Page:Impressions of Spain in 1866.djvu/24

are they all too quick in scenery such as this, when one longs to stop and sketch at every turn. Suddenly, however, the train came to a stand- still : an enormous fragment of rock had fallen across the line in the night, burying a luggage- train, but fortunately without injury to its drivers; and our party had no alternative but to get out, with their manifold bags and packages, and walk aeross the debris to another train, which, fortu- nately, was waiting for them on the opposite side of the chasm. A little experience of Spanish tra- velling taught them to expect such incidents half- a-dozen times in the course of the day's journey ; but at first it seemed startling and strange. They reached Burgos at six, and found themselves in a small but very decent * fonda,' where the daughter of the landlord spoke a little French, to their great relief. They had had visions of Italian serving nearly as well as Spanish for making themselves understood by the people; but this idea was rudely dispelled the very first day of their arrival in Spain. Great as the similarity may be in reading, the accent of the Spaniard makes him utterly incomprehensible to the be- wildered Italian scholar ; and the very likeness of some words increases the difl&culty when he finds that, according to the pronunciation, a