Guide.—­Your worship can do no better.  The day is, as you say, hot; you can do no better than drink a little of this water.  I have myself just drunk.  I would not, however, advise you to give that pony any, it appears heated and blown.

Myself.—­It may well be so.  I have been galloping at least two leagues in pursuit of a fellow who engaged to guide me to Finisterra, but who deserted me in a most singular manner, so much so, that I almost believe him to be a thief, and no true man.  You do not happen to have seen him?

Guide.—­What kind of a man might he be?

Myself.—­A short, thick fellow, very much like yourself, with a hump upon his back, and, excuse me, of a very ill-favoured countenance.

Guide.—­Ha, ha!  I know him.  He ran with me to this fountain, where he has just left me.  That man, Sir Cavalier, is no thief.  If he is any thing at all, he is a Nuveiro,—­a fellow who rides upon the clouds, and is occasionally whisked away by a gust of wind.  Should you ever travel with that man again, never allow him more than one glass of anise at a time, or he will infallibly mount into the clouds and leave you, and then he will ride and run till he comes to a water brook, or knocks his head against a fountain—­ then one draught, and he is himself again.  So you are going to Finisterra, Sir Cavalier.  Now it is singular enough, that a cavalier much of your appearance engaged me to conduct him there this morning.  I however lost him on the way.  So it appears to me our best plan to travel together until you find your own guide and I find my own master.

It might be about two o’clock in the afternoon, that we reached a long and ruinous bridge, seemingly of great antiquity, and which, as I was informed by my guide, was called the bridge of Don Alonzo.  It crossed a species of creek, or rather frith, for the sea was at no considerable distance, and the small town of Noyo lay at our right.  “When we have crossed that bridge, captain,” said my guide, “we shall be in an unknown country, for I have never been farther than Noyo, and as for Finisterra, so far from having been there, I never heard of such a place; and though I have inquired of two or three people since we have been upon this expedition, they know as little about it as I do.  Taking all things, however, into consideration, it appears to me that the best thing we can do is to push forward to Corcuvion, which is five mad leagues from hence, and which we may perhaps reach ere nightfall, if we can find the way or get any one to direct us; for, as I told you before, I know nothing about it.”  “To fine hands have I confided myself,” said I:  “however, we had best, as you say, push forward to Corcuvion, where, peradventure, we may hear something of Finisterra, and find a guide to conduct us.”  Whereupon, with a hop, skip, and a jump, he again set forward at a rapid pace, stopping occasionally at a choza, for the purpose, I suppose, of making inquiries, though I understood scarcely anything of the jargon in which he addressed the people, and in which they answered him.