Ex Libris C. K. OGDEN GAZPACHO: OE, SUMMER MONTHS IN SPAIN. BY WILLIAM GEOKGE CLARK, M.A. FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. De cornada de ansaron Guarde Dios mi corazon. SECOND EDITION, REVISED. LONDON: JOHN W. PARKER AND SON, WEST STRAND. MDCCCLI. LONDON : 6AVILL AND EDWARDS, PRINTEK8, CHAND03 STREET. C55- LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF C'-'irronn] 8ANTA BAKBaFcA CONTENTS. PACK Preface v Chap. I. France 1 II. To Burgos 10 III. BUEGOS 18 IV. To Madrid 29 V. The Gallery .37 VI. The Bull-Fight 48 VII. Madrid 59 VIII. La Granja and Segovia 69 IX. The Escorial 78 X. Toledo 86 XI. To Granada 99 XII. The Alhambra, &c. ., 106 XIII. Granada 115 XIV. Granada 123 XV. The Alpdjarrez 134 XVI. The Sierra 148 iv CONTENTS. CHAPTBR PAGE XVII. To Malaga 158 XVIII. Malaga 166 XIX. To Gibraltar 169 XX. Gibraltar 176 XXI. To RoNDA 182 XXII. RONDA 190 XXIII. To Seville 198 XXIV. The Cathedral 206 XXV. Seville 216 XXVI. Seville 227 XXVII. Cordova 244 XXVIII. Cadiz and Xerez 246 XXJX. The Bay op Vigo and the Bat of Biscay . 252 APPENDIX— (Letter from G, H. A.) 256 PREFACE. I AM going to make, at the beginning of my book, certain apologies and explanations, which would have come more appropriately at the end. But custom, which prescribes a Preface, proscribes an Epilogue, thus leaving me no alternative but to cry 'peccabo,' and impudently demand absolution for a prospective offence. Nevertheless, I hope that my preliminary confessions may take the wind out of my critics' sails. First, as to the title : Gazpacho is the name of a dish universal in, and peculiar to, Spain. It is a sort of cold soup, made of bread, pot-herbs, oil, and water. Its materials are easily come by, and its concoction requires no skill. Many a time have I seen a whole family, old and young, provided each with a long wooden spoon, sitting round the bowl, and devouring its contents with infinite zest. My Gazpacho has been prepared after a similar recipe j I know not how it may please the more VI PREFACE. refined and fastidious palates to which it will be sub- mitted; indeed, amid the multitude of dainties where- with the table is loaded, it may well remain untasted. If Mr. Ford should chance to dip into it, he may find that some of the ingredients have been filched from his pantry, and, possibly, spoilt in the cooking. When one takes as a companion an author so racy and vigorous, one cannot but appropriate and ' assimilate' his thoughts, and afterwards, unconsciously, reproduce some of them as original. Once for all, I beg his pardon for any unwitting plagiarisms. I shall be more than content if he relishes the metaphorical Gazpacho half as much as he is said to relish the reality. My readers may possibly be offended by the frequent recurrence of ' I,' ' I,' ' I.' In a record of personal experiences, — in fact, a passage of autobiography, — it is hard to see how this could have been avoided, since the gods and Lindley Murray have not provided us with any less objectionable form for the nominative singular of the first personal pronoun. Lastly, I have to apologize for writing a book at all. In my visit I enjoyed no particular facilities, and I went with no definite purpose — such as circulating the Scrip- tures, or surveying for a railroad; consequently, I was exempt from the persecutions and obstructions which a PKEFACE. VU person engaged in either would have had to encounter. From the Pyrenees to the Pillars of Hercules (that is, I think, the correct phrase), my journey was deplorably void of misadventure. So there is nothing in the sub- ject-matter to distinguish my little book from a hundred other little books — Tours, Ramblings, Loiterings, Danglings, and what not. Yet there will be a difference in the result. I tell you, not what Spain is, but what it looked like to me; the other Tourists and Ramblers tell you what it looked like to them, and my Spain may differ from their Spain as much as a view (of Hastings, say) by De Wint differs from the same view by Fielding or Turner. Besides, it may be said, if the public are sick of trifles, and want solid information, they have now the Red Booh before-mentioned to go to, which is as copious as any Blue Book, and readable into the bargain. After all, in so wide and rich a field, however skil- fully it may have been reaped, however diligently gleaned — it will go hard if there be not a few ears left to reward the latest comer. All that I have to offer is a mere handful — not a sheaf. Whatever be its destiny — to be thrashed out by merciless critics, to be trodden under foot by the unconscious crowds, or to be laid up in cedar by a few indulgent admirers — I, at all events, Vlll PREFACE. have bad no little pleasure in the gathering and tying together. An author on a small scale — if he be happy enough not to be writing for his daily bread — risks little by his venture; in case of success, there is his modicum of dear fame; in case of failure, the worst he need fear is to share in the quick oblivion which befals all but the lucky ' one in a thousand.' GAZPACHO; OB, SUMMER MONTHS IN SPAIN. 0^ CHAPTER I. NE necessary preliminary to the tour of Spain is the tour of London, which I performed on the 14th and 15th of June, 1849, from Kensington to King William-street, collecting by the way passports and ' Pratts,' letters of introduction and circular notes. As usual at that season in London, an acquaintance turned up at every corner. ' Going to Spain V said vone; 'you'll be roasted alive!' 'By the Inquisition?' ' No ! by the sun !' ' At all events,' said another, ' don't rro by Paris — you'll get the Asiatic cholera.' And a third, pointing to the ' alarming news ! !' placarded in sesquipedalian letters on the walls, said — ' you'll get the Eed Republic !' But being resolved to go, and prefer- ring the hypothetical dangers at Paris to the certainty of quarantine at Gibraltar, I left the evil prophets in their own country, and started that same evening for Folkestone. Early the next morning we set sail (metaphorically) for France. The passengers, thanks GAZ. B 2 CHANGES IN FRENCH SENTIMENT. to the attempted emeute, were only four in number. There were two little French milliners, who, having come to London to see the fashions — a proud tribute to our advancing ci\T[lization — had been suddenly recalled by the alarming news aforesaid. One was going back for the love of her husband, the other for company. ' II est si vif,' said Adele, tearfully ; ' il se battra dans les rues a coup sur.' ' How old is hef I asked. ' II a vingt ans, monsieur.' ' Et le mien, au contraire,' said Louise, coldly, ' est tr^s prudent ; il restera chez soi.' ' And how old is he V ' II a soixante ans, monsieur.' Poor Louise ! The weather was so fine, that if Adele was sick at heart, she was at least free from the mal-au- coeur, and La Manche, smooth as satin, floated us in two hours into the harbour of Boulogne. On landing, the fjens-d'armes saluted me as ' Monsieur.' We were not under a Red Republic! Nor, if I might judge from the sentiments of my fellow-travellers to Paris, were we likely to be. They purchased chiefly the AssemhUe Rationale, and applied more epithets to Ledru Rollin than I care to record or remember. True it is, I travelled in the first class ; but subsequent experience convinced me that reactionary views were very generally entertained by the lower classes too, — by cabmen, &c., whose vehicles had been confiscated for barricades, and bakers, whose loaves, displayed behind the fragile pane, had been too strong a temptation for republican virtue. The minds of coachmen were no longer unsettled ; the very postilions had forsaken the movement party. One of them, after exhausting his rich national vocabu- lary of abuse on a lazy horse, ground his teeth, and PARIS. 6 shrieked out, as a final malediction — ' Bribon de Ras- pail, va !' But I am travelling faster than the railway-train. At four P.M. I found myself at Paris. The city was, in many respects, changed since ' the days when good King Philip reigned.' The place of the Boulevard trees was ill supplied by the sickly saplings, whose French leaves might be taken at will by any passing gamin. By the way, you may always estimate the time which has elapsed since the last revolution, by the age of the trees on the Boulevard. The former lot had attained astonishing longevity — seventeen years and seven months. Will the present plantation last as long 1 Doubtless the old king, (for he had once been a school- master,) in planting his trees, recalled complacently that touching passage in the Delectus — ' Serit arbores quaj alteri sseculo prosint.' But he reckoned (as he acted) without his host, and the row he himself had planted in the streets, helped at ' the barring-out.' Every here and there one saw closed shops and empty houses, showing like the scars of revolution. The arcades of the Rue Rivoli and the walls of the Tuileries were covered with parti-coloured placards — a deformity which would not have been tolerated under the tasteful regime of either Bourbon. At the Varietes there was less variety than before, and the Vaudeville had become a sort of evening lecture on political economy for the working classes. The Place Vendome was marred by two unsightly trees of liberty, which, in spite of holy water and priests' blessings, had not taken kindly to the soil. Each had b2 4 EXHIBITION AT THE TUILERIES. been decorated with a tricolor flag; but fifteen months of stormy weather had rent the red stripe into tatters, and washed the rest into a uniform dirty white, which thing may, for aught I know, be an allegory as well as a fact. I could not get admission to the Chamber. Up to the 13th of June, certain illustrious members had turned an honest penny by selling tickets of admission, to be had at Meurice's and elsewhere, for four or five francs ; but since that afiair they were no longer to be had for love or money. En revanche, I went to the exhibition of pictures, just opened in the state-rooms of the Tuile- ries. The crowd was dense, but it was good-humoured, and averaged five feet high, so that a middle-sized Englishman could get a fair view. Of the acres of canvass on which my eye rested that day, I only re- member MuUer's ' Lady Macbeth in her sleep,' which attracted many gazers, and gave rise to many ingenious conjectures. The walls were scrawled over with inscrip- tions — ' Jean this,' or ' Pierre that,' ' entra le vingt- quatre Fevrier, 1848.' I have heard that the culinary art of Paris rises and falls with monarchical institutions. For my part, I did not detect the least smack of democracy in the cutlets at the Trois Frercs or the Cafe Anglais. But cooks, as a body, have very reactionary constitutions, and have not caught the Republic. Indeed, nine-tenths of France have either escaped infection, or have had a speedy recovery. A friend of mine, walking through the Exposition des Arts, saw a crowd following an indivi- dual through the rooms : Who is that ? he inquired of POICTIERS. an attendant. ' Mais,' said tlie man, quite simply, ' c'est Sa Majeste.' It was the President. The habit of cen- turies will survive a few months of revolution. On Monday evening (June 18) I left Paris, perched up in the banquette of the diligence, for Bordeaux. A journey tedious to make would be tedious to tell. The prospect by day was scarcely more varied than the prospect by night. Yet everything was in itself green and cheerful. La Belle France ! In the gracious month of June, what country on earth would not deserve the epithet? At Poictiers, I was willing to forego my breakfast in order to visit 'the field;' but no one there had ever heard of such a battle. Our lively friends have a con- venient trick of forgetting the dark half of their history. So I breakfasted, and 'carried a toast' (as their phrase is) to the memory of the Black Prince in solemn silence. Early on Wednesday morning we reached Bordeaux — stateliest of provincial capitals ! The citizens are very proud of their cathedral (which the English built for them on the ' vosnon-vobis' principle of bees and other industrious classes) ; of the Palace of Cardinal de Rohan, the hero of the ' diamond necklace ;' of the theatre, which is one of the finest in the world, — but, above all, they glory in a subterraneous collection of mummies, which are so supremely revolting, that they would cut a respectable figure in the chamber of horrors in Baker- street. The ghastly sacristan who precedes you with his flambeau, tells you, with a chuckle of satisfaction, that you are standing upon a conglomerate of human bones, ten feet in depth. It was like a scene in Rookwood. I went to the Opera Comique, to charm away the 6 VINEYARDS ROUND BORDEAUX. recollection before bed-time. The play was, ' Ne touchez pas h la ^et'we— quite a needless injunction, for her scenic majesty was very plain — unlike the Bordelaises generally : let me do them this justice in passing. Before daylight on Friday, I embarked in the malle poste for Bayonne. And here I am sorely tempted to inflict a new chapter on my readers, to tell them how the continuous vineyard round Bordeaux, dimly seen by starlight, roused in one's breast a crowd of pleasant hopes and memories, swelling as it was with potential claret, and recalling those dear old faces tinged with ruby reflections; how I woke from imaginary symposia to the dreary reality of the Landes in broad day; I might descant on these Landes, which, dreary though they be, have a grandeur and sublimity of their own — a vast breadth of bright green fern, bounded by a horizon of dark green pine, with a solitary shepherd, like a white speck on the waste, bringing out its utter loneliness ; I might burst into rhapsody on the picturesque Mont Marsan, with its vine-covered ravine and stately bridge — an oasis of cheerful life in the midst of death and silence; I might recount the details of an accident, whereby we were more frightened than hurt ; but in the far distance I can discern the faint blue outline of the Pyrenees, and beyond the Pyrenees lies Spain, my proper bourne. The thought lengthens out that eternity of poplars, at the end of which, says the conductor, we shall find Bayonne. I did not believe him till we got there. The hotel (or fonda) St. Eticnne, semi-Spanish in name, is thoroughly French in its good cheer. But the table-d'hote was spoiled by those everlasting politics. TABLE-D HOTE AT BAYONNE. 7 which had formed the sole subject of converse from, Boulogne to Bayonne. And most unprofitable chat too ! They 'pooh pooh' the President; don't want Louis Philippe; consider Henri V. a chimera; dissatisfied with all that is or has been, and unable to provide for what shall be. Like people in sea-sickness, they nauseate all food, while dying of hunger. Everybody sets up a little theory of government for himself, and proves from incontestable premises, by irrefragable logic, that everybody else's little theory is untenable and absurd. Like the particles of a gas, they have a mutual repulsion ; and if confined in the completest and soundest constitution in the world, it will go hard but they will find some loophole to explode by. The Abbe Sieyes said one day at dinner (and a Frenchman is always wisest in his table-talk), 'avec un peuple qui pense, on n'est jamais sur.' Who was it that said, ' the traditions of the past are the ballast of the state-vessel, and the hopes of the future its sails' 1 Well, the French crew have pitched their ballast overboard, don't know how to set their sails, and wont let any one take the rudder. And so they are drifting on over an untraversed sea to an undis- covered coast. How many years will elapse before a new Columbus shall seize the helm, and guide the ship to port 1 Meanwhile, France is paying the penalty that every nation must pay when it breaks with its history. But a truce to metaphors. If France could have been helped out of her troubles by metaphors, the jour- nalists and M. de Montalembert would have done it long 8 BIARRITZ. ago. Unfortunately, figures of speech will not pay 300 millions of debt, keep 500,000 soldiers in soup and shoes, or extract sixty millions per annum from the pockets of an un-^N^illing people. I find I have caught the prevalent infection, and am discussing politics instead of my dinner. Return we to our mutton. I found myself seated next M. H n, a celebrated violinist, still remembered by the subscribers to the Philharmonic Concerts. He, with his wife and a young lady, who accompanied him on the piano and harp respectively, had just returned from a professional expedition to Madrid. The adventure had been ill- starred in many ways, and they came back in no good humour with Spain and the things thereof. The climate was ' d'une chaleur-r-r ... ! ! ' and the public, on the other hand, 'd'une froideur-r-r . . . ! !' and not one amiable person in Madrid, except La Vizcaina, at whose hotel Madame earnestly conjured me to stop. Next day I accompanied my new friends to Biarritz, a gaunt, straggling watering-place, built about a quarter of a mile from the rocky coast. There is a little recess in the cliffs, called the Vieuxport, where both sexes bathe together — the men in a Robinson-Crusoe-like costume, and the women dressed like Lady Macbeth in the fifth act. In spite of the multitudinous ablutions, the deep remained of the same flashing green and blue as before ; and a glorious sight it was to see it from a high rock, breaking along the coast in a wavy line of white foam. Somebody compared it to a shot silk mantle for Nature's wear, trimmed with swan's-down — a simile which the two ladies rewarded with the epithet of ' ravissant.' PUBLIC BUILDINGS AT BAYONNE. 9 A day or two passed very pleasantly at Bayonne, — sight-seeing on a small scale. There is the cathedral, with its fine flamboyant cloisters ; the citadel, to which your passport is the never-failing courtesy of French officers, and which a civilian should visit for the view; and the pine-dotted sand-hills below the town, famous for some murderous work in 1814, when the Eagle, beaten home, clutched her nest with such strong gripe. But my pleasantest recollection is a balcony of the Hotel St. Etienne, filled with flowers, where I sat one fine morning listening to M. H n's violin, as it was discoursing some of those strange wild merry-pathetic German pieces, which leave one in doubt whether to get up and dance, or lie down and cry. A fresh breeze from the Atlantic was coming in, and stirring the rich languid odours of the southern blossoms. We shall bid farewell to-morrow both to sea and breeze for some time to come. CHAPTER II. JUST before my arrival at Bayonne, the old Diligence Company for the north of Spain had been roused from their drowsy monopoly by a brisk new vehicle ^ la Frangaise; and at that time the two companies were contending for the public favour, by successive reduc- tions of fare and accelerations of pace. So it resulted that the public might be whirled from the frontier to the capital in fifty hours, for twenty-five francs, instead of spending, as of old, thrice the money and twice the time. I chose the banquette in the French diligence: an airy perch, from which one gets a bird's eye view of the earth, and may practise for a prospective scramble after wild Croats or waterfalls in the Sierra Nevada. At half- past five, A. M., a prudent old gentleman had commenced the ascent ; by half-past six the conductor bounded to the summit, and the mountain began laboriously to move. However, once off the rugged pavement, (a truly pre-Macadamite formation,) the pace was not to be complained of. My companions were — 1st, a French bagman, somewhat vinous and scorbutic, who occupied the comer; 2nd, a Spanish cura, going to St. Sebastian, who was dressed in a suit of dila2)idated black, such as is worn in England by Nonconformist divines ] 3rdly, the THE BIDASSOA. 11 conductor, used to command, and peremptory as a field- marshal; and, 4thly, a merry little Gascon, coiled up among the baggage behind, who was being imported into Spain as a gardener; for in Spain the gardeners are as surely French, as in England they are Scotch. I suspect the poor fellow was striving to hide an uneasy regret for La Belle France, or some belle Fran9aise, by a forced gaiety. At all events, his hilarity was so stupendous that it cannot be expressed without a bull : he talked and laughed incessantly, and sung between whiles. His ditties, however, one and all died away in an indescribably dolorous twang, and the word ' amour-r-r.' We had need of all Jean's powers of being jolly under creditable circumstances, for the weather was wretched, — as bad as if I had brought it with me from home. The rain pattered on the roof, and the wind blew in misty gusts ; and the Atlantic, by the side of which we were passing, was chequered between sullen black and angry foam. Mem: Let no one about to travel in a hot country, even at Midsummer, come unprovided against cold; you will need the plaid as well as the blouse. About seven we reached the frontier stream — the Bidassoa, which, with its Isle of Pheasants, would have recalled many passages of Hispano-French history, — if I had ever read them. It would seem as if the famous fiat of Louis XIV. had taken a partial effect hereabouts : * II n'y a plus de Pyrenees.' The only division between the two nations, is a deep hatred and the Bidassoa, which an active French dancing- master mifrht almost skip over, and which would not drown him if he didn't. 12 IRUN — ST. SEBASTIAN. On the oue side of the bridge we had to get permission to go out — on the other, permission to go in. After the passports had received the requisite endorsement, we were suffered to proceed to Irun, where the luggage was examined for the first time. What with hauling and overhauling, we were detained at least an hour. I must do the officials the justice to say, that they treated me with a distant politeness, for which I felt duly and humbly grateful. We stopped at St. Sebastian to break- fast, and very ill I fared; but I felt that the good folks had wrongs to avenge, and so forbore to complain. The less an Englishman says of St. Sebastian the better. On some ruined houses outside the town, I could still trace the marks of balls — memorials, as the cura said, of the siege of 1813. Between this and Vergara the country improves; corn and vines below, the woods above, and, over all, the green ' Alps.' It is Switzer- land on a small scale, and the exigencies of the Basque climate have dictated a similar domestic architecture. Every traveller makes the same remark. Theophile Gautier, who, like a true Frenchman, has the drop- curtain always before his eyes, says — ' I expected to see Ketlys and Gretleys coming out of every cottage, mais heureusement I'Espagae ne porte pas I'opera comique jusqu a ce point-lu.' It is only after penetrating some distance into the interior of Spain, that one discerns any Peninsular peculiarity in the costume, manners, or features of the natives. Vascon and Gascon arc physically and morally, as well as etymologically, identical on either side of the Bidassoa. A bullfight was just going to begin as we A DILIGENCE RACE. 13 arrived at Tolosa, and the sight of the picadors riding in state to the arena was cruelly tantalizing. In the evening we had some long and steep hills to climb, which was effected by the aid of two huge oxen, whose docility and resignation formed a truly edifying contrast to the savage yells and ferocious gestures of two animals (be- lieved to belong to the genus man — species, peasant) who goaded them on. Just as we commenced the descent on the other side, the rival diligence came in sight. The consequence was, a race to the bottom, conducted with the same disregard for the limbs and feelings of the passengers as was shown in the palmy days of the road in Old England. Our top-heavy vehicle swayed fearfully as we dashed round each sharp tourni- quet, and a superstitious reverence for the powers of centrifugal force led me to expect that every turn would be a turn over. I am still convinced that we ought to have been upset, on strict mathematical principles, and am truly grateful to the unknown disturbing forces which interposed, and brought us safe to Vergara. This is the place illustrious for the final triumph of the Duke of Victory. We supped, for aught I know, in the very room where his Grace definitively routed the Carlist forces, by giving their leader a check — for a few million reals. The gallant generals met hand to hand, and struck — a bargain ! Shall I confess that I passed through Vitoria at night, and spent but one quarter of an hour there 1 I own it is not what England has a right to expect. However, for a sensitive patriot there are other asso- ciations, less agreeable, connected with Vitoria. There J4 MIRANDA-ON-THE-EBRO. it was that tliose poor devils, whose collective name was ' legion,' died by hundreds of disease and want — a tale told with most pathetic simplicity in the Auto- hiography of a Wo7'king-7nan. Now the Spaniards, who have cheated them out of the pay promised, ease their consciences by depreciating the services rendered — adding insult to injury — making light of deeds which they could not emulate, and sufferings which they would not alle"vnate. Meanwhile, the poor fellows ' sleep on, little recking,' — a few thousands more, added to the long list of their countrymen who lie below the battle-plains of the Peninsula, — at Moutiel, Almanza, or Albuera, — having lost their lives in a foreign land for a stranger's quarrel, fighting for a Peter or a Ferdinand. Even now, if a Protestant Englishman has the misfortune to die in Spain, his body is an unclean thing, and must be buried like a dead dog. Truly, intervention is a profitless and thankless task. Day dawned, and I woke just as we rattled into Miranda-on-the-Ebro, where our luggage was hauled down, and inspected for the third time. Yet, in spite of the Argus eyes which insisted upon peering into my dressing case, Spain is deluged with prohibited manu- factures. If they are not belied, the carabineros in- variably speed the smuggler for a share of his gains, and make a show of activity by pestering the tourist; Dat veniam corvis, &c. A whole hour passed before the doves in question, with ruffled plumes and tempers, again ascended to their respective perches, and crossed the bridge into old Castile. Another hour or so TILLAGE AND POPULATION. 15 brought us to the Defile of Pancorbo, a narrow gorge, through which the stream, scanty and intermittent, of traffic and travel flows into the Castilian plains. It reminded me of the Pass of Llanberris — all passes have, by the nature of the case, a strong resemblance : but whether the Iberian rocks are 500 feet higher or lower than the Celtic, I have no notion : some people, and I envy them, have an eye for measurements. It is only on emerging from the Defile of Pancorbo, that the traveller feels himself to be indeed in Spain. Nowhere else will he have seen a prospect such as the one before him. To left and right spreads a plain, with gentle undulations, covered with alternate patches of corn and fallow-land, fallow and corn- land, — changing insensibly, from the hard yellows and browns of the foreground, to the soft blue distance, and then blending with the summer haze on the low and far horizon. Directly in front, at a vast distance, rises the next of those successive sierras, which divide Spain like so many ribs. Divisions these, not merely geo- but e^Awo-graphical, and justifying the official designation of the country, — ' Las Espanas,' ' The Spains.' One jDeculiarity, however, I have remarked as common to most of the Spains— Old and New Castile, La Mancha, &c. — viz., the apparent scantiness of the population as compared with the amount of tillage. In traversing this same plain which leads to Burgos, you see the ripening corn and the new- turned furrow, — but where do the labourers live 1 There are no isolated cottages, as in England, and the villages are few and far between. One would think the quantity of corn on the ground 16 DREARY ROAD TO BURGOS. would suffice ten times over for any mouths there are to eat it. The Spaniards, to be sure, eat much more bread and much less meat than we carnivorous northerns. Whatever the cause, a Spanish plain presents the aspect of a cultivated desert. Elsewhere, the traveller may- see cultivation and may see deserts, but Spain is the only country where he will see them united. In truth, it is a land of jumbled antitheses. Not one picturesque tower, not one green dell, relieves the dreary monotony of the way from Pancorbo to Burgos. The sun climbed higher and higher through a cloudless sky, till we were almost suffocated in the flood of heat which poured unrelentingly on our heads. What a contrast to the cold mountain mists and sea breezes of yesterday ! But in these central plains, all summer long, that irresponsible tyrant rules the Spanish day, without a cloud to limit his prerogative. Let me vent my spleen, now that I am safe under the shelter of an English November. Whether it was that I became somewhat acclimatized in course of time, but I certainly never afterwards suffered so much from heat as in that ride to Burgos. I was fain to refresh myself by dipping into ' Ford,' who, unlike his namesakes in Spain, is never dry. * Sir,' once said a table-d'hote acquaintance — ' Sir, he is the traveller's vadum mecum.^ The pun was unintentional, for the speaker was a Scotch gentleman in the muslin trade. Right glad I was, an hour before noon, to see the twin towers of Burgos rising over the plain, and doubly long seemed the leagues as we neared the city. A league off we came upon the shrunk river, winding its BUEGOS. 17 way between a double row of alders and poplars whicb feebly attempted to be green. Just at the entrance of Burgos were a vast number of soldiers, in their auto-da- fe-coloured jackets, engaged in washing the greatest i:)Ossible number of indescribable garments in the smallest jiossible quantity of water. Had they been washer- women, they could not have made more noise about it. Excepting the soldiers at wash, Burgos was as still and quiet as fifteen thousand grave Castilians can make it, — and that, let me tell you, is very still indeed. You will hardly match it westward of Palmyra, — unless it be Ferrara, or Philadelphia, U. S., which, I understand, is brim-full of Quakers. GAZ. 18 CHAPTER III. I MUST confess that I experienced a sensation of loneliness as the diligence moved off on its way to Madrid. Sitting on a portmanteau, ' warranted solid,' under an archway, I watched the vehicle till it turned the corner, as Ariadne may have watched the sails of Theseus — Sinking with all she loved beneath the %'erge. Nor did I find the same consolation, for the wine of Burgos is detestable to a northern palate. There I was, a stranger, blundering over the first rudiments of Spanish conversation, in the very heart of the pride and prejudice of old Castile, — in Bui'gos, which is no city of the interpreter, where no laquais-de-place proffers his services in Biscayan-Frcnch or Maltese-English. If the traveller cannot speak Spanish enough to ask for a bed-room, or cannot muster impudence enough to occupy one without asking, he runs great chance of having to take up his quarters with the other dumb animals in the stable or kennel. Just at that time the silent city was doubly silent, for it was taking its siesta. I resolved to follow so good an example, and accordingly proceeded to seize and possess myself of a room, fol- Icv.'cd by a casual boy from the streets, whom I had THE POSADA. 19 bribed to carry my luggage up stairs, no waiter or ' boots' being forthcoming. But, in respect of the anticipated nap, I had reckoned without my host. The posada in which I was lodged was infested by diligences, which came lumbering in at intervals all that afternoon, with a cargo of hungry ' insides.' Consequently this was precisely the one noisy place in Burgos. Stairs creaked, doors banged, knives clattered, women screamed, and, worse than all, an incense-smoke of fried oil and garlic spread into every nook and corner. Your true Castilian never does anything quickly and quietly. He knows no medium between apathy and fuss; and the tumult of the one (when he is roused) equals the quietude of the other. When the ' he' is a ' she,' the same holds true, d, fortiori. Now, in this establishment, the entire personnel was female. Sleep was impossible, so I resolved to dine with the Santander diligence, at two. The waiteresses, with a ferocity quite appalling, flung on the table a profusion of strong meats, entirely unknown to the Cis-pyrenean cuisine. Every kind of meat was brought to a horrid uniformity by a thick disguise of garlic. But (as I afterwards discovered) even garlic is nothing when you're used to it. The passengers contrived to eat enormously, maintaining the while a stately and dignified reserve. As for me, if I did not satisfy my appetite, I at least received a lesson in manners: I had dined with half-a-dozen Dukes Humphrey and their duchesses. The feast over, I sallied out; for the scanty strip of shadow in the street had now widened to a comfort- able breadth, and the town was waking, after its c2 20 THE CATHEDRAL. drowsy fashion. Here and there I saw a dame or damsel, wearing a mantilla, and that awful, don't-speak-to-me countenance which ladies generally assume on their Avay to church. I followed one of these black angels accord- ingly, for my first object was the cathedral; and I was not mistaken, — in two minutes I stood before the gate of the south transept. Enter; and what a change from ' glow to gloom !' — from the common glare of day to a charmed twilight ! — from prose to poetry ! Then you can feel the joy with which the weary traveller in the desert flings himself down to rest on the far-seen, long-wished-for oasis, by the fountain beneath the palms. And those vast pillars, with that arched roof, are more impervious to the sun than the trunks and leaves of any banana, and those streams of gentle music flow sweeter than falling water. In a southern climate the exigencies of nature aid the endeavours of art, and endue the cathedral with a new significance. The fierce sun and fiercer sirocco, against which no common dwelling is proof, are not felt in the house of God. It is the shadow of a great rock in a weary land. The superstition which in England consigned the north side of the church, with its dank mould and green lichens, to the evil one, is unknown in other and sunnier lands. ' On the north side,' says the great poet-prophet (as true to nature in the one capacity, as be is true to God in the other) — ' On the north side licth the city of the Great King.' The north side is ever the chosen place for beggars, the halt and the blind, who THE CATHEDRAL. 21 else homeless, gather under the shelter of its liberal shadow. For a moment after you enter the church all is night, but gradually its glories dawn upon you one by one. Round the massive pillars are clustered niches and canopies, rich in fantastic tracery, and from each an Evangelist with a book, or bishop with pastoral staff, looks down on the few worshippers who kneel below, almost as motionless. The grand old Gothic — that catholic mould in which all Christian Europe has striven best to express its devotion — is varied here by details which epitomize the character and the history of Spain. The stern, grave figures cut in the white stone represent well the patricians of Old Castile, proud of their un- blemished honour and unconquerable resolve; the costly and varied marbles, and graceful foliage enwreathing many a tomb, and the altar-screens blazing with gold, recal the days when Spain had at her command the quarries of Carrara, the pliant fancy of Genoa, and the untold treasures of the New World. You will be roused from your day-dream by the cessation of the music and the pattering feet of the departing worshippers, or probably by some hobbling old verger, who taps you on the shoulder with his wand, and intimates that, vespers over, he is now at liberty to serve Mammon in a small way, by sho\fing you the chapels. Let us go with him by all means — we shall not grudge the fee. He will take you first to the Capella del Condestabile, a gorgeous specimen of florid Gothic in full bloom. In 22 PICTURES. the centre, on separate tombs, lie tlie effigies of the said Constable and his wife, all in white marble, in their habit as they lived. A long inscription records the titles of the founder, whose only title to posthumous fame, after all, is the splendid mausoleum which pre- serves his memory and name. Pedro Hernandez de Velasco was wiser in his generation than all the Pharaohs of Egypt. Let us go on, and look at a picture attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, and quite in his manner. It is a Magdalen, calm, yet full of sorrow, with all her golden hair hanging in wavy tresses about her face. You can see the fair smooth skin gleaming through. There is yet another picture, attached to a still greater name, — to Michael Angelo himself. A Virgin, robed in red and blue, holds the child in her arms. Two little angels, with palm-branches, hover above. In the dis- tance is a green landscape. The child is exquisite, like one of Raphael's happiest creations. The sweet face of the Virgin has something Spanish in its character, but the picture is Italian beyond doubt. Is it Michael Angelo's ? It appears to me (speaking with the diffi- dence which becomes a layman in art), that in hardness of outline, and strongly-contrasted colours, this picture has a decided resemblance to that which bears the name of Michael Angelo in the tribune of the Uffizii, at Florence. But the genuineness even of that is ques- tioned. N"ay, I believe it is a moot point whether he ever painted an easel picture at all. But the good verger is showing signs of impatience. Let us permit PLAZA MAYOR. 23 him to draw the curtain over the picture and the dis- cussion. Leaving the church, we will now turn down to the great square, the Plaza Mayor, of late re-baptized ' de la Constitucion;' it is quite empty, excepting the grim statue of some dead king or other in the centre. All round is an arcade, in that ragged tumble-down state that artists love ; and underneath are a number of dimi- nutive shops, in which the smallest possible amount of business is transacted. Business ! there is no business in Castile, except the barber's. Elsewhere custom is most unfrequent, saving ' the custom always of an after- noon.' These little shops are so still and quiet, that they might be Columbaria or Egyptian tombs, and the master, stretched motionless on the counter, might be the mummy — smoking a cigarett. When abroad, I always read the names over the shop- doors — a habit which enriches one's vocabulary wonder- fully. In the course of this interesting investigation, my eye fell upon the inscription ' Don Pedro Smith' over a haberdasher's. I started, like Robinson Ci'usoe, when he discerned the foot-print of a fellow-man in the desert island. I entered, for I hoped to get some use- ful information, in English, from Mr. Peter Smith. He was a little fat man, lolling on his counter as lazily as any Castilian of them all. This was discouraging, yet I ventured to address him in English. But, no ! though he did not deny his father, and had not forsaken his name, he had forgotten the ancestral language of all the Smiths, and was merged in the Don Pedro, So I left 2i SUPPLY AND DEMAND. him, with the usual blessing, which was all I took by the motion. It is a marvel to me how Don Pedro and his fellows get their bread. Certainly not by the sweat of their brow. They are so supremely indifferent, that I am sure two hundred of a trade might live tooether in the most perfect agreement. They pass their lives in the same dull routine, varied, at far intervals, by some such scene as this : — Let C stand for customer, D for dealer — be the wares what they may. D is discovered lying at full length on the counter, smoking. Enter C. Ave Maria purissima. D. Sin pecado concebida, (without disturbing him- self.) C. Have you got such-and-such a thing? D. God knows. Does your worship want to buy it? (A pause.) Well, I'll look by-and-by. (He finishes his cigarett, and proceeds slowly to examine his stores. Then, somewhat surprised,) Holy Mary, here it is ! we have got it. C. What's the price? D. God knows ! Will your worship call again to- morrow, or next day, and I'll tell you ? C. and D. ^T \ Usted con Dios. Exit C. Vaya j D lies down again in his former position, and rolls another cigarett. By and bye I was consoled for my first disappoint- ment by discovering a cafe, under the management of a communicative Swiss. If I had known more of Spain, SWISS CAFE. 25 I might have been sure of finding a Swiss cafe in the town. These Swiss turn up everywhere, in the most out-of-the-way corners. Couriers, valets, body-guards, and pastry-cooks, — nothing comes amiss to them. Like other children of the mist, — Asturians and Scotch High- landers, — they care not how far they wander to make a livelihood, but always cherish the hope of returning to their native hills to die. A little before sunset the good folks cheered up wonderfully, and turned out en masse to the Alameda, in the highest state of satisfaction and contentment. The Alameda affords a singular combination of scents and sounds, proceeding from stagnant pools and blowing roses, croaking frogs and chattering women. This night, however, the innocent gaieties of the promenade were cut short by a thunder-shower, scaring a whole flock of mantillas to the cafe, where they devoured huge mers-de-glace and mountains of pastry, to the detriment of their own digestion and the purses of attendant cavaliers. Early next morning I stormed the castle, which enjoys a military reputation quite unique for having repulsed Lord Wellington. It opened its gates to me on the first summons, or rather, I found them open and walked in. A few soldiers w^ere lounging or lying about in the shade, keeping up a constant fire of paper-cigars to kill time withal. I found, however, no stores of interest to reward my pains, so I evacuated the fortress, and divided the rest of the day between the cathedral and the cafe. 26 MIRAFLOKES. The morning after, I made an excursion to Miraflores, in a vehicle peculiar to the country called a calesa, in ■which you are carried at a slow trot, at the imminent risk of dislocating every joint, over a track termed by that extravagant Spanish courtesy a road, which, in winter, is a slough of despond and mud, and, in summer, is hardened into sometliing that resembles a raised map of Switzerland. However, Miraflores will repay you for the trouble of going there. The church, as you approach, looks so like Eton Chapel, that one involuntarily begins — Ye distant spires, ye antique towers, Tliat crown but here the applicability ceases, for at Miraflores, alas ! there is no watery glade, nor science, nor gratitude, to adore the holy shade of Isabel. We drove into a deserted court, where, after sundry shoutings and knockings, we were joined by a dilapi- dated attendant, quite in keeping Avith the place, who conducted me, through hollow-sounding corridors and cloisters, to the church, now silent as the tombs it covers. Here are the sepulchres of Juan II. and his wife, and their son Alphonso, unrivalled memorials of wliat filial and sisterly love can accomplish when it wields the Avcalth of a kingdom. In the centre of the church, just before the high altar, lie the effigies of the king and queen, and round the sides of the tomb are clustered saints and evangelists, personified virtues and heraldic monsters, with a profusion of flower- wreaths, carved in the boldest alto relievo and of the whitest CHURCH OF MIRAFl.ORES. 27 Carrara marble. The artist's design was, doubtless, to typify their regal grandeur, their moral worth, and the faith whereby they looked for unfading crowns. Isabel was peculiarly happy in her artist. His work displays a teeming fancy, guided by a pure taste, and executed with surpassing skill and delicacy. Unhapjiily, the beauty of the work pleaded in vain with the invaders of 1808. It spoke a language they did not understand. The flower-tracery was mutilated, and many of the statuettes have been pocketed for relics. Over the altar is a magnificent screen of carved wood. In the centre stands Jesvis with the cross, and round him are repre- . sented the principal events of his life, — the whole en- circled by a wreath of cherubs ; and outside that, figures of saints, full-size, each under his gilt canopy. Here, there is none of that ghastly reality which so often dis- turbs the pleasure of examining these gorgeous 'things of Spain ;' all is artistic and in tasteful keeping, down to the minutest details, — one lingers long, loth to look for the last time on so much beauty. At length I left the church, and followed my guide through the convent. There used to be twenty-one monks at Miraflores, whose occupation was singing masses for the repose of the royal dead ; but Espartero ' broke into the spence and turned the cowls adrift.' Three only are left, old men, who will not cumber the ground long. I saw one of them, Avandering like a melancholy ghost among the once pleasant places, fast becoming a wilderness of weeds and ruin. I visited the kitchen now fire-less ; the cellars, innocent of wine ; the refectory, which has been robbed even of its picture of a 28 DISSOLUTION OF MONASTERIES. supjjer. In the sala capitular, nearly a hundred freshly- gathered roses were arranged in the form of a cross on the floor, — the pious morning's work of one of the old fathers. The fountain in the middle of the garden has ceased to play, but the water wells through the dis- jointed stones, and keeps the life in a few straggling garden shrubs. Close by is the cemetery, covered with rank weeds, a tall cross marking, as usual, the place where the last brother was buried. It will be shifted three times more. The whole scene forcibly brought to my mind the description of the monastery of Kenna- quhair, after the Eeformatiou. One cannot help feeling some sympathy with any reverent and time-sanctioned custom, just swept away for ever; but I do not consider the late dissolution of the monasteries a matter for real regret. The appropriated revenues may have been mis- applied and wasted; solemn promises may have been broken on the part of the government, and thousands of unoflendingmen driven out to face the hardships of a world where they were as strangers ; but, withal, it is a happy thing for Spain that some hundred thousand pairs of stalwart arms, formerly employed in telling beads or swinging censers, will now be at their country's service, to fight her battles and to till her fields. 29 CHAPTER IV. THAT same day, at 2 p.m. I set out for Madrid. The diligencia differs from the diligence in having no banquette. The coupg was full, so I was compelled to go in the interior. I took my place for the south, with much the same feelings that a Scotch covenanter may have had when seating himself in the chair of torture ; in each case, it is a painful and necessary transit to a land of palms. If I were to speak from recollection of the tract between Burgos and Lerma, I should say that it was a region where fire had usurped the place of all the other elements, licking up the water, and crumbling the earth into an impalpable powder, which, in its turn, rose and ousted the air. That day's experience has corrected my notion as to the indis- pensable necessity of Oxygen, Nitrogen, and Co. as a Life Insurance ; I then found that the lungs could perform their functions for several successive hours, while inhaling and expiring equal portions of dust and tobacco-smoke. The traveller will generally find that his mental powers and spirits are elevated or depressed in exactly inverse proportion to the altitude of the sun ; accord- ingly, as it was towards evening when we passed Lerma, I had sufficient life in me to look out upon the huge 30 DESOLATION. factory-like old palace of the famous Juke of that ilk, to call up faint recollections of Gil Bias, and to listen to a long story from one of my travelling companions about a troop of bandits, who, in this unromantic nine- teenth century, had taken up their abode in the vaults of the said palace, and pillaged, with long impunity, all who passed by that road. The whole story was merely one of those pleasant extemporary fictions with which these semi-orientals beguile the time, quite con- tent if you listen in patience, and not making the smallest claim on your credulity. Before we reached Aranda, I remember crossing enormous plains, covered for the most part with cistus and lavender, the flowers of the latter deepening the rich purple of the distance, and contrasting gloriously with the transparent yellow and vermilion of the sunset. Besides the diligence and its team, creeping like a long snake over the white road, there was not a living thing to be seen — not a trace of man's handiwork. The shrieks of the driver, and the crack of his whip, were the only sounds which broke the stillness. The desolation of a plain is always more awful than the desolation of a mountain. In the latter case it is natural, and a thing of course, — in the former, it seems the result of a curse on the place. The existence of such vast deserts, within half-a-day's journey of the capital, points to something rotten in the state of Spain. And yet this is the country which once peopled a continent with its overplus. The Spanish monarchy is a tree which has decayed from the core outwards; the leaves, meanwhile, flutter out their season gaily enough, caring little for the old trunk. A SPANISH FAMILY. 31 At Aranda, we were allowed half-an-hour to regale ourselves with the never-failing, ever-excellent chocolate. With a Spanish diligence, half-an-hour means half-an- hour and something more. You are not liable, as in France, to be bustled out of your last ten minutes by the conducteur's noisy summons, ' En voiture, messieurs les voyageurs ;' so I had time to observe my com- panions. The rotonde was occupied by a father, mother, and some half-dozen children. The father was a little, timid, small-voiced man, implicitly obedient to his better-half, a lady of herculean proportions and stentorian voice, who took advantage of her palpably interesting situation to be unusually exacting. The children regarded the mother with awful reverence, and the father with contemptuous pity. I mention this because, doubtless, such a state of things is quite unheard of in our well-regulated English homes. From the roof of the diligence descended a well-made, ill-conditioned fellow, who called lustily for aguardiente to keep the cold out. Like certain other persons, he made all the world participators of his ' confidences' unasked. He had served under Cavaiarnac in Alfreria. (on whom he vented, by the way, sundry military oaths,) had deserted, and earned a scanty pittance by sitting to the artists at Seville as a model for bandits, &c. &c. I dare say, on a fitting occasion, he would have acted the character to perfection. Next morning, as the day broke, we were climbing the first slopes of the Somo Sierra, the pass which leads over the Guadarrama chain to Madrid. I got out, and walked for some miles ahead of the dilio-ence, drinkino- deep draughts of the keen air, and storing up a famous 32 THE SOMO SIERRA, appetite for breakfast, wliich Ave found prepared for us at a mountain venta. In so lonely a district, one may eat of dubious disbes witb comparative security; cats tbereabouts must be considerably scarcer tban hares. Here our deserter made himself very obnoxious. He had been repeating his draughts of aguardiente at every stage, till he became unable to take care of himself, and decidedly unfit to be intrusted with a carving-knife. He was at last, by dint of force and fraud, hoisted back on to his perch, where he fell fast asleep, and lay there with the burning sun full upon him all the way to Madrid. It would have killed anybody but a chasseur d'Afrique. Whether it killed him or not nobody cared to inquire. As we descended the southern slopes of the mountain, the breeze grew fainter and fainter at every turn, and at last died of sheer exhaustion, leaving us to repeat the same vitally interesting series of expe- riments on the organs of respiration, and, I am happy to add, with the same result. The vast plain which surrounds Madrid presents almost universally traces of the plough, though the land lying idle bears an enormous dis2:)roportiou to that actually productive. It is, in fact, an ocean of grey fallow, dotted with sporades of yellow stubble. Here and there you see a glaring village of white-washed mudj and as the vehicle stops at each of these to change horses — mules, I should say — it is surrounded by a swarm of maimed and dccrc])it old folks and preter- naturllay active urchins, with or without rags, who solicit your charity, and make liberal promises of repay- ment in the name of the blessed Virgin Mary. 1 did not see ^Madrid till we were close on the walls, for the PLAIN OF MADRID. 33 simple reason that I was not equal to the exertion of putting my head out of the window to look for it. I was then strongly reminded of exterior views which I have seen of certain Oriental cities, — a mud wall, sur- mounted hy paltry minarets and towers, with a desert all round and touching the very gates. What a contrast to the environs of London, where the country melts into the town by insensible gradations, — Wimbledon Com- mon, parks, gardens, villas, bough-pots, and Bow-bells ! The citizen of Madrid does not go beyond its walls twice in a year, and he is quite right. Once enter Madrid, and all traces of Orientalism vanish. It is the least Spanish of all Spanish towns. The Gallo-mania, which is universally, and the Anglo- mania, which is partially, prevalent in the capital, have destroyed all that was characteristic and national in architecture, customs, and costume, except the Plaza Mayor, bull-fights, and Isabel the Second. After my luggage had undergone a polite fro formd examination, I proceeded in quest of La Vizcaina, who occupies the second floor of the Casa Cordero, an enor- mous house in the very centre of the town. I was received at the door by the lady herself, a beaming, bustling housewife, still so fat and fair that I should have pronounced her forty. I have since learnt that — to use the language of mediaeval romance — she has numbered sixty winters. May she double the reckoning, for the benefit of travellers yet unborn! A delicious warm bath washed away the memory of fatigue, and prepared me for the olla, promised at five o'clock pre- cisely. The company at the ' round table' — so a table- GAZ. D 34 SPANISH table-d'hote. d'hote is termed in Spain — some twenty persons, formed a little quadruple alliance, for it contained representa- tives of each of the four powers, and of none other. In this case, the French had it all their own way. They carried on a clamorous discussion on the politics of Europe ; and if any slow-spoken Englishman or Spaniard ventured upon a deprecatory ' mais/ he was immediately borne down by a dashing, reckless Polish-lancer-like charge of assertions and inferences, so rapid that you had no time to comprehend, much less reply to them. After dinner, sundry silver or pseudo-silver dishes, with handles to them, filled with glowing charcoal, were placed on the table, whereat every one lighted his cigar. A lull ensued, and the discussion ended, as usual, in smoke. By this time, it was becoming what is called by a pleasant irony ' cool,' so every one sallied out to com- mence the real life of the day. I did the same, with the more eagerness, as I was anxious to cultivate my new acquaintance, Madrid. The eastern part of the city, — the quarter in which all the world lives, except the queen, the i)cople, and the British ambassador, — is like an outstretched hand, of which the Puerta del Sol is the palm, and the Calle de Alcaht the middle finger, being the broadest and longest of all the streets which centre in the Puerta. The ' Gate of the Sun,' by the way, is now as mythical as Aid Gate or Bishop's Gate. This street of Alcala is afiirined by the people of Madrid to be the finest street in Europe, and I am not sure that the boast is wrong; I will maintain its claims against Begent-street or the Unter den Linden. The Eue de Bivoli is out of the question, because there is THE PRADO. 35 only one row of houses; and nobody calls the Boule- vards ' a street.' The Ludwig Strasse at Muuich is a costly assemblage of pieces rapportees, which even Time will never harmonize. As an accomplished traveller well said to me, ' A city cannot be manufactured ; it must grow.'' But to return to Madrid. As the street begins to sink towards the Prado, it is bordered with double rows of acacias, planted by Espartero, and watered by Narvaez. The principal cafes are in this quarter'; as, for instance, the Suizo, long established and unpretending ; and that yclept ' del Espejo,' which, in cheap magnificence, outshines all its Parisian proto- types. There you find ices, orgeat, and lemonade; and, besides the usual temperance beverages, wines and liqueurs innumerable. Upstairs is a suite of rooms devoted to various games; billiards, played with a set of dwarf nine-pins, and cards with strange out- Englandish devices. Observe the players; they are performing a tableau vivant after Caravaggio. In another place you see a fierce Don, knitting his brows and twisting his moustache over a perplexity at dominoes. The children of the south never economize their pas- sions; they are most serious over amusements, most strenuous in idleness. It is a pleasant lounge for a new comer to sit at one of these windows about sunset, and watch the stream of pedestrians, carriages and horses, flowing down to- wards the Prado ; and now that the darkness is gathering fast over the scene, let us issue forth and follow with the crowd. The most frequented part of the Prado is that which d2 36 THE PRADO. extends about five hundred paces south of the Calle de Alcala, Avith a broad carriage drive, and a still broader space for the promenaders. Here all the able-bodied population of Madrid circulate of an evening, from the queen down to — whatever may be the other extremity of the social scale. Except her majesty, who looks best in a mantilla, and knows it, the ladies chiefly wear bonnets of the last Parisian fashion but ten — a dreadful disenchantment. Thousands of rush-bottomed chairs may be hired for a cuarto a-piece, to accommodate the wives, mothers, and daughters of the people, as they watch the gay world prancing by. The saddle-horses are mostly Andalucians, trained to paw the air and make a great show of going — but it's all pretence. Besides the bit in their mouths, the poor animals have often a band fastened across the nose, provided inter- nally with a small saw, by means of which they may be brought down on their haunches any time, without any unseemly exertion of strength on the rider's part. The carriages are built after the Long A ere mould, and are got up generally in what is conceived to be the English style — the footmen, for instance, are in top-boots. After the daylight is gone, the fair — I mean, dark — occupants descend, and promenade till ten or eleven o'clock. Altogether, the Prado at that time is very like what Hyde Park might be by gas-light. Fashion, truly, is a sad leveller of oddities, national or individual. For myself, I confess this treadmill-like mode ceases to be amusing after a time, whether in London, Paris, or Madrid. Vamos. 37 CHAPTER V. ^PHE first impulse of every stranger on waking, the J- first morning after his arrival at Madrid, is, or ought to be, to visit the Gallery. Indeed, but for that magnet, few would encounter the slow torture of diligence-travelling through the interior, when they might go by steam from port to port all round the coast (cholera-time excepted). Let the stranger, then, having duly fortified himself with chocolate, sally forth, pass intrepidly through the midst of the soldiers who are lounging about the post-office door (fierce as they look, they wont harm you), and then take the Carrera San Geronimo, carefully hugging the shady side till you come to the Prado. The scene you left so full of life, and fans, and flirtation, last night, is now abandoned to sunshine and solitude — two synonymes at this time of year. You must, however, endure the glare for a minute or two, cross right over ' the dust that once was love,' and before you stands a large, massive, but not inelegant building of red stone, with white facings and pillars, in the British infantry style. That is the Gallery. Unless your first object be the sculptures — which is scarcely conceivable — go to the door at the north end ; enter, present your passport to the old door- keeper, who returns it to your worship with a grave bow; write your name and occupation — 'proprietor' of 38 THE MADRID GALLERY. course, even if you are conscious that the only thing you hold in fee-simple is your portmanteau — buy a catalogue, and then go in, and walk straight forward, glancing to right and left, but pausing nowhere, till you have found the Pearl — that famous jewel of art. It is placed on the left hand, half-way up the long gallery, and is numbered 726 in the catalogue. Its title was conferred by Philip the Fourth, who bought it at the sale of our Charles the First's pictures, through the medium of his ambassador in London, D. Alonso de Cardenas, for two thousand pounds sterling. I dare say old Noll chuckled over the great price. But that the gallery was saleable, it would probably have been burnt as idolatrous, for pictures to the Puritans weie, indeed, as pearls before swine. The first view is dis- appointing. It has been repolished in Paris, and thereby lost that venerable mello\vness, which from habit we associate with all great pictures. One might take it for a first-rate copy turned out yesterday. Its harmony has been marred by some rude northern hand. The purple and gold of the evening sky are contrasted in a savage manner, quite unlike Raphael, whose landscapes and skies always seem to retire, and fade, and wane, in the presence of the Infant God and the Blessed Mother. The faces, however, arc uninjured. The child John is oftering flowers to Jesus, who looks up to his mother's face, as if to ask for the smile of permission. The whole group is conceived in that spirit of gentle humanity which reveals the glories of Raphael even to babes in art, and which has made his creations the household- gods of every hearth. A little further on (No. 741) is THE MADRID GALLERY. 39 the 'Virgin of the Fish,' where the painter seems stu- diously to have rejected all accessory decorations, — unless the wide green curtain behind can be so called. The maid-mother, babe in arm, sits, not ' beneath branch work of costly sardonyx,' but on a chair of plain deal, with foot-stool to match. The face of Tobit, who, kneeling, makes his humble offering, is full of mingled love and awe. It is but justice to state, that if the French have damaged some pictures by over-care, we are also in- debted to them for the preservation of others. This very picture, which was rapidly peeling off the wood when taken to Paris, was there transferred to canvas with consummate skill, and preserved for the admiration of many centuries to come. On the other side of the Gallery is the famous Spasimo di Sicilia, whose chief merit is its magnificent colouring. It is swathed in sunshine, and all a-glow with that mellow brilliance which distinguishes the master and — in a less degree — the master's master, Perugino. This quality takes off in the painting from the defect so obvious in the engravings — namely, the prominence given to the rufhanly muscular fellow who is holding the cross in such a constrained and unnatural attitude. The prancing horse, too, with his rider bear- ing the proud standard, are too conspicuous, and divert the attention from the fallen Saviour, on whom, as the interest centers, the eye should rest. How seldom, in Raphael's easel-pictures, do we meet with the Saviour except as a child! Besides this picture, there is the ' Entombment,' in the Borghese palace at Rome, and 40 THE MADRID GALLERY. the ' Transfiguration.' It would seem that Perugino also, to Avhom Raphael owed so much, loved to con- template the Saviour as an infant rather than a man. On the whole, the Spasimo, splendid as it is, lacks the pro- found and tender devotion which prevails in the earlier works, and reminds me of a saying of Overbeck, whom I saw in his studio in the Cenci palace in 1847, * When Raphael left Perugino, God left him.' On turning away from these ' world-famous' pictures of Raphael, one is j^erfectly embarrassed by riches. Names only less celebrated than his solicit your attention on every side. The eye is puzzled by profusion. It is only after a second or third visit that one can com- mence anything like a systematic examination of this vast treasure-house of art. Scarcely any kind of classi- fication has been attempted in arranging the jjictures. It is true, the two first rooms to the left and right of the Rotunda are devoted to the Spanish school ; but then you find Murillos and Riberas scattered about in all the other rooms. In truth, any system of arrangement which should show the history of the various schools, as at Berlin, would in this case expose the poverty amidst wealth which marks the gallery at Madrid. For instance, while there are hundreds of master- pieces of the Venetian school, there is not a single picture of the Tuscan previous to the time of Leonardo da Vinci — not even one of Fra Beato. This profusion on the one hand, and dearth on the other, is, however, easily ac- counted for, by considering the circumstances under which the collection was made. It was made chiefly by the Austrian princes, Charles V. and his three imme- THE MADRID GALLERY. 41 diate successors, who selected the pictures with a view to furnishing palaces for their own pleasure — not fitting up a gallery for the instruction of their people. Hence, they followed their own individual likings. It would have been natural to suppose that Philip the Second, stern and bigoted monk that he was, would have preferred the purely devotional pictures of Peru- gino or the Gaddis to the warm and worldly creations of the Venetian school. But, at the time of his acces- sion, Titian had witched the world with noble colouring, and the noontide blaze of his fame had for a time blotted out the fixed stars of art. In sublunary language, Titian was in fashion; and to imperious fashion even the monk-king, in his lonely palace on the Guadarrama, was constrained to bow. Besides, Titian had been a favourite with Charles, so, for a two-fold reason he was chosen to be the king's art-purveyor-in-chief; and his less celebrated countrymen and scholars picked up the crumbs which fell from the royal table. And very pretty jiickings doubtless they had of it, if one may judge by the number of paintings by Venetian hands now in the galleries and palaces of Spain. In the Madrid collection, there are fifteen by that cattle-jobber Jacopo Bassano. As the glory of the Venetian school declined, that of the Flemish school arose. Rubens borrowed the free pencil and glowing tints of Titian, and infused new life into art by adopting, in place of the hacknied conventionalisms of Italy, the novel types suggested by northern life and manners. These pictures were congenial to the hereditary tastes of the Spanish sove- 42 THE MADRID GALLERY. reigns, who, moreover, would naturally feel flattered at the proficiency of their subjects, as reflecting a glory upon themselves. The Flemings, too, by their alternate fits of implicit obedience and unsuccessful rebellion, afforded golden opportunities to any viceroy who might wish to make a picture gallery without paying for it (a la Francaise). The vast accumulation of Flemish and Venetian pictures in Spain — so similar in their grand characteristics — undoubtedly contributed to im- press upon rising Spanish art the character which it developed in its culmination and preserved in its decline. Doubtless the visit of Rubens (1628) was not without influence, though he did come as ' Sir Peter,' and pleni- potentiary for Great Britain. He was probably closeted many more hours with Velazquez in his studio than Avith the Conde Duque in the premier's office. Thus, the three great schools of Venice, Flanders, and Spain, which are so amply represented in the Madrid Gallery, have a close historical connexion. The Bolo- gnese school, of which there are also many specimens here, is in reality as great a misnomer as the Lake school of poetry. It is merely a collective local name for a num- ber of clever eclectics. The other three each deserve the name of school, be- cause, while they developed the naturalism of the later Romans — Michael Angelo, &c. — they preserved a dis- tinctive difference, by engrafting their respective nation- alities on the common stock. In the first, we discern the gorgeous magnificence of the semi-oriental Queen of the Adriatic, — in the second, the rude joviality and boisterous merriment of the Fleming, under his grey THE MADRID GALLERY. 43 northern sky, — in the third, the gay sunshine of Anda- kicia, half eclipsed by the cold shadow of the Inquisition, where a central oppression forced all into extremes, where men durst not be serious without being austere, and could not be light of heart without being also light of head. SjJain may be thankful that this blighting curse was powerless in the palaces of her kings, else many a fair picture would have been marked for destruction, on the ground of its displaying the Virgin's foot, or some such twaddling reason. Indeed, one is tempted to suppose that these monarchs, being themselves a I'abri, took a pleasure in possessing such pictures as were forbidden to their subjects. All the maniacs want to have what nobody else has. This love for the arts is a golden thread, running through the dark history of the Austrian house. The memory of Philip IV. is rescued from utter contempt by his patronage of the genius of Velazquez — a genius which can be estimated at Madrid, and at Madrid only, for, as he painted almost entirely for the palace, his works have not been subject to dispersion, and have made no longer migration than from one end of the capital to the other. Hence, till lately, the painter was honoured solely in his own country — a fortunate cir- cumstance, since his works may be seen without the external polish acquired by so many others during a recent trip to Paris. The earliest specimen of the master is the portrait of Gongora (No. 527), which he painted in his first visit to Madrid in the year 1 622, when the poet was sixty-one, and the artist twenty-three years 44 THE MADRID GALLERY. old. The famous 'Forge of Vulcau' was painted at Eome in the year 1630. If, instead of Phoebus, who stands simpering on the threshold with his good-natured message, there had been a donkey waiting to be shod, it would have made a capital representation of a common every-day blacksmith's shop. The series of landscapes (118, 128, 132, &c.), evi- dently studies from the scenery of Rome, were probably done about the same time. In 1639 he painted the Crucifixion (No. 51). Ob- serve how carefully he has represented even the grain and knots in the wood. The Saviour's hair hangs dishevelled over one side of his face, a peculiarity to be noticed in the Christ of -'La Coronacion,' also by Ve- lazquez. The equestrian portrait of Isabel de Bourbon is of the yeat 1 643. By the way, there is a curious mistake in Bermudez as to the second visit of Velazquez to Italy, He says that Velazquez left Madrid in November, 1648, remained one year away, and returned in June, 1651. On his return, according to this same authority, generally trustworthy and accurate, he painted the portrait of Philip witli his gun. The king had ordained that no one but Velazquez should take his likeness, ' nequis se praeter Apellem pingcret;' and, as he seems to have had a passion for 'sitting,' could therefore not bear with patience the painter's absence. One of his last and greatest works is ' Las Meninas' (No. 155), painted in 1656, four years before his death. It is especially interesting to us, as it contams the por- THE MADRID GALLERY. 45 trait of the artist himself. The pretty story about the red cross of Santiago on the breast, told by Cean Ber- mudez, and repeated by everybody, is horribly spoilt in the version of that dull pedant Palomino. The versa- tility of Velazquez is admirably illustrated by those two glorious pictures of ' the Taking of Breda,' and ' the Drinkers.' The much-vaunted ' Coronation of the Vir- gin' appeared to me cold and flat, and unaerial, unwor- thy, not merely of the subject, but even of the painter. It is only when he confines himself to man that he is divine. It would seem that the manner of Velazquez was not in the least affected by his studies in Italy. He painted Philip IV., when he was sixty, precisely in the same style that he had painted Gongora at three-and-twenty — ' nee imitator nee imitabilis.' The gallery contains sixty-two pictures of Velasquez, and forty- six of Murillo. We would counsel a visitor, after blunting the edge of his curiosity by looking at some of the grandest things of these two masters, to com- mence an examination of the Spanish school in chrono- logical order, and trace its progress, from the first feeble imitations of Italian art, to the glorious burst of national genius in which it finally exhausted itself, though there are some gaps even in the Spanish department, — we find only one specimen of Roelas, and none at all of Louis de Vargas. The pieces by Juanes, Morales, Pan- toja, and others, look like productions of a much earlier date than they really are. The ' Ecce Homos' of Morales look like those of Correggio reflected lengthwise in a 46 THE MADRID GALLERY. spoon; in fact, for a long time Spanish art trod in the steps of Italian — a considerable way behind. They were at once slow in adoption and blind in imitation, just as they are at the present day with respect to French bon- nets and English harness. But, to make up for it, Spanish art was enjoying its golden age when Italian was fixst sinking into leaden mediocrity. A stranger generally comes pre-occupied with the notion, that, with the exception of the works of the two great masters, the predominant character of the school is moroseness and gloom. The pictures of Eibera, combined with his nick- name of Spagnoletto, have contributed to foster this idea. Yet they were produced at ' Soft Parthenope,' away from all national influence. The S2)anish gallery at the Louvre also leaves this impression. But one should not judge from that collection. The lively Baron who was Louis Philippe's agent in the affair does not seem to have been endowed with the most catholic of tastes, and often gave a great deal of money for a few square feet of rubbish, with a sounding name. Most assuredly, the works of the genuinely Spanish masters, — such as Navarrete, Cauo, and Eoelas, — are conspicuous for healthy cheerfulness of tone and manly vigour of execu- tion. We must remember, too, that the artists of Spain had not a fair chance — their hands were tied by the In- quisition. If the hands of the modern artists, Aparicio and others, had been tied, too, by somebody, many acres of unoffending canvas would have been si)ared. As it is, their great daubs, — Brobdignag teaboards, — are hung up in most conspicuous places, and attract a crowd of THE MADRID GALLERY, 47 astonished natives, especially the ' Famine at Madrid.' It has that pseudo -classic air which is peculiar to one time and place — to the Theatre Francais and the French Empire, — le plus has empire de tons. The poor imitator has exaggerated the faults of his master, and diluted his strength. It is the school of David ' breaking up.' We can only wish that school a long holiday. 48 CHAPTER VI. rpHE first questions a traveller will be asked on his -L return from Spain are, — Have you seen a bull-fight 1 and have you encountered a bandit? Sometimes a country clergyman will inquire across the table whether you have been present at an auto-da-fe ? As the two latter are out of fashion just now, a bullfight is, par excellence, tlie thing of Spain. Accordingly as a professional student of national manners, I was on the look out for the first opportunity of witnessing one, just as an inquiring Spaniard would, on his arrival in London, spell over the advertisements in the Times, expecting to find an an- nouncement of the next prize-fight, under the immediate patronage of H. R. H. In Spain, these things are not done in a corner. In my first stroll through the city, I observed placards stuck up in prominent places in the streets, each making a nucleus for a crowd of idlers, informing ' the loyal in- habitants of this court,' that a bull-fight would take place on the following Monday at 5 p.m. precisely, (' weather permitting'), a parenthesis prudently kept in reserve against the contingency of a thunderstorm, a visitation rarer in Spain than here, as far as my expe- rience goes. Now it happened that I was asked to join a party of natives, who kindly undertook to procure me a ticket, and I gladly accepted the invitation, in BULL-FIGHT. 49 order that I might have some one at my elbow to refer to for explanations, such as my barbarous ultramontane ignorance needed. And very useful I found them. The day came, big with the fate of six buUs and an indefinite number of men. The weather, too, per- mitted; indeed, during the whole course of the summer, I never knew it do otherwise. Half-an-hour before the appointed time we left the Casa Cordero, all in a flutter of expectation. The whole city was a-foot, those who could afford to pay for places going to the arena — those who could not afford it watching the lucky people that could. Omnibuses were rushing to and fro, depo- siting one cargo and returning for another. We hailed one of them, — were allowed some five seconds to tumble in, which we effected, to the imminent risk of life and limb, — and were immediately whirled off" at full gallop, too happy in getting a place at all to inquire how many insides the vehicle was licensed to carry. We were put down just outside the Puerta de Alcala, a fine arch, cele- brating the triumphs of Charles III., which, but for this their monument, might have escaped the recollection of posterity. Close by stands the Plaza de Toros, to which we made our way through six inches of dust and between two rows of cavalry on guard. The building, rivalling in size a Roman amphitheatre, in its style of architecture resembles rather the old Globe in South- wark, as it appears in our illustrated Shakespeares. Alexander Dumas — greater as a cook than a dramatist, since I am credibly informed that he can make a very edible salmi without collaborateurs — compares it to a standing pie. Certainly the best part of the feast is to GAZ. E 50 BULL-FIGHT. be found inside, and there are no inducements to linger over the outer crust — not to mention the hungry crowd propelling us from behind. By dint of great patience and a little pushing, we squeeze our way up the thronged staircase and passages, and finally emerge into the arena. We have capital places — front seats in the balcony, on the shady side. The tickets bear three prices, according as they are in shade, in sun, or half-and-half. None but a native, well seasoned to Iberian summers and protected by a twopenny fan, could stand the sun. Yet almost every place is filled, for the coming fight is expected to be first-rate. Alto- gether there are about 15,000 people present, including a fair sprinkling of the softer sex in the balconies. In the centre is a box for the queen, gay with crimson velvet and gold tinsel — for her majesty loves the sports of the people, and the people love her majesty all the better for that. Close by is the chair of the president, who gives the word of command all through. As the bull-fight is a purely Audalusian invention, it is con- sidered the correct thing to appear in Andalusian cos- tume, — so one sees tier upon tier sparkling with crimson sashes and parti-coloured jackets, like dahlias at a Chiswick show. But the metaphorical dahlias in question belong not to the silent vegetable kingdom ; and if they steal and give odour, it is through the medium of paper cigars. Each individual shrieks, doubtless, the ])urcst Castilian, but they produce in the aggregate such a Babel of sound as was never heard, excejjt at Exeter Change or Exeter Hall. But stay, — the gate is opened, and an alguazil, in his BULL-FIGHT. 51 official cloak of inky black, prances in on an Andalusiau horse, or rather the horse prances in with him. This functionary is always received with a shout of derision, for an alguazil is supposed to be as remote from a centaur as an English alderman, and, by profession, quite inca- pable of sitting a horse. However, in spite of the shouts — doubtless made with the kind intention of frightening the animal — the official man rides up in safety to the front of the president's box, doffs his cap, and catches in it a key which the president flings to him. If he misses the catch, which may sometimes happen, the shouts are more hideous than ever. The key belongs, or is supposed to belong, to the door by which the bulls are to enter, and, having received it, the alguazil makes his bow and exit. Then enter the biped heroes of the day — the three matadors, attended by a dozen subordinates, called ' Chulos ' or ' Banderilleros,' each dressed in a spangled jacket, tight knee-breeches, and silk stockings, the hair plaited and tied behind in a knot of ribbon, and each carrying a cloak of some gay colour. Next ride in the picadors, padded out to an enormous bulk, armed with long lances, and wearing great slouched hats. As soon as they have doffed these to the president, they take their stations at one side of the arena, and the vast crowd is stilled at once into the hush of breathless ex- pectation. It is not an ordinary silence, not the mere negation of sound, but something positive, intense, almost appalling, — the silence which 15,000 people make toge- ther. All eyes are fixed on yonder opening gate, — there is yet a pause of a few moments, that seem an age, — and then forth rushes the expected of all expectants — e2 52 BULL-FIGHT. EL TORO — and earth shakes with a shout such as it hears nowhere else, except where it has the luck to be the site of a bull-ring. The six ' bulls of death,' as the bills term them, destined for the day's sport, have been driven over- night into a small court-yard attached to the arena, and have been kept all day without food, that the pangs of hunger may be brought to aid their natural ferocity. As they pass in one by one to the arena, a practised hand hooks on to their shoulders a knot of ribbon, the colours of which indicate to the initiated the breeding establishment from which each animal comes. The smart of the hook gives him the first foretaste of the death struggle he is about to engage in. As soon as he has reached the middle of the ring, he pauses, and looks wildly round, as if frightened by the yells of the specta- tors; then he lowers his head, and rushes at the picador, who awaits his coming, lance in rest. The brave beast ' receives but recks not of a wound,' — flings the lance aside as if it were a reed, — and, plunging his horn into the flank of the horse, repeats, with frantic rage, thrust upon thrust. For a moment horse and rider are lifted in air, and then down they fall crashing on the sand; then sally forth the foot-men, — some with their cloaks teazing the bull away from the fallen foe, while others extricate the picador and help him to his legs, for it is no easy matter to rise unaided with all that padding. The poor horse, too, if the horn has reached no vital part, stao^oers up, and is again mounted, and spurred on to a second encounter. Meanwhile the bull, his head all crimson with its baptism of blood, has received another lance- thrust, and overthrown another enemy. The same pro- BULL-FIGHT. 53 cess is repeated, till the president considers a suflScient number of horses have been killed, and then the trumpet sounds, and one of the chulos advances with the bande- rillas. The banderillas are sticks of three feet long, decorated with fluttering coloured paper, (such as econo- mical housewives put in their grates — horresco re- f evens ! — as an excellent substitute for fire during the summer mouths,) and terminated by a barbed dart. The thing is to stick a couple of these banderillas into the animal's shoulders, one on each side. To do this, of course the chulo has to stand in front of the bull for a moment, — so it is a service of some danger. Each suc- cessive pair of wounds stir him up to a display of vain rage, though it is evident that his strength is becoming exhausted. Then the trumpet sounds again, and the last act of the drama begins. The matador whose turn it is to kill the bull advances, with a crimson cloak and sword, — he bows to the president, and solicits permission to do his office. This being accorded, the matador flings his cap, with a semi-burlesque air of determined resolu- tion, to the further part of the ring, marshals his men, and directs them to entice the bull to the place fixed on for the deed, and then confronts him alone. It is a moment in which the world seems to have rolled back upon its youth, and man is again to contend for the mastery with the brute. Calm intelligence and furious strength are brought face to face, to do battle for victory and life. For a few seconds, the two adversaries stand motion- less within a yard of each other, the man with quiet mien, and lip curled in affectation of contempt, — the 54 BULL-FIGHT. beast with bloodshot eyes, wildly rolling in their sockets. Then he makes a charge; the crinason cloak is flashed like blinding lightning before his sight, and he spends his fury on the empty air. Again he returns to the attack, and again is foiled. Again and again, till the wished-for opportunity is presented — the sword flashes above his lowered head, and then is buried hilt-deep between the shoulder-blades. A moment more — there is a gush of blood from mouth and nostrils — he sinks slowly on his knees, and then fells prostrate, his great flanks heaving laboriously as the life- tide ebbs, wave by wave, away. A burst of martial music and thunders of applause greet the conquering hero of the hour. Then an underling, armed Avith a pointed knife, creeps stealthily behind, and cuts short the death agonies of the still struggling bull. Four mules, gaily caparisoned, and harnessed together in a line with ropes, are driven in, the bull is taken by the horns (any one may do that now), and hooked on behind ; the mules wheel round to that end of the arena which is directly opposite to the gate of exit, and then, lashed to a furious gallop, drag after them the ponderous carcass, which, as it goes, ploughs a long straight furrow in the sand : Et longum media sulcum diducit arena. In Juvenal's time. Christian folks were not mere spectators. And what are the feelings of a Christian man when he sees, for the first time, a combat in this modern amphitheatre'? At first, the predominant sen- sation is a sickening disgust at sight of trickling blood and protruding entrails; but this is soon over; and as BULL-FIGHT. 65 it decays, one becomes conscious of a kind of savage joy — a fierce beating of the heart — indicative of the wakening of the wild beast within, which we bridle with texts of religion, and cram with scraps of morality; which we may lull, but cannot kill ; which, if it sleep, sleeps lightly. Moreover, the contemplation of another's danger and toil enhances the sense of personal ease and security. A stranger's sympathies are with the bull. He is over- matched, and yet faces the heavy odds so gallantly. I was delighted to see him scatter, at one charge, a whole flock of jaunty chulos (who fly in all directions, like a scared aviary of gay Indian birds), and I must confess to a wicked half-wish that he might catch some of them. The horses are such wretched anatomies, that it seems almost an act of mercy to deliver them from the misery of living. They are obviously drafted from the omnibus, and destined for dog's meat. When a horse is strong and useful, we love him better than our neighbour, and only less than our dog. When he is old and worn out, we consign him unpitied to a more inglorious fate than that which awaits him in the arena. On the contrary, when the matador stands so fear- lessly single-handed before the infuriated beast, our sympathies change sides, and we are as ready as the rest to give all our hands to hail the victor — palmas qui meruit. It must be added that a man's emotions are swayed, in his own despite, in unison with those of his fellows. A crowd earnestly bent on one point, and unanimous 66 BULL-FIGHT. in expression, is like a torrent that sweeps all obstacles along with it. Accordingly, before you have been half- an-hour in the arena, you watch the various chances of the fight with as much pitiless enthusiasm as if the northern star had never shone on your cradle. On the whole, what is the moral effect of these spectacles 1 The masses, already predisposed, like their brethren of the East, to hold life cheap, are familiarized with the sight of blood; and this, I cannot doubt, contributes to the frequency of assassinations. The sight of a streaming wound, so far from chilling an Andaluz with horror, recals the hours of intense enjoy- ment he has sj)ent in the bull-ring. And since, as we have said, a selfish sense of security is a large ingre- dient in that draught of pleasure, a man is not likely to be thereby made more ready to expose himself to danger. So the people become neither the better nor the braver for these diversions. On the other hand, in the case of what are called the upper classes, I question whether the evil be altogether unmixed. A bull-fight may be to the graudee of Spain what deer-stalking or fox-hunting is to an English gentleman. It may tend to restore a healthy tone to the mind, by giving rude shocks to the crotchety tastes and false delicacy natu- rally engendered by high education and the habits of artificial society. A man of any rank may be over neat and trindy dressed, and be none the less truly gentle for seeing a slovenly, unhandsome sight now and then. At all events, I have a piece of advice to bestow on BULL-FIGHT. 57 travellers in Spain: — However barbarous they may think a bull-fight, if they wish to keep ou good terms with the natives, they had better not say so ; there is no point on which the patriotism of a Spaniard is so sensitive. Only constitute yourself the apologist of the national sports, your Spanish friend is highly flattered, and out of politeness affects to take a stranger's view of the matter, saying something about ' relics of bar- barism,' ' advancing civilization,' and the like cant phrases, borrowed for the nonce from foreign journalism. On the contrary, once begin to attack them, this same friend is up in arms to the rescue, and, by way of a tu quoque, will accuse you of having killed a man in a pugilistic encounter in Eegent's Park, or having sold your wife, with a halter round her neck, in Smithfield Market. It must not be supposed that I had time to make these reflections in the bull-ring. No sooner has one gate closed upon the dead than another is opened for the living, and so on till the whole six have fallen. If any bull is apathetic and insensible to the insults he receives, a cry is raised for ' fire, fire,' and the ban- derillas have squibs and crackers attached to them, which explode about the animal's ears, to his great annoyance and perplexity. If this will not sufiice, the spectators begin to call for ' los perros,' (the dogs,) in a kind of monotonous Red Indian-like chant, laying a savage stress on the litei-a canina. The bull-ring is a pure democracy. The will of the multitude is supreme, so the obedient president orders the dogs to be brought, 58 BULL-FJGHT. and then, for once, you may vntness an amusement Avliich the descendants of good Queen Bess's lieges have forgotten, as well as some better things. In this way some three hours have stolen over us unnoticed — three crowded hours of glorious life, or death. In all the vast circle nothing: is still, but here and there a beast's stiffening carcass, — nothing silent but the creeping shadow, which has at last embraced in its grateful coolness three-fourths of the spectators. And now that all is over, we have to elbow our way out with more trouble than we had to get in. I must repeat to my countrymen the caution given by my Spanish friends, ' Cuidado, senores, a las faltriqueras,' (Anglice, ' Take care of your pockets, gentlemen.') That night, ' wearied' — as the novelists say — ' with conflicting emotions,' I went early to bed, and slept as soundly as if my conscience were being lulled by a sermon from the dear old rector of Muddlecombe Parva. 59 CHAPTER VII. IN any foreign country the traveller ought, as a general rule, to adopt the habits of the natives, being such as the climate dictates, and the continuous expe- rience of centuries has sanctioned. This is a truth so obvious that it is almost a truism, and yet many of our wandering countrymen perpetually belie it in practice, and, with obstinate BuUism, persist in transplanting the manners and usages of the temperate into the torrid zone. What wonder if the result is frequent coups-de- soleil and gastric fevers'? Now, for my part, as I dread such contingencies more than I love my bed, I gave, the ' mozo' (or waiter) orders to call me at five a.m. punctually. At half-past five I made him bring my worship's chocolate, with a plate of sweet biscuits. The chocolate in Spain is invariably excellent, the coffee generally indifferent, and the tea bad. The two latter are foreign luxuries — the first is a necessary of life. It is also the most wholesome, for it soothes the nervous irritation to which we children of the mist are liable in these hot and arid climes. Immediately afterwards I sallied out, generally without any definite purpose, visiting first one part of the town, and then another. In this way I left, I suppose, scarcely a street in Madrid which I did not traverse, or a church which I 60 GENERAL SURVEY OF MADRID. did not enter. The result is hardly worth the trouble. One street and church are exactly like another street and church. In the latter, one always finds the same profusion of wooden Christs, and Madonnas in real petticoats, on the walls, and the same scanty sprinkling of worshippers, also in petticoats, on the floor. The images out-number the devotees here, as in all other Roman-catholic coun- tries — except Ireland, which is an exception to eveiy rule. The markets afford far more interest to a student of * the noblest study,' for the peculiarities of a strange people are more strongly brought out when catering eagerly for their creature comforts, than when pro- viding drowsily for their spiritual needs. A Spaniard, he or she, talks more while making the daily bargain than in all the rest of the twenty-four hours. The fruit-and-vegetable market was my especial lounge. There is such a fresh, sweet smell of the country, and the groups throw themselves, or are thrown, into such pretty tableaux, after the Eubens and Snyders fashion. The shambles one avoids instinctively, and fish market there is none, for Madrid is fifty hours' journey from the nearest sea, and the Manzanares has every requisite for a fine trout stream, — but water. The stroll over, I returned at eight to take a Spanish lesson. My instructor was an old cura, who, after saying mass every morning, came to me for an hour, and talked the most irrational and irreverent Rationalism. Not content with saying the severest things of the Tower of Babel and Balaam's Ass, he proceeded to assail the miracles of the New Testament, and pro- fessed his surprise at hearing that in England ' persons of illustration' (so the Spanish phrase runs) either THE MORNING PAPERS. 61 believed, or were loth to disbelieve lightly. I have since had reason to think that these opinions are fre- quently assumed, from a false politeness, out of deference to the supposed creed of heretical nations, and from a desire of vaunting the complete emancipation of thought in Spain. With this exception, my cura was a very worthy man, and honest, for he charged me, on leaving Madrid, a ridiculously-small sum for his services. After the lesson came the dejeune, for which each of the Biscayan's guests chose his own time. The bill of fare comprised cutlets, bifsteks (which, in defiance of etymology, consisted occasionally of mutton), eggs, cooked in the various forms of which that versatile production is susceptible, cherries, wine, and the morning papers. These last are clearly no indigenous growth. In form, size, price, and arrangement, they betray the prevailing weakness of Madrid, ' un faux air Parisien.' The average price is twelve reals a month, about one penny sterling per diem. They are scarcely one- fifth of the size of a London paper ; and the editors are obviously put to no trouble or expense in collecting authentic intelligence. It is, therefore, a grievous wrong to compare their cost invidiously with that of our journals. Taking all things into consideration, the Times is the cheapest article going — cheaper than your quartern loaf, even since the free-trade tariff. The bottom of each of these papers is cut off from the rest, and called the ' folletin' (a manifest Gallicism), devoted to the lightest possible literature — translations of Sue, and the great Alexander of modern fiction. The political articles appeared to me to be as inferior to their French proto- types in vigour and spirit, as to our English ' leaders' in 62 THE HUNGARIAN WAR, knowledge and good sense. Fortunately for them, the polysyllabic and pleonastic gorgeousness of the Cas- tilian idiom covers the poverty of meaning, just as the manifold Castilian cloak covers a threadbare coat, or a too literal sans-culottism. The grand topic of the day was the Hungarian war, on which ground both parties joined battle, and lied furiously. The Mode- rados were not a whit behind the Progresistas in that. Every day the Heraldo detailed grandiloquently the defeats of the rebels, and the Clamor Publico the triumphs of the patriots. To judge from the articles to which they give insertion, these journals must count largely on the ignorance and credulity of their readers. The Heraldo was then publishing a series of verbose epistles from Italy, the writer of which illustrated the marches and operations of the Spanish forces by a pro- fusion of passages, parallel or divergent, from the Latin classics, showing at every step his own consummate ignorance and assurance. I remember, in one letter, he invoked our old friend Soracte in feigned rapture, as ' Mount Socrates, beloved of Ovid and Prospertius! In the Clamor I read another series of letters, written by a Spaniard from London, in which facts and inferences were equally false. The intelligent traveller gave a glowing description of Regent's Park, crowded every afternoon with the carriages of the nobility, each drawn by four horses ; of the Opera, where brass buttons and applause were strictly forbidden ; of the placards in the streets, announcing that ' the Reverend Wilkinson would repeat, for the fourth time, his favourite sermon on Justification by Faith,' &c. Among his statistical TEMPERATUEE, 63 facts, he mentioned that 3500 persons had committed suicide in London alone during the year 1848, and proceeded to account for it after his fashion. In con- clusion, he proved to his own satisfaction, that ' the English are far from being so advanced in political and social progress as — Nosotros !' I always thought La Fatria the calmest and most rational of all these prints. I had a good opportunity of forming a judgment, for nobody read it except myself. After breakfast I generally adjourned to the gallery for some hours during the heat of the day. It is the only cool spot within ten leagvies of Madrid. The delightful temperature makes the body so comfortable, that it leaves the mind free to revel in the ' sunshine of picture' on the walls. Indeed, it required no slight effort to tear oneself away and pass through the fiery purgatory of the streets, where a thermometer on the shady side, sometimes marked 35° Reaumur. Multiply by nine, divide by four, and add thirty-two, and you find that you are immersed in a fluid whose temperature is 110° Fahrenheit: that is to say, 10° hotter than a hot warm-bath. About that time (as I saw from the papers afterwards,) all London was groaning under the insupportable heat of 85°. God clothes the lamb against the untempered wind ; and a man can bear much more than what is insufferable. In this case, too, sweet thoughts of dinner would recur diurnally about four p. M., and emboldened one to go through the ordeal of fire. The only way of getting to the roast, was to run the chance of being roasted oneself. Nothing venture, nothing have. 64 HOSPITALITIES. After dinner came the same round of lazy amuse- ments, in the Cafe, and the Prado, and the ' tertulia,' Anghce, — I dread the inevitable bull, — Anglice, ' soiree.' A letter of introduction will always procure for the stranger admission to these very agreeable, because unceremonious entertainments. I was furnished with letters to all kinds of people; French, Enlgish, German, and Spanish; and by almost all, I was received with that genuine kindness and hospitality, which I am glad to think are not peculiar to any nation, only displayed in a different fashion. With an English- man, the types of hospitality are roast beef and nut- brown ale; with a Spaniard, chocolate and sweet cakes; with a Frenchman, coffee and cognac; with a German, pipes and Rudesheimer. There were a good many of our countrymen resident at Madrid, unwillingly tarrying to watch the progress — if I may use such a law-term — of suits, instituted for the recovery of debts due to them from the Spanish government, or some Spanish com- pany; the money having been advanced years ago, for the sinking of impossible mines, or the construction of improbable railways. They could not comprehend how it was that their adversaries did not acknowledge the force of their syllogism — ' You owe the money — you've got the money — why don't you pay the money f Some- how or other, the Spaniards did not see things in that light. I met, also, sundry Frenchmen, who indulged in vehement abuse of Madrid and all that it contained. If you asked them why they stayed there so long, it was easy to anticipate the shrug of resignation and the wry face which accompanied the lachrymose response — THE THEATRE. 65 ' Monsieur, j'ai un proces !' However, after sunset, their cares were forgotten ; and at tertulias these melancholy victims of hope delayed sang, if they could, and chat- tered if they couldn't sing, very gaily and pleasantly. In default of a soiree, there was always the theatre to go to. There was only one company then playing, of inferior actors, — for all the stars at that season wander ahout to enlighten the provincial darkness. However, be the acting never so bad, it is always a good lesson in Spanish. This company had adjourned during the summer, for coolness, to the Circo del Barquillo — the Astley's of Madrid; an edifice with wooden walls and canvas roof. All the arrangements are decidedly veteri- nary. Stalls and loose boxes are fitted up as dressing- rooms for the nonce, and there is a very pervading odour of sawdust. The entree behind the scenes (that hopeless ambition of the London youth) is here accorded to the whole audience ; and between the acts the kings and queens of the stage walk about in their royal robes in the adjoining yard, sipping lemonade or smoking cigarettes, utterly regardless of dramatic effect. The comedy in Castilian is generally followed by a dance, and that by an Andalucian farce, then another dance and another farce, to conclude. As fresh pieces are pro- duced every night, the actors have no time to learn their parts, and thus they repeat, like so many parrots, after the prompter, whose suggestions are audible to the whole house. Apparently the spectators are not critical, and seem to care very little what is done on the stage, except during the ballet. The chief attraction at that time was La Senorita Vargas, a stately southern beauty, GAZ. F 66 SIGHTS. with a latent ferocity in her dark eyes, that made her look rather like a queen of tragedy than a dancer. Who knows whether she may not become a queen in reality some day 1 Germany has a few thrones left stiU. Madrid has one peculiarity which conduces very much to the visitor's comfort — namely, that there are very few inevitable 'sights' to be gone through. The armoury, said to be the finest in the world; the palace, ditto — which people who are addicted to upholstering may go and see, if they don't mind breaking the tenth command- ment; the museum of natural history, where is the largest loadstone in active operation between this and Medina; and the Academia, nearly complete the list. Everybody should devote a morning to the last-named, were it only for the sake of the Murillos. The famous picture of ' St. Isabel giving alms to the sick' has been arrested at Madrid, on its return from Paris to Seville. As the Sevilians have instituted a ' process ' for its recovery, it is likely to stay where it is some time longer. ' The Patrician's Dream' is quite cheering to look upon, so rich and glowing it is. Shut your eyes to the semi-ludicrous effect of husband, wife, and dog, in a decreasing series, like the three genders in Lindlcy Murray, all asleep. The gardens of the queen, sunk in a deep hollow below the palace, deserve a visit. The head-gardener, of course a Frenchman, struggles gallantly against all kinds of difficulties in soil, climate, and hydraulics. By a series of ingenious artifices he has concocted a plot of grass, some ten feet square, to the great astonishment of all natives, for 'green sward' and 'velvet turf in CHAMBER OF PEERS. 67 Spain are merely conventional figments of the poets, like 'jocund Spring' and ' smiling May' in England. One day my kind friend, Colonel S., took me to hear a debate in the Senado, the Spanish Chamber of Peers, which holds its sittings in the church of a suppressed convent near the palace. By dint of paint, gilding, and carpets, the place has been divested of its sanctified aspect, and made to look like a handsome modern room. They have not thought it necessary that a chamber in which a hundred gentlemen in surtouts meet to discuss secular matters in this nineteenth century should be made to resemble a chapel of the fifteenth. Antiquity is here represented in the persons of two halberdiers, who stand to guard the door, dressed in extravagant costume, like Beefeaters in fuller bloom. Rows of raised seats extend on each side of the room ; in the centre, facing the beef- eaters, are the chair and desk of the president, and on each side a little tribune, from which the clerks read out documents from time to time. The spectators are ac- commodated in niches round the walls. Each member speaks from his place, and the voting is by ballot. First a footman hands round a tray of beans, and then each advances, when his name is called, to a table in the centre, where he drops his bean into the box. The beans are then counted, and the result proclaimed by the president. On the right of the chair, in front, is the bench assigned to the ministers; and there I had the good luck to see Narvaez, otherwise called Duke of Valencia, and a great many fine names besides, and, in reality, absolute master of all the Spains. His face wears a fixed expression of inflexible resolve, very f2 6$ NARVAEZ, DUKE OF VALENCIA. effective, and is garnished with a fierce dyed moustache, and a somewhat palpable wig to match. His style of dress was what, in an inferior man, one would have called ' dandified.' An unexceptionable surtout opened to display a white waistcoat with sundry chains, and the extremities terminated, respectively, in patent leather and primrose kid. During the discussion, he alternately fondled a neat riding- whip and aired a snowy pocket handkerchief. Those who know him give him credit for good intentions and great courage, but do not expect that he will ever set the Thames on fire, what- ever he may do to the Manzanares, He is a mixture, they say, of the chivalric and the asinine, a kind of moral mule. His personal weakness is a wish to be thought young, and hence he was naturally angry when Lord Palmerston wanted to give him ' a wrinkle.' I saw, likewise, Mon, the Minister of Finance, smiling complacently, like a shopkeeper on his customers ; and the venerable Castanos, Duke of Bailen, who, as he tottered in, stooping under the weight of ninety years, was affectionately greeted by Narvaez and others. On the whole, the debate seemed to be languid, and to be listened to with little interest ; but that is the general fate of debates in July, 69 CHAPTER VIII. AT eight o'clock on the evening of Thursday, July 13, there was a great crowd assembled round the diligence, which was on the point of starting for La Granja. Some had come to see their friends off, but the main body were there out of pure idleness. I was one of the few who had any real business to be there at all, having engaged a place in the * Interior,' the only place vacant. When I had elbowed my way up to the vehicle, I found that (the luggage having been packed) it was now taking in its live stores. The Interior is privileged to contain six persons, and I found, to my dismay, that it was already occupied by a family con- sisting of three ladies, two children, a nurse with a baby in arms, and several enormous dolls. The latter and myself were the most uncomplaining sufferers of the party. I must, however, do the ladies the justice to say, that they supplied the clamorous wants of the children most bountifully from a large reticule and larger bottle, thus producing intervals of temporary ' calm ; and that they bore throughout their own incon- ' veniences and mine with creditable equanimity. I The day was just dawning as we stopped to change [ mules at Nabacerada, a lonely post-house half-way up 1 the mountain. It is surrounded on all sides by cheer- 70 THE ESCORIAL. less, treeless moorland, which looked bleak and desolate, in spite of the gilding of a summer's morning. On one of the mountain slopes, some four leagues off to the left, I could see a huge building, with vanes and roof sparkling in the sun. From its position, I of course knew it to be the Escorial. My fair companions, born and bred at Madrid, and in the habit of going to La Granja once a year, had not the least idea what it could be. The children, by this time satiate with sponge-cake, had lapsed into a dormant state ; I availed myself of their tacit permission to do likewise, with the less reluctance, as I intended to return by the same road, on horseback, in a few days. I was half-wakened by the stopping of the diligence at an iron gate, and a simultaneous demand for passports; but a few minutes after I was thoroughly roused by a rude shock, — the women shrieked direfully, and I found myself entangled in a ruinous heap of children and dolls. It seemed that in turning a corner in the ill-paved street of La Granja, we had run over a great stone, and had recovered our equilibrium by mere miracle. Loud and long was the recrimination which ensued between the conductor and the j)ostilion, as soon as we came to a final halt, in the midst of which I went off to the Fonda de los Ynfantes, where I was lodged in a huge bare room, at the cost of six francs per day (nothing included). As La Granja is crowded to excess during two months of the year, and abandoned to solitude for the other ten, everything is very dear, as in all places in a similarly abnormal state ; but I suppose I, a mere passing stranger, was ' taken in' by more than the due I LA GRANJA — QUEEN ISABEL'S GARDENS. 71 proportion. A two hours' sleep, by way of supplement to the broken night, and a good breakfast, invigorated me for the long wandering I had in view. The inn where I was lodging is a great gloomy building, con- tinuous, with open corridors to each story, surrounding a dank and mouldy courtyard. It formerly belonged to Don Carlos, and is the only large house in the village. The whole place has a comfortless, half-ruinous ajjpear- ance, excepting always the palace and its precincts, which are trim and neat enough. The palace is a long, low building, in that Gallo-Italian style which the Bourbons introduced into Spain. Next to it is the house of the Queen-Mother, who has not forsaken La Granja, in spite of its humiliating associations. The great open space in front is flanked by huge barracks, containing accommodation for above a thousand troops, who do guardsmen's duty without the name. In spite of these traditional precautions. Queen Isabel is by no means an exclusive sovereign. She permits all classes of her people to wander at their pleasure through her gardens, and to promenade close to the windows of her dining-room. The gardens are of immense extent, and present boundless variety, from the geometrical patterns and clipped hedges on the Versailles model, to the shaggy copsewood, with serpentine paths, overgrown and nearly impassable, which is here christened by the name of ' English Garden.' In threading the mazes, I startled from its siesta an ugly black snake. It startled me from a day dream, so we were even. At the further extremity of the pleasaunce a large artificial lake, which 72 LA GRANJA. reflects overhanging natural woods, itself being on a level considerably higher than the palace, is the reservoir which supplies the cascades, and the numerous foun- tains of bronze and marble, which, however, play only on special holidays. I have been assured that these royal gewgaws cost five hundred millions of reals — more than five millions sterling; but a Spaniard is always reckless of facts and figures. After many successful attempts to lose myself, I finally climbed over a stone wall which separates the garden from the moor, and set off towards an isolated pinnacle of rock which tempted me to ascend it, looking deceitfully near in the bright atmosphere. My path lay among low oaks, along sheep-tracks, or through thick grass and aromatic shrubs, where every variety of insect life was expressing its intense enjoyment of the sunshine by humming, buzzing, and chirruping, each after the fashion of its kind. The summit gained at last, I had a fine view of the white village, half girdled by its sweet succession of garden, grove, and wilderness, and nestling beneath the dark pine-woods of the Guadarrama. I descended by the side of a stream, which being small by nature, seemed determined to display itself to the utmost by taking extraordinary steps, and making a great noise about them. The sun was almost setting as I arrived at La Granja. I lingered outside the gate, to watch a review on a small scale which was going on under the avenue. There were about a thousand men in all, making a very gallant show, — for, however other departments of the public service may be neglected under the present regime, the army at least is well LA GEANJA. 73 cared for. All at once the trumpet sounded, as a shabby fly, drawn by a spavined horse, came out of the gate. It contained a priest, who was carrying the sacrament to some sick man. As it passed, all the soldiers sank on one knee, and presented arms. There was some- thing very impressive in seeing the pomp and circum- stance of war thus doing homage to religion in such humble guise. At sunset all the world turns out, — those who have carriages, to drive, — those who have none, to walk. I saw the queen in a carriage by herself, and the king in a carriage by himself, after the most approved fashion for married people. Then came the queen-mother, side by side with her husband, (but then she is not required to set an examj^le,) and afterwards various ' infants of Spain,' adult and adolescent. After the promenade I went to tea with one of the ambassadors, who generally follow the court in its summer peregrinations. I found his excellency, family, and suite, crowded together in a house which, they said, afforded a minimum of accommodation at a maximum of cost. Not a floor was horizontal, nor a wall vertical. The tables obstinately refused to stand, and the chairs warned you not to sit down on them. However, the whole party enjoyed greatly the novelties of discom- fort. For the rich, it is a new pleasure to be put to shifts in pleasure's pursuit. This is the charm of a pic-nic. The next day was consecrated to Segovia. Segovia, that city of immemorial antiquity, — chris- tened by Iberians, and walled by Phoenicians, — which 74 SEGOVIA. the Romans furnished with its aqueduct, the Moors defended with its castle, and which the Spaniards of later days crowned with its cathedral ; that epitome of Peninsular history is now, I grieve to say, accessible by means of an omnibus, — an every-day omnibus ! — which leaves La Granja at nine A. m., and returns at four P. M. My only companion in this omnibus was an old gentle- man of the most mild and pacific manners, who had, however, as he told me, served through the Peninsular war under the Duke (Wellington, not Bailen). He spoke with great admiration of his old commander, and I especially praised his intuitive sagacity in discerning the military capabilities of a district at the first glance. We had plenty of time for conversation, as nearly two hours are required to traverse the two leagues. j Segovia is built on and about a salient angle of rock, " formed by the junction of two deep ravines, — a site exactly resembling that of old Veil, of the modern Civita Castellana, and several other towns in the vicinity of Rome. Rome is forced on one's remembrance in an especial manner at Segovia by the aqueduct, which bestrides the lower town like a colossal polyped, — a most characteristic memorial of the strong practical people, whose works were never purposeless and never mean. It is still employed on the beneficent work for which it was first destined — that of conveying water in purity and plenty into the middle of a thirsty city. The houses which cluster round its base, comparatively things of yesterday, are already toppling to their fall and clutch- ing, as it were, to its pillars for support, like many generations of houses before them. Meanwhile, the SEGOVIA. 75 masonry of old Rome stands immoved, bidding fair to defy ' the tooth of time' ahnost as long as her poetry. Ascending, you pass through a narrow gate into the old town — Segovia proper, as the geographies say: going as straight on as the crooked street will permit, i you come to the prison. This prison, like most prisons in Spain, is easily discoverable, by its being the noisiest place in the whole town. What would the advocates of the silent system say to it ? I know what it would say to them. It would stretch out its many hands from the lower windows, and sujjplicate alms, in dolorous tones, for the sake of the blessed St. Peter, once simi- larly afflicted ; while from the upper windows — too high for hope of charity — it would salute them with derisive laughter, and a chorus of that peculiar harmo- nization commonly termed ' Dutch.' (The student of history need scarcely be reminded of the connexion between Spain and the Low Countries.) I have been particular in pointing out the prison, because directly behind it is the best inn in Segovia, — a very respectable inn, too, according to the Spanish standard, — the Parador de las Diligencias, — set up since the last edition of the Hand-hooJc. It is a large square house, with pillared galleries, a courtyard, and a tower at one corner, with machicolated battlements, once the mansion of a noble family. Many palaces in this and other countries have, by a similar revolution, lapsed to the public use. After making the proper amount of reflections on the instability of human things, a prudent man will order dinner, and then visit the prescribed lions of the place. First he will come to the Plaza Mayor, whose tall white 76 SEGOVIA. houses have a most artistic aversion to straight lines. Close by stands the cathedral, a specimen of late six- teenth century Gothic, crowded with pinnacles and stinted of buttresses, — looking like the pictures of our grand- mothers in the prime of life, with scanty gowns and over-gay caps. But we ought not to be too severe on the cathedral of Segovia, for in the rest of Europe, at the time of its erection, Gothic was already dead and buried. Besides, the tower is magnificent, from its mere height. The trouble of ascending will be well repaid by the grand and strange view of the mountains, with their thick woods and deep shadows, frowning over the bare plain as it basks in unbroken sunlight. [Mem. Always go up towers, — there is no exercise so elevating.) I was accompanied by a garrulous old verger, who dissertated on the lions of the city as they lay basking at our feet, and did the honours of the place with a patriotic disregard of historical accuracy. As I was wandering about the streets, looking, I suppose, as Sir Walter says, ' like a cow in a fremd loaning,' I was hailed by a voice in broken English, or rather English a little bent. The owner of the voice then introduced himself as the Marquis del A , lately attached to the Spanish Embassy in London, and ' anxious,' he said, ' to repay his obligations to English hospitality, by befriending any individual of the country.' He accord- ingly took me to the Alcazar, and introduced me to the commanding-officer, by whom I was conducted over the whole building. Some rooms still retain the old Moorish ceilings ; otherwise, there remain scarcely any traces of its builders, externally or internally, except the name. SEGOVIA. 77 The place now serves as a school for military engineers. ' My new friend then took me to his house, and pre- sented me to the Marquis, his father, who was smoking a cigar in his shirt-sleeves, to the utter destruction of I my ideal of a grandee of Spain. The house itself is an edifice of the sixteenth or seventeenth century, where capitals have degenerated into the wildest forms, and ) arches support themselves at the most fantastic pitch. i None of the seven lamps have shone upon its concep- } tiou; it is mere Gothic run mad, — the embodiment of an architect's sick dream. On parting, the young I Marquis and I expressed a mutual hope that the speedy i renewal of diplomatic relations might enable our indi- ! vidual selves to shake hands in Pall Mall. 78 CHAPTER IX. IF the entertainment for man at La Granja is dear, that for horse and groom must be remarkably cheap, judging from the price I paid for two of the former animals, and one of the latter, to convey me and my luggage to the Escorial. The distance is eight and a half leagues, (thirty-odd miles,) and the price fifty reals (ten shillings) — not half what I afterwards paid in Andalucia. We set off at noon, and reached the summit of the pass in three hours. There I paused to take breath and give it, and to look at the view, which here would really merit that much abused word — panorama. The north side of the mountain is, as I have said, covered with pines; the south side is merely dotted with shrubs, which have tried to be trees and failed, from scarcity of water and plethora of sun. North and south from the mountains' bases stretch identical yellow plains, bounded in the far distance by a circular belt of azure, which one might fancy to be Homer's ' River Ocean' girdling the earth. At Nabacerada our road turned off to the right. Thence to the Escorial it is four short leagues, or three long ones — for the Spaniards are as lax in their measure- ment as the Scotch. In a large field near the village of Guadarrama we saw several thrashing floors, with oxen. THE BLIND GUIDE, 79 not muzzled, treacling out the corn in truly oriental style. This Guadarrama was probably, in the Arab time, a place of greater importance, at least relatively, than at present, and so it gave its name to the whole Sierra. The word signifies ' lofty valley,' — as Ab-ram signifies ' Lofty Father,' and precisely describes the locality. We arrived at our destination just as the sun — set to us — was reddening the highest rocky peaks of the mountains. A ride of eight hours, performed for the first time on a Spanish saddle and at a Spanish pace — that pace which, in reference to Abbots' palfreys in the middle ages, is called ambling, and knoAvn to bene- I ficed clergymen in modern times as ' fidge-fadge,' — left ! me in no mood to criticise the supper or the bed pro- vided at the Fonda de Correos. The former I devoured greedily, and on the latter slept refreshingly, notwith- I standing that, all night long, I was riding an old fami- liar horse among well-known green lanes, and under the shadow of well-known elms, in that dear dream-land which is so like home. It was still early morning when I was recalled to Spain by a knock at the door, and an announcement that, according to order, my chocolate and ' Cornelio' were awaiting my pleasure. Cornelio is a blind man, who acts as guide to the Escorial. I had become acquainted with him through the Hand-hook. He had been blind, he told me, since nine years old. By a happy compensation, his other senses, from increased acuteuess, in some degree supply the place of the sense lost. It is curious to watch him feeling his way along the wall ivithout touching it, and suddenly stopping at 80 THE escoeial: the best point of \aew before a picture or statue, and describing it in detail with unerring memory, though without the dreary sing-song tone peculiar to ciceroni. Among other great men, he said he had shown the Escorial to Mr. Cobden and Alexander Dumas at the same time. If this is true, Mr. Cobden was doubtless one of the Englishmen whom the prolific novelist robbed so ingeniously of their supper. Our Manchester friends will do well to observe, that even Mr. Cobden may be taken in sometimes, and on a food question, too. The Escorial, being one of the numerous eighth wonders of the world, ought to console anybody for the , loss of a supper. Its outward form naturally calls to mind the inspirations of the cook, not the architect. Here, then, is a recipe for the chef-d'oeuvre of Philip II. — take a score of Manchester factories, with an acre of dead wall ; mix well, and arrange in the form of a grid- iron; put St. Paul's cathedral (slightly compressed) into the centre; serve up the whole on the side of the bar- renest Ben in all Scotland, and garnish with a scanty sprinkling of ruinous houses and dwarfed trees. The concoction of the dish will cost the wealth of a kinirdom, and it will neither be palatable nor palatial when done. The palace itself stands isolated on a wide platform, round two sides of which run the offices destined for the accommodation of the royal horses and suite. Tliese, with the village, are fast going to decay, for the present queen rarely visits, and never resides in this gloomy old abode of her ancestors. She does not like, it is said, to live so near to her future tomb, and prefers the cheerful woods and waters of La Granja or Aranjuez, to the now ITS GLOOMY ASPECT. 81 doubly dreary Escorial. The place was more lively when tenanted by monks than now, when it is not tenanted at all. There is something — as the Scotch say — ' eerie' about the loneliness of those innumerable chambers and interminable corridors. The place is curst, not that it was ever very merry in its best days. Indeed, a troop of noisy children, who accompanied us, taught the echoes to repeat sounds such as they never heard in the good old times of the founder and his successors. We were first conducted to the church, the centre, and, as it were, nucleus, of the whole mass. I have already compared it to St. Paul's ; but the resemblance IS only external. Inside, the characteristic of St. Paul's is blank dreariness — that of S. Lorenzo is oppressive solemnity, — for the one is all whitewash, the other grey granite. Here you see few or none of the tawdry deco- rations which, in most Spanish churches, mar the gene- ral tone of the building. Navarrete's colossal saints on the wall, and the effigies of the founder and his family gravely kneeling before the high altar, are the fittest tenants of the place. The sound of a human voice, or a human step, seems almost like a profanation. The vault, or ' pantheon,' into which we next descended, is scarcely more still and gloomy, though the horror of the vault is increased by its cost and magnificence, so unseemly in a charnel-house. The monarchs of Spain have left few good or great deeds to gild their memory, and, by encasing their bodies in marble and granite, have succeeded in suspending the execution of the decree, 'dust to dust.' Vain and illogical conceit — to GAZ. G 82 THE ROYAL VAULT. secure for the mortal remains an approximate immorta- lity ! Why did they not remember, that ' mortem omni- bus ex natura esse sequalem — oblivione apud posteros aut gloria distingui?' By the light of a wax candle, we could just discern the marble sarcophagi, ranged in niches round the wall, some inscribed with the names of the royal dead contained therein, others still unap- propriated. None but kings, queens, and heirs-appa- \ rent are permitted to rest here, for the etiquette of Old Spain relaxed not in its exclusiveness even after death. The ' infants' are consigned to another tomb, less ele- gantly, but more truly, named the podridero, or ' rottery.' As may be supposed, I declined my guide's proposition to visit that, and was right glad to breathe the upper air once more. ^ In the sacristy is a picture by Claudio Coello, worth notice in the history of art, as being the last great work of the Spanish school. When I afterwards saw the masterpiece of Zurbaran in the museum at Seville, it struck me that Coello must have had that picture before his eyes, or in his mind, when painting this. It contains fifty portraits ; but very little interest attaches to the courtiers of Charles II. — a monarch whose annals could furnish no grander subject for the painter than the presentation of a pyx to S. Lorenzo. In the ante-sacristy is a fine Descent from the Cross by Albert Durer. Indeed, drained as the Escorial has been for the supply of the museum at Madrid, it still contains many treasures of art. The great Titian, the Martyrdom of S. Lorenzo, is still suffered to remain, from the religio loci. There is also, in the sala capitular, or chapter- APARTMENTS OF PHILIP II. 83 room, a beautiful picture by him of St. Jerome, kneeling, — the sunshine is streaming through the trees full upon a crucifix. I can hardly understand how it was that this picture was not one of ' the hundred best' removed to Madrid from fear of the Carlists. Any one who fancies second-rate frescoes will find allegories by the acre, and apotheoses by the score, described in the Spanish guide-book with appropriate prolixity. The most interesting portion of the whole palace are the rooms occupied by Philip II. There remain a few chairs which belonged to him, and his writing-desk, still visibly stained with ink. In a corner of the little oratory he was brought to die. A narrow window close by looks out upon the high altar in the church, and the king could see, as he lay, the host lifted daily. There is something almost heroic in the unyielding and un- doubting bigotry of Philip, and as a hero his country- men are agreed to regard him. The Escorial is his temple, which should never have been profaned by the cabinet-making and upholstery of Charles IV. and Fer- dinand. There is nothing in the whole world more unsatis- factory than a brief visit to a great library. You come hungry to the banquetting-room — your appetite is whetted by the sight of an abundant feast, duly spread — you look over the bill of fare (the catalogue), which offers you dainties without end — but time presses, and your guide, equally inexorable, waits for no man, and you must rise from table without having tasted a morsel. Notwithstanding all this, the traveller, whose mission it g2 84 THE LIBRARY. is to see all sights, however unprofitable, will scarcely leave the Escorial without peeping into its famous library. He will see a handsome room painted in fresco, with many thousands of books turned with their backs to the wall. At a table will be seated a bearded, blear- eyed man, with his head below his shoulders, diligently copying a manuscript. He is, it is needless to say, a German. In the middle of the room, with his hands in his pockets, stands the stupidest or sulkiest of under- lings, whose business it is to show the books, and there- fore professes, perhaps truly, the most profound igno- rance of everything. With him, ignorance is bliss, for it saves a world of trouble. I asked in vain to look at some of the MSS. obtained from Mount Athos by Hur- tado de Mendoza, the author of Laza/rillo de Tonnes, whose collection was the nucleus of the whole library. Circumstances never presented a more favourable com- bination for a book-collector than in the case of Mendoza. He was an ardent bibliomaniac, resident in Italy, with almost imperial power delegated to him, and without any scruples as to the exercise thereof; and the result was, a store of literary treasure fit to present to a king. I could not but wnsh that Mendoza were alive again, that he might, as his manner was when angry, pitch the stupid custode out of the window. Two sides of the building look on to a terrace-garden, full of formal gravel-walks, flower-beds shut in with clipped box, and here and there a fountain, very dimi- nutive and inefficient. The tree under which Gil Bias sat, in his famous conference with the Count-duke, must have been in the orchard below. RETURN TO MADRID. 85 I wandered about half the day, unchallenged, startling innumerable lizards from their sunny day-dreams, till the Ions shadows warned me that it was time to return. I found the diligence, with its long straggling team, or rather troop, just ready to start for Madrid. Two huge Andalucians had left me an apology for a place in the coupee, which I had no alternative but to accept. Our road lay at first through shaggy, ill-conditioned woods, then over undulating ground sprinkled with shrubs, and last over a flat waste, clothed only by such shadowy forms as a dusky night and an idle fancy create between them. A four hours' ride brought us safely to the capital, while the streets were yet busy with crowds of promenaders. 86 CHAPTER X. SPEND a few weeks at Madrid in the height of summer, and you will realize in your own person the fable of the Lotus Eaters. The exhausting heat, and the influence of example, produce an intense laziness both of mind and body, and you remain day after day, without knowing why, from sheer disinclination to move. In these circumstances, my advice would be, — take a cold bath, to string the nerves to the necessary pitch, and engage a place in some diligence or other. The plan, in my own case, was completely successful, and I accordingly found myself, one fine evening towards the end of July, seated in the vehicle which was on the point of starting for Toledo. The archway was filled with the usual crowd of leave-takers ; a little troop of my own accompanied me, to protest for the last time the eternity of a friendship, which had already lasted a fortnight or more : but the clock struck seven, the postilion cracked his whip, there was a vehement agita- tion of hats and fans, and then — we turned the corner. For some hours, our course was smooth and our slumber deep, but at last a series of terrific jolts recalled us to the hard realities of time and j^lace. The time was three in the morning, and the place half-way between Aranjuez and Toledo. We could see a grim, unlovely desert, bisected by a road, of which the stones TOLEDO. 87 were rocks and the ruts chasms. Glad I was when they pointed out to me a grey mass in the distance, which, as the light grew stronger, and we approached more nearly, developed into the Alcazar and church spires of Toledo. But two hours elapsed before we crossed the bridge, crept up the narrowest and steepest of streets, and finally came to a halt in the court-yard of the Fonda del Lino. I was fortunate enough to have a letter of introduc- tion to Colonel Alva, who holds a responsible post under government, which I hastened to present. I found him truly Spanish in kindness and courtesy, and truly un-Spanish in his love for books and antiquities. I told him my object in visiting Toledo, which was simply to see the sights, and was glad to hear that he had both the will and the power to further my wishes. He accompanied me indefatigably up and down to all the chief sights, — no easy task, for nothing is level at Toledo. The city stands on a rocky eminence, nearly surrounded by a deep and narrow gorge, into which the River Tagus (or Tajo) squeezes itself, not without pain. (Hence I suppose it is that every gorge is called a Tajo; just as, in the Roman States, every river is called by the peasants a Tevere, or Tiber. In both cases, the metropolitan proper name has been transformed into a generic name.) On the land side, it is defended by double or treble walls, very useless and picturesque. Two fine bridges span the stream. This peculiarity, together with the semi-insular position of the town, first brought old Shrewsbury to my mind; and as I wandered about, I kept, in my own despite, drawing 88 TOLEDO. out in detail an elaborate parallel between the two places, finding or making for every feature of tbe one place a counterpart in the other. A lonely traveller in a foreign country is especially prone to these unprofit- able reveries; memory will anchor fast by the haunts of boyhood ; and hence it was that in the Zocodover, and on the Puente de Alcantara, I was thinking of ' Market-hill' and the ' Welsh Bridge.' But I would not wrong the fair and fertile hills and plains of Shrop- shire by likening them to the unlovely vicinage of Toledo, nor would I pollute the glassy, cool, translucent wave of Severn with so much as a thought of the muddy Tagus. Toledo, moreover, is fast crumbling into ruin, — hut Jloreat Salopia. The bridge of Alcantara, on the Madrid side, is in itself a grand object, with its lofty arch and antique gates, and commands a fine view of the river shining far below, and the castle frowning far above. It is a pleasant airy lounge at sunset. It is worth while to make acquaintance with the fat, jolly gatekeeper, for he possesses a store of most curious information, which the gift of a cigar will place at your disposal. He told me some strange stories of the cave of Hercules, ' a famous enchanter who once lived in these parts, who spirited away the daughter of the king of Granada, and so it came to pass that the Moors made war upon the Christians and conquered Toledo.' A specimen this of historical tradition in that lowest stage of degradation, when not only has truth been dis- guised in fable, but also fable itself corrupted into foolishness. The mythology, too, is startling to those THE ALCAZAR. 89 who have held from early youth the orthodox creed, wherein the voracious hero is anything but a conjuror. The cave in question is, or is said to be, two miles up the river, and at present under water. I acquiesced in the statement, for it was too hot to go a- foot, and a hired vehicle is hardly to be met with at Toledo. I beg pardon of the shade of Southey for the omission. Seen from a distance, Toledo is liked a throned queen, — seen from the inside, a widow sitting in sackcloth and ashes. It contains scarcely a tenth part of its ancient population, and the shrunk city is girdled by a belt of ruin. The Alcazar, which puts so bold a front on the matter, is, within, mere desolation and decay. It is like a good Castilian fallen on evil days, from whose proud and calm bearing you would never guess that he was poor as a beggar, and more hungry. The oldest portion is Moorish, attached to which is a magnificent incongruity of Charles the Fifth's time. The noble court, with its pillars, the vaulted corridors, and the spacious double staircase, are now in the filthiest state : but once ascend the rickety steps which lead to the top story, and all disgust will be merged in delight at the glorious prospect around and beneath. At your feet lies the city, clustering in many a picturesque mass, and beyond it the river, half encir- cling it, like a silver zone started from the clasp. East- ward and westward, a fringe of green marks the course of the Tagus; all else is a tawny, reddish waste of low hills, swelling ridge on ridge to the distant Sierra, scarcely visible on the horizon. Of the three days which I spent at Toledo, many hours 90 THE CATHEDRAL. of each were passed in the cathedral. There only the walls were thick enough to exclude the heat, and there the painted windows tempered the glare of noon to a soft dream-light. Within is matter of observation for a year, and of meditation for ever. This cathedral is longer and narrower than that of Burgos; it is also of earlier and purer Gothic. Every window is filled with painted glass of the richest colours, and the double clere- stories give an air of singular lightness and elegance. An altar in the nave marks the spot where the Virgin alighted when she paid her much celebrated visit to St. Ildefonso. The precise slab touched by her feet is care- fully preserved under an iron grating; a small piece of it, however, is let into a pillar behind the high altar without any such defence, and it is now nearly worn away by the osculations of the faithful. I watched an old man a long time as he was kneeling before it and muttering prayers, between each of which he rubbed the stone hard, and then licked his thumb. When he had concluded I accosted him, and he told me the whole story : how ' her Majesty' the Queen of Heaven had come down to honour Toledo above all the cities of the earth. He repeated all the circumstances with great earnestness of manner, and a volubility of utterance which made it difficult for me to catch his meaning. He kept perpe- tually repeating the words ' Su Majestad,' and bowing humbly as he said them. As usual in this country, a number of chapels have gathered, like parasites, round the sides of the great church; and the details of these, being more minute, demand even closer observation. As at Burgos, there THE CATHEDRAL. 91 is a ' Chapel of the Constable.' The constable was the unfortunate Alvaro de Luna, — a king's favourite, and, by natural consequence, a people's detestation. He and his wife are represented reclining each on a separate tomb, — the doughty knight and the devout dame, — he clasping his sword, she her rosary. Four knights kneel at the corners of the husband's tomb; two monks and two nuns at the corners of the other. An inscription round each records that the Constable was killed in 1453, and his wife supported her disconsolate widow- hood till 1488. Of course I went to see the dresses, crowns, &c., with which the Virgin is adorned on great festivals — the pride of Toledo, and the marvel of all Spain. If the pearls and precious stones be all real, as I was assured they were, there is not a queen in the world who possesses so costly a wardrobe as ' Su Majestad' of Toledo. In the sacristy over the altar is a magnificent picture by El Greco — ' Christ clothed with the scarlet robe.' At his right is a man in armour, said to be a portrait of the painter. At his feet is laid the cross, on which they are nailing the inscription. In the foreground is the Virgin — and behind, a crowd of heads. The face of the Virgin appeared to be wanting in expression; but there never was a more worthy representation of the Saviour, as he looks upward with glistening eyes, triumphant in suflFering. In front of this picture stands a small figure of St. Francis, by Alonzo Cano. The face, shaded by the cowl, is marked with all the ecstasy of ascetic devo- tion; but, accustomed as we are to the colossal and colourless in statuary, it is hard to go into raptures at a 92 THE CATHEDRAL. doll (for the figure is only two feet high, and painted). The verger, however, told me that, when M. Thiers visited Toledo, he insisted upon kissing this image, being moved, as he explained, not by religious, but artistic enthusiasm. Being a little man, he was accordingly lifted up in the arms of the attendants to perform the ceremony. M. Thiers is so small, that no single step can lift him from the ridiculous to the sublime. In the vestry I was shown a small Holy Family, attributed to Raphael. One of the canons assured me that it had been brought from Italy by an archbishop of Toledo, before the end of the sixteenth century. It re- sembles a Perugino in everything except a certain hard- ness of outline. If it be Raphael's at all, it must be one of his very earliest works. My faith in it was rather shaken, by hearing the name of Michael Angelo given to two heads on copper, a Virgin, and a boy-Christ. I began to suspect my informant of a reckless use of great names. In a room over the cloisters I saw a collection of gigantic grotesque figures, used in processions and mum- meries. I was told that the country people, when they entered the room, generally dropped down reverently on their knees, supposing these to be saints, and the greatest, because the biggest, they had seen. The most remark- able of all is a monster unknown to Buffon, but more like an exaggerated turtle than anything else in nature, the body of which is big enough to contain a man, whose duty it is to open and shut its jaws, for the edification of the populace on Corpus Christi day. Tliis ' snapping turtle' is called Tarasca. On its back rides, or rode, a THE archbishop's LIBRARY. 93 woman clad in scarlet, yclept of Babylon, and otlierwise christened Anna Boleyna, after the unfortunate lady who was the cause of the insult offered by Henry VIII. to Spain and the Roman church in the divorce of Cathe- rine of Arragon, and who was also the mother of her who foiled the Armada and upheld Protestantism — 'the she-wolf (as Gongora terms her), Elizabeth of England. The Archbishop's Library contains some very curious manuscripts, which the good old curator seemed never tired of producing for my inspection. Among the rest was a code of laws in Castilian, given to the city of Val- ladolid by Alphonso VII. in the eleventh century. This is one of the earliest specimens of ' romance,' but the sense can be made out with great ease. I remember one law, forbidding any Moor or Jew to take sacred pro- perty in pledge for a loan. There was also a curious Hebrew roll, and a book of papyrus written in Syriac, both of which were ' Greek' to me. The calle ancha, or Broad Street of Toledo, is about fifteen feet across, so it may be conceived what the other streets are. Indeed, when I essayed to traverse the town alone, I was perpetually losing myself in their tor- tuous labyrinths, and turning up in some unanticipated quarter. I was, therefore, compelled to put myself under the protection of a laquais-de-place, for, to my surprise, even this lonely city can boast a few specimens of the genus. It is probable, however, that this is a recent development, as my man was not by any means a master of his craft. The church of S. Juan de los Reyes stands at the north-western corner of the city, towering among ruins. 94 THE CHURCH OF S. JUAN. The Franciscan monastery, of which it formed a part, "was nearly destroyed by the French. As the name im- ports, it was one of the truly royal thank-offerings of the Catholic sovereigns. The outside, which is some- what devoid of architectural ornament, is garnished by festoons of chains, more or less rusty and broken. These are the chains which were used to bind Christian captives in the dungeons of Eonda, and (after the old pagan fashion) were hung round the newly-erected church as a trophy of the faith's triumph. There is a strong resemblance, in their main features, between the buildings of Isabella and those of her kinsman and con- temporary, Henry VII. of England. In these, however, as in more recent erections in Spain, we may observe a tendency to neglect the outside, and to lavish all the resources of ai't upon the inside; hence, the church of S. Juan, externally, seems bald when compared with the chapel at Westminster, while, internally, no other church, either in England or elsewhere, can rival it for prodi- gality of ornament. The architecture is the same in its germ, but beneath the warmer clime it has expanded, and developed into more luxuriant forms. The walls are covered with fabulous animals — rampant, couchant, and passant — amid bowers of impossible foliage, while no occasion is lost to introduce the device of the royal pair, a yoke and sheaf of arrows, tied in a true-love knot. The church of S. Juan de los Reyes used to be familiar to the readers of Gil Bias, but recent editions have misprinted it ' Royes,' and a commentator, mis- taking it for Royos, gravely explains it to mean 'the church of the red friars,' an order, I apprehend, till now EL GRECO's PICTURE. .95 unheard of in ecclesiastical history. One would have thought that the unfortunate place had suffered enough at the hands of Gallic mutilators already. The church of Santo Tome is celebrated for the picture by El Greco, ' The Burial of the Conde Orgaz/ which, in spite of what Sir E. Head and Mrs. Jameson assert, has not been removed to Madrid. This is generally considered the masterpiece of the painter; but much as I respect the high authorities which have pronounced it to be so, I must hold that it is inferior to the great picture by the same artist in the sala capitular. The upper part, containing the heavenly host, is, to my mind, very poor in conception, and worse in colouring. A dull leaden hue j^ervades the whole. But the lower part is indisputably grand and solemn. Saints Stephen and Augustine, in rich episcopal robes, are depositing the body of the good count in his tomb; the relatives of the deceased look on, grave and dig- nified, not expressing the slightest surprise at being relieved of their duty by such unwonted intei'vention. The picture is all the more effective by being free from the expression of ordinary human passions. The atmo- sphere which surrounds it is not that of every-day life; the truth represented is a higher and deeper truth than the truth of fact ; and the spectator feels that he has no business to call in question the probability of the actual occurrence. I should, doubtless, have worked myself into the proper frame of mind, and felt all this, but for an impertinent suggestion, that the grave relations, with their trim beards, were like Rip Van Winkle's mysterious Dutchmen. 9G DESERTION OF CHURCHES. I spent a long hour in this church, partly examining the picture, and partly listening to a sermon, which the slow, distinct enunciation of the preacher enabled me to follow with ease. I could understand it all the better as it was entirely declamatory and ?vith their saddles for pillows, and half-a-dozen more were stretched on the stones outside the door, with no pillow at all. We supped outside, under extraordinary difficulties as re- garded table and chairs. Of course the meal was furnished from the contents of our own saddle-bags. Contrary to our expectation, there was a vacant upper chamber, on the floor of which two beds were speedily laid, and two bodies as speedily laid upon them. The window was unglazed, and the doorway was unprovided with a door — but what did that matter to men too sleepy, after their fifty miles' ride, to fear actual draughts or possible daggers 1 Having six leagues to ride to breakfast, we were ofi" at least an hour before dawn. Our road, as before, lay along the dry, gravelly beds of rivers, — very good smooth roads indeed, but liable to interruption. How the good folks of the Alpujarrez journey in winter — sabe Dios ! RAVINE OF THE MASSACRE. 141 The whole ride to Ujihar is exceedingly uninteresting. On each side, the traveller's view is bounded by a steep bank of earth, and the road generally resembles a rail- way cutting. About ten o'clock we came to the Bar- ranco de la Matanza,' — ' Eavine of the Massacre,' — so called from the disastrous rout of the brave Marquis of Cadiz and the flower of Andalucian chivalry, bemoaned in many a patriotic ballad. Even my stupid old guide roused himself to an unwonted effort, and told me the story. Immediately after, we came upon Ujihar, a truly Moorish village, with flat roofs and latticed windows, with green plots of garden scattered among the gleaming white walls. My far-travelled companion said it re- minded him of Nazareth. I have never since heard the word * Nazareth,' even at church — God forgive me ! — without thinking of Ujihar, as it lay basking, so still and quiet, in the glare of that August sunshine. While breakfast was getting ready, we strolled up to the church, a gaunt, unattractive edifice, with nothing to show, except, indeed, some daubs in the vestry, repre- senting conflagrations and massacres, and a variety of atrocities said to have been committed by the Moors upon the Christians during their famous revolt. I dare say the Moors have a long fer contra account, if one only knew. At five o'clock I separated, with great regret, from my companion, he with his two attendants taking the road to Almeria, while I, followed by my dilapidated esquire, turned inland towards Mairena, a little village visible on the mountain side about a league off", where I had determined to stay for the night. 142 DEFECTIVE LARDER. The posada presented the most wretched and forlorn aspect, and the accommodation inside did not belie the promise of its exterior. To my inquiries respecting supper (my readers must pardon my perpetual references to the victualling department, for really these mountain rides develop an appetite unknown to persons engaged in the more usual sedentary occupations of life) — I say, then, to my inquiries respecting supper I received most disheartening replies. I ran through the whole gamut of larder and pantry in a descending scale, lessening my demands as I Avent on. ' Had they any mutton V I asked.—' No.' ' Chicken f—' No.' ' Bacon V—' No.' ' Eggsf— ' No.' ' Wine?'—' No.' ' Bread?'—' No.' ■Here was a predicament ! — and my saddlebags were emptied (chiefly, I believe, by the surreptitious nibbling of my Sancho). However, they promised to send out and buy some bread and wine ; and I also stipulated for some mulberries, for I had seen many trees by the way- side jewelled with rich purple fruit. While this primi- tive repast was being provided, I wandered about the environs of the hamlet. Some of the women, sitting at their open doors, were singularly beautiful,— Medoras or Gulnares all, — in striking contrast with the women of Ujihar or Lanjaron. Just out of the village I saw several families, each on its own ' era,' or thrashing- floor, busily engaged in beating out the corn. The dress of the men was exceedingly primitive, consisting of a shirt, and A\dde drawers reaching to the knee, which were, or had been, white. My appearance and northern complexion seemed to excite their wonder : long after I had gone by, on turning round, I could see them still PRIMITIVE POPULATION. 143 pausing in their work to gaze after me. A passing stranger is a sight passing strange at Mairena. On returning to the posada I was shown into a kind of loft, with a square aperture for window, which seemed by its appearance to have been in quiet posses- sion of the hens from time immemorial, and was besides insufferably close. I tried to convince the good hostess that eggs and chickens were the logical sequence of hens, but in vain ; so I was obliged to content myself with bread and fruit and wine, as aforesaid. I had a table and chair set out upon the flat roof, which com- manded a grand view of the whole wild district, ridge upon ridge, and valley beyond valley. Here and there, high up in the lap of some great, grim, brown, and grey mountain, was perched a white hamlet, with its own green fringe of orchard, — and through a gap in the ridge towards the south-east, I could see the deep bhie Mediterranean, and I could even make out some sails upon it, as they glittered against the rising moon. Meanwhile, I was rather pestered with three old women, who surrounded the table, taking huge delight in seeing me eat, and asking various questions, — such as, whether England was in France ? and what I had done to my hair to make it brown? About an hour after nightfall, the various members of the family disposed themselves to sleep upon the roof; and I, thinking men's company better than hens', followed their example, and lay down close to the table, on which remained some relics of supper. In the middle of the night I was awakened by a stealthy step close by me, and, looking up, I saw a strange, wild 144 MrDNIGHT GUEST. figure of a man, all in rags. He was walking to and fro beside the table, evidently hankering after the viands thereon. At last he pounced upon them, and begarii coolly to break the bread and dip it in the wir ^^ Before devouring each morsel, he held it up towards ti.o moon, at arm's length, and, waving it to and fro, muttered, ' Thanks be unto thee, Madonna, most holy.' I was amused at his thus breaking two com- mandments, and thanking the Virgin Mary or the moon, whichever it might be by whose countenance he was stealing; but as he looked very lean and poor, I did not interrupt his feast by atfy sign of wakefulness. I had scarcely dropt to sleep again, before I was roused by a loud shriek; then there was a scuffle; all the family started to their feet; the men swore, the women screamed, and then ensued such a bewildered Babel of chattering, that I in vain tried to make myself heard, and discover the cause of the disturbance. As it was past three, I rose, and ordered the horses out. My guide (save the mark !) now acknowledged to me that he had only once travelled that way twenty-five years ago, so the landlord, anxious, as I thought, to escape from the still screaming womankind, volunteered t accompany me till daybreak. On the way he told me the cause of the tumult. Some ill-conditioned admirer of his daughter had clambered in at the window of the loft where she was sleeping. It was her shriek which brought the father to the summary expulsion of the intruder. ' But for your worship's presence,' he said, ' I would have stabbed the villain then and there.' Deeds of blood are not unfamiliar in the Alpujarrez, NOCTURNAL DISTURBANCES. 145 to judge from the number of mortuary crosses we passed about half-a-league from Mairena. Mine host could not, or would not, give me any information respecting them. All he would say was, ' Tiempo de los Moros.' Some looked as if they had been erected in the year 1849. We followed a rugged path over the side of a bleak wild hill, until, after crossing the rocky bed of a torrent, it merged in a more beaten track, and by-and-by we overtook a fine bright-eyed lad, riding on a mule. He came, he told me, from AroUes (one of the mountain hamlets I had seen from Mairena), and he was very communicative with Aspect to the place and all it con- tained. He was just telling me how, the day before, the only child of an arriero had been drowned in a well, his father being absent at Calahorra (the place I was bound for), when we descried in the distance a train of mules. On nearer approach we could see a man riding on the last mule, with arms folded and head bent, neither smoking nor singing. ' That,' said the boy, ' is the poor father.' ' Ah, Don Diego,' he cried, when we met him, * sad news from AroUes.' ' Ya lo se,' replied the father quietly, and rode on. The ill news had flown fast. There was not a trace of emotion on the father's face ; the wound, doubtless, as deep wounds do, was bleeding inwardly. After leaving the boy, whose heavily-laden beast could not keep pace with ours, my precious guide lost his way and mine, so we had at last to dismount, and scramble down the side of a hill so steep, that I was compelled to clutch the shrubs which grew here and there among the stones and shale. I expected every moment to see our GAZ. L 146 GUADIX. -• horses roll neck-over-heels down, as their fore-feet are not adapted for clutching; but no, they managed to scramble safe and sound (at least as sound as ever) to the bottom, and so did Sancho, whose neck, I suppose, is reserved for another fate. We were now descending the north-eastern slopes of the Sierra, and looking over a wide plain, dotted at intervals with natural mounds. One of these, almost at our feet, was crowned with a castle, evidently Moorish, but showing traces of recent repairs. At its base was the little village of Calahorra, which we reached at last, an hour before noon. The posada was a great improvement on the last, and furnished me with plenty of ham and eggs. I should have enjoyed the soundest siesta, but for impertinent interruptions from swallows, whose mud-nests formed a novel kind of cornice to the chamber. A pleasant evening ride of three hours brought me to Guadix, where I lodged in a large and, comparatively speaking, comfortable posada, outside the gates. This town (I beg its pardon), this city, boasts of a cathedral, an alameda, and last, not least, a neveria, or ice-shop. Its narrow streets, hemmed in by mediaeval walls and towers, present some very striking and artistic combina- tions. There was a fair going on, and it was all alive with bustle down to a late hour of the night, and the ways, strait enough already, were further blocked up with rude booths, lit with many lanterns, and frequented by crowds of customers. We resumed our journey at dawn. The road from Diesma leads through a picturesque defile. I remarked the great earth banks, seamed and rent by winter rains; MOLINILLO. 147 here and there occurred a large stone, which, having protected the earth beneath from the water, stood out isolated upon a pillar of its own, like those on the Mer- de-Glace, which are formed by an analogous process. Such earth-mounds as rise detached, and are therefore not liable to have any great body of water pouring down their sides, have frequent excavations made in them, looking in the distance like so many martens' nests. These artificial caverns are used, 1 was told, for granaries. About ten I reached Molinillo, a little mill, as the name imports, situated in a shady place, in a deep quiet glen, over which looks down the snow-streaked peak of Muleyhacen. The drowsy sound of the mill-wheel accompanied my siesta — a superfluous lullaby. In the afternoon there arrived a spruce gentleman, an architect, he told me, of Granada, who proposed to join me in my ride thither. I gladly complied, because, in the first place, I was tired of the society of my * guide ;' and, secondly, the road we had to traverse bears an evil repute for robberies and assassinations. We, thanks to our good luck or the guardia civil, came to no harm, and admired at our ease the fantastic ridges of grey rock that arose around our path at every turn. After sunset, the whole earth and air seemed alive with the shrill chirp of the grill os (or crickets), which take up by night the chorus of the cicalas by day. And we, chatting almost as continuously as the grillos chirped, rode by moonlight back to Granada. l2 148 CHAPTER XVI. I HAVE a great passion for hill- climbing, and never see peak or ridge, however remote, without feeling an insane longing to be on the top of it. This is a weak- ness no one need be ashamed to confess, as it is shared by Mr, Justice Talfourd, and others of the wisest and best of our time. I remember, at my first school (whither I was sent at a tender age, in compliance with the national principle, that a mother's kisses may spoil a child, but a big boy's kicks cannot,) that I had a certain copy-book, on the outside of which was depicted Aurora in her aerial car, with a range of blue mountains in the distance, and I never could look at this picture without feeling ready to cry for spite, that I was con- demned to slave at pothooks instead of being free to rove about hills like those. At another school, when a big boy myself, I have incurred the penalties of truantry, and risked my chance of being * at the top of the tree,' solely for the pleasure of spending a long, hungry summer's day on the tops of the hills. This passion has since been fostered by Wordsworth, piqued by those gigantesque failures the Gog-Magogs, and not extin- guished by long indulgence among Apennines and Alps. So that when I saw the Peak of Veleta rising deep purple, with a fringe of gold, against the morning sky, EXPEDITION TO THE PEAK OF VELETA. 149 receding at mid-day into misty distance, and then, as evening came on, approaching once more witli a rosy smile, — I felt that I should leave a want unsatisfied if I departed from Granada without attempting the ascent. Not that the feat involves any danger, or much difficulty. High as its elevation is — nearly thirteen thousand feet — from the absence of glaciers it does not present the same obstacles as many lower peaks and passes of the Alps. This time, warned by experience, I assured myself of a trusty guide (worthy the name) in the person of Jose Villegas, who had, when a boy, tended goats on the Sierra, and was well acquainted with all its recesses. The saddlebags were loaded with provisions for three days — as if we had been ancient Greeks going on an expedition — consisting of cold fowl, ham, cheese, and bread, besides two great leathern scriptural bottles filled with wine, and I am ashamed to say how many cigars. Thus equipped, we started at three o'clock one fine afternoon in the middle of August. Our path lay, at first, over a bare, brown tract, then along steep hill- sides, occasionally skirting abrupt precipices of earth. Then, as we dipped down towards a stream, we caijae upon patches of cultivation, and passed more than one cortijo, or farm house. We made all haste, but night had fallen some time before we descended the rugged way which leads to the Cortijo San Geronimo, where we were to rest ourselves and horses. Jose beguiled the way by repeating a number of legends, which he had heard in his youth from the shepherds of the Sierra. Several of these related to the ' Laguna de Vacaras,' a small deep lake, embosomed high in the mountains. 150 LOCAL LEGENDS. One ran thus : — A shepherd was tending his flock by the side of the lake, and there came two men in strange dress, one holding an open book, and the other a fishing- net. And the man read from his book, and said, ' Cast the net.' And he cast it, and drew up a black horse. And he with the book said, ' This is not it ; cast again.' And he cast and drew up a pied horse. And he with the book said, 'This is not it; cast again.' And he cast and drew up a white horse. And he with the book said, ' This is it.' And they both mounted on the white horse and rode away, and the shepherd saw them no more. These shepherds believe that some day the lake will burst through the mountain and destroy Granada. One night a shepherd, standing by the lake, heard a voice say,— Shall I strike and break the dike ? Shall I drown Granada town ? And another voice answered, ' Not yet.' A third tale was about a friar, and how he met the devil by the lake side. These legends, Jose said, he had heard the shepherds tell of an evening when sitting in their huts together. In their vague and purposeless character, they resemble rather the fictions of Northern than those of Southern Europe. It may be, however, that they have ' hung round the mountains' since the Moorish days. The cortijo was so full that it was with difficulty that Jose found a place to lay out the contents of the saddle- bags for supper. FRUITLESS COMPLAINT. 151 Besides women and children without number, there were a lot of soldiers, who lived there, during the sum- mer months, to take care of several hundred horses, and with a non-commissioned officer to take care of them. It seems that these dehesas, or mountain pastures, formerly monastic property, have now been resumed by the crown, and of late years the government have sent the young horses intended for cavalry service to the Sierra to escape the summer heats, and find the herbage which the scorched central plains do not afford. An English trainer would stare if he saw the rugged pastures to which they are consigned. It is here, doubtless, that they acquire those cat-like qualities which I have before mentioned as characteristic of Spanish horses. I was provided with a clean-looking bed, but, alas, I had scarcely lain down, when I was assailed by myriads of chinches (known to English ears by an unsavoury monosyllable), whose continued attacks in the guerilla style, made me repent a thousand times that I had not made my bed upon the stones outside, like Jose. When I complained to the master of the house of my fellow- lodgers, he replied quietly, ' Yes ! it's the season for them.' So I was glad to get on horseback at midnight, followed by Jos6 and one of the soldiers, of whose ser- vices we should stand in need by-and-bye. There was no moonlight, and the mountain presented to the eye a vast black mass, only starred here and there by the ruddy gleam of the shepherds' fires. As we ascended, the cold grew more and more intense, and the stars above shone sharp and clear (as on a frosty winter's night), unmellowed by any intervening mist. We had 152 ASCENT OF THE PEAK OF VELETA : occasionally to dismount, and let our horses follow us over some unusually rough and stony tract, where Nature seemed to have carted her rubbish ; our progress was, therefore, slow, and the dawn had already begun to break when we reached the furthest point accessible, even to Spanish horses, perhaps a thousand feet below the summit of the peak. We left our animals in the soldiers care, with directions to meet us in a valley lower down to the left, and commenced the ascent on foot. I made great efforts to reach the top before sun- rise, — efforts painful enough in that rarefied atmosjihere, and perhaps somewhat dangerous withal, for during several days after, I continued partially deaf, my ears being swollen internally. I succeeded, however, in reaching the top just as the sun was rising out of the waters. It was a sight worth any effort, short of break- ing a bloodvessel. The mountain up whose steep slopes we had been climbing breaks away towards the east in sheer precipices, at the foot of which is a deep gorge, choked with never-melting snow. The cliffs fronting the sun were bathed in a greenish light. At our feet lay the Alpujarrez, a very jumble of mountains, as if in full revolt still ; and beyond that the great sea. A thin haze brooded over its surface, and prevented any reflec- tion of the morning light, so that it looked, not like water, but a nether heaven — starless, colourless, and void ; not boundless, however, for we could see the coast of Africa stretching away beyond, in a dim, wavy line. Gibraltar was hidden by a dark cloud, which the most ardently patriotic eyes would have striven in vain to VIEW FROM THE SUMMIT. 153 penetrate ; but the mountains beyond Malaga were clearly visible. Looking; westward, the shadow of the mountain was l^rojected in a dark purple cone, and far to the north we could see over successive Sierras into La Mancha and Castile; while, just below, the whole Vega of Granada, with its toAvns and woods, was spread as distinct as a model. Very near the summit are some rude stone buildings in ruins, doubtless the remnant of the watch-tower from which the peak derives its name. Jose, however, had his legend ready for them : * Once upon a time,' he said, 'there was a Moor, very old and very wise, and he brought his people up to the Picacho, and they dwelt here in these houses for seven years and a day. And durino- all that time there was no rain nor storm. And at the end of the seven years and a day the old Moor looked out over the sea, and he saw rising up a little cloud, like a man's hand, and he said, ' My children, let us go, for there is a storm coming,' So they went, and the storm came and scattered their houses into ruins, as you see them now.' Near the top of the peak nothing grows, except a kind of cushion-grass and the dwarf manzanlUa, which is much prized by the cullers of simples. The Sierra, however, is rich in botanical treasures. Two years ago, a German established himself in a cave on the mountain side, for the purpose of collecting plants. He had hired an attendant from Granada, but the man soon ran away, thinking his master uncanny. Nevertheless, the inde- 154 A GERMAN BOTANIST. fatigable botanist lived on alone for some months in his cave, too bold to care for wolves, too poor to fear robbers, and too much of a philosopher to be scared at goblins. Several persons at Granada mentioned the fact, but no one could remember his name. Jose, my myth-loving guide, assured me that Moorish doctors frequently came over from Africa to gather certain ' med'cinable' herbs, found only here. The story is in some degree accredited by the fact, that Granada, before the conquest, used to be a favourite place of resort for invalids from the neighbouring continent, insomuch that a part of the city especially frequented was called the Hospital of Africa. So the Sierra may enjoy a traditionary reputation among the Moors, for we have all heard with what fond regret they remember the fair kinofdom which has been ravished from them. After walking some time by the edge of the precipice, we descended to the appointed hollow, and found our horses enjoying themselves mightily on the short green grass — a rare luxury. "We lost no time in following their example, with appetites sharper than the mountain peaks and keener than the morning air. A large flat stone served for table, and a little pure stream close by, still fringed with ice of last night's freezing, served to cool our wine. After the feast we all slept for three hours in the warm sunshine, which, at an elevation of ten thousand feet, does not bake the baskers. Shortly after recommencing our descent, I dismissed the soldier, happy with a fortnight's pay, and then we went on by the Penas Kesbaladizas, or ' slippery rocks,' ARCADIAN SHEPHERDS. 155 in some places well deserving the name. Passing a pretty little cascade, we rode for a mile or two down an artificial water-course, made to fertilize, or rather create pasturage, where the hills slope down to the bed — I should say cradle — of the new-born Xenil. Here we found a large flock of milk-white goats, under the charge of a solitary goatherd, who was encased in leather of a picturesque cut, and was leaning on his crook, just like the frontispiece to a Pastoral. I offered him a draught from my bottle, which one may always do without fastidious qualms, for the poor men, with instinctive politeness, do not touch it with their lips, but drink in the Catalan fashion — that is, they hold the bottle up some distance from their mouths, and let the wine flow at its own sweet will down their throats. Here we diverged a little to the right to have a peep into the wild ravine of Guarnon, and about four in the afternoon came upon a cluster of shepherds' tents, pitched in gipsy fashion close by a little runlet of water, husbanded with great care, and made to trickle through hollow reeds. The occupants were old acquaintances of Jose, who thereupon made the opportune discovery that our horses wanted half-an-hour's rest. We accordingly complied with their hospitable invitation to enter, and I was forthwith comfortably installed on a pile of fleeces. The men were all engaged in occupations more useful than ornamental. One was sewing a pair of sheep-skin breeches for his little boy. What would Lope or Montemayor say to the degenerate descendants of their shepherds, who never condescended to make anything humbler than a sonnet 1 However, our friends 15G THE RAVINE OF SAN JUAN. seemed quite happy and contented, unskilled as they appeared to be in the refinements of love and the meta- physics of despair — ' Arcadiens sans le savoir.' Leaving the huts, we passed the ravine of San Juan, rich in green marble, says the Handbook, though I saw no quarries, and could not conceive how that unmanageable material is transported to the plains ; for there seemed to be no better road than the narrow bridle-path which leads along the steep hills overhanging the Xenil, so narrow, indeed, that it was impossible to escape the embraces of the too-affectionate briers without leaving many shreds of my garments for relics. At last we descended to the stream, and crossed it by a wooden bridge — which probably disappears every winter — at the little hamlet of Tablete. An artist would infallibly fall in love with a little mill that stands close by. Of all human inventions a water-mill is the most pic- turesque, and the dilapidated mill of Tablete, with its accessories of rocks, bridge, and poplars, would have been sketched a hundred times, had there been any landscape-painters in Spain. Leaving the hamlet, we climbed up the path on the right bank of the river, and reached Huescar the oliviferous at nightfall. Crossing the little plaza, where, beside the fountain under the trees, all the fathers of the village were assembled in a pipe conspiracy, we dismounted at the house of an elderly man, known by the name of El Tio Pardo, 'Nunky Gray,' who has a bed at the disposal of travellers. I have to thank his good bustling wife. La Tia, for a cup of excellent chocolate and a clean bed. HUESCAR. 157 Next day a ride of three hours brought us back to Granada. Both banks of the river are plentifully sprinkled with olive-grounds and orchards; here and there on a rocky point stand the ruins of an old castle — and far below, the Xenil, now chafing into angry foam against its rocks, now lingering in many a green, still pool, greets you with a murmur, the rarest and sweetest of all music in this southern land. 168 CHAPTER XVII. ON the 22nd of August, an hour before day-break, I left Granada ' for good,' much to the regret of landlord and waiters — invitd Minervd ; for during several days past I had been the only guest in the house, and with me the whole hotel's occupation was gone. This melancholy state of things was owing to a combination between the various diligence inns on the great roads, which was like to ruin the Minerva, I hope not, for it is one of the best fondas in all Spain. We passed, about a quarter of a mile from the town, the little hermitage of St. Sebastian, whither Ferdinand accompanied poor Boabdil, to bow him out of his kingdom. This reminded me to turn round, and have my ' ultimo sospiro' too, for one cannot help feeling a little melancholy at saying good-bye, for the last time, to any place, person, or thing — how much more when that place is Granada. I shall never see it again. To me, the hill which finally hid it from my sight is its grave, and all that remains with me is the unbodied image which haunts the corridors of memory, thronged already with ghosts. This, however, is a very pleasant, cheerful spirit, which I take delight in evoking. But ghosts are apt to be too garrulous, as witness Darius, A MILITARY IMPROVISATORE. 159 and Hamlet senior j so we will bid ours back to his corridors, and trot on after the mayoral. As this functionary was to be my sole companion for two long days, I made it my first care to conciliate his goodwill, by showing an interest in his life — past, present, and to come. Nothing loth, he told me all about it. For the last fifteen years he had served as a soldier in Cuba and elsewhere, and had now returned home, to serve, perhaps, a harder master without the livery. The pay of a Spanish infantry soldier, so he told me, is twelve cuartos, about fourpence a- day — that of a cavalry soldier, two reals, fivepence and a fraction. Out of this they have to find their food — no easy matter one would suppose — and yet all the soldiers I saw in Spain were anything but starvelings. My ex- hero was a very cheerful, jolly personage, who took things easily, and burst out into song on the slightest provocation. When any one passed us with the usual salutation, he extemporized stanzas apropos, of which the following is a sample, — Vaya usted con Dios ! Vaya usted con Dios ! Pero no se morira nadie Si no lo quiere Dios. That is, in English, — Go with the blessing of God ! Go with the blessing of God! Nobody never would die If it wasn't the will of God. By which it may be seen, that the improvisatores of 160 AGRICULTURE AT A LOW EBB. Spain are not subjected to many hard conditions, metrical or otherwise. All along the level plain the land seems fertile and productive enough, but with the hill begins the desert. - We saw, indeed, traces of former culture — furrows abandoned to perpetual fallow, and ruined algibes or water-tanks, lying like the wrecks of an ebbing pros- perity, as perhaps they have lain since the expulsion of the Moors. The truth is, that cultivation, or irri- gation (an equivalent term in these climates), is facile enough on the low grounds, but on the hills is only to be effected by skill, cost, and labour, as great desi- derata in Andalucia as water itself. It may be, more- over, that from the diminution of population, the higher lands can no longer be cultivated to a profit. Will the repeal of our Corn Laws bring any of these wastes under plough again ? Can corn be grown, shipped, and sold in Mark-lane, and leave a profit to the Andalucian farmer 1 I think not. The absence of rail-roads, the scarcity of other roads, the want of water communication, not to mention the oppressive and aggressive taxation, offer insuperable obstacles to a free- trade, and will effectually protect the British farmer from Si)anish competition. The white little village of La Mala (I hope it does not merit its name) was fast asleep as we passed through, all except one man, who was awake, and that( wide — he was catching birds by a process novel to me. He had a rod about ten feet long, at the end of which was a kind of cup, and by means of this he lifted a ferret up to the eaves of the houses. The little animal ALHAMA. 161 wriggled itself under the tiles, and invariably reappeared in about a minute with a swallow in its mouth. The man told me that the swallows were destined for the table. I suppose they will be served up under a more piquant name. A dreary desert, full of ups and downs (in which the former preponderate), and speckled with unhappy dwarfs of shrubs, leads to Alhama. The distance from Granada is eight long leagues. We did not meet a soul all the way till we got within a mile of Alhama, when we encountered a lady of extraordinary dimen- sions sitting on the back of a mule, in a kind of half- saddle, half-litter, and protecting her complexion with a huge red umbrella. She inquired with great anxiety whether we had seen or heard of any robbers by the way. I thought the red umbrella decidedly impru- dent, as it would be visible for miles, and might, moreover, render the bearer liable to be mistaken by a sportsman for a flamingo, or by a bull for a matador. The first view of Alhama disappointed me grievously. I had pictured to myself a grim fortress, perched on an isolated pinnacle of rock, and, lo ! there it lay on the slope of a bare hill, its castle scarcely distinguished from the surrounding houses. Ay de mi Alhama ! Alas for my ideal ! Alhama at first sight seemed, indeed, a mere 'dwarf of presage;' yet, on near pproach, 'there grew' (as the poet goes on to say) another kind of beauty in detail, that made it worth the knowing.' Just under the castle walls runs a narrow glen, splitting the hill, so narrow that it is scarcely seen till you are close upon it; and then, as GAZ. M 162 THE POSADA IN ALHAMA. you look down, it seems like a little strip of paradise, with its clear water, green leaves, and cool shadows. There is an aqueduct too, with low stone arches, spanning the market-place, and the whole town smacks of another people and another time. Not the least of its curiosities is the posada, which, by-the-bye, has been -vYhitewashed, and has otherwise amended its ways since, perhaps in consequence of, Mr. Ford's anathema. There was a fair impending, and the place was in consequence so full that I had to wait some time till a heap of corn had been dislodged to make room for my bed and me. In the interval I visited the stables, a low, rambling structure, with massive pillars like a crypt. When I asked about their date, I received the usual careless answer, 'Tiempo de los Moros,' for in Spain every erection is set down to the credit of the Moors, as surely as in England all destruction is debited to Oliver Cromwell (who, poor man, has a tolerably long score of authentic sins to answer for). We left Alhama at four o'clock in the afternoon, an hour too late, as it proved. After topping the hill, we traversed a very narrow stony pass, then came upon some level pasture-ground, with a cottage here and there, each having its trellised vine, its nest of trees, and plot of tillage. The sun was just setting as we reached the puerto, a gap in the hills, through which the road winds down to the shore j here we caught the first glimpse of the sea. The short twi- light scarcely enabled us to see our way down the rugged and steep descent, and in a little while it became pitch dark, for the night was cloudy and threatening. A few DESCEIPTION OF THE VENTAS. 1C3 drops, precursors of a storm, determined me to halt for the night at a roadside hostel, called the ' Venta Nueva,' about a league on the hither side of Vinuela. These ventas are always built on the same plan, so that one description will suffice for all. The outer door, wide as that of a barn, admits the traveller and his horse into a kind of passage paved with round stones, leading directly to the stable behind. On one side, but not divided from it by screen or door, is a large low room, with a fire-place at the further end, which serves the family for pantry, larder, kitchen, dormitory, and what not. On the other side of the passage is a small room, with a door of its own, and a square hole in the wall by way of window, reserved for any guests too dainty to share the general floor. In this case, the small chamber was appropriated to me; and the good woman of the house set herself most indefatigably to clear away a lot of potatoes, which had occupied the corner destined for my bed. The host, meanwhile, never rose from his seat; but, graciously accepting a cigar from me, began to assure me that in his house I need fear no robber (not that I had mentioned the sub- ject), that he was a man of honour, and muy caballero, very much the gentleman;' from all which I charitably concluded that he was a rogue. Happily I had no prac- tical proof of the fact. I should have slept very well had it not been for a foraging party of ants. However, preferring vegetable to animal food, they rather fright- ened than hurt me, and were probably grievously disap- pointed at finding a John Bull instead of their customary M 2 164 VELEZ. potatoes. I would not have answered for an Irishman in my place. Next morning we started betimes, and our sure-footed animals groped their way safely to Vinuela in the dark. The dawn revealed to me that we had come into a new climate. Not to mention the vines which covered every hill, the carob tree, with its strange leaves and pods, hung over the path; and below, in some well-watered place, might be seen a plot of bright green sugar-canes. Some- times we descended into the dry bed of the stream, at other times kept the zig-zag path on the hill-side. As we neared Velez, we saw the raisins laid out to dry, in frames resembling hot-beds ; and many a fig-tree stretched its boughs, laden with gigantic purple fruit, over my head, within arm's-length. I am fond of fresh figs ; my neighbours, the owners, were all a-bed; what wonder if, for once, I violated the strict letter of the catechism 1 Almost the only plant which I recognised for an old acquaintance was the catholic bramble, which spread itself over every hedge and bush, proffering unheeded and superfluous clusters. Indeed, I think the black-berries were as plenty as raisins. * Velez, both in colour and form, is an extremely picto- rial town. Its houses are of a dingy white, somewhat dilapidated ; it is crowned by a Moorish castle, in ruins, and is backed by a jagged grey sierra. What more could an artist want? Unhappily, man is not a camera lucida, and has an eye to creature comforts, so, deterred by the bad repute of the posadas, I determined to break- fast on the sea-shorC; which we reached by a road bor- AERIVAL AT MALAGA, 165 dered with impenetrable hedges of cactus, and reeds as tall as trees. Velez was once a port, but the sea has receded. Hence to Malaga, for some twenty miles, the road lay along the shore ; the vine-clad hills on the right hand, the calm blue sea on the left. We passed innu- merable trains of mules and donkeys, conveying piles of raisins in white boxes to Malaga (some of which the gentle reader doubtless ate in his Christmas pudding). At frequent intervals stood huts of wattled reeds, — houses of call for the thirsty traveller, — and what tra- veller would not be thirsty under the circumstances 1 The floor was piled with water-melons, and on a table were ranged bottles of aguardiente; these, with the never-failing pipkins of water, formed all the store. The morning had been cloudy and cool, but at last the sun shone out with all his August fervour. I was glad to discern, on rounding a headland, the tall factory- chimneys of Malaga, and still more glad when I at last drew rein at the door of the magnificent Fonda de la Alameda. It was past one o'clock, and I had been ten hours in the saddle. 166 CHAPTER XVIII. rPHE situation of Malaga is charming, and it is well -^ worth while to climb the tower of the cathedral for the sake of the prospect. Shutting your eyes to the incongruous factory-chimneys, look at the two Moorish ruins linked together by a ragged curtain-wall — at the palm-trees scattered about the edges of the town — at the blue sea and winding coast-line on one side, and the bold bare hills on the other. The cathedral itself is built, like the mother-church of Granada, in a false clas- sical style, which resembles a true classical style about as much as the hymns of a rhyming monk resemble the Odes of Horace. Nor is it rich in works of art. There is a ' Virgin of the Rosary,' by Cano, and in the sacristy a ' Holy Family,' said to be an early Murillo, and a small ' Madonna with dead Christ,' by Morales. After all, it is a clean, cool, pleasant place, and there is a very sweet-toned organ, which is played at vespers every after- noon. The streets are full of the bustle of business, and one meets, not unfrequently, with sailors drunk and riotous at mid-day — chiefly, I am sorry to say, English or American. There arc many foreign merchants resident in the town, who seem to have infected the natives with an industrial mania; at least, the paucity of promenaders BULL-FIGHT AT MALAGA. 167 on the Alameda was attributed to the busy season. At the table-d'hote, English was the chief vehicle of con- versation; you could have Harvey's sauce, pale ale, and Stilton cheese, for the asking. In the town are reading rooms and saving-banks, with other modern Transpyre- nean inventions. No infusion, however, of foreign elements can banish the bull-fight. There was one of these entertainments the day after my arrival, and for one day all Malaga forgot its raisins. The occupants of the lower seats were exceedingly noisy and boisterous. Before the fight began, they amused themselves by singling out any man in the reserved seats unfortunate enough to be the wearer of a very glossy hat, or a pair of light kid gloves, and then they directed at him a discordant cry of ' Hat ! hat !' or ' Gloves ! gloves !' till the person in question removed the obnoxious article, and saluted the many-headed tyrant with bare head or bare hand. Even a lady with a bouquet was not exempted from persecution. The first three bulls happened to be very tame, or very sulky, and the ill-humour of the crowd rose to such a pitch, that they began to tear up the benches and fling them into the arena. Some of the most obstreperous were taken into custody and removed by the soldiers. An accident, however, restored them to perfect good humour. One of the chulos was just going to stick his banderillas into the fourth bull's shoulders, when, at that moment, the trumpet, which was the signal for the matador to advance, sounded; the chulo hesitated, — the hesitation was fatal. In a moment he was on the 168 BULL-FIGHT — A FATAL RESULT. ground, and the bull's horn was deep in his body. He writhed himself free, rose to his feet all streaming with blood, leaped the barrier at a bound, and fell on the other side — to rise no more ! He died that same after- noon. Shocking as it may seem, the crowd at once became cheerful, — the show could no longer be called a failure which had resulted in the death of a man. That same week there was a picador killed at Antequera. Indeed, these accidents are by no means so rare as the defenders of bull-fighting affirm. The managers of the ring conceal as much as possible the fatal results, fearful that the amusement may be suppressed by authority. Mr. Hodgson, who keeps the hotel, told me that, once on a time, he actually saw a chulo die of wounds received in the arena, and yet the man's complete recovery was afterwards announced in an official bulletin. 169 CHAPTER XIX. I HAD intended to go from Malaga to Gibraltar in one of the steamers, but the quarantine imposed on all vessels from France had put their times out of joint, so I determined upon riding thither along the coast. Some good-natured people at the hotel tried to deter me, by narrating banditti stories. Among the rest, how a rich merchant of Gibraltar had been carried off to the mountains ; and when his family were rather tardy in paying his ransom, the brigands sent first a toe, and then a leg, by way of instalments on their side. How- ever, I was not a rich merchant, and had little to lose except time : ' Cantabit vacuus coram latrone viator.' That is to say — ' If you meet with a thief, put your hands in your pockets and whistle.' Not that I should have objected to losing a few dollars for the sake of an adventure, provided I could have insured my life against lead and steel. I engaged for my mayoral a round little dumpling of a fellow, known by the nick-name of Manuelito (when I asked for him by his real name at the house where he lodged, they did not know whom I meant). Fat as he now is, he was once the best girt horseman of his day. When the poor Count Torrijos and his confederates were entrapped at Malaga, in the days of Ferdinand the 170 NEW COMPAGNONS-DE-VOYAGE. Bloody, the authorities wanted to have them put out of the way as soon as possible, so Manuelito was sent off to Madrid, with orders to ride, ride, ride, — not ' for life,' Imt for death. In four days and a half he returned with the death-warrant, signed by the king. Just as we were going to start, on the afternoon of August 27, I received a message from two French gentlemen at another hotel, begging to join ' my party.' I dare say they expected to find a more formidable escort than little Manuel. I consented, of course, devoutly hoping that they might not be commis-voya- geurs, a class of people from whom I have suffered much in France. Happily, they turned out to be tourists, with frank and lively manners, like all the gentlemen of their country. We had not ridden many leagues, before I was acquainted with both, as well as if I had known them for years. They were great friends, and of course of opposite characters. One took a romantic and sentimental view of things, like Victor Hugo; the other, a prosaic and common-sense view, like Paul de Kock. As it imports little to know their real names, I shall call them, for shortness, Mons. Victor and Mons. Paul respectively. We jogged on together very comfortably along the dusty road, bordered with gigantic reeds, to the village of Torremolinos, where every garden has its palm-tree. They say that the palm cannot flourish except within sight of another palm, which touching fact, or fiction, I recommend to any young poet wanting to try his hand at a sonnet. Night came on before we reached Benalmedina, but FUENGIROLA MARBELLA. 171 we could see, as we passed, the grey walls of the old Moorish castle gleaming in the light of the young moon — the only crescent that shines there now. Then we followed a narrow glen {chine they would call it in the Isle of Wight,) down to the shore, along which our road lay to Fuengirola. As we rounded one jutting point of rock, the waves wet us up to the knees. With a little stronger breeze off sea, the place would be impassable. At ten o'clock at night we reached- Fuengirola, and were lodged in a posada, very clean and commendable, as posadas go. Not that we had much enjoyment of its comforts, for the inexorable little man roused us at one A.M. This riding by night was no hardship to him, as he had acquired, from long habit, the power of sleep- ing in the saddle, or even, as in the present case, when perched cross-legged on a carpet-bag. We, on the other hand, found it hard to doze in equilibrium, so we beguiled the long leagues of monotonous shore, by vigorous and well-sustained chat — Monsieur Paul burst- ing out now and then, and astounding the grave Spanish echoes with fragmentary recollections of the ' Opera Comique.' We got to Marbella at seven a.m., and were provided with decent and comfortable beds, and with a dinner, on which, if not decent or comfortable, we at all events contrived to dine. At three we prepared again for a start. ' Be sure,' I said to our silent, somnolent I little man, ' be sure you point out the Rio Verde' (which j lies between the Marbella and Estepona). This is the ' gentle river' of the ballad known to all Englishmen f (though the original spirit is somewhat diluted) in the IT2 SUPPOSED ROMAN RUINS. version of Bishop Percy, — the only bishop, by the way, who is remembered for his ' translations,' and whose ' relics' are still venerated by the stanchest Protestants. On the outskirts of the town we noticed the silk-like fibres of the aloe hung up to dry in the sun. A sort of cloth is made from them. The path here, leaving the sea-side, crosses a wide flat, dotted with low green shrubs and intersected by streams, now shrunk into threads, Avhose sinuous courses are marked by a double fringe of oleanders. In the evening, we passed the remnants of what must have been a considerable town, from the extent of the walls still traceable. To the left, we saw the ruins of a building with massive arches. In answer to a question, Manuelito just grunted out, ' Cosa de los Moros,' and went to sleep again. In spite of such authority, I felt little doubt that it was the remnant of Roman baths. There was something very impressive in those nameless ruins, standing in that lonely desert between the mountains and the sea. By-and-bye I began to be impatient for the Rio Verde, and wakened Manuelito : ' Passed it an hour since,' he replied. So, to this day, I am doubtful which of three or four streams is the ' gentle river;' and I could not, as the manner of travellers is, ' drop a tear over the fate of Alonso de Aguilar' at the right place. At eight in the evening we reached Estepona, a straggling village on the sea-shore, which is, or rather used to be, a nest of smugglers, — for that athletic and interesting race has of late been much reduced by the oppressive vigilance of the Spanish authorities. Gib- raltar may be blockaded, commercially, by a very small ESTEPONA. 173 force, so the only effective business now done in that line is on the frontiers of Portugal, and the boards of the Surrey and Adelphi theatres. The posada at which we dismounted was full of bustle ; but if the first comers had calculated on the best rooms, they were disappointed. Probably they had arrived a-foot, or on donkeys, and so were naturally displaced to make room for us true caballeros, who came on horseback. Man, in Spain, takes rank from the beast he rides, just as, in old Greece, the horseman took precedence of the ' hop-lite.' The mistress of the house was stone-blind, but, nevertheless, she directed and superintended her domestic arrangements with wonderful activity and precision. The tact of a blind person, especially one blind from birth, is an 'eerie,' almost fearful, thing to contemplate ; it is like a second sight, and I do not wonder that we read of so many blind prophets and prophetesses. Their earthly paradise is lost to them, and the justice of nature requires that they should be compensated by a clearer foresight of the paradise to come. It was touching to see how, after her work was done, she sat down and caressed her little daughter, passing her hand gently over her face, — a habit she had acquired, doubtless, during the child's infancy, to familiarize her touch with the features she could not see. While our beds were preparing we supped, as we best could, in the common room down stairs. A chilly night wind came through the open door, and suggested to some one of us what a good thing a glass of punch would be, by way of night-cap. Monsieur Paul, who 174 PUNCH PRODUCED UNDER DIFFICULTIES. had a genius for cookery, whether of liquids or solids, sprang up at the word, stationed himself at the brasero of live charcoal, — coolly displacing the bystanders, — and, though he could not speak one word of Spanish, succeeded, by dint of good-humour and impudence, in obtaining all the utensils and ingredients he wanted. How the punch was made I never knew, but it was, or seemed to be, excellent. Difficulties vanish much sooner before the smiling, bustling Frenchman, than before the quiet, grumbling John Bull. While the punch was brewing, one of the muchachas, finding out that I was an Englishman, beckoned me mysteriously aside, saying she had something to show me. I followed her to a cupboard, which she unlocked, and triumphantly displayed the contents, arranged with a view to artistic effect. In the centre was a larere specimen of procelain ware, such as in England we keep rather for use than show, and it was flanked with wine- glasses and teacups by way of supporters. These were all trophies brought from Gibraltar by her betrothed, a brave contrabandista. He was now in prison, poor fellow, but as soon as he got out, they were to be married, and, I suppose, to set up house with the treasures of the cupboard. After a sound sleep of three hours we started again at midnight. Our road lay at first along the sands, and, after crossing a somewhat deep stream, kept inland over rugged furze- clad hills. We were lighted at first by the moon, and after her setting by the morning star, brighter and clearer than in our climate, and reflected in a long column of splendour from the water. FORCIBLE ARGUMENTS. 175 Once our guide turned sharply to the left, and we followed in silent obedience through tangled shrubs, till we came to a sudden stand-still on the to]) of a cliff looking down upon the sea. Then Manuelito awoke. His horse, abandoned to his own devices, had left the path, and was accordingly rewarded, as we retraced our steps, by many kicks and opprobrious epithets from his rider. This delayed us half-an-hour. About dawn, as we were riding along a green hollow, we heard a dull, booming sound. It was the first gun- fire from the fortress. At the top of the next hill we came in sight of the rock, red with the first beams of the rising sun. ' Voila ! ' cried Monsieur Victor, venting his enthusiasm in a simile, not perhaps of the newest (which, indeed, is too much to expect in an impromptu), 'Voila le rocher, qui rougit comme une jeune fiUe a la vue de son amant !' The pucelle, indeed, seemed modestly to retire as we advanced, and we had a two hours' plodding along the flat sand before we arrived at the Spanish lines. At the gate a carabinero asked for our passports, and demanded of what nation we were. The other two, being Frenchmen, were mulcted in a dollar and a half each; I, being an Englishman, was allowed to pass free. ' What can be the reason of that V I said to Monsieur Paul. * Voila ! ' he replied, pointing to the cannon on the heights, 'une ciuquantaine de raisons !' And truly those stubborn arguers speak a logic which silences all opponents. Nothing like cannon-law after all ! 176 CHAPTER XX. WHAT shall I say of Gibraltar 1 Is it not already more familiarly known to us than Plymouth or Chatham — seeing that we speak of it by the endearing diminutive ' Gib,' while we never say, ' Plym,' or ' Chatf Have we not all heard all about it, from the letters of our respective cousins in the Muffs or Bombardiers, who have spent their prescriptive time there watching over the interests of England, and between whiles shooting rabbits at Estepona, or making pic-nics at the cork wood? I shall say the less about it because, excepting in latitude, it has ceased to be Spain, and has become part and parcel of that most expansive ' tight little island,' of whose glory we are prouder than of our purses. Excepting the cloudless sky, the old castle, and a convent or two, now reformed and secularized to more cheerful uses, there is nothing in the place to remind you that it has ever been otherwise than a small English town. (I am forgetting the new cathedral, which is made to resemble a mosque, with a view, I suppose, to African conversions.) All the streets have received English baptism, and the houses are con- structed on the principle of defying, instead of propi- tiating, the climate, being low, small, and compact, with GIBRALTAR. 177 neither court-yard nor fountain. Want of room may be one cause of this ; for even the principal square, far from rivalling the vastness of a Spanish plaza, is cribbed and confined within very narrow limits. One side of tliis square is formed by the Glub House Hotel, where we lodged, a sort of commercial inn, second-rate in everything but prices. In front of it a military band plays twice a week. The Frenchmen turned up their noses at the performance, as their wont is in all that relates to English art. I certainly thought that the drums drowned the trumpets, — that there was a defi- ciency of wind, and a superfluity of parchment. Our soldiers generally do more execution with their hands than their lips. The crowd which assembled on these occasions was curious, consisting, as it did, of Moslems and Jews, and a nondescript rabble of ' Scorpions,' — the Anglo-Spanish mongrel race, that dwells on the rock, and nowhere else, like the monkeys. Here all creeds and all trades are alike tolerated; there is neither Inquisition nor Per-quisition. Taxes and tithes are unknown. The Gibel Tarif of the Moor is an English free port, much frequented by the catholic votaries of Mammon. As a matter of course, I devoted one morning to visit the batteries, under the guidance of a tall corporal of artillery. I got permission for Messrs. Victor and Paul to go too, — a favour not always accorded to foreigners. My national vanity was abundantly gratified by their admiration ; and I quite agreed with them, that the best thing we could do would be to show our enemies our preparations for defence, and then no one would be mad enough to think of repeating that most unsuccessful of GAZ. N 178 ST. George's hall. farces, 'the Siege of Gibraltar.' There are (so our corporal said) seven hundred and seventy guns mounted, or ready for mounting, provisions for three years, and ammunition for ever. We traversed the long galleries, cut within a few yards of the face of the cliff towards the land side, with embrasures at intervals, like the galleries of the Simplon road. In one of these embra- sures, a few years ago, seven men were standing, to watch the effects of some experiments in gunnery, when a spark fell into a powder chest behind them, and blew them all out. All that could be found of them was buried in the cemetery on the Neutral Ground. The grave was pointed out to us. There was no officer among them. ' Fiat experimentum in corpore vili.' St. George's Hall, also excavated in the rock, is con- sidered one of the chief lions. Balls are occasionally given in it for the fun of the thing, since it is difficult of access, not much more than forty feet long, and has the most unelastic floor conceivable. Then we went up to the signal house, pei'ched on one of the summits, — for the rock of Gibraltar is so far like Parnassus, that it has two. Everybody agrees that the view from this point is one of the finest in the world, and I, for my part, agree with everyboely. So clear was the air, that the rocks of Africa, though ten miles away, seemed scarcely a bow-shot from us. The pale blue sky, the dark blue strait, dotted with white sails, and the grey shores, were all and each so distinct and clear, that it seemed like the drop-scene in a theatre rather than reality. Henceforth I shall always give Messrs. Telbin, Grieve, and Co. credit for high art. Monsieur Victor ST. Michael's cave. 179 was so struck with the scene, that when we got back, he shut himself up to compose a copy of impromptu verses, the gist of which was some rationalism about ' Hercule' and ' ses colonnes.' While on the spot, we all made an impromptu breakfast, consisting chiefly of porter. Some veteran eggs were boiled for us, but they proved not nice, like the corporal, for he ate them all. We supposed he was training his appetite against a pro- tracted siege. During the siege, they cooked and eat the roots of the dwarf palms which grow among the rocks, and English soldiers did, for once, drink water. Never was Gibraltar reduced to such straits. In descending, we followed the path to St. Michael's Cave, which had recently been honoured with a visit from the Inff nta and her husband. We went on till we got into inner darkness, with the mud oozing over our ankles, and the drops pattering frequent on our hats ; then we held a conclave, voted it possibly romantic, but decidedly uncomfortable, and so retreated and emerged into the sunlight. The visit of the Infanta had taken place about a month before, and the rock was still eJioino- with the fame thereof. She was received by the governor with genuine courtesy and kindness. At first she appeared constrained and reserved; but when, at dinner, Sir Robert proposed Queen Isabel's health, in a hearty Anglo-Spanish speech, she thawed at once into geniality. When the Queen heard of the reception given to her sister, she immediately 1 sat down, and with her own hand wrote to Narvaez, i requesting that the Grand Cross of Carlos Tercero should i be sent to the Governor of Gibraltar. n2 180 QUEEN ISABEL. This susceptibility of generous impulses is a noble trait in the Queen's character, and is a brighter orna- ment to her crown than any diamond there. She has been known, in default of money, to throw a costly bracelet to a beggar. That monarch is twice a monarch who ceases to be slave to a master of ceremonies. So the Grand Cross was sent forthwith; but the powers that move men like puppets, with their red tapes, for- bade its acceptance. Truly, etiquette and courtesy are not always synonymous, — rather, shall we say, etiquette is courtesy in a strait-waistcoat. I used to go for an hour or two every day to the garrison library, which is virtually thrown open to all strangers. I had a vast arrear of contemporary litera- ture to make up; I was athirst for news, since even the universal Times does not include within its universe the kingdom of Granada. Every conceivable magazine and review is to be found on that ample table j and there is not an officer in the five battalions who has not an opportunity of going to school with little ' David,' and falling in love with poor ' Pen.' Altogether, ' Gib' is a pleasant place to spend five days in, let the residents abuse it as they please. From the brave and gentle Governor, down to the brave and brusque ' Sub,' every- body was kind and hospitable. One evening, at a great dinner given by the 56th, sitting, as it were, in a flowing ocean of champagne, with an archipelago of entrees by way of islands, T could not help remembering how, that day month, I had been fasting involuntarily at Mairena, vainly appealing to empty larders and barren hens. CONTRASTS. 181 Such are the ups and downs of a tourist's life. This, in truth, it is which constitutes the charm of it, for the interchange of kisury and privation gives a tenfold zest to the enjoyment of each. Horace's Teucer understood this : ' Nunc vino pellite curas ; eras ingens iterabimus gequor.' 182 CHAPTER XXL I MIGHT have spared the quotation at the end of the last chapter, for it is somewhat stale at best, and, moreover, turned out inapplicable. My ' ingens sequor' dwindled down into the Bay of Algeciras. And this is how it came about : — A steamer was positively announced to be due at Algeciras early on the morning of the 3rd of September (our St. Oliver's Day), bound for Cadiz. Now, according to the sapient sanitary regulations then in force, any person coming direct from Gibraltar was held to be utterly pestilential, and inadmissible on board ship ; whereas, if he crossed over to Algeciras, he became at once hale and sound, and might embark when he pleased. So, after hearing a sermon from the bishop on Sunday, the 2nd, I availed myself of the kind proposi- tion of a young officer, the best of good fellows, to take me, Victor, and Paul, with all our effects, across in his yacht. As our friend's duties were all on shore, his pleasures were all on sea; and I believe he would have been better able to manage a vessel in a storm, than to put a squad of recruits through their drill. By dint of manifold tacks, we reached Algeciras in two hours and a-half, the wind being dead against us, and the boat making more water than way. Our safe arrival was com- memorated, after our national fashion, by a good dinner, in ALGECIEAS. 183 the course of which we forgot all about an eclipse of the moon, promised by almanacs for that evening (that catholic planet having no objection, it seems, to Sunday- labour). When we did sally out, she was shining above in undimmed brightness, and in the square below wei-e shining many pairs of luminaries still brighter — the poor moon was doubly eclipsed that night. Next morning we got up betimes, to be ready for the steamer, which had been promised as confidently as the eclipse ; but hour after hour passed, and still it came not. We beguiled our impatience on the terraced roof, by looking over the level sands of the Neutral Ground tor the smoke signalling its approach, and by making sketches, more or less rude, of the great Gibraltar rock, which lay before us like the British lion couchant. I find that the resemblance occurred to Mr. Borrow in the same place; but he supposes it to be menacing Spain, while to me the head appeared to be turned decidedly the other way. I suppose, if the French had it, their fancy would carve it into the outline of an eagle. Others have discerned a more ghastly similitude, and compare it to a corpse covered with a cloth, the hands crossed upon the breast, and the knees gathered up as from the death agonies. Time wore on, and our patience wore off. Paul and Victor pished and poohed and pested, and abused every- body, particularly each other, more in ennui than in anger. I strolled out, and took my seat under the acacias of the Alameda, killing time, and now and then an obtrusive ant, with Don Quixote. Whenever I looked up from my book, my eye fell upon the clearly-defined 184 OVERLAND JOURNEY TO SEVILLE. rugged outline of the Sierra, which lies to the north- west. I have said that I am a constitutional idolater of all high places, and I forthwith conceived a longing to stand upon some of the breezy summits before me. Where there's a will there's a way. I returned at once to my two ennuyes, and proposed to them to go to Seville by land. Victor acknowledged the brilliancy of the idea, but pronounced it impracticable ; Paul pleaded hippophobia, and thought a steamer in the bush worth two horses in the hand, — so I was once more to take the road alone. As luck would have it, I saw in the street an old man, whose grey hairs and generally grand- paternal aspect tempted me to accost him, and inquire where I could get horses. He replied that he had two himself, and invited me to come and see them. I liked the look of them, and bargained for them and a sturdy mayoral to take me to Seville, vid Eonda — a four days' journey — for twenty-two dollars. I started the same afternoon. Our sea-loving lieutenant was at the door to see me off. ' Good-bye,' he cried out after me ; ' take care of your- self ! Two fellows ' of ours' were robbed on that road, coming from Honda fair, last May.' I think it must be part of the military system at Gibraltar to inculcate a wholesome fear of robbers among the young subalterns, to prevent them straying too far a-field. After skirting the sands of the bay, and crossing the sluggish river by a ferry, we jogged quietly along, leav- ing the white town of San Roque on our right. Once or twice we passed a farm-house, whose inmates were sitting in a ring, stripping the grains of Indian corn OPPORTUNITY FOR A PAINTER. 185 from the stalk — ' shucking,' I think it is called in America. All the way, I saw nothing like a bandit, except two men with immensely long guns, and they were ranging a stubble-field with pointers for partridges, quite in a civilized and orthodox manner. As evening fell we came to a wood of pines and cork- trees, whose fresh young leaves contrasted well with their gnarled old trunks. Westward was a range of dark purple hills, whose summits were all ablaze with the fires of charcoal-burners, while great clouds of smoke went trailing across the clear green sky — a glorious combination of colour for any painter who should have courage to trespass on conventionalities, and paint things as they are. We soon plunged into the thick wood, and lost sight both of purple hills and green sky. There was a dense growth of underwood, intersected by many tracks, among which we wound in a most tortuous and perplexed fashion. I thought I detected something of irresolution in my guide's movements, so I questioned him as to whether he were perfectly sure of the way. He answered with an aplomb which quieted my doubts. At last, after much riding, we came to a forced halt before an impenetrable thicket, and then he was obliged to confess that he had lost has way and mine. There- upon, I regret to say, I lost my temper too, and abused him roundly J but he bore it with a patience which speedily disarmed my anger, insomuch that I lighted the cigar of resignation, and gave him another. Then it occurred to me to try an expedient familiar to the heroes of historical novels under similar circumstances, and never known to fail — namely, to lay the reins on 186 AN UNSUCCESSFUL EXPEDIENT. my horse's neck, and trust to his sagacity. I did so ; but instead of pricking up his ears, setting off at a brisk trot, and bringing me to the cell of an anchorite just as he was beginning vespers over a venison pasty and a flask of malvoisie, by my Halidame ! the unromantic brute stood stock-still, and began to browse. So we had nothing for it but to turn back and try another tack! We had not gone far before we came to a narrow, deep ravine, along the side of which we rode some time, hoping to find a passage. At last we found a place, over which we scrambled, not without peril to neck and limb, and finally, by great good luck, and to the sur- prise, I am sure, of both of us, we emerged into open ground, and clear moonlight, not very far from the right road. My attendant, who had almost cried before we got out of the wood, now plucked up his spirits, and set off at a good round pace, trying to overtake the lost time. We soon came to a steep hill, called, if I remember right, the Cuesta Dudon, at the foot of which is a shrubby dell, haunted, if not by bandits, at least by the fear of bandits. We kept on along the level, chiefly by the dry sandy bed of the Guadairo, till after midnight, and then the path turned sharp to the left, and climbed the steep hillside to Gaucin. It seemed as if we shoidd never attain the summit. The horses were tired, and so was at least one of the riders. Many a time the moonlight, shining on a cluster of white rocks, flattered my hopes that it was the village we sought; and at last, schooled by disappointments, I sturdily maintained the village itself to be only a cluster of white rocks, till we actually entered its narrow street. GAUCIN. 187 It was then half-past one, and we had been nearly ten houi-s on the road (and off it), when we finally dis- mounted before the fast-barred door of the posada. A vigorous kick woke the echoes — for they are light sleepers — and a repetition of the same woke at last the more substantial inmates of the place; and having pledged our word through the key -hole that we were * people of peace,' we were admitted. A most succinct housewife lighted me upstairs, carrying a velon, or lamp, which would have passed muster in a cabinet of domes- tic antiquities, so indisputably Roman it looked. My bed was laid on the floor of a kind of loft, the walls full of chinks and crannies, through which all the cardinal winds entered at will, and kept noisy conclave. They were so kind as to blow out the light just before I got into bed; and, for the rest, I was too tired to need a lullaby, or fear a hurly-burly. The south of Spain is traversed from west to east by a confused mass of mountain-ranges. Gaucin lies along the crest of the most southerly ridge, which, just above the village, culminates into a bold pinnacle of rocks. The little place can boast of a castle, in ruins already, and a convent marked out for ruin hereafter, and that soon. Some trees still grow in what was the convent garden, and among them a palm, which I was sur- prised to see at that elevation. But its chief boast is the prospect seaward, which all the world can hardly match. Through the wide, undulating plain — plain only by contrast — you may trace the winding course of the Gua- 188 LAST VIEW OF THE KOCK AND STRAITS. dairo, and beyond that a long wavy line of sea-coast; terminating in the abrupt rock of Gibraltar. Across the blue straits the view is bounded by the bluff headlands of Africa. I left the place at eight o'clock in the morning, after submitting to be robbed according to the approved fashion of civilized life. Mine host presented — not a pistol — but a bill, whose charges might not have been unreasonable at the ' Hotel des Princes.' Our road lay, at first, among slopes covered with vast vineyards — the vines being studiously clipped of their luxuriance, and reduced to the dimensions of gooseberry bushes. At the little hamlet of Algatocin, on turning round I saw for the last time, through a great gap in the hills, ' the rock' and the straits. Soon after we came upon the village and square tower-flanked castle of Benadalid, on the summit of a mountain, itself em- bosomed in, and overtopped by, still mightier moun- tains, and so on for five long, long leagues to Ronda. Not that the leagues should have apj^eared long — they were diversified by all the grand vicissitudes of hill scenery. Four elements go to form natural scenery — wood, water, variety of surface, and human works. Now in Andalucia generally there is a great scantiness of the first two, so that nature has something of monotony and iteration in its grandeur. We have hill and valley, castles, churches, and villages, but, after all, we lack the soften- ing grace of woodland, and we feel that the hills would be twice as grand if they had any lakes to reflect them. DEFECTS IN SPANISH SCENERY. 189 In truth, wood and water are to tte face of nature what hair and eyes are to the face of men. In Spain, Nature is bald and blind. But stay ! — if I make too sweeping an assertion, here is Ronda, with its cascade and its orchards, to give me the lie. ]90 CHAPTER XXIL rpHE town of Pionda is built along the edge of a cliff -L some six hundred feet high, just where a bleak and bare tract of table-land breaks suddenly away into a well-watered and fertile valley. It is intersected by a gorge, narrow and deep, running at right angles to the face of the cliff, which either the patient stream has excavated for itself, or some kindly convulsion i-ent for it. Just as it meets the cliff, this gorge is spanned by a bridge, massive as a Roman work, and, underneath, the little river flings itself down into the valley by a suc- cession of bold leaps. By the side of the torrent, a winding path leads down to a number of water-mills, very diminutive, but as busy as the best. Each of them seems made for a vignette — nestling under a rock, covered with spontaneous creepers, and flinging down a shower of diamonds of the best water. I am sorry to mention, for the credit of ' Young Ronda,' that I was assailed by a shower, not of meta- phoric diamonds, but of common silex — in short (as Mr. Micawber would say), some boys pelted me with stones. I was under the rock, like another Dentatus, and my assailants above, so that, having gravity all on their side, the mischievous urchins, had the aim been as good as the intention, might have brought my wanderings to RONDA. 19] an abrupt close. Fortunately, I met a sturdy miller, to whom I appealed; he flew into a great passion, and, in a scare-babe voice, poured upon them a torrent of ver- nacular invective, the only kind of torrent upon which the laws of gravity do not act. The lads fled tumultu- ously. Hereafter, perhaps, they may turn out capital guerilla-men, and use deadlier weapons, with deadlier efiect, against a foreign invader. The good miller attri- buted the savage disposition of the infant mind to the want of education, and believed the government to have an especial spite against Eonda, since they had not esta- blished any primary school in the place. His own education seemed to have been neglected in early life. Probably the schoolmaster was abroad at the time, and, has not returned yet. He spoke continually of ' the king,' and received, for the first time, from me intelli- gence of the accession of Isabel the Second. The view from below is grand indeed — quite the finest of the kind I have ever seen. The huge rock, crowned with grey walls and ruined towers, and quaint white houses, dwarfed by distance and contrast to the appear- ance of baby-toys — the falling water, gleaming brighter by comparison with the dark dell from which it issues, and above it the bridge, rivalling even the grandeur of Nature here, where she is grandest — all combine to form a picture which, when once seen, is stamped on the retina of memory for ever. They wrong it by compar- ing it to Tivoli. There is, indeed, here no Sibyl's temple, and the cascades are somewhat scant of water (at least, in summer), but all at Eonda is on a larger and nobler scale. No 'idler in Spain' could characterise it as a a 192 EONDA. ' sweet, lovely spot' — no tasteless architects of villas, no impertinent capability-men can cockneyfy Ronda. For- tunately, in Spain there is not much danger of their try- ing. Yet at Ronda we miss the gentle ghosts that haunt Tivoli. What is Espinel to Horace 1 By the way, I have a fancy for buying authors in situ, so I did try to get a copy of Marcos de Obregon, but in vain; no one had ever heard the name, or knew whether it was a man or a book. I once made a similarly ineffectual attempt to get a copy of Catullus at Verona. Neither poet nor novelist was honoured, or even known, in his own land. The town of Ronda boasts its fonda (start not, gentle reader, at the fortuitous rhyme ; I am not going, like Mrs. Radcliffe's heroes, ' to vent my feelings in the fol- lowing poem') — boasts, I repeat, its fonda, where the creature-comforts, external and internal, bed and beef, water and wine (with other alliterative antitheses), are supplied in first-rate style, considering the remoteness of the locality. I was charged, however, according to the standard which regulates the fleecing of officers from Gibraltar at fair-time. Happy Jasons those inn- keepers, to whom the golden fleece comes of itself to be shorn ! Yet the stupidest of all the flock can hardly fail to get his money's worth at Ronda. It is like no other place in the world. Nature, so bold and fantastic, has inspired man to emulate her. The town walls are built on the very edge of the cliff, and look as weather-beaten and as solid. Indeed, one could hardly tell where wall begins and rock ends, but for the moresque arches that UNION OF NATURE AND ART. 193 span the rents in the face of the cliff to afford a firm basis for the continuous fortification. Here man imi- tates nature — a little further down nature has imitated man, in rearing certain pinnacles of a curious con- glomerate, that look like the obelisks of antediluvian Pharaohs, washed out of shape by the flood. The first evening of my stay was gusty and threaten- ing, so there was a very scanty sprinkling of man- tillas on the Alameda, which, placed as it is on the edge of the cliff where it is highest, admits all the winds of heaven to free pratique. So for one night the winds and I had the promenade pretty nearly all to ourselves. The light of the waning wading moon fell upon the rocky pinnacles of the opposing hills, like battlements of some ruined city of the Genii, and between lay the valley — a depth of intense blackness. The whole scene looked more like one of Martin's j pictures than I ever saw Nature look before. Now 1 and then came a driving cloud, blotting out the moon I from the heavens, mountains from the earth, and castles 1 from the air. The next day Avas devoted to an excursion among ' the neighbouring hills. Mine host procured a guide . for me, a lean and withered old man, who with my 1 Mayoral (whom I called Agustin, his master's name) ; rode upon one under-sized horse, in defiance of Martin's Act. I A steep path among olive-groves leads down to the jvalley, and thence by the brook-side, a long league, to Ithe Cueva del Gato, or ' Cats' Cave,' the very name of Avhich is suggestive of a scramble. The mouth is above GAZ. O 194 THE CUEVA DEL GATO. a hundred feet in height, and cries aloud to be sketched. All about are strewn and piled great fragments of rock, ruins torn from the fountain, among which wild fig-trees and creeping plants innumerable have taken root, and fringe the black chasm with bright green. A little stream of the purest and coldest water trickles out with limpid lapse, contributing a modest quota to the fertility of the valley. Looking from within upon blue sky and glaring sunshine, the grateful coolness becomes doubly grateful. It is like being in a cathedral, or better still, for it is a great temple that Nature has built to God and herself (Deo Optimo Maximo sub invocatione Naturae); its water is purer than any which a priest pronounces holy, and its chiming falls are more melo- dious than the notes of an organ. But the Spaniards are not worshippers of Nature, and do not affect to be so, and the Cueva del Gato is used neither for prayer nor pic-nic. Leaving this, we followed the course of the stream for half a league more. Now and then we passed an orchard, where ripe apples and pears hung over our path — tempting fruit, had it only been a little lower and — forbidden. Then we crossed the stream and struck up the hill-side to the little village of Benajuan, nestling in a sheltered dip — a patch of cultivation, sur- rounded by a stony waste. The ground is divided into many small properties, and large stones are placed at intervals — the only landmarks. Men and women were busy ploughing up the ground for the next year's crop. Thence we ascended, by the stoniest track ever mis- named road, to Montehaque, another and larger moun- THE GORGE OF ZUMIDERO. 195 tain village, overlooking its own nook of trees and corn- plots. Above and around it slopes away a great waste of rock, and on a projecting ledge, close by, a ruined tower stands like a sentinel who has died on his post. Turning to the right, we skirted the base of an isolated mass of rock called the Peak of Zumidero, and soon came to a gorge bearing the same name, to explore which was the principal object of the excursion. This is an exploit only practicable in dry summer weather, for the path we followed bore indisputable marks of having been recently in the occupation of a furious torrent. I dismounted and followed my aged guide, lost in admiration at the agility he displayed. 'Who would have thought the old man had so much blood in him V But the scenery about me soon taxed my powers of admiration to the uttermost. We were threadine: a rent in the mountain, not above twenty or thirty feet in width, while the rocks on each side rose up perpen- dicularly to the height of I know not how many hundred feet. In some places the strata were tost and bent into most fantastic forms, now standing out vertically like the stumps of a petrified forest, now thrusting forth their jagged edges, like the rotting timbers of a stranded ark. But I feel that in the attempt to describe, I am falling into strained similes. Of this I am sure, that the Alps themselves contain no finer gorge than the Gorge of Zumidero. Yet I never heard its name before, and I believe this is the first time it has appeared o2 196 CAVERN. in print. It cannot fail to be stereotyped in the memory of all who have seen it. After half-an-hour's scrambling, we came to the mouth of the cave, into which the water (when there is any) precipitates itself, and emerges at the Cueva del Gato on the other side of the hill. The old man told me that, a few years ago, an Englishman entered at the one cave, and came out safe and sound at the other. How far the tale is true, T know not. When- ever any stranger does a fool-hardy act, he is set down as an Englishman, and many acts that nobody ever did are doubtless attributed to us. The cavern mouth looked very black and Acherontian, and the angle of descent approximated fearfully to the vertical. I would not have attempted the feat, had I been assured of findinsf within all the hidden treasures of Sultan Solyman. We reascended by a short cut, where the ground was very dry and slippery, and where, but for tufts of short grass, it would have been impossible to maintain a footing. In the middle of the climb, my poor old man alarmed me much by showing symptoms of fainting. If he had relaxed his grasp for an instant, he would infallibly have been killed. However, he recovered after a short pause, and we reached the top in safety. We rejoined our horses at the appointed place, and resumed our march homeward. When we reached the crest of the hill, looking eastward, a glorious prospect burst upon us. In the far distance were bare mountains, — just below our feet, the wooded, watered, fertile SUNSET VIEW. 197 valley, — and between them, the central glory of the whole, Pionda on her rocky throne, crowned with the light of the evening sun. The last gleam was still lingering about the hill tops when I arrived at the gates of Ronda, and so closed one of the white days of my life, the delights of which would have been doubled had they been shared with a friend. 198 CHAPTER XXIII. T LEFT Ronda at dawn on Thursday, September 6. -* Being high among the mountains, there was a dewy freshness in the earth, and a bracing keenness in the air, such as I had not experienced for many a day. The sides of the narrow valley along which our path lay were fringed with holm oak; on our left hand, rose a bold mountain-range — the flying buttresses of San Cristobal — from whose shady recesses, at rare intervals, sparkled white, green-belted hamlets. m The path continually descends, and the glen widens out into a broad valley, till, after a ride of three or four ^ hours, we come in sight of Zahara — a fortress famous for its gallant capture by the Moors, at ' the beginning of the end,' the first exploit of that war which ter- minated in the surrender of Granada. The strength of the position would seem to defy both force and fraud. It is a bold rocky hill, blocking up the valley, and commanding a prospect on every side. The old towers and long walls still remain, mouldered into beauty. The best view of the place is obtained from the north side, after winding round the base of the hill; then the little town, before hidden, comes into sight, cowering under the grim old castle walls, and sug- gesting all manner of fantastic similes, more or less PUERTO SERRANO. 199 similar. Should I liken it to a flock of sheep crowding to the fold? — or a flight of doves to the dovecot? — or the white- rohed chorus of a tragedy suppliant to Ares? — or Trojan maidens, blanched with fear, clasj^iug Hector's feet ? Before I had settled in my own mind an appro- priate fancy, the reality itself was lost to sight. About a league from Zahara, we emerged from glen and wood upon a wide, dreary desert of brown earth, studded with low shrubs, — lentisk, tamarisk, arbutus, and the dwarf ilex, with prickly leaves and acorns. As far as the eye could reach, the undulating hills were covered always with the like. It was a cheerless scene, — and, to add to the cheerlessness, it began to rain hard and threaten harder. However, we were approaching Puerto Serrano, which we reached, by pushing on, at one in the afternoon. It must he nearly eight leagues from Honda, and, wretched as the place looked, I was glad of rest and shelter on any terms. It consists of one long, miserable street of mud hovels, surrounded by a flat, treeless swamp. Everything has a squalid, desolate appearance, and the posada is like everything else. However, the poor people did their best to relieve my wants, and I was soon seated on their only stool (happy folks, that have one danger the less !) just within the open door, enjoying a very palatable mess of eggs and tomata. A number of ragged boys over the way gathered together, and observed my proceedings with much interest, and probably envy. I took no notice, and devoted all my attention to the dish, till on a sudden I was saluted by a volley of large stones, which the young savages dis- 200 A GOOD PASTOR. charged (with a bad aim, fortunately, like their fellows at Ronda), and then fled, in the Parthian manner, to gather means for a fresh assault. An angry man was the landlord, and loud and deep his curses. I found, on inquiry, that there was only one school in the village, and even that the cura had established, and taught himself without fee. All honour to him ! Who shall say that the army of martyrs receives no more recruits ? It is true, persecution has now ' no faggot for burning,' yet he is not the less a martyr who dies daily in a good cause. And a daily death it must be for a man who has seen other places and known better things, whose sensitiveness has been quickened by any sort of education, to be immured in a savage desert like this, and among a people as savage — a shepherd with a flock of undisguised wolves. The sun shone out upon us once more, as, after a rest of two hours, we left the miserable place and took our way across the comparatively cheerful desert which lies towards the north. I should rather have said, rises and falls ; for all there is gentle undulation ; the last heavings of the mountain before it dies into the plain. The stunted eminences and shallow depressions which we were now crossing, bore to the peaks and glens which we had left behind, the same relation that the ripples of a land-locked bay bear to the billows and troughs of the open sea. It was some relief even to think of the ceaseless life and play of the waters in the midst of such blank solitude and death-like stillness. For two long leagues I neither saw nor heard beast, bird, or insect ; so it was quite a pleasure to descry in the A PLEASANT SPRING. 201 distance, a large party, dressed in colours to matcli, sprinkling the bare bill-side like a bed of tulips. When we came up, we found them grouped round a little spring Avhich had somehow come spontaneously to the surface, and had provided itself against the fiery sun with a fringe of fern and a coping of wild fig-tree. There was a great mixed company gathered eagerly round it; horses and mules for the women to ride, while the men walked beside them, quite outdoing their fair companions in splendour of costume. A short jacket, slashed with various colours, a crimson sash, embroidered gaiters, and a little hat with a jaunty tuft, made these majos look as gay and as proud as peacocks; and nothing could be more pictorial than their unstu- died attitudes, as they lolled on the ground or leaned upon the shoulder of a mule. With these people pose and repose are equivalent terms. They were bound, they said, to the fair of Utrera, and were astonished to hear that it was not the object of my worship's journey also. They were very polite, and offered me the never- failing 'fire,' presenting the cigar after the most ap- proved mode of civilized society. My object was water, but they had so puddled the well that I was fain to slake my thirst with wine — an unpalatable substitute when the thirst is real. The Spaniards need not boast of their sobriety; they may thank their stars for it; in the chill foggy atmosphere of England, they would soon become acclimatized to brandy. Half a league farther on we passed near a great square castle, with keep and towers and curtain walls, 202 innkeeper's dignity. all complete. I was much tempted to diverge and examine it, but the setting sun warned me to push on, for I had no fancy for passing the night in a shrubbery, after the fashion of the Don and Sancho. It was not yet dark when we got to Coronil — a considerable place, with its ruined castle, of course; and, what was more to my purpose, a decent posada, intitled ' Del Pilar.' The burly host was reposing on a stone seat before the door as we rode up. He made no sign of welcome, but I had long found that the only way of conciliating an innkeeper was to do by design what Don Quixote did in madness, — to treat his house as if it were a castle, and him as if he were the lord thereof. The truth is, every man is above his trade, and would hold his dignity sullied by showing the least empressement towards a customer. Necessity compels him to open his door; but, in revenge, he entrenches himself behind a breast-work of reserve. Dismount and approach, he consents to parley; salute with grave courtesy, he accepts a truce; address in your stateliest Castilian, his flattered 'worship' surrenders at discre- tion ; presenc a Gibraltar cigar, the lord of the castle is merged in the idolater of tobacco, and becomes the humblest of your slaves. I tried this plan of attack at Coronil with eminent success, and was immediately put in possession of such resources for supper and sleep as the vanquished foe could command. The night, however, was rendered most unquiet by the arrival and departure of successive troops going to Utrera fair; and I regretted the less having to rise at two in the morning, and take the road UTRERA. 203 also. The dwiudling moon just showed enough of the surrounding country to free me from any regret I might otherwise have felt, at not having seen it by day — it was 'waste and bare,' — that mournful iteration knells through every Spanish tour. We passed several groups on the road, and at dawn reached Utrera, now the centre of attraction. Here we rested for an hour — time enough to see all worth seeing in the town. The church boasts an elaborately sculptured doorway of the time of Ferdinand and Isabel. Close by is a covered market, which even at that early hour was humming like a hive; the buyers swarming like so many bees about the tempting wares; heaps of water- melons, piled like cannon-balls, baskets of ripe grapes, rich green pimentoes, and scarlet tomatas. Leaving Utrera, instead of following the main road, we struck into a bye-path through a forest of scattered pine trees, the ground beneath thickly grown with the I bush called carasca, which showered its dew upon our 'feet as we rode along the narrow track. As we ap- Iproached the end of our journey, Agustin, who had ibeen sulky and taciturn all the way, began to brighten up and grow talkative. I suspected that the change of behaviour was due to a politic calculation regarding Ithe ' buena mano.' His chief theme was the oppres- ision of the government. When they helped to hunt out Espartero they had been taught to expect that they jshould have less taxes to pay for the future; but, on jthe contrary, the taxes had been doubled. Everybody iheartily repented of having exchanged Kegent Log for 'Premier Serpent. They were all ready for revolt, and 204 AN OLD RHYME. would join the French or anybody, to get rid of Narvaez. How far all this was true I know not, but I am of opinion that the lower orders in Spain (as else- where) entertain a general hatred of all governments, and an especial hatred of the government for the time being. Moreover, the improved system of national taxation introduced by Mon, affords fewer loopholes for escape than the former awkward plan of provincial assessment. Apropos of French invasion, Agustin repeated to me an old rhjTue (' refran muy antiguo') the purport of which is strangely at variance with the pride and self- confidence which are supposed to characterize all the Spanish. Here it is : — El Rey de Espafia eu campana, Y el Rey de Francia en retiro, Espana sera de Francia, Y el tiempo doy por testigo. That is Let the king of Spain fight might and main, And the French king stay at home, Yet over Spain shall the Frenchman reign, And my test is time to come. By-and-bye, we left the wood of pines, and passed through vast olive grounds, each with its hacienda, or grange, attached; then we came to a little dusty village, where I purchased two pounds of grapes for something less than an English penny, and soon after saw the Giralda, towering over a rising ground which still hid all the rest of Seville. I pushed on, and in a few minutes looked down on the wide plain which surrounds the i A CHEAP shilling's-worth. 205 walls of the famous city. Here, as at Madrid, there is no interval of compromise between town and country; compact within its walls, and thick-set with towers, the city seems to have clustered round the great central mass of the cathedral. But it was getting near noon, and intensely hot, so I did not pause to consider whether or no the first sight had disappointed me, but cantered on to meet, or make, the air. I passed over the Que- madero, where the victims of the Inquisition used to be burnt — delighted in spurning it with my horse's heels — and presented myself and my effects at the nearest gate. ' Have you anything contraband V asked the cara- binero. ' Nothing.' ' Are you sure V and he came a little nearer, lowering his tone; then, with his hand on my saddle, he repeated, ' Quite sure V in an affectionate whisper. I put a peseta into his willing hand, and was bidden to proceed, unsearched, ' with the blessing of God' — altogether, a cheap shilling's-worth. 20 G CHAPTER XXIV. rpHE Fonda de Europa has been a palace in its day. -^ Now it has a shop-front, and externally is no way distinguishable from the neighbouring houses of the tortuous Calle de los Sierpes (Serpents'-street). But inside is a court, with marble pillars all round, support- ing an arcade; and in the middle the shrubs grow as freshly, and the fountain plays as cheerfully as ever. My rooms on the ground floor opened into this court, and it was very pleasant of an evening to inhale the faint fragrance from the opening blossoms of the ' Lady of Night,' and to listen to the ceaseless splashing of the water. But, alas ! too often sentiment received rude shocks by the mingling of scents and sounds, more pro- saic and familiar, — a whiff betraying the proximity of a cigar, or a gurgling suggestive of bottled beer. The latter luxury implies, of course, the presence of our country- men, — Ubi bene est ibi patria. Wherever an English- man can get his beer, he feels himself at home. In the present case our nation was represented by two or three officers from ' Gib,' on pleasure because oft" duty, and lying in bed till noon because they were not forced to rise for parade at six. Lounging about the corri- dors of this veritable Castle of Indolence were a number of bearded, sallow specimens of young Italy, — the singers SEVILLE CATHEDRAL. 207 of the opera, — much given to oratorical vehemence and expectoration — propensities offensive at all times, but especially at dinner. These kings of the stage were the tyrants of the table, and at last goaded the much suffer- ing minority into open revolt. So some half-dozen ot us, English and French, declared ourselves a republic, and established a new provisional regime, by resolving to dine at a separate table, and a later hour. We chris- tened our mess the entente cordial. The secession was further strengthened by Paul and Victor, my old friends, who had come by way of Cadiz. The morning after my arrival, I hastened betimes to the cathedral, reckoned by all natives (except the inha- bitants of other cathedral towns) the grandest in Spain. Thus they class them, — Seville first, Toledo second, Burgos third; and I had congratulated myself in being able to see them in due order of climax. It is painful j to confess disappointment, after having come so far for ! the purpose of being astonished, but such was my feel- I ing on the first view of Seville Cathedral. It is built in jlate Gothic, — a style which Pugiu and Ruskiu have i compelled one to despise, — and, besides, is hampered i with accessory edifices, destroying all unity and symme- jtry of design. After all, its enormous height and vast I bulk give it a sublimity — barbarous, if you will — but .sublimity still. On the north side stretches the famous iCourt of Oranges, surrounded externally by the old IMoorish walls. The same gate which opened to admit iSt. Ferdinand, the conqueror of the thirteenth century, jstands ajar for the tourist of the nineteenth. A troop ';of noisy children are chasing each other in and out i I 208 SEVILLE CATHEDRAL. among the rows of orange-trees, or sailing boats of wal- nut-shell in the basin of the fountain, without let or hindrance, for in Spain, happily for the children of all growths, there are no beadles, nor any of those severe functionaries who in England impress upon one the impossibility of doing anything or going anywhere. A horse-shoe arch, under which, in old times, the mem- bers of the one true faith passed into their mosque, now admits the members of the other true faith into their cathedral. Internally, the qualities of size and height tell upon you with increased effect. At first, till your eye becomes accustomed to the stinted light, all seems dark and void, like some vast cavern. One would think that the priestly architects were jealous of admitting even the glory of heaven into the temple of God. By-and-by, as the separate details develop themselves to the view, so colossal are they that they diminish your idea of the magnitude of the whole; but this again is forced upon the understanding in spite of sense, when you reflect that those pigmies on the floor are full-sized men. Here, as elsewhere, the general effect is injured by the massive interpolations which separate the choir and counter choir from the body of the church. The altar screen reaches almost from base to roof, and contains statues enough to represent all the saints in the calendar. A number of steps lead up to the high altar, which is fenced on each side by a gilt railing as tall as an ordi- nary church. The central space between the two choirs is left open, only during mass a bar is placed along each side to keep off" the laity. The other choir has a heavy ELEVATION OF THE HOST. 209 classical screen at the western end and two enormous organs, one on each side. On Sundays and festivals all the space commanding a view of the high altar is crowded with worshippers, the men standing, till on a sudden a bell rings and every one drops down on his knees, some almost prostrating themselves, to adore the elevated Host. Through the gilded rails, amid a dense cloud of incense-smoke, you see the tapers burning round the holy place, and can just discern the scarlet and white robes of the priests on the steps of the altar. Then the organ peals out; and all your senses are captive to illu- sion. One day I was present at a procession round the aisles — a much less imposing ceremony, for it took place in fuller light, which brought to view all the accom- panying meannesses and incongruities : one saw that the tinsel was not gold. I could not help remarking that though the robes of the priests were of scarlet em- broidery, their boots looked as if they had not been cleaned for a month. Moreover, they kept chatting by the way in an undertone, and the acolytes seemed to think it good fun, for they grinned and made faces, undeterred by the presence of the Cardinal-archbishop, who was walking in the procession. At intervals he halted, and two priests came before him, and after kneel- ing for an instant, commenced jerking their pots of in- cense up, and then dexterously withdrawing them when about three inches from his Eminence's face. I was most edified by the quiet demeanour of the prelate, who seemed neither elated by the homage nor startled by the censer's proximity to his nose — habit, GAZ. P 210 PAINTINGS IN THE CATHEDRAL, doubtless, had enabled bim to surmount both weak- nesses. The church, its chapels and adjuncts, sacristy, chapter-house, &c., form a perfect museum of art, con- taining, inter alia, about a score of Murillos. Of these the most celebrated are the ' St. x\ntony of Padua,' in the last chapel on the north side, and the ' Guardian Angel' between the western doors. The former can only be well seen about four or five o'clock in a bright afternoon. In size it may be twenty feet by ten. The saint, in friar's frock and cowl, is kneeling on one knee, with out-spread hands, half open mouth and eager eye, to greet the Infant Jesus, who is seen descending in a glory girt Avith dark clouds, and attended by a host of angels. The scene is a church, with pillars and marble floor : beside St. Antony is a table, with an open book and a vase of lilies, and in the background is a door through which one sees a sunny court and arcade. The figure of the saint is glorious. The subject is one where Murillo's genius never fails him. The pale worn cheek and sunk eye flush and flash with rapturous joy; the ecstasy of a moment repays the suff'erings of years — one glimpse of heavenly light compensates a thousand nights of watching. The other picture was conceived in a tenderer mood. The Guardian Angel, in bright raiment, gently leads by the hand a little child; with one arm he points to i heaven, and the child's eyes follow it wonderingly. ' Not far from it hangs ' the Adoration of the Shep- herds,' a most charming specimen of Luis de Vargas, a master who has left little behind him but a reputation. PAINTINGS IN THE CATHEDRAL. 211 The rustics are represented bringing all manner of animals and fruits as offerings to the new-born Saviour. Beautiful as the picture is, it gives one the idea rather of a successful piece of eclecticism than an original design. A bright-eyed child hugging a goat, as loth to part with it, is quite after the manner of Raphael, and a fair-haired full-blown woman, carrying a baby, is a palpable plagiarism from Paul Veronese. The ' genre' reminds us of the Bassanos. In the Chapel of St. lago is a grand picture of Eoelas. The saint is mounted on his traditionary white horse, smiting and trampling down a crowd of turbaned infidels, breasting the tempest of battle, and leaving in his rear a calm wake, in which the banners and spears of Castile come dancing on to victory. In the distance are seen the routed Moors, flying towards some towers dimly visible against a lurid sky. Nothing can be bolder than the treatment of the subject; the horse is galloping out from the canvas, and the spectator can hardly repress an impulse to step aside and make way for him. Not far from the western entrance is a slab marking the grave of Fernando Colon (Columbus). The in- scription modestly grounds his claims to posthumous memory, on the fact that he was his father's son. Two curious representations of the galleys in which the great I admiral navigated the Atlantic are cut in the marble. . They are executed with an uncertain hand, like a I schoolboy's drawing. In one of them are two figures I with crowns, representing Ferdinand and Isabel, quite p2 212 THE GIRALDA. enormous in proportion to the vessel — nearly half-mast high. The Giralda, so called from a colossal weathercock at the top, is a great square tower at the north-east corner of the cathedral. The lower part is of Moorish con- struction, the rest a Christian addition. You ascend, not by steps, but by a succession of inclined planes, which lead easily and pleasantly to the top of the square part. This is surmounted by a somewhat fantastic erec- tion, neither tower nor spire, narrowing by successive stages to a point on which pirouettes the weathercock aforesaid, a figure of Faith, veering with every wind that blows. Was it put there in satire, or simplicity 1 I should recommend the substitution of an archbishop — if a cardinal, so much the better, the jest will have the more point. The view is of course superb. All Seville lies spread out at one's feet like a model of itself. Indeed, it is only by studying the plan of the town from this eminence that one is able to find any clue to the perplexed laby- rinth of its narrow streets. Here and there is a plot of green, cypresses or palm-trees, surrounded by gaunt ranges of white buildings, decaying and decayed — these, be sure, are the suppressed convents. Further away are outlying orange groves, most extensive on the opposite side of the Guadalquivir, whose sheeny windings are visible far to east and far to west along the level plain. A few miles to the north rise sloping hills planted with olives, and crowned here and there with a village or convent. Turning southward, the view is bounded by LIBRARY. 213- the blue rugged outline of San Cristobal — the Atlas, in both senses, of Christendom. Attached to the cathedral is a considerable library very liberally thrown open to the public. I generally spent two or three hours there in the heat of the day. There were always half-a-dozen little boys reading dili- gently. Their favourite books were Don Quixote, Mariana, and Solis. The nucleus of the library was the collection of Fernando Colon, the same who is buried in the cathedral. I was allowed to examine some very curious letters in the handwriting of Christopher himself. In a copy of Seneca, which belonged to the son, the famous lines in the Medea are marked with his pen : Venient annis saecula seris, Quibiis oceanus vincula rerum Laxet, et ingens pateat Tellus, Tetliysque novos detegat orbes, Neque sit terris ultima Thule. And in the margin he has added a note : — ' This pro- phecy was fulfilled by my father's discovery of Hispa- niola, October 12, 1492,' Columbus himself, in a memo- rial which I saw in his own hand, appealed to this ' prophecy,' as he called it — a curious instance of the almost religious reverence paid, after ' the revival of learning,' to the old classics. In the same spirit, Virgil's Pollio was construed into a vaticination of the Saviour's birth; and in the Dies Irce, the Sibyl is joined with David as a witness for the coming judgment-day. I found some curious information in a book called 214: LIBRARY. Chrandezas de Sevilla, by Espinosa, a canon of the cathe- dral in the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the following century. He gives a diffuse but interesting account of the funeral ceremonies performed in comme- moration of Phili]! the Second. A sumptuous catafalque was erected in the cathedral, adorned with pictures by Pacheco and others, representing the glories of his reign. Among the rest was one of the ' Conquest of England!' — an event frequently alluded to in the Epigrams and other poems written on the same occasion. May our enemies ever have the same cause for triumph! Yet I honour the stubborn pride which refused to believe that the * Invincible' had been vanquished. But the account given of the rejoicings at Seville in 1622, when Gregory the Fifteenth had conferred upon the Virgin the title of ' sin pecado concebida,' was still more curious and characteristic. The whole city gave itself up to delirious joy, which it manifested in the strangest way. There was a grand procession, in which all the heroes of antiquity, mythological or historical, were impressed to do honour to the immaculately-con- ceived Mary. Among the rest was a statue of Hercules, with the legend : — Ercules dize que soys Sin pecado concebida Y per vos dada la vida. Then followed a statue of Julius Cfesar, with a new interpretation of the initials S.P.Q.R. — Sancta, Pura, Querpo impecable, Reyna libre. There was also a grand tournament in the Plaza de San Francisco. All this is LIBRARY. 2] 5 narrated with the most devout gravity by the author, who concludes his book with this crowning glory vouch- safed to the faithful city. But as I cannot share his devotion, neither must I imitate his prolixity, so here I close my cathedral chapter. 216 CHAPTER XXV. rpHE convent of La Merced Calzada — ' Grace in shoes' J- — has been turned into a museum of pictures, its former occupation and occupants being gone. It is, they say, the only one of the newly-formed provincial museums which contains anything but rubbish — though, indeed, Seville might well rank as a metropolis in art. Here, probably, the gems were too well known to be abstracted with impunity; while in other places, during the turmoil of ecclesiastical revolution, many individuals, private and official, took advantage of din and dust to secure the best things for themselves. I heard so many well-authenticated stories to this effect, that, if it were not for their constant professions of pure patriotism, I should be inclined to suspect Spaniards of a propensity to jobbing. Even here the accumulation has been so indiscriminate that it does not deserve to be called a collection; everything in the shape of smeared canvas has been admitted ; and there is no catalogue by way of guide. Fortunately, the bad is so bad, and the good so good, as a general rule, that no one need be at a loss. There are, I think, no less than twenty-five Murillos, most of which were to be arranged in one saloon, called after his name. I will not stay to enumerate, much less to describe them; for a verbal sketch of this or that LA MERCED CALZADA. JilT picture, however detailed, is useless to those who have not seen it, and superfluous to those who have. I must, however, mention the ' St. Thomas of Villanueva giving alms to the poor,' which looks like a pendent to the St. Isabel at Madrid. Squalid poverty and loathsome disease are faithfully portrayed, and yet do not revolt the sense, so elevated, almost glorified, are they by the benevolence of which they are the objects. Though the I colouring is generally sombre, yet the picture is, as it { were, steeped in warm and glowing atmosphere — a pecu- •liarity observable in many or most of Murillo's works. It is produced, I am informed, by his employment of a ' red priming, which tells through the upper coating of [ paint. Here and there, where a crack or flaw occurred, I this red priming was distinctly visible. Among the rest [of the pictures, perhaps the 'St. John in the Desert,' and ' St. Francis embracing the Cross,' have remained most distinctly impressed on my memory. I stood for |Some time to watch a young artist copying the ' St. John,' and understood the original all the better. It was like ireading Chaucer, with a modernized text on the opposite ipage. In contemplating the whole series, I was lost in iadmiration of the power which enabled one man to 'depict, in such startling reality, every phase of suffering lor rejoicing humanity, and to present so grand an ideal of dying or triumphant God. The post of honour over the altar, in the ci-devcmt chapel, is assigned to ' the Apotheosis of St. Thomas iAquinas,' the masterpiece of Zurbaran. When this picture was in the Louvre, it was placed side by side with the ' Transfiguration,' and it was a moot point 218 LA MERCED CALZADA. among the Parisian amateurs whether of the two was the finer work. Zurbaran painted it when only twenty- seven, and in the course of a long life never approached the excellence of this early effort. Among the curiosities of the Museum, may be men- tioned Don Isidoro, the curator thereof, a stout old gentleman of an original and cosmopolitan turn of mind. One day he developed to me at great length a plan for remedying the confusion of Shinar, and bring- ing all mankind to speak one language, and that, of course, the Castilian — Don Isidoro being profoundly ignorant of any other. Meanwhile, pending the execu- tion of his scheme, he would make an excellent corre- sponding member for the Peace Society. It is a favourite saying with tourists, that Seville is the Florence of Spain, the most salient points of resemblance being the Giralda and Giotto's Tower. Yet it is doing foul wrong to the shade of the gentle Tuscan, to liken his graceful and airy conception to the solid, cumbrous work of Abu-Ebn-what's-his-name (the Moorish archi- tect). There is, however, so far a resemblance between the two cities, that the public buildings of each are filled Avith works of art done by the hands of their own citizens — monuments of filial gratitude. Pictures have a double charm when seen in the place for which the artist destined them, surrounded by their appropriate frame-work. One derives far more pleasure from con- templating a Murillo in the Caridad, than from its companion at Stafford-house. There is a nameless charm about the former which a Soult could not pilfer nor a Sutherland purchase. Every one has heard of the THE CARIDAD — ITS ORIGIN. 219 grand picture, ' Moses striking the Rock,' and no one was ever disappointed when he saw it. It is thoroughly Andalucian in costumes, complexions, and crockery. These systematic anachronisms of the great painters may be justified, I think, by the true principles of ' high art.' The facts of religious history are of universal application, and only interest us so far as they appertain to ourselves, our country, and our times. The painter dramatizes the scene by adopting the character and costume of his own people and his own day. So, also, in the drama itself: Juliet's nurse chatters in idiomatic Saxon, and lago sings about King Stephen and his trews. And as the great masters, in their earthly scenes, despised the proprieties of time and place, so, in their representations of Heaven, they soared above all the laws of optics. It would have seemed to them an impiety to ' foreshorten' the crowned Mother of God. In the sacristy, behind the altar, is a crucifixion, attributed to Alonso Cano, and worthy of him or any- body. The cross is set upon a mountain peak, and on it hangs the Saviour, left alone with death. A ghastly light of unnatural eclipse is seen breaking here and there through the dark clouds. This Caridad is a great hospital, founded by Don Miguel de Manara, and thereby hangs a tale. Don Miguel was young and rich, much given to revelry, whereon he spent his time and his substance as reck- lessly, as if both were to last for ever. Late one night he was returning, flushed with wine, from a gay carousal; the streets of Seville were dark, silent, and deserted. 220 THE CARIDAD — ITS ORIGIN. Suddenly be became aware of a funeral procession moving noiselessly by bis side. A long line of mourners, in deep black, walked two and two, eacb witb a lighted taper. One of them, as be passed, gave Don Miguel a taper not ligbted, saying, ' Come witb us.' He felt con- strained to follow, and tried repeatedly to light bis taper, but could not; at last be inquired wbose body they were bearing to the grave 1 and one answered him, ' Don Miguel de Maiiara's.' They came to the church where his father and ancestors were buried. It was in a blaze of light ; and as the procession entered, a multi- tude of voices began to chant a Miserere. He tried to join, but his voice refused its office: gradually, as if from the damp stone floor, a deadly chill crept over his frame from feet to head, and he remembered no more. Next morning the sexton, when be unlocked the door, found Don Miguel prostrate before the altar, in a deep swoon. He was with difficulty restored to himself — a difi'erent self, for from that time forward he abandoned his plea- sures, and devoted his life and fortune to found and endow the Hospital of the Caridad. If any rationalist presume to explain away the story, I answer, ' There is the hospital, a solid stone-and-mortar proof — can you explain away that?' The churches of Seville make little pretension, at least externally, to architectural beauty. Many, how- ever, are exceedingly curious, having been mosques in their day, or synagogues. Who shall say to what uses they may still come? In the church of All-Saints is a j curious combination — a rose window and doorway of rich florid Gothic have been grafted upon the Moorish THE UNIVERSITY. 221 stock. Close by is the house of the Counts of Montijo, now deserted and ruinous. Across the family coat of arms two iron bars are nailed, and this is the reason : — In the days of Peter the Cruel, an ancestor of the family held some office, of which he carried a wand as badge. One day, in a fit of irritation, at some act of the king's, he broke this wand. The monarch, for once belying his character and his name, pardoned the offence ; but ordered that the broken wand should always be dis- played over the arms of the house. The university presents rather an imposing exterior. Inside it is cut up into courts, too small and too plain for architectural effect. Their only decoration was a profusion of whitewash. I peeped into some of the lecture- rooms; they were very small, and simple, almost rude, in furniture. Judging from the appearance of the benches, Spanish students seemed addicted to ' whittling,' — but, as it was long vacation time, I had no opportunity of observing their habits. The library, however, was still open, as it is all the year round except saints' days. There is a reading-room attached, to which all may have free access. The books are chiefly eccle- siastical. There are, on the wholej seventy-five thou- sand volumes, including duplicates; all in most admired disorder, for the newly appointed curator, a young man, had just set himself to the task of re-arranging them, quite in Ercles' vein. The adjoining church contains several grand speci- mens of Roelas, — that great painter, who is known and honoured nowhere else but in his own city. Of these, the biggest picture, ' The Circumcision,' is perhaps the 222 A PERIPATETIC PHILOSOPHER. greatest. The face of the infant Saviour is exquisite. The brow is calm, and there is a sweet smile on the lips; and yet it is pervaded by an expression of intense pain. The subject, so nearly approaching the ludicrous, is treated in such a manner as to be incontestably sublime. The picture which, in the judgment of Cean Ber- mudez, is Roelas's masterpiece, hangs over the high altar in the church of San Isidore, and represents the death of the Saint. Roelas was a priest as well as a painter, and in this work the ecclesiastical spirit is blended with the artistic. The aged archbishop is represented as dying in the arms of his archdeacons, and the inferior clergy stand round in due order ; while above, the Virgin and Christ, with all the host of heaven, wait to crown the parting spirit. An old man, who sometimes accompanied me as laquais-de-2)lace, in his prolix exposition of the picture, spoke of ' the blessed Trinity.' I asked him how he made that out 1 and he said, ' Why, there's the Virgin, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.' Yet, on secular matters, he was generally well-informed. His name is Jose Lasso de la Vega, and claims kin with the poet Garci of that ilk. He had served under the British in the war of Independence, and cherishes a gold pencil-case, given him, he says, by ' Sir Campbell.' Now, poor and old, he is glad to be employed as ' guide to Seville,' and is far superior to the professors of the craft. One day, with the most cheerful garrulity, he narrated all his misfortunes, concluding with an elevated senti- ment : ' And yet, now that I am poor, I am better and ha})pier than when I was rich.' I pressed him to account THE RESIDENCE OF MURILLO. 223 for the fact, hoping to hear some practical philosophy from the unconscious Stoic, and his answer was : ' Well, sir, when I was rich, I used to eat more than was good for me.' Our philosopher talks in no other idiom than his native Castilian, so that one takes, perforce, a peripa- tetic lesson in the language. Generally, however, when once familiar with the place, it is better to go alone. Official people relax rules, and private people incon- venience themselves, much more readily to oblige a stranger than a native. For instance, once or twice I went with Seiior Vega, and asked permission to see the Canon Cepero's pictures, which was, on one pretext or other, always refused. I then went alone, and was immediately admitted, and the housekeeper told me I should have been admitted before, had I not been accompanied by a laquais-dii-place. The Canon's gallery contains now little that is remarkable, but the house is interesting as having been Murillo's own. This circumstance induced the Canon, who is an impassioned amateur, to fix his residence there. And a very pleasant house it is ; the rooms occupied by the artist overlook a little shady garden, with a fountain. Here he died, and was buried in a church close by. This church was destroyed by the French, and its site converted into a plazuela (or small square). They have left many such, as monuments of their domination. The construction of them does not require much archi- tectural skill. Murillo was born somewhere in the Calle de las Tiendas, lately re-christened Calle de Murillo ; with 224 DELIVERANCE OF ST. PETER. brief exceptions, he passed the threescore and four intervening years at Seville — so narrow was the orbit in which his life moved whose fame has gone round the world. The church in which he was baptized has shared the same fate as that in which he was buried; but the parish registers have been transferred to the adjoining church of St. Paul. I was curious to see the entry of his baptism, and one morning after mass I found a courteous priest, who at once fished out for me the required volume. It is the first entry for the year 1618. His father is called simply Gaspar Esteban; perhaps the family had not yet acquiesced in the nick- name of ' Murillo,' though the painter has once or twice siirned it on his works. From St. Paul to St. Peter the transition is easy. In one of the chapels of the church dedicated to the latter Saint, is a picture representing his deliverance from prison, attributed to Eoelas, but, I think, unworthy of its author. The Angel is so ponderous and muscular, that it suggests the idea of his having effected the deliverance by mere physical force. However, it is con- sidered a prize, and as such is jealously guarded by a curtain. The verger who has charge of this curtain makes much of the picture — by fees. I did not grudge the two reals, as he communicated a fact, curious, whether in a historical or etymological point of view. I should premise, that 'coger las de Villadiego' is a slang phrase in Spanish for absconding, or runningi away without leave. ' You see,' said the verger, ' that soldier asleep, keeping CASA DE PILATOS. 225 watch over His Holiness (St. Peter). Well, his name was Villadiego. So when the angel woke St. Peter, and told him to arise and follow, St. Peter could not find his shoes : ' No tengo mis calzas,' said he. ' Never mind,' replied the angel, ' coge las de Villadiego (take Villadiego's). And so the phrase has been in use ever since.' This precious story, originating probably in some ecclesiastical joke, was narrated by the man gravely, as if he believed it. It is one instance among a thousand of the simplicity with which the common people adapt Scripture, or what they suppose to be Scripture, to themselves and their habits. In the same spirit, they will tell you that a quaint mediaeval Gotho-moresque house, called the Casa de Pilatos, was really inhabited by the worthy whose name it bears. It belongs to the Duke of Medina Coeli, but is now abandoned to wind, rain, and occasional tourists. Indeed, the family has become so impoverished (so they told me) that I question whether they live in any house at all. Most of the great historic families have palaces in Seville; among the rest, the Counts of A , The history of the present Count might furnish materials for a romance, — perhaps it is a romance itself, — but ' I tell the tale as 'twas told to me.' His father lived at Seville, a quiet man of literary tastes, and averse to the fuss and fume of demonstrative patriots; accordingly, he became an object of suspicion to the mob, who, knowing no distinction between suspicion and proof, marked him for an Afrancesado, and one day tore him to pieces in the open street. Soon after, the French GAZ. Q 226 A ROMANTIC INCIDENT. came. The misfortunes of the widowed Countess made her naturally an object of sympathy to the gallant strangers, several of whom were lodged in her house. When, some time after, they evacuated Seville, the Countess evacuated it too, under the special protection of a French officer, taking with her her only son, a child of seven years old. By-and-by they found the child an incumbrance, and accordingly dropped him at a little village in Catalonia, leaving him in the charge of a peasant. One day, as he was playing in the street with some other boys, a quarrel arose, and one of them struck him. ' How dai-e you,' cried he, ' strike the Count of A !' It happened that at that moment the priest was passing, and heard what was said. He took the boy and questioned him, and learnt all he knew of his own history, — brought him back to Seville, and estab- lished his identity, to the great chagrin of collateral relatives ; and the Count of A is now living in his father's house, a prosperous gentleman. ■I 227 CHAPTER XXVI. "OESIDES Victor and Paul, there were two other J--' French gentlemen staying at our Fonda: one, an old soldier, who had served in the grand army, and had many anecdotes to tell of the Little Corporal and his campaigns; the other, a young fellow of twenty, light- hearted and feather-headed, taking kindly to everything, but, withal, dominated by one master passion. An early propensity to squirts and all the aquatic amuse- ments of childhood had grown with his growth, and developed into a tender affection for fountains, pumps, and water-tubs — a genuine hydromania. ' Ma specialite c'est les robinets,' he used to say, — and Seville was a city after his own heart. One day we went to the Alcazar, the gardens of which are full of concealed fountains. He instinctively detected them and their modus operandi, and took great delight in spouting a playful shower into the coat-pocket of his elderly com- panion. The presence of our insidious foe prevented us from paying to the gardens the attention which they well deserve, from their peculiarity. They suggest the idea of having been devised by a Dutchman, whose prim plan and precise rules are thwarted and violated by the luxuriant outgrowth of tropical vegetation — a horti- q2 228 GARDENS OF THE ALCAZAR. cultural Frankenstein. Only give nature an unlimited supply of water, and she rises with a giant's strength, defies the shears, and shows her abhorrence of geometry. (It would be well if the gardeners on a larger scale would bear in mind, that the treatment which suits the holly and the yew is not therefore applicable to the palm and the aloe.) Green oranges (not in any way alle- gorical) were hanging in profusion from the drooping boughs. He of the robinets plucked enough to fill the pockets of his revered friend, thus doing a double mis- chief. I felt strongly tempted to push him into the fish-pond, and take an appropriate and summary ven- geance for all his pleasant vices. Here Philip the Fifth used to dangle and angle, with some success it is said. The species of fish which allowed themselves to be caught by him must have been remarkably loyal or remarkably stupid. The Moorish rooms of the Alcazar are on a somewhat larger scale than the portion of the Alhambra from which they were copied. The principal court is about twenty-eight paces long, by twenty-two broad. It also struck me that the stucco ornaments were less elaborately wrought out in detail than their prototypes. One day, in company with a French banker, long resident at Seville, we went to explore Triana, the suburb which lies on the north side of the Guadalquivir. On the way we met a priest, with a few acolytes, carrying the host to some sick person. As my com- panions, Roman-catholics though they were, did not kneel, I thought myself, as a protestant, entitled, d fortiori, to dispense with the ceremony, so we all merely INSTANCES OF SPANISH PRIDE. 229 took off our hats, and accordingly received a savage look from his reverence, and the epithet of ' barbaros.' This made our banker very wroth, — and he forthwith commenced a diatribe against Spaniards in general and Sevillians in particular, accusing them of ignorance, laziness, and pride. They lived, he said, from hour to hour, taking no thought for the morrow, and wrapt up in the contemplation of their own national and personal superiority to all other nations and persons upon earth, though even their patriotism was more parochial than national. They were all ashamed of their trade; the very hawker in the street would try to impress you with the idea that he hawked for his amusement. By-and-by we came to a wattled hut on the river's bank to wait for the ferry-boat, in which a man was sitting eating a water-melon. According to the Spanish fashion, he asked us to partake, saying, ' I am eating it merely for refreshment.' The banker whispered, ' It's his dinner, but he's too proud to own it.' There may be — indeed, I know there is — much truth in all this vituperation, but I have always remarked that Frenchmen were prone to indulge in unmeasured contempt for their Peninsular neighbours, — who, in character and feeling, are separated from them by barriers, compared with which the Pyrenees are but mole-hills. The juster and true view is, to regard national faults as the shadows attendant upon national virtues. In the course of the same walk, we visited the Cartuja, an enormous convent, now converted into a porcelain manufactory by Mr. Pickman, — perhaps the 230 ANGLO-SPANISH SPECULATION. only Englishman who has found a Spanish speculation answer. He had at first difficulties to contend with — jealousy on the part of the natives, and misconduct on the part of his own countrymen. For he had imported forty or fifty skilled workmen from Stafford- shire, and in the course of a few weeks most of them had to be sent home, as they proved incapable of with- standing the temptations of a country, where a man might be drunk for a week on a day's wages. How- ever, the preliminary obstacles have been overcome, and the establishment shows all the outward signs of prosperity. Here and there, among the workmen, I still noticed the light hair and heavy eye which characterize us children of the mist. What would the old abbots say, if they could see their corridors and cloisters filled with a busy crowd, and their desecrated church piled high with pottery, the ' superior' being a stranger and a heretic ! Part of the rich stall-carving is now stowed away in what was the sacristy, and part has been sent across the river to the Museum. Close by is an immense orange-grove, in which Mr. Pickman has erected two summer-houses, of the willow pattern, such as George the Fourth loved, and painted like an ornamental flower-pot, thus pleasantly blending the shop and the garden. But Mr. P.'s courtesy ought to exempt him from all quizzing. I hope he may make and keep a large fortune, and be made a ' Grand of Spain,' under the title of Duke of Perseverance — a title quite in accordance with the modern coinage. It is, however, a monstrous anomaly to designate an hereditary aristocracy by abstract qualities rather than INCONSISTENCY OF TITLES. 231 territorial possessions. The ' Duke of Thunder,' suits the naval hero well, but is not so applicable to the country vicar who succeeds him. Moreover, such an assumption is apt to provoke a mischief-loving Nemesis to plague a man, even in his own generation. The ' Prince of Peace' may be a prisoner of war, and the ' Duke of Victory' utterly defeated. We might, perhaps, adopt the plan, with modifications, in our plain-spoken England, — and, in ostracizing to the Upper House a Foreign Secretary or Chancellor of the Exchequer, might entitle them respectively, ' Marquis of Meddling' and ' Duke of Deficiency.' Seville boasts a spacious theatre, dedicated to St. Ferdinand ; for theatres in Spain are not supposed, as in England, to be in exclusive occupation of the anta- gonist powers. Here, Italian operas alternate with the legitimate drama, — by which term I understand any sort of piece in which the dialogue is spoken, and not sung. The evening generally concludes with a boisterous farce, full of outrageous practical jokes, which would out-Wright Wright, and frighten the Adelphi from its propriety. When a piece has been unusually successful, the audience mark their approval by summoning all the actors by name. They then come forward, one by one, and chant an extemporary quatrain, referring generally to some provincial scandal of the day, resembling in quality the effusions of ' the Manchegan Prophetess' (whom my readers have doubt- less forgotten). The principal attraction seemed to be the national dances, which were executed with immense spirit and 232 SPECIMENS OE THE NATIONAL BALLET. grace. The baile is a genuine home-growth, a healthful and vigorous pleasure, cordially enjoyed by spectators and performers — unlike that miserable exotic which, in England, fashion fosters into artificial life, and cannot find an English name for. One day, we messmates of the entente cordial nego- tiated with Don Feliz Garcia, the baile-master, for a special performance, which took place in a court-yard hired for the occasion. The dances peculiar to each province of Spain were exhibited as we required, in due geographical succession; from the graceful Andalucian to the merry Scotch-reel-like Aragonese, and the heavy clownish Gallician. Each fair dancer was attended by her Duenna, upon whose knees she sate to take breath in the pauses of the music. The place was crowded with uninvited spectators, — among the rest an old man with a guitar, who sang between whiles impromptu verses in praise of our hair, our complexions, or (faute de mieux) our hats. The whole aftair cost us about fifteen dollars, and the amusement was well worth the money. I am sorry to add that the northern gold was on this occasion spent as it too often is at home; for the next day I met Don Feliz reeling about the street in a truly British state of intoxication. The bull-ring is an enormous structure, half-finished, looking as if it were half-ruined, and all the more pic- turesque for that. Through the gap one sees the cathe- dral, with its many buttresses and pinnacles, and over all, the Giralda, rosy in the light of the evening sun. One day I was present at a funcion de novillos — a kind of juvenile bull-fight, in which young beasts are FUNCION DE NOVILLOS. 233 brought to be bullied, and, if possible, killed by young men. It is a kind of parody of a real bull-fight — nothing of its pomp, and circumstance, and danger; a farce in- stead of a tragedy — very grotesque and ludicrous. For instance, a man in night-gown and night-cap is brought in upon a bed, shamming sickness, and is placed in the middle of the arena. Then a young bull, with his horns sheathed in corks, is let in ; of course he rushes at the only prominent object — the bed, and turns it over and over, the sick man taking care so to dispose the mat- tresses and bolsters, that the animal may spend his fury upon them and not upon him. At another time several men are set upright in round wicker baskets, about five feet high, with neither top nor bottom. The bull charges these, one after the other, knocks them down, and rolls them along with his horns. It is great fun to watch the evident perplexity of the beast when he sees their spontaneous motion. Then, when his back is turned, the attendants jump over the barrier and set the baskets on their legs again ; and the same joke is repeated till one is tired of it. The unpractised matadors generally fail in attempting ; the fatal stroke, so the poor defenceless animal has to be j despatched by means of the media luna, an instrument, 1 as its name imports, shaped like a half-moon, and ; attached to a long pole. Armed with this, a man comes ;■ slily behind and hamstrings him ; after which he is I feloniously slain with a knife plunged through the spinal I vertebrae. We could not refrain from loudly expressing i our disgust at this barbarity, to the great amusement of ( our neighbours, to whom the spectacle was familiar. An 284 AMPHITHEATRE AT ITALICA. i| Englisli lady was sitting not far off, and looked on without the slightest change of colour. I charitably hoped that she was rouged for the nonce. An examination of these bull-rings made clear to me the uses of many parts of the ancient Roman amphi- theatres, about which I had puzzled myself in vain with conjectures at Verona and Nismes. The remains of an ancient amphitheatre are still to be seen about four miles from Seville, and I was anxious to examine them by the light of my recently-acquired experience. The place was called Italica, and bears to Seville the same relation that Fsesulse does to Florence (another point of resemblance). I accordingly made an expedition thither, in a kind of cabriolet peculiar to the country — gaudily painted, studded with brass nails, and attached to the horse by the most complicated system of harness. The driver sat upon my toes, his legs dangling over the side, and urged, scolded, or soothed his beast Avith a rich and varied vocabulary. By dint of all this we executed the four miles in about an hour and a half, coming to a final halt at the wretched hamlet of Santiponce. I was immediately pounced upon by a crowd of women and children offering Roman coins, first, at a dollar a-piece, and finally, letting me have a dozen for a shilling. At intervals among the olive-clad slopes, fragments of solid rock-like masonry are visible just above the ground, evidencing the extent and grandeur of this second-rate Roman colony. I question whether, a thousand years hence, such traces of Manchester will be seen among the corn-fields. Italica, founded by Scipio Africanus, for his Italian AMPHITHEATRE AT ITALICA. 235 veterans (whence the name), was certainly the birth- place of Theodosius, perhaps also that of Trajan and Hadrian. Yet, if this had been the case, one would have expected Honorius's laureate to have made the town in particular, not the country in general, the theme of his panegyric, where he says : — Sola novum Latiis vectigal Iberia rebus Contulit Augiistos Haec general qui cuncta regant. Half a mile from the hamlet is the Amphitheatre, built in the hollow of a hill, by way of taking advantage [ of the ground. It has evidently been destroyed by some I violent means, perhaps gunpowder. Vast masses of I cement and stone lie rent and shattered round the oval. I The arena itself is raised much above its old level, and is now a corn-field. It is still possible, in despite of brambles, to work one's way into some under-ground chambers — without much profit, I confess. However, having come on purpose, I persisted in taking some rude measure- ments, while my companion, an artillery-man, yawned fearfully, and complained of having been brought to the ancient Italica under false pretences. ' What was Trajan to him, or he to Trajan V The pleasure and profit of my sojourn at Seville were materially enhanced by an acquaintance (may I say friendship?) which I formed with Mr. Ludwig, a German by birth, the kindest, wisest, and gentlest of men and through him with Colonel D , an Irishman in the service of Spain, a noble sample of a noble people. They introduced me to the circulo, or club, where there 23G SOCIETY IN SPAIN. i were papers of all nations to read, chess to look at, and sometimes music to listen to. Many a night we used to walk or sit for hours in the Plaza del Duque, chatting on all manner of topics, hut especially on the things of Spain. Both of them had conceived a great admiration for the people among whom they were dwelling, and their experience of many years entitles their opinions to all respect from a passing stranger. They maintained that the Spaniards were by nature most courteous and hospitable ; that the occasional rudeness of which tra- vellers complained was due to their own ignorance of the national manners; that the boys who threw stones at me were but boys, who did it in mischief and not malice ; that the popular prejudices, however vehement, were not obstinate ; the Due de Montpensier, for instance, against whom, as a Frenchman, everybody had at first entertained a patriotic antipathy, had now entirely conciliated their affection; that if smuggling were once put a stop to by a moderate tariff, they would cease to regard the Manchester manufacturers as 'Vampyres sucking the blood of Spain,' (a common simile with their journalists;) that the Andalucians at least, were more free from fanaticism than the inha- bitants of English towns ; that if, in some respects, the moral tone was lower than in England, in others it was higher, especially as regarded the sins of gluttony and intemperance ; that the morality of the clergy had much improved since their wealth had been diminished, and that the old proverb — La cruz en los pecbos. El Diablo en los beelios, NARVAEZ. 237 ought to be banished from any future edition of the * Fiiosofia Vulgar;' that the political depression of the country was merely the exhaustion consequent upon the uninterrupted troubles of the last half-century; that the people were growing wiser and better every day under the wholesome discipline of Narvaez, a system promising more real progress than all the schemes of those who called themselves Progresistas. The immense army now on foot, 150,000 men, was essential to the maintenance of peace; Espartero had fallen because he slighted the military to flatter civilians, refusing an audience to officers maimed in the service, while he admitted any shopkeeper in the uniform of the National Guard, thus throwing away the staff to lean upon the reed. The most popular step Narvaez ever took was the dismissal of the British minister, because it flattered the national spirit of independence, and they held that he had good priina facie grounds for the act. One Portal, chief conspirator at Seville, had been promoted in the army by Mr. Bulwer's influence : he showed to his fellow-plotters a letter signed with Mr. Bulwer's name — a forgery of course — promising the co-operation of the English squadron, in case of revolt; this, com- bined with other circumstances, had convinced Narvaez — who, like all honest, but not over-wise men, jumps at conclusions — of the complicity of the ambassador, and the refusal of Lord Palmerston to receive the Spanish envoy, confirmed his opinion. During the insurrection at Seville, the infanta, who had recently arrived from I Paris, seeking a haven from the storms of revolution, 238 PICTURE GALLERIES, was obliged to escape in disguise, and take refuge on board a vessel in the middle of the river. (By this time, one may hoj^e Fortune is tired of repeating her cruel practical joke.) On the whole, my informants regarded the state of Spain as full of hope, even for bond-holders. This roseate view of things is not by any means universal, but I think it right to give it, as we are in the habit of receiving facts and inferences solely on the authority of our friends the Progresistas, whose vocation as a constitutional opposition is to grumble. I ought to mention, also, my obligations to Mr. Williams, our vice-consul, generally acknowledged to be the most accomplished connoisseur in Spanish art now living. His gallery still possesses some treasures; among the rest three Murillos, a Zurbaran, and one Sebastian del Piombo (signed). He was kind enough to accompany me to Seiior Maestri's, where is a fine Murillo, ' St. Francis Praying.' Don Anicete Bravo has an immense collection of pictures labelled with great names. One ' undoubted Titian' is a bad copy of the ' Bacchus and Ariadne,' in our National Gallery. Half Seville lives on pictorial thefts and forgeries ; not a day passed that I was not pestered with people offering for sale fragments of broken altar-screens; and half the saints in the calendar painted on oval bits of zinc and copper. Every Englishman is supposed by these harpies to be * as rich as Crazes,' and at least as crazy as rich. They hold that John, like other Bulls, may be baited, blinded, and bled, by the shallowest ai'tifices, and the laquals-de- PICTUKE GALLERIES. 239 place is always ready to entice the said John to the picture-dealer's — thus performiug the functions of Chulo for the Matador. I had been forewarned, and came to Seville with a firm resolution not to be parted from my money on any pretence. ' Virtus post nummos' (' Genuine cash is better than questionable virtu'). So it was in the most sceptical frame of mind that I followed Seiior Vega to the house of one Don Joachim Eeyuoso, an old man, who professed to have an original ' Murillo.' It was a small house, situated in an augostillo, or wynd, too narrow even to be called a lane, and crowded from floor to roof with pictures, bad and indifferent. By contrast with the small daubs which surrounded it, the supposed ' Murillo' stood out prominent in merit as in size. It is about seven feet by five. The subject is this : A Franciscan monk has been reading St. Thomas Aquinas, and doubting as he read, when suddenly the Virgin appears surrounded with cherubs and attended by St. Francis and St. Thomas himself, to each of whom she reaches a crown, while the former admonishes the monk to believe in the doctrine of the latter. The longer I looked at the picture, the more my own scepticism wavered. I inquired its history, which was simple and straightforward enough. The canon Pereyra had obtained it from the suppressed convent of La Eegina, and at the sale of his pictures the present owner had bought it. The price now demanded was five thousand reals — not low enough to encourage a suspicion of imposture. I went home and consulted my books, Sir Edmund Head had seen the picture in Pereyra's i collection, and believed it to be the earliest specimen of 240 A GENUINE MURILLO. Murillo extant, {Handbook of Painting, page 162). Don Antonio Ponz, who made a journey through Spain, en amateur, in the year 1780, speaking of the Regina, says : ' Hay en el claustro de este convento dos quadros de la primera manera 6 estilo de Murillo, el uno el otro representa a San Francisco en ademan de persuadir a un religioso que siga la doctrina de Santo Tomas,' vol. ix. p. 93. Cean Bermudez (iii. 49) and Stirling (p. 828) both mention it. I visited the Regina, now a hat manufactory. I found in the cloister spaces where pictures had been, corresponding in size to the soi-disant ' Murillo,' but rounded atop. The picture was quadrangular. On exami- antion, I found that it had been round also, but pieces had been subsequently let in to make it square with the frame. I then went to Mr. Williams to consult him. He remembered the picture perfectly, but had lost all trace of it since the dispersion of the Canon Pereyra's gallery. He accompanied me to Don Joachim's, and a glance suflRced to convince him that it was the picture it pro- fessed to be. He added also that he had no doubt about its being a genuine Murillo, painted before 1640, while the artist was still a scholar of Castillo. Fortified by such authority, I closed the bargain. The next difficulty was how to remove it. The Spanish government have expressly prohibited the ex- portation of old pictures ; therefore, if this were sent in its frame, the package would excite suspicion by its size and shape, and most likely be seized. The on^ alternative was to have it rolled up, that it might A GENUINE MURILLO. 241 put in a box of less artistic form. So the picture eventually arrived safe in England, disguised as oranges. On the back I observe the words : ' Soy el cuadro del Canonigo Pereyra/ — an additional proof of its genuine- ness, which I had not seen before. The front is in evil plight, from its exposure for near two centuries to the winds of heaven, from the handiwork of restorers, and from the tender mercies of the English custom-house; yet I think that in the figures of St. Francis and the monk, very evident traces may still be discerned of the great master's hand. The St. Thomas is obviously copied, in face and dress, from Zurbaran. Ars longa — ' Art is long-winded.' So says, or should say, the proverb ; therefore I hope that my readers will excuse this prolix narrative from a poor novice naturally anxious to impress upon others his own conviction that for once he has drawn a prize in the lottery, and become possessor of a genuine ' Murillo,' remarkable in the history of art as the earliest known specimen. Among the passing visitors at our hotel was the author of Rookwood — a gentleman who personally has nothing of the charnel-house or dungeon in his compo- sition. I look forward to a Spanish romance on The Conquest of Seville, or The Tower of Gold. There came also a cannie Scot, with two sons, whose forte and theme was domestic economy, and who warned us day by day, that we should find pale ale ' varry expensuv.' One day in my rambles, which were desul- tory Uke my book, I fell in with a faded clerical-looking '>rson, who, I found, had been a friar, and was still a 'jendicant. He begged me to go with him and see GAZ. B 242 STATISTICS OF ASSASSINATION. sometliing. I went with him accordingly across the Court of Oranges to a little chapel adjacent to the cathe- dral. I expected to see a picture or a statue ; but there, to my horror, was a corpse, with the face uncovered and smeared with clotted blood. It was wrapped in white, and some tapers were burning at the head and feet. It was a man who had been killed in the Alameda the preceding evening, whether by accident or design I did not learn. Apropos to this, my conductor proceeded to give me some appalling statistics of assassination. How far he had means of knowing, and how much credit his asser* tions were entitled to, I cannot say. He informed me that in the past month there had been nineteen murders and attempts to murder in Seville alone ; and that during the May of 1848, there were as many as thirty. If this be true, considerable deductions must be made from my two friends' enthusiastic praise of the lower orders of Andalucia. The frequency of the crime may be partly accounted for, not palliated, by the habit of carrying a long knife, persisted in, in defiance of prohibition. Yet this same people of Seville, who took no notice of the murders at their own doors, read and canvassed with eager interest the details of a murder in London, which then constituted the 'English news' of the Spanish papers. When I narrated my adventure that day at dinner, our Scotch friend looked blanker and blanker; and at last, laying down his knife and fork, said to his sons : * I tell ye what, boys, the sooner we get out o' this toon the better.' For my part, I never felt more sorry to leave any toon in my life; and, judging from my per- EVENING WALKS. 243 sonal experience only, I should pronounce Seville a quiet and orderly place. I had many a lonely walk in star- light and moonlight by the banks of the Guadalquivir, without being either robbed or threatened. This I must say for the civilization of the Sevillians, that wherever they kill men, they bury them outside the walls ; and at all events, kill their sheep and oxen outside the walls also. 244 CHAPTEE XXVII. /^ ORDOVA — ' birthplace of Seneca and Lucan, and ^ Gonsalvo; under the Romans, the rival of Athens: under the Moors, the rival of Damascus, famous then for the magnificence of its palaces, the learning of its university, and the sanctity of its mosque,' — surely deserves a chapter to itself. Conceive then, reader, a white town, with a blank grey mass of building con- spicuous in the centre, dotted with occasional palms, and half-circled by olive groves — conceive the lazy yellow Guadalquivir winding through the plain, spanned by a long bridge, and over all, the stern sierra frowning from the north — conceive all this, and you will have as good an idea of Cordova, as I have — for I did not see it. When I reached Seville, I was wearied of diligence and saddle, and comfort whispered in my ear, ' Sit modus lasso,' and plied me with a Spanish proverb, ' A quien Dios quiere bien, en Sevilla le dio a comer; a quien mal, en Cordova un lugar.' So I lingered a whole month at Seville, scarcely harbouring a transient thought of ' the birthplace of Seneca,' &c. Good-natured friends have since repeatedly assured me that I have missed the finest thing in Spain; but with a traveller, ' the finest thing always is what he has seen, and you have not. 1 CORDOVA. 245 Besides, hope suggests that I may have another oppor- tunity, and inspires me to improvise a farewell quatrain, in the manner of our ' Manchegan Prophetess,' — Now for the land of mist and rain ! But if next year I'm lord of a Hundred pounds, I'll come again • To have a peep at Cordova. 246 CHAPTER XXVIII. ' 4 DIOS, vecinos, que me mudo.' My flitting took -^ place one fine morning early in October, when I embarked myself and my goods on board the steamer bound for Cadiz. The flat dreary banks reminded a young Englishman, who accompanied us, of the Nile, only here there was not so much as a basking crocodile to relieve the monotony. Further down, the river winds about with most abrupt curves, and it is only by seeing a large sail now and then, coming apparently over dry land, that one is able to trace its erratic course. As we approach San Lucar, the banks are fringed with pines, which on that day, by a species of mirage, seemed as if they grew in mid air. Passing the bar, we emerged from calm to trouble. It was like leaving the nursery for a public school . My companion ' grew paler and paler as we flew;' but I, having a week's voyage, at least, in prospect, made up my mind and my body not to surrender to a two hours' storm. We soon landed at Cadiz; and, after some little trouble at the custom-house, proceeded to the English hotel, kept by Yldefonso Jimenes, a Maltese, who enjoys a deserved reputation for his civility and his pale sherry. The comparative attractions of Cadiz and Seville must not be estimated by the space allotted to them respectively by that capricious CONVENT OF CAPUCHINS. 247 spoilt Childe Harold. He dismisses Seville in a couple of lines, and devotes half a canto to the glorification of Cadiz. A most perverse choice, truly; but I suppose ' Inez' was at the bottom of it. The morning after our arrival we walked round the ramparts, which are of immense height and strength where the Isthmus is narrowest, as if to prevent the sea from converting Cadiz into an island. We then visited, as a matter of course, the convent of Capuchins, now turned into schools. In the church, over the high altar, hangs ' The Nuptials of St. Catherine,' which possesses a mournful interest as the last work of Murillo. While engaged upon it, he fell from the scaffolding, and suffered an injury which brought him to the grave soon afterwards. It has been ludicrously retouched; patches of white have been stuck on to the tips of the noses and the prominences of the cheek bones, in almost all the figures, which makes the picture like a scene in a flour-mill. The church was preparing for a festival on the morrow, and a number of women had brought each her quota of flowers, and were zealously arranging them under the direction of a priest. These pious women were chiefly advanced in years; the younger sort frequent the alameda more than the church. How- ever, at this advanced season, the evenings were becom- ing chilly, and a sharp breeze rendered the mantilla insufficient and the fan superfluous, so that there was but a scanty sprinkling of the fair sex (if the term may be used of Spanish ladies), even on the alameda. I had entertained a suspicion that Cadiz owed its reputation for female beauty chiefly to the fortunate accident of its 248 XEREZ. rhyme — since rhyme, iu our intractable language, often masters reason — but from the scanty sample I was per- mitted to see, I am inclined to think the reputation deserved. Like their Sevillian rivals, they have the pale cheek and dark liquid eye, expressive of rest, not apathy, — the rest of slumbering passion, — reminding one of a thunder- cloud, so deeply black that we know it to be instinct with fire. The gait and carriage of the Sevillian ladies are characterized by a voluptuous languor, — those of the Gaditanas by a buoyant elasticity. Your matter-of-fact people, who find or make a reason for everything, would say that it was the sea-air that caused the difference; but it is a subject rather for a poetaster than a sciolist, — and a dangerous subject for either. The men very uugallantly herd together of an even- ing in the club, reading newspapers or plajang billiards. A man who cares for anything else, art or architecture, will find little to detain him at Cadiz, — hardly enough to make it worth his while to unravel the intricacies of the streets, which, from their being so similar, and cutting each other at such various angles, puzzle a new- comer exceedingly. Therefore, as I found my host Jimenes was going on business of his own to Xerez, I resolved to accom- pany him, and see that ' mother of mighty wine.' We crossed over to Puerto Santa Maria in a little steamer. A lad on board attracted my notice by his bright eyes and huge red cap, so I asked him on what business he was bound. He replied, ' To catch chameleons,' — of which interesting genus he offered to procure me a WINE-STORES OF XEREZ. 249 specimen for sixpence sterling, assuring me tliat it would be no trouble to take to England, as they lived entirely upon air. But it occurred to me tbat the air of Southampton might not agree with the animal's digestion so well as the air of Puerto Santa Maria; however, I gave him the commission, which he did not execute, after all. Thence we took a calesa for the remaining two leagues. As the carriage had no springs, and the road was like what an Irish road may have been before General Wade's time, I was not sorry to come in sight of the vine-coloured slopes and Moorish walls of Xerez. Mr. Macaulay, in one of his essays, speaks of a hypothetical army ' encamped on the banks of the Rhine or the Xerez.' The river is as hypothetical as the army; at least, if there ever was such a river, it has vanished from the memory of the oldest inhabitant, and taken its bed along with it. The Guadalete is in full force a couple of miles off. But we have to treat of a nobler theme than water. ' Water is very well in its way' (so far, Pindar was right), but to speak of it after Xerez is an anti-climax. Being furnished with a letter to Mr. John David Gordon, our Vice-Consul, I lost no time in visiting his wine-stores. The separate warehouses, or bodegas, are called each after the name of some saint, — indeed, one is even called the ' Bodega de Jesus.' This application of sacred names to secular things seems like a profanation to us pro- testants, who usually lay by our religion, like a Sunday coat, for six days in the week, and religiously abstain from using it. I tasted, sipping prudently, a great number of samples, — sherry, pale, brown, and Amontil- 250 THE CARTUJA. lado, Pajarete, and Arrope, wliicli is sherry boiled down to one-fifth of its original bulk, and used in converting pale Avine into brown. The foreman who escorted me said that they had seven thousand pipes in stock, some of it nearly two centuries old — but the latter assertion rather staggered my credulity. I was shown some hard, whitish clay, called piedra de vino (wine-stone), which is used in clearing the sherry. My conductor insisted upon putting a lump in my pocket as a specimen. Of course I forgot it, and a few days after, found it reduced, like Hannibal, to a handful of white dust. There is little at Xerez to gratify any sense except taste; it is a common- place second-rate town. Its population, I was told, do not neglect their golden opportunities, and are much given to drunkenness. Next day we returned by a more circuitous route, in order to visit the Cartuja, one of the most famous con- vents in Spain. It is now tenanted only by a single family, the matron of which acted as cicerone. Every picture has been removed from church and sacristy, every particle of furniture from the cells of the brethren. The prior's ' cell' is a very pleasant suite of rooms, look- ing out upon a little garth filled with pomegranates, and over that commanding a -wide prospect of valley, and river, and bay. Bare as the rooms were, the bright sunshine clothed them with cheerfulness. I dare say the poor ex-prior regrets his quiet rooms as deeply as any ex-kiug his palace and his pomp. Musing on these things, and diving into the crimson depths of a huge pomegranate, rich and ripe, I walked up and down the large court. It is about ninety yards square, with a THE CAETUJA. 251 continuous cloister on every side. The central space was used as a campo sancto, and divided into four equal portions; the first appropriated to the brethren, the second to their lay dependents, the third to the children of their schools, and the fourth to the undistinguished poor. The neglected cypresses look as if they mourned doubly now^ — for the living as well as the dead. 258 CHAPTER XXIX. ON Sunday morning, Oct. 7, at nine o'clock, I em- barked on board the steamer ' Montrose,' bound for Southampton. I found myself one of a small and select party of cabin passengers, half-a-dozen in all. Two of these were Anglo-Americans, going to Lisbon, in the enjoyment of rude health, and happy in the prospect of a ten days' quarantine. The rest of us were all English, including one Irishman. The day being calm, we discussed in the most amicable spirit with our brethren of the west the present and the future of the great Anglo- Saxon race, all cordially agreeing that, wide as the Atlantic was, two such ' tall' nations might easily shake hands over it. Next afternoon we came in sight of the rugged out- line of Cintra, and at four o'clock cast anchor in the Tagus. Of course we were not permitted to land, and watched from the deck our two friends as they were rowed off to undergo the prescribed course of pillage and purification in a lonely convent on the southern bank of the river. Over against us was the gaunt palace of the Necesidades, so called, I suppose, because the necessities of the exchequer have hindered it of com- pletion. As the evening closed, we could see the citizens pacing up and down on the terrace by the shore; and BAY OF VIGO. 253 that was all we saw of Lisbon. On Tuesday afternoon we left the Tagus, and the following evening were oflf Oporto. A wild surf was lashing the coast, and it was not without trouble that a boat came off to us with a cargo of fruit and a young cockney, who, had he been in the full enjoyment of that domestic comfort which every Briton has a right to expect upon the deep, would have been offensive and impertinent. Next morning when I went on deck we were just sailing into the bay of Vigo, where we anchored for some hours for the purpose of taking in nine or ten deck passengers, fine bullocks. They came on board in capital condition, but during the voyage one of them died, and the rest were lean kine indeed when it was over. The subject- waves did their duty most patrioti- cally as protectors of the British grazier. Some few years since, our consul at Vigo imported a bull from England, with the enlightened purpose of improving the native stock, but the unfortunate animal was denounced by the priest as godless and heretical, and had to be sent home again. ' Cantabrum indoctum juga ferre nostra !' The dwellers on this north-western coast are much more ignorant, and therefore more brutal than their countrymen elsewhere. Not long ago one of our Alexandrian steamers was wrecked there, and the neigh- bouring people came down and pillaged everything, going so far as to wrench the rings off the ladies' fingers. One could not regret being delayed in the bay of Vigo, which, in my opinion, fully deserves the enco- miums it has received. The little town clustering about 254 VOYAGE HOME. the tower-crowned steep, the wavy hills, sprinkled with pines and dotted with white granges, the winding edge of sand that fringes the still land-locked waters — how could a scene be other than exquisite with all these 1 The eye of the traveller from the south rested with double pleasure on the dark verdure. When we sailed out of the bay that same afternoon, we found the sea running high, and the long surf climb- ing savagely up the grey cliffs. The water, except here and there a crest of foam, was all of a dead purple, what Homer calls ' wine-like.' The wind blew right against us, and continued so all the way, prolonging our unhappy voyage to ten days instead of seven. We were suffering what Spanish sailors call ' the lashing of St. Francis's cord,' (el cordonazo de San Francisco,) be- cause the day consecrated to him falls near the autumnal equinox. Similarly the gales of the vernal equinox are termed ' the thrashing of St. Joseph's stick,' (la bar- rada de San Jos6,) that saint's day being the eighteenth of March. Our nor'easter, moreover, brought with it cold and wet, so the passengers mostly kept their berths. During five lonely nights and days, all the time which I did not devote to sleep and Don Quixote, I spent in recalling my summer's experience. As I dragged my memory, little incidents and minute details, which had sunk and had been forgotten, came up to the light, and arranged themselves into a shadowy picture. So in the midst of this cold autumnal storm I was able almost to live over again the sunny pleasant days of summer. The process amused me for many idle days, and I thought that if I set down its results they might amuse other ARRIVAL. 255 people for a few idle hours. Not but that I was glad when it came to an end, when on Tuesday evening, October 1 6, I was told that we were within sight of the English coast. I jumped up, hastened on deck, and there, sure enough, in the misty distance, was the wavy outline of the long-looked-for land. As I watched, a bright ray shot out from some lighthouse on a far-off promontory like a star of welcome. APPENDIX. P'T'HE following letter, for which I am indebted *- J- to an old schoolfellow, will speak for itself. My own doings would have seemed tame after his, so I kept the letter for the end, — just as the game comes in with the last course, and as the guns and crackers are reserved for the finale of a melodrama.] ' Let me congratulate you, mon ami, on your safe return from the Iberian wanderings, and claim to add, as a yet closer bond to our friendship, the memory of those strange spots which we now retain in common. ' There are some traits of the manners of the Spanish people, unimaginable unless seen, which each of us has met with, — unaltered, I doubt not, by the lapse of even such a space as three years, for that I calculate to be the in- terval between our visits. You probably have expe- rienced a counterpart to that incident — which pictured to me more vividly than whole histories of civil commo- tions, the unsettled and restless state of the public mind — whilst my friend Don Jaime and I were refreshing ourselves, after the fatigues of winter-quarters in the cities, among the glorious spring gardens Avhich sur- round the fruity Alhaurin el Grande, distant about five leagues from Malaga. We found that the wondrous variety of scents and colours which we inhaled and gazed APPENDIX. 257 on, from fig, vine, pomegranate, peach, quince, nectarine, and apricot, — all bursting out in the first richness of flower and leaf, mingling with last year's orange and lemon, and set in a frame-work of dark olive, — all this luxuriance, suggestive though it was of future luxuries, did not make us forget the fact, that our worthy and cleanly hostess (she promised to send me a cake of figs and almonds, which I never had) could give us but little variety for the su])ply of our table. Lean hens and un- seasonable partridges formed the chief of our diet; so, in our epicurism, we inquired if no pork-chops were attainable. We thought this not an unreasonable de- mand, for we continually encountered living specimens of the food in our rambles. The reply was, 'Noj the tax on pork is so high that the people are waiting for a pronunciamento before they will kill their pigs; then, all that will be changed.' This was singularly confirmed a few days after, on our return to Malaga, when the carabinero at the entrance, on our neglecting to bribe him, challenged a portable writing-desk of the smallest dimensions, and inquired whether it contained — fancy, of all things in the world to smuggle in such a guise ! — ' alguna cosa de puerco.^ ' Similar characteristic incidents I doubt not you have met with; but there is one portion of Spain — where I spent three very delightful weeks — which I am sure you are quite unacquainted with, close as you have been to i^-'j boundaries. You remember, as you glided down the Guadalquivir from Seville to Cadiz, when near San Lucar, that the opposite banks of the river, though not lofty, were so thickly wooded with pines and other low GAZ. S 258 APPENDIX. trees, that they formed a barrier inscrutable by the eye. Within this ridge lies a large space of country, much in the same condition as it appeared, I fancy, when vege- tation had first overcome the shock of the deluge. A wilderness, chiefly of sandy soil, sometimes slightly un- dulating and covered with the pines, standing in clusters, or continuous, — sometimes with only low, odoriferous and spiniferous bushes, through which it is with difficulty you can force your way, — and woe to your nether gar- ments, and what is contained within them, if you attempt it without a leathern apron. Then, perhaps, you come upon several miles of unbroken sand, terminating in a rich spot, where water lui-ks and nourishes all reedy things, frogs and mosquitoes; but it flows not, — ever stagnant, it gives the name of the Marismilla to this district. Occasionally the wood might be dignified with the name of forest, and anon entirely disappears. Here, you will allow, is variety enough for the picturesque, and — if you will permit it, in the absence of towering- hills and living waters — even for the beautiful; nature, in all her first spring redundance, starting forth amid the ruins of previous years — for all is untouched by the hand of man — and assuming all the quaint shapes and grace- ful combinations, which are vainly sought for in the midst of cultivation. Now let me add the chief charm to the picture, — and you, who are not ashamed of the traces of our original savage instincts, which civilization has deigned to tolerate, though sometimes in a strangely metamorphosed garb, — you will symj^athise with me when I add, as the chief attraction of this wild region, that it is the primest sporting-ground in all Europe. APPENDIX. 259 Countless herds of the red deer scour across its wastes. The wild boar roots in its marshy thickets, whilst his grim mate leads out her tuskless progeny to wallow in its seething mire. The lynx flashes in his brightness across your path, and seems only too conscious that you are the more dangerous animal of the two. Wolves also are reported; and your guide sometimes points mysteriously to an unwonted impression in the sand, and mutters ' Lobo.' Such form the chief objects of the ' caza mayor,' or larger game. Foxes of wondrous size and cunning steal about, too; and for the ' caxa menor,' or small game, you find abundance of red-legged partridges, hares and rabbits, woodcocks and wild-fowl, if you take the trouble to visit their haunts. You would as soon think of shooting at a sparrow at home, as at a snipe in this wilderness. ' Fancy, now, the gleesomeness of heart with which I found myself, one bright morning early in February, ferried across the turbid river, and deposited in this double-barrelled paradise, when all traces of winter had vanished, and the heat had not yet called forth the swarming mosquitoes, or boiled up the malaria from the reeking swamps, — in company with three right jovial and hearty good fellows; the one, our senior and acknow- ledged chief, a keen sportsman and crack shot of some years' standing; another, whose fame had not yet stood the test of such a lapse of time, but whom I had seen, a few weeks before, plant a bullet in the breast of a stag, as he stood for a moment at gaze, at the distance of a hundred and twenty paces, before he plunged into the thicket, visible only by the head and horns; the third, s2 y60 APPENDIX. though he claimed not equal sylvan glories, exhaustless in good humour and profuse in wit. Our host likewise of the posada at Puerto Santa Maria was there in double capacity, displaying the qualities of a patriarchal hunter — skill in the slaughter of his venison during the day, and in preparing therefrom savoury meat for the even- ing's repast. Imagine this company assembled on the banks of the stream, where was waiting for each his steed, led by an attendant gallego, or ' gallifat,' as we termed him, (0 Don Jorge, doctus utriusque linguae, how you enriched both !) who rode when his master dis- mounted for the purposes of sport : imagine us starting off on that bright, fresh morning under the guidance of the sage huntsman and guardian of the ' coto,' Manuel Toro, and penetrating into the depths of the wilderness, caring little for all other possessions in the world save our trusty weai)ons, and the extra horse, laden with provisions, which accompanied us. All other needfuls had been sent on before to the ' Palacio de Dona Ana,' including fresh meat and all things required in cooking, several casks of prime Xerez, wonderful stores of pale ale, beds, and carpet-bags. We shot only at such small game as presented itself on and near our line of march, as the caza mayor requires more tim^ and preparation than were consistent with our design of reaching our quarters before nightfall. The Palacio itself would have afforded us scanty accommodation beyond the shelter of its stout walls, a few chairs and table, with a blazing fire, and bare bedsteads, — kept there by the habitues of the * coto,' and at the service of all who had the privi- lege of the entree. These are confined to twenty sub- scribers, who rent it of the Duke of Medina Sidonia, APPENDIX. 2G1 each of whom can tahe with him a couple of friends, but may not send them to shoot without accompanying them himself. Owing to the experience and forethought of my friends, we found nothing wanting to comfort and even luxury, though there was no other habitation, save the huts of the guardians of the ' coto,' or ' preserve,' for leagues around us. ' I cannot give you a detailed account of all our doings, for as I kept no notes of the transactions of each day, the whole is now blended into one delightful mass of irregular recollections, wherein are thrown together the morning rides, with the first cigar lighted, as we plunged into the depths of the wilderness — chatting gaily of our prospects of sport, — or the silent ambus- cades, to which we stole with quick breath and cautious step — the anxious crouching behind bush or sand-bank whilst the beaters were driving up the game — the hurried excitement of the shot, the triumph when the quarry fell, or the half-disgusted resignation with which one waited for ' better luck next time' when it passed scatheless — the jollity of the hour of ' bacada,' or ' mouthful,' alias lunch, when our sumpter-horse was lightened of a good part of his load — the change of scene from one beat to another — the ride home when the day's work was over, quite enough tired to enjoy the rest, but not too wearied to acknowledge that reprn'ov ek: KvvayiaQ Tpdire^a 7r\T]pr]q — the delicious languor which super- vened, and cut short all disquisitions on the merits of the day's sport, and the narrations of former exploits, and sent us to our couches, the last weed smoked, by ten o'clock, glad of the release when the arrangements for the morrow had been completed. All these diverse 262 APPENDIX. scenes I could not now reduce to regular narrative order, but they are all vividly, though confusedly, impressed on my memory. I may, however, give you a sketch of one day's proceedings as a sample : — ' Conceive us, then, as having taken due precautions to store away an ample breakfast at eight o'clock, and ready for the start at nine. Manuel Toro, having knowingly surveyed the heavens, and consulted the auspices, with which he was deeply conversant, leads the way, generally against the wind, in company with our senior, Don Juan — ever the first ready to move. We ride along for three or four miles perhaps — till we ap- proach the first ground where game is expected — at a signal we silently dismount; our attendants mount in our places, and wait with our steeds, whilst Manuel assigns our posts. Suppose we halt at A, the wind blowing as the arrow points. The line A B F may be T. C Ji n il APPENDIX. 263 the edge of a thicket, the ridge of a sandbank, or some inequality in the ground, which offers shelter at occa- sional spots. Manuel walks a-head, all the rest of the guns following : he points out a station, B, to one who is left there, to conceal himself as best he may, when he sees where his neighbour is similarly posted at C. He then draws a line in the sand, in the direction B C, that he may be sure of the position of the next human being to him in the world, as his first object in discharging his duty towards his neighbour, is not to make him the object at which he discharges his piece. This is a very needful precaution, as, in the bewildering sameness of surrounding objects, he might easily lose all knowledge of his locality without such a mark, and his friend will keep himself as little visible as possible if he wishes for the chance of a shot. C takes similar measures, mark- inu- out the direction of both B and D. So Manuel proceeds, dropping one at each station, until he has fixed the last at F. He then emerges at g, and gives a signal to the beaters at A, who proceed to take their places at 6 c c? e / so as to encompass the whole space to be beaten. They then ride down w4nd, tapping the trees, forcing their way through the densest coverts, but with- out much noise, as the game is easily roused; perhaps at the first movement a stag is disturbed in his morning slumber — looks around him — scents the tainted air, and dashes away from danger as he fancies, and makes for the position occupied by D; but D is too excited when he hears his tread among the crackling bushes; he turns to peep into the thicket; but, alas! his motion has snapped a twig, the stag becomes suspicious, and turns S64 APPENDIX. away towards C. C, meanwhile, with all determination, hardly breathes — he moves not a muscle save to grasp his gun more firmly, and hopes to reap the reward of his perseverance; but the top of his cap of an unsylvan hue, is distinguishable between two disjointed branches, or the wind wafts a lock of his hair above his head, if he have dofted his head-gear for greater secresy; him the fates favour not, and the benado, getting more frightened, ruslies on towards B. Here his fear gets the better of his sagacity, or B has left nothing to betray his presence — the deer dashes out past him; as soon as he has crossed one of the lines diverging from B — marked out for human safety — B may do his best or worst for deer destruction. If he is not too nervous when he levels his weapon, he remembers that said deer is moving rapidly — perhaps eighty or a hundred yards off — he aims a little in front of his fore-shoulder; and if his bullet go true, and the shoulder is struck, over rolls his victim, and he is happy; if he has fired a little too late, or too far back, and the poor beast receive the missile in his paunch, he will bear his hurt for miles, and must be followed up; and woe to the rest of the day's sport, for all the party join in pursuit of a ' benado panzado' (pronounced beuao panzao); otherwise, as is not uncom- mon, his bullet goes whirring on, with a sound very startling to the unaccustomed, who fancy that it must have passed within a few yards of their own precious carcases, when in fact it may have been continually lenirthening: its distance from them — or bui'ies itself with an unsatisfactory thud in a bank of sand. ' The distance between the posts of ambush varies APPENDIX. 265 from one to three hundred yards, according to the size of the beat and conveniences for concealment, so that if the beast is lucky enough to choose the exact central spot between the two guns, he may get off with the chance only of being reached by a long shot. The keejier always examines the track of a deer after the spot where he has been fired at, and pronounces whether he has been hit or not; a drop on the sand, which an unpractised eye would overlook, causes him to pronounce that he is hit; and if he decides that ' da sangre,' the rule is, he must be followed — an occu- pation probably for the remainder of the day. They can tell, also, by his track whereabouts he has received his wound, by a limp, or a trailing of a leg, or a weak- ness on one side. If it is fixed that he is hard hit, time is given him before we follow, in order that, on finding himself uncomfortable, he may take to the nearest resting-place, and stop there to bewail his melancholy fate (' echaremos un cigarro'). When it is fancied that he will not be urged onwards by the sounds of pursuit, but has laid down and is getting stiffish, and unwilling to start on again — in short, when the cigar is ended, we take to the track. When he enters a thicket, we surround the covert with guns before it is entered by the beaters, so that he may be secured if he have not passed through ; and so on until we either overtake him, or evening overtakes us. When once it has been said of the benado that he ' da sangre,' he becomes of less interest to all the party save one — to him v/ho fired the shot which told; for, whoever may at last bring him down, he is reckoned among the trophies 2GG Al'PENDIX of the first blood-drawer. T remember, on one occasion, when my neighbour had fired at a deer, it came after- wards beautifully within shot for me. I coolly sent one bullet at him, which disabled a fore-leg, but as he went stumbling up the slope of sand, I thought it as well, lest he should give us more trouble, to bestow my second upon him, and this struck him in the shoulder, and brought him at once to the ground. I was rather proud of my feat; especially as it was performed in sight of one or two more, who saw how each bullet told. When the beat was over, and some of us were exa- mining his two. wounds, to my astonishment the keeper and my friend, who had fired first, came up along the track, and declared he had been hit before I fired. I, and the rest who had seen me fire, were quite sure that my two bullets were there in those two holes ; however, as Manuel affirmed that he was bleeding before ever I fired, we were sore puzzled. At last, in turning him over, we found that the first shot had passed over his bead, and cut a round hole in the erected ear, from which a drop or two of blood had flowed. This ex- plained the mystery, and showed the sharp-sightedness and accuracy of these keen observers. ' Thus we slew the deer. When we came to a more swampy covert, we expected to turn out a ' cochinc' Some of the party who had fleet horses, and manage- able, used to gallop after them with spears, if the ground was open, and try to transfix them. This is a very exciting, but dangerous amusement ; as, first, it requires the full gallop — for a pig can go as fast as a horse for some distance; and as the ground is very un- APPEMDIX. 267 even, and, especially in many parts, full of rabbit burrows, the roll of the horse and rider is by no means unfrequent. Again, the boar, when brought to bay, has a very ugly way of using his tusks, and if the horse is unused to the sport, and so gets frightened at the hideous beast, or not perfectly tractable, so as to turn shortly and quickly at a motion of the hand, he runs a good chance of being ripped up, or getting an un- pleasant gash in the shoulder ; nor is the rider's leg at all proof against the onslaught of the exasperated brute. Sometimes they would turn sulky, and take refuge in an impenetrable thicket of low bushes, where all the interstices seemed filled up with reeds, and would set us and the dogs at defiance for hours : no one dared venture into the lair if he had been able to reach it, for he could not have used his gun, and the boar would have dashed at him, cutting his way with his tusks, and, before the intruder could turn, would have upset and given him the last Adonizing touch in the thigh. Our last resource was to set fire to his domain ; and we sometimes burnt down an acre or more of the wilder- ness without succeeding in dislodging the crafty old pig- ' When we had been a few days at the Palacio, we were, joined by a Belgian Count, who brought letters of introduction to one of the party. We were going to occupy the following day with the ' caza menor,' and give our horses a rest, of which they stood much in need, since they were hard worked all through the day : when not oppressed by our weight, they were in the hands of the gallifats, and much more seriously em- 268 APPENDIX. ployed in forcing through the thickest parts of the coverts which were at all practicable. ' Our new comrade appeared next morning gorgeously- arrayed in a new shooting-frock (jacket it could not be called) of some fancy plaid, which he assured us had been specially recommended to him by Milady Shrewsbury durinfj a recent visit to England. This was trimmed with a long fringe all round, apparently constructed ex- pressly to catch at all protruding twigs, and, after encum- bering the wearer for a short time in the woods, to aid in rending the light and delicate frock from his shoulders. We were disposed to smile when we thought what a thing of shreds and tatters our gay butterfly Avould become after a few hours' struggling through brushwood ; if the wicked notion of leaving him to his own imaginations, and pitying him afterwards, did occur, it was rejected by our sense of the duties of hospitality, and, after explaining to him the probable fate of his admired costume, if he persisted in exposing it to hard- ships for which the artist never designed it, we rigged him out in an old real English velveteen shooting-jacket — how his dress-boots fared we had not heart to inquire — they certainly had not a sole to answer. He acquitted himself, however, better than might have been expected from his outward man, though he exhibited a few pecu- liarities. One day, when he was stationed beside a piece of water through which the deer would be driven — and where he might have a leisurely and uninterrupted shot — a herd of several benados, accompanied by numerous ciervas, dashed past him into the water. Now it is a high misdemeanour to slay a cierva, or doe, but our APPENDIX, 2G9 friend, instead of singling out a pair of antlers, and aim- ing at him who bore them, in his raptures and amaze- ment blazed, no doubt quite promiscuously, into the middle of the herd — and, to his own astonishment no doubt, as such a thing had not happened before, down fell a beast. He instantly mounted his horse, rode into the water — jumped off, heedless of his boots, which on this occasion were of the tragic order of untauned leather — such as heroes appear in on the stage — and danced frantically around his fallen victim. Nor was his ex- citement cooled either by the water, which he splashed around, or by the announcement that he had slain a ' cierva :' in fact, during the whole of his stay with us we never could impress him sufficiently with the heinous- ness of his offence. That he had slain anything so large, appeared to him perfectly satisfactory. In spite of this we liked him much, and we were sorry when he took his leave. Manuel Toro summed up his character admirably, as far as we were concerned with it, by saying that he was ' muy buen hombre, pero no cazador' (' a very good fellow, but no sportsman.') ' I might go on with many reminiscences, of various scenes, but I think I have sketched you enough to show the style of our three weeks' campaign, and will leave you to pronounce whether you would not have liked to have been one of the party. ' Believe me, yours very sincerely, ' G. H. A.' THE END. LONDON : BAVILL AND EDWARDS, PBINTEUS, CHANDOS STBEET. 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