athirst too for vengeance: he turns robber. You ask what is become of a handsome young fellow you noticed some months ago, and who was the cock of his village. "Alark!" replies an old woman, "he has been obliged to take to the mountain. It was not his fault, poor lad! he was such a quiet peaceable body!-God be good to him!" No good souls make the government responsible for all the mischief done by the robbers. "It is the government," they say, that drives poor

people desperate, who only want to be let alone, and to earn an honest penny by their trade.

The paragon of Spanish brigands, the prototype of the hero of the highway,-the Robin Hood, the Roque Guinan of our day, is the famous Jose Maria, surnamed El Tempranito, Peep-o'-day. He is the man most talked of from Madrid to Seville, and from Seville to Malaga. If he stops a diligence he offers the ladies his hand to help them to alight, and takes care that they shall be conveniently seated in the shade, for it is by daylight he performs the greater number of his exploits. Never does an oath or a coarse expression escape his lips; on the contrary he is almost deferential in his demeanour, and displays a natural politeness that is never at fault. If he takes a ring off a lady's hand, "Ah! madam," he says, "so beautiful a hand needs no rings to adorn it." And while he slips the jewel off the fair finger, he kisses the hand with an air that seems to prove to use the expression of a Spanish lady-that he prizes the kiss more than the ring. The latter he takes with an absent air, as if he hardly thought of it; the kiss, on the contrary, he makes last a long while. I have been assured he always leaves travellers enough money to carry them to the next town, and that he has never refused any one permission to retain a trinket which was dear to the owner from any associations of memory.

Jose Maria has been depicted to me, as a young man, between five-and-twenty and thirty, well made, with an open and cheerful countenance, teeth white as pearls, and remarkably expressive eyes. He usually dresses very richly in the costume of a majo. His linen is always brilliantly white, and his hands would do honour to an exquisite of London or Paris.

It is not more than five or six years, since he took to the road. His parents had destined him for the church, and he studied theology in the University of Grenada: but his vocation was not very strong, as we shall presently see, for he made his way by night to a young lady of good family. Love,

they say, excuses many things,-but they talk of violence,a servant wounded! I have never been able to come distinctly at the whole truth of this story. The father made a great noise, and a criminal prosecution was instituted. Jose Maria was obliged to take flight, and exile himself to Gibraltar. There, when his money began to run low, he made a bargain with an English merchant to smuggle in a considerable quantity of prohibited goods. He was betrayed by a man whom he admitted into his confidence. The officers of the customs knew the route he was to take, and lay in wait for him. All the mules he drove were taken. But he did not give them up without a desperate fight, in which he killed or wounded several of the officers. From that moment he had no other resource than levying contributions on travellers.

Extraordinary good luck has universally attended him up to this day. A price has been set on his head, a description of his person is posted upon the gates of all the towns, with a promise of eight-thousand reals reward to whoever shall give him up, alive or dead,* though it were even one of his accomplices. Still Jose Maria continues to ply his dangerous trade with impunity, and his operations extend from the frontiers of Portugal to the kingdom of Murcia. His band is not numerous, but it is composed of men of long-proved fidelity and resolution. One day, at the head of a dozen chosen men he surprised, at the Ventu de Gazin, seventy royalist volunteers sent in pursuit of him, and disarmed them all. He was seen afterwards slowly wending his way back to the mountains, driving before him two mules, laden with the seventy carbines, which he carried off as if to erect them into a trophy.

Wonders are told of his dexterity in ball-practice. With his horse at a gallop he sends a ball into the trunk of an olive tree, at a hundred-and-fifty paces. The following anecdote elucidates at once his skill and his generosity:

:

One Captain Castro, an officer of great courage and activity, who makes it his business to hunt down robbers, no less, it is said, to satisfy a personal vengeance, than in discharge of his military duty, learned from one of his spies, that, on a certain day, Jose Maria would be found in a sequestered aldea, where he had a mistress. On the day named Castro mounts his horse, and, to avoid exciting suspicion, by putting too large a force on foot, he takes with him only four lancers. Whatever

* When I was in Seville they found one morning, on the gate of Triana, under the description of Jose Maria's person, these words, written in pencil,-"Signature of the aforesaid JOSE MARIA,"

precautions he took to conceal his march, he could not hinder Jose Maria from getting knowledge of it. At the moment when Castro, after having passed through a deep defile, was entering a valley in which was situated the aldea of his enemy's mistress, twelve well-mounted horsemen suddenly appeared on his flank, and much nearer than he to the defile through which alone he could make his retreat. The lancers gave themselves up for lost. A man on a bay horse sets off at a gallop from the troop of robbers, and pulls up abruptly at the distance of a hundred paces from Castro.

"No one takes Jose Maria unawares," he cries out. "Captain Castro, what have I done to you, that you should seek to deliver me into the hands of justice? I might kill you; but brave hearts are grown scarce, and I grant you your life. Here is something to remember me by, and to teach you to avoid me. Have at your schako!" And with the word he levels his carbine, and sends a ball through the top of the captain's schako; then instantly wheels round, and disappears with his men.

Here is another example of his courtesy :

A wedding party was assembled in an aldea, in the neighbourhood of Andujar. The new-married pair had already received the compliments of their friends, and the party was about to sit down to table, under a fig-tree before the door of the house; every one was disposed to do justice to the good cheer; and the perfumes of the jessamine and orange blossoms, mingled agreeably with the more substantial odours exhaled by the dishes, with which the table was loaded. Suddenly appeared a horseman, issuing from the thicket, about a pistol-shot from the house. The stranger threw himself lightly from the saddle, kissed his hand to the company, and led bis horse into the stable. No one had been expected, but in Spain every passer-by is welcome to a festive entertainment. Besides, to judge from the stranger's dress, he seemed a man of importance. The bridegroom immediately went after him, to invite him to dinner.

While the guests were asking each other in whispers who was this new-comer, the notary of Andujar had become pale as death. He tried to rise from the chair on which he was seated,-next the bride, but his knees bent under him, and he could not stand. One of the guests, who had long been suspected of smuggling practices, went up to the bride. It is Jose Maria," said he ; "I am much mistaken, or he comes here to do some mischief, (para hacer una muerte.) The notary is his mark." What

was to be done?-Make the notary escape? Impossible:Jose Maria would speedily be up with him. Arrest the bri

gand? But his band was doubtless in the environs: besides, he had his pistols in his belt, and he was never without his poinard. "But what on earth have you done to him, senor notario?" "Alas! nothing; absolutely nothing!"

Some one whispered that the notary had told the tenant on his farm, two months before, that if Jose Maria ever came and asked him for drink, he should put a stout dose of arsenic in his wine.

The company were still pondering the matter, without touching the olla, when the stranger re-appeared, followed by the bridegroom. All doubt was at an end; it was Jose Maria. He cast a passing tiger-glance at the notary, who fell a-trembling, as if he had the ague; then gracefully saluted the bride, and begged permission to dance at her wedding. You may be sure she did not think of refusing him, or giving him an uncivil reception. Jose Maria immediately drew a stool to the table, and seated himself, without ceremony, between her and the notary, who seemed every moment on the point of swooning away.'

The répast began. Jose Maria was most assiduous in his attentions to the bride. When the choicer wine was put on the table, the bride, taking a glass of Montilla, (a better wine than sherry, in my opinion,) touched it with her lips, and immediately presented it to the bandit. This is an act of politeness offered at table to esteemed persons. It is called una fineza. Unfortunately the custom is falling into disuse in good society, which is as eager here as elsewhere to divest itself of all national habits.

Jose Maria took the glass, returned thanks with cordial earnestness, and assured the bride he begged she would consider him her servant, and that he would gladly do whatever she was pleased to command him.

Trembling, and bending timidly towards her terrible guest, she faltered, "Grant me one favour."

"A thousand!" exclaimed Jose Maria.

“Forget, I implore you, the evil intentions with which you may have come hither. Promise me, that, for my sake, you will forgive your enemies, and that there shall be no outrage at my wedding."

Notary!" said Jose Maria, turning to the trembling man of law, "thank the senora :-but for her I would have killed you before you had digested your dinner. Quit your fears: I

will do you no hurt." Then pouring him out a glass of wine he added, with a somewhat sarcastic smile, "Come, notary, drink my health; the wine is good, and it is not poisoned.' The unfortunate notary felt as if he swallowed a handful of pins. "Come, my friends," cried the robber, "be merry, (vaya de broma,) hurrah for the bride." Then leaping up he ran and seized a guitar, and began to improvise a song in honor of the new-married couple.

In fine, during the whole of the dinner, and the ball that followed it, he made himself so agreeable that the women's eyes filled with tears to think that so charming a young fellow would one day perhaps end his life on the gallows. He danced, he sang, he was everything for everybody. Towards midnight a little girl, twelve years old, half clad in rags, went up to Jose Maria, and said some words to him in the gypsey jargon; Jose Maria started, ran to the stable, and soon returned leading his good horse by the bridle. Then going up to the bride, Adieu," he said, "child of my soul (hija de mi alma :) never shall I forget the moments I have passed with you. They are the happiest I have seen for many a year. Be good enough to accept this trifle from a poor devil, who wishes he had a mine to offer you." At the same time he presented her with a handsome ring."

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"Jose Maria," cried the bride, as long as there is one loaf in this house, the half of it shall be yours.'

The robber shook hands with all the men of the party, including even the notary, and kissed all the women, then springing lightly into the saddle he was off again to the mountains. It was not till then the notary breathed freely. Half-an-hour afterwards there arrived a detachment of miquelets, but no one had seen the man they were in search of.

The Spanish people,-who know by heart the romance of the Twelve Peers, who sing the exploits of Renaldo de Montalburn, must necessarily feel a lively interest in the only man in these our prosaic times, in whom are revived the chivalric virtues of the champions of old. Another motive besides, contributes to augment the popularity of Jose Maria. He is exceedingly liberal. Money costs him little trouble to gain, and he dispenses it freely to the unfortunate. Never, it is said, has a poor man applied to him, and not received abundant alms.

A muleteer told me, that having lost a mule, that constituted his whole fortune, he was about to throw himself headlong into the Guadalquiver, when a box containing six ounces of