Yet the white uncertain outlines
perceptible against the dark-blue waters of the stream stir the poetic
mind, and the possessor of a little fancy finds it not difficult to
imagine that Diana and her nymphs are bathing below, while he himself
runs no risk of ending like Acteon.
I have been told that one day a party of good-for-nothing fellows banded
themselves together, and bribed the bell-ringer at the cathedral to ring
the Angelus some twenty minutes before the proper hour. Though it was
still broad daylight, the nymphs of the Guadalquivir never hesitated,
and putting far more trust in the Angelus bell than in the sun, they
proceeded to their bathing toilette--always of the simplest--with an
easy conscience. I was not present on that occasion. In my day, the
bell-ringer was incorruptible, the twilight was very dim, and nobody but
a cat could have distinguished the difference between the oldest orange
woman, and the prettiest shop-girl, in Cordova.
One evening, after it had grown quite dusk, I was leaning over the
parapet of the quay, smoking, when a woman came up the steps leading
from the river, and sat down near me. In her hair she wore a great
bunch of jasmine--a flower which, at night, exhales a most intoxicating
perfume.
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