We met many other mules, much more exemplary, in teams of two, three,
and four, covered with bells and drawing every kind of carryall and
stage and omnibus. These vehicles were built when the road was, about
1750, and were, like the road, left to the natural forces for keeping
themselves in repair. The natural forces were not wholly adequate in
either case, but the vehicles were not so thick with dust as the road,
because they could shake it off. They had each two or four passengers
seated with the driver; passengers clustered over the top and packed the
inside, but every one was in the joyous mood of people going home for
the day. In a plaza not far from the Triana bridge you may see these
decrepit conveyances assembling every afternoon for their suburban
journeys, and there is no more picturesque sight in Seville, more
homelike, more endearing. Of course, when I say this I leave out of the
count the bridge over the Guadalquivir at the morning or evening hour
when it is covered with brightly caparisoned donkeys, themselves covered
with men needing a shave, and gay-kerchiefed women of every age, with
boys and dogs underfoot, and pedestrians of every kind, and hucksters
selling sea-fruit and land-fruit and whatever else the stranger would
rather see than eat.
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