sunk for so long, there is small activity either of commerce, trade, or
manufacture to support its seventy thousand inhabitants; and suitable
docks have yet to be constructed to enable it to take the commercial
rank to which its situation entitles it. Its resemblance to Venice is
remarkable. Lying as it does seven miles at sea, the inhabitants could,
if they wished it, have had canals instead of streets, for most of the
thoroughfares begin and end at the ocean. Coming straight from the
[Illustration: CADIZ--VIEW FROM THE TAVIRA TOWER.]
ultra-Moorish Seville with its narrow winding streets, the traveller
wonders why in neighbouring Cadiz, which also belonged to the Moors for
over five hundred years, the streets should be so much wider and
straighter, and why they possess so few patios and other Arabian
characteristics. The explanation lies in the fact that almost the entire
town was newly laid out and rebuilt after the bombardment in 1596. Cadiz
being practically on an island is much cooler than Seville, so that
Moorish patios are not essential to comfort, and their places are taken
by the turrets on the top of the houses, from whence sea-breezes and a
magnificent view can be obtained at the same time.
The history of Cadiz is an epitome of the progress of civilisation up to
the time when Spain was the chiefest nation of the world. It capitulated
to Hamilcar Barca in B.C. 237, it was fortified by Cæsar, rebuilt in
marble by Balbus, and destroyed by the Goths. Its greatness was its
misfortune. So rich it was that England in 1596 fitted out an expedition
to sack the city. Lord Essex did his work so thoroughly that Cadiz was
brought to the verge of bankruptcy, and Spain received the first blow to
her supremacy. Two other English expeditions against this place proved
unsuccessful; but it was bombarded at the end of the eighteenth century,
it was devastated by the plague, and was the theatre of the horrible
massacres in the revolution of 1820. Cadiz supplied the ancient Roman
epicures with salt fish and anything but proper dancing girls; and was
resorted to by philosophers, who came here to study the curious
phenomena of the tides. A city with such a history might be expected to
be full of antiquarian records; yet, from a mere archæological point of
view, it is by no means a place of great attractiveness. In the convent
of San Francisco is to be seen the last Murillo, the picture upon which
the artist was engaged when he fell from the scaffold and sustained his
fatal injuries; but beyond this and the cathedral, which is not
remarkable, the city is destitute of works of art.
[Illustration: CADIZ--VIEW FROM SAN CARLOS BATTERY.]
Moreover, Cadiz is one of the noisiest cities in Spain; but it is, none
the less, a delightful city to live in. Here the beggar nuisance is
unknown, its society is, with the exception of that of Madrid and
Barcelona, the most cultivated in the Peninsula, and its women are the
most graceful in Andalusia. The Alameda, where everybody promenades in
the evening, commands lovely views of the ocean, the blue of which is
varied, according to the light, with rich dark green and royal purple.
And in a walk along the sea walls surrounding the city one passes large
mercantile storehouses, and mixes with sailors from all parts of the
world--negroes and Moors (betokening the nearness of Africa), troops of
soldiers who are always at the quick step, and crowds of hardy,
picturesque, and sun-browned fishermen.
[Illustration: MALAGA--VIEW FROM THE “FARULA PROMENADE.”]
One does not find in Cadiz the virile gaiety that prevails in Seville.
The tone is quieter, more subdued and less fitful. If the Sevillians are
not intensely joyous, they are in tears--the people of Cadiz take their
happiness as it comes, rather than make it a sacrifice to their
subsequent peace of mind. They are as tidy and attractive as their own
orderly, sunny streets, and invariably courteous both between themselves
and towards strangers. The women are taller than their sisters of
Seville, a trifle darker, and a shade less languishing, but--they are
Andalusian, and in that admittance the highest compliment to feminine
fascination is paid.
Different, quite different from Cadiz, different in situation, tone, and
complexion is Malaga. Seen from the shore, the houses stand out in
violet and yellow against a background of green and reddish hills, and
on either side of the town the mountains stretch out into the distance
as far as the eye can reach. The site of the city is excellent; its
harbour is one of the best in the kingdom; and in importance it ranks
next to Barcelona among the commercial centres of Spain. Its merchants
are men of substance, and their villas are objects of beauty in suburbs
that are naturally beautiful. But Malaga does not appeal to the heart of
the visitor as does Cadiz or Córdova. The certain grandeur that one
notes from a distance dwindles almost to vanishing point as one comes
nearer; and when one plunges into the narrow, ill-kept, malodorous
streets of the lower town, the delusion is dispelled altogether. But one
has only to leave the city behind one to regain the first impression of
its picturesqueness. If one would see Malaga at its best, an expedition
must be undertaken to the summit of the high hill which overlooks the
city. The tramway takes one the first part of the journey--the only part
that the average Spaniard ever attempts. I am not sure that I blame him
for stopping short there. The walk up that brown-baked hill under the
fierce rays of the morning sun is an achievement that makes some call
upon one’s powers of endurance, but the view from the summit fully
atones for the discomforts of the climb. At one’s feet lies picturesque
Malaga, set in a huge garden of tropical and semi-tropical floral
vegetation; beyond it the blue, clear, glinting Mediterranean stretches
far out to where, in the distance, the shores of Africa are dimly
visible.
Although the land winds are occasionally variable and trying, the
climate of Malaga is one of the most equable in Europe. Winter as we
know it is unknown here; and the sugar cane, which is destroyed by the
merest suspicion of frost, is cultivated on a large and profitable
scale. As an invalid resort it has a considerable repute, but it is as a
flourishing commercial centre rather than a sanitorium that Malaga is
best known. The raisins of Malaga are famous, the manufacture of sugar
gives employment to some thousands of hands, while its wines are widely
celebrated. The port receives visits from upwards of 2,500 vessels
annually; and although the air of thrift and prosperity is not so marked
as it is in Barcelona, and its people lack the sterling integrity and
moral balance of the Catalans, there are unmistakable evidences of
progress and improvements in its streets. Much building is in progress,
the paving of the thoroughfares is receiving attention, and the new
stores and warehouses that are being erected are constructed on the most
modern plan. Like Cadiz, Malaga is of immemorial antiquity; and, like
the white city on the west of Gibraltar, it is singularly deficient in
antiquarian monuments. Phœnicians, Carthagenians and Romans occupied it
in turn; the Moors caused it to be styled “a paradise on earth;” and the
French sacked it in 1810 and walked off with twelve millions of reals in
gold and silver. The present cathedral, which was nearly 200 years in
the making,
[Illustration: MALAGA--VIEW FROM THE “GIBRALFARO.”]
presents a motley appearance. Many architects have put much bad art into
its decoration, and with the exception of the magnificently-carved
_Silleria del Coro_, archæologists find little in it to engage their
attention.
The reports as to the amount of ignorance that prevails in Malaga are
probably exaggerated, since commercial progress and ignorance do not
usually go hand-in-hand. But there is no gainsaying the fact that
superstition, which is most nearly allied to, and has its foundation in
ignorance, is widespread; and the people are notorious for their
republican tendencies. The sacredness of human life is only imperfectly
understood here; and juries are even, according to official report,
culpably averse to bringing in adequate verdicts in cases of
manslaughter. The Andalusian is quick-tempered and impulsive--he acts
without thinking when he is provoked--and stabbing cases are the not
infrequent outcome of the most trifling disagreements. The Procurator
Fiscal of Malaga has commented severely upon the leniency with which
juries regard such offences. But how can one bring home the heinous
nature of manslaughter to a number of men who know themselves capable of
committing it within the hour if the provocation should arise; and who
realise, moreover, that the person charged only acted on the spur of the
moment, and was desperately sorry for his hastiness the moment
afterwards? And if the Malaga people are prone to swift individual
action, they will act collectively with equal passion and the same
entire want of conviction. One might, and possibly would, live all one’s
life in the city without coming to any harm, but the reading in the
newspapers of frequent impetuous blood-lettings conduces to a feeling of
insecurity.
After bustling, thriving Malaga, one finds in Ronda--“the Tivoli of
Andalusia”--a haven of wondrous peace and infinite loveliness.
Half-a-century ago Ronda was one of the gayest, the most flourishing,
the most beautifully-situated towns in the south of Spain.
Half-a-century ago it was the grand centre of smuggling for the mountain
district of which it was the capital; and at that date “free trade” was
a very feasible, highly profitable, and eminently virtuous method of
earning a livelihood. But
[Illustration: THE GORGE, RONDA.]
the decay of smuggling meant the diminution of prosperity and
_joyaunce_. No longer are the streets alive with dancing and the
strumming of guitars. Contrabandists in costumes of picturesque
splendour no longer linger in its shadows. Ronda has lost its air of
thrift and light-heartedness, but the situation of the town still
remains to maintain its world-wide renown for beauty. A long tract of
table-land terminates, with the abruptness of an ocean-cliff, in a
precipice varying in height from 800 to 1,000 feet. On this natural
platform stands Ronda above an Alpine valley, in which the orange and
olive flourish in rich luxuriance. The view from the bridge is a sheer
delight. A chasm, 300 feet wide, divides the old town from the new. It
is spanned by a massive wooden bridge, under which, at a depth
[Illustration: RONDA--GENERAL VIEW, WITH THE MOORISH BRIDGE OF THE “TAJO
DE RONDA.”]
of some 700 feet, the Guadalvin rushes forth into open day from the
caverns which hitherto have imprisoned its waters. In a bound it clears
a huge ledge of rock and dashes onward down the slope, until, having
fertilised the green meadows of the valley, it finally empties itself
into the green-hued and romantic Guadairo. The sides of the cliff are
covered with festoons of moist, fresh creepers; and nothing could be
more delightful than the transition from the sun-baked town into these
cool depths, where the spray of the waterfall, dropping like unseen,
gentle dew, maintains a perpetual freshness.
The Basque Provinces.
The Basques are a people apart and peculiar in the most acceptable
application of the term. They are distinct from the Spaniards of the
rest of Spain in type, language, law and custom. They are conservative,
shrewd, industrious and intelligent in a high degree. The men possess
the hardy and robust appearance common to mountaineers and the symmetry
of form which is almost universal in Spain. The women are decidedly
handsome, but of a type which is at variance with the characteristic of
Spanish beauty. It is enhanced, moreover, by an erect and dignified
carriage not usually belonging to peasants, and is attributable
principally to a very unpeasantlike planting of the head on the neck and
shoulders. But for the difference in dress, many of the village girls,
who are universally blondes, might be mistaken for well-bred English or
German ladies. But, like all women trained to severe manual labour,
their beauty disappears with their youth.
In these provinces of mountain and valley everybody works; and, for the
most part, they work their own land. Consequently, Basque farms are
small. Five acres, or in other words, just so much land as a man, his
wife and family can till, dictates the size of the holding. The Basques,
who are the most Gothic gentlemen of Spain, and claim to be the oldest
race in Europe, are grievously affected by genealogy. Peppery as the
Welsh, proud as Lucifer, and combustible as his matches, as one writer
has described them, these _Nobleza de España_--they are noble by the
mere fact of being born in these provinces--fire up when their pedigree
is questioned. Yet they recognise no indignity in agricultural
employment. Adam, the first gentleman who bore arms, occupied himself in
husbandry, and you will not convince a Basque that Adam did not speak
Basque.
[Illustration: HENDAYE--GENERAL VIEW.]
But without accepting or controverting their pretensions to being the
oldest inhabitants of the Continent, these _Caballeros hijos de algo_
are admitted to be the aborigines of the Iberian Peninsula. They have
held the provinces of Alava, Viscaya and Guipuzcoa for themselves; they
have never been subdued or expelled. Liberty has been their immemorial
birthright, and their lives the means by which they have preserved it.
The Visigoths never conquered them; the Moors could not prevail against
them; and they beat back the Franks who swarmed down upon Spain from the
north. While they fought for their homes and their independence their
arms were consistently victorious. They are born mountain fighters, and
have been distinguished at all times for their great valour; but their
Carlist tendencies brought disaster upon them. The conspicuous part they
played in both the Carlist wars resulted in the loss of all their
special privileges. In particular they resented the order countermanding
their exemption from compulsory military service, which they had
hitherto enjoyed, and it was thought that they would prove a failure as
regular soldiers. But this fear was misplaced; and although Gonzalo de
Córdova affirmed that he would rather be a keeper of wild beasts than a
commander of Basques, the wearers of the blue blouses and red trousers
of the Highland provinces have proved themselves exceptional soldiers
when commanded by Basque officers.
[Illustration: IRUN--GENERAL VIEW.]
To the dwellers on the sea-board, fishing affords a lucrative
occupation, and they are considered to be among the best sailors in
Spain. The islanders, dwelling in the sub-alpine towns in the midst of
green hills, cultivate maize, which is the staple breadstuff, good
milk, inferior cheese, and splendid apples. Oranges and palms flourish
in the more sheltered districts; but the wine of the country, though
wholesome and palatable, is distinctly thin. The hotels are generally
very good, and the roads are amongst the best in Spain. The songs and
dances of the Basques are of ancient origin, and are entirely different
from those in other parts of the Peninsula. Their language is as
difficult as Russian, and as ear-pleasing as Welsh. The devil is said to
have devoted seven years to the study of it in the Bilboes, and to have
mastered exactly three words. Pelota, which is played more or less all
over Spain, is zealously cultivated only in the Basque provinces.
[Illustration: PASAJES--VIEW OF THE TOWN.]
The game of pelota is not only interesting in itself, but it challenges
the common impression that the Spaniards are an indolent people, who
prefer to take their recreation with the least possible physical
exertion. In point of fact, Spain is experiencing, in common with
England, the dubious blessing of athletic professionalism. Her
bull-fighters to-day are all “pros.,” and her pelota players belong to
the same category. The game, which would resemble fives if it were not
so vastly different, is the most fatiguing I have ever witnessed. So
greatly does it tax the constitution, that the career of its paid
devotees is limited to three, or at the most, four years. It is played
with a four-ounce ball, which has a diameter of eight
[Illustration: PASAJES DE SAN JUAN (GUIPUSCOA).]
inches, and is “volted” about a court, 175 feet long, 50 feet wide, and
40 feet high, by the players, whose hands are encased in leather gloves
about two feet in length, protected by basket-work backs. The rallies
between good players realise anything between twelve and twenty strokes;
and although “soft returns” are not unknown, the majority of the strokes
are delivered with all the force of which the players are capable. In a
game of fifty up the players will wear a hole completely through the
soles of their shoes.
[Illustration: SAN SEBASTIAN--COUCHA PROMENADE.]
The traveller by the Paris-Madrid route leaves France at Hendaye, the
charming little seaside town on the Bay of Biscay, and enters Spain at
Irun, which is comparatively modern, is charmingly situated, and is
about as much French as Hendaye is Spanish. But except that here the
passenger has his luggage examined, changes trains, and puts his watch
back twenty-five minutes to mark the difference that is observed between
Paris and Madrid time, Irun is of no particular interest: unless, of
course, the traveller has plenty of time on his hands, for in that case
he will traverse the eight miles to Pasajes, the pretty land-locked
harbour which, thanks to the enterprise of a private company, has been
made the best port between Coruña and Cherbourg, and ships a third part
of the entire exportation of the Spanish wine to France. Pasajes is
perhaps the most picturesque port on the north coast of Spain. The
tramway also runs over the eleven miles which separate Irun from San
Sebastian. This city, which boasts some 33,000 inhabitants, and the
favour of royal patronage, is historically interesting on account of the
gallant assault by which it was taken by the English forces in the face
of the strenuous defence made by the French veterans under General Rey
in 1813; it is fashionable by reason of the annual visit of the ex-Queen
Regent and the young King, who spend four months in each year in the
handsome royal palace overlooking the sea, and it
[Illustration: BILBAO--SUBURBS.]
is beautiful with a beauty that is entirely its own. Here you shall find
the tamarisks and the geranium and heliotrope in full bloom far into the
autumn, and the birds singing among the foliage, and the Spanish
sunlight glinting through the trees and lying hot on the white
horse-shoe of glistening sand. And even on the stillest day the blue
Atlantic rollers break fiercely upon the rocks beneath the quaint bit of
old town, and curl themselves magnificently along the firm, smooth
beach. _La Perla del Oceano_, the bathing establishment, is a popular
resort, and, in the season, thousands of bathers disport
[Illustration: BILBAO--GENERAL VIEW.]
themselves on the yellow sands. The old ramparts of the land defence
works are now demolished, and their site is occupied by the handsome
streets of the _Parte Nueva_, or New Town. The _Calle de la Alameda_,
stretches across the isthmus that divided the old town from the new. And
beyond the old town the gaunt eminence of _Monte Orgullo_, crowned by
the castle of _La Mota_, rises sheer out of the sea, and forms a scene
which fills the eyes with beauty and the mind with memories that do not
easily fade. The Grand Casino, which cost £80,000, the bull-ring, the
churches of Santa Maria and San Vicente, the _Palacio de la Diputacion_,
and the _Pelota_ Court--these lions of San Sebastian are but so many
specks in the broad impression one carries away of ocean, and sky, and
the black mountain frowning majestically through the golden sunshine.
[Illustration: BILBAO--VISCAYA BRIDGE.]
Bilbao, the most important city in the Basque provinces, and one of the
most progressive and flourishing places in Spain, is the capital of
Viscaya, and gained its proud title of _La Invicta Villa de Bilbao_ by
successfully withstanding three sieges by the army of Don Carlos. The
river Nervion, upon which it is situated, is navigable for steamers up
to the town, eight and a-half miles from its mouth. The old town, which
is composed of a mass of narrow streets, closely packed between the
river and the hills--the city is built in a mountain gorge--was famous
for its iron and steel manufactures in the days of Elizabeth; and
Shakespeare uses the terms _bilbo_, a rapier, and _bilboes_,
[Illustration: OLD BILBAO.]
fetters. The new town, on the more spacious left bank of the river, is
well built; the principal streets are straight and broad, and the houses
are substantial. Three stone and two iron bridges cross the river
between the old and the new Bilbao. The city owes, of course, its
prosperity mainly to the enormous deposits of iron ore on the left bank
of the Nervion, which, though known since the earliest times, have only
been systematically exploited during the last quarter of a century. Long
lines of steamers are constantly loading iron ore, chiefly for Cardiff,
Newport, Glasgow, and Newcastle; and the annual amount of British
tonnage entering Bilbao exceeds, with the exception of Antwerp, that of
any other foreign port in Europe. Pig iron is the staple export--red
[Illustration: BILBAO--THE ARENAL PROMENADE.]
wines, wool, and other products are numerous, but unimportant.
The iron ore mines (red and brown hematite) in the Somorrostro range and
district are largely in the hands of English capitalists. These mines,
which began to attract the attention of British iron masters about 1870,
occur chiefly in the mountain limestone, and are worked in open
quarries. Short railways and tramways have been made to San Nicolas on
the Nervion; and a wire tramway has been constructed by the Galdames
Mining Company, who possess a cliff of iron ore about a mile long and
280 feet high. The tramway carries the ore through a tunnel, 600 feet
long, to the quay. The Landore Siamese Steel Company have important
hematite mines connected with the river by a wire tramway, carrying
baskets for loading.
[Illustration: BILBAO--THE ORCONERO IRON ORE COMPANY’S WHARF IN
LUCHANA.]
Bilbao is largely modern and wholly commercial, and its public buildings
are not notable. But its thoroughfares are full of movement, and the
shady arenal, in the old town--the focus of the life of the whole
city--contains the principal hotels, the chief cafes, and the New
Theatre. The land which this beautiful promenade now occupies was at
one time very boggy, and swept by the tides. Now the two principal
avenues are asphalted. The Church of _San Nicolás de Bari_, which faces
it, is one of the city parish churches. It was built towards the end of
the fifteenth century on the ruins of the sailors’ and fishermen’s
little church. This church has suffered greatly on account of floods,
especially during the year 1553. It was closed in 1740 as ruin
threatened it. When it fell, the present one was begun in 1743. During
the last war it was used as a provisioning station; and, after repairs,
was opened for worship on the 21st of January, 1881.
In Northern Spain.
[Illustration: A GALICIAN.]