Many of the houses were built in the Moorish style,
round patios, or courts, cooled by fountains and open to the sky;
and as the inhabitants passed much of their time in these courts,
and on the terraced roofs during the summer season, it follows that
many a glance at their domestic life might be obtained by an aerial
spectator like myself, who could look down on them from the clouds.
I enjoyed, in some degree, the advantages of the student in the
famous old Spanish story, who beheld all Madrid unroofed for his
inspection; and my gossiping squire, Mateo Ximenes, officiated
occasionally as my Asmodeus, to give me anecdotes of the different
mansions and their inhabitants.
I preferred, however, to form conjectural histories for myself,
and thus would sit for hours, weaving, from casual incidents and
indications passing under my eye, a whole tissue of schemes,
intrigues, and occupations of the busy mortals below. There was scarce
a pretty face or a striking figure that I daily saw, about which I had
not thus gradually framed a dramatic story, though some of my
characters would occasionally act in direct opposition to the part
assigned them, and disconcert the whole drama. Reconnoitering one
day with my glass the streets of the Albaycin, I beheld the procession
of a novice about to take the veil; and remarked several circumstances
which excited the strongest sympathy in the fate of the youthful being
thus about to be consigned to a living tomb.
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