The following is from the delightful pencil of Washington Irving: it
will be seen to bear all the polish of his best style:--
"Many are apt to picture Spain to their imaginations as a soft southern
region, decked out with all the luxuriant charms of voluptuous Italy. On
the contrary, though there are exceptions in some of the maritime
provinces, yet, for the greater part, it is a stern, melancholy country,
with rugged mountains, and long sweeping plains, destitute of trees, and
indescribably silent and lonesome, partaking of the savage and solitary
character of Africa. What adds to this silence and loneliness, is the
absence of singing-birds, a natural consequence of the want of groves
and hedges. The vulture and the eagle are seen wheeling about the
mountain-cliffs, and soaring over the plains, and groups of shy bustards
stalk about the heaths; but the myriads of smaller birds, which animate
the whole face of other countries are met with in but few provinces in
Spain, and in those chiefly among the orchards and gardens which
surround the habitations of man.
"In the interior provinces the traveller occasionally traverses great
tracts cultivated with grain as far as the eye can reach, waving at
times with verdure, at other times naked and sunburnt, but he looks
round in vain for the hand that has tilled the soil. At length, he
perceives some village on a steep hill, or rugged crag, with mouldering
battlements and ruined watch tower; a stronghold, in old times, against
civil war, or Moorish inroad; for the custom among the peasantry of
congregating together for mutual protection, is still kept up in most
parts of Spain, in consequence of the maraudings of roving freebooters.
"But though a great part of Spain is deficient in the garniture of
groves and forests, and the softer charms of ornamental cultivation, yet
its scenery has something of a high and lofty character to compensate
the want. It partakes something of the attributes of its people; and I
think that I better understand the proud, hardy, frugal, and abstemious
Spaniard, his manly defiance of hardships, and contempt of effeminate
indulgences, since I have seen the country he inhabits.
"There is something, too, in the sternly simple features of the Spanish
landscape, that impresses on the soul a feeling of sublimity. The
immense plains of the Castiles and of La Mancha, extending as far as the
eye can reach, derive an interest from their very nakedness and
immensity, and have something of the solemn grandeur of the ocean. In
ranging over these boundless wastes, the eye catches sight here and
there of a straggling herd of cattle attended by a lonely herdsman,
motionless as a statue, with his long, slender pike tapering up like a
lance into the air; or, beholds a long train of mules slowly moving
along the waste like a train of camels in the desert; or, a single
herdsman, armed with blunderbuss and stiletto, and prowling over the
plain. Thus the country, the habits, the very looks of the people, have
something of the Arabian character. The general insecurity of the
country is evinced in the universal use of weapons. The herdsman in the
field, the shepherd in the plain, has his musket and his knife. The
wealthy villager rarely ventures to the market-town without his trabuco,
and, perhaps, a servant on foot with a blunderbuss on his shoulder; and
the most petty journey is undertaken with the preparation of a warlike
enterprise.
"The dangers of the road produce also a mode of travelling, resembling,
on a diminutive scale, the caravans of the east. The arrieros, or
carriers, congregate in convoys, and set off in large and well-armed
trains on appointed days; while additional travellers swell their
number, and contribute to their strength. In this primitive way is the
commerce of the country carried on. The muleteer is the general medium
of traffic, and the legitimate traverser of the land, crossing the
peninsula from the Pyrenees and the Asturias to the Alpuxarras, the
Serrania de Ronda, and even to the gates of Gibraltar. He lives frugally
and hardily: his alforjas of coarse cloth hold his scanty stock of
provisions; a leathern bottle, hanging at his saddle-bow, contains wine
or water, for a supply across barren mountains and thirsty plains. A
mule-cloth spread upon the ground, is his bed at night, and his
pack-saddle is his pillow. His low, but clean-limbed and sinewy form
betokens strength; his complexion is dark and sunburnt; his eye
resolute, but quiet in its expression, except when kindled by sudden
emotion; his demeanour is frank, manly, and courteous, and he never
passes you without a grave salutation: 'Dios guarde à usted!' 'Va usted
con Dios, Caballero!' 'God guard you! God be with you, Cavalier!'
"As these men have often their whole fortune at stake upon the burthen
of their mule, they have their weapons at hand, slung to their saddles,
and ready to be snatched out for desperate defence. But their united
numbers render them secure against petty bands of marauders, and the
solitary bandolero, armed to the teeth, and mounted on his Andalusian
steed, hovers about them, like a pirate about a merchant convoy, without
daring to make an assault.
"The Spanish muleteer has an inexhaustible stock of songs and ballads,
with which to beguile his incessant wayfaring. The airs are rude and
simple, consisting of but few inflexions. These he chants forth with a
loud voice, and long, drawling cadence, seated sideways on his mule, who
seems to listen with infinite gravity, and to keep time, with his paces,
to the tune. The couplets thus chanted, are often old traditional
romances about the Moors, or some legend of a saint, or some love-ditty;
or what is still more frequent, some ballad about a bold contrabandista,
or hardy bandolero, for the smuggler and the robber are poetical heroes
among the common people of Spain. Often the song of the muleteer is
composed at the instant, and relates to some local scenes or some
incident of the journey. This talent of singing and improvising is
frequent in Spain, and is said to have been inherited from the Moors.
There is something wildly pleasing in listening to these ditties among
the rude and lonely scenes that they illustrate; accompanied, as they
are, by the occasional jingle of the mule-bell.
"It has a most picturesque effect also to meet a train of muleteers in
some mountain-pass. First you hear the bells of the leading mules,
breaking with their simple melody the stillness of the airy height; or,
perhaps, the voice of the muleteer admonishing some tardy or wandering
animal, or chanting, at the full stretch of his lungs, some traditionary
ballad. At length you see the mules slowly winding along the cragged
defile, sometimes descending precipitous cliffs, so as to present
themselves in full relief against the sky, sometimes toiling up the deep
arid chasms below you. As they approach, you descry their gay
decorations of worsted tufts, tassels, and saddle-cloths, while, as they
pass by, the ever-ready trabuco slung behind the packs and saddles,
gives a hint of the insecurity of the road.
"The ancient kingdom of Granada, into which we are about to penetrate,
is one of the most mountainous regions of Spain. Vast sierras, or chains
of mountains, destitute of shrub or tree, and mottled with variegated
marbles and granites, elevate their sun-burnt summits against a
deep-blue sky; yet in their rugged bosoms lie engulfed the most verdant
and fertile valley, where the desert and the garden strain for mastery,
and the very rock is, as it were, compelled to yield the fig, the
orange, and the citron, and to blossom with the myrtle and the rose.
"In the wild passes of these mountains the sight of walled towns and
villages, built like eagles' nests among the cliffs, and surrounded by
Moorish battlements, or of ruined watch-towers perched on lofty peaks,
carries the mind back to the chivalric days of Christian and Moslem
warfare, and to the romantic struggle for the conquest of Granada. In
traversing these lofty sierras the traveller is often obliged to alight
and lead his horse up and down the steep and jagged ascents and
descents, resembling the broken steps of a staircase. Sometimes the road
winds along dizzy precipices, without parapet to guard him from the
gulfs below, and then will plunge down steep, and dark, and dangerous
declivities. Sometimes it straggles through rugged barrancos, or
ravines, worn by winter torrents, the obscure path of the
contrabandista; while, ever and anon, the ominous cross, the monument of
robbery and murder, erected on a mound of stones at some lonely part of
the road, admonishes the traveller that he is among the haunts of
banditti, perhaps at that very moment under the eye of some lurking
bandolero. Sometimes, in winding through the narrow valleys, he is
startled by a hoarse bellowing, and beholds above him on some green fold
of the mountain side a herd of fierce Andalusian bulls, destined for the
combat of the arena. There is something awful in the contemplation of
these terrific animals, clothed with tremendous strength, and ranging
their native pastures in untamed wildness, strangers almost to the face
of man: they know no one but the solitary herdsman who attends upon
them, and even he at times dares not venture to approach them. The low
bellowing of these bulls, and their menacing aspect as they look down
from their rocky height, give additional wildness to the savage scenery
around."
(From _The Alhambra_, or _New Sketch Book_, to which we propose to
return in a _Supplement_ in a fortnight.)
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