This species of _cavallero_ pauper should by no means be encouraged; he is not of the picturesque sort. Nowhere do the wretches look their character better than at Seville; as all admirers of Murillo can testify, without consulting any other nature than his canvass. But these consider they confer a sort of obligation on the individual they condescend to apply to. Nothing can exceed their astonishment and indignation when refused. Their great highway is the superb polished mosaic marble of the Cathedral; where they divide the authority with the embroidered dignitaries of the choir. It is useless to hope for an instant's leisure for the contemplation of this unique temple, until you have disposed of its entire population of ragged despots.
A sort of chivalrous etiquette is observed, in virtue of which a female chorus is the first to form your escort from pillar to pillar. These dismissed, you are delivered over to the barefooted Murillos. There are two modes of escape. The rich man should go in with his two hands filled with coin, and distribute to all, even to many who will return for a second contribution before he has done. But if economical, you may attain the same end, and more permanently, by sacrificing four or five days to walking up and down the nave, without looking at anything, but simply undergoing the persecution of the mob. After the fourth visit you will be left in peace.
These counsels I am competent to give you from dreadful experience; more dreadful from my having pursued a middle course. To one barefooted and rotten-scalped embryo brigand I only gave a two-_quarto_ piece (halfpenny) about equal in real consequence to twopence in England. If you have ever seen, in the era of mail coaches, the look of quiet surprise on the countenance of the well-fed charioteer, who, having, after the sixth or seventh stage, opened the door, and muttered from behind his _cache-nez_ the usual "coachman, gen'lemen" received a long-searched-for deprecatory sixpence from some careful knight with a false shirt-collar--you have noticed the self-same look, which was leisurely transferred by the urchin from the piece of copper in the open palm to my face, and back to the piece of copper.