TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE
* Obvious printer errors have been silently corrected.
* Original spelling was kept, but variant spellings were made
consistent when a predominant usage was found.
* Italics are denoted by underscores as in _italics_.
* Small caps are represented in upper case as in SMALL CAPS.
* Illustrations have been slightly moved so that they do not
break up paragraphs while remaining close to the text they
illustrate.
* Illustration captions have been harmonized and made consistent
so that the same expressions appear in the text and in the List
of Illustrations.
* Repetitive chapter headings under some illustrations have not
been kept.
* Some Spanish and Galician expressions have been changed, namely:
Page 31: "_Ave Maria purissima_" replaced by "_Ave María
purísima_",
Page 36: "_caldo Gallego_" replaced by "_caldo gallego_",
Page 66: "_Vida Gallego_" replaced by "_Vida Gallega_",
Page 86: "Rosaria" replaced by "Rosario",
Page 90: "_gigantones_" replaced by "_gigantes_",
Page 92: "Colegieta" replaced by "Colegiata",
Page 119: "Antonio Palachio" replaced by "Antonio Palacios",
Page 132: "Filguiera" replaced by "Filgueira",
Page 144: "pi y Suñer" replaced by "Pi y Suñer",
Page 188: "Bembibra" replaced by "Bembibre",
and throughout the text "sereño" has been replaced by "sereno",
"Hôtel" with "Hotel" and "compostella" by "compostela".
A CORNER
OF SPAIN
[Illustration: GALICIA'S GOLDEN SANDS]
A CORNER
OF SPAIN
BY WALTER WOOD
WITH AN INTRODUCTION
BY MARTIN HUME
ILLUSTRATED IN COLOUR AND
LINE FROM PICTURES BY
FRANK H. MASON, R.B.A.
AND WITH NUMEROUS REPRODUCTIONS
FROM PHOTOGRAPHS
NEW YORK
JAMES POTT & CO.
LONDON: EVELEIGH NASH
1910
Printed by BALLANTYNE & CO. LIMITED
Tavistock Street, Covent Garden, London
PREFACE
This book does not pretend to be a history or a complete record of
Galicia. Its purpose is to show something of the life and character
of a little-known part of Spain, and to deal with things seen and
done by the visitor who travels under competent and comfortable
guidance. I have written either of what I experienced or on the
authority of prominent residents with whom I came in contact in my
wanderings.
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION Pp. 1-21
CHAPTER I
GALICIA AND ITS PEOPLE
The Real Galicia : The Hundred Maidens : The Glory of the North-West :
Granite Hills : Gallegans and their Lives : Pigeon-cots and
Maize-barns : The Night-watchman's Chant : Civil Guards and
Constables : A Modest Breakfast : Eating and drinking : The Waiter as
a Gentleman : Enterprise and Open-air Life : The Blessed "To-morrow" :
Cigarettes : The Unexpected : Photography : Wine and a Bibber :
Across the Biscay Pp. 23-47
CHAPTER II
VIGO BAY AND HILLS
Sun-bound : Sharp Contrasts : Devil-fish and Ink-fish : Sardines : A
Spanish Infant : Vigo's Enterprise : The Lazaretto : Treasure-ships :
A Grandee's Home : A Fishing-town : _Memento mori_ : Handling Catches :
Clubs and Warships : A Russian Funeral : Emigrants : A Valley Town :
The Press and a Distributor : Borrow's Vigo Pp. 49-67
CHAPTER III
SPAIN'S JERUSALEM
Galicia's Patron Saint : Pilgrims and Pestilence : A Holy City :
A Monumental History : Noisy Students : The Fascination of the
Cathedral : Precious Relics : A Wealth of Silver : The _Compostela_ :
St. James's Sepulchre : The Gate of Glory : The Mighty Censer :
Religious Festivals : Our Lady of the Rosary : St. James's Day
Festivities : The Way of Blood and Tears : Mediæval Night : From
Pilgrims' Hill Pp. 69-96
CHAPTER IV
THINGS SEEN
More Contrasts : Bewildering Baedeker : A Galician Vineyard : Sabbath
Peace : Wayside Inns : Security of Travel : Brawny Brigands : A
Sonorous Tongue Pp. 97-108
CHAPTER V
THE ATLANTIC COAST AND THE FRONTIER
Romantic Scenery : A Blighted Town : British Enterprise : The
Napoleonic Wars : A Quaint Old Place : Galicia's Fjords : A
Remarkable Lighthouse : Down to Portugal : Friendly Sentries : The
Glories of the Miño : Orense and its Famous Bridge Pp. 109-124
CHAPTER VI
LOCOMOTION
The Diligence : Railways : Galicia's Rolling-stock : The Solemnity
of Journeying by Train : Motor-cars and Motor-buses : Beauty in the
Saddle : Shocks in Travelling : "Drummers" of the North-West : Cycles
and a Freak Pp. 125-139
CHAPTER VII
MONDARIZ
An Alluring Hotel : Beneficent Waters : A Noble Building : Pine
Hills and Trout-streams : A Splendid Pump-room : The Logan of Arcos :
Sobroso's Ruins : Creaking Bullock-carts : Peaceful Prospects
Pp. 141-151
CHAPTER VIII
GALICIA'S BURDEN-BEARERS
The Woman with the Coffin : Women and Weights : Wages and Rent : My
Pretty Maid : Hairdressing : Universal Washing : A Galician Funeral
Pp. 153-163
CHAPTER IX
AROSA BAY AND LA TOJA
A Favourite Anchorage for British Warships : Roman Remains :
Religious Prisoners : Cortegada and the King of Spain : An
Attractive Workhouse : Borrow and the Bible : An Arcaded Town :
Columbus and his Ships : The Haunt of the Wolf : The Island of La
Toja : A Wonderful Cure : Golf Pp. 165-177
CHAPTER X
CORUNNA AND ITS HERO
The Most Happy and Invincible Armada : Modern Corunna : The
_Miradores_ : Wellington, Napoleon, and the Gallegans : The
Peninsular War : The Tragedy of Moore's Retreat to Corunna : A
Butchered Rearguard : Marvellous Marching : The Last Stand : Moore's
Death : His Burial on Corunna's Ramparts Pp. 179-194
INDEX Pp. 195-203
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
Galicia's Golden Sands (_colour_) _Frontispiece_
A Land of Mountain and Flood 1
Peasants in their Sunday Best. Fishwives _To face_ 8
A Galician Laundry 23
A Galician Market Place (_colour_) _To face_ 25
A Granary. A Pigeon-cot _"_ 30
A Merry Roadside Group _"_ 37
A Cattle Market. An Open-air Market _"_ 41
San Simon's Island, Vigo Bay 49
Vigo, Galicia's Gateway (_colour_) _To face_ 51
Galician Children. Afraid of the Camera _"_ 54
On the Quay at Vigo. Fishermen's Cottages at Cangas _"_ 61
Santiago, from the Alameda 69
Santiago de Compostela (_colour_) _To face_ 71
One of Santiago's Twin Towers _"_ 74
Rua del Villar, Santiago (_colour_) _"_ 81
A Logan 97
A Galician Village (_colour_) _To face_ 99
A Galician Fishing-boat. Men and Women rowing up
Vigo Bay _"_ 104
The Church at Bouzas, on the Coast 109
Tuy, a Hill City on the Frontier (_colour_) _To face_ 111
Ferrol, the Spanish Portsmouth _"_ 113
The Bridge at Ramallosa. The Shrine on the Bridge _"_ 118
Oxen towing a Broken-down Motor-bus 125
Pontevedra by Night: the Bull-ring (_colour_) _To face_ 127
A Diligence on the Highway. Oxen Yoked to a Diligence _"_ 128
The Hills of Mondariz 141
Mondariz (_colour_) _To face_ 143
A Peasant's Funeral in the Hills. A Peasant Woman,
with her Distaff, driving a Bullock-cart _"_ 150
Gathering Firewood in the Pine Hills 153
The Fishing Town of Marin (_colour_) _To face_ 155
A Maid of Cangas _"_ 159
Carrying Water. A Woman Threshing Beans _"_ 162
Arosa Bay 165
The Island of La Toja (_colour_) _To face_ 167
The Torre de Hércules, Corunna 179
A Road in the Hills (_colour_) _To face_ 181
Elviña, where Sir John Moore was Mortally Wounded.
The House, Modernised, in which he died _"_ 191
Sir John Moore's Tomb at Corunna. Corunna Bay, from
the Ramparts _"_ 194
Map of Galicia 195
[Illustration: A LAND OF MOUNTAIN AND FLOOD]
INTRODUCTION
I stood upon the salient bastion of an ancient fortress towering
high above a swift and placid river. Below and around me swept line
upon line of crumbling walls and grass-grown moats, the scene of
many a bloody struggle in the evil days of old. From a hundred grim
embrasures peeped rusty cannon, harmless now, and dark-eyed children
sported upon the battlements that once had belched defiance and
destruction to the foe across the stream. For this old white town,
cramped within its triple ramparts, is the last vantage ground of
Portugal; and on the other side of the Miño straight before me is
Galicia, the unconquered land of the Gael, a land of mountain and
flood, of mist and sunlight, such as are all the western promontories
in which the mysterious Celtic people have finally found a home after
ages of unrecorded wanderings.
The scene as I looked upon it from these old battlements of Valença
is as fair as any that Europe can offer. Down in the valley on both
sides of the stream the maize-fields are reddening in the autumn sun,
and between them, and terraced on the hill slopes above them, vines,
heavy now with great masses of black grapes, are trained over slender
posts of grey granite, forming endless arcades of fruit and foliage.
Then higher up, climbing the steep skirts of the mountains, vast
forests of darkling pines throw into relief the majestic summits,
bare and boulder-strewn, upon which the ardent southern sunlight
glows and quivers, whilst deep purple shadows fleck the tints of old
rose and cinnamon where the sunlight falls. Across the majestic iron
bridge that spans the Miño, the one modern note in all this scene,
there rises an ancient city clustered upon a rise crowned by square
battlemented towers. Some old feudal fortress it would seem; but
closer acquaintance proves it to be a Christian cathedral built at a
time when bishops girt the sword and donned their armour to fight the
infidel and defend their faith with their lives.
Tuy, the first city of Galicia, is a relic of a past age. Its
tortuous narrow streets, mere alleys a few feet wide, are like those
of the prehistoric Celtic city of Citania in Portugal: deep channels
worn in the living rock and patched where necessary with flat slabs.
The city itself is as silent as the grave, and the frowning old
castle-cathedral, with its tinkling bell calling to worship, almost
alone indicates the presence of the living. A mediæval writer calls
Tuy "lately a city of pagans," but for well upon ten centuries now
the brave old Romanesque church has stood aloft unmoved like a cliff
to resist the incursions of the enemies of the Church. But Tuy,
quaint and suggestive of thought as it is, can hardly be considered a
typical Galician city; for the best and most picturesque regions of
Galicia are those which surround the glorious fjords cut deep into
the land that entitles the little "Kingdom" to be called the Norway
of Spain.
The scenery up the Miño to Orense is, as Mr. Wood has mentioned, one
of the most fascinating series of river views for fifty miles that
Europe can show. Foaming and tearing its way between dark gorges,
broadening here and there into smiling little valleys, the mountains
terraced almost to their distant summits with mere steps upon which
crops are raised, the river passes through infinite phases of beauty.
But the towns, and even villages, are few and far between in these
wild regions, and the suave and beautiful inland bays, with the
sweet valleys and soaring sierras that surround them, will form for
visitors the main attractions of Galicia.
I have here little to add to Mr. Wood's glowing descriptions of many
of the places he visited, except to confirm them fully and completely
from long and intimate local knowledge. To come comfortably and
safely from brumous England in the spring or autumn in less than
sixty hours to this enchanted land is almost like a sudden change of
world. This vivid light sharpening all the outlines and vivifying
the colours to almost fierce intensity, can surely not emanate from
the pale, misty sun we left but two short days ago; these azure seas
landlocked by the eternal hills of pines and gilded summits, seem a
different element from the sullen turgid grey of the Channel waves.
And the chaffering folk in the markets of Vigo clad in brilliant
colours, vehement in their bargaining as if life depended upon the
price of the glowing fruits and glittering fish which they buy and
sell; do they belong to the same human family of sad-faced people we
have left behind us? Look at these hardy fisherfolk, and still more
at the husbandmen and graziers in the inland valleys, and you will
recognise their close resemblance with some of our own people. These,
you will say, might well be Connemara folk, and in many respects
besides personal appearance these Gallegos are like their brother
Celts in other western lands indented by the sea. The bays of Western
Ireland from Donegal to Kerry; the lochs of Scotland from Ross to
Argyll; the waters that run deep into the Breton land from St. Michel
round to Morbihan, all breed upon their banks and valleys men of the
same race as these, though none of them are so untouched by outer
influences, except in the matter of language, as these Gallegos.
Wanderers are they and workers throughout their world: they have none
of the Castilian's haughty assumption of superiority independent of
circumstances. Throughout the Peninsula, both in Spain and Portugal,
in many parts of eastern South America, wherever a poor wage may be
gained by hard work; harvesting other people's crops, carrying other
people's burdens, there you will find the patient Gallego, hardy,
frugal, and honest, yearning like a true Celt for his own home and
his own kin again: sometimes, indeed, though rarely, so overcome by
the homesickness as to be unable to resist the craving for his native
hill-side before even he has amassed the few crowns that will enable
him to provide some little comfort for him and his.
This Celtic instinct and need to wander in search of work in order
to render less hard the lot of the weaker ones left behind, is the
main reason for the almost universal labour of the women of Galicia
in tasks elsewhere usually allotted to men. The constant drain of the
best and strongest of the male population of Galicia by emigration is
the saddest phase of Galician life. Something like twenty thousand
Gallegos emigrate to the Argentine Republic every year. They are
usually men of the soil, crowded out by a vicious system of taxation
and the infinite subdivision of the soil amongst a multitude of
peasants owning their tiny crofts. The soil and climate of Galicia
are the best in Spain and the people are by far the most laborious;
and yet it is calculated that three-quarters of the poorer classes
in the province are only kept alive by remittances sent by the
hardworking sons, husbands, and brothers in America. Not less than
eight millions of pesetas (£280,000) thus finds its way, mostly in
very small sums, annually to those who stay at home living upon the
hard fare and keeping the wolf from the door as best they may by
constant toil upon land or sea.
But a better time, it is hoped, is dawning for this favoured land.
The unrivalled fishing grounds are providing now not only food
for those who live upon the shores. All along the Ria of Vigo and
elsewhere factories are working, preserving and packing sardines for
the markets in the world. The abundant vegetables and fruits, which
according to the altitude upon the hill-sides may be gathered from
early spring to late autumn, are likewise being preserved for export
to countries less abundant than this. Other industries, too, are
awakening after the stifled sleep of generations, and if the burden
of taxation upon land and labour can be lightened in its incidence
there may yet be sunshine for the humble cottages of the Galician
valleys, and prosperity flowing from the labour of Gallegos in their
own land rather than from remittances from abroad. The living of
these poor, patient folk is incredibly frugal; and like that of their
kinsmen in Western Ireland inferior in stamina. Maize bread, and
_brona_, a coarse millet bread, is the staple food with potatoes,
though wheat of the finest quality can be grown; and the province
which provides cattle for the consumption of half Spain, and once
did a splendid trade in oxen with England, feeds its own population
mainly on fish, varied by an occasional meal of cow-beef too poor for
export.
[Illustration: PEASANTS IN THEIR SUNDAY BEST]
[Illustration: FISHWIVES]
Of all this the casual visitor sees nothing, and perhaps cares
nothing. He drives through a smiling land greener than Kerry, more
sunny than the overrated French Riviera: he lingers in abundantly
supplied markets, where all the fruits of the earth and ocean seem
spread in glowing heaps: he spins in a comfortable motor-car along
good roads cut upon the steep sides of mountains, and at every
turn of the tortuous way admiring some new enchanting prospect
of far-flung valley, towering cliffs or smiling fjord. The white
cottages with their attendant conical dovecots and tiny granaries,
their cobs of maize hung to ripen in fringe-like rows from their
verandahs, are, it is true, mean and dark within; but they form a
gracious note amidst the lush green of never-failing vegetation. Not
even in the depth of winter is the landscape free from flowers. In
February the wallflowers are in full bloom in the crannies of ancient
masonry, and the sweet-scented mimosa is bent down by the weight of
its masses of yellow flowers; a few weeks later the starry white and
crimson camellias grow in the open with marvellous luxuriance, and by
the middle of April the cherries are ripe in the sheltered valleys.
The air blows soft and moist from the sea through most of the year,
tempering the ardent sun even in the height of summer; and this fact,
which accounts for the marvellous verdancy and fertility of the soil,
also brings with it frequent showers and mists drifting up the Rias,
especially in the winter and early spring. But the rains are seldom
of long continuance, and the sunshine invariably follows close upon
them, drying everything with wonderful rapidity and leaving the
country more sparkling and green than ever.
Through such a country as this the traveller may go by motor-car
or railway from one fjord to another, rarely long out of sight of
blue water most of the way from Vigo to the _bellisima_ Noya, by
the holy town of Padron, where the body of St. James first took
harbour on its miraculous voyage from the Holy Land to the country
that thenceforward was to be its home. In old times it was part of
the great pilgrimage after worshipping at the shrine of the Saint at
Santiago to trudge on to Padron, the Iria Flavia of the Romans, and
the ancient Galician verse says:
"_Quien va á Santiago
E non va al Padron
O' faz romeria ó non._"
Through the Middle Ages a stream of pilgrims wended their way from
all Christian lands to Santiago. The innumerable stars of the Milky
Way are called by Spaniards "the road of Santiago," expressive of the
vast concourse of the faithful that flocked to the Galician shrine.
I have before me as I write a naïve relation of a German priest,
the envoy, by the way, of an emperor seeking a Portuguese bride,
who thought it his duty on the way to worship at the sainted tomb
of Santiago. His narrative marks quaintly the immense difference
that has come over the world since the mid-fifteenth century in
which he wrote. On arriving at Astorga the band of pilgrims who
travelled together, and of which he and his colleague formed part,
were advised to go no farther for the present, as one of the great
rieving territorial nobles, who afterwards gave Ferdinand and
Isabella so much trouble to crush, was ravaging Galicia and making
war on the all-powerful favourite of the King, Don Alvaro de Luna.
The pilgrims being very numerous, decided to run the risk, confiding
in the harmless and meritorious character of their journey. Not
far from Pontevedra, however, they fell in with a strong force of
freebooters, who at once attacked them, wounding many and stripping
the whole company to the skin. On their knees, and in mortal terror,
the Emperor's envoys showed their credentials and prayed for mercy,
but no attention was paid to them, though they invoked Santiago and
all the other saints in the calendar. They were allowed, at last, to
go on the way with their companions, despoiled and, as the narrator
says, "full of pain, suffering and anguish, passing through towns
burnt and sacked by the marauders."
At last arriving at Pontevedra some kindness was shown them, and, on
foot still, the whole band trudged on to Santiago. After visiting the
shrine there they walked, as in duty bound, "with certain pilgrims
from Ireland," to Padron, where beneath the waves they were shown
the stone ship that had brought to the port the body of the apostle.
Then to another shrine at Finisterre also they went on foot, and
finally, their religious duty being ended, they proceeded on their
matrimonial mission to Portugal.
The streets of Santiago can have changed but little since those
far-off days of pious pilgrimage, when from all points of Christendom
came the countless thousands to expiate sins or seek salvation.
As the big omnibus from Cornes station bumps and rumbles into the
streets of the ancient city, almost the only vehicle that ever
invades them, a plunge is made into the centuries of long ago. Narrow
slab-paved streets with dim arcades on both sides, above which houses
of unimaginable antiquity are reared. Scallop shells adorn the
fronts of many of them, indicating that they were formerly pilgrims'
lodgings, and carved coats of arms with knightly casques above remind
us that in the old days nobles, too, lived in the streets of the holy
city. It looks almost an anachronism for men and women in modern garb
to wander through these silent streets and to tread the very slabs
worn thin by the pilgrim shoon of the centuries of faith so long ago.
Though lacking its sacred associations, Pontevedra in its way is
almost as quaint as Santiago. Standing at the head of its lovely
Ria, just where the river Lerez joins the bay, it is surrounded
by gracious hills backed by the Sierra high aloft. No words can
exaggerate the luxuriant character of the vegetation all around.
As elsewhere, maize and vines floor the valleys and lower slopes
with abundant fruit trees and a wilderness of flowers. Above are
the oaks, sycamores, and chestnuts, then higher still the grave
solemn pines, crowned at last by bare rocky summits glittering and
gilded in the sun. The ancient Plaza and Calle Real of Pontevedra,
with arcade-arches so low that most Englishmen have to stoop to
enter them, must present the same aspect as in the Middle Ages;
these very houses and arcades must have stood as now when Columbus
sailed in his Pontevedra ship to discover the New World. Whether the
great "admiral of the ocean sea" was, as some have not hesitated to
assert, of Pontevedran origin himself it is difficult now to decide;
but certain it is that many of the Spanish sea-dogs who guided the
_conquistadores_ into the unknown were men from Pontevedra and the
adjoining port of Marin.
All Galicia is historic ground for Englishmen. Its bays and
harbours have been the resort of our ships in peace and war from
time immemorial, and here in Pontevedra the English John of Gaunt
reigned for years as so-called King of Castile in right of his wife
the daughter of Peter the Cruel. Here in the country round the
Sotomayors, the Sarmientos, the Fonsecas, and Montenegros fought out
their endless feuds in which the warlike archbishops of Santiago
took a frequent part, until the great Isabella with iron hand and
virile energy crushed them all with her _hermandad_. Here in the
neighbourhood was born that Sarmiento whom we in England know best,
him of Gondomar, who ruled our crowned poltroon James I. by bluff and
mother wit. To the Sarmientos too belonged that Maria de Salinas
as she is incorrectly called in our annals, the devoted friend of
Katherine of Aragon, and the ancestress of the house of Willoughby
d'Eresby.
From Corunna, the Groyne, as our forbears translated it, sailed
those numerous futile fleets that Philip destined to bring stubborn
England to her knees. From the great Armada down to the poor squadron
that sailed for Ireland when Elizabeth lay dying, Corunna was the
trysting-place for England's foes. Here came the Desmonds, O'Donnells
and O'Sullivans, who hoped to set a Catholic Ireland under the
seal of Spain. Here landed the Irish bishops and priests who went
backwards and forwards from Killibegs to Spain plotting and planning
for Ireland's emancipation: here Drake and Norris in 1589 avenged
the Armada by a bloody but fruitless siege, greatly to Elizabeth's
indignation. I have told elsewhere[A] the not too creditable story of
this unauthorised siege in which the strong wine of Galicia proved a
worse enemy to the English than the pikes and partisans of the brave
Gallegan peasants and their womenkind led by the redoubtable heroine
Maria Pita herself.
[A] "The Year after the Armada."
But all the blood feud has been forgotten long ago. The splendid
soldier of British blood whose body lies buried upon the ramparts
of Corunna died for Spain, as did thousands of our countrymen in
that Titanic war to free the Peninsula from the grip of Napoleon;
and Gallegos, high and low, have nothing but warm Celtic welcome
for British visitors to their beautiful and long-neglected land. The
British home fleet finds a frequent rendezvous in the magnificent Bay
of Arosa, where Villa Garcia receives with open arms the sailors who
come in peace. This beautiful Villa Garcia and its adjoining town
of Carril, upon the line of railway from Pontevedra to Santiago,
are destined for great things in the near future. Upon a charming
wooded island, Cortegada, a few cable-lengths only from the shore,
the new marine palace of the King of Spain is to be built, and the
English-born Queen will be cheered by the sight of the fleets of her
native land lying within hail of her summer home.
Nothing more exquisite can be imagined than a trip by sailing-boat or
steam launch through this lovely landlocked bay of Arosa. Defended
in the entrance by the storied isles of Ons, the great inlet looks
like a vast lake surrounded by mountains on all sides. The water
is so clear and pellucid that the bottom can be clearly seen many
fathoms deep. A lofty island, that of Arosa, occupies a position
in the centre of the bay, and on the opposite side, near the sandy
promontory of Grove, the pine-clad isle of La Toja, with its
wonderful healing hot wells within a few feet of the sea, possesses
one of the finest hotels in Spain.
For, whatever happens with the rest of the country, this land of
Galicia is going ahead at last. Gallegos who have returned rich
from the Argentina are showing an increasing disposition to invest
capital in native enterprises, and the factories that are springing
up around Vigo are the result. Not only can La Toja show an hotel of
which any country in Europe might be proud, but, at Mondariz, the
establishment in the high valley of the Tea, which Mr. Wood so justly
praises, is an hotel that will satisfy the most exacting visitor. If
only the terrible exodus of the able-bodied male population can be
checked by making the lot of the peasant less cruelly hard than it
is, Galicia should be one of the most prosperous regions in Europe.
As a proof that the present poverty and backwardness are the result
of political causes it may be mentioned that thousands of Gallegos
cross the Miño every summer and autumn to labour in the Portuguese
fields and return with their hoarded wage to help them through the
winter at home, much as the Irish harvester serves the English
farmer. There are reasons for the latter, for English agricultural
land is richer than Irish, and racial causes operate in this case.
But the land on the south of the Miño is much the same as on the
north, the climate is identical, and the Gallegos and people of
North Portugal are of the same stock and speak a similar tongue.
And yet the North Portuguese small farmer, well off and prosperous,
can afford to hire the man in a similar position across the Spanish
frontier to do his hard work, whilst in Galicia women do the work of
men in their husbands' absence.
The visitor whose aim is but to pass a pleasant holiday of a few
weeks in Galicia, especially without a good knowledge of the
language, cannot hope to study the unspoilt people in their own
homes. Those whom he will meet in the seaports and along the bays are
to some extent sophisticated and accustomed to deal with foreigners,
but it would well repay a scholar interested in Celtic folklore to
live amongst the peasants of some of the inland valleys for a time,
to gather some of the traditions which are yet handed down from
remote antiquity amongst these primitive folk. Like all their race,
the Gallegos are shy and distrustful. Their superstitions and rites
are for them almost sacred things, but with patience and tact many of
their quaint beliefs may still be gathered from them, as they have
been by the greatest of living Spanish women, the Countess of Pardo
Bazan, whose books upon her native land of Galicia are redolent of
the soil, as are those of another distinguished Gallego, the Marquis
of Figueroa.
The peasant cultivators of the isolated valleys and mountain slopes
rarely come into the larger centres of population. Each little
local town has its fortnightly market, where produce and cattle are
sold for money with which to pay the tax-collector and to buy the
simple necessaries not produced upon the soil. To see the Galician
peasant as he is, one must study him at his local fair, and on one
of his long pilgrimages to a holy shrine. On these occasions, as
on similar occasions with the Irish peasantry, he is for a time
boisterously gay, given to singing, dancing, and music, the latter
being produced from the native bagpipes, _gaita_, and tambour. But
in the long winter nights in his dark cottage, with its smoky fire
of vine-cuttings and pine-cones, the Gallego, like his brother Celt
elsewhere, is moody, poetical and speculatively mystic. In such
surroundings as this the tale of wraiths and demons goes shuddering
round, for the Señor Cura, who sternly reproves such talk when he
hears it, is safe in his lonely little parsonage adjoining the
village church.
But not alone of malevolent spirits is the conversation around the
cottage fire. Much communing there is of America, and of kinsmen and
friends who are seeking a livelihood, and sometimes, but rarely,
finding not only that but a fortune in far Argentina. How Tio Pedro,
a returned Indiano with pockets full of money, is coming to build a
fine house in his native valley; how poor Juanito has returned ill
and homesick without a dollar; how the good lad Pepe sends the large
sum of ten pesetas every month to his old mother, who is looked up
to in consequence as quite a wealthy woman, and so on--talk not very
different, indeed, from that which goes on around the turf fire of
many a hill-side cottage in Western Ireland.
And Galicia, like Ireland, is a land of saints and soldiers. From
its mountain fastnesses and those of its neighbour Asturias, went
forth those indomitable Christians who saved Europe and the world
from the domination of Islam. This was the focus of mystic religious
fervour which made the mediæval Spanish Christian ten times a man.
Here the ecstatic visions seen by star-gazing shepherds in the night
foretold the final victory of the Cross; here the blazing emblem of
the redemption miraculously led the Christian hosts to combat; hither
to this land of fervid faith was wafted the body of the apostle in
its ship of stone, to give heart to his own people; and from time
immemorial the stoutest priests and bishops of the Spanish Church
have issued from the race that alone of all Spaniards held even the
Roman legions at bay, and provided the spiritual fervour that finally
rolled back the Moor. From Cæsar to Wellington great commanders have
borne testimony to the martial valour of the Gallegos; and there
are no bonnier fighters even now in Spain than the thickset, stocky
little chaps who are drawn, usually much against their will, to fill
Spanish regiments in distant parts of the country and in North Africa.
And yet with all their fine qualities, and in spite of the fact that
many of the most eminent writers, thinkers, and administrators of
Spain are natives of Galicia, Gallegos are often held by Castilians
in derision. To the Gallego with his half-Portuguese speech is
attributed every story which requires boorish stupidity as its
subject, and the "bull," which English people are fond of calling
Irish, depending as it does upon the mental process being too rapid
for vocal expression, is considered by Castilians as the special
characteristic of the Gallego.
This is the people, and this is the land, which Mr. Wood describes
in the present volume, with the aid of the excellent illustrations
of Mr. Mason. To those English travellers who, deserting the beaten
track of tourists, are tempted to see for themselves this unspoilt
pleasure-ground, a feast of new and pleasant impressions may be
confidently promised. They will find a country of loch and mountain
that will make the Scottish Highlands seem trivial and tame, they
will find a climate as soft as Munster and as warm as Italy, a
vegetation as green as that of Killarney without the chilling mists
of Ireland.
Drawbacks naturally there are. The country is backward, and some
of the smaller hotels are lacking in the luxuries that English
travellers expect. But progress in these and other respects is
being made with giant strides. The great English liners that carry
passengers from England to Vigo and Corunna in two days and a half
are of course excellent, and the principal hotels of Vigo, Mondariz
and La Toja, are all that can be desired. The hostelries of Santiago
and Pontevedra are being greatly improved, and new modern hotels are
in project. The new Association in Galicia with a branch in London
for the purpose of rendering the province agreeable to English
visitors is already hard at work stirring up local opinion in favour
of the reforms in accommodation and locomotion that are needed, and
every important interest and authority in Galicia, from the Cardinal
Archbishop of Santiago to the local town councillors, are pledged to
do their utmost to make this sweet "Corner of Spain" an attractive
and fitting resort for British seekers after health and recreation.
MARTIN HUME,
_Chairman of the London Committee of
the Galician Association_.
[Illustration: A GALICIAN LAUNDRY]
[Illustration: A GALICIAN MARKET-PLACE]
CHAPTER I
GALICIA AND ITS PEOPLE
Even Spaniards are sometimes at a loss to say which part of their
kingdom is Galicia, just as Londoners occasionally pause before
locating Yorkshire. The Englishman confesses either that he has
never heard of Galicia or does not know where the country is. He
imagines vaguely that it is situated in Poland. There are, indeed,
two Galicias, one north of the Carpathians and the other, of which I
am writing, bounded by the Atlantic and the Bay of Biscay. Galicia
includes Corunna, which is known to all good Englishmen because of
the burial on its ramparts of Sir John Moore. The country, too, is
associated with Columbus and the Armada, for the explorer's own
ship was built at a Galician port, and the Armada finally sailed
from Corunna to conquer England. Spain's holiest city, Santiago de
Compostela, is in Galicia.
If you consult a map of Spain you will see Galicia at the top corner,
jutting boldly into the Atlantic, with a coast-line, largely formed
of glorious inland bays, of two hundred and forty miles. No other
part of the Peninsula presents such a wonderful and majestic frontage
to the sea; nor does any other Spanish province afford greater
contrasts of scenery and people.
This corner of Spain has a history which goes back to the times of
the Phoenicians, centuries before St. James the Elder, who is to
Galicia what Christ is to Palestine, preached the Gospel on its
rugged shores. Romans and Moors tried in vain to conquer Galicia, and
in Santiago Cathedral there is a tablet recording the triumph ten
centuries ago of Christians over Moslems at the battle of Clavijo.
There is a famous legend of this celebrated fight. The Moors demanded
from Galicia the tribute of a hundred virgins, from whom they meant
to benefit their nation's stock, but the monstrous claim inspired the
native Christians with such a warlike spirit that they slaughtered
sixty thousand of the infidels and drove the Moors out of the
country. Betanzos, an old-world town near Corunna, is associated with
this thousand-year-old belief, and one of its quaint thoroughfares is
called the Street of the Hundred Maidens.
Galicia is a land of hills. They are seen as soon as the coast is
observed, and no journey can be made without beholding them. The
hills are not high enough to be called mountains, but their altitude
in many cases gives them a noble and dignified appearance. Richard
Ford called Galicia the Switzerland of Spain; but there are no hills
in the province to compare with even the range on Lake Geneva, and
nothing to equal the majestic Dent du Midi; yet those north-western
heights have charms and beauties of their own, and in some respects
are more attractive than the hills of Switzerland. The Alps allure
the climber, but the day is not remote when the sierras of Galicia
will irresistibly call those travellers who crave for splendid
panoramas and are fascinated by the chance of sport. Wolves and wild
boars still roam about the lonely hills, remote from man, and there
is abundant fishing everywhere.
The country is well watered, a number of rivers, of which the chief
is the Miño, flowing into the bays and the Atlantic through its hills
and valleys. In ordinary seasons the streams are insignificant, but
after heavy rains they develop into raging torrents and thunder
over their rocky beds. The rivers, too, will rise swiftly and to
great heights. At the end of December 1909 Galicia, like the rest
of Europe, was swept by storms, and rivers rose from twenty to
twenty-five feet above their normal level, destroying bridges,
buildings, animals, and human life. A Galician river in flood is a
striking spectacle, especially a stream like the Miño, which even
in ordinary seasons is a swift and turgid water. The Miño separates
Galicia from Portugal, acting as a natural frontier from the southern
extremity of the province to San Gregorio. This river has been well
called the Glory of Galicia, and the tourist to the country would be
fully recompensed for his visit even if he did nothing more than make
the railway journey along the Miño's splendid and impressive banks.
Galicia's hills abound in granite, much of which is easily accessible
and workable. In many of the country districts the peasants and
small farmers, for the sake of asking, are permitted to quarry for
building purposes and to secure those thin upright grey posts which
are such a singular feature of the vineyards. It seems strange
that in a land where trees are so abundant and timber is to be had
for the trouble of felling preference should be given to granite;
yet the stone is easier and cheaper to work than timber, and on
the hills and roadsides men and women are constantly quarrying the
brittle substance. The way of working and the tools employed are very
simple. Holes are chiselled at distances of about a foot; then iron
or wooden wedges are driven in and the granite block is separated.
The same system of wedge-driving is employed in getting the props
for vineyards, and the long thin slabs come easily away. Enormous
numbers of these granite supports are used, and long high walls are
often seen, built of slabs placed upright in the ground and so close
together that the structure looks like solid stone.
Much has been written of the poverty of the Gallegans, as the people
of Galicia are called, and the sparsity of food and drink for many
of the two million people who compose the population of the country;
but the appearance of the strong and healthy men and women does not
confirm what writers in that melancholy strain have put on record.
The very maize bread which forms the basis of the peasant's food
has been maligned; yet no one ventures to belittle porridge as an
article of diet for the conquering Scot. The comely and powerful
fisher-lasses who travel the East Coast in the herring season do not
live in luxury, nor do their sisters of Galicia, many of whom, in
strength and figure, are their equals. Where the fisher-girl drinks
coffee, tea, or cocoa, the Gallegan woman takes wine; and she can buy
a tumblerful of very drinkable liquor, red or white, for a halfpenny;
for another halfpenny she can get a piece of bread big enough for a
sustaining meal. Even a Scotchwoman, however canny, would be hard
pressed to make a midday meal at the cost of a penny. Fruit, too,
is so abundant that it may be had for the picking, and vegetables
are plentiful. There are grapes everywhere; and though most of the
chickens and bacon go into the towns for sale, yet there are so many
fowls and pigs in Galicia that the taste of poultry and pork is known
throughout the country. At noon on the roadside working men and women
make a far more varied meal than the rough dinner of the British
labourer. In England, when the streets are fog-bound, and navvies and
road-makers are content to make shift, while eating and drinking,
with a warm ray or two from a neighbouring watchman's fire, the
Galician worker is taking a midday meal on the shore of some glorious
bay or river, or on the hill-side in romantic scenery--and in almost
constant sunshine.
In every part of Galicia there are quaint round pigeon-cots. Many
of them are included in farm-buildings, to which they give an
added picturesqueness; others are perched on summits of slopes,
like lonely watch-towers. There are no buildings in England which
have the appearance of these Galician pigeon-houses, but there
are a few in Scotland, in the neighbourhood of Arbroath, with the
same characteristics. The Gallegan cannot afford to cultivate
pigeon-rearing as a hobby, and with him, as with many Englishmen,
the birds are kept for eating purposes. Sentiment is vanquished by
utility.
Maize-barns, or granaries, are universal. The granaries are oblong,
narrow structures, mostly built of granite, but sometimes of timber,
and raised on walls or pillars about a man's height above the level
of the ground. They are noticeable features of every landscape, and
some of them are romantic-looking buildings, with a cross at one
gable and a pinnacle at the other. In the autumn the granaries are
filled with the maize which has been gathered from the fields and
stripped and dried in the sun. On village pavements, in fields, on
the beach, and in all sorts of odd corners the cereal is spread out
to dry, and makes glorious golden patches in the sunshine. Women,
helped by children, prepare the maize for grinding into flour.
Primitive methods of grinding are employed, and crude ways of baking
and cooking, as you may see by entering a Galician cottage and
examining the open, chimneyless fireplace--the big stone slab on
which the fuel burns.
[Illustration: A GRANARY]
[Illustration: A PIGEON-COT]
The cry of the night-watchman, the _sereno_, is of all Galicia's
old customs one of the strangest and most famous. The _sereno_ is a
romantic figure, with his Spanish cloak and gleaming pike--a weapon
much resembling the halberd carried by our Yeomen of the Guard. While
the English policeman in the dark early hours is gloomily patrolling
his beat, his fellow in Galicia is pacing the quaint streets which
differ little in appearance from their aspect centuries ago, and
every hour he proclaims the time or in other ways gives proof that
he is about and doing his duty. The ancient town of Pontevedra is
celebrated for the watchman's call. Hourly throughout the night the
_sereno_ chants the time, and the sonorous notes of his "_Ave María
purísima_," Gabriel's salutation to the Virgin, has a singular effect
upon the stranger, awake and listening in bed. The accomplished
_sereno_ will not only cry the hour, but will also, for the benefit
of listeners, add interesting items of news, as, for instance, that
love-making is proceeding on a neighbouring balcony. The eerie chant
lingers in one's memory, and may be likened to the solemn cry from
a steamer's crow's-nest in mid-ocean of "Lights are burning bright
and all's well." In Santiago and elsewhere the _sereno_ still does
duty in the night, but perhaps the day is near when he will be ousted
by the commonplace policeman. In many of the towns the watchman
whistles every hour instead of chanting. There are other cries in
Galicia which will interest the visitor, and amongst them is the
protracted musical announcements of the girls and women of Corunna
who are selling fish. They walk along the pavement with wide, shallow
baskets poised gracefully on their heads, uttering a cry which makes
you marvel that human beings can maintain it without bringing on that
collapse of the vocal cords which perhaps, in uncharitable moments,
you desire to see accomplished.
In Galicia, as on the Continent generally, the policeman differs from
his English prototype. There, in addition to being a keeper of the
peace, he is a fighting man, liable to be called upon for military
service. The famous Civil Guard of Spain, a force which bears the
highest reputation, every member being a specially selected man
of thoroughly good character, has its detachments in Galicia--the
striking-looking fellows with their glazed three-cornered hats,
rifles, swords, and revolvers. A couple of them are on duty at the
exit of every railway station of importance, and on lonely country
roads, marching on each side, you will come across a pair, carrying
their rifles at the slope, prepared for action. The purpose of this
system of patrol is to lessen the risk of both men being surprised at
once.
The Civil Guards exercise a wide influence over the people, and to
them is largely due the present peaceful state of the country. The
total strength of the force is twenty-five thousand men, of whom five
thousand are mounted. The cavalry are armed with sabres, carabines,
and revolvers. Comparison has been made between them and the Royal
Irish Constabulary, and it is a very proper one, although I think
the Royal Irish is physically a finer body. The Civil Guards have
great powers, and are entitled to take the law into their own hands
in extremities, such as shooting down an escaping prisoner or a
murderer caught in the act.
There is perfect security in travelling throughout Galicia, either
alone or in parties, and even in the remotest districts the idea of
personal danger, from man or beast, does not enter the visitor's
mind. Probably there is not in North-West Spain any greater risk
incurred than would be experienced by pedestrians from tramps on the
highways of North-West England.
The ordinary Galician policeman is very much like a Spanish soldier
in appearance, except in Corunna, where he wears a helmet. His
sword is ready to his hand, and he often carries a revolver and a
stick. He is permitted to smoke on duty; and perhaps not even the
iron discipline of the Civil Guard would compel the members of the
force to abandon the cigarette. A Galician policeman being at heart
a _caballero_--which is "gentleman"--will spare no trouble to put
a stranger on the right track, and will not only direct him to the
place he wishes to reach, but will, in the friendliest manner,
accompany him as far as his duties will permit, smoking contentedly
and well pleased with life.
I saw only one policeman on stern duty in Galicia, and that
was in Vigo, where he was conducting a belligerent lady to the
police-station, guiding her by a gentlemanly pressure on the arm.
She was loudly and volubly giving her version of what had happened;
and a crowd of bare-headed or shawled friends added their voices to
the confusion. They were all probably swearing to things which they
could not possibly have seen. At Vigo also I noticed a constable,
old enough to be near the superannuation stage, trying to preserve
the peace between an aged peasant and an ill-conditioned juvenile
who might have been his grandson. At intervals the old man paused
to cuff and persuade the boy, and the policemen seemed to form one
of the little crowd which accompanied and watched the performers. I
followed them for a short distance; then, as there was no prospect of
an arrest, I walked away.
The constable in every land attracts one's notice and commands
respect. Much at times depends on him; also on chambermaids and
waiters. Both these types of servant compel attention in Galicia, if
only for their odd and interesting habits. A Galician chambermaid,
who from her appearance might be anything from a respectable
charwoman to the mother of a promising family, does not know the
meaning of ceremony; at any rate she does not stand upon it, and will
break into your bedroom with the morning coffee without warning,
and derive intense amusement from any timidity or embarrassment due
to her abrupt appearance. She is too primitive to be disturbed by
trifles, even such as gazing upon her when she tucks up to sleep on
a couch in the hall of an hotel at the foot of the main staircase--a
post she occupies, apparently, to meet the necessities of belated or
early-going travellers.
The Galician waiter is remote from the rest of his kind. In the two
palatial establishments which the country possesses he figures,
during the season, either in orthodox swallow-tails or a livery
approximating to the garb of club attendants at home, but generally
speaking he is not so smart. In the morning he presents a slovenly
appearance, because breakfast, as Englishmen understand it, is either
an unimportant or a non-existent meal, and the waiter is reserving
his energies for the feast that counts, the lunch. The native is
content to start the day on coffee and a roll without butter--for
which omission he has reason for gratitude, because Galician butter
is neither good nor plentiful--or on a small cup of chocolate and
bread. If he favours coffee he takes it from a basin, with which a
dessert-spoon is supplied, enabling him to deal with the liquid as
he would absorb soup, or he drinks it, Christian fashion, by way of
the vessel's rim. The chocolate is a concoction so thick that a spoon
or bread will stand upright in it; yet the preparation is delicious
in the estimation of those who like it, especially when taken with a
frothy sugar, which is served in a glass of water--a creation which
looks like frozen beaten white of egg, and is almost large enough to
fill the tumbler. With this chocolate and bread the Spaniard bears
the burden of the day's battle until the real breakfast is served;
then indeed he makes up for any loss he may have suffered after
rising.
The midday meal is heavy and bewildering, from the English point
of view. _Hors-d'oeuvre_ will begin the feast--excellent olives,
sardines, anchovies, appetising little salads and other oddments;
then come heavier dishes, succeeded by soup and fish--all things
reversed, as it seems, compared with English order and arrangements.
There is a very palatable and wholesome dish called _caldo gallego_,
a soup which is as peculiar to Galicia as is _bouillabaisse_ to
Marseilles. Incidentally I may say that I had _bouillabaisse_ as
good in a Galician hotel as in one of the best hotels of France's
southern seaport where I tried it--a dish which would have moved even
Thackeray, its great admirer, to expressions of applause.
"_This Bouillabaisse a noble dish is--
A sort of soup, or broth, or brew,
Or hotch-potch of all sorts of fishes,
That Greenwich never could outdo;
Green herbs, red peppers, mussels, saffron,
Soles, onions, garlic, roach, and dace:
All these you eat at_ TERRÉ'S _tavern,
In that one dish of Bouillabaisse._"
You may not eat all these good things in the Galicia _bouillabaisse_
as Thackeray did at Terré's tavern in Paris; but the _caldo gallego_
is as rich and varied in vegetables as _bouillabaisse_ is in
marine delicacies. The _caldo Gallego_ has the advantage of freedom
from that taint of garlic which is so repellant to the English palate.
[Illustration: A MERRY ROADSIDE GROUP]
A peculiarity of service in Galician public dining-rooms is the
piling up of plates before you. The stack is gradually lessened as
you get through the courses. Free use may be made of your private
cutlery to help yourself to salt and pepper, after the custom of
the Continent. The wine is placed on the table either in bottles
or decanters. There is a tendency to tire of the wine and crave
for English beer. This is obtainable in the principal hotels and
_cafés_, but only at a heavy charge, a bottle of ale costing more
than a bottle of ordinary wine. Being specially brewed for export,
the beer is not equal to the article which is bought at home. Very
good Spanish lager can be had, especially in Vigo, at the bar in the
Calle Velazquez Moreno, opposite the post and telegraph office. At
that place, also, excellent afternoon tea is served. To my regret and
financial loss, I did not discover this welcome retreat until two or
three days before the _Antony_ bore me from Galicia.
By the time _déjeuner_ is served the waiter has become himself. He
has assumed a collar and a dinner-jacket, and bustles round with
every wish to please his customers. He takes a real interest in them,
and, given proper treatment and consideration, there is no trouble to
which he will not go to meet an expressed or implied wish. He can be
led like a lamb, but if any sign is shown of driving him he displays
the mule's unpleasant attributes. I remember that at one hotel, into
the dining-room of which I wandered early in the mornings, an elderly
waiter, coatless and collarless, with a soiled napkin over his arm,
ignored my existence for a day or two. He was performing the task
of a _frotteur_, skating, in melancholy, meditative fashion, over
the polished wooden floor, with a rag-bundle on his right foot. He
would slide past with an air of almost grotesque seriousness, so
intent on his work that he failed to see me; at least that was the
impression made on my mind. Commands in ordinary English to produce
some breakfast failed to move him; yet when, in due course, on
entering the room, I greeted him as a man, a brother, and especially
a _caballero_, he skated elegantly to the mysterious region where
the coffee was prepared, and ceremoniously produced not only coffee
and rolls, but also butter. One morning I desired Rocquefort--to his
polite but palpable amazement--and thereafter he conceived that no
British breakfast was complete without the cheese concomitant. At
this hotel the butter was very good--a native product with a cheesy
flavour; in other hotels Danish butter in tins was provided. Galicia
can produce first-rate butter, yet the Gallegans go to Denmark for
the article, and bring it over land or sea--or both--in tins. One of
the remarkable things about Galicia is that although the country is
so productive, still in many cases there are no adequate systems of
making the most of natural resources.
A great change, however, is taking place, and some of the richest
and most enterprising public men in North-West Spain are devoting
themselves with enthusiastic zeal to the task of awakening the people
and making them realise the immense possibilities of the province.
Energetic measures for development are being taken by the Asociación
para el Fomento del Turismo en Galicia, of which prominent members
are Messrs. Miguel Fernandez Lema, ex-Lord Mayor of Vigo; Manuel
Olivie, the Town Clerk, who is a well-known author; Eladio de Lema,
Director, _El Faro de Vigo_; Jaime Solar, Director, _Noticiero de
Vigo_ and _Vida Gallega_; Manuel Borrajo, President, Asociación de
Cultura; Angel Bernandez, writer and secretary of the Asociación
Fomento Turismo; Guillermo de Oya, President of the Asociación, and
Dr. Ildefonso Zabaleta, Medical Officer of Health for Vigo Harbour.
Mr. Frederico Barreras Masso, one of Vigo's most distinguished
citizens, is doing much to bring Galicia into closer union with Great
Britain, and all these efforts are being zealously fostered and
supported by residents like Mr. Ricardo Rodriguez Pastor, of Corunna;
Mr. Thomas Guyatt, the British Vice-Consul at Corunna; and Mr. R.
Walker, the British Vice-Consul at Villa Garcia.
Most of Galicia's business is transacted in the open air, and much
of it concerns the handling of live stock. In the larger towns,
like Santiago, there is a weekly cattle market, where dealers
and peasants assemble from the surrounding country, travelling
by diligence, bullock-cart, pony, mule, or on foot, and making a
wonderful congregation of human beings, from the pure gipsy type
to the thorough Gallegan. Girls and women are everywhere, driving
cattle, carrying great round baskets crammed with fowls, which are
kept quiet and in place because their legs are tied, or piloting
pigs. Native swine are not amenable to discipline, and the custom is
to tie a rope or piece of string to one of the hind legs and let the
beast go ahead. In the market the squealing animals are imprisoned by
this method. Sometimes a quicker system is adopted--that of conveying
pigs in sacks slung pannier-wise across the back of a mule or pony.
This practice does not apply to full-grown animals; it is the smaller
fry that are subjected to the indignity.
[Illustration: A CATTLE MARKET]
[Illustration: AN OPEN-AIR MARKET]
At Santiago market a peasant drove a mule past me with two sacks
from the depths of which came muffled screams. He shook the sacks,
and from each a little pig was shot to the ground, uttering piercing
squeals, then, after the hind leg had been secured, settling into a
continuous grunt of protest. Bargaining and wrangling were going on
all round me, to the accompaniment of choruses of squeals and grunts,
crowing of cocks, cackling of hens, and lowing of cattle. Business
was conducted on simple lines--prodding of pigs' ribs, examining
of oxen's mouths and other points, and lifting and calculating the
weight and general promise of table and laying birds. Prices
having been arranged, payment was made; and I was surprised to see
how many fat silver dollars were poured from ancient purses and
money-bags by peasants whose appearance conveyed the impression that
they were almost destitute. Pontevedra is a great cattle centre, and
enormous markets are held there two or three times a year. Herds of
cattle monopolise the roads at these seasons, making motoring and
driving a slow and laborious business.
This universal open-air life is in marked contrast to the dark and
unwholesome dwellings of the lower classes in Galicia. The cottages
in the country districts are in many cases mere hovels of the most
primitive type, often enough without windows and admitting light only
by the doorway. Fowls and quadrupeds share the establishments with
their owners, and pigs grunt joyously in the room where the master
and mistress and children take their rest--frequently on a bed as
crude and dirty as that on which the porkers sleep. In this respect
the Gallegan peasant somewhat resembles his prototype who is found
in country places in Ireland which are remote from towns. In the
principal centres of population, however, the people are much better
housed and the municipalities exercise a far more rigid sanitary
supervision.
Most things are done in Galicia on the seductive system of
_mañana_--to-morrow. It is useless to attempt to hurry people. Not
even the demands of telegraphy will rouse them to robust activity.
To send a telegram is a serious and impressive undertaking. First
you find your telegraph office, which even in a city like Santiago
is hidden in the shadow of the cathedral. Then you enter, and
discover that you are in the wrong part of the premises, being in the
operating office. A cigar is burning on the table, while the clerk
to whom it belongs is talking with his colleague, the transmitter
meanwhile tapping lazily. Even the instruments seem to be possessed
with the spirit of languor. Finally an individual comes who, after
showing almost pained surprise at your unseemly energy, conducts
you to the proper place, and ceremoniously gives you a telegraph
form and a pencil. When the message has been written and handed in,
and you have put down your payment, you reasonably assume that the
exhausting transaction is completed, and that you are free to depart.
Not so--you are in Spain, where hurry is indecency. The change is
not ready, and when it does appear the coins are accompanied by a
triangular receipt torn from the message, giving details of the
telegram and the price which has been paid for it. Then triumphantly
you go away, blessing Spain; but the fervour of your benediction is
nothing compared with your expressions on learning that the telegram
has not been delivered in England because of a misread address. It
is useless either to wail or to protest, since the one would be
ineffective and the other too late. Stamps are bought mostly at your
hotel, where the letter-box is kept to be emptied by the postman.
There are no street pillar-boxes in Galicia. I saw one, a ramshackle,
red-painted structure, bearing a resemblance to a rabbit-hutch, hung
outside a general store-shop in a village, and gathered that the
enterprise shown in displaying the receptacle was unexampled. When
an ordinary post office is not available it is customary to place
letters in the hotel box.
It cannot be said that Galicia is rich in works of art. Some of
the paintings which adorn the churches are neither very good nor
interesting, nor are the examples in the castles such as to claim
more than passing notice. But travellers will not journey to
the country for the sake of seeing what they can get so well at
the Louvre, the National Gallery, the Tate Gallery, the Wallace
Collection and elsewhere. They will go to see the land and its
people, and to wander through the old-world streets and squares and
market-places, which have charms unrivalled in any region within such
easy reach of England.
Two things are inseparable from the Galician--his cigarette and his
umbrella. His tobacco is cheap, and much of it is good, so that he
can enjoy at little cost the weed which is as much a man's necessity
as luxury. For cinco centimos, a coin which sounds imposing, but
whose value is less than a halfpenny, he can get seven hand-made
cigarettes. True, when I bought two packets from a dark Spanish lady
in a darker shop she warned me that they were known as "men-killers,"
but I have smoked worse in England at a higher price. The better
qualities are relatively cheap. The Galician cigarette is made of
dark, dry, loose tobacco, rolled in a gumless paper, with the ends
folded to keep the particles from escaping.
The umbrella answers two purposes--to keep the rain off in wet
weather and to serve as a shelter from the sun. I observed men with
umbrellas slung at their sides under their coats, like swords, and I
suppose the crook-shaped handles were suspended from hooks stitched
to the waistcoats.
At every turn there is something unexpected in Galicia. On going
back to my hotel one night I wished to develop some films. I had
neither chemicals nor means of doing the work, but learned that
in the village there was a competent operator who would develop
the exposures. I asked for directions as to how and where I should
find the skilled performer. It was long before I learned that he
lived in a house at the top of the village. A guide was needful,
and he came--a waiter from the hotel, carrying a paper lantern with
a candle. He led the way across a field, then up a rugged path,
puddled with recent rain, and from that to the rocky, steep bed
of a little stream running down the side of a hill they call the
Devil's Boulders. The scene was such as may be found in Morocco,
when the Moor or negro who pilots you carries his ancient lamp to
light your path, or in the Catskills, or the Middle West, where the
same friendly office has been performed for me in the darkness
when crossing lonely fields or penetrating woods. Up the gulley
for some hundreds of yards, now stumbling on a small boulder, now
plunging into deep mire with a prickly, unseen bough unexpectedly
touching your face or hands--then a halt at a gateway leading from
the gulley, and a hail to which there was no answer. Up the gulley
still farther, and a pause and rattle at another gate, through which
a light could be seen, and the answering hail. Then came an elderly
man with a lighted candle and begged us to enter. We descended two
or three stone stairs, crossed a small flagged yard, and went into a
store-room, with heaps of onions lying on the floor and other food
and articles dimly outlined by the candle and the lantern. Thence we
went into a comfortable living-room, where a woman who was busy with
her mending smiled upon us, and a little girl gazed at me something
after the manner in which in the days of our youth we believed that
our forefathers, as children, would have looked upon Napoleon if they
had seen him in the flesh. This was the house of the photographer--a
farmer; but he had no means, he explained, of getting artificial
light for developing, and must wait till daylight before he could
fulfil his task. The films were left, and the farmer led us through
his vineyard to the gate. Before we reached the gulley which was our
homeward path he explained that a clear little stream ran through his
grounds, and that in it he washed his films, plates, and prints.
Vineyards are everywhere in Galicia, and some of their wines are
excellent, notably those from the districts of Orense, Amandi,
Valdeorras, and Rivero. On the self-contained estate of Mondariz a
first-rate wine is grown which is provided free for visitors. In most
places the hotel charges include wine. Occasionally the vintage is
not palatable enough to suit the traveller, but at a very small cost
a superior brand may be had to take the place of the unsatisfactory
product. A capital red wine is served without charge at lunch and
dinner on board the Booth liners.
There is abundance of wine in the country; but some of the peasants
do not take it, preferring the pure water from the hills. The vast
majority, however, are wine-drinkers; yet there is none of that
degrading drunkenness which one may see in every part of Britain.
I noticed only one intoxicated person in Galicia, and that was on
a Sunday afternoon at Caldas, when an aged peasant, in frilled
knickers, was staggering down the road, as near the middle as he
could keep, but occasionally lurching towards the gutter and the
walls of the houses. He was perfectly harmless, and very affable,
and occasionally paused and supported himself against a house side
and reproved the juveniles who followed him and offered pointed
criticisms on his state. The spectacle was rare enough to claim
attention and provoke derision. In England the toper would have been
unnoticed.
In the principal towns there is at least one club, and the stranger
has no difficulty in getting admission for the purpose of seeing the
newspapers and spending a pleasant hour. The English clubman shrinks
from the vulgar public gaze, but in Galicia the member loves to be
as near his fellow-creatures as he can get. Usually he sits at an
open window on the street level, within easy touching distance of the
passer-by. The clubmen, like all the residents of the country with
whom the visitor may come in contact, are most hospitably disposed
towards him.
The British tourist has become accustomed in his own country to
hotels which are more than comfortable--they are luxurious--and when
he is abroad he expects their equal. In Galicia, until recently, he
could not get it; yet now, at Mondariz and La Toja, he has the choice
of palatial establishments which are unrivalled in Spain. The visitor
may reach Galicia by way of the Channel, spending about three days
in trains, or journey direct by sea, landing at the gate of Galicia,
which is Vigo. For that part of the undertaking he is thoroughly
equipped by the Booth Steamship Company, Limited, whose powerful
and splendid modern vessels have the reputation of being the most
comfortable of all that cross the Bay of Biscay.
[Illustration: SAN SIMON'S ISLAND, VIGO BAY]
[Illustration: VIGO, GALICIA'S GATEWAY]