Journey in a Spanish Diligence.
Spanish Diligence Lines--Leaving Seville--An Unlucky Start--Alcalà of
the Bakers--Dinner at Carmona--A Dehesa--The Mayoral and his
Team--Ecija--Night Journey--Cordova--The Cathedral-Mosque--Moorish
Architecture--The Sierra Morena--A Rainy Journey--A Chapter of
Accidents--Baylen--The Fascination of Spain--Jaen--The Vega of Granada.
Granada, _November_ 14, 1852.
It is an enviable sensation to feel for the first time that you are in
Granada. No amount of travelling can weaken the romantic interest which
clings about this storied place, or take away aught from the freshness of
that emotion with which you first behold it, I sit almost at the foot of
the Alhambra, whose walls I can see from my window, quite satisfied for
to-day with being here. It has been raining since I arrived, the thunder
is crashing overhead, and the mountains are covered with clouds, so I am
kept in-doors, with the luxury of knowing that all the wonders of the
place are within my reach. And now let me beguile the dull weather by
giving you a sketch of my journey from Seville hither.
There are three lines of stages from Seville to Madrid, and their
competition has reduced the fare to $12, which, for a ride of 350 miles,
is remarkably cheap. The trip is usually made in three days and a half. A
branch line from Baylen--nearly half-way--strikes southward to Granada,
and as there is no competition on this part of the road, I was charged $15
for a through seat in the _coupé_. On account of the lateness of the
season, and the limited time at my command, this was preferable to taking
horses and riding across the country from Seville to Cordova. Accordingly,
at an early hour on Thursday morning last, furnished with a travelling
ticket inscribed: "Don Valtar de Talor" (myself!), I took leave of my
English friends at the Fonda de Madrid, got into an immense, lumbering
yellow vehicle, drawn by ten mules, and started, trusting to my good luck
and bad Spanish to get safely through. The commencement, however, was
unpropitious, and very often a stumble at starting makes the whole journey
limp. The near mule in the foremost span was a horse, ridden by our
postillion, and nothing could prevent that horse from darting into all
sorts of streets and alleys where we had no desire to go. As all mules
have implicit faith in horses, of course the rest of the animals followed.
We were half an hour in getting out of Seville, and when at last we
reached the open road and dashed off at full gallop, one of the mules in
the traces fell and was dragged in the dust some twenty or thirty yards
before we could stop. My companions in the coupé were a young Spanish
officer and his pretty Andalusian bride, who was making her first journey
from home, and after these mishaps was in a state of constant fear and
anxiety.
The first stage across the valley of the Guadalquivir took us to the town
of Alcalà, which lies in the lap of the hills above the beautiful little
river Guadaira. It is a picturesque spot; the naked cliffs overhanging the
stream have the rich, red hue of cinnabar, and the trees and shrubbery in
the meadows, and on the hill-sides are ready grouped to the artist's
hand. The town is called Alcalà de los Panadores (of the Bakers) from its
hundreds of flour mills and bake-ovens, which supply Seville with those
white, fine, delicious twists, of which Spain may be justly proud. They
should have been sent to the Exhibition last year, with the Toledo blades
and the wooden mosaics. We left the place and its mealy-headed population,
and turned eastward into wide, rolling tracts, scattered here and there
with gnarled olive trees. The soil was loose and sandy, and hedges of
aloes lined the road. The country is thinly populated, and very little of
it under cultivation.
About noon we reached Carmona, which was founded by the Romans, as,
indeed, were nearly all the towns of Southern Spain. It occupies the crest
and northern slope of a high hill, whereon the ancient Moorish castle
still stands. The Alcazar, or palace, and the Moorish walls also remain,
though in a very ruinous condition. Here we stopped to dinner, for the
"Nueva Peninsular," in which I was embarked, has its hotels all along the
route, like that of Zurutuza, in Mexico. We were conducted into a small
room adjoining the stables, and adorned with colored prints illustrating
the history of Don John of Austria. The table-cloths, plates and other
appendages were of very ordinary quality, but indisputably clean; we
seated ourselves, and presently the dinner appeared. First, a vermicelli
_pilaff_, which I found palatable, then the national _olla_, a dish of
enormous yellow peas, sprinkled with bits of bacon and flavored with oil;
then three successive courses of chicken, boiled, stewed and roasted, but
in every case done to rags, and without a particle of the original
flavor. This was the usual style of our meals on the road, whether
breakfast, dinner or supper, except that kid was sometimes substituted for
fowl, and that the oil employed, being more or less rancid, gave different
flavors to the dishes, A course of melons, grapes or pomegranates wound up
the repast, the price of which varied from ten to twelve reals--a real
being about a half-dime. In Seville, at the Fonda de Madrid, the cooking
is really excellent; but further in the interior, judging from what I have
heard, it is even worse than I have described.
Continuing our journey, we passed around the southern brow of the hill,
under the Moorish battlements. Here a superb view opened to the south and
east over the wide Vega of Carmona, as far as the mountain chain which
separates it from the plain of Granada. The city has for a coat of arms a
silver star in an azure field, with the pompous motto: "As Lucifer shines
in the morning, so shines Carmona in Andalusia." If it shines at all, it
is because it is a city set upon a hill; for that is the only splendor I
could find about the place. The Vega of Carmona is partially cultivated,
and now wears a sombre brown hue, from its tracts of ploughed land.
Cultivation soon ceased, however, and we entered on a _dehesa_, a
boundless plain of waste land, covered with thickets of palmettos. Flocks
of goats and sheep, guarded by shepherds in brown cloaks, wandered here
and there, and except their huts and an isolated house, with its group of
palm-trees, there was no sign of habitation. The road was a deep, red
sand, and our mules toiled along slowly and painfully, urged by the
incessant cries of the _mayoral_, or conductor, and his _mozo_. As the
mayoral's whip could only reach the second span, the business of the
latter was to jump down every ten minutes, run ahead and belabor the
flanks of the foremost mules, uttering at the same time a series of sharp
howls, which seemed to strike the poor beasts with quite as much severity
as his whip. I defy even a Spanish ear to distinguish the import of these
cries, and the great wonder was how they could all come out of one small
throat. When it came to a hard pull, they cracked and exploded like
volleys of musketry, and flew like hail-stones about the ears of the
_machos_ (he-mules). The postillion, having only the care of the foremost
span, is a silent man, but he has contracted a habit of sleeping in the
saddle, which I mention for the benefit of timid travellers, as it adds to
the interest of a journey by night.
The clouds which had been gathering all day, now settled down upon the
plain, and night came on with a dull rain. At eight o'clock we reached the
City of Ecija, where we had two hours' halt and supper. It was so dark and
rainy that I saw nothing, not even the classic Xenil, the river of
Granada, which flows through the city on its way to the Guadalquivir, The
night wore slowly away, and while the _mozo_ drowsed on his post, I caught
snatches of sleep between his cries. As the landscape began to grow
distinct in the gray, cloudy dawn, we saw before us Cordova, with the dark
range of the Sierra Morena rising behind it. This city, once the glory of
Moorish Spain, the capital of the great Abd-er-Rahman, containing, when in
its prime, a million of inhabitants, is now a melancholy wreck. It has not
a shadow of the art, science, and taste which then distinguished it, and
the only interest it now possesses is from these associations, and the
despoiled remnant of its renowned Mosque.
We crossed the Guadalquivir on a fine bridge built on Roman foundations,
and drove slowly down the one long, rough, crooked street. The diligence
stops for an hour, to allow passengers to breakfast, but my first thought
was for the Cathedral-mosque, _la Mezquita_, as it is still called. "It is
closed," said the ragged crowd that congregated about us; "you cannot get
in until eight o'clock." But I remembered that a silver key will open
anything in Spain, and taking a mozo as a guide we hurried off as fast as
the rough pavements would permit. We had to retrace the whole length of
the city, but on reaching the Cathedral, found it open. The exterior is
low, and quite plain, though of great extent. A Moorish gateway admitted
me into the original court-yard, or _hàram_, of the mosque, which is
planted with orange trees and contains the fountain, for the ablutions of
Moslem worshippers, in the centre. The area of the Mosque proper,
exclusive of the court-yard, is about 400 by 350 feet. It was built on the
plan of the great Mosque of Damascus, about the end of the eighth century.
The materials--including twelve hundred columns of marble, jasper and
porphyry, from the ruins of Carthage, and the temples of Asia
Minor---belonged to a Christian basilica, of the Gothic domination, which
was built upon the foundations of a Roman temple of Janus; so that the
three great creeds of the world have here at different times had their
seat. The Moors considered this mosque as second in holiness to the Kaaba
of Mecca, and made pilgrimages to it from all parts of Moslem Spain and
Barbary. Even now, although shorn of much of its glory, it surpasses any
Oriental mosque into which I have penetrated, except St. Sophia, which is
a Christian edifice.
All the nineteen original entrances--beautiful horse-shoe arches--are
closed, except the central one. I entered by a low door, in one corner of
the corridor. A wilderness of columns connected by double arches (one
springing above the other, with an opening between), spread their dusky
aisles before me in the morning twilight. The eight hundred and fifty
shafts of this marble forest formed labyrinths and mazes, which at that
early hour appeared boundless, for their long vistas disappeared in the
shadows. Lamps were burning before distant shrines, and a few worshippers
were kneeling silently here and there. The sound of my own footsteps, as I
wandered through the ranks of pillars, was all that I heard. In the centre
of the wood (for such it seemed) rises the choir, a gaudy and tasteless
excrescence added by the Christians. Even Charles V., who laid a merciless
hand on the Alhambra, reproved the Bishop of Cordova for this barbarous
and unnecessary disfigurement.
The sacristan lighted lamps in order to show me the Moorish chapels.
Nothing but the precious materials of which these exquisite structures are
composed could have saved them from the holy hands of the Inquisition,
which intentionally destroyed all the Roman antiquities of Cordova. Here
the fringed arches, the lace-like filigrees, the wreathed inscriptions,
and the domes of pendent stalactites which enchant you in the Alcazar of
Seville, are repeated, not in stucco, but in purest marble, while the
entrance to the "holy of holies" is probably the most glorious piece of
mosaic in the world. The pavement of the interior is deeply worn by the
knees of the Moslem pilgrims, who compassed it seven times, kneeling, as
they now do in the Kaaba, at Mecca. The sides are embroidered with
sentences from the Koran, in Cufic characters, and the roof is in the
form of a fluted shell, of a single piece of pure white marble, fifteen
feet in diameter. The roof of the vestibule is a wonderful piece of
workmanship, formed of pointed arches, wreathed and twined through each
other, like basket-work. No people ever wrought poetry into stone so
perfectly as the Saracens. In looking on these precious relics of an
elegant and refined race, I cannot help feeling a strong regret that their
kingdom ever passed into other hands.
Leaving Cordova, our road followed the Guadalquivir, along the foot of the
Sierra Morena, which rose dark and stern, a barrier to the central
table-lands of La Mancha. At Alcolea, we crossed the river on a noble
bridge of black marble, out of all keeping with the miserable road. It
rained incessantly, and the scenery through which we passed had a wild and
gloomy character. The only tree to be seen was the olive, which covered
the hills far and near, the profusion of its fruit showing the natural
richness of the soil. This part of the road is sometimes infested with
robbers, and once, when I saw two individuals waiting for us in a lonely
defile, with gun-barrels thrust out from under their black cloaks, I
anticipated a recurrence of a former unpleasant experience. But they
proved to be members of the _guardia civil_, and therefore our protectors.
The ruts and quagmires, made by the rain, retarded our progress, and it
was dark when we reached Andujar, fourteen leagues from Cordova. To
Baylen, where I was to quit the diligence, and take another coming down
from Madrid to Granada, was four leagues further. We journeyed on in the
dark, in a pouring rain, up and down hill for some hours, when all at
once the cries of the mozo ceased, and the diligence came to a dead stop.
There was some talk between our conductors, and then the mayoral opened
the door and invited us to get out. The postillion had fallen asleep, and
the mules had taken us into a wrong road. An attempt was made to turn the
diligence, but failed, leaving it standing plump against a high bank of
mud. We stood, meanwhile, shivering in the cold and wet, and the fair
Andalusian shed abundance of tears. Fortunately, Baylen was close at hand,
and, after some delay, two men came with lanterns and escorted us to the
_posada_, or inn, where we arrived at midnight. The diligence from Madrid,
which was due six hours before, had not made its appearance, and we passed
the rest of the night in a cold room, fasting, for the meal was only to be
served when the other passengers came. At day-break, finally, a single
dish of oily meat was vouchsafed to us, and, as it was now certain that
some accident had happened, the passengers to Madrid requested the
_Administrador_ to send them on in an extra conveyance. This he refused,
and they began to talk about getting up a pronunciamento, when a messenger
arrived with the news that the diligence had broken down at midnight,
about two leagues off. Tools were thereupon dispatched, nine hours after
the accident happened, and we might hope to be released from our
imprisonment in four or five more.
Baylen is a wretched place, celebrated for having the first palm-tree
which those see who come from Madrid, and for the victory gained by
Castaños over the French forces under Dupont, which occasioned the flight
of Joseph Buonaparte from Madrid, and the temporary liberation of Spain
from the French yoke. Castaños, who received the title of Duke de Baylen,
and is compared by the Spaniards to Wellington, died about three months
ago. The battle-field I passed in the night; the palm-tree I found, but it
is now a mere stump, the leaves having been stripped off to protect the
houses of the inhabitants from lightning. Our posada had one of them hung
at the window. At last, the diligence came, and at three P.M., when I
ought to have been in sight of Granada, I left the forlorn walls of
Baylen. My fellow-passengers were a young sprig of the Spanish nobility
and three chubby-faced nuns.
The rest of the journey that afternoon was through a wide, hilly region,
entirely bare of trees and habitations, and but partially cultivated.
There was something sublime in its very nakedness and loneliness, and I
felt attracted to it as I do towards the Desert. In fact, although I have
seen little fine scenery since leaving Seville, have had the worst of
weather, and no very pleasant travelling experiences, the country has
exercised a fascination over me, which I do not quite understand. I find
myself constantly on the point of making a vow to return again. Much to my
regret, night set in before we reached Jaen, the capital of the Moorish
kingdom of that name. We halted for a short time in the large plaza of the
town, where the dash of fountains mingled with the sound of the rain, and
the black, jagged outline of a mountain overhanging the place was visible
through the storm.
All night we journeyed on through the mountains, sometimes splashing
through swollen streams, sometimes coming almost to a halt in beds of deep
mud. When this morning dawned, we were ascending through wild, stony
hills, overgrown with shrubbery, and the driver said we were six leagues
from Granada. Still on, through a lonely country, with now and then a
large _venta_, or country inn, by the road-side, and about nine o'clock,
as the sky became more clear, I saw in front of us, high up under the
clouds, the snow-fields of the Sierra Nevada. An hour afterwards we were
riding between gardens, vineyards, and olive orchards, with the
magnificent Vega of Granada stretching far away on the right, and the
Vermilion Towers of the Alhambra crowning the heights before us.