Instead of taking a drive around Cordova, I simply wandered here and there, weaving fancies from the names of the streets, which to me is one of the greatest pleasures in which a traveller may indulge in a foreign city. Cordova, alma ingeniorum parens, could write at every street-corner the name of an artist or an illustrious author born within her walls; to give her due honor, she has remembered them all with maternal gratitude. You find the little square of Seneca and the house where he may have been born; the street of Ambrosio Morales, the historian of Charles V., who continued the Chronicle General of Spain commenced by Florian d'Ocampo; the street of Pablo de Cespedes, painter, architect, sculptor, antiquary, and the author of a didactic poem, "The Art of Painting," unfortunately not finished, though adorned with splendid passages. He was an ardent enthusiast of Michelangelo, whose works he had admired in Italy, and in his poem he addressed a hymn of praise to him which is one of the most beautiful passages in Spanish poetry, and, in spite of myself, the last verses have slipped from my pen, which every Italian, even if he does not know the sister language, can appreciate and understand. He believes, he tells the reader, that one cannot find the perfection of painting anywhere except
"Que en aquela escelente obra espantosa
Mayor de cuantas se han jamas pintado,
Que hizo el Buonarrota de su mano
Divina, en el etrusco Vaticano!
"Cual nuevo Prometeo en alto vuelo
Alzándose, estendiò los alas tanto,
Que puesto encima el estrellado cielo
Una parte alcanzò del fuego santo;
Con que tornando enriquecido al suelo