GATHERINGS FEOM SPAIN, BY THE AUTHOR OF THE HANDBOOK OF SPAIN; CHIEFLY SELECTED FROM THAT WORK, WITH / MUCH NEW MATTER. NEW FVITION. LONDON: JOHN MUEBAY, ALBEMAELE STEEET. 1851. T5P3B HONOURABLE MES, FOED, THESE pages, which she has been so good as to peruse and approve of, are dedicated, in the hopes that other fair readers may follow her example, By her very affectionate Husband and Servant, RICHARD FORD. 224818 PREFACE. MANY ladies, some of* whom even contemplate a visit to Spain, having condescended to signify to the publisher their regrets, that the Handbook was printed in a form, which ren- dered its perusal irksome, and also to express a wish that the type had been larger, the Author, to whom this distin- guished compliment was communicated, has hastened to submit to their indulgence a few extracts and selections, which may throw some light on the character of a country and people, always of the highest interest, and particularly so at this moment, when their independence is once more threatened by a crafty and aggressive neighbour. In preparing these compilations for the press much new matter has been added, to supply the place of portions omitted ; for, in order to lighten the narrative, the Author has removed much lumber of learning, and has not scrupled occasionally to throw Strabo, and even Saint Isidore himself, overboard. Progress is the order of the day in Spain, and its advance is the more rapid, as she was so much in arrear of other nations. Transition is the present condition of the country, where yesterday is effaced by to-morrow. There the relentless march of European intellect is crushing many a native wild flower, which, having no value save colour and sweetness, must be rooted up before cotton-mills are con- PREFACE. structed and bread stuffs substituted ; many a trait of na- tionality Ji manners and costume is already effaced ; monks are gone, and mantillas are going, alas ! going. In the changes that have recently taken place, many descriptions of ways and things now presented to the public will soon become almost matters of history and antiquarian interest. The passages here reprinted will be omitted in the forthcoming new edition of the Handbook, to which these pages may form a companion ; but their chief object has been to offer a few hours' amusement, and may be of instruction, to those who remain at home ; and should the humble attempt meet with the approbation of fair readers, the author will bear, with more than Spanish resignation, whatever animadversions bearded critics may be pleased to inflict on this or on the other side of the water. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. T'AOK A General View of Spain Isolation King of the Spains Castiliim Precedence Localism Want of Union Admiration of Spain M. Thiers in Spain 1 CHAPTER II. The Geography of Spain Zones Mountains The Pyrenees The Gabacho, and French Politics ....... 7 CHAPTER 111. The Rivers of Spain Bridges Navigation The Ebro and Tagus . 23 CHAPTER IV. Divisions into Provinces Ancient Demarcations Modern Departments Population Revenue Spanish Stocks . . . . .30 CHAPTER V. Travelling in Spain Steamers Roads, Roman, Monastic, and Royal Modern Railways English Speculations . . . . . 4C CHAPTER VI. Post Office in Spain Travelling with Post Horses Riding post Mails and Diligences, Galeras, Coches de Colleras, Drivers and Manner of Driving, and Oaths ......... 3 CHAPTER VII. Spanish Horses Mules Asses Muleteers Maragatos . . 6S CONTENTS. CHAPTER VIII. P Riding Tour in Spain Pleasures of it Pedestrian Tour Choice of Companions Rules for a Riding Tour Season of Year Day's Journey Management of Horse ; his Feet ; Shoes ; General Hints . CHAPTER IX. The Rider's Costume Alforj as : Their contents The Bota, and How to use it Pig Skins and Borracha Spanish Money Onzas and smaller Coins .......... 94 CHAPTER X. Spanish Servants : their Character Travelling Groom, Cook, and Valet ... 105 CHAPTER XL A Spanish Cook Philosophy of Spanish Cuisine Sauce Difficulty of Commissariat The Provend Spanish Hares and Rabbits The Olla Garbanzos Spanish Pigs Bacon and Hams Omelette Salad and Gazpacho 119 CHAPTER XII. Drinks of Spain Water Irrigation Fountains Spanish Thirstiness The Alcarraza Water Carriers Ablutions Spanish Chocolate Agraz Beer Lemonade . . . . . .136 CHAPTER XIII. Spanish Wines Spanish Indifference Wine-making Vins du Pays Local Wines Benicarld Valdepenas . . .145 CHAPTER XIV. Sherry Wines The Sherry District Origin of the Name Varieties of Soil Of Grapes Pajarete Rojas Clemente Cultivation of Vines Best Vineyards The Vintage Amontillado The Capataz The Bodega Sherry Wine Arrope and Madre Vino A Lecture on Sherry in the Cellar at the Table Price of Fine Sherry Falsi- fication of Sherry Manzanilla The Alpistera . . . 1 50 CONTENTS. CHAPTER XV. Spanish Inns: Why so Indifferent The Fonda Modern Improve- ments The Posada Spanish Innkeepers The Venta : Arrival in it Arrangement Garlic Dinner Evening Night Bill Identity with the Inns of the Ancients ....... 165 CHAPTER XVI. Spanish Robbers A Robber Adventure Guardias Civiles Exag- gerated Accounts Cross of the Murdered Idle Robber Tales French Bandittiphobia Robber History Guerrilleros Smugglers Jose Maria Robbers of the First Class The Ratero Miguelites Escorts and Escopeteros Passes, Protections, and Talismans Execution of a Robber . . . . . . . .186 CHAPTER XVII. The Spanish Doctor : His Social Position Medical Abuses Hospitals Medical Education Lunatic Asylums Foundling Hospital of Seville Medical Pretensions Dissection Family Physician Consultations Medical Costume Prescriptions Druggists Snake Broth Salve for Knife-cuts . . . . . . .213 CHAPTER XVI1L Spanish Spiritual Remedies for the Body Miraculous Relics Sanative Oils Philosophy of Relic Remedies Midwifery and the Cinta of Tortdsa Bull of Crusade 236 CHAPTER XIX. The Spanish Figaro Mustachios Whiskers Beards Bleeding Heraldic Blood Blue, Red, and Black Blood Figaro's Shop The Baratero Shaving and Toothdrawing . . . . . 255 CHAPTER XX, What to observe in Spain How to observe Spanish Incuriousness and Suspicions French Spies and Plunderers Sketching in Spain Difficulties; How Surmounted Efficacy of Passports and Bribes Uncertainty and Want of Information in the Natives . . .265 CONTENTS. CHAPTER XXI. Origin of Bull-fight or Festival, and its Religious Character Fiestas Reales Royal Feasts Charles I. at one Discontinuance of the Old System Sham Bull-fights Plaza de Toros Slang Lan- guageSpanish Bulls Breeds The Going to a Bull-fight . . 286 CHAPTER XXII. The Bull-fight Opening of Spectacle First Act, and Appearance of the Bull The Picador Bull Bastinado The Horses, and their Cruel Treatment Fire and Dogs The Second Act The Chulos and their Darts The Third Act The Matador Death of the Bull The Conclusion, and Philosophy of the Amusement Its Effect on Ladies 300 CHAPTER XXIII. Spanish Theatre; Old and Modern Drama; Arrangement of Play- houses The Henroost The Fandango ; National Dances A Gipsy Ball Italian Opera National Songs and Guitars . . .318 CHAPTER XXIV. Manufacture of Cigars Tobacco Smuggling via Gibraltar Cigars of Ferdinand VII. Making a Cigarrito Zumalacarreguy and the Schoolmaster Time and Money wasted in Smoking Postscript on Spanish Stock .... 335 GATHERINGS FROM SPAIN. CHAPTER I. A general view of Spain Isolation King of the Spains Castilian pre- cedence Localism Want of Union Admiration of Spain M. Thiers in Spain. THE kingdom of Spain, which looks so compact on the map, is composed of many distinct provinces, each of which in earlier times formed a separate and independent kingdom ; and although all are now united under one crown by marriage, inheritance, conquest, and other circumstances, the original distinctions, geographical as well as social, remain almost unaltered. The language, costume, habits, arid local character of the natives, vary no less than the climate and productions of the soi^ The chains of mountains which intersect the whole peninsula, and the deep rivers which separate portions of it, have, for many years, operated as so many walls and moats, by cutting off intercommu- nication, and by fostering that tendency to isolation which must exist in all hilly countries, where good roads and bridges do not abound. As similar circumstances led the people of ancient Greece to split into small principalities, tribes and clans, so in Spain, man, following the example of the nature by which he is sur- rounded, has little in common with the inhabitant of the adjoin- ing district ; and these differences are increased and perpetuated by the ancient jealousies and inveterate dislikes, which petty and contiguous states keep up with such tenacious memory. The general comprehensive term " Spain," which is convenient for geographers and politicians, is calculated to mislead the traveller, for it would be far from easy to predicate any single thing of Spain or Spaniards which will be equally applicable to all its 2 RING ,6P : T&E SPAINS. [CHAP. i. heterogeneous c,om,t>oneht r par/g. ( , HPhe north-western provinces are more rainy than Devonshire, while the centre plains are more calcined than those of the deserts of Arabia, and the littoral south or eastern coasts altogether Algerian. The rude agricultural Gallician, the industrious manufacturing artisan of Barcelona, the gay and voluptuous Andalucian, the sly vindictive Valenoian, are as essentially different from each other as so many distinct characters at the same masquerade. It will therefore be more convenient to the traveller to take each province by itself and treat it in detail, keeping on the look-out for those peculiarities, those social and natural characteristics or idiosyn- cracies which particularly belong to each division, and distinguish it from its neighbours. The Spaniards who have written on their own geography and statistics, and who ought to be sup- posed to understand their own country and institutions the best, have found it advisable to adopt this arrangement from feeling the utter impossibility of treating Spain (where union is not unity) as a whole. There is no king of Spain : among the infinity of king- doms, the list of which swells out the royal style, that of " Spain " is not found ; he is King of the Spains, Rex Hispaniarum, Rey de las Espanas, not " Rey de Espana." Philip II., called by his countrymen el prudente, the prudent, wishing to fuse down his heterogeneous subjects, was desirous after his conquest of Por- tugal, which consolidated his dominion, to call himself King of Spain, which he then really was ; but this alteration of title was beyond the power of even his despotism ; such was the opposition of the kingdoms of Arragon and Navarre, which never gave up the hopes of shaking off the yoke of Castile, and recovering their former independence, while the empire provinces of New and Old Castile refused in anywise to compromise their claims of pre-eminence. They from early times, as now, took the lead in national nomenclature ; hence " Castellano" Castilian, is syno- nymous with Spaniard, and particularly with the proud genuine older stock. " Castellano d las derechas" means a Spaniard to the backbone ; " Hablar Castellano" to speak Castilian, is the correct expression for speaking the Spanish language. Spain again was long without the advantage of a fixed metropolis, like Rome, Paris, or London, which have been capitals from their foundation, and recognized and submitted to as such ; here, the CHAP, i.] LOCALISM OF SPANIARDS. 3 cities of Leon, Burgos, Toledo, Seville, Valladolid, and others, have each in their turns been the capitals of the kingdom. This constant change and short-lived pre-eminence has weakened any- prescriptive superiority of one city over another, and has been a cause of national weakness by raising up rivalries and disputes about precedence, which is one of the most fertile sources of dissension among a punctilious people. In fact the king was the state, and wherever he fixed his head-quarters was the court, La Corte, a word still synonymous with Madrid, which now claims to be the only residence of the Sovereign the residenz, as Germans would say ; otherwise, when compared with the cities above mentioned, it is a modern place ; from not having a bishop or cathedral, of which latter some older cities possess two, it has not even the rank of a ciudad, or city, but is merely denominated villa, or town. In moments of national danger it exercises little influence over the Peninsula : at the same time, from being the seat of the court and government, and therefore the centre of patronage and fashion, it attracts from all parts those who wish to make their fortune ; yet the capital has a hold on the ambition rather than on the affections of the nation at large. The inhabitants of the different provinces think, indeed, that Madrid is the greatest and richest court in the world, but their hearts are in their native localities. " Mi paisano" my fellow-countryman, or rather my fellow-county- man, fellow-parishioner, does not mean Spaniard, but Anda- lucian, Catalonian, as the case may be. When a Spaniard is asked, Where do you come from ? the reply is, " Soy hijo de Murcia hijo de Granada" " I am a son of Murcia a son of Granada," &c. This is strictly analogous to the " Children of Israel," the " Beni " of the Spanish Moors, and to this day the Arabs of Cairo call themselves children of that town, "Ibn el Musr" &c. ; and just as the Milesian Irishman is "a boy from Tipperary," &c., and ready to fight with any one who is so also, against all who are not of that ilk ; similar too is the clanship of the Highlander; indeed, everywhere, not perhaps to the same ex- tent as in Spain, the being of the same province or town creates a powerful freemasonry ; the parties cling together like old school- fellows. It is a home and really binding feeling. To the spot of their birth all their recollections, comparisons, and eulogies B2 4 DISUNION OF SPANIARDS. [CHAP. i. are turned ; nothing to them comes up to their particular pro- vince, that is, their real country. " La P atria" meaning Spain at large, is a subject of declamation, fine words, palabras}>&- laver, in which all, like Orientals, delight to indulge, and to which their grandiloquent idiom lends itself readily ; but their patriotism is parochial, and self is the centre of Spanish gravity. Like the German, they may sing and spout about Fatherland: in both cases the theory is splendid, but in practice each Spaniard thinks his own province or town the best in the Peninsula, and himself the finest fellow in it. From the earliest period down to the present all observers have been struck with this localism as a salient feature in the character of the Iberians, who never would amalgamate, never would, as Strabo said, put their shields together never would sacrifice their own local private interest for the general good ; on the contrary, in the hour of need they had, as at present, a constant tendency to separate into distinct juntas, " collective " assemblies, each of which only thought of its own views, utterly indifferent to the injury thereby occasioned to what ought to have been the common cause of all. Common danger and interest scarcely can keep them together, the ten- dency of each being rather to repel than to attract the other : the common enemy once removed, they instantly fall to logger- heads among each other, especially if there be any spoil to be divided : scarcely ever, as in the East, can the energy of one individual bind the loose staves by the iron power of a master mind ; remove the band, and the centrifugal members instanta- neously disunite. Thus the virility and vitality of the noble people have been neutralised : they have, indeed, strong limbs and honest hearts ; but, as in the Oriental parable, "a head" is wanting to direct and govern : hence Spain is to-day, as it always has been, a bundle of small bodies tied together by a rope of sand, and, being without union, is also without strength, and has been beaten in detail. The much-used phrase Espano- lismo expresses rather a " dislike of foreign dictation," and the " self- estimation " of Spaniards, Espanoles sobre todos, than any real patriotic love of country, however highly they rate its ex- cellences and superiority to every other one under heaven : this opinion is condensed in one of those pithy proverbs which, no- \vhere more than in Spain, are the exponents of popular senti- CHAP, i.] ADMIRATION OF SPAIN. 5 ment : it runs thus, " Quien dice Esparto,, dice todo" which means, " Whoever says Spain, says everything." A foreigner may perhaps think this a trifle too comprehensive and exclusive ; but he will do well to express no doubts on the subject, since he will only be set down by every native as either jealous, envious, or ignorant, and probably all three. To boast of Spain's strength, said the Duke of Wellington, is the national weakness. Every infinitesimal particle which con- stitutes nosotros, or ourselves, as Spaniards term themselves, will talk of his country as if the armies were still led to victory by the mighty Charles V., or the councils managed by Philip II. instead of Louis-Philippe. Fortunate, indeed, was it, according to a Castilian preacher, that the Pyrenees concealed Spain when the Wicked One tempted the Son of Man by an offer of all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them. This, indeed, was predicated in the mediaeval or dark ages, but few peninsular congregations, even in these enlightened times, would dispute the inference. It was but the other day that a foreigner was relating in a tertulia, or conversazione of Madrid, the well- known anecdote of Adam's revisit to the earth. The narrator explained how our first father on lighting in Italy was perplexed and taken aback ; how, on crossing the Alps into Germany, he found nothing that he could understand how matters got darker and stranger at Paris, until on his reaching England he was altogether lost, confounded, and abroad, being unable to make out any thing. Spain was his next point, where, to his infinite satisfaction, he found himself quite at home, so little had things changed since his absence, or indeed since the sun at its creation first shone over Toledo. The story concluded, a distinguished Spaniard, who was present, hurt perhaps at the somewhat pro- testant-dissenting tone of the speaker, gravely remarked, the rest of the party coinciding, Si 9 Senor, y tenia razon ; la Es- pana es Paradiso " Adam, Sir, was right, for Spain is para- dise ;" and in many respects this worthy, zealous gentleman was not wrong, although it is affirmed by some of his countrymen that some portions of it are inhabited by persons not totally exempt from original sin ; thus the Yalencians will say of their ravishing huerta, or garden, Es un paradiso habitado por de~ monios, " It is an Eden peopled by subjects of his Satanic Ma- 6 M. TRIERS IN SPAIN. [CHAP. i. jesty." Again, according to the natives, Murcia, a land over- flowing with milk and honey, where Flora and Pomona dispute the prize with Ceres and Bacchus, possesses a cielo y suelo bueno, el entresuelo malo, has " a sky and soil that are good, while all between is indifferent ;" which the entresol occupant must settle to his liking. Another little anecdote, like a straw thrown up in the air, will point out the direction in which the wind blows. Monsieur Thiers, the great historical romance writer, in his recent hand- gallop tour through the Peninsula, passed a few days only at Madrid ; his mind being, as logicians would say, of a subjective rather than an objective turn, that is, disposed rather to the consideration of the ego, and to things relating to self, than to those that do not, he scarcely looked more at any thing there, than he did during his similar run through London : " Behold," said the Spaniards, " that little gabacho ; he dares not remain, nor raise his eyes from the ground in this land, whose vast superiority wounds his personal and national vanity." There is nothing new in this. The old Castilian has an older saying: Si Dios no fuese Dios, seria rey de las Espanas, y el de Francia su cocinero " If God were not God, he would make himself king of the Spains, with him of France for his cook." Lope de Vega, without de- rogating one jot from these paradisiacal pretensions, used him of England better. His sonnet on the romantic trip to Madrid ran thus : " Carlos Stuardo soy, Que siendo amor mi guia, Al cielo de Espana voy, Por ver mi estrella Maria." " I am Charles Stuart, who, with love for my guide, hasten to the heaven Spain to see my star Mary." The Virgin, it must be remembered, after whom this infanta was named, is held by every Spaniard to be the brightest luminary, and the sole empress of heaven. CHAP, n.1 GEOGRAPHY OF SPAIN. CHAPTER II. The Geography of Spain Zones Mountains The Pyrenees The Gabacho, and French Politics. FROM Spain being the most southern country in Europe, it is very natural that those who have never been there, and who in England criticise those who have, should imagine the climate to be even more delicious than that of Italy or Greece. This is far from being the fact ; some, indeed, of the sea coasts and sheltered plains in the S. and E. provinces are warm in winter, and ex- posed to an almost African sun in summer, but the N. and W. districts are damp and rainy for the greater part of the year, while the interior is either cold and cheerless, or sunburnt and wind-blown : winters have occurred at Madrid of such severity that sentinels have been frozen to death ; and frequently all com- munication is suspended by the depth of the snow in the elevated roads over the mountain passes of the Castiles. All, therefore, who are about to travel through the Peninsula, are particularly cautioned to consider well their line of route beforehand, and to select certain portions to be visited at certain seasons, and thus avoid every local disadvantage. One glance at a map of Europe will convey a clearer notion of the relative position of Spain in regard to other countries than pages of letter-press : this is an advantage which every school- boy possesses over the Plinys and Strabos of antiquity ; the an- cients were content to compare the shape of the Peninsula to that of a bull's hide, nor was the comparison ill chosen in some respects. We will not weary readers with details of latitude and longitude, but just mention that the whole superficies of the Pe- ninsula, including Portugal, contains upwards of 19,000 square leagues, of which somewhat more than 15,500 belong to Spain; it is thus almost twice as large as the British Islands, and only one-tenth smaller than France ; the circumference or coast-line 8 GENERAL VIEW OF SPAIN. [CHAP. 11. is estimated at 750 leagues. This compact and isolated territory, inhabited by a fine, hardy, warlike population, ought, therefore, to have rivalled France in military power, while its position be- tween those two great seas which command the commerce of the old and new world, its indented line of coast, abounding in bays and harbours, offered every advantage of vying with England in maritime enterprise. Nature has provided commensurate outlets for the infinite pro- ductions of a country which is rich alike in everything that is to be found either on the face or in the bowels of the earth ; for the mines and quarries abound with precious metals and marbles, from gold to iron, from the agate to coal, while a fertile soil and every possible variety of climate admit of unlimited cultivation of the natural productions of the temperate or tropical zones : thus in the province of Granada the sugar-cane and cotton-tree luxuriate at the base of ranges which are covered with eternal snow : a wide range is thus afforded to the botanist, who may ascend by zones, through every variety of vegetable strata, from the hothouse plant growing wild, to the hardiest lichen. It has, indeed, required the utmost ingenuity and bad government of man to neutralise the prodigality of advantages which Provi- dence has lavished on this highly favoured land, and which, while under the dominion of the Romans and Moors, resembled an Eden, a garden of plenty and delight, when in the words of an old author, there was nothing idle, nothing barren in Spain ' nihil otiosum, nihil sterile in Hispania." A sad change has come over this fair vision, and now the bulk of the Peninsula offers a picture of neglect and desolation, moral and physical, which it is painful to contemplate : the face of nature and the niind of man have too often been dwarfed and curtailed of their fair proportions ; they have either been neglected and their in- herent fertility allowed to run into vice and luxuriant weeds, which it will show against any country in the world, or their energies have been misdirected, and a capability of all good con- verted into an element equally powerful for evil ; but pride and laziness are here as everywhere the keys to poverty, altivez y pereza, Haves de pobreza. The geological construction of Spain is very peculiar, and unlike that of most other countries ; it is almost one mountain or CHAP. Ji.] CLIMATE AND ELEVATION OF SPAIN. 9 agglomeration of mountains, as those of our countrymen who are speculating in Spanish railroads are just beginning to discover. The interior rises on every side from the sea, arid the central portions are higher than any other table-lands in Europe, ranging on an average from two to three thousand feet above the level of the sea, while from this elevated plain chains of mountains rise again to a still greater height. Madrid, which stands on this central plateau, is situated about 2000 feet above the level of Naples, which lies in the same latitude ; the mean temperature of Madrid is 59, while that of Naples is 63 30'; it is to this difference of elevation that the extraordinary difference of cli- mate and vegetable productions between the two capitals is to be ascribed. Fruits which flourish on the coasts of Provence and Genoa, which lie four degrees more to the north than any por- tion of Spain, are rarely to be met with in the elevated interior of the Peninsula : on the other hand, the low and sunny mari- time belts abound with productions of a tropical vegetation. The mountainous character and general aspect of the coast are nearly analogous throughout the circuit which extends from the Basque Provinces to Cape Finisterre ; and offer a remarkable contrast to those sunny alluvial plains which extend, more or less, from Cadiz to Barcelona, and which closely resemble each other in vegetable productions, such as the fig, orange, pomegranate, aloe, and carob tree, which grow everywhere in profusion, except in those parts where the mountains come down abruptly into the sea itself. Again, the central districts, composed of vast plains and steppes, Parameras, Tierras de campo, y Secanos, closely resemble each other in their monotonous denuded aspect, in their scarcity of fruit and timber, and their abundance of cereal productions. Spanish geographers have divided the Peninsula into seven distinct chains of mountains. These commence with the Pyrenees and end with the Bretican or Andalucian ranges : these cordilleras, or lines of lofty ridges, arise on each side of inter- vening plains, which once formed the basins of internal lakes, until the accumulated waters, by bursting through the obstruc- tions by which they were dammed up, found a passage to the ocean : the dip or inclination of the country lies from the east towards the west, and, accordingly, the chief rivers which form 10 ZONES OF SPAIN. [CHAP. n. the drains and principal water-sheds of the greater parts of the surface, flow into the Atlantic : their courses, like the basins through which they pass, lie in a transversal and almost a parallel direction ; thus the Duero, the Tagus, the Guadiana. and the Guadalquivir, all flow into their recipient between their distinct chains of mountains. The sources of the supply to these leading arteries arise in the longitudinal range of elevations which descends all through the Peninsula, approaching rather to the eastern than to the western coast, whereby a considerably greater length is obtained by each of these four rivers, when compared to the Ebro, which disembogues in the Mediter- ranean. The Moorish geographer Alrasi was the first to take difference of climate as the rule of dividing the Peninsula into distinct portions ; and modern authorities, carrying out this idea, have drawn an imaginary line, which runs north-east to south-west, thus separating the Peninsula into the northern, or the boreal and temperate, and the southern or the torrid, and subdividing these two into four zones : nor is this division altogether fanciful, for there is no caprice or mistake in tests derived from the vegetable world ; manners may make man, but the sun alone modifies the plant : man may be fused down by social appliances into one uniform mass, but the rude elements are not to be civilized, nor can nature be made cosmopolitan, which heaven forfend. The first or northern zone is the Cantabrian, the European ; this portion skirts the base of the Pyrenees, and includes portions of Catalonia, Arragon, and Navarre, the Basque provinces, the Asturias, and Gallicia. This is the region of humidity, and as the winters are long, and the springs and autumns rainy, it should only be visited in the summer. It is a country of hill and dale, is intersected by numerous streams which abound in fish, and which irrigate rich meadows for pastures. The valleys form the now improving dairy country of Spain, while the mountains furnish the most valuable and available timber of the Peninsula. In some parts corn will scarcely ripen, while in others, in addition to the cerealia, cider and an ordinary wine are produced. It is inhabited by a hardy, independent, and rarely subdued population, since the mountainous country offers CHAP, ii.] ZONES OF SPAIN. 1! natural means of defence to brave Highlanders. It is useless to attempt the conquest with a small army, while a large one would find no means of support in the hungry localities. The second zone is the Iberian or eastern, which, in its mari- time portions, is more Asiatic than European, and where the lower classes partake of the Greek and Carthaginian character, being false, cruel, and treacherous, yet lively, ingenious, and fond of pleasure: this portion commences at Burgos, and includes the southern portion of Catalonia and Arragon, with parts of Castile, Valencia, and Murcia. The sea-coasts should be visited in the spring and autumn, when they are delicious ; but they are intensely hot in the summer, and infested with myriads of muskitoes. The districts about Burgos are among the coldest in Spain, and the thermometer sinks very much below the ordinary average of our more temperate climate ; and as they have little at any time to attract the traveller, he will do well to avoid them except during the summer months. The population is grave, sober, and Castilian. The elevation is very considerable ; thus the upper valley of the Mino and some of the north-western portions of Old Castile and Leon are placed more than 6000 feet above the level of the sea, and the frosts often last for three months at a time. The third zone is the Lusitanian, or western, which is by far the largest, and includes the central parts of Spain and all Portugal. The interior of this portion, and especially the pro- vinces of the two Castiles and La Mancha, both in the physical condition of the soil and the moral qualities of the inhabitants, presents a very unfavourable view of the Peninsula, as these inland steppes are burnt up by summer suns, and are tempest and wind-rent during winter. The general absence of trees, hedges, and enclosures exposes these wide unprotected plains to the rage and violence of the elements: poverty-stricken mud houses, scattered here and there in the desolate extent, afford a wretched home to a poor, proud, and ignorant population ; but these localities, which offer in themselves neither pleasure nor profit to the stranger, contain many sites and cities of the highest interest, which none who wish to understand Spain can possibly pass by unnoticed. The best periods for visiting this portion of Spain are May and June, or September and October. 12 GENERAL DROUGHT OF SPAIN. [CHAP. n. The more western districts of this Lusitanian zone are not so disagreeable. There in the uplands the ilex and chesnut abound, while the rich plains produce vast harvests of corn, and the vine- yards powerful red wines. The central table-land, which closely resembles the plateau of Mexico, forms nearly one-half of the entire area of the Peninsula. The peculiarity of the climate is its dryness ; it is not, however, unhealthy, being free from the agues and fevers which are prevalent in the lower plains, river-swamps, and rice-grounds of parts of Valencia and Andalucia. Rain, indeed, is so comparatively scarce on this table-land, that the annual quantity on an average does not amount to more than ten inches. The least quantity falls in the mountain regions near Guadalupe, and on the high plains of Cuenca and Murcia, where sometimes eight or nine months pass without a drop falling. The occasional thunder-storms do but just lay the dust, since here moisture dries up quicker even than woman's tears. The face of the earth is tanned, tawny, and baked into a veritable terra cotta : everything seems dead and burnt on a funeral pile. It is all but a miracle how the prin- ciple of life in the green herb is preserved, since the very grass appears scorched and dead ; yet when once the rains set in, vege- tation springs up, phoenix-like, from the ashes, and bursts forth in an inconceivable luxuriance and life. The ripe seeds which have fallen on the soil are called into existence, carpeting the desert with verdure, gladdening the eye with flowers, and intoxi- cating the senses with perfume. The thirsty chinky dry earth drinks in these genial showers, and then rising like a giant, refreshed with wine, puts forth all its strength ; and what vege- tation is, where moisture is combined with great heat, cannot even be guessed at in lands of stinted suns. The periods of rains are the winter and spring, and when these are plentiful, all kinds of grain, and in many places wines, are produced in abundance. The olive, however, is only to be met with in a few favoured localities. The fourth zone is the Boetican, which is the most southern and African ; it coasts the Mediterranean, basking at the foot of the mountains which rise behind and form the mass of the Pen- insula : this mural barrier offers a sure protection against the cold winds which sweep across the central region. Nothing can CHAP, ir.] GEOGRAPHY OF SPAIN. 13 be more striking than the descent from the table elevations into these maritime strips ; in a few hours the face of nature is com- pletely changed, and the traveller passes from the climate and vegetation of Europe into that of Africa. This region is cha- racterised by a dry burning atmosphere during a large part of the year. The winters are short and temperate, and consist rather in rain than in cold, for in the sunny valleys ice is scarcely known except for eating ; the springs and autumns delightful beyond all conception. Much of the cultivation depends on artificial irrigation, which was carried by the Moors to the highest perfection : indeed water, under this forcing, vivifying sun, is the blood of the earth, and synonymous with fertility: the productions are tropical ; sugar, cotton, rice, the orange, lemon, and date. The algarrobo, the carob tree, and the adelfa, the oleander, may be considered as forming boundary marks be- tween this the tierra caliente, or torrid district, and the colder regions by which it is encompassed. Such are the geographical divisions of nature with which the vegetable and animal productions are closely connected ; and we shall presently enter somewhat more fully into the climate of Spain, of which the natives are as proud as if they had made it themselves. This Boetican zone, Andalucia, which contains in itself many of the most interesting cities, sites, and natural beauties of the Peninsula, will always take precedence in any plan of the traveller, and each of these points has its own peculiar attractions. These embrace a wide range of varied scenery and objects ; and Andalucia, easy of access, may be gone over almost at every portion of the year. The winters may be spent at Cadiz, Seville, or Malaga ; the summers in the cool mountains of Ronda, Aracena, or Granada. April, May, and June, or September, October, and November, are, however, the most preferable. Those who go in the spring should reserve June for the mountains ; those who go in the autumn should reverse the plan, and commence with Eonda and Granada, ending with Seville and Cadiz. Spain, it has thus been shown, is one mountain, or rather a jumble of mountains, for the principal and secondary ranges are all more or less connected with each other, and descend in a serpentising direction throughout the Peninsula, with a general 14 SPANISH MOUNTAINS. [CHAP. n. inclination to the west. Nature, by thus dislocating the country, seems to have suggested, nay, almost to have forced, localism and isolation to the inhabitants, who each in their val- leys and districts are shut off from their neighbours, whom to love, they are enjoined in vain. The internal communication of the Peninsula, which is thus divided by the mountain-walls, is effected by some good roads, few and far between, and which are carried over the most con- venient points, where the natural dips are the lowest, and the ascents and descents the most practicable. These passes are called Puertos port&, or gates. There are, indeed, mule-tracks and goat-paths over other and intermediate portions of the chain, but they are difficult and dangerous, and being seldom provided with ventas or villages, are fitter for smugglers and bandits than honest men : the farthest and fairest way about will always be found the best and shortest road. The Spanish mountains in general have a dreary and harsh character, yet not without a certain desolate sublimity : the highest are frequently capped with snow, which glistens in the clear sky. They are rarely clad with forest trees ; the scarped and denuded ridges cut with a serrated outline the clean clear blue sky. The granitic masses soar above the green valley or yellow corn-plains in solitary state, like the castles of a feudal baron, that lord it over all below, with which they are too proud to have aught in common. These mountains are seen to greatest advantage at the rise and setting of the sun, for during the day the vertical rays destroy all form by removing shadows. These geographical peculiarities of Spain, and particularly the existence of the great central elevation, when once attained are apt to be forgotten. The country rises from the coast, directly in the north-western provinces, and in some of the southern and eastern, with an intervening alluvial strip and swell : but when once the ascent is accomplished, no real descent ever takes place we are then on the summit of a vast elevated mass. The roads indeed apparently ascend and descend, but the mean height is seldom diminished : the interior hills or plains are undulations of one mountain. The traveller is often deceived at the apparent low level of snow-clad ranges, such as the Guadarrama ; this will be accounted for by adding the great elevation of their bases CHAP, ii.] THE PYRENEES. 15 above the level of the sea. The palace of the Escorial, which is placed at the foot of the Guadarrama, and at the head of a seem- ing plain, stands in reality at 2725 feet above Valencia, while the summer residence of the king at La Granja, in the same chain, is thirty feet higher than the summit of Vesuvius. This, indeed, is a castle in the air a chateau en Espagne, and worthy of the most German potentate to whom that element belongs, as the sea does to Britannia. The mean temperature on the plateau of Spain is as 15 Reaumur, while that of the coast is as 18 and 19, in addition to the protection from cutting winds which their mountainous backgrounds afford ; nor is the traveller less de- ceived as regards the heights of the interior mountains than he is with the champaigns, or table-land plains. The eye wanders over a vast level extent bounded only by the horizon, or a faint blue line of other distant sierras ; this space, which appears one townless level, is intersected with deep ravines, barrancas, in which villages lie concealed, and streams, arroyos, flow unper- ceived. Another important effect of this central elevation is the searching dryness and rarefication of the air. It is often highly prejudicial to strangers ; the least exposure, which is very tempting under a burning sun, will often bring on ophthal- mia, irritable colics, and inflammatory diseases of the lungs and vital organs. Such are the causes of the pulmonia, which carries off the invalid in a few days, and is the disease of Madrid. The frozen blasts descending from the snow-clad Guadarrama catch the incautious passenger at the turning of streets which are roast- ing under a fierce sun. Is it to be wondered at, that this capital should be so very insalubrious ? in winter you are frozen alive, in summer baked. A man taking a walk for the benefit of his health, crosses with his pores open from an oven to an ice-house ; catch-cold introduces the Spanish doctor, who soon in his turn presents the undertaker. As the Pyrenees possess an European interest at this moment when the Napoleon of Peace proposes to annihilate their ex- istence, which defied Louis XIV. and Buonaparte, some de- tails may be not unacceptable. This gigantic barrier, which divides Spain and France, is connected with the dorsal chain which comes down from Tartary and Asia. It stretches far be- yond the transversal spine, for the mountains of the Basque Pro- 16 THE PYRENEES. [CHAP. IT. vinces, Asturias, and Gallicia, are its continuation. The Pyrenees, properly speaking, extend E. to W., in length about 270 miles, being both broadest arid highest in the central portions, where the width is about 60 miles, and the elevations exceed 11,000 feet. The spurs and offsets of this great transversal spine penetrate on both sides into the lateral valleys like ribs from a back-bone. The central nucleus slopes gradually E. to the gentle Mediterranean, and W. to the fierce Atlantic, in a long uneven swell. This range of mountains was called by the Romans Monies and Saltus Pyrenei, and by the Greeks FIupjjvi/j probably from a local Iberian word, but which they, as usual, catching at sound, not sense, connected with their IIvp, and then bolstered up their erroneous derivation by a legend framed to fit the name, asserting that it either alluded to a fire through which certain precious metals were discovered, or because the lofty summits were often struck with lightning, and dislocated by the volcanos. According to the Iberians, Hercules, when on his way to " lift " Geryon's cattle, was hospitably received by Bebryx, a petty ruler in these mountains ; whereupon the demigod got drunk, and ra- vished his host's daughter Pyrene, who died of grief, when Her- cules, sad and sober, made the whole range re-echo with her name ; a legend which, like some others in Spain, requires con- firmation, for the Phoenicians called these ranges Purani, from the forests, Pura meaning wood in Hebrew. The Basques have, of course, their etymology, some saying that the real root is Biri, an elevation, while others prefer Bierri enac, the " two countries," which, separated by the range, were ruled by Tubal ; but when Spaniards once begin with Tubal, the best plan is to shut the book. The Maledeta is the loftiest peak, although the Pico del Me- diodia and the Canigu, because rising at once out of plains and therefore having the greatest apparent altitudes, were long con- sidered to be the highest ; but now these French usurpers are dethroned. Seen from a distance, the range appears to be one mountain-ridge, with broken pinnacles, but, in fact, it consists of two distinct lines, which are parallel, but not continuous. The one which commences at the ocean is the most forward, being at least 30 miles more in advance towards the south than CHAP, ii.] THE GABACHO. 17 the corresponding line, which commences from the Mediter- ranean. The centre is the point of dislocation, and here the ramifications and reticulations are the most intricate, as it is the key-stone of the system, which is buttressed up by Las Tres Sorellas, the three sisters Monte Perdido, Cylindro, and Mar- bore. Here is the source of the Garonne, La Garona ; here the scenery is the grandest, and the lateral valleys the longest and widest. The smaller spurs enclose valleys, down each of which pours a stream : thus the Ebro, Garona, and Bidasoa are fed from the mountain source. These tributaries are generally called in France Gaves,* and in some parts on the Spanis-h side Gabas ; but Gav signifies a " river/' and may be traced in our Avon ; and Humboldt derives it from the Basque Gav, a " hol- low or ravine ;" cavus. The parting of these waters, or their flowing down either N. or S., should naturally mark the line of division between France and Spain : such, however, is not the case, as part of Ccrdana belongs to France, while Aran be- longs to Spain ; thus each country possesses a key in its neighbour's territory. It is singular that this obvious incon- venience should not have been remedied by some exchange when the long-disputed boundary question was settled between Charles IV. and the French republic. Most of the passes over this Alpine barrier are impracticable for carriages, and remain much in the same state as in the time * The word Gabacho, which is the most offensive vituperative of the Spaniard against the Frenchman, and has by some been thought to mean "those who dwell on Gaves," is the Arabic Cabach, detestable, filthy, or ' qui prava indofc est, moribusque." In fact the real meaning cannot be further alluded to beyond referring to the clever tale of El Frances y Espaifol by Quevedo. The antipathy to the Gaul is natural and national, and dates far beyond history. This nickname was first given in the eighth century, when Charlemagne, the Buonaparte of his day, invaded Spain, on the abdication and cession of the crown by the chaste Alonso, the prototype of the wiftol Charles IV.; then the Spanish Moors and Christians, foes and friends, forgot their hatreds of creeds in the greater loathing for the abhorred intruder, whose '* peerage felt " in the memorable passes of Roncesvalles. The true deriva- tion of the word Gabacho, which now resounds from these Pyrenees to the Straits, is blinked in the royal academical dictionary- such was the servile adulation of the members to their French patron Philip V. JMueran los Gabachos, *' Death to the miscreants," was the rally cry of Spain after the inhuman butcheries of the terrorist Murat; nor have the echoes died away; a spark may kindle the prepared mine: of what an unspeakable va^e is a national war-cry which at once gives to a whole people a shibboleth, a rally- ing watch- word to a common cause ! Vox populi vox Dei, 18 THE PYRENEES. [CHAP. n. of the Moors, who from them called the Pyrenean range Albort, from the Roman Portce, the ridge of " gates." Many of the wild passes are only known to the natives and smugglers, and are often impracticable from the snow ; while even in summer they are dangerous, being exposed to mists and the hurricanes of mighty rushing winds. The two best carriageable lines of inter- communication are placed at each extremity : that to the west passes through Irun ; that to the east through Figueras. The Spanish Pyrenees offer few attractions to the lovers of the fleshly comforts of cities ; but the scenery, sporting, geology, and botany are truly Alpine, and will well repay those who can u rough it " considerably. The contrast which the unfrequented Spanish side offers to the crowded opposite one is great. In Spain the mountains themselves are less abrupt, less covered with snow, while the numerous and much frequented baths in the French Pyrenees have created roads, diligences, hotels, tables-d'hote, cooks, Ciceronis, donkeys, and so forth ; for the Badauds de Paris who babble about green fields and des belles horreurs, but who seldom go beyond the immediate vicinity and hackneyed " lions." A want of good taste and real perception of the sublime and beautiful is nowhere more striking, says Mr. Erskine Murray, than on the French side, where mankind remains pro- foundly ignorant of the real beauties of the Pyrenees, which have been chiefly explored by the English, who love nature with all their heart and soul, who worship her alike in her shyest re- treats and in her wildest forms. Nevertheless, on the north side many comforts and appliances for the tourist, are to be had ; nay, invalids and ladies in search of the picturesque can ascend to the Breche de Roland. Once, however, cross the frontier, and a sudden change comes over all facilities of locomotion. Stern is the first welcome of the "hard land of Iberia," scarce is the food for body or mind, and deficient the accommodation for man or beast, and simply because there is small demand for either. No Spaniard ever comes here for pleasure ; hence the localities are given up to the smuggler arid izard. The Oriental insesthetic incuriousness for things, old stones, wild scenery, &c., is increased by political reasons and fears. The neighbour, from the time of the Celt down to to-day, has ever been the coveter, ravager, and terror of Spain : her " knavish tricks," CHAP, ii.] FRENCH POLICY. 19 fire and rapine are too numerous to be blinked or written away, too atrocious to be forgiven : to revenge becomes a sacred duty. However governments may change, the policy of France is im- mutable. Perfidy, backed by violence, " ruse doublee de force," is the state maxim from Louis XIV. and Buonaparte down to Louis-Philippe : the principle is the same, whether the instru- ment employed be the sword or wedding ring. The weaker Spain is thus linked in the embrace of her stronger neighbour, and has been made alternately her dupe and victim, and degraded into becoming a mere satellite, to be dragged along by fiery Mars. France has forced her to share all her bad fortune, but never has permitted her to participate in her success. Spain has been tied to the car of her defeats, but never has been allowed to mount it in the day of triumph. Her friendship has always tended to denational- ise Spain, and by entailing the forced enmity of England, has caused to her the loss of her navies and colonies in the new world. " The Pyrenean boundary,'* says the Duke of Wellington, " is the most vulnerable frontier of France, probably the only vulnerable one ;" accordingly she has always endeavoured to dismantle the Spanish defences and to foster insurrections and pronunciamientos in Catalonia, for Spain's infirmity is her oppor- tunity, and therefore the " sound policy " of the rest of Europe is to see Spain strong, independent, and able to hold her own Pyrenean key. While France therefore has improved her means of approach and invasion, Spain, to whom the past is prophetic of the future, has raised obstacles, and has left her protecting barrier as broken and hungry as when planned by her tutelar divinity. Nor are her Highlanders more practicable than their granite fastnesses. "Here dwell the smuggler, the rifle sportsman, and all who defy the law : here is bred the hardy peasant, who, accustomed to scale mountains and fight wolves, becomes a ready raw material for the guerrilleros, and none were ever more formidable to Rome or France than those marshalled in these glens by Ser- torius and Mina. When the tocsin bell rings out, a hornet swarm of armed men, the weed of the hills, starts up from every rock and brake. The hatred of the Frenchman, which the Duke said formed " part of a Spaniard's nature," seems to increase in intensity in proportion to vicinity, for as they touch, so they fret 20 THE PYRENEES. [CHAP. 11. and rub each other : here it is the antipathy of an antithesis ; the incompatibility of the saturnine and slow, with the mercurial and rapid ; of the proud, enduring, and ascetic, against the vain, the fickle, and sensual ; of the enemy of innovation and change, to the lover of variety and novelty ; and however tyrants and tricksters may assert in the gilded galleries of Versailles that II n'y a plus de Pyrenees, this party -wall of Alps, tiiis barrier of snow and hurricane, does and will exist for ever : placed there by Providence, as was said by the Gothic prelate Saint Isidore, they ever have forbidden and ever will forbid the banns of an unnatural alliance, as in the days of Silius Italicus : ' Pyrene celsa nimbosi verticis arce Divisos Celtis late prospectat Hiberos Atque seterna tenet magnis divortia terris." If the eagle of Buonaparte could never build in the Arragonese Sierra, the lily of the Bourbon assuredly will not take root in the Castilian plain ; so sings Ariosto : " Che non lice Che '1 giglio in quel terreno habbia radice !" This inveterate condition either of pronounced hostility, or at best of armed neutrality, has long rendered these localities dis- agreeable to the man of the note-book. The rugged mountain frontiers consist of a series of secluded districts, which constitute the entire world to the natives, who seldom go beyond the natural walls by which they are bounded, except to smuggle. This vocation is the curse of the country ; it fosters a wild reliance on self-defence, a habit of border foray and insurrection, which seems as necessary to them as a moral excitement and combustible element, as carbon and hydrogen are in their physical bodies. Their habitual suspicion against prying foreigners, which is an Oriental and Iberian instinct, converts a curious traveller into a spy or partisan. Spanish authorities, who seldom do these things except on compulsion, cannot understand the gratuitous braving of hardship and danger for its own sake the botanizing and geologizing, &c., of the nature and adventure-loving English. The impertincnte curioso may possibly escape observation in a Spanish city and crowd, but in these lonely hills it is out of the question : he is the observed of all observers ; and they, from CHAP, ii.] THE PYRENEES. 21 long smuggling and sporting habits, are always on the look-out, and are keen-sighted as hawks, gipseys, and beasts of prey. Latterly some who, by being placed immediately under the French boundary, have seen the glitter of our tourists' coin, have become more humanized, and anxious to obtain a share in the profits of the season. The geology and botany have yet to be properly investigated. In the metal-pregnant Pyrenees rude forges of iron abound, but everything is conducted on a small, unscientific scale, and pro- bably after the unchanged primitive Iberian system. Fuel is scarce, and transport of ores on muleback expensive. The iron is at once inferior to the English and much dearer : the tools and implements used on both sides of the Pyrenees are at least a century behind ours ; while absurd tariffs, which prevent the importation of a cheaper and better article, retard improve- ments in agriculture and manufactures, and perpetuate poverty and ignorance among backward, half-civilised populations. The timber, moreover, has suffered much from the usual neglect, waste, and improvidence of the natives, who destroy more than they consume, and never replant. The sporting in these lonely wild districts is excellent, for where man seldom penetrates the ferae naturae multiply : the bear is, however, getting scarce, as a premium is placed on every head destroyed. The grand object is the Cobra Montanez, or Rupicapra, German Steinbock, the Bouquetin of the French, the Izard (Ibex, becco, bouc, bock, buck). The fascination of this pursuit, like that of the Chamois in Switzerland, leads to constant and even fatal accidents, as this shy animal lurks in almost inaccessible localities, and must be stalked with the nicest skill. The sporting on the north side is far inferior, as the cooks of the table-d'hotes have waged a guerra al cuchillo, a war to the knife, and fork too, against even les pctits oiseaux ; but your French artiste persecutes even minnows, as all sport and fair play is scouted, and everything gives way for the pot. The Spaniards, less mechanical and gastronomic, leave the feathered and finny tribes in comparative peace. Ac- cordingly the streams abound with trout, and those which flow into the Atlantic with salmon. The lofty Pyrenees are not only alem- bics of cool crystal streams, but contain, like the heart of Sappho, sources of warm springs under a bosom of snow. The most 22 THE PYRENEES. [CHAP. 11. celebrated issue on the north side, or at least those which are the most known and frequented, for the Spaniard is a small bather, and no great drinker of medicinal waters. Accommodations at the baths on his side scarcely exist, while even those in France are paltry when compared to the spas of Germany, and dirty and indecent when contrasted with those of England. The scenery is alpine, a jumble of mountain, precipice, glacier, and forest, enlivened by the cataract or hurricane. The natives, when not smugglers or guerrilleros, are rude, simple, and pastoral : they are poor and picturesque, as people are who dwell in mountains. Plains which produce " bread stuffs " may be richer, but what can a traveller or painter do with their monotonous common- place ? In these wild tracts the highlanders in summer lead their flocks up to mountain huts and dwell with their cattle, strug- gling against poverty and wild beasts, and endeavouring really to keep the wolf from the door: their watch-dogs are mag- nificent ; the sheep are under admirable control being, as it were, in the presence of the enemy, they know the voice of their shepherds, or rather the peculiar whistle and cry : their wool is largely smuggled into France, and when manufactured in the shape of coarse cloth is then re-smuggled back again. CHAP, in.] THE RIVERS OF SPAIN. 23 CHAPTER III. The Rivers of Spain Bridges Navigation The Ebro and Tagus. ' THERE are six great rivers in Spain, the arteries which run between the seven mountain chains, the vertebrae of the geolo- gical skeleton. These water-sheds are each intersected in their extent by others on a minor scale, by valleys and indentations, in each of which runs its own stream. Thus the rains and melted snows are all collected in an infinity of ramifications, and are carried by these tributary conduits into one of the main trunks, which all, with the exception of the Ebro, empty themselves into the Atlantic. The Duero and Tagus, unfortunately for Spain, disembogue in Portugal, and thus become a portion of a foreign dominion exactly where their commercial importance is the greatest. Philip II. saw the true value of the possession of an angle which rounded Spain, and insured to her the possession of these valuable outlets of internal produce, and inlets for external commerce. Portugal annexed to Spain gave more real power to his throne than the dominion of entire continents across the Atlantic, and is the secret object of every Spanish government's ambition. The Mino, which is the shortest of these rivers, runs through a bosom of fertility. The Tajo, Tagus, which the fancy of poets has sanded with gold and embanked with roses, tracks much of its dreary way through rocks and comparative barrenness. The Guadiana creeps through lonely Estremadura, infecting the low plains with miasma. The Guadalquivir eats out its deep banks amid the sunny olive-clad regions of Anda- lucia, as the Ebro divides the levels of Arragon. Spain abounds with brackish streams, Salados, and with salt-mines, or saline deposits after the evaporation of the sea-waters ; indeed, the soil of the central portions is so strongly impregnated with " villainous saltpetre," that the small province of La Mancha alone could furnish materials to blow up the world; the surface of these 24 SPANISH RIVERS. [CHAP. in. regions, always arid, is every day becoming more so, from the singular antipathy which the inhabitants of the interior have against trees. There is nothing to check the power of rapid evaporation, no shelter to protect or preserve moisture. The soil becomes more and more parched and dried up, insomuch that in some parts it has almost ceased to be available for cultivation : another serious evil, which arises from want of plantations, is, that the slopes of hills are everywhere liable to constant denuda- tion of soil after heavy rain. There is nothing to break the descent of the water ; hence the naked, barren stone summits of many of the sierras, which have been pared and peeled of every particle capable of nourishing vegetation : they are skeletons where life is extinct ; not only is the soil thus lost, but the detritus washed down either forms bars at the mouths of rivers, or chokes up and raises their beds ; they are thus rendered liable to overflow their banks, arid convert the adjoining plains into pestilential swamps. The supply of water, which is afforded by periodical rains, and which ought to support the reservoirs of rivers, is carried off' at once in violent floods, rather than in a gentle gradual disembocation. From its mountainous character Spain has very few lakes, as the fall is too considerable to allow water to accumulate ; the exceptions which do exist might with greater propriety be termed lochs not that they are to be com- pared in size or beauty to some of those in Scotland. The volume in the principal rivers of Spain has diminished, and is diminishing; thus some which once were navigable, are so no longer, while the artificial canals which were to have been sub- stituted remain unfinished : the progress of deterioration ad- vances, while little is done to counteract or amend what every year must render more difficult and expensive, while the means of repair and correction will diminish in equal proportion, from the poverty occasioned by the evil, and by the fearful extent which it will be allowed to attain. However, several grand water-companies have been lately formed, who are to dig Arte- sian wells, finish canals, navigate rivers with steamers, and issue shares at a premium, which will be effected if nothing else is. The rivers which are really adapted to navigation are, how- ever, only those which are perpetually fed by those tributary streams that flow down from, mountains which are covered with CHAP, in] SPANISH BRIDGES. 25 snow all the year, and these are not many. The majority of Spanish rivers are very scanty of water during the summer time, and very rapid in their flow when filled by rains or melting snow : during these periods they are impracticable for boats. They are, moreover, much exhausted by being drained off, sangrado that is, bled, for the purposes of artificial irrigation ; thus, at Madrid and Valencia, the wide beds of the Manzanares and the Turia are frequently dry as the sands of the seashore when the tide is out. They seem only to be entitled to be called rivers by courtesy, because they have so many and such splendid bridges ; as numerous are the jokes cut by the newly-arrived stranger, who advises the townsfolk to sell one of them to pur- chase water, or compares their thirsting arches to the rich man in torments, who prays for one drop ; but a heavy rain in the mountains soon shows the necessity for their strength and length, for their wide and lofty arches, their buttress-like piers, which before had appeared to be rather the freaks of architectural magnificence than the works of public utility. Those who live in a comparatively level country can scarcely form an idea of the rapidity and fearful destruction of the river inundations in this land of mountains. The deluge rolls forth in an avalanche, the rising water coming down tier above tier like a flight of steps let loose. These tides carry everything before them scarring and gullying up the earth, tearing down rocks, trees, and houses, and strewing far and wide the relics of ruin ; but the fierce fury is short-lived, and is spejit in its own violence ; thus the traveller at Madrid, if he wishes to see its Thames, should run down or take the 'bus as he can, when it rains, or the river will be gone before he gets there. When the Spaniards, under those blockheads Blake and Cuesta, lost the battle of Rio Seco, which gave Madrid to Buonaparte, the French soldiers, in cross- ing the dry river bed in pursuit of the fugitives, exclaimed, " Why Spanish rivers run away too !" Many of these beds serve in remote districts, where highways and bridges are thought to be superfluous luxuries, for the double purposes of a river when there is water in them, and as a road when there is not. Again, in this land of anomalies, some streams have no bridges, while other bridges have no streams ; the most remarkable of these ponies asinorum is at Coria, where 26 THE EBRO. [CHAP. m. the Alagon is crossed at an inconvenient, and often dangerous ferry, while a noble bridge of five arches stands high and dry in the meadows close by. This has arisen from the river having quitted its old channel in some inundation ; or, as Spaniards say, salido de su madre, gone out from its mother, who does not seem to know that it is out, or certainly does not care, since no steps have ever been taken by the Corians to coax it back again under its old arches ; they call on Hercules to turn this Alpheus, and rely in the meantime on their proverb, that all fickle, unfaithful rivers repent and return to their legitimate beds after a thousand years, for nothing is hurried in Spain, Despues de anos mil, vuelve el rio a su cubil. On the fishing in these wandering streams we shall presently say something. The navigation of Spanish rivers is Oriental, classical, and imperfect ; the boats, barges, and bargemen carry one back beyond the mediaeval ages, and are better calculated for artistical than commercial purposes. The "great river," the Guadal- quivir, which was navigable in the time of the Romans as far as Cordova, is now scarcely practicable for sailing-vessels of a moderate size even up to Seville. Passengers, however, have facilities afforded them by the steamers which run backwards and forwards between this capital and Cadiz ; these conveniences, it need not be said, were introduced from England, although the first steamer that ever paddled in waters was of Spanish in- vention, and was launched at Barcelona in 1543 ; but the Spanish Chancellor of the Exchequer of the time was a poor red tapist, and opposed the whole thing, which, as usual, fell to the ground. The steamers on the Guadalquivir are safe ; indeed, in our times, the advertisements always stated that a mass was said before starting in the heretical contrivance, just as to this day Birmingham locomotives, when a railway is first opened in France, are sprinkled with holy water, and blessed by a bishop, which may be a new " wrinkle " to Mr. Hudson and the primate of York. There is considerable talk in Arragon about rendering the Ebro navigable, and it has been surveyed this year by two en- gineers p^nglish of course. The local newspapers compared the astonishment of the herns and peasantry, created on the banks by this arrival, as second only to that occasioned when Don Quixote CHAP, in.1 THE TAGUS. 27 and Sancho ventured near the same spot into the enchanted bark. There has been still older and greater talk about establishing a water communication between Lisbon and Toledo, by means of the Tagus. This mighty river, which is in every body's mouth, because the capital of the kingdom of Port wine is placed at its embouchure, is in fact almost as little known in Spain and out of it, as the Niger. It has been our fate to behold it in many places and various phases of its most poetical and picturesque course first green and arrowy amid the yellow corn fields of New Castile ; then freshening the sweet Tempe of Aranjuez, clothing the gardens with verdure, and filling the nightingale- tenanted glens with groves ; then boiling and rushing around the granite ravines of rock-built Toledo, hurrying to escape from the cold shadows of its deep prison, and dashing joyously into light and liberty, to wander far away into silent plains, arid on to Talavera, where its waters were dyed with brave blood, and gladly reflected the flash of the victorious bayonets of England, triumphantly it rolls thence, under the shattered arches of Almaraz, down to desolate Estremadura, in a stream as tranquil as the azure sky by which it is curtained, yet powerful enough to force the mountains at Alcantara. There the bridge of Trajan is worth going a hundred miles to see ; it stems the now fierce condensed stream, and ties the rocky gorges together ; grand, simple, and solid, tinted by the tender colours of seventeen cen- turies, it looms like the grey skeleton of Roman power, with all the sentiment of loneliness, magnitude, and the interest of the past and present. Such are the glorious scenes we have beheld and sketched ; such are the sweet waters in which we have re- freshed our dusty and weary limbs. How stern, solemn, and striking is this Tagus of Spain ! No commerce lias ever made it its highway no English steamer has ever civilized its waters like those of France and Germany. Its rocks have witnessed battles, not peace ; have reflected castles and dungeons, not quays or warehouses : few cities have risen on its banks, as on those of the Thames and Rhine; it is truly a river of Spain that isolated and solitary land. Its waters are .vithout boats, its banks without life ; man has never laid his 28 THE TAGUS. [CHAP, in hand upon its billows, nor enslaved their free and independent gambols. It is impossible to read Tom Campbell's admirable description of the Danube before its poetry was discharged by the smoke of our ubiquitous countrymen's Dampf Schiff, without applying his lines to this uncivilised Tagus : " Yet have I loved thy wild abode, Unknown, unploughed, untrodden shore, Where scarce the woodman finds a road, And scarce the fisher plies an oar; For man's neglect I love thee more, That art nor avarice intrude To tame thy torrent's thunder shock, Or prune the vintage of thy rock, Magnificently rude !" As rivers in a state of nature are somewhat scarce in Great Britain, one more extract may be perhaps pardoned, and the more as it tends to illustrate Spanish character, and explain las cosas de Espana, or the things of Spain, which it is the object of these humble pages to accomplish. The Tagus rises in that extraordinary jumble of mountains, full of fossil bones, botany, and trout, that rise between Cuenca and Teruel, and which being all but unknown, clamour loudly for the disciples of Isaac Walton and Dr. Buckland. It disem- bogues into the sea at Lisbon, having flowed 375 miles in Spain, of which nature destined it to be the aorta. The Toledan chro- niclers derive the name from Tagus, fifth king of Iberia, but Bochart traces it to Dag, Dagon, a fish, as besides being con- sidered auriferous, the ancients pronounced it to be piscatory. Not that the present Spaniards trouble their head more about the fishes here than if they were crocodiles. Grains of gold are indeed found, but barely enough to support a poet, by amphi- bious paupers, called artesilleros from their baskets, in which they collect the sand, which is passed through a sieve. The Tagus might easily be made navigable to the sea, and then with the Xarama connect Madrid and Lisbon, and facilitate importation of colonial produce, and exportation of wine and grain. Such an act would confer more benefits upon Spain than ten thousand charters or paper constitutions, guaranteed by the CHAP, in.] NAVIGATION OF THE TAGUS. 29 sword of Narvaez, or the word and honour of Louis-Philippe. The performance has been contemplated by many foreigners, the Toledans looking lazily on ; thus in 1581, Antonelli, a Neapo- litan, and Juanelo Turriano, a Milanese, suggested the scheme to Philip II., then master of Portugal ; but money was wanting the old story for his revenues were wasted in relic-removing and in building the useless Escorial, and nothing was made except, water parties, and odes to the " wise and great king " who was to perform the deed, to the tune of Macbeth's witches, " I'll do, I'll do, I V/ do" for here the future is preferred to the present tense. The project dozed until 1641, when two other foreigners, Julio Martelli and Luigi Carduchi, in vain roused Philip IV. from his siesta, who soon after losing Portugal itself, forthwith forgot the Tagus. Another century glided away, when in 1755 Richard Wall, an Irishman, took the thing up ; but Charles III., busy in waging French wars against England, wanted cash. The Tagus has ever since, as it roared over its rocky bed, like an unbroken barb, laughed at the Toledan who dreamily angles for impossibilities on the bank, invoking Brunei, Hercules, and Rothschild, instead of putting his own shoulder to the water- wheel. In 1808 the scheme was revived : F ro< Xavier de Ca- banas, who had studied in England our system of canals, pub- lished a survey of the whole river ; this folio ' Memoria sobre la Navigacion (lei Tajo,' or, ' Memoir on the Navigation of the Tagus,' Madrid, 1829, reads like the blue book of one dis- covering the source of the Nile, so desert-like are the unpeopled, uncultivated districts between Toledo and Abrantes. Ferd. VII. thereupon issued an approving paper decree, and so there the thing ended, although Cabanas had engaged with Messrs. Wallis and Mason for the machinery, &c. Recently the project has been renewed by Senor Bermudez de Castro, an intelligent gen- tleman, who, from long residence in England, has imbibed the schemes and energy of the foreigner. Veremos I " we shall see ;" for hope is a good breakfast but a bad supper, says Bacon ; and in Spain things are begun late in the day, and never finished ; so at least says the proverb : En Espana se empieza tarde, y se acaba nunca. 30 DIVISION INTO PROVINCES. [CHAP. iv. CHAPTER IV. Dhisions into Provinces Ancient Demarcations Modern Departments Population Revenue Spanish Stocks. IN the divisions of the Peninsula which are effected by moun- tains, rivers, and climate, a leading principle is to be traced throughout, for it is laid down by the unerring hand of nature. The artificial, political, and conventional arrangement into kingdoms and provinces is entirely the work of accident and absence of design. These provincial divisions were formed by the gradual union of many smaller and previously independent portions, which have been taken into Spain as a whole, just as our inconvenient counties constitute the kingdom of England ; for the incon- veniences of these results of the ebb and flow of the different tides in the affairs of man's dominion these boundaries not fixed by the lines and rules of theodolite-armed land surveyors, use had provided remedies, and long habit had reconciled the inhabitants to divisions which suited them better than any new arrangement, however scientifically calculated, according to sta- tistical and geographical principles. The French, during their intrusive rule, were horrified at this " chaos administratif," this apparent irregularity, and introduced their own system of departements, by which districts were neatly squared out and people re-arrariged, as if Spain were a chess- board and Spaniards mere pawns peones, or footmen, which this people, calling itself one of caballeros, that is, riders on horses par excellence, assuredly is not: nor, indeed, in this paradise of the church militant, can the moves of any Spanish bishop or knight be calculated on with mathematical certainty, since they seldom will take the steps to-morrow which they did yesterday. Accordingly, however specious the theory, it was found to be CHAP, iv.] PROVINCES. 31 no easy matter to carry departementalization out in practice : individuality laughs at the solemn nonsense of in-door pedants, who would class men like ferns or shells. The failure in this attempt to remodel ancient demarcations and recombine antipa- thetic populations was utter and complete. No sooner, therefore, had the Duke cleared the Peninsula of doctrinaires and invaders than the Lion of Castile shook off their papers from his mane, and reverted like the Italian, on whom the same experiment was tried, to his own pre-existing divisions, which, however defective in theory, and unsightly and inconvenient on the map, had from long habit been found practically to suit better. Recently, in spite of this experience among other newfangled transpyrenean reforms, innovations, and botherations, the Peninsula has again been parcelled out into forty-nine provinces, instead of the former national divisions of thirteen kingdoms, principalities, and lord- ships ; but long will it be before these deeply impressed divisions, which have grown with the growth of the monarchy, and are engraved in the retentive memories of the people, can be effaced. Those who are curious in statistical details are referred to the works of Paez, Antillon, and others, who are considered by Spaniards to be authorities on vast subjects, which are fitter for a gazetteer or a handbook than for volumes destined like these for lighter reading ; and assuredly the pages of the respectable Spaniards just named are duller than the high-roads of Castile, which no tiny rivulet the cheerful companion of the dusty road ever freshens, no stray flower adorns, no song of birds gladdens " dry as the remainder of the biscuit after the voyage." The thirteen divisions have grand and historical names : they belong to an old and monarchical country, not to a spick and span vulgar democracy, without title-deeds. They fill the mouth when named, and conjure up a thousand recollections of the better and more glorious times of Spain's palmy power, when there were giants in the land, not pigmies in Parisian paletots, whose only ambition is to ape the foreigner, and disgrace and denationalize themselves. First and foremost Andalucia presents herself, crowned with a quadruple, not a triple tiara, for the name los cuatro reinos, "the four kingdoms," is her synonym. They consist of those of Seville, Cordova, Jaen, and Granada. There is magic and 32 PROVINCES. [CHAP. iv. birdlime in the very letters. Secondly advances the kingdom of Murcia, with its silver-mines, barilla, and palms. Then the gentle kingdom of Valencia appears, all smiles, with fruits and silk. The principality of grim and truculent Catalonia scowls next on its fair neighbour. Here rises the smoky factory chimney ; here cotton is spun, vice and discontent bred, and revolutions concocted. The proud and stiff-necked kingdom of Arragon marches to the west with this Lancashire of Spain, and to the east with the kingdom of Navarre, which crouches with its green valleys under the Pyrenees. The three Basque Provinces which abut thereto, are only called El Senorio, " The Lord- ship," for the king of all the Spains is but simple lord of this free highland home of the unconquered descendants of the abo- riginal man of the Peninsula. Here there is much talk of bullocks and fueros, or "privileges;" for when not digging and delving, these gentlemen by the mere fact of being born here, are fighting and upholding their good rights by the sword. The empire province of the Castiles furnishes two coronets to the royal brow ; to wit, that of the older portion, where the young monarchy was nursed, arid that of the newer portion, which was wrested afterwards from the infidel Moor. The ninth division is desolate Estremadura, which has no higher title than a province, and is peopled by locusts, wan- dering sheep, pigs, and here and there by human bipeds. Leon, a most time-honoured kingdom, stretches higher up, with its corn-plains and venerable cities, now silent as tombs, but in auld lang syne the scenes of mediaeval chivalry and romance. The kingdom of Gallicia and the principality of the Asturias form the seaboard to the west, and constitute Spain's breakwater against the Atlantic. It is not very easy to ascertain the exact population of any country, much less that of one which does not yet possess the advantages of public registrars ; the people at large, for whom, strange to say, the pleasant studies of statistics and political economy have small charms, consider any attempt to number them as boding no good ; they have a well-grounded apprehen- sion of ulterior objects. To " number the people" was a crime in the East, and many moral and practical difficulties exist in arriving at a true census of Spain. Thus, while some writers on CHAP, iv.] POPULATION 33 statistics hope to flatter the powers that be, by a glowing exag- geration of national strength, " to boast of which," says the Duke, " is the national weakness," the suspicious many, on the other hand, are disposed to conceal and diminish the truth. We should be always on our guard when we hear accounts of the past or present population, commerce, or revenue of Spain. The better classes will magnify them both, for the credit of their country ; the poorer, on the other hand, will appeal ad misericordiam, by representing matters as even worse than they really are. They never afford any opening, however indirect, to information which may lead to poll-taxes and conscriptions. The population and the revenue have generally been exagge- rated, and all statements may be much discounted ; the present population, at an approximate calculation, may be taken at about eleven or twelve millions, with a slow tendency to in- crease. This is a low figure for so large a country, and for one which, under the Romans, is said to have swarmed with inha- bitants as busy and industrious as ants ; indeed, the longest period of rest and settled government which this ill-fated land has ever enjoyed was during the three centuries that the Roman power was undisputed. The Peninsula is then seldom men- tioned by authors ; and how much happiness is inferred by that silence, when the blood-spattered page of history was chiefly employed to register great calamities, plagues, pestilences, wars, battles, or the freaks of men, at which angels weep ! Certainly one of the causes which have changed this happy state of things, has been the numerous and fierce invasions to which Spain has been exposed ; fatal to her has been her gift of beauty and wealth, which has ever attracted the foreign ravisher and spoiler. The Goths, to whom a worse name has been given than they deserved in Spain, were ousted by the Moors, the real and wholesale destroyers ; bringing to the darkling West the luxu- ries, arts and sciences of the bright East, they had nothing to learn from the conquered ; to them the Goth was no instructor, as the Roman had been to him ; they despised both of their pre- decessors, with whose wants and works they had no sympathy, while they abhorred their creed as idolatrous and polytheistic down went altar and image. There was no fair town which 8 34 DIFFERENT RACES. [CHAP. iv. they did not destroy ; they exterminated, say their annals, the fowls of the air. The Gotho-Spaniard in process of time retaliated, and com- bated the invader with his own weapons, bettering indeed the destructive lesson which was taught. The effects of these wars, carried on without treaty, without quarter, and waged for country and creed, are evident in those parts of Spain which were their theatre. Thus, vast portions of Estremadura, the south of Toledo and Andalucia, by nature some of the richest and most fertile in the world, are now dehesas y despoblados, de- populated wastes, abandoned to the wild bee for his heritage ; the country remains as it was left after the discomfiture of the Moor. The early chronicles of both Spaniard and Moslem teem with accounts of the annual forays inflicted on each other, and to which a frontier-district was always exposed. The object of these border guerrilla- warfares was extinction, talar, quemar y robar, to desolate, burn, and rob, to cut down fruit-trees, to " harry," to " razzia." * The internecine struggle was that of rival nations and creeds. It was truly Oriental, and such as Ezekiel, who well knew the Phoenicians, has described : " Go ye after him through the city and smite ; let not your eye have pity, neither have ye pity ; slay utterly old and young, both maids and little children and women." The religious duty of smiting the infidel precluded mercy on both sides alike, for the Christian foray and crusade was the exact counterpart of the Moslem algara and algihad; while, from military reasons, everything was turned into a desert, in order to create a frontier Edom of starvation, a defensive glacis, through which no in- vading army could pass and live ; the " beasts of the field alone increased." Nature, thus abandoned, resumed her rights, and has cast off every trace of former cultivation ; and districts the granaries of the Roman and the Moor, now offer the saddest con- trasts to that former prosperity and industry. To these horrors succeeded the thinning occasioned by causes of a bigoted and political nature : the expulsion of the Jews * Razzia is derived from the Arabic Al ghazia, a word which expresses these raids of a ferocious, barbarous age. It has been introduced to European dictionaries by the Pelissiers, who thus civilize Algeria. They make a soli- tude, and call it peace. CHAP, iv.] BUONAPARTE'S INVASION. 35 deprived poor Spain of her bankers, while the final banishment of the Moriscoes, the remnant of the Moors, robbed the soil of its best and most industrious agriculturists. Again, in our time, have the fatal scenes of contending Chris- tian and Moor been renewed in the struggle for national inde- pendence, waged by Spaniards against the Buonapartist invaders, by whom neither age nor sex was spared neither things sacred nor profane ; the land is everywhere scarred with ruins ; a few hours' Vandalism sufficed to undo the works of ages of piety, wealth, learning and good taste. The French retreat was worse than their advance : then, infuriated by disgrace and disaster, the Soults and Massenas vented their spite on the unarmed vil- lagers and their cottages. But let General Foy describe their progress : " Ainsi que la neige precipitee des sommets des Alpes dans les vallons, nos armees innombrables detruisaient en quel- ques heures, par leur seul passage, les ressources de toute une coritree ; elles bivouaquaient habituellement, et a chaque gite nos soldats demolissaient les maisons baties depuis un demi-siecle, pour construire avec les decombres ces longs villages alignes qui souvent ne devaient durer qu'un jour : au defaut du bois des forets les arbres fruitiers, les vegetaux precieux, comme le mu- rier, Tolivier, 1'oranger, servaient a les rechauffer ; les consents irrites a la fois par le besoin et par le danger contractaient une ivresse morale dont nous ne cherchions pas a les guerir." " So France gets drunk with blood to vomit crime, And fatal ever have her saturnalia been." Who can fail to compare this habitual practice of Buonaparte's legions with the terrible description in Hosea of the " great people and strong" who execute the dread judgments of heaven ? " A fire devoureth before them, and behind them a flame burneth ; the land is the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness, yea, and nothing shall escape them." No sooner were they beaten out by the Duke, than population began to spring up again, as the bruised flowerets do when the iron heel of marching hordes has passed on. Then ensued the civil fratricide wars, draining the land of its males, from which bleeding Spain has not yet recovered. Insecurity of property and person will ever prove bars to marriage and increased population. D2 36 REVENUE. [CHAP. rv. Again, a deeper and more permanent curse has steadily operated for the last two centuries, 'at which Spanish authors long have not dared to hint. They have ascribed the depopulation of Estre- madura to the swarm of colonist adventurers and emigrants who departed from this province of Cortes and Pizarro to seek for fortune in the new world of gold and silver ; and have attributed the similar want of inhabitants in Andalucia to the similar out- pouring from Cadiz, which, with Seville, engrossed the traffic of the Americas. But colonisation never thins a vigorous, well- conditioned mother state witness the rapid and daily increase of population in our own island, which, like Tyre of old, is ever sending forth her outpouring myriads, and wafts to the utter- most parts of the sea, on the white wings of her merchant fleets, the blessings of peace, religion, liberty, order, and civilisation, to disseminate which is the mission of Great Britain. The real permanent and standing cause of Spain's thinly peopled state, want of cultivation, and abomination of desolation, is BAD GOVERNMENT, civil and religious ; this all who run may read in her lonely land and silent towns. But Spain, if the anecdote which her children love to tell be true, will never be able to remove the incubus of this fertile origin of every evil. When Ferdinand III. captured Seville and died, being a saint he escaped purgatory, and Santiago presented him to the Virgin, who forthwith desired him to ask any favours for beloved Spain. The monarch petitioned for oil, wine, and corn conceded ; for sunny skies, brave men, and pretty women allowed ; for cigars, relics, garlic, and bulls by all means ; for a good government " Nay, nay," said the Virgin, " that never can be granted ; for were it bestowed, not an angel would remain a day longer in heaven." The present revenue may be taken at about 12,000,000/. or 13,000,000/. sterling ; but money is compared by Spaniards to oil ; a little will stick to the fingers of those who measure it out ; and such is the robbing and jobbing, the official mystification and peculation, that it is difficult to get ^t facts whenever cash is in question. The revenue, moreover, is badly collected, and at a ruinous per centage, and at no time during this last century has been sufficient for the national expenses. Recourse has been had to the desperate experiments of usurious loans and wholesale confiscations. At one time church pillage and appropriation CHAP, iv.] THE BOLSA. 37 was almost the only item in the governmental budget. The recipients were ready to " prove from Vatel exceedingly well " that the first duty of a rich clergy was to relieve the necessitous, and the more when the State was a pauper : croziers are no match for bayonets. This system necessarily cannot last. Since the reign of Philip II. every act of dishonesty has been perpetrated. Public securities have been " repudiated," interest unpaid, and principal spunged out. No country in the Old World, or even New drab-coated World, stands lower in financial discredit. Let all be aware how they embark in Spanish specula- tions : however promising in the prospectus, they will, sooner or later, turn out to be deceptions ; and whether they assume the form of loans, lands, or rails, none are real securities : they are mere castles in the air, chateaux en Espagne: " The earth has bubbles as the water has, and these are of them." For the benefit and information of those who have purchased Iberian stock, it may be stated that an Exchange, or Bolsa de Comercio, was established at Madrid in 1831. It may be called the coldest spot in the hot capital, and the idlest, since the usual u city article " is short and sweet, " sin operaciones" or nothing has been bought or sold. It might be likened to a tomb, with " Here lies Spanish credit " for its epitaph. If there be a thing which " La perftde Albion" " a nation of shopkeepers," dislikes, worse even than a French assignat, it is a bankrupt. One cir- cumstance is clear, that Castilian pundonor, or point of honour, will rather settle its debts with cold iron and warm abuse than with gold and thanks. The Exchange at Madrid was first held at St. Martin* s, a saint who divided his cloak with a supplicant. As comparisons are odious, and bad examples catching, it has been recently removed to the Calle del Desengano, the street of " finding out fallacious hopes," a locality which the bitten will not deem ill-chosen. As all men in power use their official knowledge in taking advantage of the turn of the market, the Bolsa divides with the court and army the moving influence of every situacion or crisis of the moment : clever as are the ministers of Paris, they are mere tyros when compared to their colleagues of Madrid in the arts of working the telegraph, gazette, &c., and thereby feathering their own nests. S3 SPANISH STOCK." [CHAP. iv. The Stock Exchange is open from ten to three o'clock, where those who like Spanish funds may buy them as cheap as stinking mackerel ; for when the 3 per cents, of perfidious Albion are at 9'8, surely Spanish fives at 22 are a tempting investment. The stocks are numerous, arid suited to all tastes and pockets, whether those funded by Aguado, Ardouin, Toreno, Mendizabal, or Mon, " all honourable men," and whose punctuality is un-remitting, for in some the principal is consolidated, in others the interest is deferred ; the grand financial object in all having been to re- ceive as much as possible, and pay back in an inverse ratio their leading principle being to bag both principal and interest. As we have just said, in measuring out money and oil a little will stick to the cleanest fingers the Madrid ministers and con- tractors made fortunes, and actually " did " the Hebrews of Lon- don, as their forefathers spoiled the Egyptians. But from Philip II. downwards, theologians have never been wanting in Spain to prove the religious, however painful, duty of bank- ruptcy, and particularly in contracts with usurious heretics. The stranger, when shown over the Madrid bank, had better evince no impertinent curiosity to see the ' Dividend pay office," as it might give offence. Whatever be our dear reader's pursuit in the Peninsula, let him " Neither a borrower nor lender be, For loan oft loseth both itself and friend." Beware of Spanish stock, for in spite of official reports, docu- mentos, and arithmetical mazes, which, intricate as an arabesque pattern, look well on paper without being intelligible ; in spite of ingenious conversions, fundings of interest, coupons some active, some passive, and other repudiatory terms and tenses, the present excepted the thimblerig is always the same ; and this is the question, since national credit depends on national good faith and surplus income, how can a country pay interest on debts, whose revenues have long been, and now are, miserably insuf- ficient for the ordinary expenses of government ? You cannot get blood from a stone ; ex nihilo nihilfit. Mr. Macgregor's report on Spain, a truthful exposition of commercial ignorance, habitual disregard of treaties and viola- tion of contracts, describes her public securities, past and pre- CHAP, iv.l PUBLIC DEBT. 39 sent. Certainly they had very imposing names and titles Juros Bonos, Vales reales, Titulos, &c., much more royal, grand, and poetical than our prosaic Consols ; but no oaths can attach real value to dishonoured and good-for-nothing paper. Accord- ing to some financiers, the public debts of Spain, previously to 1808, amounted to 83,763,966/., which have since been increased to 279,083,089^., farthings omitted, for we like to be accurate. This possibly may be exaggerated, for the government will give no information as to its own peculation and mismanagement : according to Mr. Henderson, 78,649,675/. of this debt is due to English creditors alone, and we wish they may get it, when he gets to Madrid. In the time of James I., Mr. Howell was sent there on much such an errand ; and when he left it, his " pile of unre- dressed claims was higher than himself." At all events, Spain is over head and ears in debt, and irremediably insolvent. And yet few countries, if we regard the fertility of her soil, her golden possessions at home and abroad, her frugal temperate population, ought to have been less embarrassed ; but Heaven has granted her every blessing, except a good and honest government. It is either a bully or a craven : satisfaction in twenty -four hours a la Bresson, or a line-of-battle ship off Malaga Cromwell's receipt is the only argument which these semi -Moors under- stand : conciliatory language is held to be weakness : you may obtain at once from their fears what never will be granted by their sense of justice. 40 TRAVELLING IN SPAIN. [CHAP. v. CHAPTER Y. Travelling in Spain Steamers Roads, Roman, Monastic, and Royal Modern Railways English Speculations. OF the many misrepresentations regarding Spain, few are more inveterate than those which refer to the dangers and difficulties that are there supposed to beset the traveller. This, the most romantic, racy, and peculiar country of Europe, may in reality be visited by sea and land, and throughout its length and breadth, with ease and safety, as all who have ever been there well know, the nonsense with which Cockney critics who never have been there scare delicate writers in albums and lady-bird tourists, to the contrary notwithstanding: the steamers are regular, the mails and diligences excellent, the roads decent, and the mules sure-footed ; nay, latterly, the posadas, or inns, have been so increased, and the robbers so decreased, that some ingenuity must be evinced in getting either starved or robbed. Those, however, who are dying for new excitements, or who wish to make a picture or chapter, in short, to get up an adventure for the home-market, may manage by a great exhibition, of impru- dence, chattering, and a holding out luring baits, to gratify their hankering, although it would save some time, trouble, and ex- pense to try the experiment much nearer home. As our readers live in an island, we will commence with the sea and steamers. The Peninsular and Oriental Navigation Company depart re- gularly three times a month from Southampton for Gibraltar. They often arrive at Corunna in seventy hours, from whence a mail starts directly to Madrid, which it reaches in three days and a half. The vessels are excellent sea-boats, are manned by English sailors, and propelled by English machinery. The pas- sage to Vigo has been made in less than three days, and the voyage to Cadiz touching at Lisbon included seldom exceeds CHAP. v.J STEAMERS. 41 six. The change of climate, scenery, men, and manners effected by this week's trip, is indeed remarkable. Quitting the British Channel we soon enter the " sleepless Bay of Biscay," where the stormy petrel is at home, and where the gigantic swell of the Atlantic is first checked by Spain's iron-bound coast, the moun- tain break-water of Europe. Here The Ocean will be seen in all its vast majesty and solitude : grand in the tempest-lashed storm, grand in the calm, when spread out as a mirror ; and never more impressive than at night, when the stars of heaven, free from earth-born mists, sparkle like diamonds over those " who go down to the sea in ships, and behold the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep." The land has disappeared, and man feels alike his weakness and his strength ; a thin plank se- parates him from another world ; yet he has laid his hand upon the billow, and mastered the ocean ; he has made it the highway of commerce, and the binding link of nations. The steamers which navigate the Eastern coast from Marseilles to Cadiz and back again, are cheaper indeed in their fares, but by no means such good sea-boats ; nor do they keep their time the essence of business with English regularity. They are foreign built, and worked by Spaniards and Frenchmen. They gene- rally stop a day at Barcelona, Valencia, and other large towns, which gives them an opportunity to replenish coal, and to smuggle. A rapid traveller is also thus enabled to pay a flying visit to the cities on the seaboard ; and thus those lively authors who comprehend foreign nations with an intuitive eagle-eyed glance, obtain materials for sundry octavos on the history, arts, sciences, literature, and genius of Spaniards. But as Mons. Feval remarks of some of his gifted countrymen, they have merely to scratch their head, according to the Horatian expression, and out come a number of volumes, ready bound in calf, as Minerva issued forth armed from the temple of Jupiter. The Mediterranean is a dangerous, deceitful sea, fair and false as Italia ; the squalls are sudden and terrific ; then the crews either curse the sacred name of God, or invoke St. Telmo, ac- cording as their notion may be. We have often been so caught when sailing on these perfidious waters in these foreign craft, and think, with the Spaniards, that escape is a miracle. The hilarity excited by witnessing the jabber, corfusion, and lubber 42 SPANISH EOADS. [CHAP. v. proceedings, went far to dispel all present apprehension, and future also. Some of our poor blue-jackets in case of a war may possibly escape the fate with which they are threatened in this French lake. But no wise man will ever go by sea when he can travel by land, nor is viewing Spam's coasts with a telescope from the deck, and passing a few hours in a sea-port, a very satis- factory mode of becoming acquainted with the country. The roads of Spain, a matter of much importance to a judi- cious traveller, are somewhat a modern luxury, having been only regularly introduced by the Bourbons. The Moors and Spa- niards, who rode on horses and not in carriages, suffered those magnificent lines with which the Romans had covered the Penin- sula to go to decay ; of these there were no less than twenty- nine of the first order, which were absolutely necessary to a nation of conquerors and colonists to keep up their military and commercial communications. The grandest of all, which like the Appian might be termed the Queen of Roads, ran from Merida, the capital of Lusitania, to Salamanca. It was laid down like a Cyclopean wall, and much of it remains to this day, with the grey granite line stretching across the aromatic wastes, like the vertebrae of an extinct mammoth. We have followed for miles its course, which is indicated by the still standing miliary columns that rise above the cistus underwood ; here and there tall forest trees grow out of the stone pavement, and show how long it has been abandoned by man to Nature ever young and gay, who thus by uprooting and displacing the huge blocks slowly recovers her rights. She festoons the ruins with necklaces of flowers and creepers, and hides the rents and wrinkles of odious, all-dilapidating Time, or man's worse neglect, as a pretty maid decorates a shrivelled dowager's with diamonds. The Spanish muleteer creeps along by its side in a track which he has made through the sand or pebbles ; he seems ashamed to trample on this lordly way, for which, in his petty wants, he has no occasion. Most of the similar roads have been taken up by monks to raise convents, by burgesses to build houses, by military men to con- struct fortifications thus even their ruins have perished. The mediaeval Spanish roads were the works of the clergy ; and the long-bearded monks, here as elsewhere, were the pioneers of civilization ; they made straight, wide, and easy the way which CHAP, v.] LEGEND OF SANTO DOMINGO. 43 led to their convent, their high place, their miracle shrine, or to whatever point of pilgrimage that was held out to the devout ; traffic was soon combined with devotion, and the service of mam- mon with that of God. This imitation of the Oriental practice which obtained at Mecca, is evidenced by language in which the Spanish term Feria signifies at once a religious function, a holi- day, and a fair. Even saints condescended to become waywar- dens, and to take title from the highway. Thus Santo Domingo de la Calzada, " St. Domenick of the Paved Road" was so called from his having been the first to make one through a part of Old Castile for the benefit of pilgrims on their way to Com- postella, and this town yet bears the honoured appellation. This feat and his legend have furnished Southey with a subject of a droll ballad. The saint having finished his road, next set up an inn or Venta, the Mari tomes of which fell in love with a handsome pilgrim, who resisted ; whereupon she hid some spoons in this Joseph's saddlebags, who was taken up by the Alcalde, and forthwith hanged. But his parents some time afterwards passed under the body, which told them that he was innocent, alive, and well, and all by the intercession of the sainted road- maker ; thereupon they proceeded forthwith to the truculent Alcalde, who was going to dine off two roasted fowls, and, on hearing their report, remarked, You might as well tell me that this cock (pointing to his roti) would crow ; whereupon it did crow, and was taken with its hen to the cathedral, and two chicks have ever since been regularly hatched every year from these respectable parents, of which a travelling ornithologist should secure one for the Zoological Garden. The cock anJ hen were duly kept near the high altar, and their white feathers were worn by pilgrims in their caps. Prudent bagsmen will, however, put a couple of ordinary roast fowls into their u pro- vend," for hungry is this said road to Logrono. In this land of miracles, anomalies, and contradictions, the roads to and from this very Compostella are now detestable. In other provinces of Spain, the star-paved milky way in heaven is r ~ called El Camino de Santiago, the road of St. James ; but the Gallicians, who know what their roads really are, namely, the worst on earth, call the milky-way El Camino de Jerusalem, ^ the road to Jerusalem," which it assuredly is not. The an- 44 ROAD TO TOLEDO. [CHAP. v. cients poetically attributed this phenomenon to some spilt milk of Juno. Meanwhile the roads in Gallicia, although under the patronage of Santiago, who has replaced the Roman Hermes, are, like his milky-way in heaven, but little indebted to mortal repairs. The Dean of Santiago is waywarden by virtue of his office or dignity, and especially " protector." The chapter, however, now chiefly profess to make smooth the road to a better world. They have altogether degenerated from their forefathers, whose grand object was to construct roads for the pilgrim ; but since the cessation of offering-making Hadjis, little or nothing has been done in the turnpike-trust line. Some of the finest roads in Spain lead either to the sitios or royal pleasure-seats of the king, or wind gently up some elevated and monastery-crowned mountain like Monserrat. The ease of the despot was consulted, while that of his subjects was neglected ; and the Sultan was the State, Spain was his property, and Spa- niards his serfs, and willing ones, for as in the East, their perfect equality amongst each other was one result of the immeasurable superiority of the master of all. Thus, while he rolled over a road hard and level as a bowling-green, and rapidly as a galloping team could proceed, to a mere summer residence, the commu- nication between Madrid and Toledo, that city on which the sun shone on the day light was made, has remained a mere track ankle-deep in mud during winter and dust-clouded during sum- mer, and changing its direction with the caprice of wandering sheep and muleteers ; but Bourbon Royalty never visited this widowed capital of the Goths. The road therefore was left as it existed if not before the time of Adam, at least before Mac Adam. There is some talk just now of beginning a regular road ; when it will be finished is another affair. The church, which shared with the state in dominion, followed the royal example in consulting its own comforts as to roads. Nor could it be expected in a torrid land, that holy men, whose abdomens occasionally were prominent and pendulous, should lard the stony or sandy earth like goats, or ascend heaven-kiss- ing hills so expeditiously as their prayers. In Spain the primary consideration has ever been the souls, not the bodies, of men, or legs of beasts. It would seem indeed, from the indifference CHAP, v.] ROAD TO LA CORUNA. 45 shown to the sufferings of these quadrupedal blood -engines, Maquinas de sangre, as they are called, and still more from the reckless waste of biped life, that a man was of no value until he was dead ; then what admirable contrivances for the rapid tra- velling of his winged spirit, first to purgatory, next out again, and thence from stage to stage to his journey's end arid blessed rest ! More money has been thus expended in masses than would have covered Spain with railroads, even on a British 1 scale of magnificence and extravagance. To descend to the roads of the peninsular earth, the principal lines are nobly planned. These geographical arteries, which form the circulation of the country, branch in every direction from Madrid, which is the centre of the system. The road- making spirit of Louis XIY. passed into his Spanish descendants, and during the reigns of Charles III. and Charles IV. commu- nications were completed between the capital and the principal cities of the provinces. These causeways, "Arrecifes " these royal roads, " Caminos reales" were planned on an almost unnecessary scale of grandeur, in regard both to width, parapets, and general execution. The high road to La Coruna, especially after entering Leon, will stand comparison with any in Europe ; but when Spaniards finish anything it is done in a grand style, and in this instance the expense was so enormous that the king inquired if it was paved with silver, alluding to the common Spanish corruption of the old Roman via lata into " camino de plain ^ of plate. This and many of the others were constructed from fifty to seventy years ago, and very much on the M'Adam system, which, having been since introduced into England, has rendered our roads so very different from what they were not very long since. The war in the Peninsula tended to deteriorate the Spanish roads when bridges and other conveniences were fre- quently destroyed for military reasons, and the exhausted state of the finances of Spain, and troubled times, have delayed many of the more costly reparations ; yet those of the first class were so admir- ably constructed at the beginning, that, in spite of the injuries of war, ruts, and neglect, they may, as a whole, be pronounced equal to many of the Continent, and are infinitely more pleasant to the traveller from the absence of pavement. The roads in England have, indeed, latterly been rendered so excellent, and we are so 46 CROSS ROADS. [CHAP. v. apt to compare those of other nations with them, that we forget that fifty years ago Spain was in advance in that and many other respects. Spain remains very much what other countries were : she has stood on her old ways, moored to the anchor of prejudice, while we have progressed, and consequently now appears behind- hand in many things in which she set the fashion to England. The grand royal roads start from Madrid, and run to the prin- cipal frontier and sea-port towns. Thus the capital may be compared to a spider, as it is the centre of the Peninsular web. These diverging fan-like lines are sufficiently convenient to all who are about to journey to any single terminus, but inter-commu- nications are almost entirely wanting between any one terminus with another. This scanty condition of the Peninsular roads accounts for the very limited portions of the country which are usually visited by foreigners, who the French especially keep to one beaten track, the high road, and follow each other like wild geese ; a visit to Burgos, Madrid, and Seville, and then a steam trip from Cadiz to Valencia and Barcelona, is considered to be making the grand tour of Spain ; thus the world is favoured with volumes that reflect and repeat each other, which tell us what we know already, while the rich and rare, the untrodden, unchanged, and truly Moro-Hispanic portions are altogether neglected, except by the exceptional few, who venture forth like Don Quixote on their horses, in search of adventures and the picturesque. The other roads of Spain are bad, but not much more so than in other parts of the Continent, and serve tolerably well in dry weather. They are divided into those which are practicable for wheel-carriages, and those which are only bridle-roads, or as they call them, " of horseshoe," on which all thought of going with a carriage is out of the question ; when these horse or mule tracks are very bad, especially among the mountains, they com- pare them to roads for partridges. The cross roads are seldom tolerable ; it is safest to keep the high-road or, as we have it in English, the furthest way round is the nearest way home for there is no short cut without hard work, says the Spanish proverb, " ho hay atajo, sin trabajo." All this sounds very unpromising, but those who adopt the customs of the country will never find much practical difficulty in CHAP, v.l TRAVELLING. 47 getting to their journey's end ; slowly, it is true, for where leagues and hours are convertible terms the Spanish hora being the heavy German stunde the distance is regulated by the day -light. Bridle-roads and travelling on horseback, the former systems of Europe, are very Spanish and Oriental ; and where people journey on horse and mule back, the road is of minor import- ance. In the remoter provinces of Spain the population is agri- cultural and poverty-stricken, unvisiting and imvisited, not going- much beyond their chimney's smoke. Each family provides for its simple habits and few wants ; having but little money to buy foreign commodities, they are clad and fed, like the Bedouins, with the productions of their own fields and flocks. There is little circulation of persons ; a neighbouring fair is the mart where they obtain the annual supply of whatever luxury they can indulge in, or it is brought to their cottages by wandering mule- teers, or by the smuggler, who is the type and channel of the really active principle of trade in three-fourths of the Penin- sula. It is wonderful how soon a well-mounted traveller be- comes attached to travelling on horseback, and how quickly he becomes reconciled to a state of roads which, startling at first 10 those accustomed to carriage highways, are found to answer perfectly for all the purposes of the place and people where they are found. Let us say a few things on Spanish railroads, for the mania of England has surmounted the Pyrenees, although confined rather more to words than deeds ; in fact, it has been said that no rail exists, in any country of either the new world or the old one, in which the Spanish language is spoken, probably from other ob- jections than those merely philological. Again, in other coun- tries roads, canals, and traffic usher in the rail, which in Spain is to precede and introduce them. Thus, by the prudent delays of national caution and procrastination, much of the trouble and expense of these intermediate stages will be economized, and Spain will jump at once from a mediaeval condition into the com- forts and glories of Great Britain, the land of restless travellers, Be that as it may, just now there is much talk of railroads, and splendid official and other documentos are issued, by which the " whole country is to be intersected (on paper) with a net- work of rapid and bowling-green communications," which are to 48 CONTEMPLATED RAILROADS. [CHAP. v. create a " perfect homogeneity among Spaniards ;"' for great as have been the labours of Herculean steam, this amalgamation of the Iberian rope of sand has properly been reserved for the crowning performance. It would occupy too much space to specify the infinite lines which are in contemplation, which may be described when com- pleted. Suffice it to say, that they almost all are to be effected by the iron and gold of England. However this estrangerismo, this influence of the foreigner, may offend the sensitive pride, the Espanolismo of Spain, the power of resistance offered by the national indolence and dislike to change, must be propelled by British steam, with a dash of French revolution. Yet our speculators might, perhaps, reflect that Spain is a land which never yet has been able to construct or support even a sufficient number of common roads or canals for her poor and passive commerce and circulation. The distances are far too great, and the traffic far too small, to call yet for the rail ; while the geolo- gical formation of the country offers difficulties which, if met with even in England, would baffle the colossal science and extravagance of our first-rate engineers. Spain is a land of mountains, which rise everywhere in Alpine barriers, walling off province from province, and district from district. These mighty cloud-capped sierras are solid masses of hard stone, and any tunnels which ever perforate their ranges will reduce that at Box to the delving of the poor mole. You might as well cover Switzerland and the Tyrol with a net-work of level lines, as those caught in the aforesaid net will soon discover to their cost. The outlay of this up-hill work may be in an inverse ratio to the remuneration, for the one will be enormous, and the other paltry. The parturient mountains may produce a most musipular interest, and even that may be " deferred." Spain, again, is a land of dehesas y despoblados: in these wild unpeopled wastes, next to travellers, commerce and cash are what is scarce, while even Madrid, the capital, is without in- dustry or resources, and poorer than many of our provincial cities. The Spaniard, a creature of routine and foe to innova- tions, is not a moveable or locomotive ; local, and a parochial fixture by nature, he hates moving like a Turk, and has a par- ticular horror of being hurried ; long, therefore, here has an CHAP, v.] DIFFICULTIES OF RAILROADS. 49 ambling mule answered all the purposes of transporting man and his goods. Who again is to do the work even if England will pay the wages? The native, next to disliking regular sustained labour himself, abhors seeing the foreigner toiling even in his service, and wasting his gold and sinews in the thankless task. The villagers, as they always have done, will rise against the stranger and heretic who comes to " suck the wealth of Spain." Supposing, however, by the aid of Santiago and Brunei, that the work were possible and were completed, how is it to be secured against the fierce action of the sun, and the fiercer violence of popular ignorance ? The first cholera that visits Spain will be set down as a passenger per rail by the dispossessed muleteer, who now performs the functions of steam and rail. He consti- tutes one of the most numerous and finest classes in Spain, and is the legitimate channel of the semi-Oriental caravan system. He will never permit the bread to be taken out of his mouth by this Lutheran locomotive: deprived of means of earning his livelihood, he, like the smuggler, will take to the road in another line, and both will become either robbers or patriots. Many, long, and lonely are the leagues which separate town from town in the wide deserts of thinly-peopled Spain, nor will any pre- ventive service be sufficient to guard the rail against the guer- rilla warfare that may then be waged. A handful of opponents in any cistus-overgrown waste, may at any time, in five minutes, break up the road, stop the train, stick the stoker, and burn the engines in their own fire, particularly smashing the luggage- train. What, again, has ever been the recompense which the foreigner has met with from Spain but breach of promise and ingratitude? He will be used, as in the East, until the native thinks that he has mastered his arts, and then he will be abused, cast out, and trodden under foot ; and who then will keep up and repair the costly artificial undertaking? certainly not the Spaniard, on whose pericranium the bumps of operative skill and mechanical construction have yet to be developed. The lines which are the least sure of failure will be those which are the shortest, and pass through a level country of some natural productions, such as oil, wine, and coal. Certainly, if the rail can be laid down in Spain by the gold and science of England, the gift, like that of steam, will be worthy of the E 50 BENEFITS OF RAILROADS. [CHAP. v. Ocean's Queen, and of the world's real leader of civilization ; and what a change will then come over the spirit of the Peninsula ! how the siestas of torpid man-vegetation, will be disturbed by the shrill whistle and panting snort of the monster engine ! how the seals of this long hermetically shut-up land will be broken ! how the cloistered obscure, and dreams of treasures in heaven, will be enlightened by the flashing fire-demon of the wide-awake money- worshipper ! what owls will be vexed, what bats dispos- sessed, what drones, mules, and asses will be scared, run over, and annihilated ! Those who love Spain, and pray, like the author, daily for her prosperity, must indeed hope to see this " net-work of rails " concluded, but will take especial care at the same time not to invest one farthing in the imposing specu- lation. Recent results have fully justified during this year what was prophesied last year in the Hand-Book : our English agents and engineers were received with almost divine honours by the Spaniards, so incensed were they with flattery and cigars. Their shares were instantaneously subscribed for, and directors nomi- nated, with names and titles longer even than the lines, and the smallest contributions in cash were thankfully accepted : " L'argent dans une bourse entre agreablement ; Mais le terme venu, quand il faut le rendre, C'est alors que les douleurs commencent a nous prendre." When the period for booking up, for making the first instalments, arrived, the Spanish shareholders were found somewhat wanting : they repudiated ; for in the Peninsula it has long been easier to promise than to pay. Again, on the only line which seems likely to be carried out at present, that of Madrid to Aranjuez, the first step taken by them was to dismiss all English engineers and navvies, on the plea of encouraging native talent and in- dustry rather than the foreigner. Many of the English home proceedings would border on the ridiculous, were not the laugh of some speculators rather on the wrong side. The City capitalists certainly have our pity, and if their plethora of wealth required the relief of bleeding, it could not be better performed than by a Spanish Sangrado. How different some of the windings-up, the final reports, to the magnificent beginnings arid grandiloquent prospectuses put forth as baits for John Bull, CHAP, v.] ANGLO-HISPANO KAILROADS. 51 who hoped to be tossed at once, or elevated, from haberdashery to a throne, by being offered a " potentiality of getting rich beyond the dreams of avarice !" Thus, to clench assertion by example, the London directors of the Royal Valencia Company made known by an advertisement only last July, that they merely re- quired 240,000,000 reals to connect the seaport of Valencia where there is none to the capital Madrid, with 800,000 inha- bitants, there not being 200,000. One brief passage alone seemed ominous in the lucid array of prospective profit " The line has not yet been minutely surveyed ;" this might have suggested to the noble Marquis whose attractive name heads the provisional committee list, the difficulty of Sterne's traveller, of whom, when observing how much better things were managed on the Continent than in England, the question was asked, " Have you, sir, ever been there? " A still wilder scheme was broached, to connect Aviles on the Atlantic with Madrid, the Asturian Alps and the Guadarrama mountains to the contrary notwithstanding. The originator of this ingenious idea was to receive 40,000/. for the cession of his plan to the company, and actually did receive 25,000/., which, considering the difficulties, natural and otherwise, must be con- sidered an inadequate remuneration. Although the original and captivating prospectus stated " that the line had been surveyed, and presented no engineering difficulties" it was subsequently thought prudent to obtain some notion of the actual localities, arid Sir Joshua Walmsley was sent forth with competent assist- ance to spy out the land, which the Jewish practice of old was rather to do before than after serious undertakings. A sad change soon came over the spirit of the London dream by the discovery that a country which looked level as Arrowsmith's map in the prospectus, presented such trifling obstacles to the rail as sundry leagues of mountain ridges, which range from 6000 to 9000 feet high, and are covered with snow for many months of the year. This was a damper. The report of the special meeting (see 'Morning Chronicle,' Dec. 18, 1845) should be printed in letters of gold, from the quantity of that article which it will preserve to our credulous countrymen. Then and there the chairman observed, with equal naivete and pathos, " that had he known as much before as he did E2 52 LONDON RAILEOAD MEETINGS. [CHAP. Y. now, he would have been the last man to carry out a railway in Spain." This experience cost him, he observed, 5000/. ? which is paying dear for a Spanish rail whistle. He might for five pounds have bought the works of Townshend and Captain Cook : our modesty prevents the naming another red book, in which these precise localities, these mighty Alps, are described by persons who had ridden, or rather soared, over them. At another meeting of another Spanish rail company, held at the London Tavern, October 20, 1846, another chairman announced " a fact of which he was not before aware, that it was impossible to surmount the Pyrenees." Meanwhile, the Madrid govern- ment had secured 30,000/. from them by way of caution money ; but caution disappears from our capitalists, whenever excess of cash mounts from their pockets into their heads ; loss of com- mon sense and dollars is the natural result. But it is the fate of Spain and her things, to be judged of by those who have never been there, and who feel no shame at the indecency of the nakedness of their geographical ignorance. When the blind lead the blind, beware of hillocks and ditches. CHAP. vi. ! POST-OFFICE. 53 CHAPTER VI. Post-Office in Spain Travelling with post-horses Riding post Mails and Diligences, Galeras, Codies de Colleras, Drivers, and Manner of Driving, and Oaths. A SYSTEM of post, both for the despatch of letters and the con- veyance of couriers, was introduced into Spain under Philip and Juana, that is, towards the end of the reign of our Henry VII. ; whereas it was scarcely organised in England before the govern- ment of Cromwell. Spain, which in these matters, as well as in many others, was once so much in advance, is now compelled to borrow her improvements from those nations of which she for- merly was the instructress : among these may be reckoned all travelling in carriages, whether public or private. The post-office for letters is arranged on the plan common to most countries on the Continent : the delivery is pretty regular, but seldom daily twice or three times a- week. Small scruple is made by the authorities in opening private letters, whenever they suspect the character of the correspondence. It is as well, there- fore, for the traveller to avoid expressing the whole of his opi- nions of the powers that be. The minds of men have been long troubled in Spain ; civil war has rendered them very distrustful and guarded in their written correspondence " carta canta" fi a letter speaks." There is the usual continental bother in obtaining post-horses, which results from their being a monopoly of government. There must be a passport, an official order, notice of departure, &c. ; next ensue vexatious regulations in regard to the number of passengers, horses, luggage, style of carriage, and so forth. These, and other spokes put into the wheel, appear to have been invented by clerks who sit at home devising how to impede rather than facilitate posting at all. Post-horses and mules are paid at the rate of seven reals each 54 PUBLIC CONVEYANCES. [CHAP. vi. for each post. The Spanish postilions generally, and espe- cially if well paid, drive at a tremendous pace, often amount- ing to a gallop ; nor are they easily stopped, even if the traveller desires it they seem only to be intent on arriving at their stages' end, in order to indulge in the great national joy of then doing nothing : to get there, they heed neither ruts nor ravines ; and when once their cattle are started the inside pas- senger feels like a kettle tied to the tail of a mad dog, or a comet ; the wild beasts think no more of him than if he were Mazeppa : thus money makes the mare and its driver to go, as surely in Spain as in all other countries. Another mode of travelling is by riding post, accompanied by a mounted postilion, who is changed with the cattle at each relay. It is an expeditious but fatiguing plan ; yet one which, like the Tartar courier of the East, has long prevailed in Spain. Thus our Charles I. rode to Madrid under the name of John Smith, by which he was not likely to be identified. The delight of Philip II., who boasted that he governed the world from the Escorial, was to receive frequent and ea,rly intelligence ; and this desire to hear something new is still characteristic of the Spanish govern- ment. The cabinet-couriers have the preference of horses at every relay. The particular distances they have to perform are all timed, and so many leagues are required to be done in a fixed time ; and, in order to encourage despatch, for every hour gained on the allowed time, an additional sum was paid to them : hence the common expression " ganando horas" gaining hours equi- valent to our old " post haste haste for your life." The usual mode of travelling for the affluent is in the public conveyances, which are the fashion from being novelties and only introduced under Ferdinand VII. ; previously to their being allowed at all, serious objections were started, similar to those raised by his late Holiness to the introduction of railways into the papal states; it was said that these tramontane facilities would bring in foreigners, and with them philosophy, heresy, and innovations, by which the wisdom of Spain's ancestors might be upset. These scruples were ingeniously got over by bribing the monarch with a large share of the profits. Now that the royal monopoly is broken down, many new and competing com- panies have sprung up ; this mode of travelling is the cheapest CHAP, vi.] DILIGENCES. 55 and safest, nor is it thought at all beneath the dignity of " the best set," nay royalty itself goes by the coach. Thus the Infante Don Francisco de Paula constantly hires the whole of the diligence to convey himself and his family from Madrid to the sea-coast ; and one reason gravely given for Don Enrique's not coming to marry the Queen, was that his Royal Highness could not get a place, as the dilly was booked full. The public carriages of Spain are quite as good as those of France, and the company who travel in them generally more respectable and better bred. This is partly accounted for by the expense : the fares are not very high, yet still form a serious item to the bulk of Spaniards ; consequently those who travel in the public carriages in Spain are the class who would in other countries travel per post. It must, however, be admitted that all travelling in the public convey- ances of the Continent necessarily implies great discomfort to those accustomed to their own carriages ; and with every possible precaution the long journeys in Spain, of three to five hundred miles at a stretch, are such as few English ladies can undergo, and are, even with men, undertakings rather of necessity than of pleasure. The mail is organized on the plan of the French malle-poste, and offers, to those who can stand the bumping, shak- ing, and churning of continued and rapid travelling without halt- ing, a means of locomotion which leaves nothing to be desired. The diligences also are imitations of the lumbering French model. It will be in vain to expect in them the neatness, the well-appointed turn-out, the quiet, time-keeping, and infinite facilities of the English original. These matters when passed across the water are modified to the heroic Continental contempt for doing things in style ; cheapness, which is their great prin- ciple, prefers rope-traces to those of leather, and a carter to a regular coachman ; the usual foreign drags also exist, which render their slow coaches and bureaucratic absurdities so hateful to free Britons ; but when one is once booked and handed over to the conductor, you arrive in due time at the journey's end. The " guards" are realities ; they consist of stout, armed, most picturesque, robber-like men and no mistake, since many, before they were pardoned and pensioned, have frequently taken a purse on the Queen's highway ; for the foreground of your first sketch, they are splendid fellows, and worth a score of marshals. They 56 EXPENSES ON THE ROAD. [CHAP. vi. are provided with a complete arsenal of swords and blunder- busses, so that the cumbrous machine rolling over the sea of plains looks like a man-of-war, and has been compared to a marching citadel. Again in suspicious localities a mounted escort of equally suspicious look gallops alongside, nor is the primitive practice of black mail altogether neglected : the consequence of these admirable precautions is, that the diligences are seldom or never robbed ; the thing, however, is possible. The whole of this garrisoned Noah's ark is placed under the command of the Mayoral or conductor, who like all Spanish men in authority is a despot, and yet, like them, is open to the conciliatory influences of a bribe. He regulates the hours of toil and sleep, which latter blessings, says Sancho, on the man who invented it ! is uncertain, and depends on the early or late arrival of the diligence and the state of the roads, for all that is lost of the fixed time on the road is made up for by curtailing the time allowed for repose. One of the many good effects of setting up diligences is the bettering the inns on the road ; and it is a safe and general rule to travellers in Spain, whatever be their vehicle, always to inquire in every town which is the posada that the diligence stops at. Persons were dispatched from Madrid to the different stations on the great lines, to fit up houses, bed-rooms, and kitchens, and provide everything for table service ; cooks were sent round to teach the innkeepers to set out and prepare a proper dinner and supper. Thus, in villages in which a few years before the use of a fork was scarcely known, a table was laid out, clean, well served, and abundant. The example set by the diligence inns has produced a beneficial effect, since they offer a model, create competition, and suggest the existence of many comforts, which were hitherto unknown among Spaniards, whose abnegation of material enjoyments at home, and praiseworthy endurance of privations of all kinds on jour- neys, are quite Oriental. In some of the new companies every expense is calculated in the fare, to wit, journey, postilions, inns, &c., which is very convenient to the stranger, and prevents the loss of much money and temper. A chapter on the dilly is as much a standing dish in every Peninsular tour as a bullfight or a bandit adventure, for which there is a continual demand in the home-market ; and CHAP. vi.J BEDS FOR TRAVELLERS. 57 no doubt in the long distances of Spain, where men and women are boxed up for three or four mortal days together (the nights not being omitted), the plot thickens, and opportunity is afforded to appreciate costume and character ; the farce or tragedy may be spun out into as many acts as the journey takes days. In general the order of the course is as follows : the breakfast con- sists at early dawn of a cup of good stiff chocolate, which being the favourite drink of the church and allowable even on fast days, is as nutritious as delicious. It is accompanied by a bit of roasted or fried bread, and is followed by a glass of cold water, to drink which is an axiom with all wise men who respect the efficient condition of their livers. After rumbling on, over a given number of leagues, when the passengers get well shaken together and hungry, a regular knife and fork breakfast is pro- vided that closely resembles the dinner or supper which is served up later in the evening ; the table is plentiful, and the cookery to those who like oil and garlic excellent. Those who do not, can always fall back on the bread and eggs, which are capital ; the wine is occasionally like purple blacking, and sometimes serves also as vinegar for the salad, as the oil is said to be used indif- ferently for lamps or stews ; a bad dinner, especially if the bill be long, and the wine sour, does not sweeten the passengers' tempers ; they become quarrelsome, and if they have the good luck, a little robber skirmish gives vent to ill-humour. At nightfall after supper, a few hours are allowed on your part to steal whatever rest the mayoral and certain voltigeurs, creeping and winged, will permit ; the beds are plain and clean ; sometimes the mattresses may be compared to sacks of walnuts, but there is no pillow so soft as fatigue ; the beds are generally arranged in twos, threes, and fours, according to the size of the room. The traveller should immediately on arriving secure his, and see that it is comfortable, for those who neglect to get a good one must sleep in a bad. Generally speaking, by a little management, he may get a room to himself, or at least select his companions. There is, moreover, a real civility and politeness shown by all classes of Spaniards, on all occasions, towards strangers and ladies ; and that even failing, a small tip, " una gratificacioncita" given beforehand to the maid, or the waiter, seldom fails to smooth all difficulties. On these, as on all occa 58 THE GALERA. [CHAP. vi. sions in Spain, most things may be obtained by good humour, a smile, a joke, a proverb, a cigar, or a bribe, which, though last, is by no means the least resource, since it will be found to mollify the hardest heart and smooth the greatest difficulties, after civil speeches had been tried in vain, for Dadivas quebrantan penas, y entra sin barrenas, gifts break rocks, and penetrate without gimlets ; again, Mas ablanda dinero que palabras de Caballero, cash softens more than a gentleman's palaver. The mode of driving in Spain, which is so unlike our way of handling the ribbons, will be described presently. Means of conveyance for those who cannot afford the diligence are provided by vehicles of more genuine Spanish nature and discomfort ; they may be compared to the neat accommodation for man arid beast which is doled out to third-class passengers by our monopolist railway kings, who have usurped her Majesty's highway, and fleece her lieges by virtue of act of Parlia- ment. First and foremost comes the galera, which fully justifies its name ; and even those who have no value for their time or bones will, after a short trial of the rack and dislocation, ex- claim, "que diable allais-je fairs dans cette galere?" These machines travel periodically from town to town, and form the chief public and carrier communication between most provincial cities ; they are not much changed from that classical cart, the rheda, into which, as we read in Juvenal, the whole family of Fabricius was conveyed. In Spain these primitive locomotives have stood still in the general advance of this age of progress, and carry us back to our James I., and Fynes Moryson's accounts of " carry ers who have long covered waggons, in which they carry passengers from city to city ; but this kind of jour- neying is so tedious, by reason they must take waggons very early and come very late to their innes, none but women and people of inferior condition used to travel in this sort." So it is now in Spain. This galera is a long cart without springs ; the sides are lined with matting, while beneath hangs a loose open net, as under the calesinas of Naples, in which lies and barks a horrid dog, who keeps a Cerberus watch over iron pots and sieves, and such like gipsey utensils, and who is never to be conciliated. These CHAP, vi.] CARRIAGES AND CARTS. 59 galeras are of all sizes ; but if a galera should be a larger sort of vehicle than is wanted, then a " tartana" a sort of covered tilted cart, which is very common in Valencia, and which is so called from a small Mediterranean craft of the same name, will be found convenient. The packing and departure of the galera. when hired by a family who remove their goods, is a thing of Spain ; the heavy luggage is stowed in first, and beds and mattresses spread on the top, on which the family repose in admired disorder. The galera is much used by the " poor students" of Spain, a class unique of its kind, and full of rags and impudence ; their adventures have the credit of being rich and picturesque, and recall some of the accounts of " waggon incidents " in ; Roderick Random,' and Smollett's novels. Civilization, as connected with the wheel, is still at a low ebb in Spain, notwithstanding the numerous political revolutions. Except in a few great towns, the quiz vehicles remind us of those caricatures at which one laughed so heartily in Paris in 1814 ; and in Madrid, even down to Ferdinand VII.'s decease, the Prado its rotten row was filled with antediluvian car- riages grotesque coachmen and footmen to match, which with us would be put into the British Museum ; they are now, alas for painters and authors ! worn out, and replaced by poor French imitations of good English originals. As the genuine older Spanish ones were built in remote ages, and before the invention of folding steps, the ascent and descent were facilitated by a three-legged footstool, which dangled, strapped up near the door, as appears in the hieroglyphics of Egypt 4000 years ago ; a pair of long-eared fat mules, with hides and tails fantastically cut, was driven by a superannuated postilion in formidable jackboots, and not less formidable cocked hat of oil- cloth. In these, how often have we seen Spanish grandees with pedigrees as old-fashioned, gravely taking the air and dust! These slow coaches of old Spain have been rapidly sketched by the clever young American ; such are the ups and downs of nations and vehicles. Spain for having discovered America has in return become her butt ; she cannot go a- head ; so the great dust of Alexander may stop a bung-hole, and we too join in the laugh and forget that our ancestors see Beaumont and Fletcher's SO THE COCHE DE COLLERAS. [CHAP. vi. ' Maid of the Inn ' talked of " hurrying on featherbeds that move upon four-wheel Spanish caroches" While on these wheel subjects it may be observed that the carts and other machines of Spanish rural locomotion and husbandry have not escaped better ; when not Oriental they are Roman ; rude in form and material, they are always odd, picturesque, and inconvenient. The peasant, for the most part, scratches the earth with a plough modelled after that invented by Triptolemus, beats out his corn as described by Homer, and carries his harvest home in strict obedience to the rules in the Georgics. The iron work is iniquitous, but both sides of the Pyrenees are centuries behind England ; there, absurd tariffs prohibit the importation of our cheap and good work in order to encourage their own bad and dear wares thus poverty and ignorance are perpetuated. The carts in the north-west provinces are the unchanged plau- stra, with solid wheels, the Roman tympana which consist of mere circles of wood, without spokes or axles, much like mill-stones or Parmesan cheeses, and precisely such as the old Egyptians used, as is seen in hieroglyphics, and no doubt much resembling those sent by Joseph for his father, which are still used by the Affghans and other unadvanced coachmakers. The whole wheel turns round together with a piteous creaking ; the drivers, whose leathern ears are as blunt as their edgeless teeth, delight in this ex- cruciating ChirriOy Arabice charrar, to make a noise, which they call music, and delight in, because it is cheap and plays to them of itself; they, moreover, think it frightens wolves, bears, and the devil himself, as Don Quixote says, which it well may, for the wheel of Ixion, although damned in hell, never whined more piteously. The doleful sounds, however, serve like our waggoners' lively bells, as warnings to other drivers, who, in narrow paths and gorges of rocks, where two carriages cannot pass, have this notice given them, and draw aside until the coast is clear. We have reserved some details and the mode of driving for the coche de colleras, the earache of horse-collars, which is the real coach of Spain, and in which we have made many a pleasant trip ; it too is doomed to be scheduled away, for Spaniards are descending from these coaches and six to a chariot and pair, and by degrees beautifully less, to a fly. Mails and diligences, we have said, are only established on the CHAP, vi.] THE COCHE DE COLLERAS. 61 principal high roads connected with Madrid : there are but few local coaches which run from one provincial town to another, where the necessity of frequent and certain intercommunication is little called for. In the other provinces, where these modern conveniences have not been introduced, the earlier mode of tra- velling is the only resource left to families of children, women, and invalids, who are unable to perform the journey on horse- back. This is thefestina lente, or voiturier system ; and from its long continuance in Italy and Spain, in spite of all the im- provements adopted in other countries, it would appear to have something congenial and peculiarly fitted to the habits and wants of those cognate nations of the south, who have a Gotho-Orientai dislike to be hurried no corre priesa, there is plenty of time. Sie haben zeit genug. The Spanish vetturino, or " Calesero" is to be found, as in Italy, standing for hire in particular and well-known places in every principal town. There is not much necessity for hunting for him ; he has the Italian instinctive perception of a stranger arid traveller, and the same importunity in volunteering himself, his cattle, and carriage, for any part of Spain. The man, how- ever, and his equipage are peculiarly Spanish ; his carriage and his team have undergone little change during the last two cen- turies, and are the representatives of the former ones of Europe ; they resemble those vehicles once used in England, which may still be seen in the old prints of country-houses by Kip ; or, as regards France, in the pictures of Louis XIV.'s journeys and campaigns by Vandermeulen. They are the remnant of the once universal " coach and six," in which according to Pope, who was not infallible, British fair were to delight for ever. The " coche de colleras" is a huge cumbrous machine, built after the fashion of a reduced lord mayor's coach, or some of the equipages of the old cardinals at Rome. It is ornamented with rude sculpture, gilding, and painting of glaring colour, bat the modern pea-jacket and round hat spoil the pictitve which requires passengers dressed in brocade and full-bottomed wigs ; the fore- wheels are very low, the hind ones very high, and both remark- ably narrow in the tire ; remember when they stick in the mud, and the drivers call upon Santiago, to push the vehicle out back- war 'ds, as the more you draw it forwards the deeper you get into 62 THE MAYOEAL. [CHAP. vi. the mire. The pole sticks out like the bowsprit of a ship, and contains as much wood and iron work as would go to a small waggon. The interior is lined with gay silk and gaudy plush, adorned with lace and embroidery, with doors that open indiffer- ently and windows that do not shut well ; latterly the general poverty and prose of transpyrenean civilization has effaced much of these ornate nationalities, both in coach and drivers ; better roads and lighter vehicles require fewer horses, which were absolutely necessary formerly to drag the heavy concern through heavier ways. The luggage is piled up behind, or stowed away in a front boot. The management of driving this vehicle is conducted by two persons. The master is called the " mayoral " his helper or cad the " mozoj' or, more properly, " el zagal" from the Arabic, " a strong active youth." The costume is peculiar, and is based on that of Andalucia, which sets the fashion all over the Penin- sula, in all matters regarding bull-fighting, horse-dealing, rob- bing, smuggling, and so forth. He wears on his head a gay- coloured silk handkerchief, tied in such a manner that the tails hang down behind ; over this remnant of the Moorish turban he places a high-peaked sugarloaf-shaped hat with broad brims ; his jaunty jacket is made either of black sheepskin, studded with silver tags and filigree buttons, or of brown cloth, with the back, arms, and particularly the elbows, welted and tricked out with flowers and vases, cut in patches of different-coloured cloth and much embroidered. When the jacket is not worn, it is usually hung over the left shoulder, after the hussar fashion. The waistcoat is made of rich fancy silk ; the breeches of blue or green velvet plush, ornamented with stripes and filigree but- tons, and tied at the knee with silken cords and tassels ; the neck is left open, and the shirt collar turned down, and a gaudy neck-handkerchief is worn, oftener passed through a ring than tied in a knot ; his waist is girt with a red sash, or with one of a bright yellow. This "/a/a,"* a sine qua non, is the old Roman * Faja ; the Hhezum of Cairo. Atrides tightens his sash when preparing for action Iliad xi. 15. The Roman soldiers kept their money in it. Ibit qui zonam perdidit. Hor. ii. Ep. 2. 40. The Jews used it for the same pur- pose Matthew x. 9 ; Mark vi. 8. It is loosened at night. " None shall slumber or sleep, neither shall the girdle of their loins be loosed." Isaiah v. 27. CHAP, vi.] THE ZAGAL. 63 zona ; it serves also for a purse, " girds the loins," and keeps up a warmth over the abdomen, which is highly beneficial in hot climates, and wards off any tendency to irritable colic ; in the sash is stuck the " navaja" the knife, which is part and parcel of a Spaniard, and behind the " zagal" usually places his stick. The richly embroidered gaiters are left open at the outside to show a handsome stocking ; the shoes are yellow, like those of our cricketers, and are generally made of untanned calfskin, which being the colour of dust require no cleaning. The cale- seros on the eastern coast wear the Valencian stocking, which has no feet to it being open at bottom, it is likened by wags to a Spaniard's purse ; instead of top boots they wear the ancient Roman sandals, made of the esparto rush, with hempen soles, which are called " alpargatasf Arabice Alpalgah. The " zagal" follows the fashion in dress of the " mayoral" as nearly as his means will permit him. He is the servant of all-work, and must be ready on every occasion ; nor can any one who has ever seen the hard and incessant toil which these men undergo, justly accuse them of being indolent a reproach which has been cast somewhat indiscriminately on all the lower classes of Spain ; he runs by* the side of the carriage, picks up stones to pelt the mules, ties and unties knots, and pours forth a volley of blows and oaths from the moment of starting to that of arrival. He sometimes is indulged with a ride by the side of the mayoral on the box, when he always uses the tail of the hind mule to pull himself up into his seat. The harnessing the six animals is a difficult opera- tion ; first the tackle of ropes is laid out on the ground, then each beast is brought into his portion of the rigging. The start is always an important ceremony, and, as our royal mail used to do in the country, brings out all the idlers in the vicinity. When the team is harnessed, the mayoral gets all his skeins of ropes into his hand, the " zagal" his sash full of stones, the helpers at the venta their sticks ; at a given signal all fire a volley of oaths arid blows at the team, which, once in moOn, away it goes, pitching over ruts deep as routine prejudices, with its pole dip- ping and rising like a ship in a rolling sea, and continues at a brisk pace, performing from twenty-five to thirty miles a-day. The hours of starting are early, in order to avoid the mid-day heat ; in these matters the Spanish customs are pretty much the 64 DRIVING IN SPAIN. [CHAP. vi. same with the Italian ; the calesero is always the best judge of the hours of departure arid these minor details, which vary ac- cording to circumstances. Whenever a particularly bad bit of road occurs, notice is given to the team by calling over their names, and by crying out " arre, arre" gee-up, which is varied with "jirme, Jirme" steady, boy, steady ! The names of the animals are always fine-sounding and polysyllabic ; the accent is laid on the last syllable, which is always dwelt on and lengthened out with a particular emphasis Cdpitana-d Bandolerd-d Generala-a Valerosa-d. All this vocal driving is performed at the top of the voice, and, indeed, next to scaring away crows in a field, must be considered the best possible practice for the lungs. The team often exceeds six in number, and never is less ; the propor- tion of females predominates : there is generally one male mule making the seventh, who is called " el macho" the male par excel- lence, like the Grand Turk, or a substantive in a speech in Cortes, which seldom has less than half a dozen epithets : he invariably comes in for the largest share of abuse and ill usage, which, in- deed, he deserves the most, as the male mule is infinitely more stubborn and viciously inclined than the female. Sometimes there is a horse of the Rosinante breed ; he is called " el cavallo" or rather, as it is pronounced, " el caval ?/o-o." The horse is always the best used of the team ; to be a rider, " cabailero" is the Spaniard's synonym for gentleman ; and it is their correct mode of addressing each other, and is banded gravely among the lower orders, who never have crossed any quadruped save a mule or a jackass. The driving a coche de colleras is quite a science of itself, and is observed in conducting diligences; it amuses the Spanish " majo " or fancy-man as much as coach-driving does the fancy- man of England ; the great art lies not in handling the ribbons, but in the proper modulation of the voice, since the cattle are always addressed individually by their names ; the first syllables are pronounced very rapidly ; the " macho" the male mule, who is the most abused, is the only one who is not addressed by any names beyond that of his sex : the word is repeated with a volu- ble iteration ; in order to make the two syllables longer, they are strung together thus, macho macho macho mdcho-o: CHAP, vi.] SWEARING. 65 they begin in semiquavers, flowing on crescendo to a semibreve or breve, so the four words are compounded into one polysyllable. The horse, caballo. is simply called so ; he has no particular name of his own, which the female mules are never without, and which they perfectly know indeed, the owners will say that they under- stand them, and all bad language, as well as Christian women, " como Cristianas " and, to do the beasts justice, they seem more shocked and discomfited thereby than the bipeds who profess the same creed. If the animal called to does not answer by pricking up her ears, or by quickening her pace, the threat of " Id vara" the stick, is added the last argument of Spanish drivers, men in office, and schoolmasters, with whom there is no sort of reason equal to that of the bastinado, " no hay tal razon, como la del baston." It operates on the timorous more than " unadorned eloquence." The Moors thought so highly of the bastinado, that they held the stick to be a special gift from Allah to the faith- ful. It holds good, a priori and a posteriori, to mule and boy, " al hijo y mulo, para el culo ;" and if the "macho" be in fault, and he is generally punished to encourage the others, some abuse is added to blows, such as " que perro-o," " what a dog !" or some unhandsome allusion to his mother, which is followed by throwing a stone at the leaders, for no whip could reach them from the coach-box". When any particular mule's name is called, if her companion be the next one to be abused, she is seldom addressed by her name, but is spoken to as " a la otra-a" " aquella otrd-d" " Now for that other one," which from long association is expected and acknowledged. The team obeys the voice and is in admirable command. Few things are more entertaining than driving them, especially over bad roads ; but it requires much practice in Spanish speaking and swearing. Among the many commandments that are always broken in Spain, that of " swear not at all " is not the least. " Our army swore lustily in Flanders," said Uncle Toby. But few nations can surpass the -Spaniards in the language of vituperation : it is limited only by the extent of their anatomical, geographical, astronomical, and religious knowledge ; it is so plentifully be- stowed on their animals " un muletier a ce jeu vaut trois rois" that oaths and imprecations seem to be considered as the only language the mute creation can comprehend ; and as actions are F 66 SPANISH OATt.3. [CHAP. vi. generally suited to the words, the combination is remarkably effective. As much of the traveller's time on the road must be passed among beasts and muleteers, who are not unlike them, some knowledge of their sayings and doings is of great use : to be able to talk to them in their own lingo, to take an interest in them and in. their animals, never fails to please ; " Por vida del demonio, mas sabe Usia que nosotros ;" " by the life of the devil, your honour knows more than we," is a common form of com- pliment. When once equality is established, the master mind soon becomes the real master of the rest. The great oath of Spain, which ought never to be written or pronounced, prac- tically forms the foundation of the language of the lower orders ; it is a most ancient remnant of the phallic abjuration of the evil eye, the dreaded fascination which still perplexes the minds of Orientals, and is not banished from Spanish and Neapolitan superstitions.* The word terminates in ojo, on which great stress is laid : the j is pronounced with a most Arabic, guttural aspiration. The word ajo means also garlic, which is quite as often in Spanish mouths, and is exactly what Hotspur liked, a " mouth-filling oath," energetic and Michael Angelesque. The pun has been extended to onions : thus, " qjos y cebollas " means oaths and imprecations. The sting of the v>ath is in the " ajo; 9 all women and quiet men, who do not wish to be particularly objurgatory, but merely to enforce and give a little additional vigour, un soupgon d'ail, or a shotting to their discourse, drop the offensive " /0," and say " car" " carai" " caramba" The Spanish oath is used as a verb, as a substantive, as an adjective, just as it suits the grammar or the wrath of the utterer. It is * The dread of the fascination of the evil eye, from which Solomon was not exempt (Proverbs xxiii. 6), prevails all over the East ; it has not been extirpated from Spain or from Naples, which so long belonged to Spain. The lower classes in the Peninsula hang round the necks of their children and cattle a horn tipped with silver ; this is sold as an amulet in the silver- smiths' shops ; the cord by which it is attached ought to be braided from a black mare's tail. The Spanish gipsies, of whom Borrow has given us so complete an account, thrive by disarming the mal de ojo, " querelar nasula" as they term it. The dread of the " Ain ara " exists among all classes of the Moors. The better classes of Spaniards make a joke of it ; and often, when you remark that a person has put on or wears something strange about him, the answer is, " Es para que no me hagan mal de ojo" Naples is the head-quarters for charms and coral amulets : all the learning has been col- lected by the Canon Jorio and the Marques Arditi. CHAP, vi.] HINTS FOR HIRING. 67 equivalent also to a certain place and the person who lives there. " Vaya Usted al C ajo " is the worst form of the angry " Vaya Usted al demonio" or " a los infiernos" and is a whim- sical mixture of courtesy and transportation. " Your Grace may go to the devil, or to the infernal regions ! " Thus these imprecatory vegetables retain in Spain their old Egyptian flavour and mystical charm ; as on the Nile, according to Pliny, onions and garlic were worshipped as adjuratory divini- ties. The Spaniards have also added most of the gloomy northern Gothic oaths, which are imprecatory, to the Oriental, which are grossly sensual. Enough of this. The traveller who has much to do with Spanish mules and asses, biped or quadruped, will need no hand-book to teach him the sixty-five or more " serments espaignols" on which Mons. de Brantome wrote a treatise. More becoming will it be to the English gentleman to swear not at all ; a reasonable indulgence in Caramba is all that can be permitted ; the custom is more honoured in the breach than in the observance, and bad luck seldom deserts the house of the imprecator. " En la casa del que jura, no falta desaventura" Previously to hiring one of these " coaches of collars," which is rather an expensive amusement, every possible precaution should be taken in clearly arid minutely specifying everything to be done, and the price ; the Spanish " caleseros " rival their Italian colleagues in that untruth, roguery, and dishonesty, which seem everywhere to combine readily with jockeyship, and distin- guishes those who handle the whip, " do jobbings," and conduct mortals by horses ; the fee to be given to the drivers should never be included in the bargain, as the keeping this important item open and dependent on the good behaviour of the future reci- pients offers a sure check over master and man, and other road- classes. In justice, however, to this class of Spaniards, it may be said that on the whole they are civil, good-humoured, and hard- working, and, from not having been accustomed to either the screw bargaining or alternate extravagance of the English travel- lers in Italy, are as tolerably fair in their transactions as can be expected from human nature brought in constant contact with four-legged and four-wheeled temptations. They offer to the artist an endless subject of the picturesque ; everything con- nected with them is full of form, colour, and originality. They F2 08 HINTS FOR HIRING. [CHAP. vi. can do nothing, whether sitting, driving, sleeping, or eating, that does not make a picture ; the same may be said of their animals and their habits and harness ' those who draw will never find the midday halt long enough for the infinite variety of sub-^ ject and scenery to which their travelling equipage and attendants form the most peculiar and appropriate foreground : while our modern poetasters will consider them quite as worthy of being sung in immortal verse as the Cambridge carrier Hobson, who was Milton's choice. CHAP, vii.] THE ANDALUCIAN HORSE. 69 CHAPTER VII. Spanish Horses Mules Asses Muleteers Maragatos. AYE now proceed to Spanish quadrupeds, having placed the wheel-carriages before the horses. That of Andalucia takes pre- cedence of all ; he fetches the highest price, arid the Spaniards in general value no other breed ; they consider his configuration and qualities as perfect, and in some respects they are right, for no horse is more elegant or more easy in his motions, none are more gentle or docile, none are more quick in acquiring showy accomplishments, or in performing feats of Astleyari agility; he has very little in common with the English blood-horse ; his mane is soft and silky, and is frequently plaited with gay ribbons ; his tail is of great length, and left in all the proportions of nature, not cropped and docked, by which Voltaire was so much offended : " Fiers et bizarres Anglais, qui des memes ciseaux Coupez la tete aux rois, et la queue aux chevaux." It often trails to the very ground, while the animal has perfect command over it, lashing it on every side as a gentleman switches his cane ; therefore, when on a journey, it is usual to double and tie it up, after the fashion of the ancient pig-tails of our sailors. The Andalucian horse is round in his quarters, though inclined to be small in the barrel ; he is broad-chested, and always carries his head high, especially when going a good pace ; his length of leg adds to his height, which sometimes reaches to sixteen hands ; he never, however, stretches out with the long graceful sweep of the English thorough-bred ; his action is apt to be loose and shambling, and he is given to dishing with the feet. The pace is, notwithstanding, perfectly delightful. From being very long in the pastern, the motion is broken as it were by the springs of a carriage; their pace is the peculiar "paso Cas- 70 OTHER SPANISH HORSES. [CHAP. vu. tellano," which is something more than a walk, and less than a trot, and it is truly sedate and sedan-chair-like, and suits a grave Don, who is given, like a Turk, to tobacco and contemplation. Those Andalucian horses which fall when young into the hands of the officers at Gibraltar acquire a very different action, and lay themselves better down to their work, and gain much more in speed from the English system of training than they would have done had they been managed by Spaniards. Taught or un- taught, this pace is most gentlemanlike, and well did Beaumont and Fletcher " Think it noble, as Spaniards do in riding, In managing a great horse, which is princely ;" and as has been said, is the only attitude in which the kings of the Spains, true 0tXi7T7roi, ought ever to be painted, svitching the world with noble horsemanship. Many other provinces possess breeds which are more useful, though far less showy, than the Andalucian. The horse of Castile is a strong, hardy animal, and the best which Spain pro- duces for mounting heavy cavalry. The ponies of Gallicia, although ugly and uncouth, are admirably suited to the wild hilly country and laborious population ; they require very little care or grooming, and are satisfied with coarse food and Indian corn. The horses of Navarre, once so celebrated, are still esteemed for their hardy strength ; they have, from neglect, de- generated into ponies, which, however, are beautiful in form, hardy, docile, sure-footed, and excellent trotters. In most of the large towns of Spain there is a sort of market, where horses are publicly sold ; but Eonda fair, in May, is the great Howden and Horncastle of the four provinces of Seville, Cordova, Jaen, and Granada, and the resort of all the picturesque-looking rogues of the south. The reader of Don Quixote need not be told that the race of Gines Passamonte is not extinct ; the Spanish Chalanes, or horse-dealers, have considerable talents ; but the cleverest is but a mere child when compared to the perfection of rascality to which a real English professor has attained in the mysteries of lying, chaunting, and making up a horse. The breeding of horses was carefully attended to by the Spanish government previously to the invasion of the French, by whom CHAP, vii.] MULES. 71 the entire horses and brood-mares were either killed or stolen, and the buildings and stables burnt. The saddles used commonly- in Spain are Moorish ; they are made with high peak and croup behind ; the stirrup-irons are large triangularly-shaped boxes. The food is equally Oriental, and consists of " barley and straw," as mentioned in the Bible. We well remember the horror of our Andalucian groom, on our first reaching Gallicia, when he rushed in, exclaiming that the beasts would perish, as nothing was to be had there but oats and hay. After some difficulty he was persuaded to see if they would eat it, which to his surprise they actually did ; such, however, is habit, that they soon fell out of condition, and did not recover until the damp mountains were quitted for the arid plains of Castile. Spaniards in general prefer mules and asses to the horse, which is more delicate, requires greater attention, and is less sure-footed over broken and precipitous ground. The mule performs in Spain the functions of the camel in the East, and has something in his morale (besides his physical suitableness to the country) which is congenial to the character of his masters ; he has the same self-willed obstinacy, the same resignation under burdens, the same singular capability of endurance of labour, fatigue, and privation. The mule has always been much used in Spain, and the demand for them very great ; yet, from some mistaken crotchet of Spanish political economy (which is very Spanish), the breeding of the mule has long been attempted to be pre- vented, in order to encourage that of the horse. One of the reasons alleged was, that the mule was a non-reproductive animal ; an argument which might or ought to apply equally to the monk ; a breed for which Spain could have shown for the first prize, both as to number and size, against any other country in all Christendom. This attempt to force the production of an animal far less suited to the wants and habits of the people has failed, as might be expected. The difficulties thrown in the way have only tended to raise the prices of mules, which are, and always were, very dear ; a good mule will fetch from 25/. to 50/., while a horse of relative goodness may be purchased for from 201. to 40/. Mules were always very dear ; thus Martial, like a true Andalucian Spaniard, talks of one which cost more 72 ASSES. [CHAP. vii. than a house. The most esteemed are those bred from the mare and the ass, or " garanon" * some of which are of extraordinary size ; and one which Don Carlos had in his stud-house at Aranjuez in 1832 exceeded fifteen hands in height. This colossal ass and a Spanish infante were worthy of each other. The mules in Spain, as in the East, have their coats closely shorn or clipped ; part of the hair is usually left on in stripes like the zebra, or cut into fanciful patterns, like the tattooings of a New Zealand chief. This process of shearing is found to keep the beast cooler arid freer from cutaneous disorders. The operation is performed in the southern provinces by gipsies, who are the same tinkers, horse-dealers, and vagrants in Spain as elsewhere. Their clipping recalls the " inulo cur to," on which Horace could amble even to Brundusium. The operators rival in talent those worthy Frenchmen who cut the hair of poodles on the Pont Neuf, in the heart and brain of European civilization. Their Spanish colleagues may be known by the shears, formid- able and classical- shaped as those of Lachesis and her sisters, which they carry in their sashes. They are very particular in clipping the heels and pasterns, which they say ought to be as free from superfluous hair as the palm of a lady's hand. Spanish asses have been immortalised by Cervantes ; they are endeared to us by Sancho's love and talent of imitation ; he brayed so well, be it remembered, that all the long-eared chorus joined a performer who, in his own modest phrase, only wanted a tail to be a perfect donkey. Spanish mayors, accord- ing to Don Quixote, have a natural talent for this braying ; but, save and except in the west of England, their right worshipfuls may be matched elsewhere. The humble ass, " burro" " borrico" is the rule, the as in prsesenti, arid part and parcel of every Spanish scene : he forms the appropriate foreground in streets or roads. Wherever two or three Spaniards are collected together in market, junta, or "con- gregation," there is quite sure to be an ass among them ; he is * The garanon is also called " burro padre? ass father, not " padre burro" " Padre'' the prefix of paternity, is the common title given in Spain to the clergy and the monks. " Father jackass" might in many instances, when applied to the latter, be too morally and physically appropriate, to be con- sistent with the respect due to the celibate cowl and cassock. CHAP, vn.1 ASSES OF LA MANCHA. 73 the hardworked companion of the lower orders, to whom to work is the greatest misfortune ; sufferance is indeed the common virtue of both tribes. They may, perhaps, both wince a little when a new burden or a new tax is laid on them by Senor Mon, but they soon, when they see that there is no remedy, bear on and endure : from this fellow-feeling, master and animal cherish each other at heart, though, from the blows and imprecations bestowed openly, the former may be thought by hasty observers to be ashamed of confessing these predilections in public. Some under-current, no doubt, remains of the ancient prejudices of chivalry ; but Cervantes, who thoroughly understood human nature in general, and Spanish nature in particular, has most justly dwelt on the dear love which Sancho Panza felt for his " Rucio" and marked the reciprocity of the brute, affectionate as intelligent. In fact, in the Sagra district, near Toledo, he is called Elvecino, one of the householders ; and none can look a Spanish ass in the face without remarking a peculiar expression, which indicates that the hairy fool considers himself, like the pig in a cabin of the " first gem of the sea," to be one of the family, de la familia, or de nosotyos. La Maricha is the paradise of mules and asses ; many a Sancho at this moment is there fondling and embracing his ass, his " chato chatito" " romo" or other complimentary variations of Snub, with which, when not abusing him, he delights to nick- name his helpmate. In Spain, as Sappho says, Love is yAvKu- irtKpov, an alternation of the agro-dolce ; nor is there any Preven- tion of Cruelty Society towards animals ; every Spaniard has the same right in law and equity to kick and beat his own ass to his own liking, as a philanthropical Yankee has to wallop his own niggar ; no one ever thinks of interposing on these occasions, any more than they would in a quarrel between a man and his wife. The words are, at all events, on one side. It is, however, re- corded in piam memoriam, of certain Roman Catholic asses of Spain, that they tried to throw off one Tomas Trebino and some other heretics, when on the way to be burnt, being horror-struck at bearing such monsters. Every Spanish peasant is heart- broken when injury is done to his ass, as well he may be, for it is the means by which he lives ; nor has he much chance, if he loses him, of finding a crown when hunting for him, as was once 74 THE MULETEER. [CHAP. vn. done, or even a government like Sancho. Sterne would have done better to have laid the venue of his sentimentalities over a dead ass in Spain, rather than in France, where the quadruped species is much rarer. In Spain, where small carts and wheel- barrows are almost unknown, and the drawing them is con- sidered as beneath the dignity of the Spanish man, the substitute, an ass, is in constant employ ; sometimes it is laden with sacks of corn, with wine-skins, with water-jars, with dung, or with dead robbers, slung like sacks over the back, their arms and legs tied under the animal's belly. Asses' milk, " leche de burra" is in much request during the spring season. The brown sex drink it in order to fine their complexions and cool their blood, " refrescar la sangre ;" the clergy and men in office, " los empleados" to whom it is mother's milk, swallow it in order that it may give tone to their gastric juices. Eiding on assback was accounted a disgrace and a degradation to the Gothic hidalgo, and the Spaniards, in the sixteenth century, mounted unrepining cuckolds, " los cornudos pacientes" on asses. Now- a-days, in spite of all these unpleasant associations, the grandees and their wives, and even grave ambassadors from foreigmparts, during the royal residence at Aranjuez, much delight in ele- vating themselves on this beast of ill omen, and " borricadas " or donkey parties are all the fashion. The muleteer of Spain is justly renowned ; his generic term is arrieroy a gee-uper, for his arre arre is pure Arabic, as indeed are almost all the terms connected with his craft, as the Moriscoes were long the great carriers of Spain. To travel \vith the muleteer, when the party is small or a person is alone, is both cheap and safe ; indeed, many of the most picturesque portions of Spain, Ronda and Granada for instance, can scarcely be reached except by walking or riding. These men, who are con- stantly on the road, and going backwards and forwards, are the best persons to consult for details ; their animals are generally to be hired, but a muleteer's stud is not pleasant to ride, since their beasts always travel in single files. The leading animal is furnished with a copper bell with a wooden clapper, to give notice of their march, which is shaped like an ice-mould, sometimes two feet long, and hangs from the neck, being contrived, as it were, on CHAP, vii.] THE MULETEER. 75 purpose to knock the animal's knees as much as possible, and to emit the greatest quantity of the most melancholy sounds, which, according to the pious origin of all bells, were meant to scare away the Evil One. The bearer of all this tintinnabular clatter is chosen from its superior docility and knack in picking out a way. The others follow their leader, and the noise he makes when they cannot see him. They are heavily but scien- tifically laden. The cargo of each is divided into three portions ; one is tied on each side, and the other placed between. If the cargo be not nicely balanced, the muleteer either unloads or adds a few stones to the lighter portion the additional weight being compensated by the greater comfort with which a well-poised burden is carried. These " sumpter " mules are gaily decorated with trappings full of colour and tags. The head-gear is com- posed of different coloured worsteds, to which a multitude of small bells are affixed ; hence the saying, " muger de mucha campanilla" a woman of many bells, of much show, much noise, or pretension. The muleteer either walks by the side of his animal or sits aloft on the cargo, with his feet dangling on the neck, a seat which is by no means so uncomfortable as it would appear. A rude gun, " but 'twill serve," and is loaded with slugs, hangs always in readiness by his side, and often with it a guitar ; these emblems of life and death paint the unchanged reckless condition of Iberia, where extremes have ever met, where a man still goes out of the world like a swan, with a song. Thus accoutred, as Byron says, with "all that gave, promise of pleasure or a grave," the approach of the caravan is announced from afar by his cracked or guttural voice : " How carols now the lusty muleteer !" For when not engaged in swearing- or smoking, the livelong day is passed in one monotonous high- pitched song, the tune of which is little in harmony with the im- port of the words, or his cheerful humour, being most unmusical and melancholy ; but such is the true type of Oriental melody, as it is called. The same absence of thought which is shown in England by whistling is displayed in Spain by singing. " Quien canta sus males espanta ;" he who sings frightens away ills, a philosophic consolation in travel as old and as classical as Virgil : " Cantantes licet usque, minus via tsedet, eamus," 76 MARAGATOS. [CHAP. vii. which may be thus translated for the benefit of country gentle- men : If we join in doleful chorus, The dull highway will much less bore us. The Spanish muleteer is a fine fellow ; he is intelligent, active, and enduring; he braves hunger and thirst, heat and cold, mud and dust ; he works as hard as his cattle, never robs or is robbed ; and while his betters in this land put off everything till to-morrow except bankruptcy, he is punctual and honest, his frame is wiry and sinewy, his costume peculiar ; many are the leagues and long, which we have ridden in his caravan, and longer his robber yarns, to which we paid no attention ; and it must be admitted that these cavalcades are truly national and picturesque. Mingled with droves of mules and mounted horsemen, the zig-zag lines come threading down the mountain defiles, now tracking through the aromatic brushwood, now concealed amid rocks and olive-trees, now emerging bright and glittering into the sunshine, giving life arid movement to the lonely nature, and breaking the usual still- ness by the tinkle of the bell and the sad ditty of the muleteer sounds which, though unmusical in themselves, are in keeping with the scene, and associated with wild Spanish rambles, just as the harsh whetting of the scythe is mixed up with the sweet spring and newly-mown hay-meadow. There is one class of muleteers which are but little known to European travellers the Marayatos, whose head-quarters are at San Roman, near Astorga ; they, like the Jew and gipsy, live ex- clusively among their own people, preserving their primeval cos- tume and customs, and never marrying out of their own tribe. They are as perfectly nomad and wandering as the Bedouins, the mule only being substituted for the camel ; their honesty and industry are proverbial. They are a sedate, grave, dry, matter of* fact, business-like people. Their charges are high, but the security counterbalances, as they may be trusted with untold gold. They are the channels of all traffic between Gallicia and the Castiles, being seldom seen in the south or east provinces. They are dressed in leathern jerkins, which fit tightly like a cuirass, leaving the arms free. Their linen is coarse but white, especially the shirt collar ; a broad leather belt, in which there is a purse, is CHAP, vii.] COSTUME OF THE MARAGATCS. 77 fastened round the waist. Their breeches, like those of the Valen- cians, are called Zaraguelles, a pure Arabic word for kilts or wide drawers, and no burgomaster of Rembrandt is more broad- bottomed. Their legs are encased in long brown cloth gaiters, with red garters ; their hair is generally cut close sometimes, however, strange tufts are left. A huge, slouching, flapping hat completes the most inconvenient of travelling dresses, and it is too Dutch to be even picturesque ; but these fashions are as unchangeable as the laws of the Medes and Persians were ; nor will any Maragato dream of altering his costume until those dressed models of painted wood do which strike the hours of the clock on the square of Astorga : Pedro Mato, also, another figure costumee, who holds a weathercock at the cathedral, is the observed of all observers ; and, in truth, this particular costume is, as that of Quakers used to be, a guarantee of their tribe and respectability ; thus even Cordero, the rich Maragato deputy, appeared in Cortes in this local costume. The dress of the Maragata is equally peculiar : she wears, if married, a sort of head- gear, El Caram.iello, in the shape of a crescent, the round part coming over the forehead, which is very Moorish, and resembles those of the females in the basso-rilievos at Granada. Their hair flows looselv on their shoulders, while their apron or petticoat hangs down open before and behind, and is curiously tied at the back with a sash, and their bodice is cut square over the bosom. At their festivals they are covered with ornaments of long chains of coral and metal, with crosses, relics, and medals in silver. Their earrings are very heavy, and supported by silken threads, as among the Jewesses in Barbary. A marriage is the grand feast ; then large parties assemble, and a president is chosen, who puts into a waiter whatever sum of money he likes, and all invited must then give as much. The bride is enveloped in a mantle, which she wears the whole day, and never again except on that of her husband's death. She does not dance at the wedding-ball. Early next morning two roast chickens are brought to the bed-side of the happy pair. The next evening ball is opened by the bride and her husband, to the tune of the gaita, or Moorish bagpipe. Their dances are crave and serious ; such indeed is their whole character. The 78 THEIR ORIGIN. [CHAP. vn. Maragatos^ with their honest, weather-beaten countenances, are seen with files of mules all along the high road to La Coruna. They generally walk, and, like other Spanish arrieros, although they sing and curse rather less, are employed in one ceaseless shower of stones and blows at their mules. The whole tribe assembles twice a year at Astorga, at the feasts of Corpus and the Ascension, when they dance El Canizo, be- ginning at two o'clock in the afternoon, and ending precisely at three. If any one not a Maragato joins, they all leave off immediately. The women never wander from their homes, which their undomestic husbands always do. They lead the hardworked life of the Iberian females of old, and now, as then, are to be seen everywhere in these west provinces toiling in the fields, early before the sun has risen, and late after it has set ; and it is most painful to behold them drudging at these unfemi- nine vocations. The origin of the Maragatos has never been ascertained. Some consider them to be a remnant of the Celtiberian, others of the Visigoths ; most^ however, prefer a Bedouin, or caravan descent. It is in vain to question these ignorant carriers as to their history or origin ; for like the gipsies, they have no traditions, and know nothing. Arrieros, at all events, they are ; and that word, in common with so many others relating to the barb and carrier-caravan craft, is Arabic, and proves whence the system and science were derived by Spaniards. The Maragatos are celebrated for their fine beasts of burden ; indeed, the mules of Leon are renowned, and the asses splendid and numerous, especially the nearer one approaches to the learned university of Salamanca. The Maragatos take precedence on the road ; they are the lords of the highway, being the channels of commerce in a land where mules and asses represent luggage rail trains. They know and feel their importance, and that they are the rule, and the traveller for mere plea- sure is the exception. Few Spanish muleteers are much more polished than their beasts, and however picturesque the scene, it is no joke meeting a string of laden beasts in a narrow road, especially with a precipice on one side, cosa de Espana. The Maragatos seldom give way, and their mules keep doggedly CHAP, vii.] TRAVELLING IN THE INTERIOR. 79 on ; as the baggage projects on each side, like the paddles of a steamer, they sweep the whole path. But all wayfaring details in the genuine Spanish interior are calculated for the pack, as in England a century back ; and there is no thought bestowed on the foreigner, who is not wanted, nay is disliked. The inns, roads, and right sides, suit the natives and their brutes ; nor will either put themselves out of their way to please the fancies of a stranger. The racy Peninsula is too little travelled over for its natives to adopt the mercenary conveniences of the Swiss, that nation of innkeepers and coach-jobbers. 80 RIDING TOURS. [CHAP, vin CHAPTER VIII. Riding Tour in Spain Pleasures of it Pedestrian Tour Choice of Com- panions Rules for a Riding Tour Season of Year Day's Journey Management of Horse ; his Feet; Shoes; General Hints. A MAN in a public carriage ceases to be a private individual : he is merged into the fare, and becomes a number according to his place ; he is booked like a parcel, and is delivered by the guard, How free, how lord and master of himself, does the same dependent gentleman mount his eager barb, who by his neighing and pawing exhibits his joyful impatience to be off too ! How fresh and sweet the free breath of heaven, after the frousty atmosphere of a full inside of foreigners, who, from the narcotic effects of tobacco, forget the existence of soap, water, and clean linen ! Travelling on horseback, so unusual a gratification to Englishmen, is the ancient, primitive, and once universal mode of travelling in Europe, as it still is in the East ; mankind, however, soon gets accustomed to a changed state of locomotion, and forgets how recent is its introduction. Fynes Moryson gave much the same advice two centuries ago to travellers in England, as must be now suggested to those who in Spain desert the coach- beaten highways for the delightful bye-ways, and thus explore the rarely visited, but not the least interesting portions of the Peninsula. It has been our good fortune to perform many of these expeditions on horseback, both alone and in company ; and on one occasion to have made the pilgrimage from Seville to Santiago, through Estremadura and Gallicia, returning by the Asturias, Biscay, Leon, and the^Castiles ; thus riding nearly two thousand miles on the same horse, and only accompanied by one Andalucian servant, who had never before gone out of his native province. The same tour was afterwards performed by two friends with two servants; nor did they or ourselves ever meet with any real impediments or difficulties, scarcely indeed suf- ficient of either to give the flavour of adventure, or the dignity CHAP, viu.] ROYAL ROADS. 81 of danger, to the undertaking. It has also been our lot to make an extended tour of many months, accompanied by an English lady, through Granada, Murcia, Valencia, Catalonia, and Arragon, to say nothing of repeated excursions through every nook and corner of Andalucia. The result of all this experience, combined with that of many friends, who have ridden over the Peninsula, enables us to recommend this method to the young, healthy, and adventurous, as by far the most agreeable plan of proceeding ; and, indeed, as we have said, as regards two-thirds of the Peninsula, the only practicable course. The leading royal roads which connect the capital with the principal seaports are, indeed, excellent ; but they are generally drawn in a straight line, whereby many of the most ancient cities are thus left out, and these, together with sites of battles and historical incident, ruins and remains of antiquity, and scenes of the greatest natural beauty, are accessible with difficulty, and in many cases only on horseback. Spain abounds with wide tracts which are perfectly unknown to the Geographical Society. Here, indeed, is fresh ground open to all who aspire in these threadbare days to book something new ; here is scenery enough to fill a dozen portfolios, and subject enough for a score of quartos. How many flowers pine unbotanised, how many rocks harden ungeologised ; what views are dying to be sketched ; what bears and deer to be stalked ; what trout to be caught and eaten ; what valleys expand their bosoms, longing to embrace their visitor; what virgin beauties hitherto unseen await the happy member of the Travellers' Club, who in ten days can ex- change the bore of eternal Pall Mall for these untrodden sites ; and then what an accession of dignity in thus discovering a terra incognita, and rivalling Mr. Mungo Park ! Nor is a guide want- ing, since our good friend John Murray, the grand monarque of Handbooks, has proclaimed from Albemarle Street, // riy a plus de Pyrenees. \ As the wide extent of country which intervenes between the radii of the great roads is most indifferently provided with public means of inter-communication ; as there is little traffic, and no demand for modern conveyances even mules and horses are not always to be procured, and we have always found it best to set out on these distant excursions with our own beasts : the com- 82 HINTS TO TRAVELLERS. [CHAP. vin. fort and certainty of this precaution have been corroborated be- yond any doubt by frequent comparisons with the discomforts undergone by other persons, who trusted to chance accommoda- tions and means of locomotion in ill-provided districts and out- of-the-way excursions : indeed, as a general rule, the traveller will do well to carry with him everything with which from habit he feels that he cannot dispense. The chief object will be to combine in as small a space as possible the greatest quantity of portable comfort, taking care to select the really essential ; for there is no worse mistake than lumbering oneself with things that are never wanted. This mode of travelling has not been much detailed by the generality of authors, who have rarely gone much out of the beaten track, or undertaken a long-continued riding tour, and they have been rather inclined to overstate the dangers and difficulties of a plan which they have never tried. At the same time this plan is not to be recommended to fine ladies nor to delicate gentlemen, nor to those who have had a touch of rheumatism, or who tremble at the shadows which coming gout casts before it. Those who have endurance and curiosity enough to face a tour in Sicily, may readily set out for Spain ; rails and post- horses certainly get quicker over the country ; but the pleasure of the remembrance and the benefits derived by travel are com- monly in an inverse ratio to the ease and rapidity with which the journey is performed. In addition to the accurate know- ledge which is thus acquired of the country (for there is no map like this mode of surveying), and an acquaintance with a con- siderable, and by no means the worst portion of its population, a riding expedition to a civilian is almost equivalent to serving a campaign. It imparts a new life, which is adopted on the spot, and which soon appears quite natural, from being in perfect harmony and fitness with everything around, however strange to all previous habits and notions ; it takes the conceit out of a man for the rest of his life it makes him bear and forbear. It is a capital practical school of moral discipline, just as the hardiest mariners are nurtured in the roughest seas. Then and there will be learnt golden rules of patience, perseverance, good temper, and good fellowship : the individual man must come out, for better or worse* On these occasions, where wealth and rank CHAP, viu.] HEALTHFUL EXERCISE. 83 are stripped of the aids and appurtenances of conventional supe- riority, a man will draw more on his own resources, moral and physical, than on any letter of credit ; his wit will be sharpened by invention-suggesting necessity. Then and there, when up, about, and abroad, will be shaken off dull sloth ; action Demosthenic action will be the watch- word. The traveller will blot out from his dictionary the fatal Spanish phrase of procrastination by-and-by, a street which leads to the house of never, for " por la calle de despues, se va a la casa de nunca.^ Reduced to shift for himself, he will see the evil of waste the folly of improvidence and want of order. He will whistle to the winds the paltry excuse of idleness, the Spanish " no se puede" " it is impossible." He will soon learn, by grappling with difficulties, how surely they are overcome, how soft as silk becomes the nettle when it is sternly grasped, which would sting the tender-handed touch, how powerful a principle of realising the object proposed, is the moral conviction that we can and will accomplish it. He will never be scared by shadows thin as air, for when one door shuts another opens, and he who pushes on arrives. And after all, a dash of hardship may be endured by those accustomed to loll in easy biitzskas, if only for the sake of novelty ; what a new relish is given to the palled appetite by a little unknown privation ! hunger being, as Cervantes says, the best of sauces, which, as it never is wanting to the poor, is the reason why eating is their huge delight. Again, these sorts of independent expeditions are equally conducive to health of body : after the first few days of the new fatigue are got over, the frame becomes of iron, " hecho de bronze" and the rider, a centaur not fabulous. The living in the pure air, the sustaining excitement of novelty, exercise, and constant occupation, are all sweetened by the willing heart, which renders even labour itself a pleasure ; a new and vigorous life is infused into every bone and muscle : early to bed and early to rise, if it does not make all brains wise, at least invigorates the gastric juices, makes a man forget that he has a liver, that storehouse of mortal misery bile, blue pill, and blue devils. This health is one of the secrets of the amazing charm which seems inherent to this mode of travelling, in spite of all the apparent hardships 84 DELIGHTS OF A TOUR. [CHAP. vin. with which it is surrounded in the abstract. Oh ! the delight of this gipsy, Bedouin, nomade life, seasoned with unfettered liberty ! We pitch our tent wherever we please, and there we make our home far from letters ie requiring an immediate answer," and distant dining-outs, visits, ladies' maids, band-boxes, butlers, bores, and button-holders. Escaping from the meshes of the west end of London, we are transported into a new world ; every day the out-of-door pan- orama is varied ; now the heart is cheered and the countenance made glad by gazing on plains overflowing with milk and honey, or laughing with oil and wine, where the orange and citron bask in the glorious sunbeams, the palm without the desert, the sugar- cane without the slave. Anon we are lost amid the silence of cloud- capped glaciers, where rock and granite are tost about like the fragments of a broken world, by the wild magnificence of Nature, who, careless of mortal admiration, lavishes with proud indif- ference her fairest charms where most unseen, her grandest forms where most inaccessible. Every day and everywhere we are unconsciously funding a stock of treasures and pleasures of memory, to be hived in our bosoms like the honey of the bee, to cheer and sweeten our after-life, when we settle down like wine- dregs in our cask, which, delightful even as in the reality, wax stronger as we grow in years, and feel that these feats of our youth, like sweet youth itself, can never be our portion again. Of one thing the reader may be assured, that dear will be to him, as is now to us, the remembrance of those wild and weary rides through tawny Spain, where hardship was forgotten ere undergone: those sweet-aired hills those rocky crags and torrents those fresh valleys which communicated their own freshness to the heart that keen relish for hard fare, gained and seasoned by hunger sauce, which Ude did not invent those sound slumbers on harder couch, earned by fatigue, the downiest of pillows the braced nerves the spirits light, elastic, and joyous that freedom from care that health of body and soul which ever rewards a close communion with Nature and the shuffling off of the frets and factitious wants of the thick-pent artificial city. Whatever be the . number of the party, and however they travel, whether on wheels or horseback, admitting even that a CHAP, viii.] CHOICE OF COMPANIONS. 85 pleasant friend pro vehiculo est, that is, is better than a post- chaise, yet no one should ever dream of making a pedestrian tour in Spain. It seldom answers anywhere, as the walker arrives at the object of his promenade tired and hungry, just at the moment when he ought to be the freshest and most up to intellectual pleasures. The deipnosophist Athenaeus long ago discovered that there was no love for the sublime and beautiful in an empty stomach, aesthetics yield then to gastronomies, and there is no prospect in the world so fine as that of a dinner and a nap, or siesta afterwards. The pedestrian in Spain, where fleshly comforts are rare, will soon understand why, in the real journals of our Peninsular soldiers, so little attention is paid to those objects which most attract the well-provided traveller. In cases of bodily hardship, the employment of the mental facul- ties is narrowed into the care of supplying mere physical wants, rather than expanded into searching for those of a contemplative or intellectual gratification ; the footsore and way-worn require, according to " The unexempt condition By which all mortal frailty must subsist, Refreshment after toil, ease after pain." Walking is the manner by which beasts travel, who have therefore four legs ; those bipeds who follow the example of the brute animals will soon find that they will be reduced to their level in more particulars than they imagined or bargained for. Again, as no Spaniard ever walks for pleasure, and none ever perform a journey on foot except trampers and beggars, it is never supposed possible that any one else should do so except from compulsion. Pedestrians therefore are either ill received, or become objects of universal suspicion ; for a Spanish autho- rity, judging of others by himself, always takes the worst view of the stranger, whom he considers as guilty until he proves himself innocent. Before the pleasures of a riding tour through Spain are men- tioned, a few observations on the choice of companions may be made. Those who travel in public conveyances or with muleteers are seldom likely to be left alone. It is the horseman who strikes into out-of-the-way, unfrequented districts, who will feel the 86 OCCASIONAL DEPRESSION. [CHAP. vm. want of that important item a travelling companion, on which, as in choosing a wife, it is easy enough to give advice. The patient must, however, administer to himself, and the selection will depend, of course, much on the taste and idiosyncracy of each individual ; those unfortunate persons who are accustomed to have everything their own way, or those, happy ones, who are never less alone than when alone, and who possess the alchymy of finding resources and amusements in themselves, may perhaps find that plan to be the best ; at all events, no company is better than bad company: " mas vale ir solo, que mal acompanado" A solitary wanderer is certainly the most unfettered as regards his notions and motions, " no tengo padre ni madre, ni perro que me ladre" He who has " neither father, mother, nor dog to oark at him," can read the book of Spain, as it were, in his own room, dwelling on what he likes, and skipping what he does not, as with a red Murray. Every coin has, however, its reverse, and every rose its thorn. Notwithstanding these and other obvious advantages, and the tendency that occupation and even hardships have to drive away imaginary evils, this freedom will be purchased by occasional moments of depression ; a dreary, forsaken feeling will steal over the most cheerful mind. It is not good for man to be alone ; and this social necessity never comes home stronger to the warm heart than during a long-continued solitary ride through the rarely visited districts of the Peninsula. The sentiment is in perfect harmony with the abstract feeling which is inspired by the present condition of unhappy Spain, fallen from her high estate, and blotted almost from the map of Europe. Silent, sad, and lonely is her face, on which the stranger will too often gaze ; her hedgeless, treeless tracts of corn-field, bounded only by the low horizon ; her uninhabited, uncultivated plains, abandoned to the wild flower and the bee, and which are rendered still more melancholy by ruined castle, or village, which stand out bleach- ing skeletons of a former vitality. The dreariness of this abomination of desolation is increased by the singular absence of singing birds, and the presence of the vulture, the eagle, and lonely birds of prey. The wanderer, far from home and friends, feels doubly a stranger in this strange land, where no smile greets his coming, no tear is shed at his going, where his memory SPANISH MANNERS. passes away, like that of a guest who tarrieth but a day, where nothing of human life is seen, where its existence only is inferred by the rude wooden cross or stone-piled cairn, which marks the unconsecrated grave of some traveller who has been waylaid there alone, murdered, and sent to his account with all his im- perfections on his head. However confidently we have relied on past experience that such would not be our fate, yet these sorts of Spanish milestones marked with memento mori. are awkward evidences that the thing is not altogether impossible. It makes a single gentleman, whose life is not insured, not only trust to Santiago, but keep his powder dry, and look every now and then if his percussion cap fits. On these occasions the falling in with any of the no- made half-Bedouin natives is a sort of godsend ; their society is quite different from that of a regular companion, for better or worse until death us do part, as it is casual, and may be taken up or dropped at convenience. The habits of all Spaniards when on the road are remarkably gregarious ; a common fear acts as a cement, while the more they are in number the merrier. It is hail ! well met, fellow-traveller ! and the being glad to see each other is an excellent introduction. The sight of passengers bound our way is like speaking a strange sail on the Atlantic, Hola Camara ! ship a-hoy. This predisposition tends to make all travellers write so much and so handsomely of the lower classes of Spaniards, not indeed more than they deserve, for they are a fine, noble race. Something of this arises, because on such occasions all parties meet on an equality ; and this levelling effect, perhaps unperceived, induces many a foreigner, however proud and reserved at home, to unbend, and that un- affectedly. He treats these accidental acquaintances quite differently from the manner in which he would venture to treat the lower orders of his own country, who, probably, if conciliated by the same condescension of manner, would appear in a more amiable light, although they are inferior to the Spaniard in his Oriental goodness of manner, his perfect tact, his putting himself and others into their proper place, without either self- degradation or vulgar assumption of social equality or superior physical powers. A long solitary ride is hardly to be* recommended ; it is not 88 FRIENDSHIPS. [CHAP. vm. fair to friends who have been left anxious behind, nor is it prudent to expose oneself, without help, to the common accidents to which a horse and his rider are always liable. Those who have a friend with whom they feel they can venture to go in double harness, had better do so. It is a severe test, and the trial becomes greater in proportion as hardships abound and accommodations are scanty causes which sour the milk of human kindness, and prove indifferent restorers of stomach or temper. It is on these occasions, on a large journey and in a small venta, that a man finds out what his friend really is made of. While in the more serious necessities of danger, sickness, and need a friend is one indeed, and the one thing wanting, with whom we share our last morsel and cup gladly. The salt of good fellow- ship, if it cannot work miracles as to quantity, converts the small loaf into a respectable abstract feed, by the zest and satisfaction with which it flavours it. Nothing, moreover, cements friendships for the future like having made one of these conjoint rambles, provided it did not end in a quarrel. The mere fact of having travelled at all in Spain has a peculiarity which is denied to the more hackneyed countries of Europe. When we are introduced to a person who has visited these spell-casting sites, we feel as if we knew him already. There is a sort of freemasonry in having done some- thing in common, which is not in common with the world at large. Those who are about to qualify themselves for this ex- clusive quality will do well not to let the party exceed five in number, three masters and two servants ; two masters with two servants are perhaps more likely to be better accommodated ; a third person, however, is often of use in trying journeys, as an arbiter elegantiarum et rixarum, a referee and arbitrator ; for in the best regulated teams it must happen that some one will occasionally start, gib, or bolt, when the majority being against him brings the offender to his proper senses. Four eyes, again, see better than two, " mas ven cuatro ojos que dos." By attending to a few simple rules, a tour of some months' duration, and over thousands of miles, may be performed on one and the same horse, who with his rider will at the end of the journey be neither sick nor sorry, but in such capital condition as to be ready to start again. We presume that the time will CHAR viir.] CHOICE OF HORSES. 89 be chosen when the days are long and Nature has thrown aside her wintry garb. Fine weather is the joy of the wayfarer's soul, and nothing can be more different than the aspect of Spanish villages in good or in bad weather ; as in the East, during wintry rains they are the acmes of mud and misery, but let the sun shine out, and all is gilded. It is the smile which lights up the habitually sad expression of a Spanish woman's face. The blessed beam cheers poverty itself, and by its stimu- lating, exhilarating action on the system of man, enables him to buffet against the moral evils to which countries the most favoured by climate seem, as if it were from compensation, to be more exposed than those where the skies are dull, and the winds bleak and cold. As in our cavalry regiments, where real service is required, a perfect animal is preferred, a rider should choose a mare rather than a gelding ; the use of entire horses is, however, so general in Spain, that one of such had better be selected than a mare. The day's journey will vary according to circumstances from twenty- five to forty miles. The start should be made before daybreak, and the horse well fed at least an hour before the journey is com- menced, during which Spaniards, if they can, go to church, for they say that no time is ever lost on a journey by feeding horses and men and hearing masses, misa y cebada no estorban Jornada. The hours of starting, of course, depend on the distance and the district. The sooner the better, as all who wish to cheat the devil must get up very early. " Quien al demonio quiere en- ganar, muy temprano levantarse ha" It is a great thing for the traveller to reach his night quarters as soon as he can, for the first comers are the best served : borrow therefore an hour of the morning rather than from the night ; and that hour, if you lose it at starting, you will never overtake in the day. Again, in the summer it is both agreeable and profitable to be under weigh and off at least an hour or two before sunrise, as the heat soon gets insupportable, and the stranger is exposed to the tabardillo, the coup de soleil, which, even in a smaller degree, occasions more ill health in Spain than is generally imagined, and espe- cially by the English, who brave it either from ignorance or foolhardiness. The head should be well protected with a silk handkerchief, tied after a turban fashion, which all the natives 90 TRAVELLING PACE. [CHAP. vm. do ; in addition to which we always lined the inside of our hats with thickly doubled brown paper. In Andalucia, during summer, the muleteers travel by night, and rest during- the day- heat, which, however, is not a satisfactory method, except for those who wish to see nothing. We have never adopted it. The early mornings and cool afternoons and evenings are infi- nitely preferable ; while to the artist the glorious sunrises and sunsets, and the marking of mountains, and definition of forms from the long shadows, are magnificent beyond all conception. In these almost tropical countries, when the sun is high, the effect of shadow is lost, and everything looks flat and unpic- turesque. The journey should be divided into two portions, and the longest should be accomplished the first : the pace should average about five miles an hour, it being an object not to keep the animal unnecessarily on his legs : he may be trotted gently, and even up easy hills, but should always be walked down them ; nay, if led, so much the better, which benefits both horse and rider. It is surprising how a steady, continued slow pace gets over the ground : Chi va piano, va sa?io, e lontano, says the Italian ; paso a paso va lejos, step by step goes far, responds the Castilian. The end of the journey each day is settled before starting, and there the traveller is sure to arrive with the even- ing. Spaniards never fidget themselves to get quickly to places where nobody is expecting them : nor is there any good to be got in trying to hurry man or beast in Spain ; you might as well think of hurrying the Court of Chancery. The animals should be rested, if possible, every fourth day, and not used during halts in towns, unless they exceed three days' sojourn. On arriving at every halting-place, look first at the feet, and pick out any pebbles or dirt, and examine the nails and shoes carefully, to see that nothing is loose ; let this inspection become a habit ; do not wash the feet too soon, as the sudden chill sometimes pro- duces fever in them : when they are cool, clean them and grease the hoof well ; after that you may wash as much as you please. The best thing, however, is to feed your horse at once, before thinking of his toilet ; the march will have given an appetite, while the fatigue requires immediate restoration. If a horse is to be worried with cleaning, &c., he often loses heart and gets CHAP, vni.] FEEDING YOUR HORSE. 91 off his feed : he may be rubbed down when he has done eating, and his bed should be made up as for night, the stable darkened, and the animal left quite quiet, and the longer the better : feed him well again an hour before starting for the afternoon stage, and treat him on coming in exactly as you did in the morning. The food must be regulated by the work : when that is severe, give corn with both hands, and stint the hay and other lumber : what you want is to concentrate support by quality, not quantity. The Spaniard will tell you that one mouthful of beef is worth ten of potatoes. If your horse is an English one, it must be re- membered that eight pounds' weight of barley is equal to ten of oats, as containing less husk and more mucilage or starch, which our horse-dealers know when they want to make up a horse ; overfeeding a horse in the hot climate of Spain, like overfeeding his rider, renders both liable to fevers and sudden inflammatory attacks, which are much more prevalent in Gibraltar than else- where in Spain, because our countrymen will go on exactly as if they were at home. At all events, feed your horse well with something or other , or your Spanish squire will rain proverbs on you, like Sancho Panza; the belly must be filled with hay or straw, for it in reality carries the feet, O paja o heno el vientre lleno tripas llevan a pies, and so forth. The Spaniards when on a journey allow their horses to drink copiously at every stream, saying that there is no juice like that of flints ; and indeed they set the example, for they are all down on their bellies at every brook, swilling water, according to the proverb, like an ox, and wine when they can get it, like a king. If therefore you are riding a Spanish horse which has been accustomed to this continual tippling, let him drink, otherwise he will be fevered. If the horse has been treated in the English fashion, give him his water only after his meals, otherwise he will break out into weakening sweats. Should the animal ever arrive distressed, a tepid gruel, made with oatmeal or even flour, will comfort him much. At nightfall stop the feet with wet tow, or with horse dung, for that of cows will seldom be to be had in Spain, where goats furnish milk, and Dutchmen butter. Let the feet be constantly attended to ; the horse having twice as many as his rider, requires double attention, and of what use 92 THE HORSE'S FOOT. [CHAP. vm. to a traveller is a quadruped that has not a leg to go upon ? This is well known to those commercial gentlemen, who are the only persons now-a-days in England who make riding journeys. It is the shoe that makes or mars the horse, and no wise man, in Spain or out, who has got a four-footed hobby, or three half- crowns, should delay sending to Longman's for that admirable " Miles on the Horse's Foot." " Every knight errant," says Don Quixote, " ought to be able to shoe his own Rosinante himself." Rosin is pure Arabic for a hackney at least he should know how this calceolation ought to be done. As a general rule, always take your quadruped to the forge, where the shoes can be fitted to his feet, not the feet to ready-made shoes ; and if you value the comfort, the extension of life and service of your steed -fasten the fore shoes with five nails at most in the outside, and with two only in the inside, and those near the toe ; do not in mercy fix by nails all round an unyielding rim of dead iron, to an expand- ing living hoof; remember also always to take with you a spare set of shoes, with nails and a hammer for the want of a nail the shoe was lost ; for the want of a shoe the rider was tost. In many parts of Spain, where there are no fine modern roads, you might almost do without any shoes at all, as the ancients did, and is done in parts of Mexico ; but no unprotected hoof can stand the constant wear and tear, the filing of a macadamised highway. The horse will probably be soon in such condition as to want no more physic than his rider; a lump, however, of rock-salt, and a bit of chalk put at night into his manger, answers the same purposes as Epsoms and soda do to the master. You should wash out the long tail and mane, which is the glory of a Spanish horse, as fine hair is to a woman, with soda and water ; the alkali combining with the animal grease forms a most searching detergent. A grand remedy for most of the accidents to which horses are liable on a journey, such as kicks, cuts, strains, &c., is a constant fomentation with hot water, which should be done under the immediate superintendence of the master, or it will be either done insufficiently, or not done at all ; hot water, according to the groom genus, having been created principally as a recipient of something stronger. A crupper and breastplate are almost indispensable, from the steep ascents and descents in the mountains. The mosquero, the fly- CHAP, vm.] THE MOSQUERO. 93 flapper, is a great comfort to the horse, as, being in perpetual motion, and hanging between his eyes, it keeps off the flies ; the head-stall, or night halter, never should be removed from the bridle, but be rolled up during the day, and fastened along the side of the cheek. The long tail is also rolled up when the ways are miry, just as those of our blue jackets and horse-guards used to be. 94 THE EIDER'S COSTUME. TCHAP. ix. CHAPTER IX. The Rider's Costume Alforjas: their contents The Bota, and How to use it Pig Skins and Borracha Spanish Money Onzas and smaller Coins. THE rider's costume and accoutrements require consideration ; his great object should be to pass in a crowd, either unnoticed, or to be taken for " one of us," Uno de Nosotros, and a member of the Iberian family de la Familia : this is best effected by adopting the dress, that is usually worn by the natives when they travel on horseback, or journey by any of their national convey- ances, among which Anglo-Franco mails arid diligences are not yet to be reckoned ; all classes of Spaniards, on getting outside the town-gate, assume country habits, and eschew the long-tailed coats and civilization of the city ; they drop pea-jackets and foreign fashions, which would only attract attention, and expose the wearers to the ridicule or coarser marks of consideration from the peasantry, muleteers, and other gentry, who rule on the road, hate novelties, arid hold fast to the ways and jackets of their forefathers ; the best hat, therefore, is the common som- brero calanes, which resemble those worn at Astley'sby banditti, being of a conical shape, is edged with black velvet, ornamented with silken tufts, and looks equally well on a cockney from London, or on a squire from Devonshire. The jacket should be the universal fur Zamarra, which is made of black sheepskin, in its ordinary form, and of lambskin for those who can pay ; a sash round the waist should never be forgotten, being most useful both in reality and metaphor : it sustains the loins, and keeps off the dangerous colics of Spain, by maintaining an equable heat over the abdomen ; hence, to be Homerically well girt is half the battle for the Peninsular traveller. The capa the cloak, or the mania a striped plaid, and saddle- bags, the Alforjas, are absolute essentials, and should be strapped on the pommel of the saddle, as being there less heating to the horse than when placed on his flanks, and being in front, they CHAP, ix.] THE ALFORJAS. 95 are more handy for sudden use, since in the mountains and valleys, the rider is constantly exposed to sudden variations of wind and weather ; when -ZEolus and Sol contend for his cloak, as in ^Esop's Fables, and the buckets of heaven are emptied on him as soon as the god of fire thinks him sufficiently baked. These saddle-bags are most classical, Oriental, and convenient ; they indeed constitute the genus bagsman, and have given their name to our riding travellers ; they are the Sarcince of Cato the Censor, the Bulgce of Lucilius, who made an epigram thereon : " Cum bulgd coenat, dormit, lavat, omnis in una. Spes hominis bulga hac devincta est csetera vita :" which, as these indispensables are quite as necessary to the modern Spaniard, may be thus translated : " A good roomy bag delighteth a Roman, He is never without this appendage a minute ; In bed, at the bath, at his meals, in short no man Should fail to stow life, hope, and self away in it." The countrymen of Sancho Panza, when on the road, make the same use of their wallets as the Romans did ; they still (the washing excepted) live and die with these bags, in which their hearts are deposited with their bread and cheese. These Spanish alforjas, in name and appearance, are the Moorish al horeh. (The F and H, like the B and Y, X and j;, are almost equivalent, and are used indiscriminately in Spanish cacography.) They are generally composed of cotton arid worsted, and are embroidered in gaudy colours and patterns ; the correct thing is to have the owner's name worked in on the edge, which ought to be done by the delicate hand of his beloved mistress. Those made at Granada are very excellent; the Moorish, especially those from Morocco, are ornamented with an infinity of small tassels. Peasants, when dismounted, mendi- cant monks, when foraging for their convents, sling their alforjas over their shoulders when they come into villages. Among the contents which most people will find it convenient to carry in the right-hand bag, as the easiest to be got at, a pair of blue gauze wire spectacles or goggles will be found useful, as ophthalmia is very common in Spain, and particularly in the cal- cined central plains. The constant glare is unrelieved by any verdure, the air is dry, and the clouds of dust highly irritating 96 WHAT TO STOW AWAY IN THE ALFORJAS. [CHAP. ix. from being- impregnated with nitre. The best remedy is to bathe the eyes frequently with hot water, and never to rub them when inflamed, except with the elbows, los ojos con los codos. Spaniards never jest with their eyes or faith ; of the two perhaps they are seriously fondest of the former, not merely when spark- ling beneath the arched eyebrow of the dark sex, but when set in their own heads. " I love thee like my eyes," is quite a hackneyed form of affection ; nor, however wrathful and impreca- tory, do they under any circumstance express the slightest uncharitable wishes in regard to the visual organs of their bit- terest foe. The whole art of the alforjas is the putting into them what you want the most often, and in the most handy and accessible place. Keep here, therefore, a supply of small money for the halt and the blind, for the piteous cases of human suffering and poverty by which the traveller's eye will be pained in a land where soup- dispensing monks are done away with, and assistant new poor law commissioners not yet appointed ; such charity from God's purse, bolsa de Dios, never impoverishes that of man, and a cheerful giver, however opposed to modern political economists, is commended in that old-fashioned book called the Bible. The left half of the alforjas may be apportioned to the writing and dressing cases, and the smaller each are the better. Food for the mind must not be neglected. The travelling library, like companions, should be select and good ; libros y amigos pocos y buenos. The duodecimo editions are the best, as a large heavy book kills horse, rider, and reader. Books are a matter of taste ; some men like Bacon, others prefer Pickwick ; stow away at all events a pocket edition of the Bible, Shakspere, and Don Quixote : and if the advice of dear Dr. Johnson be worth following, one of those books that can be taken in the hand) and to the fire-side. Martial, a grand authority on Spanish hand-books, recommended " such sized companions on a long journey." Quartos and folios, said he, may be left at home in the book-case " Scrinia da magnis, me manus una capit." Here also keep the passport, that indescribable nuisance and CHAP, ix.] THE BOTA. 97 curse of continental travel, to which a free-born Briton never can get reconciled, and is apt to neglect, whereby he puts him- self in the power of the worst and most troublesome people on earth. Passports in Spain now in some degree supply the In- quisition, and have been embittered by vexatious forms borrowed from bureaucratic France. Having thus disposed of these matters on the front bow of his saddle, to which we always added a bota the pocket-pistol of Hudibras one word on this Bota, which is as necessary to the rider as a saddle to his horse. This article, so Asiatic and Spanish, is at once the bottle and the glass of the people of the Peninsula when on the road, and is perfectly unlike the vitreous crockery and pewter utensils of Great Britain. A Spanish woman would as soon think of going to church without her fan, or a Spanish man to a fair without his knife, as a traveller without his bota. Ours, the faithful, long-tried comforter of many a dry road, and honoured now like a relic, is hung up a votive offering to the Iberian Bacchus, as the mariners in Horace suspended their damp garments to the deity who had delivered them from the dangers of water. Its skin, now shrivelled with age and with fruitless longings for wine, is still redolent of the ruby fluid, whether the generous Valdepenas or the rich vino de Toro : and refreshing to our nostrils is even an occasional smell at its red- stained orifice. There the racy wine-perfume lingers, and brings water into the mouth, it may be into the eyelid. What a dream of Spanish odours, good, bad, and indifferent, is awakened by its well-known borracha ! what recollections, breathing the aroma of the balmy south, crowd in ; of aromatic wastes, of leagues of thyme, whence Flora sends forth advertisements to her tiny bee- customer ; of churches, all incense ; of the goats and monks, long-bearded and odoriferous ; of cities whose steam of garlic, ollas, oil, and tobacco rises up to the heavens, mingled with the thousand and one other continental sweets which assail a man's nose, whether he lands at Calais or Cadiz ! There hangs our smelling-bottle bota, now a pleasure of memory ; it has had its day, and is never again to be filled in torrid, thirsty Spain, nor emptied, which is better. This Bota, from whence the terms Butt of sherry, bouteille, and bottle are derived, is the most ancient Oriental leathern bottle H 98 THE BOTA. [CHAP, ix, alluded to in Job xxxii. 19, " My belly ready to burst like new bottles ;" and in the parable, Matt. ix. 17, about the old ones, the force and point of which is entirely lost by our word bottle, which being made of glass, is not liable to become useless by age like one made of leather. Such a " bottle of water " was the last among the few things which Abraham gave to Hagar, when he turned out the mother of the Arabians, whose descendants brought its usage into Spain. The shape is like that of a large pear or shot-pouch, and it contains from two to five quarts. The narrow neck is mounted with a turned wooden cup, from which the contents are drunk. The way to use it is thus grasp the neck with the left hand and bring the rim of the cup to the mouth, then gradually raise the bag with the other hand till the wine, in obedience to hydrostatic laws, rises to its level, and keeps always full in the cup without trouble to the mouth. The gravity with which this is done, the long, slow, sustained, Sancho-like devotion of the thirsty Spaniards when offered a drink out of another man's bota, is very edifying, and is as deep as the sigh of delight and gratitude with which, when unable to imbibe more, the precious skin is returned. No drop of the divine contents is wasted, except by some newly-arrived bungler, who, by lifting up the bottom first, inundates his chin. The hole in the cup is made tight by aw r oodsn spigot, which again is perforated and stopped with a small peg. Those who do not want to take a copious draught do not pull out the spigot, but merely the little peg of it ; the wine then flows out in a thin thread. The Catalonians and Aragonese generally drink in this way ; they never touch the. vessel with their lips, but hold it up at a distance above, and pilot the stream into their mouths, or rather under-jaws. It is much easier for those who have had no practice to pour the wine into their necks than into their mouths, but their drinking- . bottles are made with a long narrow spout, and are called " Porrones" The Bota must not be confounded with the Borracha or Cuero, the wine-skin of Spain, which is the entire, and answers the purpose of the barrel elsewhere. The bota is the retail re- ceptacle, the cuero is the wholesale one. It is the genuine pig's skin, the adoration of which disputes in the Peninsula with the cigar, the dollar, and even the worship of the Virgin. The shops CHAP, ix.] THE BOTA-WINE. 99 of the makers are to be seen in most Spanish towns ; in them long lines of the unclean animal's blown out hides are strung up like sheep carcases in our butchers-' shambles. The tanned and manufactured article preserves the form of the pig, feet and all, with the exception of one : the skin is turned inside out, so that the hairy coat Hnes the interior, which, moreover, is carefully pitched like a ship's bottom, to prevent leaking ; hence the peculiar flavour, which partakes of resin and the hide, which is called the borracha, and is peculiar to most Spanish wines, sherry excepted, which being made by foreigners, is kept in foreign casks, as we shall presently show when we touch on " good sherris sack." A drunken man, who is rarer in Spain than in England, is called a borracho ; the term is not complimentary. These cueros, when filled, are suspended in ventas and elsewhere, and thus economise cellarage, cooperage, and bottling ; and such were the bigbellied monsters which Don Quixote attacked. As the bota is always near every Spaniard's mouth who can get at one, all classes being ever ready, like Sancho, to give " a thousand kisses," not only to his own legitimate bota, but to that of his neighbour, which is coveted more than wife : therefore no prudent traveller will ever journey an inch in Spain without getting one, and when he has, will never keep it empty, espe- cially when he falls in with good wine. Every man's Spanish attendant will always find out, by instinct, where the best wine is to be had ; good wine neither needs bush, herald, nor crier; in these matters, our experience of them tallies with their proverb, " mas vale vino maldito, que no agua bendita" " cursed bad wine is better than holy water ;" at the same time, in their various scale of comparisons, there is good wine, better wine, arid best wine, but no such thing as bad wine ; of good wine, the Spaniards are almost as good judges as of good water; they rarely mix them, because they say that it is spoiling two good things. Vino Moro, or Moorish wine, is by no means indicative of uncleanness, or other heretical imperfections implied generally by that epithet ; it simply means, that it is pure from never having been baptized with water, for which the Asturians, who keep small chandlers' shops, are so infamous, that they are said, from inveterate habit, to adulterate even water; aguan el agua. It is a great mistake to suppose, because Spaniards are seldom H 2 1UO MONEY. [CHAP. ix. seen drunk, and because when on a journey they drink as much water as their beasts, that they have any Oriental dislike to wine ; the rule is " Agua como buey, y vino como Rey" " to drink water like an ox, and wine like a king." The extent of the given quantity of wine which they will always swallow, rather suggests that their habitual temperance may in some degree be connected more with their poverty than with their will. The way to many an honest breast lies through the belly in this classical land, where the tutelar of butlers still keeps the key of their cellars and hearts aperit prsecordia Bacchus : nor is their Oriental blessing unconnected with some " savoury food " previously ad- ministered. And independently of the very obvious reasons which good wine does and ought to afford for its own consump- tion, the irritating nature of Spanish cookery provides a never- failing inducement. The constant use of the savoury class of con- diments and of pepper is very heating, " la pimicnta escalienta" A salt-fish, ham and sausage diet creates thirst ; a good rasher of bacon calls loudly for a corresponding long and strong pull at the " bota" " a torresno de tocino, buen golpe de vino." This digression on botas will be pardoned by all who, having ridden in Spain, know the absolute necessity of them. The traveller will of course remember the advice given by the rogue of Ventero to Don Quixote to take shirts and money with him. u Put money in thy purse " said also honest lago, for an empty one is a beggarly companion in the Peninsula as elsewhere. There is no getting to Rome or to Santiago if the pilgrim's scrip be scanty, or his mule lame : Camino de Roma^ ni mula coja ni Bolsafloja. Practically it may be said, that there is no paper money in Spain, Notes may be taken in some of the larger cities, but in the provinces the value of a man in office's promise to pay on paper, is not considered by the shrewd natives to be actually equal to cash ; while they will readily give these notes to foreigners, they prefer for their own use the old-fashioned repre- sentatives of wealth, gold and silver, towards the smallest fraction of which they have the largest possible veneration. Accounts are usually kept in reales de vellon of royal bullion ; and these are subdivided into maravedis, the ancient coin of the Peninsula : there are minor fractions even of farthings, consisting in material CHAP, ix.] MONEYS ; *, 101 of infinitesimal bits of any metals, melted church bells, old can- non, &c., with names and values unknown in our happy land, where not much is to be got for a mite ; in Spain, where cheap- ness of earth-produce is commensurate with poverty, anything, even to an old button, goes for a maravedi, and we have found that in changing a dollar by way of experiment into small coppers in the market at Seville, among the multitudinous specimens of Spanish mints of all periods, Moorish and even Roman coins were to be met with, and still current. The dollar, or Duro, of Spain is well known all over the world, being the form under which silver has been generally exported from the Spanish colonies of South America. It is the Italian " Colonato," so called because the arms of Spain are supported between the two pillars of Hercules. The coinage is slovenly : it is the weight of the metal, not the form, which is looked to by the Spaniard, who, like the Turk, is not so clever a workman or mechanist as devout worshipper of bullion. Fer- dinand VII. continued for a long while to strike money with his father's head, having only had the lettering altered : thus early Trajans exhibit the head of Nero. When the Cortes en- tered Madrid after t:\& Duke's vicrcry at Salamanca, they patriotically prohibited the currency of all coins bearing the head of the intrusive Joseph ; yet his dollars being chiefly made out of stolen church plate, gilt and ungilt, were, although those of an usurper, intrinsically worth more than the legitimate duro ; this was a too severe test for the loyalty of those whose real king and god is cash. Such a decree was worthy of senators who were busier employed in expelling French tropes from their dictionary than French troops from their country. The wiser Chinese take Ferdinand's and Joseph's dollars alike, calling them both " devil's head" money. These bad prejudices against good coin have now given way to the march of intellect ; nay, the five- franc piece with Louis-Philippe's clever head on it bids fair to oust the pillared Duro. The silver of the mines of Murcia is exported to France, where it is coined, and sent back in the manufactured shape. France thus gains a handsome percentage, and habituates the people to her image of power, which comes recommended to them in the most acceptable likeness of current coin. 102 , : ! ClOCp COINAGE. [CHAP. TX. In Spain cash, ambrosial cash, rules the court, the camp, the grove ; hence the extraordinary credit of three millions recently required for the secret service expenses of the Tuileries, and official enthusiasm and unanimity secured thereby in the Mont- pensier purchase. The whole decalogue is condensed at Madrid into one commandment, Love God as represented on earth not by his vicar the Pope, but by his lord-lieutenant, Don Ducat. " El primero es amar Don Dinero, Dios es omnipotent, Don Dinero es sit lugarteniente" Thus grandees and men in Spanish offices, both governmental and printing ones, have preferred the other day five-franc pieces to the ribbons of the Legion of honor ; nor, considering the swindlers on whom this badge of Austerlitz has been prostituted, were these worthy Castilians much out in their calculations, if there be any truth in the catechism of Falstaff. The gold coinage is magnificent, and worthy of the country and period from which Europe was supplied with the precious metals. The largest piece, the ounce, " onza" is worth sixteen dollars, or about 31. 6s. ; and while it puts to shame the dimi- nutive Napoleons of France and sovereigns of England, tells the tale of Spain's former wealth, and contrasts strangely with her present poverty and scarcity of specie : these large coins have however been so sweated, not by the sun, but by Jews, foreign and domestic, so clipped worse than Spanish mules or French poodles, that they seldom retain their proper weight and value. They are accordingly looked upon every where with suspicion ; a shopkeeper, in a big town, brings out his scales like Shylock, while in a village shrugs, ajos 9 and negative expressions are your change ; nor, even if the natives are satisfied that they are not light, can sixteen dollars be often met with, nor do those who have so much ready money by them ever wish that the fact should be generally known. Spaniards, like the Orientals, have a dread of being supposed to have money in their possession ; it exposes them to be plundered by robbers of all kinds, professional or legal ; by the " alcalde" or village authority, and the " escri- bano," the attorney, to say nothing of Senor Mon's tax- gatherer ; for the quota of contributions, many of which are apportioned among the inhabitants themselves of each district, CHAP, ix.] AVARICE OF SPANIARDS. 103 falls heaviest on those who have, or are supposed to have, the most ready money. The lower classes of Spaniards, like the Orientals, are gene- rally avaricious. They see that wealth is safety and power, where everything is venal ; the feeling of insecurity makes them eager to invest what they have in a small and easily concealed bulk, " en lo que no habla" " in that which does not tell tales." Consequently, and in self-defence, they are much addicted to hoarding. The idea of finding hidden treasures, which prevails in Spain as in the East, is based on some grounds ; for in every country which has been much exposed to foreign invasions, civil wars, and domestic misrule, where there were no safe modes of investment, in moments of danger property was converted into gold or jewels and concealed with singular ingenuity. The mis- trust which Spaniards entertain of each other often extends, when cash is in the case, even to the nearest relations, to wife and children. Many a treasure is thus lost from the accidental death of the hider, who, dying without a sign, carries his secret to the grave, adding thereby to the sincere grief of his widow and heir. One of the old vulgar superstitions in Spain is an idea that those who were born on a Good Friday, the day of mourning, were gifted with a power of seeing into the earth and of discovering hidden treasures. One place of concealment has always been under the bodies in graves ; the hiders have trusted to the dead to defend what the quick could not : this accounts for the uni- versal desecration of tombs and churchyards during Bonaparte's invasion. The Gauls growled like gowls amid the churchyards ; they despoiled the mouldering corpses of the last pledge left by weeping affection ; or, as Burke observed of their domestic doings, they unplumbed the dead to make missiles of destruction against the living. These hordes, in their hurried flight before the advancing Duke, also hid much of their ill-gotten gains, which to this day are hunted after. Who has forgotten Borrow 's gra- phic picture of the treasure-seeking Mol ? At this very moment the authorities of San Sebastian are narrowly superintending the- diggings of an old Frenchwoman, to whom some dying thief at home has revealed the secret of a buried kettle full of gold ounces. 104 CONCEALMENT OF CASH. [CHAP. ix. Having provided the " Spanish" those metallic sinews of war, which also make the mare go in peace, a prudent master, if he intends to be really the master, will hold the purse himself, and, moreover, will keep a sharp eye on it, for the jingle of coin dispels even a Spanish siesta, and causes many a sleepless day to every listener, from the beggar to the queen mother. CHAP, x.] SPANISH SERVANTS. 105 CHAPTER X. Spanish Servants: their Character Travelling Groom, Cook, and Valet. DON QUIXOTE'S first thought, after having determined to ride forth into Spain, was to get a horse ; his second was to secure a squire ; and as the narrative of his journey is still an excellent guide-book for modern travellers, his example is not to be slighted. A good Sancho Panza will on the whole be found to be a more constant comfort to a knight-errant than even a Dul- cinea. To secure a really good servant is of the utmost con- sequence to all who make out-of-the-way excursions in the Peninsula ; for, as in the East, he becomes often not only cook, but interpreter and companion to his master. It is therefore of great importance to get a person with whom a man can ramble over these wild scenes. The so doing ends, on the part of the attendant, in an almost canine friendship ; and the Spaniard, when the tour is done, is broken-hearted, and ready to leave his home, horse, ass, and wife, to follow his master, like a dog, to the world's-end. Nine times out of ten it is the master's fault if he has bad servants : tel maitre tel valet. Al amo imprudente, el mozo negligente. He must begin at once, and exact the per- formance of their duty ; the only way to get them to do any- thing is, as the Duke said, to " frighten them," to " take a decided line." It is very difficult to make them see the im- portance of detail and of doing exactly what they are told, which they will always endeavour to shirk when they can ; their task must be clearly pointed out to them at starting, and the earliest and smallest infractions, either in commission or omission, at once and seriously noticed, the moral victory is SOOM gained. The example of the masters, if they be active and orderly, is the best lesson to servants ; mucho sabe el rato, pero mas el goto ; the rats are well enough, but the cats are better. Achilles, Pa- troclus, and the Homeric heroes, were their own cooks ; and 106 CHARACTER OF SPANISH SERVANTS. [CHAP. x. many a man who, like Lord Blayney, may not be a hero, will be none the worse for following the epical example, in a Spanish venta: at all events a good servant, who is up to his work, and will work, is indeed a jewel ; and on these, as on other occasions, he deserves to be well treated. Those who make themselves honey are eaten by flies quien se liace miel, le comen las moscas ; while no rat ever ventures to jest with the cat's son,- con hijo de gato, no se burlan los ratones. The great thing is to make them get up early, and learn the value of time, which the groom cannot tie with his halter, tiempo y hora, no se ata con soga : while a cook who oversleeps himself not only misses his mass, but his meat, quien se levanta tarde, ni oye misa, ni compra carne. If (which is soon found out) the servants seem not likely to answer, the sooner they are changed the better ; it is loss of time and soap, and he who is good for nothing in his own village will not be worth more either in Seville or else- where, so says the proverb. The principal defects of Spanish servants and of the lower classes of Spaniards are much the same, and faults of race. As a mass, they are apt to indulge in habits of procrastination, waste, improvidence, and untidiness. They are unmechanical and ob- stinate, easily beaten by difficulties, which their first feeling is to raise, and their next to succumb to ; they give the thing up at once. They have no idea indeed of grappling with anything that requires much trouble, or of doing anything as it ought to be done, or even of doing the same thing in the same way ac- cident and the impulse of the moment set them going. They are very unmechanical, obstinate, and prejudiced ; ignorant of their own ignorance and incurious as Orientals ; partly from pride, self-opinion, and idleness, they seldom will ask questions for information from others, which implies an inferiority of knowledge, and still more seldom will take an answer, unless it be such a one as they desire ; their own wishes, opinions, and wants are their guides, and self the centre of their gravity, not those of their employers. As a Spaniard's yes, when you beg a favour, generally means no, so they cannot or will not under- stand that your no is really a negative when they come petition- ing to be idle ; at the same time a great change for the better comes over them when they are taken out of the city on a CHAP, x.] CHARACTER OF SPANISH SERVANTS. 107 rambling tour. The nomad life excites them into active service- able fellows; in fact the uncertain harum-scarum nomad ex- istence is exactly what suits these descendants of the Arab ; they cannot bear the steady sustained routine of a well-managed household ; they abhor confinement ; hence the difficulty of getting Spaniards to garrison fortresses or to man ships of war, from whence there is no escape. As for what we call a well-appointed servants' hall, the case is hopeless in Spanish field or city, and is equally so whether the life be above or below stairs. In the house of the middle or highest classes this is particularly shown in everything that regards gastronomies, which are the tests and touchstones of good service. In truth, the Spaniard, accustomed to his own desultory, free and easy, impromptu, scrambling style of dining, is constrained by the order and discipline, the pomp and cere- mony, and serious importance of a well-regulated dinner, and their observance of forms extends only to persons, not to things : even the grandee has only a thin European polish spread over his Gotho-Bedouin dining table ; he lives and eats surrounded by an humble clique, in his huge ill-furnished barrack-house, without any elegance, luxury, or even comfort, according to sound trans-pyrenean notions : few indeed are the kitchens which possess a cordon bleu, and fewer are the masters who really like an orthodox entree, one unpolluted with the heresies of garlic and red pepper : again, whenever their cookery at- tempts to be foreign, as in their other imitations, it ends in being a flavourless copy ; but few things are ever done in Spain in real style, which implies forethought and expense ; everything is a make-shift ; the noble master reposes his affairs on an unjust steward, and dozes away life on this bed of roses, somnolescent over business and awake only to intrigue ; his numerous ill-con- ditioned, ill-appointed servants have no idea of discipline or subordination ; you never can calculate on their laying even the table-cloth, as they prefer idling in the church or market to doing their duty, and would rather starve, dance, and sleep out of place and independently, than feast and earn their wages jby fair work ; nor has the employer any redress, for if he dismisses them he will only get just such another set, or even worse. In our own Spanish household, the instant dinner and siesta 108 CHARACTER OF SPANISH SERVANTS. [CHAP. x. were over, the cook with his kitchen-man, the valet with the footman invariably stripped off their working apparel liveries are almost unheard of donned their comical velvet embroidered hats, their sky-blue waistcoats, and scarlet sashes, and were off with a guitar to some scene of song and love-making, leaving their master alone in his glory to moralize on the uncertainty of human concerns and the faithlessness of mankind. What can't be cured must be endured. To resume, therefore, the character of these Spanish servants ; they are very loquacious, and highly credulous, as often is the case with those given to romancing, which they, and especially the Andalucians, are to a large degree ; and, in fact, it is the only remaining romance in Spain, as far as the natives are concerned. As they have an especial good opinion of themselves, they are touchy, sensitive, jealous, and thin-skinned, and easily affronted whenever their imperfections are pointed out ; their disposition is very sanguine and inflammable ; they are always hoping that what they eagerly desire will come to pass without any great exertion on their parts ; they love to stand still with their arms folded, while other men put their shoulders to the wheel. Their lively ima- gination is very apt to carry them away into extremes for good or evil, when they act on the moment like children, and having gratified the humour of the impulse relapse into their ordinary tranquillity, which is that of a slumbering volcano. On the other hand, they are full of excellent and redeeming good qua- lities ; they are free from caprice, are hardy, patient, cheerful, good-humoured, sharp-witted, and intelligent : they are honest, faithful, and trustworthy ; sober, and unaddicted to mean, vulgar vices ; they have a bold, manly bearing, and will follow well wherever they are well led, being the raw material of as good soldiers as are in the world ; they are loyal and religious at heart, and full of natural tact, mother-wit, and innate good manners. In general, a firm, quiet, courteous, and somewhat reserved mariner is the most effective. Whenever duties are to be performed, let them see that you- are not to be trifled with. The coolness of a determined Englishman's manner, when in earnest, is what few foreigners can withstand. Grimace arid gesticulation, sound and fury, bluster, petulance, and imperti- nence fume and fret in vain against it, as the sprays and foam of CHAP, x.] SPANISH AND ENGLISH MANNERS. 109 the "French lake" do against the unmoved and immoveable rock of Gibraltar. An Englishman, without being over-familiar, may venture on a far greater degree of unbending in his inter- course with his Spanish dependants than he can dare to do with those he has in England. It is the custom of the country ; they are used to it, and their heads are not turned by it, nor do they ever forget their relative positions. The Spaniards treat their servants very much like the ancient Romans or the modern Moors ; they are more their vernce, their domestic slaves : it is the absolute authority of the father combined with the kindness. Servants do not often change their masters in Spain : their rela- tion and duties are so clearly defined, that the latter runs no risk of compromising himself or his dignity by his familiarity, which can be laid down or taken up at his own pleasure ; whereas the scorn, contempt, and distance with which the said courteous Don would treat a roturier who presumed to be intimate, baffle description. In England no man dares to be intimate with his footman ; for supposing even such absurd fancy entered his brain, his footman is his equal in the eye of man-made law, God having created them utterly unequal in all his gifts, whether of rank, wealth, form, or intellect. Conventional barriers ac- cordingly must be erected in self-defence : and social barriers are more difficult to be passed than walls of brass, more impos- sible to be repealed than the whole statutes at large. No master in Spain, and still less a foreigner, should ever descend to per- sonal abuse, sneers, or violence. A blow is never to be washed out except in blood, and Spanish revenge descends to the third and fourth generation ; and whatever these backward Spaniards have to learn from foreigners, it is not the duty of revenge, nor how to perform it. There should be no threatenings in vain, but whenever the opportunity occurs for punishment, let it be done quietly and effectively, and the fault once punished should not be needlessly ripped up again ; Spaniards are sufficiently un- forgiving, and hoarders-up o unrevenged grievances require to be reminded. A kind and uniform behaviour, a showing- con- * o sideration to them, in a manner which implies that you are ac- customed to it, and expect it to be shown to you, keeps most things in their right places. Temper and patience are the great requisites in the master, especially when he speaks the language 110 TRAVELLING EXPENSES. [CHAP. x. imperfectly. He must not think Spaniards stupid because they cannot guess the meaning of his unknown tongue. Nothing again is gained by fidgeting and overdoing, and however early you may get up, daybreak will not take place the sooner : no por mucho madrugar, amanece mas temprano. Let well alone : be not zealous overmuch: be occasionally both blind and deaf: shut the door, and the devil passes by : keep honey in mouth and an eye to your cash : miel en boca y guarda la bolsa. Still how much less expenditure is necessary in Spain than in per- forming the commonest excursion in England ! and yet many who submit to their own countrymen's extortions are furious at what they imagine is an especial cheating of them, quasi English- men, abroad : this outrageous economy, with which some are afflicted, is penny wise and pound foolish : pay, pay therefore with both hands. The traveller must remember that he gains caste, gets brevet rank in Spain that he is taken for a grandee incog., and ranks with their nobility ; he must pay for these luxuries : how small after all will be the additional per centage on his general expenditure, and how well bestowed is the excess, in keeping the temper good, and the capability of enjoying un- ruffled a tour, which only is performed once in a life ! No wise man who goes into Spain for amusement will plunge into this guerrilla, this constant petty warfare, about sixpences. Let the traveller be true to himself ; hold his tongue ; avoid bad company, quien liace su cama con perros, se levanta con pulgas, those who sleep with dogs get up with fleas ; and make room for bulls and fools, al loco y toro da le corro, and he may see Spain agreeably, and, as Catullus said to Veranius, who made the tour many centuries ago, may on his return amuse his friends and " old mother :" " Visam te incolumem, audiamque Iberum Narrantem loca, facta, nationes, Sicut tuus est mos." which may be thus Englished : May you come back safe, and tell Of Spanish men, their things and places, Of Spanish ladies' eyes and faces, In your own way, and so well. Two masters should take two servants, and both should be Spaniards : all others, unless they speak the language perfectly, CHAP, x.l TRAVELLING SERVANTS. Ill are nuisances. A Gallegan or Asturian makes the best groom, an Andaluz the best cook and personal attendant. Sometimes a person may be picked up who has some knowledge of languages, and who is accustomed to accompany strangers through Spain as a sort of courier. These accomplishments are very rare, and the moral qualities of the possessor often diminish in proportion as his intellect has marched ; he has learnt more foreign tricks than words, and sea-port towns are not the best schools for honesty. Of these nondescripts the Hispano- Anglo, who generally has de- serted from Gibraltar, is the best, because he will work, hold his tongue, and fight ; a monkey would be a less inconvenience than a chattering Ibero-Gallo ; one who has forgotten his national accomplishments cooking and hairdressing, and learnt very few Spanish things, such as good temper and endurance. Whichever of the two is the sharpest should lead the way, and leave the other to bring up the rear. They should be mounted on good mules, and be provided with large panniers. One should act as the cook and valet, the other as the groom of the party ; and the utensils peculiar to each department should be carried by each professor. Where only one servant is employed, one side of the pannier should be dedicated to the commissariat, and the other to the luggage ; in that case the master should have a flying port- manteau, which should be sent by means of cosarios, and precede him from great town to great town, as a magazine, wardrobe, or general supply to fall back on. The servants should each have their own saddle-bag and leathern bottle, which, since the days of Sancho Panza, are part and parcel of a faithful squire, and when all are carried on an ass are quite patriarchal. " Iba Sancho Panza sobre su jumento, como un patriarca con sus alforjas y bota" The servants will each in their line look after their own affairs ; the groom will take with him the things of the stable, and a small provision of corn, in order that a feed may never be wanting, on an unexpected emergency ; he will always ascertain beforehand through what sort of a country each day's journey is to be made, and make preparations accordingly. The valet will view his masters in the same light as the groom does his beasts ; and he will purvey and keep in readiness all that appertains to their comfort, always remembering a moskito net we shall presently 112 WHAT TO TAKE ON A JOURNEY. [CHAP. x. say a word on the fly-plague of the Peninsula with nails to knock into the walls to hang it up by, not forgetting a hammer and gimlet ; common articles enough, but which are never to be got at the moment and place where they are the most wanted. He will also carry a small canteen, the smaller and more ordi- nary the better, as anything out of the common way attracts attention, and suggests, first, the coveting other men's goods, and so on to assaults, batteries, robberies, and other inconveniences, which have been exploded on our roads ; although F. Moryson took care to caution our ancestors " to be warie on this head, since theeves have their spies commonly in all innes, to enquire into the condition of travellers." The manufactures of Spain are so rude and valueless that what appears to us to be the most ordinary appears to them to be the most excellent, as they have never seen anything so good. The lower orders, who eat with their fingers, think everything is gold which glitters, todo es oro lo que reluce ; as, after all, it is what is on the plate that is the rub, let no wise man have such smart forks and knives as to tempt cut-throats to turn them to unnatural purposes. However, avoid all superfluous luggage, especially prejudices and foregone con- clusions, for " en largo camino pajd pesa," a straw is heavy on a long journey, and the last feather breaks the horse's back. A store of cigars, however, must always be excepted ; take plenty and give them freely ; it always opens a conversation well with a Spaniard, to offer him one of these little delicate marks of atten- tion. Good snuff is acceptable to the curates and to monks (though there are none just now). English needles, thread, and pairs of scissars take no room, and are all keys to the good graces of the fair sex. There is a charm about a present, bachshish, in most European as well as Oriental countries, and still more if it is given with tact, and at the proper time ; Spaniards, if unable to make any equivalent return, will always try to repay by civi- lities and attentions. Every one must determine for himself whether he prefers the assistance of this servant in the kitchen or at the toilet ; since it is not easy for mortal man to dress a master and a dinner, and both well at the same time, let alone two masters. A cook who runs after two hares at once catches neither. No prudent tra- veller on these, or on any occasions, should let another do for him CHAP, x.] COOKING UTENSILS. 113 what he can do for himself, and a man who waits upon himself is sure to be well waited on. If, however, a valet be absolutely necessary, the groom clearly is best left in his own chamber, the stable ; he will have enough to do to curry and valet his four animals, which he knows to be good for their health, though he never scrapes off the cutaneous stucco by which his own illote carcass is Roman cemented. From long experience we have found that if the rider will get into the habit of carrying all the things requisite for his own dressing in a small separate bag, and employ the hour while the cook is getting the supper under weigh, it is wonderful how comfortably he will proceed to his puchero. The cook should take with him a stewing pan, and a pot or kettle for boiling water ; he need not lumber himself with much batterie de cuisine ; it is not much needed in the imperfect gas- tronomy of the Peninsula, where men eat like the beasts which perish ; all sort of artillery is rather rare in Spanish kitchen or fortress ; an hidalgo would as soon think of having a voltaic battery in his sitting-room as a copper one in his cuisine ; most classes are equally satisfied with the Oriental earthenware alias, pucheros, or pipkins, which are everywhere to be found, and have some peculiar sympathy with the Spanish cuisine, since a stew be it even of a cat never eats so well when made in a metal vessel ; the great thing is to bring the raw materials, first catch your hare. Those who have meat and money will always get a neighbour to lend them a pot. A venta is a place where the rich are sent empty away, and where the poor hungry are not filled ; the whole duty of the man-cook, therefore, is to be always thinking of his commissariat ; he need not trouble himself about his master's appetite, that will seldom fail, nay, often be a mis- fortune ; a good appetite is not a good per se,* for it, even when the best, becomes a bore when there is nothing to eat ; his capucho or mule hamper must be his travelling larder, cellar, and store- room ; he will victual himself according to the route, and the distances from one great town to another, and always take care to start with a good provision : indeed to attend to the commissariat * When George IV. once complained that he had lost his royal appetite, " What a scrape, sir, a poor man would be in if he found it !" said his Rochester companion. 114 SPANISH BREAD. [CHAP. x. is, it cannot be too often repeated, the whole duty of a man cook in hungry Spain, where food has ever been the difficulty ; a little foresight gives small trouble and ensures great comfort, while perils by sea and perils by land are doubled when the stomach is empty, whereas, as Sancho Panza wisely told his ass, all sorrows are alleviated by eating bread : todos los duelos, con pan son buenoSy and the shrewd squire, who seldom is wrong, was right both in the matter of bread and the moral : the former is admirable. The central table-lands of Spain are perhaps the finest wheat - growing districts in the world ; however rude and imperfect the cultivation for the peasant does but scratch the earth, and seldom manures the life-conferring sun comes to his assistance ; the returns are prodigious, and the quality superexcellent ; yet the growers, miserable in the midst of plenty, vegetate in cabins composed of baked mud, or in holes burrowed among the friable hillocks, in an utter ignorance of furniture, and absolute neces- saries. The want of roads, canals, and means of transport pre- vents their exportation of produce, which from its bulk is diffi- cult of carriage in a country where grain is removed for the most part on four-footed beasts of burden, after the oriental and patriarchal fashion of Jacob, when he sent to the granaries of Egypt. Accordingly, although there are neither sliding scales nor corn laws, and subsistence is cheap and abundant, the popu- lation decreases in number and increases in wretchedness ; what boots it if corn be low-priced, if wages be still lower, as they then everywhere are and must be ? The finest bread in Spain is called pan de candeal, which is eaten by men in office and others in easy circumstances, as it was by the clergy. The worst bread is the pan de municion, and forms the fare of the Spanish soldier, which, being sable as a hat, coarse and hard as a brickbat, would just do to sop in the black broth of the Spartan military ; indeed, the expression de municion is synonymous in the Peninsula with badness of quality, and the secondary meaning is taken from the perfection of badness which is perceptible in every thing connected with Spanish ammunition, from the knapsack to the citadel. Such bread and water, and both hardly earned, are the rations of the poor patient Spanish private ; nor can he when before the enemy reckon always on even that, unless it be supplied from an ally's commissariat. CHAP, x.] THEESHING AND WINNOWING. 115 Perhaps the best bread in Spain is made at Alcala de Guadaira, near Seville, of which it is the oven, and hence the town is called the Alcala of bakers. There bread may truly be said to be the soul of its existence, and samples abound everywhere : roscas, or circular-formed rusks, are hung up like garlands, and hogazas, loaves, placed on tables outside the houses. It is, indeed, as Spaniards say, Pan de Dios the " angels' bread of Esdras." All classes here gain their bread by making it, and the water- mills and mule-mills are never still ; women and children are busy picking out earthy particles from the grain, which get mixed from the common mode of threshing on a floor in the open air, which is at once Biblical and Homeric. At the outside of the villages, in corn-growing districts, a smooth open " threshing- floor " is prepared, with a hard surface, like a fives court : it is called the era, and is the precise Roman area. The sheaves of corn are spread out on it, and four horses yoked most classically to a low crate or harrow, composed of planks armed with flints, &c., which is called a trillo : on this the driver is seated, who urges the beasts round and round over the crushed heap. Thus the grain is shaken out of the ears and the straw triturated ; the latter becomes food for horses, as the former does for men. When the heap is sufficiently bruised, it is removed and winnowed by being thrown up into the air ; the light winds carry off the chaff, while the heavy corn falls to the ground. The whole operation is truly picturesque and singular. The scene is a crowded one, as many cultivators contribute to the mass and share in the labour ; their wives and children cluster around, clad in strange dresses of varied ; colours. They are sometimes sheltered from the god of fire under i boughs, reeds, and awnings, run up as if for the painter, and fall- ' ing of themselves into pictures, as the lower classes of Spaniards and Italians always do. They are either eating and drinking, singing or dancing, for a guitar is never wanting. Meanwhile the fierce horses dash over the prostrate sheaves, and realise the splendid simile of Homer, who likens to them the fiery steeds of Achilles when driven over Trojan bodies. These out-of-door threshings take place of course when the weather is dry, and generally under a most terrific heat. The work is often con- tinued at nightfall by torch-light. During the day the half-clad dusky reapers defy the sun and his rage, rejoicing rather in the i 2 116 BREAD [CHAP. x. heat like salamanders ; it is true that their devotions to the porous water-jar are unremitting, nor is a swill at a good passenger's bota ever rejected ; all is life and action ; busy hands and feet, flashing eyes, and eager screams ; the light yellow chaff, which in the sun's rays glitters like gold dust, envelopes them in a halo, which by night, when partially revealed by the fires and mingled with the torch glare, is almost supernatural, as the phantom figures, now dark in shadows, now crimsoned by the fire flash, flit to and fro in the vaporous mist. The scene never fails to rivet and enchant the stranger, who, coming from the pale north and the commonplace in-door flail, seizes at once all the novelty of such doings. Eye and ear, open and awake, become inlets of new sensations of attention and admiration, and convey to heart and mind the poetry, local colour, movement, grouping, action, and attitude. But while the cold-blooded native of leaden skies is full of fire and enthusiasm, his Spanish companion, bred and born under unshorn beams, is chilly as an icicle, indifferent as an Arab : he passes on the other side, not only not admiring, but positively ashamed ; he only sees the barbarity, antiquity, and imperfect process ; he is sighing for some patent machine made in Birmingham, to be put up in a closed barn after the models approved of by the Royal Agricultural Society in Cavendish Square ; his bowels yearn for the appliances of civilization by which " bread stuffs " are more scientifically manipulated and manufactured, minus the poetry. To return, however, to dry bread, after this new digression, and all those who have ever been in Spain, or have ever written on Spanish things, must feel how difficult it is to keep regularly on the road without turning aside at every moment, now to cull a wild flower, now to pick up a sparkling spar. This corn, so beaten, is very carefully ground, and in La Mancha in those charming windmills, which, perched on eminences to catch the air, look to this day, with their outstretched arms, like Quixotic giants ; the flour is passed through several hoppers, in order to secure its fineness. The dough is most carefully kneaded, worked, and re-worked, as is done by our biscuit-makers ; hence the close-grained, caky, somewhat hea-vy consistency of the crumb, whereas, according to Pliny, the Romans esteemed Spanish bread on account of its lightness. CHAP, x.] LUNCHEON. 117 The Spanish loaf has not that mysterious sympathy with butter and cheese as it has in our verdurous Old England, probably because in these torrid regions pasture is rare, butter bad, and cheese worse, albeit they suited the iron digestion of Sancho, who knew of nothing better : none, however, who have ever tasted Stilton or Parmesan will join in his eulogies of Castilian quesOy the poorness of which will be estimated by the distinguished consideration in which a round cannon-ball Dutch cheese is held throughout the Peninsula. The traveller, nevertheless, should take one of them, for bad is here the best, in many other things besides these : he will always carry some good loaves with it, for in the damper mountain districts the daily bread of the natives is made of rye, Indian corn, and the inferior cerealia. Bread is the staff of the Spanish traveller's life, who, having added raw garlic, not salt, to it, then journeys on with security, con pan y ajo crudo se anda seguro. Again, a loaf never weighs one down, nor is ever in the way ; as -ZEsop, the prototype of Sancho, well knew. La hogaza no embaraza. Having secured his bread, the cook in preparing supper should make enough for the next day's lunch, las once, the eleven o'clock meal, as the Spaniards translate meridie, twelve or mid-day, whence the correct word for luncheon is derived, merienda merendar. Wherever good dishes are cut up there are good leavings, " donde buenas ollas quebran, buenos cascos quedan;" and nothing can be more Cervantic than the occasional al fresco halt, when no better place of accommodation is to be met with. As the sun gets high, and man and beast hungry and weary, wherever a tempting shady spot with running water occurs, the party draws aside from the high road, like Don Quixote and Sancho Panza ; a retired and concealed place is chosen, the luggage is removed from the animals, the hampers which lard the lean soil are unpacked, the table-cloth is spread on the grass, the botas are laid in the water to cool their contents ; then out with the provision, cold partridge or turkey, sliced ham or chorizo simple cates, but which are eaten with an appetite and relish for which aldermen would pay hundreds. They are fol- lowed, should grapes be wanting, with a soothing cigar, and a sweet slumber on earth's freshest, softest lap. In such wild banquets Spain surpasses the Boulevards. Alas ! that such hours 118 THE OLLA. [CHAP. x. should be bright and winged as sunbeams ! Such is Peninsular country fare. The olla, on which the rider may restore ex- hausted nature, is only to be studied in larger towns ; and dining, of which this is the foundation in Spain, is such a great resource to travellers, and Spanish cookery, again, is so Oriental, clas- sical, and singular, let alone its vital importance, that the subject will properly demand a chapter to itself. CHAP, xi.] A SPANISH COOK. 119 CHAPTER XL A Spanish Cook Philosophy of Spanish Cuisine Sauce Difficulty of Commissariat The Provend Spanish Hares and Rabbits The Olla Garbanzo Spanish Pigs Bacon and Hams Omelette Salad and Gazpacho. IT would exhaust a couple of Colonial numbers at least to discuss properly the merits and digest Spanish cookery. All that can be now done is to skim the subject, which is indeed fat and unctuous. Those meats and drinks will be briefly noticed which are of daily occurrence, and those dishes described which we have often helped to make, and oftener helped to eat, in the most lar- derless ventas and hungriest districts of the Peninsula, and which provident w r ayfarers may make and eat again, and, as we pray, with no worse appetite. To be a good cook, which few Spaniards are, a man must not only understand his master's taste, but be able to make something out of nothing ; just as a clever French artiste converts an old shoe into an epigramme d'agneau, or a Parisian milliner dresses up two deal boards into a fine live Madame, whose only fault is the appearance of too much embonpoint. Genuine and legitimate Spanish dishes are .excellent in their way, for no man nor man- cook ever is ridiculous when he does not attempt to be what he is not. The au naturel may occasionally be somewhat plain, but seldom makes one sick ; at all events it would be as hopeless to make a Spaniard understand real French cookery as to endeavour to explain to a depute the meaning of our constitution or parlia- ment. The ruin of Spanish cooks is their futile attempts to imitate foreign ones : just as their silly grandees murder the glorious Castilian tongue, by substituting what they fancy is pure Parisian, which they speak comme des vaches Espagnoles. Dis moi ce que tu manges etje te dirai ce que tu es is " un mot pro- fond " of the great equity judge, Brillat Savarin, who also dis- covered that " Les destinees des nations dependent de la maniere 120 THE NATIONAL COOKERY. [CHAP. xi. dont elles se nourrissent" since which General Foy has attri- buted all the accidental victories of the British to rum and beef. And this great fact much enhances our serious respect for punch, and our true love for the ros-bif of old England, of which, by the way, very little will be got in the Peninsula, where bulls are bred for baiting, and oxen for the plough, not the spit. The national cookery of Spain is for the most part Oriental; and the ruling principle of its preparation is stewing ; for, from a scarcity of fuel, roasting is almost unknown ; their notion of which is putting meat into a pan, setting it in hot ashes, and then covering the lid with burning embers. The pot, or olla, has accordingly become a synonyme for the dinner of Spaniards, just as beefsteaks or frogs are vulgarly supposed to constitute the whole bill of fare of two other mighty nations. Wherever meats are bad and thin, the sauce is very important ; it is based in Spain on oil, garlic, saffron, and red peppers. In hot countries, where beasts are lean, oil supplies the place of fat, as garlic does the want of flavour, while a stimulating condiment excites or curries up the coats of a languid stomach. It has been said of our heretical countrymen that we have but one form of sauce melted butter and a hundred different forms of religion, whereas in orthodox Spain there is but one of each, and, as with religion, so to change this sauce would be little short of heresy. As to colour, it carries that rich burnt umber, raw sienna tint, which Murillo imitated so well ; and no wonder, since he made his par- ticular brown from baked olla bones, whence it was extracted, as is done to this day by those Spanish painters who indulge in meat. This brown negro de hueso colour is the livery of tawny Spain, where all is brown from the Sierra Morena to duskier man. Of such hue is his cloak, his terra-cotta house, his wife, his ox, his ass, and everything that is his. This sauce has not only the same colour, but the same flavour everywhere ; hence the diffi- culty of making out the material of which any dish is composed. Not Mrs. Glass herself could tell, by taste at least, whether the ingredients of the cauldron be hare or cat, cow or calf, the afore- said ox or ass. It puzzles even the acumen of a Frenchman ; for it is still the great boast of the town of Olvera that they served up some donkeys as rations to a Buoriapartist detachment. All this is very Oriental. Isaac could not distinguish tame kid from CHAP. xi.J SCARCITY OF PROVISIONS. 121 wild venison, so perplexing was the disguise of the savoury sauce ; arid vet his senses of smell and touch were keen, and his suspicions of unfair cooking were awakened. A prudent diner, therefore, except when forced to become his own cook, will never look too closely into the things of the kitchen if he wishes to live a quiet life ; for quien las cosas mucho apura, no vive vida segura. All who ride or run through the Peninsula, will read thirst in the arid plains, and hunger in the soil -denuded hills, where those who ask for bread will receive stones. The knife and fork question has troubled every warrior in Spain, from Henri IV. down to Wellington ; " subsistence is the great dif- ficulty always found" is the text of a third of the Duke's wonderful despatches. This scarcity of food is implied in the very name of Spain, iTravia, which means poverty and destitution, as well as in the term Bisonos, wanters, which long has been a synonyme for Spanish soldiers, who are always, as the Duke described them, " hors de combat," " always wanting in every thing at the critical moment." Hunger and thirst have ever been, and are, the best defenders of the Peninsula against the invader. On sierra and steppe these gaunt sentinels keep watch and ward, and, on the scarecrow principle, protect this paradise, as they do the infernal regions of Yirgil " Malesuada fames et turpis egestas Horribiles visu." A riding tour through Spain has already been likened to serving a campaign ; and it was a saying of the Grand Conde, " If you want to know what want is, carry on a war in Spain." Yet, notwithstanding the thousands of miles which we have ridden, never have we yet felt that dire necessity, which has been kept at a respectable distance by a constant unremitting attention to the proverb, A man forewarned is forearmed. Hombre prevenido nuncafu vencido, there is nothing like precaution and provision. " If you mean to dine," writes the all-providing Duke to Lord Hill from Moraleja, "you had better bring your things, as I shall have nothing with me;" the ancient Bursal fashion holds good on Spanish roads : " Regula Bursalis est omni tempore talis, Prandia fer tecum, si vis comedere mecum. ' 122 EATING ON THE ROAD. [CHAP. xi. A man who is prepared, is never beaten or starved ; therefore, as the valorous Dalgetty has it, a prudent man will always victual himself in Spain with vivers for three days at least, and his cook, like Sancho Panza, should have nothing else in his head, but thoughts how to convey the most eatables into his am- bulant larder. He must set forth from every tolerable-sized town with an ample supply of tea, sugar, coffee, brandy, good oil, wine, salt, to say nothing of solids. The having something ready gives him leisure to forage and make ulterior preparations. Those who have a corps de reserve to fall back upon say a cold turkey and a ham can always convert any spot in the desert into an oasis ; at the same time the connection between body and soul may be kept up by trusting to venta luck, of which more anon ; it offers, however, but a miserable existence to persons of judg- ment. And even when this precaution of provision be not re- quired, there are never wanting in Spain the poor and hungry, to whom the taste of meat is almost unknown, and to whom these crumbs that fall from the rich man's table are indeed a feast ; the relish and gratitude with which these fragments are devoured do as much good to the heart of the donor as to the stomach of the donees, for the best medicines of the poor are to be found in the cellars, kitchens, and hampers of the rich. All servants should be careful of their traps and stores, which are liable to be pilfered and plundered in ventas, where the elite of society is not always assembled : the luggage should be well corded, for the devil is always a gleaning, ata al saco, ya espiga el diablo. Formerly all travellers of rank carried a silver olla with a key, the guardacena, the save supper. This ingenious con- trivance has furnished matter for many a pleasantry in picaresque tales and farces. Madame Daunoy gives us the history of what befel the good Archbishop of Burgos and his orthodox olla. There is nothing in life like making a good start ; thus the party arrives safely at the first resting-place. The cook must never appear to have anything when he arrives at an inn ; he must get from others all he can, and much is to be had for asking and crying, as even a Spanish Infante knows the child that CHAP. xi.l HARES AND RABBITS. 125 does not cry is not suckled, quien no llora, no mama; the artiste must never fall back on his own reservoirs except in cases of absolute need ; during the day he must open his eyes and ears and must pick up everything eatable, and where he can and when he can. By keeping a sharp look-out and going quietly to work the cook may catch the hen and her chickens too. All is fish that comes into the net, and, like Buonaparte and his marshals, nothing should be too great for his ambition, nothing too small for his rapacity. Of course he will pay for his collections, which the aforesaid gentry did not : thus fruit, onions, salads, which, as they must be bought somewhere, had better be secured whenever they turn up. The peasants, who are sad poachers, will constantly hail travellers from the fields with offers of partridges, rabbits, melons, hares, which always jump up in this pays de 1'imprevu when you least expect it: Salta la liebre cuando menos uno piensa. Notwithstanding Don Quixote thought that it augured bad luck to meet with a hare on entering a village, let not a bold traveller be scared, but forthwith stew the omen ; a hare, as in the time of Martial, is considered by Spaniards to be the glory of edible quadrupeds, and to this day no old stager ever takes a rabbit when he can get a hare, a perro viejo echale liebre y no conejo. In default however of catching one, rabbits may always be bagged. Spain abounds with them to such a degree, that ancient naturalists thought the animal indigenous, and went so far as to derive the name Spain from Sephan, the rabbit, which the Phoenicians found here for the first time. Be that as it may, the long-eared timid creature appears on the early Iberian coins, as it will long do on her wide wastes and tables. By the bye, a ready-stewed rabbit or hare is to be eschewed as suspicious in a venta : at the same time, if the consumer does not find out that it is a cat, there is no great harm done ignorance is bliss ; let him not know it, he is not robbed at all. It is a pity to dispel his gastronomic delusion, as it is the knowledge of the cheat that kills, and not the cat. Pol ! me occidistis, amici. The cook therefore should ascertain beforehand what are the bona fide in- gredients of every dish that he sets before his lord. In going into the kitchens of the Peninsula, precedence must on every account be given to the olla : this word means at once 124 THE OLLA PODRIDA. [CHAP. xi. a species of prepared food, and the earthenware utensil in which it is dressed, just as our term dish is applicable to the platter and to what is served on it. Into this olla it may be affirmed that the whole culinary genius of Spain is condensed, as the mighty Jinn was into a gallipot, according to the Arabian Night tales. The lively and gastronomic French, who are decidedly the leaders of European civilization in the kitchen, deride the barbarous practices of the Gotho-Iberians, as being darker than Erebus and more ascetic than aesthetic ; to credit their authors, a Peninsular breakfast consists of a teaspoonful of chocolate, a dinner, of a knob of garlic soaked in water, and a supper, of a paper cigarette ; and according to their parfait cuisinier^ the olla is made of two cigars boiled in three gallons of water but this is a calumny, a mere invention devised by the enemy. The olla is only well made in Andalucia, and there alone in careful, well-appointed houses ; it is called a puchero in the rest of Spain, where it is but a poor affair, made of dry beef, or rather cow, boiled with garbanzos or chick peas, and a few sausages. These garbanzos are the vegetable, the potato of the land ; and their use argues a low state of horticultural knowledge. The taste for them was introduced by the Carthaginians the puls punica, which (like the fides punica, an especial ingredient in all Spanish governments and finance) afforded such merriment to Plautus, that he introduced the chick-pea eating Poenus, pul- tiphagonides, speaking Punic, just as Shakspere did the toasted- cheese eating Welshman talking Welsh. These garbanzos re- quire much soaking, being otherwise hard as bullets ; indeed, a lively Frenchman, after what he calls an apology for a dinner, compared them, in his empty stomach, as he was jumbled away in the dilly, to peas rattling in a child's drum. The veritable olla the ancient time-honoured olla podrida, or pot pourri the epithet is now obsolete is difficult To be made : a tolerable one is never to be eaten out of Spain, since it requires many Spanish things to concoct it, and much care ; the cook must throw his whole soul into the pan, or rather pot ; it may be made in one, but two are better. They must be of earthenware ; for, like the French pot au feu, the dish is good for nothing when made in an iron or copper vessel ; take there- fore two, and put them on their separate stoves with water. CHAP, xi.] THE OLLA PODRIDA. 125 Place into No. 1, Garbanzos, which have been placed to soak over-night. Add a good piece of beef, a chicken, a large piece of bacon ; let it boil once and quickly ; then let it simmer : it requires four or five hours to be well done. Meanwhile place into No. 2, with water, whatever vegetables are to be had : . lettuces, cabbage, a slice of gourd, of beef, carrots, beans, celery, endive, onions and garlic, long peppers. These must be pre- viously well washed and cut, as if they were destined to make a salad ; then add red sausages, or " chorizos ;" half a salted pig's face, which should have been soaked over-night. When all is sufficiently boiled, strain off the water, and throw it away. Remember constantly to skim the scum of both saucepans. When all this is sufficiently dressed, take a large dish, lay in the bottom the vegetables, the beef in the centre, flanked by the bacon, chicken, and pig's face. The sausages should be arranged around, en couronne ; pour over some of the soup of No. 1, and serve hot, as Horace did : " Uncta satis ponuntur oluscula lardo." No violets come up to the perfume which a coming olla casts before it ; the mouth-watering bystanders sigh, as they see and smell the rich freight steaming away from them. This is the olla en grande, such as Don Quixote says was eaten only by canons and presidents of colleges ; like turtle soup, it is so rich and satisfactory that it is a dinner of itself. A worthy dignitary of Seville, in the good old times, before reform and appropriation had put out the churches' kitchen fire, and whose daily pot-luck was transcendental, told us, as a wrinkle, that he on feast-days used turkeys instead of chickens, and added two sharp Ronda apples, and three sweet potatoes of Malaga. His advice is worth attention : he was a good Roman Catholic canon, who believed everything, absolved everything, drank everything, ate everything, and digested everything. In fact, as a general rule, anything that is good in itself is good for an olla, provided, as old Spanish books always conclude, that it contains nothing contrary to the holy mother church, to orthodoxy, and to good manners " que no contiene cosa que se oponga a nuestra madre Iglesia, y santafe catolica, y buenas costumbres" Such an olla as this is not to be got on the road, but may be made to restore exhausted nature when halting in the cities. Of course, every olla. must everywhere be made according to what can be got. In private 126 BACON. [CHAP. XL families the contents of No. 1, the soup, is served up with bread, in a tureen, and the frugal table decked with the separate con- tents of the olla in separate platters ; the remains coldly serve, or are warmed up, for supper. The vegetables and bacon are absolute necessaries; without the former an olla has neither grace nor sustenance ; la olla sin verdura, ni time gracia ni hartura, while the latter is as essential in this stew as a text from Saint Augustine is in a sermon : No hay olla sin tocino, Ni sermon sin Agustino. Bacon throughout the length and breadth of the Peninsula is more honoured than this, or than any one or all the fathers of the church of Rome ; the hunger after the flesh of the pig is equalled only by the thirst for the contents of what is put afterwards into his skin ; and with reason, for the pork of Spain has always been, and is, unequalled in flavour ; the bacon is fat and flavoured, the sausages delicious, and the hams transcendantly superlative, to use the very expression of Diodorus Siculus, a man of great taste, learning, and judgment. Of all the things of Spain, no one need feeling ashamed to plead guilty to a predilection and pre- ference to the pig. A few particulars may be therefore par- doned. In Spain pigs are more numerous even than asses, since they pervade the provinces. As those of Estremadura, the Hampshire of the Peninsula, are the most esteemed, they alone will be now noticed. That province, although so little visited by Spaniards or strangers, is full of interest to the antiquarian and naturalist ; and many are the rides at different periods which we have made through its tangled ilex groves, and over its depopulated and aromatic wastes. A granary under Roman and Moor, its very existence seems to be all but forgotten by the Madrid govern- ment, who have abandoned it to feres natures, to wandering sheep, locusts, and swine. The entomology of Estremadura is endless, and perfectly uninvestigated de minimis non curat Hispanus ; but the heavens and earth teem with the minute creation ; there nature is most busy and prolific, where man is most idle and un- productive ; and in these lonely wastes, where no human voice disturbs the silence, the balmy air resounds with the buzzing hum CHAP, xi.] PIGS OF ESTREMADURA. 127 of multitudinous insects, which career about on their business of love or food without settlements or kitchens, rejoicing in the fine weather which is the joy of their tiny souls, and short-lived plea- sant existence. Sheep, pigs, locusts, and doves are the only living things which the traveller will see for hours and hours. Now and then a man occurs, just to prove how rare his species is here. Vast districts of this unreclaimed province are covered with woods of oak, beech, and chesnut ; but these park-like scenes have no charms for native eyes ; blind to the picturesque, they only are thinking of the number of pigs which can be fattened on the mast and acorns, which are sweeter and larger than those of our oaks. The acorns are still called bellota, the Arabic bollot belot being the Scriptural term for the tree and the gland, which, with water, formed the original diet of the aboriginal Iberian, as well as of his pig ; when dry, the acorns were ground, say the classical authors, into bread, and, when fresh, they were served up as the second course. And in our time ladies of high rank at Madrid constantly ate them at the opera and elsewhere ; they were the presents sent by Sancho Panza's wife to the Duchess, and formed the text on which Don Quixote preached so eloquently to the goatherds, on the joys and innocence of the golden age and pastoral happiness, in which they constituted the foundation of the kitchen. The pigs during the greater part of the year are left to support nature as they can, and in gauntness resemble those greyhound- looking animals which pass for porkers in France. When the acorns are ripe and fall from the trees, the greedy animals are turned out in legions from the villages, which more correctly may be termed coalitions of pigsties. They return from the woods at night, of their own accord, and without a swine's general. On entering the hamlet, all set off at a fall gallop, like a legion possessed with devils, in a handicap for home, into which each single pig turns, never making a mistake. We have more than once been caught in one of these pig-deluges, and nearly carried away horse and all, as befell Don Quixote, when really swept away by the " far-spread and grunting drove." In his own home each truant is welcomed like a prodigal son or a domestic father. These pigs are the pets of the peasants; they are 128 KILLING A PIG. [CHAP, xi- brought up with their children, and partake, as in Ireland, in the domestic discomforts of their cabins ; they are universally re- spected, and justly, for it is this animal who pays the " rint;" in fact, are the citizens, as at Sorrento, and Estremenian man is quite a secondary formation, and created to tend herds of these swine, who lead the happy life of former Toledan dignitaries, with the additional advantage of becoming more valuable when dead. It is astonishing how rapidly they thrive on their sweet food ; indeed it is the whole duty of a good pig animal propter con- vivia natum to get as fat and as soon as he can, and then die for the good of his country. It may be observed for the inform- ation of our farmers, that those pigs which are dedicated to St. Anthony, on whom a sow is in constant attendance, as a dove was on Venus, get the soonest fat ; therefore in Spain young porkers are sprinkled with holy water on his day, but those of other saints are less propitious, for the killing takes place about the 10th and llth of November, or, as Spaniards date it, por el St. Andres, on the day of St. Andrew, or on that of St. Mar- tin ; hence the proverb " every man and pig has his St. Martin or his fatal hour, a cada puerco su San Martin." The death of a fat pig is as great an event in Spanish families, who generally fatten up one, as the birth of a baby ; nor can the fact be kept secret, so audible is his announcement. It is con- sidered a delicate attention on the part of the proprietor to cele- brate the auspicious event by sending a portion of the chitterlings to intimate friends. The Spaniard's proudest boast is that his blood is pure, that he is not descended from pork-eschewing Jew or Moor a fact which the pig genus, could it reason, would deeply deplore. The Spaniard doubtless has been so great a consumer of pig, from grounds religious, as well as gastronomic. The eating or not eating the flesh of an animal deemed unclean by the impure infidel, became a test of orthodoxy, and at once of correct faith as well as of good taste ; and good bacon, as has been just observed, is wedded to sound doctrine and St. Augus- tine. The Spanish name Torino is derived from the Arabic Tachim, which signifies fat. The Spaniards however, although tremendous consumers of the pig, whether in the salted form or in the skin, have to the CHAP, xi.] PORK OF MONTANCHES. 129 full the Oriental abhorrence to the unclean animal in the abstract. Muy puerco is their last expression for all that is most dirty, nasty, or disgusting. Muy cochina never is forgiven, if applied to woman, as it is equivalent to the Italian Vacca, and to the canine feminine compliment bandied among our fair sex at Billingsgate ; nor does the epithet imply moral purity or chastity ; indeed in Castilian euphuism the unclean animal was never to be named except in a periphrasis, or with an apology, which is a singular remnant of the Moorish influence on Spanish manners. Haluf or swine is still the Moslem's most obnoxious term for the Christians, and is applied to this day by the ungrateful Algerines to their French bakers and benefactors, nay even to the " illustre >ugeaud" The capital of the Estremenian pig-districts is Montanches :mons anguis and doubtless the hilly spot where the Duke of Arcos fed and cured " ces petits jambons vermeils," which the Due de St. Simon ate and admired so much ; " ces jambons ont un parfum si admirable, un gout si rdeve et si vivifiant, qu'on en est surpris : il est impossible de rien manger si exquis." His Grace of Arcos used to shut up the pigs in places abounding in vipers, ion which they fattened. Neither the pigs, dukes, nor their toadeaters seem to have been poisoned by these exquisite vipers. According to Jonas Barrington, the finest Irish pigs were those tthat fed on dead rebels : one Papist porker, the Enniscorthy iboar, was sent as a show, for having eaten a Protestant parson: She was put to death and dishonoured by not being made bacon of. Naturalists have remarked that the rattlesnakes in America retire before their consuming enemy, the pig, who is thus the ^gastador or pioneer of the new world's civilization, just as 'Pizarro, who was suckled by a sow, and tended swine in his youth, was its conqueror. Be that as it may, Montanches is [illustrious in pork, in which the burgesses go the whole hog, ^whether in the rich red sausage, the chorizo, or in the savoury [piquant embuchados, which are akin to the mortadelle of Bologna, -only less hard, and usually boiled before eating, though good also raw ; they consist of the choice bits of the pig seasoned with condiments, with which, as if by retribution, the paunch of the ivoracious animal is filled ; the ruling passion strong in death. \W strongly recommend Juan Valiente* who recently was the K ioi) A MEAT OMELETTE. [CHAP. xi. alcalde of the town, to the lover of delicious hams ; e&chjamon averages about 12 Ib. ; they are sold at the rate of 7-J- reales, about I8d.i for the libra carnicera, which weighs 32 of our ounces. The duties in England are now very trifling ; we have for many years had an annual supply of these delicacies, through the favour of a kind friend at the Puerto. The fat of these jamones, whence our word ham and gammon, when they are boiled, looks like melted topazes, and the flavour defies language, although we have dined on one this very day, in order to secure accuracy and undeniable prose, like Lope de Vega, who, accord- ing to his biographer, Dr. Montalvan, never could write poetry unless inspired by a rasher ; " Toda es cosa vil," said he, " a donde falta un pernil " (in which word we recognize the precise perna whereby Horace was restored) : Therefore all writing is a sham, Where there is wanting Spanish ham. Those of Gallicia and Catalonia are also celebrated, but are not to be compared for a moment with those of Montanches, which are fit to set before an emperor. Their only rivals are the sweet hams of the Alpujarras, which are made at Trevelez, a pig-hamlet situated under the snowy mountains on the oppo- site side of Granada, to which also we have made a pilgrimage. They are called dulces or sweet, because scarcely any salt is used in the curing ; the ham is placed in a weak pickle for eight days, and is then hung up in the snow ; it can only be done at this place, where the exact temperature necessary is certain. Those of our readers who are curious in Spanish eatables will find excellent garbanzos, chorizos, red pepper, chocolate and Valencian sweetmeats, &c. at Figul's, a most worthy Catalan, whose shop is at No. 10, Woburn Buildings, St. Pancras, London ; the locality is scarcely less visited than Montanches, but the penny -post penetrates into this terra incognita. So much space has been filled with these meritorious bacons and hams, that we must be brief with our remaining bill of fare. For a pisto or meat omelette take eggs, which are to be got almost everywhere ; see that they are fresh by being pellucid ; beat these kuevos trasparentes well up ; chop up onions and whatever savoury herbs-you have with you ; add small slices of any meat out of your hamper, cold turkey, ham, &c. ; beat it CHAP, xi.] THE GUISADO. 131 all up together and fry it quickly. Most Spaniards have a peculiar knack in making these tortillas, revueltas de kuevos, which to fastidious stomachs are, as in most parts of the Conti- nent, a sure resource to fall back upon. The Guisado, or stew, like the olla, can only be really done in a SpajtnslT'plptin, atid of those which we import, the Anda- lucian ones draw flavour out the best. This dish is always well done by every cook in every venta, barring that they are apt to put in bad oil, and too much garlic, pepper, and saffron. Super- intend it, therefore, yourself, and take hare, partridge, rabbit, chicken, or whatever you may have foraged on the road ; it is capital also with pheasant, as we proved only yesterday ; cut it up, save the blood, the liver, and the giblets ; do not wash the pieces, but dry them in a cloth ; fry them with onions in a tea- cup of oil till browned ; take an olla, put in these bits with the oil, equal portions of wine and water, but stock is better than water ; claret answers well, Valdepenas better ; add a bit of bacon, onions, garlic, salt, pepper, pimientos, a bunch of thyme or herbs; let it simmer, carefully skimming it; half an hour before serving add the giblets ; when done, which can be tested by feeling with a fork, serve hot. The stew should be con- stantly stirred with a wooden spoon, and grease, the ruin of all cookery, carefully skimmed off as it rises to the surface. When made with proper care and with a good salad, it forms a supper for a cardinal, or for Santiago himself. Another excellent but very difficult dish is the polio con arroz, or the chicken and rice. It is eaten in perfection in Valencia, and therefore is often called Polio Valenciano. Cut a good fowl into pieces, wipe it clean, but do not put it into water ; take a saucepan, put in a wine-glass of fine oil, heat the oil well, put in a bit of bread ; let it fry, stirring it about with a wooden spoon ; when the bread is browned take it out and throw it away : put in two cloves of garlic, taking care that it does not burn, as, if it does, it will turn bitter ; stir the garlic till it is fried ; put in the chicken, keep stirring it about while it fries, then put in a little salt and stir again ; whenever a sound of cracking is heard, stir it again ; when the chicken is well browned or gilded, dorado, which will take from five to ten minute*, stirring constantly , put in chopped onions, three or four chopped red or green chilis, and K2 132 STARRED EGGS. [CHAP. xi. stir about ; if once the contents catch the pan, the dish is spoiled ; then add tomatas, divided into quarters, and parsley ; take two teacupsful of rice, mix all well up together ; add hot stock enough to cover the whole over ; let it boil once, and then set it aside to simmer until the rice becomes tender and done. The great art consists in having the rice turned out granulated and separate, not in a pudding state, which is sure to be the case if a cover be ever put over the dish, which condenses the steam. It may be objected, that these dishes, if so curious in the cook- ing, are not likely to be well done in the rude kitchens of a venta ; but practice makes perfect, and the whole mind and intellect of the artist is concentrated on one object, and not frittered away by a mul- tiplicity of dishes, the rock on which many cooks founder, where more dinners are sacrificed to the eye and ostentation. One dish and one thing at a time is the golden rule of Bacon ; many are the anxious moments .that we have spent over the rim of a Spanish pipkin, watching, life set on the cast, the wizen she- mummy, whose mind, body, and spoon were absorbed in a single mess: Well, my mother, que tal? what sort of a stew is it? Let me smell and taste the salsa. Good, good ; it promises much. Vamos, Senora go on, my lady, thy spoon once more how, indeed, can oil, wine, and nutritive juices amalgamate without frequent stirring ? Well, very well it is. Now again, daughter of my soul, thy fork. Asi, asi ; thus, thus. Per Bucco, by Bacchus, tender it is may heaven repay thee ! Indeed, from this tenderness of the meat arises ease of digestion ; here, pot and fire do half the work of the poor stomach, which too often in inns elsewhere is overtaxed, like its owner, and condemned to hard labour and a brickbat beefsteak. Poached eggs are at all events within the grasp of the meanest culinary capacity. They are called ffueitos estrellados, starred eggs. When fat bacon is wedded to them, the dish is called Haevos conmagras; not that magras here means thin as to condition, but rather as to slicing ; and these slices, again, are positively thick ones when compared to those triumphs of close shaving which are carved at Yauxhall. To make this dish, with or without the bacon, take eggs ; the contents of the shell are to be emptied into a pan filled with hot oil or lard, manteca de puerco, pig's butter: it must be remembered, although Strabo mentions as a singular CHAP, xi.] SALAD. 133 fact that the Iberians made use of butter instead of oil, that now it is just the reverse ; a century ago butter was only sold by the apothecaries, as a sort of ointment, and it used to be iniquitous. Spaniards generally used either Irish or Flemish salted butter, and from long habit thought fresh butter quite insipid ; indeed, they have no objection to its being a trifle or so rancid, just as some aldermen like high venison. In the present age of pro- gress the Queen Christina has a fancy dairy at Madrid, where she makes a few pounds of fresh butter, of which a small portion is or was sold, at five shillings the pound, to foreign ambassadors for their breakfast. Recently more attention has been paid to the dairy in the Swiss-like provinces of the north-west. The Spaniards, like the heroes in the Iliad, seldom boil their food (eggs excepted), at least not in water ; for frying, after all, is but boiling in oil. Travellers should be cautioned against the captivating name of manteca Valenciana. This Valencian butter is composed (for the cow has nothing to do with it) of equal portions of garlic and hogs' lard pounded together in a mortar ; it is then spread on bread, just as we do arsenic to destroy vermin. It, however, agrees well with the peasants, as does the soup of their neighbours the Catalans, which is made of bread and garlic in equal portions fried in oil and diluted with hot water. This mess is called sopa de gato, probably from making cats, not Catalans, sick. One thing, however, is truly delicious in Spain the salad, to compound which, says the Spanish proverb, four persons are wanted : a spendthrift for oil, a miser for vinegar, a counsellor for salt, and a madman to stir it all up. N.B. Get the biggest bowl you can, in order that this latter operation may be thoroughly performed. The salad is the glory of every French dinner, and the disgrace of most in England, even in good houses, and from two simple causes ; first, from the putting in eggs, mustard, and other heretical ingredients, and, secondly, from making it long be- fore it is wanted to be eaten, whereby the green materials, which should be crisp and fresh, become sodden and leathery. Prepare, therefore, your salad in separate vessels, and never mix the sauce with the herbs until the instant that you are ready to transfer the refreshing result to your plate. Take lettuce, or whatever salad is to be got, ; do. not cut it with a steel knife, which turns the 134 GAZPACHO. [CHAP. xi. edges of the wounds black, and communicates an evil flavour ; let the leaf be torn from the stem, which throw away, as it is hard and bitter ; wash the mass in many waters, and rinse it in napkins till dry ; take a small bowl, put in equal quantities of vinegar and water, a teaspoonful of pepper and salt, and four times as much oil as vinegar and water, mix the same well toge- ther ; prepare in a plate whatever fine herbs can be got, especially tarragon and chervil, which must be chopped small. Pour the sauce over the salad, powder it with these herbs, and lose no time in eating. For making a much worse salad than this, a foreign artiste in London used some years ago to charge a guinea. Any remarks on Spanish salads would be incomplete without some account of gazpacho, that vegetable soup, or floating salad, which during the summer forms the food of the bulk of the people in the torrid portions of Spain. This dish is of Arabic origin, as its name, " soaked bread," implies. This most ancient Oriental Roman and Moorish refection is composed of onions, garlic, cucumbers, chilis, all chopped up very small and mixed with crumbs of bread, and then put into a bowl of oil, vinegar, and fresh water. Reapers and agricultural labourers could never stand the sun's fire without this cooling acetous diet. This was the o^vKparog of the Greeks, the posca, potable food, meat and drink, potus et esca, which formed part of the rations of the Eoman soldiers, and which Adrian (a Spaniard) delighted to share with them, and into which Boaz at meal-time invited Ruth to dip her morsel. Dr. Buchanan found some Syrian Christians who still called it ail, ail, Hil, Hila, for which our Saviour was supposed to have called on the Cross, when those who understood that dialect gave it him from the vessel which was full of it for the guard. In Andalucia, during the summer, a bowl of gaz- pacho is commonly ready in every house of an evening, and is partaken of by every person who comes in. It is not easily digested by strangers, who do not require it quite so much as the natives, whose souls are more parched and dried up, and who perspire less. The components, oil, vinegar, and bread, are all that is given out to the lower class of labourers by farmers who profess to feed them ; two cow's horns, the most primitive form of bottle and cup, are constantly seen suspended on each CHAP. XL] GAZPACHO. 135 side of their carts, arid contain this provision, with which they compound their migas : this consists of crumbs of bread fried in oil, with pepper and garlic ; nor can a stronger proof be given of the common poverty of their fare than the common expression, " buenas migas hay" there are good crumbs, being equivalent to capital eating. In very cold weather the mess is warmed, and then is called gazpacho caliente. Oh ! dura messorum ilia oh ! the iron mess digesting stomachs of ploughmen. 136 WATER. [CHAP. xn. CHAPTER XII. Drinks of Spain Water Irrigation Fountains Spanish Thirstiness The Alcarraza Water Carriers Ablutions Spanish Chocolate Agraz Beer Lemonade. IN dipping into Spanish liquids we shall not mix wine with water, but keep them separate, as most Spaniards do ; the latter is entitled to rank first, by those who prefer the opinion of Pin- dar, who held water to be the best of things, to that of Anacreon, who was not member of any temperance society. The profound regard for water of a Spaniard is quite Oriental ; at the same time, as his blood is partly Gothic and partly Arab, his allegiance is equally mixed and divided; thus, if he adores the juice of flints like a Moslem, he venerates the juice of the grape like a German. Water is the blood of the earth, and the purificator of the body in tropical regions and in creeds which, being regulated by latitudes, enforce frequent ablution ; loud are the praises of Arab writers of wells and water-brooks, and great is their foun- tain and pool worship, the dipping in which, if their miraculous cases are to be credited, effects more and greater cures than those worked by hydropathists at Grafenberg ; a Spaniard's idea of a paradise on earth, of a " garden," is a well-watered district ; irrigation is fertility and wealth, and therefore, as in the East, wells, brooks, and water-courses have been a constant source of bickering ; nay the very word rivality has been derived from these quarrel and law -suit engendering rivers, as the name given to the well for which the men of Gerah and Isaac differed, was called esek from the contention. The flow of waters cannot be mistaken ; the most dreary ste- rility edges the most luxuriant plenty, the most hopeless barren- ness borders on the richest vegetation ; the line of demarcation is perceived from afar, dividing the tawny desert from the ver- durous garden. The Moors who came from the East were fully sensible of the value of this element ; they collected the best CHAP, xii.] FOUNTAINS. 337 springs with the greatest care, they dammed up narrow gorges into reservoirs, they constructed pools and underground cisterns, stemmed valleys with aqueducts that poured in rivers, and in a word exercised a magic influence over this element, which they guided and wielded at their will ; their system of irrigation was far too perfect to be improved by Spaniard, or even destroyed. In those favoured districts where their artificial contrivances remain, Flora still smiles and Ceres rejoices with Pomona ; wherever the ravages of war or the neglect of man have ruined them, the gar- den has relapsed into the desert, and plains once overflowing with corn, gladness, and population, have shrunk into sad and silent deserts. The fountains, .of . Spaia, ..especially in the hotter and more Moorish districts, are numerous; they cannot fail to strike and please the stranger, whether they be situated in the public walk, garden, market-place, or private dwelling. Their mode of supply is simple : a river which flows down from the hills is diverted at a certain height from its source, and is carried in an artificial canal, which retains the original elevation, into a reservoir placed above the town which is to be served ; as the waters rise to their level, the force, body, and altitude of some of the columns thrown up are very great. In our cold country, where, except at Charing Cross, the stream is conveyed underground and unseen, all this gush of waters, of dropping diamonds in the bright sun, which cools the air and gladdens the sight and ear, is unknown. Again there is a waste of the " article/' which would shock a Chelsea Water- works Director, arid induce the rate-collector to refer to the fines as per Act of Parliament. The fondest wish of those Spaniards who wear long-tailed coats, is to imitate those gentry ; they are ashamed of the patriarchal uncivilised system of their ancestors much prefer the economical lead pipe to all this extravagant and gratuitous splashing they love a turncock better than the most Oriental Rebecca who comes down to draw water. The fountains in Spain as in the East are the meeting and greeting places of womankind ; here they flock, old and young, infants and grand- mothers. It is a sight to drive a water-colour painter crazy, such is the colour, costume, and groupings, such is the clatter of tongues and crockery ; such is the life and action ; now trip along a bevy of damsel Hebes with upright forms and chamois step 138 THIRST. [CHAP, xii. light yet true ; more graceful than opera-dancers, they come laughing and carolling along, poising on their heads pitchers modelled after the antique, and after everything which a Sevres jug is not. It would seem that to draw water is a difficult ope- ration, so long are they lingering near the sweet fountain's rim. It indeed is their al fresco rout, their tertulia ; here for awhile the hand of woman labour ceases, and the urn stands still ; here more than even after church mass, do the young discuss their dress and lovers, the middle-aged and mothers descant on babies and housekeeping ; all talk, and generally at once ; but gossip refresheth the daughters of Eve, whether in gilded boudoir or near mossy fountain, whose water, if a dash of scandal be added, becomes sweeter than eau sucree. The Iberians were decided water-drinkers, and this trait of their manners, which are modified by climate that changes not, still exists as the sun that regulates : the vinous Greek Athenseus was amazed that even rich Spaniards should prefer water to wine ; and to this day they are if possible curious about the latter's qua- lity ; they will just drink the wine that grows the nearest, while they look about and enquire for the best water ; thus even our cook Francisco, who certainly had one of the best places in Seville, and who although a good artiste was a better rascal qualities not incompatible preferred to sacrifice his interests rather than go to Granada, because this man of the fire had heard that the water there was bad. The mother of the Arabs was tormented with thirst, which her Hispano-Moro children have inherited ; in fact in the dog-days, of which here there are packs, unless the mortal clay be frequently wetted it would crumble to bits like that of a figure modeller. Fire and water are the elements of Spain, whether at an auto defe or in a church-stoop ; with a cigar in his mouth a Spaniard smokes like Vesuvius, and is as dry, combustible, and inflam- matory ; and properly to understand the truth of Solomon's remark, that cold water is to a thirsty soul as refreshing as good news, one must have experienced what thirst is in the exposed plains of the calcined Castiles, where coup de soleil is rife, and a gentleman on horseback's brains seem to be melting like Don Quixote's when Sancho put the curds into his helmet. It is just the country to send a patient to, who is troubled with hydro- CIIAP.-XII.J INTENSE HEAT. 139 phobia. u Those rayes," to use the words of old Howell, " that do but warm you in England, do roast you here ; those beams that irradiate onely, and gild your honey-suckled fields, do here scorch and parch the chinky gaping soyle, and put too many wrinkles upon the face of your common mother." Then, when the heavens and earth are on fire, and the sun drinks up rivers at one draught, when one burnt sienna tone per- vades the tawny ground, and the green herb is shrivelled up into black gunpowder, and the rare pale ashy olive-trees are blanched into the livery of the desert ; then, when the heat and harshness make even the salamander muleteers swear doubly as, they toil along like demons in an ignited salitrose dust then, in- deed, will an Englishman discover that he is made of the same material, only drier, and learn to estimate water; but a_good thirst is too serious an evil, too bordering on suffering, to be made, like an appetite, a matter of congratulation ; for when all fluids evaporate, and the blood thickens into currant jelly, and the nerves tighten up into the catgut of an overstrung fiddle, getting attuned to the porcupinal irritability of the tension of the mind, how the parched soul sighs for the comfort of a Scotch mist, and fondly turns back to the uvula-relaxing damps of Devon ! then, in the blackhole-like thirst of the wilderness, every mummy hag rushing from a reed hut, with a porous cup of brackish water, is changed by the mirage into a Hebe, bearing the nectar of the immortals ; then how one longs for the most wretched Venta, which heat and thirst convert into the Clarendon, since in it at least will be found water and shade, and an escape from the god of fire ! Well may Spanish historians boast, that his orb at the creation first shone over Toledo, and never since has set on the dominions of the great king, who, as we are assured by Senor Berni, " has the sun for his hat," tiene al sol por su sombrero; but humbler mortals who are not grandees of this solar system, and to whom a coup de soleil is neither a joke nor a metaphor, should stow away non-conductors of heat in the crown of their beavers. Thus Apollo himself preserved us. And oh ! ye our fair readers, who chance to run such risks, and value complexion, take for heaven's sake a parasol and an Alcarraza. This clay utensil as its Arabic name al Karaset implies is a porous refrigeratory vessel, in which water when placed in a current 140 SPANISH WATER-SELLERS. [CHAP. xn. of hot air becomes chilled by evaporation ; it is to be seen hung up on poles dangling from branches, suspended to waggons in short, is part arid parcel of a Spanish scene in hot weather and localities ; every posada has rows of them at the entrance, and the first thing every one does on entering, before wishing even the hostess Good morning, or asking permission, is to take a full draught : all classes are learned on the subject, and although on the whole they cannot be accused of teetotalism, they are loud in their praises of the pure fluid. The common form of praise is agua muy rica very rich water. According to their pro- ^ verbs, good water should have neither taste, smell, nor colour, " ni sabor, olor, ni color" which neither makes men sick nor in debt, nor women widows, " que no enferma, no adeuda, no enviuda" and besides being cheaper than wine, beer, or brandy, it does not brutalize the consumer, nor deprive him of his com- mon sense or good manners. As Spaniards at aUjtimes are as dry as the desert or a sponge, selling water is a very active business ; on every alameda and prado shrill voices of the sellers of drinks and mouth combustibles vendedores de combustibles de boca are heard crying, " Fire, fire, candela Water ; who wants water ?" agua ; guien quiere agua ? which, as these Orientals generally exaggerate, is described as masfresca que la nieve, or colder than snow ; and near them little Murillo-like urchins run about with lighted ropes like artil- lerymen for the convenience of smokers, that is, for every ninety and nine males out of a hundred ; while water-carriers, or rather retail pedestrian aqueducts, follow thirst like fire-engines ; the Aguador carries on his back, like his colleague in the East, a porous water-jar, with a little cock by which it is drawn out ; he is usually provided with a small tin box strapped to his waist, and in which he stows away his glasses, brushes, and some light azucarillos panales, which are made of sugar and white of egg, which Spaniards dip and dissolve in their drink. In the town, at particular stations water-mongers in wholesale have a shed, with ranges of jars, glasses, oranges, lemons, &c., and a bench or two on which the drinkers " untire themselves." In winter these are provided with an anafe or portable stove, which keeps a supply of hot water, to take the chill off the cold, for Spaniards, from a sort of dropsical habit, drink like fishes all the year round. CHAP, xii.] WANT OF CLEANLINESS. 141 Ferdinand the Catholic, on seeing- a peasant drowned in a river, observed, " that he had never before seen a Spaniard who had had enough water." At the same time it must be remembered that this fluid is applied with greater prodigality in washing their inside than their outside. Indeed, a classical author remarks that the Spaniards only learnt the use of hot water, as applicable to the toilette, from the Romans after the second Punic war. Their baths and thermae were destroyed by the Goths, because they tended to encourage effeminacy ; and those of the Moors were prohibited by the Gotho-Spaniards partly from similar reasons, but more from a religious hydrophobia. Ablutions and lustral purifications formed an article of faith with the Jew and Moslem, with whom " cleanliness is godliness." The mendicant Spanish monks, according to their practice of setting up a directly antagonist principle, considered physical dirt as the test of moral purity and true faith ; and by dining and sleeping from year's end to year's end in the same unchanged woollen frock, arrived at the height of their ambition, according to their view of the odour of sanctity, insomuch that Ximenez, who was him- self a shirtless Franciscan, induced Ferdinand and Isabella, at the conquest o v f Granada, to close and abolish the Moorish baths. They forbade not only the Christians but the Moors from using anything but holy water. Fire, not water, became the grand element of inquisitorial purification. The fair sex was warned by monks, who practised what they preached, that they should remember the cases of Susanna, Bath- sheba, and La Cava,~whose fatal bathing under the royal palace at Toledo led to the downfall of the Gothic monarchy. Their aqueous anathemas extended not only to public, but to minutely private washings, regarding which Sanchez instructs the Spanish confessor to question his fair penitents, and not to absolve the over-washed. Many instances could be produced of the prac- tical working of this enjoined rule ; for instance, Isabella, the favourite daughter of Philip II., his eye, as he called her, made a solemn vow never to change her shift until Ostend was taken. The siege lasted three years, three months, and thirteen days. The royal garment acquired a tawny colour, which was called Isabel by the courtiers, in compliment to the pious princess. Again, Southey relates that the devout Saint Eufraxia entered into a 142 CHOCOLATE. [CHAP. xii. convent of 1 30 nuns, not one of whom had ever washed her feet, and the very mention of a bath was an abomination. These obedient daughters to their Capuchin confessors were what G il de Avila termed a sweet garden of flowers, perfumed by the good smell and reputation of sanctity, " ameno jar din de flores^ olo- rosas por el buen odor y fa/na de santidad." Justice to the land of Castile soap requires us to observe that latterly, since the suppression of monks, both sexes, and the fair especially, have departed from the strict observance of the religious duties of their excellent grandmothers. Warm baths are now pretty gene- rally established in the larger towns. At the same time, the interiors of bedrooms, whether in inns or private houses, as well by the striking absence of glass and china utensils, which to English notions are absolute necessaries, as by the presence of French pie-dish basins, and duodecimo jugs, indicate that this " little damned spot " on the average Spanish hand, has riot yet been quite rubbed out. However hot the day, dusty the road, or long the journey, it has never been our fate to see a Spanish attendant use a single drop of water as a detergent, or, as polite writers say, " perform his ablutions ;" the constant habit of bathing and complete wash- ing is undoubtedly one reason why the French and other conti- nentals consider our soap-loving countrymen to be cracked. Under the Spanish Goths the Hemerobaptistse, or people who washed their persons once a day, were set down as heretics. The Duke of Frias, when a few years ago on a fortnight's visit to an English lady, never once troubled his basins and jugs ; he simply rubbed his face occasionally with the white of an egg, which, as Madame Daunoy records, was the only ablution of the Spanish ladies in the time of Philip IV. ; but these details of the dressing- room are foreign to the use made in Spain of liquids in kitchen and parlour. One word on chocolate, which is to a Spaniard what tea is to a Briton coffee to a Gaul. It is to be had almost everywhere, and is always excellent ; the best is made by the nuns, who are great confectioners and compounders of sweetmeats, sugarplums and orange-flowers, water and comfits, " Et tons ces mets Sucre's en pate, ou bien liquides, Dont estomacs devots furent toujours avides." It was long a disputed point whether chocolate did or did not CHAP, xii.] ICED DRINKS. 143 break fast theologically, just as happened with coffee among the riid Moslems. But since the learned Escobar decided that liquidum non rumpit jejunium, a liquid does not break fast, it has become the universal breakfast of Spain. It is made just liquid enough to come within the benefit of clergy, that is, a spoon will "almost stand up in it ; only a small cup is taken, una jicara, a Mexican word for the cocoa-nuts of which they were first made, generally with a bit of toasted bread or biscuit: as these jicaras have seldom any handles, they were used by the rich (as coffee- cups are among the Orientals) enclosed in little filigree cases of silver or gold ; some of these are very beautiful, made in the form of a tulip or lotus leaf, on a saucer of mother-o'-pearl. The flower is so contrived that, by a spring underneath, on raising the saucer, the leaves fall back and disclose the cup to the lips, while, when put down, they re-close over it, and form a protection against the flies. A glass of water should always be drunk after this chocolate, since the aqueous chasse neutralizes the bilious propensities of this breakfast of the gods, as Linnaeus called chocolate. Tea and coffee have supplanted chocolate in England and France ; it is in Spain alone that we are carried back to the breakfasts of Belinda and of the wits at Button's ; in Spain exist, unchanged, the fans, the game of ombre, tresillo, and the coche de colleras, the coach and six, and other social usages of the age of Pope and the ' Spectator/ Cold liquids in the hot dry summers of Spain are necessaries: not luxuries ; snow and iced drinks are sold. in the streets at prices so low as to be within the reach of the poorest classes ; the rich refrigerate themselves with agraz. This, the Moorish HacaraZ) is the most delicious and most refreshing drink ever devised by thirsty mortal ; it is the new pleasure for which Xerxes wished in vain, and beats the " hock and soda water," the " hoc erat in votis" of Byron, and sherry cobler itself. It is made of pounded unripe grapes, clarified sugar, and water ; it is strained till it becomes of the palest straw-coloured amber, and well iced. It is particularly well made in Andalucia, and it is worth going there in the dog-days, if only to drink it it cools a man's body and soul. At Madrid an agreeable drink is sold in the streets ; it is called Michi Michi, from the Yalencian Mitj e Mitj, " half and half," and is as unlike the heavy wet mixture of 144 ICED LEMONADE. [CHAP. XH. London, as a coal-porter is to a pretty fair Valenciana. It is made of equal portions of barley-water and orgeat of Chufas, and is highly iced. The Spaniards, among other cooling fruits, eat their strawberries mixed with sugar and the juice of oranges, which will be found a more agreeable addition than the wine used by the French, or the cream of the English, the one heats, and the other, whenever it is to be had, makes a man bilious in Spain. Spanish ices, helados, are apt to be too sweet, nor is the sugar well refined ; the ices, when frozen very hard and in small forms, either representing fruits or shells, are called quesos, cheeses. Another favourite drink is a weak bottled beer mixed with iced lemonade. Spaniards, however, are no great drinkers of beer, notwithstanding that their ancestors drank more of it than wine, which was not then either so plentiful or universal as at the pre- sent ; this substitute . cf grapeless countries passed from the Egyptians and Carthaginians into Spain, where it was excellent, and kept yell. The vinous Roman soldiers derided the beer- drinking Iberians, just as the French did the English before the battle of Agincourt. " Can sodden water barley-broth decoct their cold blood to such valiant heat ?" Polybius sneers at the magnificence of a Spanish king, because his home was furnished with silver and gold vases full of beer, of barley- wine. The genuine Goths, as happens everywhere to this day, were great swillers of ale and beer, heady and stupifying mixtures, accord- ing to Aristotle. Their archbishop, St. Isidore, distinguished between celia ceria, the ale, and cerbisia, beer, whence the pre- sent word cerbeza is derived. Spanish beer, like many other Spanish matters, has now become small. Strong English beer is rare and dear ; among one of the infinite ingenious absurdities of Spanish customs' law, English beer in barrels used to be pro- hibited, as were English bottles if empty but prohibited beer, in prohibited bottles, was admissible, on the principle that two fiscal negatives made an exchequer affirmative. WINES OF SPAIN. 145 CHAPTER XIII. Spanish Wines Spanish Indifference Wine-making Vins du Pays Local Wines Benicarld Valdepenas. THE wines of Spain deserve a chapter to themselves. ^ indeed is not less popular among us than Murillo, in spite of the num'Bers of bad copies of the one, which are passed off for un- doubted originals, and butts of the other, which are sold neat as imported. The Spaniard himself is neither curious in port, nor particular in Madeira ; he prefers quantity to quality, and loves flavour much less than he hates trouble ; a cellar in a private house, of rare fine or foreign wines, is perhaps a greater curiosity than a library of ditto books ; an hidalgo with twenty names simply sends out before his frugal meal for a quart of wine to the nearest shop, as a small burgess does in the City for a pint of porter. Local in every thing, the Spaniard takes the goods that the gods provide him, just as they come to hand ; he drinks the wine that grows in the nearest vineyards, and if there are none, then regales himself with the water from the least distant spring. It is so in everything ; he adds the smallest possible exertion of his own to the bounties of nature ; his object is to obtain the largest produce for the smallest labour ; he allows a life-conferring sun and a fertile soil to create for him the raw material, which he exports, being perfectly contented that the foreigner should return it to him when recreated by art and industry ; thus his wool, barilla, hides, and cork-bark, are im- ported by him back again in the form of cloth, glass, leather, and bungs. The most celebrated and perfect wines of the Peninsula are port and sherry, which owe their excellence to foreign, not to native skill, the principal growers and makers being Europeans, and their system altogether un-Spanish ; nothing can be more rude, antique, and unscientific, than the wine-making in those L 146 WINES OF SPAIN. [CHAP. xm. localities where no stranger has ever settled. But Spain is a land bottled up for antiquarians, and it must be confessed that the national process is very picturesque and classical ; no Ariadne revel of Titian is more glittering or animated, no bas- relief more classical in which sacrifices are celebrated " To Bacchus, who first from out the purple grape Crushed the sweet poison of misused wine." Often have we ridden through villages redolent with vinous aroma, and inundated with the blood of the berry, until the very mud was encarnadined ; what a busy scene ! Donkeys laden with panniers of the ripe fruit, damsels bending under heavy baskets, men with reddened legs and arms, joyous and jovial as satyrs, hurry jostling on to the rude and dirty vat, into which the fruit is thrown indiscriminately, the black-coloured with the white ones, the ripe bunches with the sour, the sound berries with those decayed ; no pains are taken, no selection is made ; the filth and negligence are commensurate with this carelessness ; the husks are either trampled under naked feet or pressed out under a rude beam ; in both cases every refining operation is left to the fermentation of nature, for there is a divinity that shapes our ends, rough hew them how we may. The wines of Spain, under a latitude where a fine season is a certainty, might rival those of France, and still more those of the Rhine, where a good vintage is the exception, not the rule. Their varieties are infinite, since few districts, unless those that are very elevated, are without their local produce, the names, colours, and flavours of which are equally numerous and varied. The thirsty traveller, after a long day's ride under a burning sun, when seated quietly down to a smoking peppery dish, is enchanted with the cool draught of these vins du pays, which are brought fresh to him from the skins or amphora jars ; he longs to transport the apparently divine nectar to his own home, and wonders that " the trade " should have overlooked such de- licious wine. Those who have tried the experiment will find a sad change for the worse come over the spirit of their dream, when the long-expected importation greets their papillatory organs in London. There the illusion is dispelled ; there to a cloyed fastidious taste, to a judgment bewildered and frittered away by variety of the best vintages, how flat, stale, and unprofitable CHAP, xm.] VALDEPENAS. 147 does this much-fancied beverage appear! The truth is, that its merit consists in the thirst and drinking vein of the -traveller, rather than in the wine itself. Those therefore of our readers whose cellars are only stocked with choice Bordeaux, Xerez, and Champagne, may sustain with resignation the absence of other sorts of Spanish grape juice. If an exception is to be made, let it be only in favour of Valdepenas and Manzanilla. The locaLwines may therefore be tossed off rapidly. The Navarrese drink their Peralta, the Basques their Chacolet, which is a poor vin ordinaire and inferior to our good cider. The Arragonese are supplied from the vineyards of Carinena ; the Catalans, from those of Sidges and Benicarlo ; the former is a rich sweet wine, with a peculiar aromatic flavour ; the latter is the well-known black strap, which is exported largely to Bor- deaux to enrich clarets for our vitiated taste, and as it is rich red, and full flavoured, much comes to England to concoct what is denominated curious old port by those who sell it. The fiery and acrid brandy which is made from this Benicarlo is sent to the bay of Cadiz to the tune of 1000 butts a year to doctor up worse sherry. The central provinces of Spain consume but little of these ; Leon has a wine of its own which grows chiefly near Zamora and Toro, and it is much drunk at the neighbouring and learned university of Salamanca, where, as it is strong and heady, it pro- motes prejudice, as port is said to do elsewhere. Madrid is supplied with wines grown at Tarancon, Arganda, and other places in its immediate vicinity, and those of the latter are fre- quently substituted for the celebrated Valdepenas of La Mancha, which was mother's milk to Sancho Panza and his two eminent progenitors ; they differed, as their worthy descendant informed the Knight of the Wood, on the merits of a cask ; one of them just dipped his tongue into the wine, and affirmed that it had a taste of iron ; the other merely applied his nose to the bung- hole, and was positive that it smacked of leather ; in due time when the barrel was emptied, a key tied to a thong confirmed the degustatory acumen of these connoisseurs. The red blood of this " valley of stones" issues with such abundance, that quantities of old wine are often thrown away, for the want of skins, jars, and casks into which to place the new. L 2 148 THE BEST VINEYARDS. [CHAP. xm. From the scarcity of fuel in these denuded plains, the primings of the vine are sometimes as valuable as the grapes. Even at Valdepenas, with Madrid for its customer, the wine continues to be made in an unscientific, careless manner. Before the French invasion, a Dutchman, named Muller, had begun to improve the system, and better prices were obtained ; whereupon the lower classes, in 1S08, broke open his cellars, pillaged them, and nearly killed him because he made wine dearer. It is made of a Burgundy grape which has been transplanted and transported from the stinted suns of fickle France, to the certain and glorious summers of La Mancha. The genuine wine is rich, full-bodied, and high-coloured. It will keep pretty well, and improves for four or five years, nay, longer. To be really enjoyed it must be drunk on the spot ; the curious in wine should go down into one of the cuevas or cave-cellars, and have a goblet of the ruby fluid drawn from the big-bellied jar. The wine, when taken to distant places, is almost always adulterated ; and at Madrid with a decoction of log- wood, which makes it almost poisonous, acting upon the nerves and muscular system. The best vineyards and bodegas or cellars are those which did belong to Don Carlos, and those which do belong to the Marques de Santa Cruz. One anecdote will do the work of pages in setting forth the habitual indifference of Spaniards, and the way things are managed for them. This very nobleman, who cer- tainly was one of the most distinguished among the grandees in rank and talent, was dining one day with a foreign ambassador at Madrid, who was a decided admirer of Valdepenas, as all judicious men must be, and who took great pains to procure it quite pure by sending down trusty persons and sound casks. The Marques at the first glass exclaimed, " What capital wine ! where do you manage to buy it in Madrid ?" " I send for it," was the reply, " to your administrador at Valdepenas, Anglice unjust steward, and shall be very happy to get you some." The wine is worth on the spot about 51. the pipe, but the land carriage is expensive, and it is apt, when conveyed in skins, to be tapped and watered by the muleteers, besides imbibing the disagreeable smack of the pitched pigskin. The only way to secure a pure, unadulterated, legitimate article, is to send up double quarter sherry casks ; the wine is then put into one, and CHAP. xm.J VALDEPENAS. 149 that again is protected by an outer cask, which acts as a pre- ventive guard, against gimlets, straws, and other ingenious con- trivances for extracting the vinous contents, and for introducing an aqueous substitute. It must then be conveyed either on mules or in waggons to Cadiz and Santander. It is always as well to send for two casks, as accidents in this pays de rimjjrevu constantly happen where wine and women are in the case. The importer will receive the most satisfactory certificates signed and sealed on paper, first duly stamped, in which the alcalde, the muleteer, the guardia, and all who have shared in the booty, will minutely describe and prove the accident, be it an upset, a breaking of casks, or what not. Very little pure Yaldepenas ever reaches England ; the numerous vendors' bold asser- tions to the contrary notwithstanding. As sherry is a subject of more general interest, it will be treated with somewhat more detail. 150 SHERRY. [CHAP, xiv CHAPTER XIV. Sherry Wines The Sherry District Origin of the Name Varieties of Soil Of Grapes Pajarete Rojas Clemente Cultivation of Vines- Best Vineyards The Vintage Amontillado The Capataz The Bo- dega Sherry Wine Arrope and Madre Vino A Lecture on Sherry in the Cellar at the Table Price of Fine Sherry Falsification of Sherry Manzanilla The Alpistera. SHERRY, a wine which requires more explanation than many of its consumers imagine, is grown in a limited nook of the Penin- sula, on the south-western corner of sunny Andalucia, which occupies a range of country of which the town of Xerez is the capital and centre. The wine-producing districts extend over a space which is included consult a map within a boundary drawn from the towns of Puerto de S a - Maria, Rota, San Lucar, Tribujena, Lebrija, Arcos, and to the Puerto again. The finest vintages lie in the immediate vicinity of Xerez, which has given therefore its name to the general produce. The wine, however, becomes inferior in proportion as the vineyards get more distant from this central point. Although some authors who, to show their learning, hunt for Greek etymologies in every word have derived sherry from BrjpoQ, dry, to have done so from the Persian Schiraz would scarcely have been more far-fetched. Sherris sack, the term used by Falstaff, no mean authority in this matter, is the precise seco de Xerez, the term by which the wine is known to this day in its own country ; the epithet seco, or dry the seek of old English authors, and the sec of French ones being used in contradistinction to the sweet malvoisies and muscadels, which are also made of the same grape. The wine, it is said, was first introduced into England about the time of Henry VII., whose close alliance with Ferdinand and Isabella was cemented by the marriage of his son with their daughter. It became still more popular among us under Elizabeth, when those who sailed under CHAP, xiv.] FOUR CLASSES OF SOIL. 151 Essex sacked Cadiz in 1596, and brought home the fashion of good " sherris sack, from whence," as Sir John says, " comes valour." The visit to Spain of Charles I. contributed to keep- ing up among his countrymen this taste for the drinks of the Peninsula, which extended into the provinces, as we find Howell writing from York, in 1645, for " a barrell or two of oysters, which shall be well eaten," as he assures his friend, " with a cup of the best sherry, to which this town is altogether addicted." During the wars of the succession, and those fatal quarrels with England occasioned by the French alliance and family compact of Charles III., our consumption of sherries was much diminished, arid the culture of the vine and the wine-making was neglected and deteriorated. It was restored at the end of last century by the family of Gordon, whose houses at Xerez and the Puerto most deservedly rank among the first in the country. The improved quality of the wines was their own recommendation ; but as fashion influences everything, their vogue was finally esta- blished by Lord Holland, who, on his return from Spain, intro- duced superlative sherry at his undeniable table. The quality of the wine depends on the grape and the soil, which has been examined and analysed by competent chemists. Omitting minute and uninteresting particulars, the first class and the best is termed the Albariza ; this whitish soil is composed of clay mixed with carbonate of lime and silex. The second sort is called Barras, and consists of sandy quartz, mixed with lime arid oxide of iron. The third is the Arenas, being, as the name indicates, little better than sand, and is by far the most widely extended, especially about San Lucar, Rota, and the back of Arcos ; it is the most productive, although the wine is gene- rally coarse, thin, and ill-flavoured, and seldom improves after the third year : it forms the substratum of those inferior sherries which are largely exported to the discredit of the real article. The fourth class of soil is limited in extent, and is the JBugeo, or dark-brown loamy sand which occurs on the sides of rivulets and hillocks. The wine grown on it is poor and weak ; yet all the inferior produces of these different districts are sold as sherry wines, to the great detriment of those really produced near Xerez itself, which do not amount to a fifth of the quantity exported. The varieties of the grape are far greater than those of the soil 152 VINES OF ANDALUCIA. [CHAP. xiv. on which they are grown. Of more than a hundred different kinds, those called Listan and Palomina Blanca are the best. The increased demand for sherry, where the producing surface is limited, has led to the extirpation of many vines of an inferior kind, which have been replaced by new ones whose produce is of a larger and better quality. The Pedro Ximenez, or delicious sweet-tasted grape which is so celebrated, came originally from Madeira, and was planted on the Rhine, from whence about two centuries ago one Peter Simon brought it to Malaga, since when it has extended over the south of Spain. It is of this grape that the rich and luscious sweet wine called Pajarete is made ; a name which some have erroneously derived from Pajaros, the birds, who are wont to pick the ripest berries ; but it was so called from the wine having been originally only made at Paxarete, a small spot near Xerez : it is now prepared every- where, and thus the grapes are dried in the sun until they almost become raisins, and the syrop quite inspissated, after that they are pressed, and a little fine old wine and brandy is added. This wine is extremely costly, as it is much used in the rearing and maturation of young sherry wines. There is an excellent account of all the vines of Andalucia by Rojas Clemente. This able naturalist disgraced himself by being a base toady of the wretched minion Godoy, and by French partisanship, which is high treason to his own country. Accord- ingly, to please his masters, he " contrasts the frank generosity, the vivacity, and genial cordiality of the Xerezanos, with the sombre stupidity and ferocious egotism of the insolent people on the banks of the Thames," by whom he had just before been most hospitably welcomed. This worthy gentleman wrote, how- ever, within sight of Trafalgar, and while a certain untoward event was rankling in his and his estimable patron's bosom. The vines are cultivated with the greatest care, and demand unceasing attention, from the first planting to their final decay. They generally fruit about the fifth year, and continue in full and excellent bearing for about thirty-five years more, when the produce begins to diminish both in quantity arid in quality. The best wines are produced from the slowest ripening grapes ; the vines are delicate, have a true bacchic hydrophobia, or antipathy to water are easily affected and injured by bad smells and rank CHAP. xiv.J THE VINTAGE. 153 weeds. The vine-dresser enjoys little rest ; at one time the soil must be trenched and kept clean, then the vines must be pruned, and tied to the stakes, to which they are trained very low ; anon insects must be destroyed ; and at last the fruit has to be gathered arid crushed. It is a life of constant care, labour, and ex- pense. Thejiighest qualities of flavour depend on the grape and soil, and as the favoured spots are limited, and the struggle and com- petition for their acquisition great, the prices paid are always high, and occasionally extravagantly so ; the proprietors of vine- yards are very numerous, and the surface is split and partitioned into infinite petty ownerships. Even the Pago de Macharnudo, the finest of all, the Clos de Vougeot, the Johannisberg of Xerez, is much subdivided ; it consists of 1200 aranzadas, one of which may be taken as equivalent to our acre, being, however, that quantity of land which can be ploughed with a pair of bullocks in a day of these 1200, 460 belong to the great house of Pedro Domecq, and their mean produce may be taken at 1895 butts, of which some 350 only will run very fine. Among the next most renowned pagos, or wine districts, may be cited Carrascal, Los Tercios, Barbiana alta y baja, Anina, San Julian, Mochiele, Carraola, Cruz del Husillo, which lie in the immediate termino or boundary of Xerez ; their produce always ensures high prices in the market. Many of these vineyards are fenced with canes, the arundo donax, or with aloes, whose stiff-pointed leaves form palisadoes that would defy a regiment of dragoons, and are called by the natives the devil's toothpicks ; in addition, the capataz del campo, or country bailiff, is provided, like a keeper, with- large and ferocious dogs, who would tear an intruder to pieces. The fruit when nearly mature is especially watched ; for, accord- ing to the proverb, it requires much vigilance to take care of ripe grapes and maidens Ninas y vinos, son mal de guardar. When the period of the vintage arrives, the cares of the pro- prietors and the labours of the cultivators and makers increase. The bunches are picked and spread out for some days on mattings ; the unripe grapes, which have less substance and spirit, are separated, and are exposed longer to the sun, by which they improve. If the berries be over-ripe, then the saccharine prevails, and there is a deficiency of tartaric acid. The selected 154 THE VINTAGE. [CHAP. xiv 4 grapes are sprinkled with lime, by which the watery and acetous particles are absorbed and corrected. A nice hand is requisite in this powdering, which, by the way, is an ancient African custom, in order to avoid the imputation of FalstaiF, " There is lime in this sack/' The treading out the fruit is generally done by night, because it is then cooler, and in order to avoid as much as possible the plague of wasps, by whom the half- naked operators are liable to be stung. On the larger vineyards there is generally a jumble of buildings, which contain every requisite for making the wine, as well as cellars into which the must or pressed grape juice is left to pass the stages of ferment- ation, and where it remains until the following spring before it is removed from the lees. When the new wine is racked off, all the produce of the same vineyard and vintage is housed together, and called a partido or lot. The vintage, which is the all-absorbing, all-engrossing moment of the year, occupies about a fortnight, and is earlier in the Rota districts than at Xerez, where it commences about the 20th of September; into these brief moments the hearts, bodies, and souls of men are condensed; even Venus, the queen of neigh- bouring Cadiz, and who during the other three hundred and fifty-one days of the year, allies herself willingly to Bacchus, is now forgotten. Nobles and commoners, merchants and priests, talk of nothing but wine, which then and there monopolises man, and is to Xerez what the water is at Grand Cairo, where the rising of the Nile is at once a pleasure and a profit. When the vintage is concluded, the custom-house officers take note in their respective districts of the quantity produced on each vine- yard, to whom it is sold, and where it is taken to ; nor can it be resold or removed afterwards, without a permit and a charge of a four per cent, ad valorem duty. It need not be said, that in a land where public officers are inadequately paid, where official honesty and principle are all but unknown, a bribe is all-sufficient ; false returns are regularly made, and every trick resorted to to facilitate trade, and transfer revenue into the pockets of the col- lectors, rather than into the Queen's treasury ; thus are defeated the vexations and extortions of commerce-hampering excise, to hate which seems to be a second nature in man all over the world. Commissioners excepted. In the first year a decided difference CHAP, xiv.] MANUFACTURE OF SHERRY. 155 takes place in these new wines ; some become bastos or coarse, others sour and others good ; those only which exhibit great delicacy, body, and flavour are called finos or fine ; in a lot of one hundred butts, rarely more than from ten to fifteen can be calculated as deserving this epithet, and it is to the high price paid for these by the almacenistas or storers of wines, that the grower looks for remuneration ; the qualities of the wines usually produced in each particular termino or district do not vary much ; they have their regular character and prices among the trade, by whom they are perfectly understood and exactly valued. These singular changes in the juice of grapes grown on the same vineyard, invariably take place, although no satisfactory reason has been yet assigned ; the chemical processes of nature have hitherto defied the investigations of man, and in nothing more than in the elaboration of that lusus naturae vel Bacchi, that variety of flavour which goes by the name of amontillado ; this has been given to it from its resemblance in dry ness and quality to the wines of Montilla, near Cordova : the latter, be it observed, are scarcely known in England at all, nor indeed in Spain, except in their own immediate neighbourhood, where they supply the local consumption. This amontillado, when the genuine production of nature, is very valuable, as it is used in correcting young Sherry wines, which are running over sweet ; L it is very scarce, since out of a hundred butts of mnofino, not more than five will possess its properties. Much of the wine which is sold in London as pure amontillado, is a fictitious pre- paration, and made up for the British market. All sherries are a matured mixture of grape juice ; champagne itself is a manufactured wine; nor does it much matter, provided a * palateable and wholesome beverage be produced. In all the lead- ; ing and respectable houses, the wine is prepared from grapes grown I in the district, nor is there the slightest mystery made in explaining the artificial processes which are adopted ; the rearing, educating and finishing,, as it were, of these wines, is a work of many years, and is generally intrusted to the Capataz, the chief butler, or head man, who very often becomes the real master ; this import- ant personage is seldom raised in Andalucia, or in any wine- growing districts of Spain ; he generally is by birth an Asturian, or a native of the mountains contiguous to Santander, from 156 THE CAPATAZ, [CHAP. xiv. whence the chandlers and grocers, hence called Los Montaneses, are supplied throughout the Peninsula. These Highlanders are celebrated for the length of their pedigrees, and the tasting properties of their tongues ; we have more than once in Estre- madura and Leon fallen in with flights of these ragged gentry, wending, Scotch-like, to the south in search of fortune ; few had shoes or shirts, yet almost every one carried his family parch- ment in a tin case, wherein his descent from Tubal respectable, although doubtful was proven to be as evident as the sun is at noon day. These gentlemen of good birth and better taste seldom smoke, as the narcotic stupifying weed deadens papillatory delicacy. Now as few wine-masters in Spain would give up the cigar to gain millions, the Capataz soon becomes the sole possessor of the secrets of the cellar ; and as no merchants possess vineyards of their own sufficient to supply their demand, the purchases of new wines must be made by this confidential servant, who is thus enabled to cheat both the grower and his own employer, since he will only buy of those who give him the largest com- mission. Many contrive by these long and faithful services to amass great wealth ; thus Juan Sanchez, the Capataz of the late Petro Domecq, died recently worth 300 ? OOOZ. Towards his latter end, having been visited by his confessor and some qualms of conscience, he bequeathed his fortune to pious and charitable uses, but the bulk was forthwith secured by his at- torneys and priests, whose charity began at home. As the chancellor is the keeper of the Queen's conscience, so the Capataz is the keeper of the bodega or the wine-store, which is very peculiar, and the grand lion of Xerez. The rich and populous town, when seen from afar, rising in its vine-clad knoll, is characterised by these huge erections, that look like the pent-houses under which men-of-war are built at Chatham. These temples of Bacchus resemble cathedrals in size and lofti- ness, and their divisions, like Spanish chapels, bear the names of the saints to whom they are dedicated, and few tutelar deities have more numerous or more devout worshippers ; but Romanism mixes itself up in everything of Spain, and fixes its mark alike on salt-pans and mine shafts, as on boats and bodegas. These huge repositories are all above ground, and are the antithesis of CHAP, xiv.] BODEGAS OF XEREZ. 157 our under-ground cellars. The wines of Xerez are thus found to ripen both better and quicker, as one year in a bodega inspires them with more life than do ten years of burial. As these wines are more capricious in the development of their character than young ladies at a boarding-school, the greatest care is taken in the selection of eligible and healthy situations for their educa- tion ; the neighbourhood of all offensive drains or effluvia is care- fully avoided, since these nuisances are sure to affect the delicately organised fluids, although they fail to damage the noses of those to whose charge they are committed ; and strange to say, in this land of contradictions, Cologne itself is scarcely more renowned for its twenty arid odd bad smells ascertained by Coleridge, than is this same tortuous, dirty, and old-fashioned Xerez. Here, as in the Rhenish city, all the sweets are bottled up for exportation, all the stinks kept for home consumption. The new bodegas are consequently erected in the newer portions of the town, in dry and open places ; connected with them are offices and workshops, in which everything bearing upon the wine trade is manufactured, even to the barrels that are made of American oak staves. The interior of the bodega is kept deliciously cool ; the glare outside is carefully excluded, while a free circulation of air is admitted ; an even temperature is very essential, and one at an average of 60 degrees is the best of all. There are more than a thousand bodegas registered at the custom house for the Xerez district \ the largest only belong to the first-rate firms, and mostly to Europeans, that is, to English and Frenchmen, A heavy capital is required, much patience and forethought, qualities which do not grow on these or on any hills of Spain. This necessity will be better understood when it is said, that some of these stores contain from one to four thousand butts, and that few really fine sherries are sent out of them until ten or twelve years old. Supposing, therefore, that each butt averages in value only 25/., it is evident how much time and investment of wealth is necessary. Sherry wine, when mature and perfect, is made up from many butts. The " entire," indeed, is the result of Xerez grapes, but of many different ages, vintages, and varieties of flavour. The contents of one barrel serve to correct another until the pro- posed standard aggregate is produced ; and to such a certainty 158 WINE-MIXING. [CHAP. xiv. has this uniform admixture been reduced, that houses are enabled to supply for any number of years exactly that particular colour, flavour, body, &c., which particular customers demand. This wine improves very much with age, gets softer and more aromatic, and gains both body and aroma, in which its young wines are deficient. Indeed, so great is the change in all respects, that one scarcely can believe them ever to have been the same : the baby differs not more from the man, nor the oak from the acorn. That Capataz has attained the object of his fondest wishes, who has observed in his compositions the poetical principles of Horace, the callida juncture the omne tulit punctum qui mis- cuit utile dulci ; this happy and skilful junction of the sweet and solid, should unite fulness of body, an oily, nutty flavour and bouquet, dry ness, absence from acidity, strength, durability, and spirituosity. Very little brandy is necessary, as the vivifying power of the unstinted sun of Andalucia imparts sufficient alcohol, which ranges from 20 to 23 per cent, in fine sherries, and only reaches about 12 in clarets and champagnes. Fine pure sherry is of a rich brown colour, but in order to flatter the conventional tastes of some English, " pale old sherry " must be had, and colour is chemically discharged at the expense of delicate aroma. Another absurd deference to British prejudice, is the sending sherries to the East Indies, because such a trip is found some- times to benefit the wines of Madeira. This is not only expensive but positively injurious to the juice of Xerez, as the wine returns diminished in quantity, turbid, sharp, and deteriorated in flavour, while from the constant fermentation it becomes thinner in body and more spirituous. The real secret of procuring good sherry is to pay the best price for it. at the best house, and then to keep the purchase for many years in a good cellar before it is drunk. To return to the Capataz. This head master passes this life of probation in tasting. He goes the regular round of his butts, ascertaining the qualities, merits, and demerits of each pupil, which he notes by certain marks or hieroglyphics. He corrects faults as he goes along, making a memorandum also of the date and remedy applied, and thus at his next visit he is enabled to report good progress, or lament the contrary. The new wines, after the fermentation is past, are commonly enriched with an arrope, or sort of syrup, which is found very much to encourage CHAP, xiv.] WINE IN CASK. 159 them. There are extensive manufactories of this cordial at San Lucar, and wherever the arenas, or sandy soil, prevails. The must, or new grape juice, before fermentation has commenced, is boiled slowly down to the fifth of its bulk. It must simmer, and requires great care in the skimming and not being burnt. Of this, when dissolved, the vino de color, the madre vino, or mother wine, is made, by which the younger ones are nourished as by mother's milk. When old, this balsamic ingredient becomes strong, perfumed as an essence, and very precious, and is worth from three to five hundred guineas a butt ; indeed it scarcely ever will be sold at all. All the principal bodegas have certain huge and time-honoured casks which contain this divine ichor, which inspires ordinary wines with generous and heroic virtues ; hence possibly their dedication of their tuns not to saints and saintesses, but to Wellingtons and Nelsons. It is from these reservoirs that distinguished visitors are allowed just a sip. Such a com- pliment was paid to Ferdinand VII. by Pedro Domecq, and the cask to this day bears the royal name of its assayer. Whatever quantity is taken out of one of these for the benefit of younger wines, is replaced by a similar quantity drawn from the next oldest cask in the cellar. After a year or two trial of the new wines, it is ascertained how they will eventually turn out ; if they go wrong, they are expelled from the seminary, and shipped off to the leathern-tongued consumers of Hamburgh or Quebec, at about 151. per butt. All the various forms, stages, and steps of education are readily ex- plained in the great establishments, among which the first are those of Domecq and John David Gordon, and nothing can exceed the cordial hospitality of these princely merchants ; whoever comes provided with a letter of introduction is carried off bodily, bags, baggage, and all, to their houses, which, considering the iniquity of Xerezan inns, is a satisfactory move. Then and there the guest is initiated into the secrets of trade, and is handed over to the Capataz, who delivers an explanatory lecture on vinology, which is illustrated, like those of Faraday, by experiments : tasting sherry at Xerez has, as Senor Clemente would say, very little in common with the commonplace customs of the London Docks. Here the swarthy professor, dressed somewhat like Figaro in the Barber of Seville, is followed by sundry jacketed 160 TASTING WINE. [CHAP. xiv. and sandalled Ganymedes, who bear glasses on waiters ; the lec- turer is armed with a long stick, to the end of which is tied a bit of hollow cane, which he dips into each butt ; the subject is begun at the beginning, and each step in advance is explained to the listening party with the gravity of a judicious foreman of a jury : the sample is handed round and tasted by all, who, if they are wise, will follow the example of their leader (on whom wine has no more effect than on a glass), by never swallowing the sips, but only permitting the tongue to agitate it in the mouth, until the exact flavour is mastered ; every cask is tried, from the young wine to the middle-aged, from the mature to the golden ancient. Those who are not stupefied by the fumes, cannot fail to come out vastly edified. The student should hold hard during the first trials, for the best wine is reserved until the last. He ascends, if he does not tumble off, a vinous ladder of excellence. It would be better to reverse the order of the course, and com- mence with the finest sorts while the palate is fresh and the judg- ment unclouded. The thirster after knowledge must not drink too deeply rrow, but remember the second ordeal to which he will afterwards be exposed at the hospitable table of the pro- prietor, whose joy and pride is to produce fine wine and plenty of it, when his friends meet around his mahogany. What a grateful offering is then made to the jovial god, by whom the merchant lives, and by whom the deity is now set from his glassy prison free ! What a drawing of popping corks, half consumed by time ! what a brushing away of venerable cobwebs from flasks binned apart while George the Third was king ! The delight of the worthy Amphitryon on producing a fresh bottle, exceeds that of a prolific mother when she blesses her husband with a new baby. He handles the darling decanter, as if he dearly loved the contents, which indeed are of his own making ; how the clean glasses are held up to the light to see the bright trans- parent liquid sparkle and phosphoresce within ; how the intelligent nose is passed slowly over the mantling surface, redolent with fragrancy ; how the climax of rapture is reached when the god- like nectar is raised to the blushing lips ! The wine suffices in itself for sensual gratification and for in- tellectuitl conversation : all the guests have an opinion ; what gentleman, indeed, cannot judge on a horse or a bottle ? When CHAP. xiv.J PRICES OF SHERRY. 161 differences arise, as they will in matters of taste, and where bottles circulate freely, the master-host decides " Tells all the names, lays down the law, Que $a est bon ; ah, goutez ga." There is to him a combination of pleasure and profit in these genial banquets, these noctes coenseque Deum. Many a good connection is thus formed, when an English gentleman, who rio\v, perhaps for the first time, tastes pure and genuine sherry. A good dinner naturally promotes good humour with mankind in general, and with the donor in particular. A given quantity of the present god opens both heart and purse-strings, until the tongue on which the magic flavour lingers, murmurs gratefully out, " Send me a butt of amontillado pasado, and another of seco reanejo, and draw for the cash at sight." An important point will now arise, what is the price ? That ever is the question and the rub. Pure genuine sherry, from ten to twelve years old, is worth from 50 to 80 guineas per butt, in the bodega, and when freight, insurance, duty, and charges are added, will stand the importer from 100 to 130 guineas in his cellar. A butt will run from 108 to 112 gallons, and the duty is 5s. 6d. per gallon. Such a butt will bottle about 52 dozen. The reader will now appreciate the bargains of those " pale " and " golden sherries " advertised in the English news- papers at 36s. the dozen, bottles included. They are maris expers, although much indebted to French brandy, Sicilian Marsala, Cape wine, Devonshire cider, and Thames water. The growth of wine amounts to some 400,000 or 500,000 arrobas annually. The arroba is a Moorish name, and a dry measure, although used for liquids ; it contains a quarter of a hundredweight ; 30 arrobas go to a bota, or butt, of which from 8000 to 10,000 of really fine are annually exported : but the quantities of so-called sherries, " neat as imported," in the manu- facture of which San Lucar is fully occupied, is prodigious, and is increasing every year. To give an idea of the extent of the growing traffic, in 1842 25,096 butts were exported from these districts, and 29,313 in 1843 ; while in 1845 there were exported 18,135 butts from Xerez alone, and 14,037 from the Puerto, making the enormous aggregate of 32,172 butts. Now as the M 162 ADULTERATION OF WINES. [CHAP. xiv. vineyards remain precisely the same, probably some portion of these additional barrels may not be quite the genuine produce of the Xerez grape : in truth, the ruin of sherry wines has commenced, from the numbers of second-rate houses that have sprung up, which look to quantity, not quality. Many thousand butts of bad Niebla wine are thus palmed off on the enlightened British public after being well brandied and doctored ; thus a conventional notion of sherry is formed, to the ruin of the real thing ; for even respectable houses are forced to fabricate their wines so as to suit the depraved taste of their consumers, as is done with pure clarets at Bordeaux, which are charged with Hermitages and Benicarlo. Thus delicate idiosyncratic flavour is lost, while headache and dyspepsia are imported ; but there is a fashion in wines as in physicians. Formerly Madeira was the vinous panacea, until the increased demand induced disreputable traders to deteriorate the article, which in the reaction became dishonoured. Then sherry was resorted to as a more honest and wholesome beverage. Now its period of decline is hastening from the same causes, and the average produce is becoming inferior, to end in disrepute, .and possibly in a return to the wines of Madeira, whose makers have learnt a lesson in the stern school of adversity. Be that as it may, the people at large of Spain are scarcely acquainted with the taste of sherry wine, beyond the immediate vicinity in which it is made ; and more of it is swallowed at Gibraltar at the messes, than in either Madrid, Toledo, or Sala- manca. Sherry is a foreign wine, and made and drunk by foreigners ; nor do the generality of Spaniards like its strong fla- vour, and still less its high price, although some now affect its use, because, from its great vogue in England, it argues civilization to adopt it. This use obtains only in the capital and richer seaports ; thus at inland Granada, not 150 miles from Xerez, sherry would hardly be to be had, were it not for the demand created by our travelling countrymen, and even then it is sold per bottle, and as a liqueur. At Seville, which is quite close to Xerez, in the best houses, one glass only is handed round, just as only one glass of Greek wine was in the house of the father of even Lucullus among the ancient Romans, or as among the modern ones is still done with Malaga or Yino de Cypro ; this single glass is drunk as a chasse, and being considered to aid digestion, is called the CHAP, xiv.] MANZANILLA. 1C3 yolpe medico, the coup de medecin ; it is equivalent, in that hot country, to the thimbleful of Cura^oa or Cognac, by which coffee is wound up in colder England and France. In Andalucia it was no less easy for the Moor to encourage the use of water as a beverage, than to prohibit that of wine, which, if endued with strength, which sherry is, must destroy health when taken largely and habitually, as is occasionally found out at Gibraltar. Hence the natives of Xerez themselves infinitely prefer a light wine called Manzanilla, which is made near San Lucar, and is at once much weaker and cheaper than sherry. The grape from whence it is produced grows on a poor and sandy soil. The vintage is very early, as the fruit is gathered before it is quite ripe. The wine is of a delicate pale straw colour, and is extremely wholesome ; it strengthens the stomach, without heating or inebriating, like sherry. All classes are passionately fond of it, since the want of alcohol enables them to drink more of it than of stronger beverages, while the dry quality acts as a tonic during the relaxing heats. It may be compared to the ancient Lesbian, which Horace quaffed so plentifully in the cool shade, and then described as never doing harm. The men employed in the sherry wine vaults, and who have therefore that drink at their command, seldom touch it, but invariably, when their work is done, go to the neighbouring shop to refresh themselves with a glass of " innocent " Manzanilla. Among their betters, clubs are formed solely to drink it, and with iced water and a cigar it transports the consumer into a Moslem's dream of paradise. It tastes better from the cask than out of the bottle, and improves as the cask gets low. The origin of the name has been disputed ; some who prefer sound to sense derive it from Manzana, an apple, which had it ^>een cider might have passed ; others connect it with the distant town of Mansanilla on the opposite side of the river, where it is neither made nor drunk. The real etymology is to be found in its striking resemblance to the bitter flavour of the flowers of camomile (manzanilla), which are used by our doctors to make a medicinal tea, and by those of Spain for fomentations. This flavour in the wine is so marked as to be at first quite disagree- able to strangers. If its eulogistic consumers are to be believed, the wine surpasses the tea in hygeeian qualities : none, say they. 164 THE ALPISTERA. [CHAP, xiv who drink it are ever troubled with gravel, stone, or gout. Certainly, it is eminently free from acidity. The very best Manzanilla is to be had in London of Messrs. Gorman, No. 16, Mark Lane. Since " Drink it, ye dyspeptics" was enjoined last year in the * Handbook/ the importation of this wine to Eng- land, which previously did not exceed ten butts, has in twelve short months overpassed two hundred ; a compliment delicate as it is practical, which is acknowledged by the author a drinker thereof with most profound gratitude. By the way, the real thing to eat with Manzanilla is the alpistera. Make it thus : To one pound of fine flour (mind that it is dry) add half a pound of double-refined, well-sifted, pounded white sugar, the yolks and whites of four very fresh eggs, well beaten together ; work the mixture up into a paste ; roll it out very thin ; divide it into squares about half the size of this page ; cut it into strips, so that the paste should look like a hand with fingers ; then dislocate the strips, and dip them in hot melted fine lard, until of a delicate pale brown ; the more the strips are curled up and twisted the better ; the alpistera should look like bunches of ribbons ; powder them over with fine white sugar. They are then as pretty as nice. It is not easy to make them well ; but the gods grant no excellence to mortals without much labour and thought. So Venus the goddess of grace was allied to hard-working Vulcan, who toiled and pondered at his fire, as every cook who has an aspiring soul has ever done. CHAP, xv.] SPANISH INNS. 165 CHAPTER XY. Spanish Inns : Why so Indifferent The Fonda Modern Improvements The Posada Spanish Innkeepers The Venta : Arrival in it Arrange- mentGarlic Dinner Evening Night Bill Identity with the Inns of the Ancients. HAVING thus, and we hope satisfactorily, discussed the eatables and drinkables of Spain, attention must naturally be next directed to those houses on the roads and in the towns, where these com- forts to the hungry and weary public are to be had, or are not to be had, as sometimes will happen in this land of " the unex- pected ;" the Peninsular inns, with few exceptions, have long been divided into the bad, the worse, and the worst ; and as the latter are still the most numerous and national, as well as the worst, they will be gone into the last. In few countries will the rambler agree oftener with dear Dr. Johnson's speech to his squire Boswell, " Sir, there is nothing which has been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced, as by a good tavern." Spain offers many negative arguments of the truth of our great moralist and eater's reflection ; the inns in general are fuller of entertainment for the mind than the body, and even when the newest, and the best in the country, are indifferent if compared to those which Englishmen are accustomed to at home, and have created on those high roads of the Continent, which they most frequent. Here few gentlemen will say with Falstaff, " Shall I not take mine ease in mine inn?" Badness of roads and discomforts of ventas cannot well escape the notice of those who travel on horseback and slowly, since they must dwell on and in them; whereas a rail whisks the passenger past such nuisances, with comet-like rapidity, and all things that are soon out of sight are quicker out of mind ; nevertheless, let no as- piring writer be deterred from quitting the highways for the byeways of the Peninsula, " There is. Sir," as Johnson again M 166 INNSWHY SO INDIFFERENT. [CHAP. xv. said to Boswell, " a good deal of Spain that has not been peram- bulated. I would have you go thither ; a man of inferior talents to yours, may furnish us with useful observations on that country." Why the public accommodations should be second-rate is soon explained. Nature and the natives have long combined to isolate still more their Peninsula, which already is moated round by the unsocial sea, and is barricadoed by almost impassable mountains. The Inquisition all but reduced Spanish man to the condition of a monk in a wall-enclosed convent, by standing sentinel, and keeping watch and ward against the foreigner and his perilous novelties ;* Spain thus un visited and un visiting, became arranged for Spaniards only, and has scarcely required conveniences which are more suited to the curious wants of other Europeans and strangers who here are neither liked, wished for, nor even thought of, by natives who seldom travel except on compulsion and never for amusement ; why indeed should they ? since Spain is paradise, and each man's own parish in his eyes is the central spot of its glory. When the noble and rich visited the provinces, they were lodged in their own or in their friends' houses, just as the clergy and monks were received into convents. The great bulk of the Peninsular family, not being overburdened with cash or fastidiousness, have long been and are inured to infinite inconveniences and negations ;' they live at home in an abundance of privations, and expect when abroad to be worse off; and they well know that comfort never lodges at a Spanish inn; as in the East, they cannot conceive that any travelling should be unattended by hardships, which they endure with Oriental resig- nation, as cosas de Espana, or things of Spain which have always been so, and for which there is no remedy but patient resignation ; * The very word Novelty has become in common parlance synonymous with danger, change, by the fear ot which all Spaniards are perplexed ; as in religion it is a heresy. Bitter experience has taught all classes that every change, every promise of a new era of blessing and prosperity has ended in a failure, and that matters have got worse : hence they not only bear the evils to which they are accustomed, rather than try a speculative ameliora- tion, but actually prefer a bad state of things, of which they know the worst, to the possibility of an untried good. Mas vale el mal conocido, que el Men on witnouL r>oveity ow/we sin u-voueuuuj i me icjjij, ^ "^ *^ ii - T- much the same. "Vaya Usted con Dios, y que no hay a Novedad /" "Go with God, your grace ! and may nothing new happen," says another, on starting his friend off on a journey. CHAP. xv. J CONTINENTAL INNS. 167 the bliss of ignorance, and the not knowing of anything better, is everywhere the grand secret of absence of discontent ; while to those whose every -day life is a feast, every thing that does not come up to their conventional ideas becomes a failure, but to those whose daily bread is dry and scanty, whose drink is water, every thing beyond prison-fare appears to be luxury. In Spain there has been little demand for those accommodations which have been introduced on the continent by our nomade countrymen, who carry their tea, towels, carpets, comforts and civilization with them ; to travel at all for mere pleasure is quite a modern invention, and being an expensive affair, is the most indulged in by the English, because they can best afford it, but as Spain lies out of their hackneyed routes, the inns still retain much the same state of primitive dirt and discomfort, which most of those on the continent presented, until repolished by our hints and guineas. In the Peninsula, where intellect does not post in a Britannic britzcka and four, the inns, and especially those of the country and inferior order, continue much as they were in the time of the Romans, and probably long before them ; nay those in the very vicinity of Madrid, "the only court on earth," are as classically wretched, as the hostelry at Aricia, near the Eternal City, was in the days of Horace. The Spanish inns, indeed, on the bye-roads and remoter districts, are such as render it almost unadvisable for any English lady to venture to face them, unless predetermined to go through roughing-it, in a way of which none who have only travelled in England can form the remotest idea : at the same time they may be and have been endured by even the sick and delicate. To - youth, and to all men in enjoyment of good health, temper, patience, and the blessing of foresight, neither a dinner nor a bed will ever be wanting, to both of which hunger and fatigue will give a zest beyond the reach of art ; and fortunately for travellers, all the Continent over, and particularly in Spain, bread and salt, as in the days of Horace, will be found to appease the wayfarer's bark- ing stomach, nor will he who after that sleeps soundly be bitten by fleas, " quien duerme bien^ no le picau las pulgas" The plea- sures of travelling in this wild land are cheaply purchased by these trifling inconveniences, which may always be much lessened by 168 THE FONDA. [CHAP, xv provision in brain and basket ; the expeditions teem with inci- dent, adventure, and novelty ; every day and evening present a comedy of real life, and offer means of obtaining insight into human nature, and form in after-life a perpetual fund of inter- esting recollections : all that was charming will be then remem- bered, and the disagreeable, if not forgotten, will be disarmed of its sting, nay, even as having been in a battle, will become a pleasant thing to recollect and to talk, may be twaddle, about. Let not the traveller expect to find too much ; if he reckons on finding nothing he will seldom be disappointed ; so let him not look for five feet in a cat, "no busces cinco pies al goto" Spain, as the East, is not to be enjoyed by the over-fastidious in the fleshly comforts : there, those who over analyze, who peep too much behind the culinary or domestic curtains, must not expect to pass a tranquil existence. First and foremost among these refuges for the destitute comes the fonda, the hotel. This, as the name implies, is a foreign thing, and was imported from Venice, which in its time was the Paris of Europe, the leader of sensual civilization, and the sink of every lie and iniquity. Its fondacco, in the same manner, served as a model for the Turkish fondack. The fonda is only to be found in the largest towns and principal seaports, where the presence of foreigners creates a demand and supports the establishment. To it frequently is attached a cafe, or " botil- lerid" a bottlery and a place for the sale of liqueurs, with a " neveria" a snowery where ices and cakes are supplied. Men only, not horses, are taken in at a fonda ; but there is generally a keeper of a stable or of a minor inn in the vicinity, to which the traveller's animals are consigned. The fonda is tolerably furnished in reference to the common articles with which the sober unindulgent natives are contented : the traveller in his comparisons must never forget that Spain is not England, which too few ever can get out of their heads. Spain is Spain, a truism which cannot be too often repeated ; and in its being Spain con- sists its originality, its raciness, its novelty, its idiosyncrasy, its best charm and interest, although the natives do not know it, and are every day, by a foolish aping of European civilization, paring away attractions, and getting commonplace, unlike them- selves, and still more unlike their Gotho-Moro and most pic- CHAP, xv.] THE FONDA. 169 turesque fathers and mothers. Monks, as we said in our preface, are gone, mantillas are going, the shadow of cotton versus corn has already darkened the sunny city of Figaro, and the end of all Spanish things is coming. Ay I de mi Espana I Thus m Spain, and especially in the hotter provinces, it is heat and not cold which is the enemy : what we call furniture carpets, rugs, curtains, and so forth would be a positive nuisance, would keep out the cool, and harbour plagues of vermin beyond endurance. The walls of the apartments are frequently, though simply, whitewashed : the uneven brick floors are covered in winter with a matting made of the " esparto" rush, and called an t( estera" as was done in our king's palaces in the days of Elizabeth : a low iron or wooden truckle bedstead, with coarse but clean sheets and clothes, a few hard chairs, perhaps a stiff- backed, most uncomfortable sofa, and a rickety table or so, com- plete the scanty inventory. The charges are moderate ; about two dollars, or 8,9. 6d., per head a-day, includes lodging, break- fast, dinner, and supper. Servants, if Spanish, are usually charged the half ; English servants, whom no wise person would take on the Continent, are nowhere more useless, or greater incumbrances, than in this hungry, thirsty, tealess, beerless, beefless land : they give more trouble, require more food and attention, and are ten times more discontented than their masters, who have poetry in their souls ; an aesthetic love of travel, for its own sake, more than counterbalances with them the want of material gross comforts, about which their pudding -headed four- full-meals- a-day attendants are only thinking. Charges are higher at Madrid, and Barcelona, a great commercial city, where the hotels are appointed more European-like, in accom- modation and prices. Those who remain any time in a large town bargain with the innkeeper, or go into a boarding-house, " casa de pupilos" or " de huespedes" where they have the best opportunity of learning the Spanish language, and of obtaining an idea of national manners and habits. This system is very common. The houses may be known externally by a white paper ticket attached to the extremity of one of the windows or balconies. This position must be noted ; for if the paper be placed in the middle of the balcony, the signal means only that lodgings are here to be let. Their charges are very reasonable. 170 CHANGES IN SPANISH INNS. [CHAP, xv Since the death of Ferdinand VII. marvellous improvements have taken place in some fondas. In the changes and chances of the multitudinous revolutions, all parties ruled in their rota- tion, and then either killed or banished their opponents. Thus royalists, liberals, patriots, moderates, &c., each in their turn, have been expatriated ; and as the wheel of fortune and politics went round, many have returned to their beloved Spain from bitter exile in France and England. These travellers, in many cases, were sent abroad for the public good, since they were thus enabled to discover that some things were better managed on the other side of the water and Pyrenees. Then and there suspicion crossed their minds, although they seldom will admit it to a foreigner, that Spain was not altogether the richest, wisest, strongest, and first of nations, but that she might take a hint or two in a few trifles, among which perhaps the accommodations for man and beast might be included. The ingress, again, of foreigners by the facilities offered to travellers by the increased novelties of steamers, mails, and diligences necessarily called for more waiters and inns. Every day, therefore, the fermentation occasioned by the foreign leaven is going on ; and if the national musto, or grape-juice, be not over-drugged with French brandy, something decent in smell and taste may yet be produced. In the seaports and large towns on the Madrid roads the twi- light of cafe and cuisine civilization is breaking from La belle France. Monastic darkness is dispelled, and the age of convents is giving way to that of kitchens, while the large spaces and ample accommodations of the suppressed monasteries suggest an easy transition into " first-rate establishments," in which the occupants will probably pay more and pray less. News, indeed, have just arrived from Malaga, that certain ultra-civilized hotels are actually rising, to be defrayed by companies and engineered by English, who seem to be as essential in regulating these novelties on the Continent as in the matters of railroads and steamboats. Rooms are to be papered, brick floors to be ex- changed for boards, carpets to be laid down, fireplaces to be made, and bells are to be hung, incredible as it may appear to all who remember Spain as it was. They will ring the knell of nationality ; and we shall be much mistaken if the grim old Cid, when the first one is pulled at Burgos, does not answer it himself CHAP, xv.] THE POSADA. 171 by knocking the innovator down. Nay, more, for wonders never cease ; vague rumours are abroad that secret and solitary closets are contemplated, in which, by some magical mechanism, sudden waters are to gush forth ; but this report, like others via Madrid and Paris telegraph, requires confirmation. As- suredly, the spirit of the Holy Inquisition, which still hovers over orthodox Spain, will long ward off these English heresies, which are rejected as too bad even by free-thinking France. The genuine Spanish town inn is called the posada, as being meant to mean, a house of repose after the pains of travel. Strictly speaking, the keeper is only bound to provide lodging, salt, and the power of cooking whatever the traveller brings with him or can procure out of doors ; and in this it differs from thefonda, in which meats and drinks are furnished. The posada ought only to be compared to its type, the khan of the East, and never to the inn of Europe. If foreigners, and especially Englishmen, would bear this in mind, they would save them- selves a great deal of time, trouble, and disappointment, and not expose themselves by their loss of temper on the spot, or in their note-books. No Spaniard is ever put out at meeting with neither attention nor accommodation, although he maddens in a moment on other occasions at the slightest personal affront, for his blood boils without fire. He takes these things coolly, which colder-blooded foreigners seldom do. The native, like the Oriental, does not expect to find anything, and accordingly is never surprised at only getting what he brings with him. His surprise is reserved for those rare occasions when he finds any- thing actually ready, which he considers to be a godsend. As most travellers carry their provisions with them, the uncertainty of demand would prevent mine host from filling his larder with perishable commodities ; and formerly, owing to absurd local privileges, he very often was not permitted to sell objects of consumption to travellers, because the lords or proprietors of the town or village had set up other shops, little monopolies of their own. These inconveniences sound worse on paper than in prac- tice ; for whenever laws are decidedly opposed to common sense and the public benefit, they are neutralized in practice ; the means to elude them are soon discovered, and the innkeeper, if he has not the things by him himself, knows where to get them. 172 THE POSADA. [CHAP. xv. On starting next day a sum is charged for lodging, service, and dressing the food : this is, called el ruido de casa, an indemnifica- tion to mine host for the noise, the disturbance, that the traveller is supposed to have created, which is the old Italian incommodo de la casa, the routing and inconveniencing of the house ; and no word can be better chosen to express the varied and never- ceasing din of mules, muleteers, songs, dancing, and laughing, the dust, the row, which Spaniards, men as well as beasts, kick up. The English traveller, who will have to pay the most in purse and sleep for his noise, will often be the only quiet person in the house, and might claim indemnification for the injury done to his acoustic organs, on the principle of the Turkish soldier who forces his entertainer to pay him teeth-money, to compensate for the damage done to his molars and incisors from masticating indifferent rations. Akin to the posada is the "parador" a word probably derived from Waradah, Arabice, " a halting-place ;" it is a huge caravan- sary for the reception of waggons, carts, and beasts of burden ; these large establishments are often placed outside the town to avoid the heavy duties and vexatious examinations at the gates, where dues on all articles of consumption are levied both for municipal and government purposes. They are the old sisa, a word derived from the Hebrew Sisah, to take a sixth part, and are now called el derecho de puertas, the gate-due ; and have always been as unpopular as the similar octroi of France ; and as they are generally farmed out, they are exacted from the peasantry with great severity and incivility. There is perhaps no single grievance among the many, in the mistaken system of Spanish political and fiscal economy, which tends to create and keep alive, by its daily retail worry and often wholesale injustice, so great a feeling of discontent and ill-will towards authority as this does ; it obstructs both commerce and travellers. The officers are, however, seldom either strict or uncivil to the higher classes, and if courteously addressed by the stranger, and told that he is an English gentleman, the official Cerberi open the gates and let him pass unmolested, and still more if quieted by the Vir- gilian sop of a bribe. The laws in Spain are indeed strict on paper, but those who administer them, whenever it suits their private interest, that is ninety- nine times out of a hundred, evade CHAP, xv.] SPANISH INNKEEPERS. 173 and defeat them ; they obey the letter, but do not perform the spirit, " se obedece^pero no se cumple ;" indeed, the lower classes of officials in particular are so inadequately paid that they are compelled to eke out a livelihood by taking bribes and little presents, which, as Backshish in the East, may always be offered, and will always be accepted, as a matter of compliment. The idea of a bribe must be concealed ; it shocks their dignity, their sense of honour, their "pundonor :" if, however, the money be given to the head person as something for his people to drink, the delicate attention is sacked by the chief, properly appreciated, and works its due effect. Another term, almost equivalent to the " posada," is the " meson" which is rather applicable to the inns of the rural and smaller towns, to the " hosterias" than to those of the greater. The " mesonero" like the Spanish " ventera" has a bad reputation. It is always as well to stipulate something about prices beforehand. The proverb says, " Por un ladron, pier den ciento en el meson 19 u Venter a hermosa, mal para la bolsa" " For every one who is robbed on the road, a hundred are in the inn." " The fairer the hostess, the fouler the reckon- ing." It is among these innkeepers that the real and worst rob- bers of Spain are to be met with 3 since these classes of worthies are everywhere only thinking how much they can with decency overcharge in their bills. This is but fair, for nobody would be an innkeeper if it were not for the profit. The trade of inn- keeping is among those which are considered derogatory in Spain, where so many Hindoo notions of caste, self-respect, purity of blood, etc., exist. The harbouring strangers for gain is opposed to every ancient and Oriental law of sacred hospitality. Now no Spaniard, if he can help it, likes to degrade himself; this accounts for the number of fondas in towns being kept by Frenchmen, Italians, Catalans, Biscayans, who are all foreigners in the eye of the Castilian, and disliked and held cheap ; accord- ingly the inn-keeper in Don Quixote protests that he is a Christian, although a ventero, nay, a genuine old one Cristiano vifjo rancio ; an old Christian being the common term used to distinguish the genuine stock from those renegade Jews and Moors who, rather than leave Spain, became pseudo- Christians and publicans. 174 THE VENTA. [CHAP, xv The country Parador, Meson, Posada, and Venta^ call it how you will, is the Roman stabulum, whose original intention was the housing of cattle, while the accommodation of travellers was secondary, and so it is in Spain to this day. The .accommo- dation for the beast is excellent; cool roomy stables, ample mangers, a never-failing supply of fodder and water, every comfort and luxury which the animal is capable of enjoying, is ready on the spot ; as regards man, it is just the reverse ; he must forage abroad for anything he may want. Only a small part of the barn is allotted him, and then he is lodged among the brutes below, or among the trusses and sacks of their food in the lofts above. He finds, in spite of all this, that if he asks the owner what he has got, he will be told that " there is every- thing," hay de todo, just as the rogue of a veniero informed Sancho Panza, that his empty larder contained all the birds of the air, all the beasts of the earth, all the fishes of the sea, a Spanish magnificence of promise, which, when reduced to plain English, too often means, as in that case, there is everything that you have brought with you. This especially occurs in the ventas of the out-of-the-way and rarely- visited districts, which, however empty their larders, are full of the spirit of Don Quixote to the brim ; and the everyday occurrences in them are so strange, and one's life is so dramatic, that there is much diffi- culty in " realising," as the Americans say ; all is so like being in a dream or at a play, that one scarcely can believe it to be actually taking place, and true. The man of the note-book and the artist almost forget that there is nothing to eat ; meanwhile all this food for the mind and portfolio, all this local colour and oddness, is lost upon your Spanish companion, if he be one of the better classes : he is ashamed, where you are enchanted ; he blushes at the sad want of civilization, clean table-cloth, and beef- steaks, and perhaps he is right : at all events, while you are raving about the Goths, Moors, and this lifting up the curtain of two thousand years ago, he is thinking of Mivart's ; and when you quote Martial, he and the ventero set you down as talking non- sense, and stark staring mad ; nay, a Spanish gentleman is often affronted, and suspects, from the impossibility to him, that such things can be objects of real admiration, that you are laugh- iag at him in your sleeve, arid considering his country as CHAP. xv. J THE VENT A. 175 Roman, African, or in a word, as un-European, which is what he particularly dislikes and resents. These ventas have from time immemorial been the subject of jests and pleasantries to Spanish and foreign wits. Quevedo and Cervantes indulge in endless diatribes against the roguery of the masters, and the misery of the accommodations, while Gongora compares them to Noah's ark ; and in truth they do contain a variety of animals, from the big to the small, and more than a pair, of more than one kind of the latter. The word venta is derived from the Latin vendendo, on the lucus a non lucendo principle of etymology, because provisions are not sold in it to travellers : old Covarrubias explains this mode of dealing as consisting " especially in selling a cat for a hare," which indeed was and is so usual a venta practice, that venderlo d uno goto por liebre has become in common Spanish parlance to be equiva- lent to doing or taking one in. The natives do not dislike the feline tribe when well stewed : no cat was safe in the Alhambra, the galley-slaves bagged her in a second. This venta trait of Iberian gastronomy did not escape the compiler of Gil Bias. Be that as it may, a venta, strictly speaking, is an isolated country inn, or house of reception on the road, and, if it be not one of physical entertainment, it is at least one of moral, and accordingly figures in prominent characters in all the personal narratives and travels in Spain ; it sharpens the wit of both hungry cooks and lively authors, and ingenii largitor venter is as old as Juvenal. Many of these ventas have been built on a large scale by the noblemen or convent brethren to whom the village or adjoining territory belonged, and some have at a distance quite the air of a gentleman's mansion. Their walls, towers, and often elegant elevations glitter in the sun, gay and promising, while all within is dark, dirty, and dilapidated, and no better than a whitened sepulchre. The ground floor is a sort of common room for men and beasts ; the portion appropriated to the stables is often arched over, and is very imperfectly lighted to keep it cool, so that even by day the eye has some difficulty at first in making out the details. The ranges of mangers are fixed round the walls, and the harness of the different animals suspended on the pillars which support the arches ; a wide door, always open to the road, leads into this great stable ; a small 1T6 RECEPTION AT THE VENTA. [CHAP. xv. space in the interior is generally left unincumbered, into which the traveller enters on foot or on horseback ; no one greets him ; no obsequious landlord, bustling waiter, or simpering chambermaid takes any notice of his arrival: the venter o sits in the sun smoking, while his wife continues "her uninterrupted chasse for " small deer " in the thick covers of her daughters' hair ; nor does the guest pay much attention to them ; he proceeds to a gibbous water-jar, which is always set up in a visible place, dips in with the ladle, or takes from the shelf in the wall an alcarraza of cold water ; refreshes his baked clay, refills it, and replaces it in its hole on the taller, which resembles the decanter stands in a butler's pantry : he then proceeds, unaided by ostler or boots, to select a stall for his beast, unsaddles and unloads, and in due time applies to the ventero for fodder ; the difference of whose cool reception contrasts with the eager welcome which awaits the traveller at bedtime : his arrival is a godsend to the creeping tribe, who, like the ventero^ have no regular larder ; it is not upstairs that he eats, but where he is eaten like Polonius ; the walls are frequently stained with the marks of nocturnal combats, of those internecine, truly Spanish guerrillas, which are waged without an Elliot treaty, against enemies who, if not exterminated, murder sleep. Were these fleas and French ladybirds unani- mous, they would eat up a Goliath ; but fortunately, like other Spaniards, they never act together, and are consequently con- quered and slaughtered in detail ; hence the proverbial expression for great mortality among men, mueren como chinches. Having first provided for the wants and comforts of his beast, for " the master's eye fattens the horse," the traveller begins to think of himself. One, and the greater side of the building, is destined to the cattle, the other to their owners. Immediately opposite the public entrance is the staircase that leads to the upper part of the building, which is dedicated to the lodgment of fodder, fowls, vermin, and the better class of travellers. The arrangement of the larger class of posadas and ventas is laid out on the plan of a convent, and is well calculated to lodge the greatest number of inmates in the smallest space. The ingress and egress are facilitated by a long orridor, into which the doors of the separate rooms open ; these are called " cuartos" whence our word " quarters" may be derived. There is seldom CHAP, xv.] ARRANGEMENT OF THE VENTA. 177 any furniture in them ; whatever is wanted, is or is not to be had of the host from some lock-up store. A rigid puritan will be much distressed for the lack of any artificial contrivance to hold water ; the best toilette on these occasions is a river's bank, but rivers in unvisited interiors of the Castiles are often rarer even than water-basins. It is, however, no use to draw nets in streams where there are no fish, nor to expect to find conveniences which no one else ever asks for, and those articles which seem to the foreigner to be of the commonest and daily necessity, are un- known to the natives. However, as there are no carpets to be spoiled, and cold water retains its properties although brought up in a horse-bucket or in the cook's brass cauldron, ablutions, as the albums express it, can be performed. What a school, after all, a venta is to the slaves of comforts, and without how many absolute essentials do they manage to get on, and happily ! What lessons are taught of good-humoured patience, and that British sailor characteristic of making the best of every occur- rence, and deeming any port a good one in a storm ! Complaint is of no use ; if you tell the landlord that his wine is more sour than his vinegar, he will gravely reply, " Senor, that cannot be, for both came out of the same cask." The portion of the ground-floor which is divided by the public entrance from the stables, is dedicated to the kitchen and accommodation of the travellers. The kitchen consists of a huge open range, generally on the floor, the ollas pots and culi- nary vessels being placed against the fire arranged in circles, as described by Martial, iven suck, will willingly, when left alone, let an infant die. The nurses of the Cuna were familiar with starvation, and even if their milk of human kindness were not dried up or soured, they have not the means of satisfying their hungry number. The proportion who died was frightful ; it was indeed an organized system of infanticide. Death is a mercy to the child, and a saving to the establishment ; a grown-up man's life never was worth much in Spain, much less that of a deserted baby. The exposure of children to immediate death by the Greeks and Romans, was a trifle less cruel than the protracted dying in these Spanish charnel-houses. This Cnna, when last we visited it, was managed by an inferior priest, who, a true Spanish unjust steward, misapplied the funds. He became rich, like Gil Bias's overseer at Yalladolid, by taking care of the pro- perty of the poor and fatherless ; his well-garnished quarters and portly self were in strange contrast with the condition of his wasted charges. Of these, the sick and dying were separated from the healthy ; the former were placed in a large room, once the saloon of state, whose gilded roof and fair proportions mocked the present misery. The infants were laid in rows on dirty mattresses along on the floor, and were left unheeded and unattended. Their large heads, shrivelled necks, hollow eyes, and wax wan figures, were shadowed with coming death. Called into existence by no wisli or fault of their own, their brief span was run out ere begun, while their mother was far aw r ay exclaiming, " When I have sufficiently wept for his birth, I will weep for his death." Those who were more healthy Ijty paired in cradles arranged along a vast room ; but famine was in their cheeks, need starved in their eyes, and their shrill cry pained the ear on passing the threshold ; from their being underfed, they were restless and ever moaning. Their existence has indeed begun with a sob, with El primer sollozo de la Cuna, the first sigh of the cradle, asRioja 226 FOUNDLING HOSPITAL AT SEVILLE. [CHAP. xvii. says, but all cry when entering the world, while many leave it with smiles. Some, the newly exposed, just parted from their mother's breast, having sucked their last farewell, looked plump and rosy ; they slept soundly, blind to the future, and happily unconscious of their fate. About one in twelve survived to idle about the hospital, ill clad, ill fed, and worse taught. The boys were destined for the army, the girls for domestic service, nay, for worse, if public report did not wrong their guardian priest. They grew up to be selfish and unaffectionate ; having never known what kind- ness was, their young hearts closed ere they opened ; " the world v/as not their friend, nor the world's law/' It was on their heads that the barber learned to shave, and on them were visited the sins of their parents ; having had none to care for them, none to love, they revenged themselves by hating mankind. Their occupation consisted in speculating on who their parents may be, and whether they should some day be reclaimed and become rich. A few occasionally are adopted by benevolent and childless persons, who, visiting the Cuna, take a fancy to an interesting infant ; but the child is liable ever after to be given up to its parents, should they reclaim it. Townshend men- tions an Oriental custom at Barcelona, where the girls when marriageable were paraded in procession through the streets, and any desirous of taking a wife was at liberty to select his object by " throwing his handkerchief." This Spanish custom still prevails at Naples. Such was the Cana of Seville when we last beheld it. It is now, as we have recently heard with much pleasure, admirably conducted, having been taken in charge by some benevolent ladies, who here as elsewhere are the best nurses and guardians of man in his first or second infancy, not to say of every inter- mediate stage. Our readers will concur in deeming that wight unfortunate who falls ill in Spain, as, whatever be his original complaint, it is too often followed by secondary and worse symptoms, in the shape of the native doctor ; and if the judgment passed by Spa- niards on that member of society be true, Esculapius cannot save the invalid from the crows ; the faculty even at Madrid are little in advance of their provincial colleagues, nay, often they are CHAP, xvii.] MEDICAL PRETENSIONS. U27 more destructive, since, being practitioners in the only court, the heaven on earth, they are in proportion superior to the medical men of the rest of the world, of whom of course they can learn nothing. They are, however, at least a century behind their brother professors of England. An unreasonable idea of self- excellence arises both in nations and in individuals, from having no knowledge of the relative merits of others, and from having few grounds or materials whereon to raise comparison ; it exists therefore the strongest among the most uninformed and those who mix the least in the world. Thus in spite of manifold deficiencies, some of which will be detailed, the self-esteem of these medical men exceeds, if possible, that of the military ; both have killed their " ten thousands." They hold themselves to be the first sabreurs, physicians, and surgeons on earth, and the best qualified to wield the shears of the Parcae. It would be a waste of time to' try to dispel this fatal delusion ; the well- intentioned monitor would simply be set down as malevolent, envious, and an ass ; for they think their ignorance the perfec- tion of human skill. Few foreigners can ever hope to succeed among them, nor can any native who may have studied abroad, easily introduce a better system : his elder brethren would make common cause against him as an innovator ; he would be sum- moned to no consultations, the most lucrative branch of practice, while the confessors would poison the ears of the women (who govern the men) with cautions against the danger to their souls, of having their bodies cured by a Jew, a heretic, or a foreigner, for the terms are almost convertible. Meanwhile, as in courts of justice and other matters in Spain, all sounds admirably on paper the forms, regulations, and system are perfect in theory. Colleges of physicians and sur- geons superintend the science, the professors are members of infinite learned societies, lectures are delivered, examinations are conducted, and certificates duly signed and sealed, are given. The young Galenista is furnished with a licence to kill, but what is wanting from beginning to end, to practitioner and patient, is life. The medical men know, nevertheless, every aphorism of the ancients by rote, and discourse as eloquently and plausibly on any case as do their ministers in Cortes. Both write capital theories and opinions extemporaneously. Their splendid lan- guage supplies words which seem to have cost thought. What 228 MEDICAL EDUCATION. [CHAP. xvn. is deficient is that clinical and best of education where the case is brought before the student with the corollary of skilful treat- ment : accidental deaths are consequently more common than cures. Dissection again is even now repulsive to their Oriental pre- judices ; the pupils learn rather by plates, diagrams, models, preparations, and skeletons, than from anatomical experiments on a subject. As among the ancients and in the East to this day an idea is prevalent among the masses in Spain, that the touch of a dead body pollutes ; nor is the objection raised by the clergy, that it savours of impiety to mutilate a form made in the image of God, yet exploded. It will be remembered by our medical readers, if we have any, that Vezalius, the father of modern anatomy, when at Madrid was demanded by the Inquisition from Philip II., to be burnt for having performed an operation. The king sent him to expiate his sin by a pilgrimage to the Holy Land ; he was shipwrecked, and died of starvation at Zante. Can it be wondered at, with such a theoretical education, that practice should continue to be antiquated, classical, and Oriental, and necessarily very limited ? In difficult cases of compound fracture, gun-shot wounds, the doctors give the patient up almost at once, although they continue to meet and take fees, until death relieves him of his complicated sufferings. In chronic cases and slighter fractures they are less dangerous; for as their pottering remedies do neither good nor harm, the struggle for life and death is left to nature, who sometimes works the cure. In acute di-eases and inflammations they seldom suc- ceed ; for however fond of the lancet, they only nibble with the case, and are scared at the bold decided practice of Englishmen, whereat they shrug up shoulders, invoke saints, and descant learnedly on the impossibility of treating complaints under the bright sun and warm air of Catholic Spain, after the fonnulse of cold, damp, and foggy, heretical England. Most Spaniards who can afford it have their family or bolster doctor, the Medico de Cabecera, and their confessor. This pair take care of the bodies and souls of the whole house, bring them gossip, share their puchero, purse, and tobacco. They rule the husband through the women and the nursery, nor do they allow their exclusive privileges to be infringed on. Etiquette is the life of a Spaniard, and often his death, since every one has heard CHAP, xvii.] FAMILY PHYSICIAN. 229 (the Spaniards swear it is all a French lie) that Philip III. was killed, rather than violate a form. He was seated too near the fire, and, although burning, of course as king of Spain the im- propriety of moving himself never entered his head, and when he requested one of his attendants to do so, none, in the absence of the proper officer whose duty it was to superintend the royal chair, ventured to take that improper liberty. In case of sudden emergencies among her Catholic Majesty's subjects, unless the family doctor be present, any other one, even if called in, gene- rally declines acting until the regular Esculapius arrives. An English medical friend of ours saved a Spaniard's life by chancing to arrive when the patient, in an apoplectic fit, was foaming at the mouth and wrestling with death ; all this time a strange doctor was sitting quietly in the next room smoking his cigar at the brasero, the chafing-dish, with the women of the family. Our friend instantly took 30 ounces from the sufferer's arm, not one of the Spanish party even moving from their seats. Thus Apollo preserved him ! The same medical gentleman happened to accidentally call on a person who had an inflammation in the cornea of the eye : on questioning he found that many consulta- tions had been previously held, at which no determination was come to until at the last, when sea-bathing was prescribed, with a course of asses' milk and Chiclana snake-broth ; our heretical friend, who lacked the true faith, just touched the diseased part with caustic. When this application was reported at the next consultation, the native doctors all crossed themselves with horror and amazement, which was increased when the patient recovered in a week. As a general rule at the first visit, they look as wise as pos- sible, shake their heads before the women, and always magnify the complaint, which is a safe proceeding all over the world, since all physicians can either cure or kill the patient ; in the first event they get greater credit and reward, while in the other alternative, the disease, having been beyond the reach of art, bears the blame. The medicos exhibit considerable ingenuity in prolonging an apparent necessity for a continuance of their visits. A common interest induces them to pull together a rare exception in Spain and play into each other's hands. The family doctor, whenever appearances will in anywise justify him, R 230 MEDICAL COSTUME. [CHAP. xvu. becomes alarmed, and requires a consultation, a Junta. "What any Spanish Junta is in affairs of peace or war need not be ex- plained ; and these are like the rest, they either do nothing, or what they do do, is done badly. At these meetings from three to seven Medicos de apelacion, consulting physicians, attend, or more, according to the patient's purse : each goes to the sick man, feels his pulse, asks him some questions, and then retires to the next room to consult, generally allowing the invalid the benefit of hearing what passes. The Protomedico, or senior, takes the chair ; and while all are lighting their cigars, the family doctor opens the case, by stating the birth, parentage, and history of the patient, his constitution, the complaint, and the medicines hitherto prescribed. The senior next rises, and gives his opinion, often speaking for half an hour ; the others follow in their rotation, and then the Protomedico, like a judge, sums up, going over each opinion with comments : the usual termination is either to confirm the previous treatment, or make some insignificant alteration : the only certain thing is to ap- point another consultation for the next day, for which the fees are heavy, each taking from three to five dollars. The con- sultation often lasts many hours, and becomes at last a chronic complaint. It must be said, in justice to these able practitioners, that as a body they are careful in their dress : external appearance, not to say finery in apparel, raises in the eyes of the many, a profession which here is of uncertain social standing. On the same prin- ciple how careful is the costume, how brilliant are the shirt- studs of foreign fiddlers when in England ! The worthy Anda- lucian doctor of our Spanish family, and an efficient one, as two of his patients now at rest could testify, never paid a visit except when gaily attired. So the Matador , when he enters the arena to kill the bull, is clad as a first-rate dandy majo. This attention to person arises partly from the Moro-Ibero love of ostentation, and partly from sound Galenic principles and a high sense of pro- fessional duty. The ancient authorities enforced on the prac- titioner an attention to everything which created cheerful im- pressions, in order that he might arrive at the patient's pillow like a messenger of good tidings, and as a minister of health, not of death. They held that a grave costume might suggest un- CHAP, xvii.] PRESCRIPTIONS. 231 pleasant associations to the sick man. Raven-coloured undertaker tights, and a funereal, cadaverous look to match, are harbingers of blue devils and black crape, which no man, even when in blessed health, contemplates with comfort ; while the effect of such a fades hippocratica staring in the face of a poor devil whose life is despaired of, must be fatal. The prescriptions of these well-dressed gentlemen are some- what more old-fashioned than their coats. Their grand recipe in the first instance is to do nothing beyond taking the fee and leaving nature alone, or, as the set phrase has it, dejar a la naturaleza. The young and those whose constitutions are strong and whose complaints are weak, do well under the healing in- fluence of their kind nurse Nature, and recover through her vis medicatrix, which, if not obstructed by art, everywhere works wonderful cures. The Sangrado will say that a Spanish man or woman is more marvellously made than a clock, inasmuch as his or her machinery has a power in itself to regulate its own motions, and to repair accidents ; and therefore the watchmaker who is called in, need not be in a hurry to take it to pieces when a little oiling and cleaning may set all to rights. The remedies, when the proper time for their application arrives, are simple, and are sought for rather among the vegetables of the earth's surface than from the minerals in its bowels. The external recipes con- sist chiefly of papers smeared with lard, applied to the abdomen, sinapisms and mustard poultices to the feet, fomentations of marsh-mallows or camomile flowers, and the aid of the curate. The internal remedies, the tisanes, the Leches de Almendras, de Burras, decoctions of rice, and so forth, succeed each other in such regular order, that the patient scholar has nothing to do but repeat the medical passages in Horace's ' Satires.' In no coun- try, however, can all the sick be always expected to recover even then, since " Para todo hay remedio, sino para la muertd* " There is a remedy for everything except death." If by chance the patient dies, the doctor and the disease bear the blame. Perhaps the old Iberian custom was the safest ; then the sick were exposed outside their doors, and the advice of casual passengers was asked, whose prescriptions were quite as likely to answer as images, relics, snake-soup, or milk of almonds or R 2 232 DRUGGISTS. [CHAP. xvn. " And, doctor, do you really think That asses' milk I ought to drink ? It cured yourself, I grant, is true, But then 't was mother's milk to you." Nor, if the doctors knew how to prescribe them, are the nicer and most efficacious remedies, the preparations of mo- dern chemical science, to be procured in any except the very largest towns; although, as in Romeo's apothecary, " the needy " shelves are filled with empty boxes " to make a show." The trade of a druggist is anything but free, and the numbers are limited ; none may open a Botica without a strict exa- mination and licence ; although, of course, this is to be had for money. None may sell any potent medicine, except according to the prescription of some local medical man ; everything is a monopoly. The commonest drugs are often either wanting or grossly adulterated, but, as in their arsenals and larders, no dis- penser will admit such destitution ; hay de todo, I have every thing, swears he, and gallantly makes up the prescription simply by substituting other ingredients ; and as the correct ones nine times out of ten are harmless, no great injury is sustained. There is nothing new in this, for Quevedo, in his Zahurdas de Pluton, or Satan's Pigsties, introduces a yellow-faced bilious judge scourging Spanish apothecaries for doing exactly the same, " Hence your shops," quoth he, for he both preached and flogged, " are arsenals of death, whose ministers here get their pills (balls rather) which banish souls from the earth ;" but these and other things have been long done with impunity, as Pliny said, no physician was ever hung for murder. One ad- vantage of general distrust in drugs and doctors is, that the great masses of the people think very little about them or their com- plaints : thus they escape all fancied and imaginary complaints, which, if indulged in, become chronic, and more difficult to cure than those afflicting the body for who can minister to a mind diseased ? Again, from this want of confidence in remedies, very little physic at all is taken ; owing to this limited demand, druggists' shops are as rare in Spain as those of booksellers. No red, green, or blue bottles illuminate the streets at night, and there are more of these radiant orbs in the Fore street of the capital of the west of England, than in the whole capital of CHAP, xvii.] SNAKE-BROTH. 233 the Spains, albeit with a population six times greater. It is true that, at Madrid, feeding on plum-pudding, diluted with sour cider and clotted cream, is not habitual. Many of the prescriptions of Spain are local, and consist of some particular spring, some herb, some animal, or some parti- cular air, or place, or bath, is recommended, which, however, is said to be very dangerous, unless some resident local medico be first consulted. One example is as good as a thousand : near Cadiz is Chiclana, to which the faculty invariably transport those patients whom they cannot cure, that is, about ninety-five in the hundred; so in chronic complaints sea-bathing there, is prescribed, with a course of asses' milk ; and if that fail, then a broth made of a long harmless snake, which abounds in the aromatic wastes near Barrosa. We have forgotten the generic name of this valuable reptile of Esculapius, one of which our naturalists should take alive, and either breed from it in the Regent's Park, or at least investigate his comparative anatomy with those exquisite vipers which make, as we have shown, such delicious pork at Montanches. We cannot refrain from giving one more prescription. Many of the murders in Spain should rather be called homicides, being free from malice prepense, and caused by the readiness of the national cuchillo, with which all the lower classes are armed like wasps; it is thus always at hand, when the blood is most on fire, and before any refrigeratory process commences. Thus, where an unarmed Englishman closes his fist, a Spaniard opens his knife. This rascally instrument becomes fatal in jealous broils, when the lower classes light their anger at the torch of the Furies, and prefer using, to speaking daggers. Then the thrust goes home ; and however unskilled the regular Sangrados may be in anatomy and handling the scalpel, the universal people know exactly how to manage their knife and where to plant its blow ; nor is there any mistake, for the wound, although not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church door, " 5 t will serve." It is usually given after the treacherous fashion of their Oriental and Iberian ancestors, and if possible by a stab behind, and " under the fifth rib ;" and " one blow" is enough. The blade, like the cognate Arkansas or Bowie knife of the Yankees, will " rip up a man right away," or drill him until a surgeon can see through his body. The 234 SALVE FOR KNIFE-CUTS. [CHAP. xvn. number killed on great religious and other festivals, exceeds those of most Spanish battles in the field, although the occur- rence is scarcely noticed in the newspapers, so much is it a matter of course ; but crimes which call forth a second edition and double sheet in our papers, are slurred over on the Continent, for foreigners conceal what we most display. In minor cases of flirtation, where capital punishment is not called for, the offending party just gashes the cheek of the pec- cant one, and suiting the word to the action observes, " ya estas senalaa" "Now you are marked." This is precisely winkel quarte, the gash in the cheek, which is the only salve for the touchy honour of a German student, when called ein dummer junge, a stupid youth : " Und ist die quart gesessen So ist der touche vergessen." Again, " Mira que te pego, mira que te matoj* " Mind I don't strike thee mind I don't kill thee ;" are playful fondling ex- pressions of a Maja to a Ma jo. When this particular gash is only threatened, the Seville phrase was, " Mira que te pinto un jabeque ;" " Take care that I don't draw you a xebeck" (the sharp Mediterranean felucca). " They jest at wounds who never felt a scar," but whenever this jabeque has really been inflicted, the patient, ashamed of the stigma, and not having the face to show himself or herself, is naturally anxious to recover a good character and skin, which only one cosmetic, one sovereign panacea, can effect. This in Philip IV.'s time was cat's grease, which then removed such superfluous marks ; while Don Quixote considered the oil of Apariccio to be the only cure for scratches inflicted by female or feline claws. In process of time, as science advanced, this was superseded by Unto del hombre, or man's grease. Our estimable friend Don Nicolas Molero, a surgeon in high practice at Seville, assured us that previously to the French invasion he had often prepared this cataleptic specific, which used to be sold for its weight in gold, until, having been adulterated by unprincipled empirics, it fell into disrepute. The receipt of the balsam of Fierabras has puzzled the modern commentators of Don Quixote, but the kindness of Don Nicolas furnished us with the ingredients CHAP, xvii.] THE PARISH DOCTOR. 235 of this pommade divine, or rather mortale. " Take a man in full health who has been just killed, the fresher the better, pare off the fat round the heart, melt it over a slow fire, clarify, and put it away in a cool place for use." The multitudinous church ceremonies and holidays in Spain, which bring crowds together, combined with the sun, wine, and women, have always ensured a supply of fine subjects. In Spain, as elsewhere, the doctor mania is an expensive amusement, which the poor and more numerous class, especially in rural localities, seldom indulge in. Like their mules, they are rarely ill, and they only take to their beds to die. They have, it is true, a parish doctor, to whom certain districts are apportioned ; when he in his turn succumbs to death, or is otherwise removed, the vacancy is usually announced in the newspapers, and a new functionary is often advertised for. His trifling salary is made up of payments in money and in kind, so much in corn and so much in cash ; the leading principle is cheapness, and, as in our new poor-law, that proficient is pre- ferred, who will contract to do for the greatest number at the smallest charge. His constituents decline sometimes to place full confidence in his skill or alacrity : they oftener do consult the barber, the quack, or curandero ; for there is generally in orthodox Spain some charlatan wherever sword, rosary, pen, or lancet is to be wielded. The nostrums, charms, relics, incan- tations, &c., to which recourse is had, when not mediaeval, are scarcely Christian ; but the spiritual pharmacoposia of this land of Figaro is far too important to form the tail-piece of any chapter. 236 SPIRITUAL REMEDIES FOR THE BODY. [CHAP. xvin. CHAPTER XVIII. Spanish Spiritual Remedies for the Body Miraculous Relics Sanative Oils Philosophy of Relic Remedies Midwifery and the Cinta of Tor- tosa Bull of Crusade. THE Beverend Dr. Fernando Castillo, an esteemed Spanish author and teacher, remarks, in his luminous Life of St. Dome- nick, that Spain has been so bountifully provided by heaven with fine climate, soil, and extra number of saints, that his countrymen are prone to be idle and to neglect such rare advantages. Cer- tainly they may not dig and delve so deeply as is done in lands less favoured, but the reproach of omitting to call on Hercules to do their work, or of not making the most of Santiago in any bodily dilemma, is a somewhat too severe reproach : nowhere in case of sickness have the saving virtues of relics, and the adjurations of holy monks, been more implicitly relied on. As our learned readers well know, the medical practice of the ancients was, as that of the Orientals still is, more peculiar than scientific. When disease was thought to be a divine punishment for sin, it was held to be wicked to resist by calling in human aid : thus Asa was blamed, and thus Moslems and Spaniards resign themselves to their fate, distrusting, and very properly, their medical men : " Am I a god, to kill or make alive ?" In the large towns, in these days of progress, some patients may " suffer a recovery" according to European practice; but in the country and remote villages, and we speak from repeated per- sonal experience, the good old reliance on relics and charms is far from exploded ; and however Dr. Sangrado and Philip III., whose decrees on medical matters yet adorn the Spanish statutes at large, deplore the introduction of perplexing chemistry, mineral therapeuticals still remain a considerable dead letter, as the church has transferred the efficacy of faith from spiritual to temporal concerns, and gun-shot wounds. Even Ponz, the Lysons CHAP, xviii.] MIRACULOUS SANATIVE OILS. 237 of Spain, and before the Inquisition was abolished, ventured to express surprise at the number of images ascribed to St. Luke, who, says he, was not a sculptor, but a physician, whence possibly their sanative influence. The old Iberians were great herbalist doctors ; thus those who had a certain plant in their houses, were protected, as a blessed palm branch now wards off lightning. They had also a drink made of a hundred herbs, and hence called centum herbce^ a bebida de cien herbas, which, like Morison's vegetable pills, cured every possible disease, and was so palatable that it was drunk at banquets, which modern physic is not ; moreover, according to Pliny, they cured the gout with flour, and relieved elongated uvulas by hanging purslain round the patient's throat. So now the curas y curanderos, country curates and quacks, furnish charms and incantations, just as Ulysses stopped his bleeding by cantation : a medal of Santiago cures the ague, a handkerchief of the Virgin the ophthalmia, a bone of San Magin answers all the purposes of mercury, a scrap of San Frutos supplied at Segovia the loss of common sense ; the Virgin of Ona destroyed worms in royal Infantes, and her sash at Tor- tosa delivers royal Infantas. Every Murcian peasant believes that no disease can affect him or his cattle, if he touches them vvith the cross of Caravaca, which angels brought from heaven and placed on a red cow. When we were last at Manresa, the worthy man who showed the cave in which Loyola the founder of the Jesuits did penance for a year, increased an honest liveli- hood by the sale of its pulverized stones, that were swallowed by the faithful in cases in which an English doctor would prescribe Dover's or James's powders. Every province, not to say parish, has its own tutelar saint and relic, which are much honoured and resorted to in their local jurisdiction, and very little thought of out of it, their power to cure having been apparently granted to them by Santiago, as a commission to commit is by Queen Victoria to a magistrate, whose authority does not extend beyond the county bounds. Zaragoza was admirably provided : a portion of the liver of Santa Engracia was anciently resorted to, in cases where blue pill would be beneficial ; the oil of her lamps, which never smoked the ceilings, cured lamparones, or tumours in the neck, while that which burnt before the Virgen del Pilar., or the image of the Virgin which came down from heaven on a pillar, 238 COSTUME OF CONVALESCENTS. [CHAP. xvm. restored lost legs ; Cardinal de Retz mentions in his Memoirs having seen a man whose wooden substitutes became needless when the originals grew again on being rubbed with it ; and this portent was long celebrated by the Dean and Chapter, as well it deserved, by an especial holiday, for Macassar oil cannot do much more. This graven image is at this moment the object of popular adoration, and disputes even with the worship of tobacco and money : countless are the mendicants, the halt, blind, and the lame, who cluster around her shrine, as the equally afflicted ancients, with whom physicians were in vain, did around that of Minerva ; and it must be confessed that the cures worked are almost incredible. It may be said that all this is a raking up of remnants of mediaeval superstition and darkness, and it is probable that the medical men in Madrid and the larger towns, and especially those who have studied at Paris, do not place implicit confidence in these spiritual, nor indeed in any other purely Spanish reme- dies ; but their tried medicinal properties are set forth at length in scores of Spanish county and other histories which we have the felicity to possess, all of which have passed the scrutinizing ordeal of clerical censors, and have been approved of as con- taining nothing contrary to the creed of the Church of Rome or good customs ; nor can it be permitted that a church which professes to be always one, the same, and the only true one, should at its own convenience " turn its back on itself, " arid deny its own drugs and doctrines. Nothing is set down here which was not perfectly notorious under the reign of Ferdinand VII. ; and whatever the doctors of physic or theology may now disbelieve in Spain, more reliance is still placed, in the rural districts, where foreign civilization has not penetrated, on miracles than on medicines. We have often and often seen little children in the streets dressed like Franciscan monks Cupids in cowls whose pious parents had vowed to clothe them in the robes of this order, provided its sainted founder preserved their darlings during measles or dentition. Nothing was more common than that women, nay, ladies in good society, should appear for a year in a particular religious dress, called el habito, or with some reli- gious badge on their sleeves in token of similar deliverance. CHAP, xvin.] CURE OF SOULS. 239 One instance in our time amused all the tertulias of Seville, who maliciously attributed the sudden relief which a fair high-born un- married invalid experienced from an apparent dropsical complaint to causes not altogether supernatural ; Pues, Don Ricardo, " and so, Master Richard," would her friends of the same age and rank often. say, "you are a stranger; go and ask dearest Esperanza why she wears the Virgin of Carmel ; come back and let us know her story, and we will tell you the real truth." Vaya I vaya I Don Ricardo, usted es muy majadero, " Go to, Master Richard, your Grace is an immense bore," replied the penitent, if she suspected the authors arid motive of the embassy. The pious in antiquity raised temples to Minerva medica or Esculapius, as Spaniards do altars to Na. Senora de los Reme- dies, our Lady of the Remedies, and to San Roque, whose inter- vention renders " sound as a roach," a proverb devised in his honour by our ancestors, who, before the Reformation, trusted likewise to him ; and both thought, if Cicero is to be credited, that these tutelars did at least as much as the doctor. Alas ! for the patient credulity of mankind, which still gulps down such medicinal quackery as all this, and which long will continue to do so even were one of the dead to rise from the grave, to deprecate the absurd treatment by which he and so many have been sacrificed. However, by way of compensation, the saving the soul has been made just as primary a consideration in Spain as the curing the body has been in England. These relics, charms, and amulets represent our patent medicines ; and the wonder is how any one in Great Britain can be condemned to death in this world, or how any one in the Peninsula can be doomed to per- dition in the next : possibly the panaceas are in neither case quite specific. Be that as it may, how numerous and well- appointed are the churches and convents there, compared to the hospitals ; how amply provided the relic-magazine with bones and spells, when compared to the anatomical museums and chemists' shops ; again, what a flock of holy practitioners come forth after a Spaniard has been stabbed, starved, or executed, not one of whom would have stirred a step to save an army of his country- men when alive ; and what coppers are now collected to pay masses to get his soul out of purgatory ! 240 PHILOSOPHY OF RELICS. [CHAP. xvm. Beware, nevertheless, gentle Protestant reader, of dying in Spain, except in Cadiz or Malaga, where, if you are curious in Christian burial, there is snug lying for heretics ; and for your life avoid being even sick at Madrid, since if once handed over to the faculty make thy last testament forthwith, as, if the judg- ment passed on their own doctors by Spaniards be true, Escu- lapius cannot save thee from the crows : avoid the Spanish doctors therefore like mad dogs, and throw their physic after them. The masses and many in Spain have their own tutelars and refuges for the destitute ; the kings and queens whom God preserve ! have their own especial patroness by prerogative, in the image of the Virgin of Atocha at Madrid, which they and the rest of the royal family visit every Sunday in the year when in royal health. No sooner was the sovereign taken dangerously ill, and the court physicians at a loss what to do, as sometimes is the case even in Madrid, than the image used to be brought to his bedside ; witness the case of Philip III., thus described by Bassompierre in his dispatch : " Les medecins en desesperent depuis ce matin que Ton a commence a user des remedes spiri- tuels, et. faire transporter au palais I' image de N. D. de Athoche." The patient died three days after the image was sent for. Although neither priest nor physician might credit the sana- tive properties of rags and relics, they gladly called them in, for if the case then went wrong, how could mortal man be expected to succeed when the supernatural remedy had failed ? All in- quests in awkward cases are hushed up by ascribing the death to the visitation of God. Again, if a relic does not always cure it rarely kills, as calomel has been known to do. This interruptive principle, one distinct from human remedies, is admitted by the church in the prayers for sick persons ; and where faith is sincere, even relics must offer a powerful moral medical cordial, by acting on the imagination, and giving confidence to the patient. This chance is denied to the poor Protestant, nay, even to a newly-converted tractarian, for truly, to believe in the efficacy of a monkish bone, the lesson must have been learnt in the nursery. Their substitute in Lutheran lands, in partibus infidelium, is found in laudanum, news, and gossip ; the latter being the grand specific by which Sir Henry kept scores of dowagers alive, to the despair of jointure-paying sons, from marquises down to CHAP, xviii.] SPANISH MIDWIFERY. 241 baronets ; and how much real comfort is conveyed by the gentle whisper, " Your ladyship cannot conceive what an interest his or her Royal Highness the takes in your ladyship's con- valescence !" The form of the moral restorative will vary according to climate, creeds, manners, &c. ; it is to the substance alone that the philosophical physician will look. That chord must be touched, be it what it may, to which the pulse of the patient will respond ; nor, provided he is recovered, do the means much signify. One word only on Spanish midwifery. There is a dislike to male accoucheurs, and the midwife, or comadre, generally brings the Spaniard into the world by the efforts of nature and the aid of manteca depuerco, or hogs' lard, a launching appropriate enough to a babe, who, if it survives to years of discretion, will assuredly love bacon. The newly-born is then wrapped up, like an Egyp- tian mummy, and is carefully protected from fresh air, soap, and water ; an amulet is then hung round its neck to disarm the evil eye, or some badge of the Virgin is to ensure good luck : thus the young idea is taught from the cradle, what errors are to be avoided and what safeguards are to be clung to, lessons which are seldom forgotten in after-life. Without entering further into baby details, the scanty population of the Peninsula may in some measure be thus accounted for. Parturition also is fre- quently fatal ; in ordinary cases the midwife does very well, but when a difficulty arises she loses her head and patient. It is in these trying moments, as in the critical operations of the kitchen, that a male artiste is preferable. The Queens and Infantas of Spain have additional advantages. The palladium of the city of Tortosa is the cinta * or girdle, which the Virgin, accompanied by St. Peter and St. Paul, brought herself from heaven to a priest of the cathedral in 1178; an event in honour of which a mass is still said every second Sunday in October. The gracious gift was declared authentic in 1617, by Paul V., and to justify his infallibility it works every sort of miracle, especially in obstetric cases ; it is also brought out to defend the town on all occasions of public calamity, but failed in the case of Suchet's attack. This * Hallarse en Cinta is the Spanish equivalent for our "being in the family way." 242 SPIRITUAL AIDS TO ACCOUCHEMENT. [CHAP. xvm. girdle, more wonderful than the cestus of Venus, was conveyed in 1822, by Ferdinand VII.'s command, in solemn procession to Aranjuez, in order to facilitate the accouchement of the two Infantas, and as Lucina when duly invoked favoured women in travail, so their Royal Highnesses were happily delivered, and one of the babes then born, is the husband of Isabel II. For humbler Castilian women, when pregnant, a spiritual remedy was provided by the canons of Toledo, who took the liveliest interest in many of the cases. The grand entrance to the cathedral had thirteen steps, and all females who ascended and descended them ensured an early and easy time of it. No wonder therefore, when these steps were reduced to the number of seven, that the greatest possible opposition should have been made by the fair sex, married and unmarried. All these things of Spain are rather Oriental ; and to this day the Barbary Moors have a cannon at Tangiers by which a Christian ship was sunk, and across this their women sit to obtain an easy delivery. In all ages and countries where the science of midwifery has made small progress, it is natural that some spiritual assistance should be contrived for perils of such inevitable recurrence as childbirth. The panacea in Italy was the girdle of St. Margaret, which became the type of this Cinta of Tortosa, and it was resorted to l$- the monks in all cases of difficult parturition. It was sup- posed to benefit the sex, because when the devil wished to eat up St. Margaret, the Virgin bound him with her sash, and he became tame as a lamb. This sash brought forth sashes also, and in the 17th century had multiplied so exceedingly, that a traveller affirmed " if all were joined together, they would reach all down Cheapside ;" but the natural history of relics is too well known to be enlarged upon. Any account of Spanish doctors without a death, would be dull as a blank day with fox-hounds, although the medical man, differing from the sportsman, dislikes being in at it. He, the moment the fatal sisters three are running into their game, slips out, and leaves the last act to the clergyman : hence the Spanish saying, "When the priest begins, the physician ends." It is related in the history of Don Quixote, that no sooner did the barber feel the poor knight's wrist, than he advised him to attend to his soul and send for* his confessor ; and now, when a Castilian hidalgo takes to his bed, his friends pursue much the same course, CHAP, xviii.] BtfLL OF CRUSADE. 2(3 nor does the catastrophe often differ. Lord Bacon, great in wise saws and instances, prayed that his death might come from Spain, because then it would be long on the journey ; but he was not aware that the gentlemen in black formed an exception to the proverbial procrastination and dilatoriness of their fellow country- men. As patients are soon dispatched, the law * of the land sub- jects every physician to a fine of ten thousand maravedis, who fails after his first visit to prescribe confession ; the chief object in sickness being, as the preamble states, to cure the soul ; and so it is in Italy, where Gregory XVI. issued in 1845 three decrees ; one to forbid railroads, another to prohibit scientific meetings, and a third to order all medical men to cease to attend invalids who had not sent for the priest and communicated after the third visit. In Spain, the first question asked in our time of the sick man was, not whether he truly repented of his sins, but whether he had got the Bull ; and if the reply was in the negative, or his old nurse had omitted to send out and buy one, the last sacra- ments were denied to the dying wretch. One word on this wonderful Bull, that disarms death of its sting, and which, although few of our readers may ever have heard of it, plays a far more important part in the Peninsula than the quadruped does in the arena. Fastings are nowhere more strictly enjoined than here, where Lent represents the Ramadan of the Moslem. The denials have been mitigated to those faithful who have good appetites, by the paternal indulgence of their holy father at Rome, who, in consideration that it was necessary to keep the Spanish crusaders in fighting condition in order more effectually to crush the infidel, conceded to Saint Ferdinand the permission that his army might eat meat rations during Lent, provided there were any, for, to the credit of Spanish commissariats in general, few troops fast more regularly and religiously. The auspicious day on which the arrival is proclaimed of this welcome bull that announces dinner, is celebrated by bells merry as at a marriage feast; in the provincial cities mayors and corporations go to cathedral in what is called state, to the wonder of the mob and amusement of their betters at the resurrection of quiz coaches, the robes, maces, and obsolete trappings, by which these shadows of a former power and dignity hope to mark individual and col- * Eecopilacion. Lib. iii. Tit. xvi. Ley 3. 244 NECESSITY OF THE BULL. [CHAP. xvm. lective insignificancy. A copy of this precious Bull cannot of course be had for nothing, and as it must be paid for, and in ready money, it forms one of the certain branches of public in- come. Although the proceeds ought to be expended on cru- sading purposes, Ferdinand VII., the Catholic King, and the only sovereign in possession of such a revenue, never contributed one mite towards the Christian Greeks in their recent struggle against the Turkish unbelievers. These bulls, or rather paper-money notes, are prepared with the greatest precautions, and constituted one of the most profitable articles of Spanish manufacture ; a maritime war with England was dreaded, not so much from regard to the fasting transatlantic souls, as from the fear of losing, as Dr. Robertson has shown, the sundry millions of dollars and silver dross remitted from America in exchange for these spiritual treasures. They were printed at Seville, at the Dominican convent, the Porta call ; but Soult, who now it appears is turning devotee, burnt down this gate of heaven, with its passports, and the presses. The bulls are only good for the year during which they are issued ; after twelve months they become stale and unprofitable. There is then, says Blanco White, and truly, for we have often seen it, " a prodigious hurry to obtain new ones by all those who wish well to their souls, and do not overlook the ease and comfort of their stomachs." A fresh one must be annually taken out. like a game-certificate, before Spaniards venture to sport with flesh or fowl, and they have reason to be thankful that it does not cost three pounds odd : for the sum of dos reales, or less than sixpence, man, woman, and child may obtain the benefit of clergy and cookery ; but evil betides the uncertificated poacher, treadmills for life are a farce, perdition catches his soul. His certificate is demanded by the keeper of conscience when he is caught in the trap of sickness, and if without one, his conviction is certain; he cannot plead ignorance of the law, for a postscript and condition is affixed to all notices of jubilees, indulgences, and other purgatorial benefits, which are fixed on the church doors ; and the language is as courteous and peremptory as in our popular assessed tax- paper " Se ha de tener la bula :" you must have the bull ; if you expect to derive any relief from these relaxations in purgatory, which all Spaniards most particularly do : hence the common CHAP, xviii.] DEATH-BED IN SPAIN. 245 phrase used by any one, when committing some little peccadillo in other matters, tengo mi bula para todo I have got my bull, my licence to do any thing. The possession of this document acts on all fleshly comforts like soda on indigestion, indeed it neutralizes everything except heresy. As it is cheap, a Protestant resident, albeit he may not quite believe in its saving effects, will do well to purchase one for the sake of the peace of mind of his weaker brethren, for in this religion of forms and outer observances, more horror is felt by rigid Spaniards, at seeing an Englishman eating meat during a fast, than if he had broken all the ten command- ments. The sums levied from the nation for these bulls is very large, although they are diminished before finally paid into the exchequer ; some of the honey gathered by so many bees will stick to their wings, and the place of chief commissioner of the Bula is a better thing than that in the Excise or Customs of unbelieving countries. To return to the dying man : if he has the bull, the host is brought to him with great pomp ; the procession is attended by crowds who bear crosses, lighted candles, bells and incense ; and as the chamber is thrown open to the public, the ceremony is ac- companied by multitudes of idlers. The spectacle is always impo- sing, as it must be, considering that the incarnate Deity is believed to be present. It is particularly striking on Easter Sunday, when the host is taken to all the sick who have been unable to commu- nicate in the parish church. Then the priest walks either under a gorgeous canopy, or is mounted in the finest carriage in the town ; and while all as he passes kneel to the wafer which he bears, he chuckles internally at his own reality of power over his prostrate subjects ; the line of streets are gaily decorated as for the triumphal procession of a king : the windows are hung with velvets and tapestries, and the balconies filled with the fair sex arrayed in their best, who shower sweet flowers down on the procession just at the moment of its passage, and sweeter smiles during all the rest of the morning on their lovers below, whose more than divided adoration is engrossed by female divinities. To die without confession and communication is to a Spaniard the most poignant of calamities, as he cannot be saved while he is taught that there is in these acts a preserving virtue of their own, independent of any exertions on his part. The host is given when s 246 BURIAL DRESSES. [CHAP, xvm human hopes are at an end, and the heat, noise, confusion, and ex citement, seldom fail to kill the already exhausted patient. Then when life's idle business at. a gasp is o'er, the body is laid out in j capilla ardiente, or an apartment prepared as a chapel, by taking out the furniture ; where the family is rich, a room on the grounc floor is selected, in which a regular altar is dressed up, and rows o: large candles lighted placed around the body ; the public is thei allowed to enter, even in the case of the sovereign : thus we be held Ferdinand VII. laid out dead and full dressed with his hai on his head, and his stick in his hand. This public exhibition ii a sort of coroner's inquest ; formerly, as we have often seen, the body was clad in a monk's dress, with the feet naked and the hands clasped over the breast; the sepulchral shadow ther thrown over the dead and placid features by the cowl, seldoir failed to raise a solemn undefinable feeling in the hearts of spec- tators, speaking, as it did, a language to the living which coulc not be misunderstood. The woollen dresses of the mendicant orders were by far the most popular, from the idea that, when old, they had become toe saturated with the odour of sanctity for the vile nostrils of the evil one ; and as a tattered dress often brought more than half-a- dozen new ones, the sale of these old clothes was a benefit alike to the pious vendor and purchaser ; those of St. Francis were preferred, because at his triennial visits to purgatory, he knows his own, and takes them back with him to heaven ; hence Milton peopled his shadowy limbo with wolves in sheep's clothing : " who, to be sure of Paradise, Dying put on the robes of Dominick, Or in Franciscan think to pass unseen." Women in our time were often laid out in nuns' dresses, wear- ing also the scapulary of the Virgin of Carmel, which she gave tc Simon Stock, with the assurance that none who died with it on, should ever suffer eternal torments. The general adoption ol these grave fashions induced an accurate foreigner to remark, thai no one ever died in Spain except nuns and monks. In this hoi country, burial goes hand in hand with death, and it is absolutely necessary from the rapidity with which putrefaction comes on, The last offices are performed in somewhat an indecent manner : formerly the interment took place in churches, or in the yards neai CHAP, xviii.] BURIAL PLACES. 247 them, a custom which from hygeian reasons is now prohibited. Public cemeteries, which give at least 4 per cent, interest, have been erected outside the towns, in which long lines of catacombs gape greedily for those occupants who can pay for them, while a wide ditch is opened every day for those who cannot. In this campo santo, or holy field, death levels all ranks, which seems hard on those great families who have built and endowed chapels to secure a burial among their ancestors. They however raised no objections to the change of law, nor have ever much troubled themselves about the dilapidated sepulchres and crumbling effigies of their " grandsires cut in alabaster ;" the real opposition arose from the priests, who lost their fees, and thereupon assured their flocks, that a future resurrection was anything but certain to bodies committed into such new-fangled depositories. * Be that as it may, the corpse in its slight coffin is carried out, followed by the male relations, and is then put into its niche without further form or prayer. Ladies who die soon after marriage, and before the bridal hours have danced their measure, are sometimes buried in their wedding dresses, and covered with flowers, the dying injunctions of Shakspere's Queen Catherine : " When I am dead, good wench, Let me be used with honour ; strew me o'er With maiden flowers, that all the world may know I was a chaste wife to my grave." At such funerals the coffin is opened in the catacomb, to gratify the indecent curiosity of the crowd ; the dress is next day dis- cussed all over the town, and the entierro or funeral is pronounced to be muy lucido or very brilliant ; but life in Spain is a jest, and these things show it. The place assigned for children who die under seven years of age lies apart from that of the adults ; their early death is held in Spain to be rather a matter of congratula- tion than of grief, since those whom the gods love die young ; their epitaphs tell a mixed tale of joy and sorrow. El parvulo fue arrebatado a la gloria, the little one was snatched up into Paradise : " There is beyond the sky a heaven of joy and love, And holy children, when they die, go to that world above." Yet nature will not be put aside, and many a mother have we seen, loitering alone near the graves, adorning them with roses s2 248 BURIAL OF THE POOR. J. C HAP. xvm. and plucking up weeds which have no business to grow there ; the little corpses are carried to the tomb by little children of the same age, clad in white, and are strewed with flowers short-lived as themselves, sweets to the sweet. The parents return home yearning after the lost child its cradle is empty, its piteous moan is heard no more, its playthings remain where it left them, and recall the cruel gap which grief cannot fill up, although it " Stuffs out its vacant garments with its form." The bodies of the lower orders, dressed in their ordinary attire, are borne to their long home by four men, as is described by Martial ; " no useless coffins enclose their breasts," they are car- ried forth as was the widow's son at Nain. And often have we seen the frightful death-tray standing upright at the doors of the humble dead, with a human outline marked on the wood by the death -damp of a hundred previous burdens. Such bodies are cast into the trench like those of dogs, and often naked, as the survivors or sextons strip them even of their rags. Those poorer still, who cannot afford to pay the trifling fee, sometimes during the night, suspend the bodies of their children in baskets, near the cemetery porch. We once beheld a cloaked Spaniard pacing mournfully in the burial-ground of Seville, who, when the public trench was opened, drew from beneath the folds the body of his dead child, cast it in and disappeared. Thus half the world lives without knowing how the other half dies. In the upper ranks the etiquette of the funeral commences after the reality is over. The first necessary step is within three days to pay a visit of condolence to the family ; this is called para dar el pesame. The relations are all assembled in the best room, and seated on chairs placed at the head, the women at one end and the men at another. When a condoling lady and gentle- man enter, she proceeds to shake hands with all the other ladies one after another, and then seats herself in the next vacant chair ; the gentleman bows to each of the men as he passes, who rise and return it, a grave dumb-show of profound affliction being kept up by all. On reaching the chief mourners, they are addressed by each condoler with this phrase, " Acompano a usted en su sentimiento ;" " I share in the affliction of your grace ;" the company meanwhile remain silent as an assemblage CHAP, xvni.] FUNERAL SERVICE. 249 of undertakers. After sitting among them the proper time, each retires with much the same form. In a few days afterwards a printed letter is sent round in the name of all the surviving relations to announce the death to the friends of the family, and to beg the favour of attendance at the funeral service : these invitations are all headed with a cross ( + ), which is called El Cristus. Before the invasion of the enemy, who not only destroyed the walls of convents, but sapped religious belief also, very many books were printed, and private letters written, with this sign prefixed. In our time sundry medical men at Seville always headed with it their prescriptions, the Cardinal Archbishop having granted a certain number of years' release from purgatory to all who sanctified with this mark their recipes even of senna and rhubarb. Under this cross, in the invitation, are placed the letters R. I. P. A., which signify " Requiescat in pace. Amen." At the appointed hour the mourners meet in the casa moituarid) or the house of death, and proceed together to church. All are dressed in full black, and before the progress of paletots and civilization, wore no cloaks : this, as it rendered each man of them more uncomfortable than St. Bartholomew was without his skin, was considered an offering of genuine grief to the manes of the deceased. Uncloaking in Spain is, be it remembered, a mark of respect, and is equivalent to our taking off the hat. When the company arrives at church, they are received by the ministers, and the ceremony is very solemnly performed before a catafalque covered with a pall, which is placed before the altar, and is brilliantly lighted up with wax candles. As soon as the service is concluded, all advance and bow to the chief mourners, who are seated apart, and thus the tragedy concludes. Parents do not put on mourning for their children, which is a remnant of the patriarchal and Roman supe- riority of the head of the family, for whom, however, when dead, all the other members pay the most observant respect. The forms and number of days of mourning are most nicely laid down, and are most rigidly observed, even by distant relations, who refrain from all kinds of amusements : " None bear about the mockery of woe To public dances or to private show." We well remember the death of a kind and venerable Marquesa 250 ALL SOULS' DAY. [CHAP. xvm. at Seville just before the carnival, whose chief grief at dying, was the thought of the number of young ladies who would thus be de- prived of their balls and masquerades ; many, anxious and obliging, were the inquiries sent after her health, and more even were the daily prayers offered up to the Virgin, for the prolongation of her precious existence, could it be only for a few weeks. November drear, brings in other solemnities connected with the dead, and in harmony with the fall of the sear and yellow leaves, to which Homer compares the races of mortal men. The night before the first of November our All Hallow-e'en is kept in Spain as a vigil or wake ; it is the fated hour of love divinations and mysteries ; then anxious maidens used to sit at their balconies to see the image of their destined husbands pass or not pass by. November the first is dedicated to the sainted dead, and November the second to all souls : it is termed in Spanish el dia de los difuntos, the day of the dead, and is most scru- pulously observed by all who have lost during the past year some friend, some relation how few have not ! The dawn is ushered in by mournful bells, which recal the memory of those who cannot come back at the summons; the cemeteries are then visited ; at Seville, long processions of sable-clad females, bearing chased lamps on staves, walk slowly round and round, chaunting melancholy dirges, returning when it gets dusk in a long line of glittering lights. The graves during the day are visited by those who take a sad interest in their occupants, and lamps and flower garlands are suspended as memorials of affec- tion, and holy water is sprinkled, every drop of which puts out some of the fires of purgatory. These picturesque proceedings at once resemble the Eed es Segheer of modern Cairo, theferalia of the Romans, the Ne^ut