CHAP. II.
St. Jago lies at the distance of four good leagues from Alcantara. It was necessary for me to set out the same night, and notwithstanding a terrible storm, and the remonstrances of my trusty servant Alfonso, I mounted on horseback, and galloped out of the city gates. Alfonso had prophesied true; the rain, mixed with thunder and lightning, burst in clouds from the sky, and soaked us to the skin; the wind which blew a hurricane, threw us several times from our horses, and no path was cognizable to our sight;—the poor animals, sunk at every pace deeper in the bogs; at last we neither knew the situation of the convent, nor the direction of the town, and in the most imminent peril of being drowned or choaked in the moors, reached the borders of a forest.—Here new terrors overwhelmed us. To lessen the fright I began to sing a song, and Alfonso joined me by way of chorus. Suddenly the
