay, generally called the Groyne.  It is divided into the old and new town, the latter of which was at one time probably a mere suburb.  The old town is a desolate ruinous place, separated from the new by a wide moat.  The modern town is a much more agreeable spot, and contains one magnificent street, the Calle Real, where the principal merchants reside.  One singular feature of this street is, that it is laid entirely with flags of marble, along which troop ponies and cars as if it were a common pavement.