MADRID.--GREAT ENGINEERING FEAT.--THE PICTURE-GALLERY.--PASTIMES
AND OCCUPATIONS OF THE MADRILEÑOS.--THE BATH AND TOILET.--QUEEN
ISABEL AND THE KING CONSORT.--THE VIRGIN'S WARDROBE.--THE ROYAL
ARMERIA.--REMARKABLE PAINTINGS.--CHURCH IN THE CALLE DE TOLEDO.
Madrid is by far the most flourishing town of Spain; and if there is
such a thing as progress, artistic, political, or social, it is of
course to be found therein. It suffers, however, under an unfortunate
agglomerate of disadvantages, such as a river without water;[8] a great
elevation in the midst of barren sandy plains, over whose treeless
surface the winds are ever blowing--in summer hot and blighting, in
winter with keen and piercing breath, from the snows of the Guadarrama
range; streets periodically liable to showers, not of rain, but of
bullets; careless government; a distrustful population; and a total
want of private enterprise, which has been all but stamped out.
One hears, however, a great deal about _Progresista_ ministers, who
have certainly instituted various companies of credit, to which is
owing the web of railways which is rapidly spreading throughout the
country, and connecting the capital with the Mediterranean, the
Atlantic, and the North. Drought, which was once much dreaded, is
now at least rendered impossible, as a river, the Lozoya, has been
conducted from twelve leagues off, amongst the Guadarrama mountains,
to the city;[9] an engineering feat that the Progresistasts are never
tired of bringing before the notice of the intelligent foreigner,
and which the priests look upon with great suspicion, as some of the
first-fruits of the great Antichrist, Civilisation, the attendant
fiends on which, in their opinion, are Industry and Progress. A
fountain of real water(!) now plays in the centre of the Puerta del
Sol, of which the inhabitants are extremely proud.
Some of the larger buildings of Madrid are ambitious in design,
but somehow they appear as flimsy as if the material used in their
construction were pasteboard. The general aspect of the streets,
compared with those of the old Spanish cities, with their massive
and venerable buildings, is modern and paltry. There is none of that
imposing magnificence which in some of the old provincial capitals
seems to accord so perfectly with our conception of Spanish dignity
and grandeur. There are twelve theatres, a splendid bull-ring, an
enormous palace, the finest gallery of pictures in the world--for
which the Spaniards are indebted to a great extent to Cromwell, who
blindly sold them the fine collection which he appropriated from his
king's effects after he had brought his plot for the judicial murder of
Charles I. to a successful issue. In a long promenade called the Prado,
the winds are ever blowing, but the flowers never; and although there
are two melancholy rows of little trees, which in some measure remind
one of those in a Noah's-ark, their attempts to reach anything like a
decent growth, from a soil of hardened sand and stones, are singularly
disheartening. Among other places provided for the amusement of the
Madrileños, there is a casino, where they may play at the lucrative
game of _trente-et-quarante_. Though the metropolis of the kingdom,
there is no cathedral in Madrid. Some of the shops are very splendid;
and to finish this rapid survey, I need scarcely mention that there is
hardly a single mouth without a cigar in it, or a solitary spot that is
not perfumed with the odour of tobacco smoke.
Art is here at a standstill, and the moral and material resources which
raise a nation in the respect of the world are but slowly and feebly
developed. Literature, which the Inquisition in past times rendered a
perilous occupation, has never been able to recover the ground it has
lost, and is now almost abandoned.[10] Fierce political contests and
party animosities occupy all the spare time of the Madrileños; and in
these the angry Dons are always ready to engage, generally with more
spirit than discretion. The lounge, if not the bath, is, however, a
favourite way of passing the time in Madrid, as in London. In the
Prado, as in Rotten Row, one meets with some very alarming dandies,
who favour one with a cold stare, as if they intended to measure him
from head to foot. Yet from the best authority, as well as from our own
observation, we know perfectly well that in this country, which is a
very poor one, these dazzling señors and señoras find that pride has a
hard struggle to maintain against poverty, and that consequently all
is not gold that glitters. Although the boot is bright, it frequently
contains no stocking. Although the scarf be vivid, and the pin stuck
into it be gorgeous, there may be no shirt beneath. And so these
beautiful Apollos, whom we behold sucking the knobs of their canes with
such dignified grace, while ogling "partial beauty" over railings, may
often be compared not only to whitened, but to painted sepulchres. As
an illustration of Spanish manners, we have learned on good authority
that an illustrious minister of government, a man of high education and
taste, remained a fortnight in an hotel, and would never during that
period allow the _garçon_ to change the water in his washhand basin.
"The farther South, the farther the bath," might well be a Spanish
proverb, if it is not; and, in fact, as all geographers know, the Wash
is only to be found in the North.
Now if ablution is so little practised by the higher classes, we may
well ask what must be the state of the lowest? When the unsavoury truth
is told, one can only exclaim with a gasp, What do they do, then? Those
beautiful girls, so well _soignées_, so gaily dressed, and so fair
to behold--what substitute have they for this first necessary of the
toilet? "Well," we are told, "they are instructed from early youth by
their medical advisers that water is unwholesome, and, as it renders
the skin coarse and rugose, must be avoided. Consequently, once a week
they attempt to clean themselves, as Dejazet used to do, with cold
cream, a dry towel, and some white sand."
The Spaniards, in fact, are an indolent people, and have no desire to
correct their slothful habits by the bracing effects of cold water;
and although the great ladies, in the utter absence of all occupation,
have no other task than that of fostering their beauty and pampering
their vanity, they do not consider water necessary to these ends:
moreover, water is scarce, and therefore dear. The medical men beyond
the Pyrenees, who might be expected to correct so grave an error,
are creatures of habit, conservative from force of education, and
comparatively cut off from the remainder of the scientific world. The
Spaniard too, besides being an hydrophobist, has always a shivering
dread of fresh air. Whenever he is asked to go anywhere, it is always
_muy frio_ with him. And yet in spite of these customs he is not, we
suppose, more unhealthy than other men.
Lounging one day on the Prado, a great clattering of hoofs was heard,
and the Queen of Spain, in an open carriage, drawn by six magnificent
mules, all over silver and gold, dashed past, escorted by a detachment
of cavalry. By her side sat an ordinary-looking young man, who, we were
informed, was the King-Consort. Every Saturday afternoon, Her Majesty
visits the Church Atocha[11] to pay her respects to a coarse, black
wooden doll, which is wrapped, in a very grotesque manner, in garments
encrusted with gold and stiff with precious stones of sufficient value
to build half a dozen hospitals and endow the poor of Madrid for life.
This image, which is supposed to have been carved by St. Luke, is said
to have been brought from Antioch, and popular superstition ascribes to
it the power of performing miracles.
Within this church we were shown the court dress in which the Queen was
arrayed some years ago when an attempt was made upon her life. It is,
of course, very splendid, and the blood-stained robes were presented to
the Virgin as an offering of the Queen's gratitude for her deliverance
from the arm of the assassin. As the gift is repeated every year on the
anniversary day, the Virgin[12] has now about as splendid a wardrobe as
any modern Queen of Sheba.
While the verger, or whatever he called himself, was explaining this
remarkable exemplification of his Monarch's piety, we observed that he
was smoking a cigarette; upon which we, naturally thinking it was the
correct thing, proceeded to do likewise. That functionary, however, put
an end to our delusion at once, by observing,--
"Señor, the profane may not smoke here. I am within the bosom of the
church, and my actions are consecrated."
Regarding this as one of those singular _cosas de España_ to which
the stranger must submit, we presented the holy, but rather dirty,
gentleman with the cigarette from which our too confiding lips were so
cruelly divorced.
Within the Royal Armeria are many interesting objects. Although the
veneration with which we regard a sword which the hand of Cortes
once upon a time touched, or a particular suit of armour in which
the body of Columbus was once encased, like a jelly in a mould, may
savour, perhaps, of hero-worship, idolatry, and superstition, we must
acknowledge the imputation that we are subject to it. Here are the
swords of Philip II. and of Francisco Pizarro, conquerors of Peru, and
there that of Charles V., Emperor of Germany, together with his entire
armour--the actual suit in which he was painted by Titian. Several
revolvers of the seventeenth century, and a war-saddle of the Cid, are
also exhibited.
For anyone who wishes to enjoy a feast of pictures uninterruptedly,
and we suppose that is not an unnatural taste, the Madrid gallery is
the place. Few but English travellers go there, the Spaniards seeming
to care as little about the glories of their Murillos and Velasquez',
as they do about Leech or Cruikshank, and perhaps not so much. There
is plenty of space for the loiterer in the gallery, and in its silence
he may dream away in peace a few happy hours. There are pictures here,
of course, on which genius has stamped its impress, and on which
all who are capable of appreciating the beauty of art gaze with
admiration. That wondrous Crucifixion, for instance, by Velasquez,
produces at once an impression which roots one to the spot. In the
midst of a waste of lonely darkness, hangs heavily on a coarse stake
of wood the dead form of the wearied man. The end of all his misery,
the relief brought by death, seems to be distinctly delineated in the
attitude of that forsaken, emaciated form,--with half its face veiled
by the dank hair which falls over it as the head bows forward at the
last mortal spasm,--a sight at which the words "It is finished" rise
instinctively to our lips while we gaze at that marvellous production
of perfect art. The next picture on which the eye falls is one of a
brighter character--The Assumption of the Virgin, by Murillo. The
look of childish, confiding innocence in the gentle face is beyond
expression. As there have been inspired writers, surely there have
been also inspired painters, and this Spanish master must have been
one of them, during the composition of this immortal work. Close at
hand is the famous picture of the infant St. John, by the same hand.
Beside the beautiful boy is a gentle lamb. The little animal has crept
confidingly, without a symptom of fear, to the child's side. As it
should be with so pure a subject, the colouring and general treatment
are nobly simple, and that is the source of its beauty.
Velasquez, of course, is represented in all his strength. Whether
the subject of his portraiture be the haughty noble or the loathsome
pauper, he is the quintessence of strength and truth, and the highest
delineator of national character. The splendid colouring and fine
_chiaroscuro_ of Ribera can be recognised in several of his most
beautiful productions. In the centre of the long gallery the steps
are suddenly arrested before a painting which really deserves the
title that the catalogue gives it--a marvel, _El Pasmo de Sicilia_,
one of the masterpieces of Raffaelle. The subject is that of Christ
falling under the cross; and in truth, it is a noble example of power,
colouring, and harmony. The development of the human form is at once
muscular and graceful, and the sufferer's sorrow is expressed with
wonderful force. The grouping of the figures, most of which are nearly,
if not quite, the size of life, is perfection. For force of treatment
the work is a worthy rival of the Transfiguration in the Vatican,
albeit the latter is celestial and mystic; while this represents the
pure earthly side of Christ's nature, depicting him as a man ennobled
by sorrow, untainted by sin, and purified by suffering. The expression
of the Saviour's countenance, as his eyes meet those of his mother, at
the moment when, smarting under blow and taunt, he faintly endeavours
to rise from his bruised knees, is beyond everything that has been
depicted on canvas.
Farther on, amongst this _embarras_ of gems, which includes a long
array of pictures any single one of which would add to a city's fame,
hangs a noble Titian. Mounted (life-size) on his sturdy Flemish
charger, is a grand old mediæval knight, dressed in chased and
damascened armour. His round, dogged-looking head is thrust well into
a simple morion, and his beard of a week's growth shows a disregard
of personal foppery not unbecoming in those who make war a business,
and perhaps unavoidable in the life of the camp. With stern and steady
look, his long lance grasped in his nervous hand, ready to place in
rest at a moment's need, he gallops towards the fray.
A _San Sebastian_ of Guido, is a painting which it would be impossible
to match, except by that in the capitol at Rome, by the same hand.
This is, indeed, a noble picture of the young martyr. One can see by
the ecstatic expression of the countenance that he is exulting in a
hope that carries him, on the wings of faith, beyond the persecutions
and sufferings of this world, and reveals to him the dawn of a higher,
better, and purer life. What to him are the arrows burying themselves
one after the other deep in his fair flesh? His soul is above, far away
from pain, and in the joy of opening immortality is no longer sensible
of the agonies of its earthly body.
There is a beautiful picture by Barbalunga of a dying girl. The dull
grey of twilight is gradually deepening to night in the lonely chamber,
and the film of death is slowly gathering on the flickering eye,
symbolising the end of all that is beautiful on earth. We particularly
noted one fine production by Guercino. Some wicked-looking old men are
stealthily approaching Susanna bathing, creeping onward from behind
with outstretched hands, as if they were going to catch a butterfly.
Two naked ladies, by Titian, in his most untrammeled style, are
distinctly of the flesh, fleshy; but they are splendid specimens of
that great master's proficiency in delineating the human form--of his
consummate fidelity to truth in colouring and expression.
The vast picture by Rubens of the Adoration of the Magi shows
plainly--with many hundred others, however--how Art, _longa_ as it may
be, must, like all things mortal, have a limit. This limit, in the
present instance, is where, the mirror being held up to Nature, Nature
herself cries out with delight at her own reflection, mistaking it for
another self. The limitation here attained is Perfection. We suppose
that expression of adoration, as seen in the fifty faces delineated,
is beyond imitation. Then how admirable is the grouping, how gorgeous
the colouring, how perfect the arrangement of light and shade, never
surpassed, or perhaps equalled, either by the master himself or by
Titian. What an advantage to modern art it would be if we could gain
some insight into the chemistry of the colours used in past centuries!
Why should our Reynolds and Lawrences fade away, in some cases into
mere outlines filled up with pale tints, when the paintings of the
sixteenth century still retain the hues on their canvas in all their
pristine splendour? The crimson drapery of one of the Magi in the
picture in question seems as fresh and as brilliant as it was on the
day when it was painted by the master's hand.
Of course it appears something like presumption in us to add our feeble
commentaries upon the numerous gems in this matchless collection to
those of the great judges who have preceded us; yet, perchance, in
his simple worship of art, a little outburst of enthusiasm upon the
subjects which strike a sympathetic chord within the humbler pilgrim as
he passes, may be pardoned.
The great picture by Velasquez called _Las Meniñas_--The Favourites--is
worthy of the distinguished reward bestowed on its painter by his
patron, Philip IV. On the left, as one views the work, the great artist
is seen at his easel taking the portrait of the Infanta Margarita,
daughter of the king, as she stands amidst her attendant _meniñas_.
The depth of the background, on which is painted the distant wall of
the great oaken chamber, with a mirror in which is seen reflected the
faces of Philip and his consort, is admirably given, although we are
rather mystified in endeavouring to explain how persons are to be
reflected in a glass when nobody is in front of it except those who
are not reflected. The sombre air of the interior of the old room is
truth itself. Monotony in the effect of the brown tones is saved by
the distant light streaming in through an open door. On the right, in
the foreground, two favourite dwarfs are toying with a large dog. The
picture is a noble rendering of the domestic arrangements of Spanish
royalty in the seventeenth century.
When it was finished, Velasquez inquired of the king whether anything
was wanting in the work. "Yes, there is one thing, and one only,"
replied Philip; and, taking a brush from the artist, he traced with his
own hand the red cross of Santiago, the highest order in Spain, on the
painter's breast.
There are, of course, as in all galleries, no end of dead Christs and
live Apostles; and also very vivid productions in the horror-line by
one Goya, whose life appears to have been, besides that of an artist,
court favourite, and bull-fighter, a mixture of that of Don Juan and
Baron Munchausen. It would take volumes to describe half of the works
worthy of high admiration contained in this richest of collections;
for it holds, besides the general mass of its treasures, ten Raphaels,
sixty-two Rubens', forty-six Murillos, fifty-three Teniers', sixty-four
Velasquez', forty-three Titians, thirty Tintorettos, twenty-two
Vandycks, fifty-four Breughels, nineteen Poussins, ten Claudes,
twenty-three Snyders, fifty-five Giordanos, fifty-eight Riberas, ten
Wouvvermans, _cum multis aliis_. They have been collected chiefly from
the palaces of La Granja, the Escorial, and El Pardo. When it is said
it is the finest collection in the world, the expression alludes more
particularly to the number of actual gems and masterpieces contained
therein, than to any complete chronological series of schools gradually
developed before the eye.
The exterior of the gallery, or Real Museo de Pinturas, as seen
from the Prado, is elegant and classic, but not too pure; and it is
decidedly too long for its height.
Of course in every continental town there is always that architectural
black-dose, the Cathedral, to be _done_. But, praise be to the
divinity presiding over the weary Cockney, there is none at Madrid.
There is nothing nearer to a cathedral than a dirty, big church in
the Calle de Toledo, where we were regaled with the sight of various
delectable relics: such as a saint's toe in pickle and a martyr's
tooth on a velvet cushion. This church is amongst the _quartiers_
of the poorer classes. It was natural, consequently, that we, poor
benighted foreigners, should be supposed to be able to see, do, or
understand nothing without assistance. We were, therefore, escorted
all over the building by a sickly-looking old hag of a lady, who, with
the one remaining tusk sticking out of her jaw like a dilapidated
milestone, created sad havoc in her attempts to articulate "_la lingua
dulce de España_." What she said no pronouncing dictionary could have
enabled us to interpret. She seemed particularly enthusiastic about
the saint's toe, and, as she pointed it out, smiled sweetly on the
side of her mouth where the one tooth was. Now, when we are shown such
things as saints' toes in pickle, or the bottled tears of martyrs,
we make a point of never appearing to doubt the authenticity of the
same for a moment. Firstly, we assume an appearance of credulity from
motives of good taste; secondly, for the reason that if the old lady
who exhibits them sees one is interested in the articles brought to
notice, there is no knowing what may not be eventually produced for
one's delectation, even to a phial of ink which was once shown to one
of our friends, in a church in Italy, as "some of the darkness which
covered Egypt." We never came across anyone yet whose tongue so fairly
bolted with her as this yellow old lady, who followed us like a shadow
into the very streets, scratching herself with one hand, while with the
other she tried to arrange into a round knot the stubble on the top of
an otherwise bald head.
We that evening dined luxuriously on one of the great continental
standing dishes: "Cock and Salad"--notwithstanding that the former
article looked, if it did not taste, as if it had departed this life,
not by violence, but from some natural disease. Being in Spain, we
called for a bottle of Sherry or Xeres, the first glassful of which
took us by the throat like a bull-dog and held us there. The next
morning, after breakfasting at the cheerful hour of five upon tea
which, when analytically considered, seemed to consist chiefly of
chopped broomsticks and dead flies, we started by train for the
Escorial.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] The Manzanares.
[9] The engineer, Señor Lucio del Valle, was created Marqués del Lozoya.
[10] The _Annual of Public Instruction_, nevertheless, gives a pompous
list of national libraries and their contents. The number of volumes
contained in those establishments is 1,166,595, spread over the
capital and provinces. The library of Madrid alone contains 390,000;
that of the Central University, 300,000; of Barcelona, 136,000; and
of Salamanca, 55,000. There are similar institutions not only on the
Continent, but in the Balearic and Canary Isles; that of Palma and
Majorca contains 35,000 volumes, and that of Mahon nearly 11,000. As
to the archives, the entire history of the country, of its customs
and political life, may be said to be represented in them. There are
70,278 packets of papers in the old palace of Simancas, 35,000 at
Alcala de Henares, 34,000 in the archives of the Crown of Aragon, and
97,000 in the national historical record office. As regards the public
instruction of Spain, there are at present 27,000 infant schools; 77
institutions for training teachers, and 5 for the deaf and dumb or
blind.
[11] Antioch.
[12] The Virgin in Spain, besides having a wardrobe equal to that of
a dozen earthly queens, and a collection of jewels which would take
Messrs. Hancock and Emmanuel months to value, always wears a royal
crown, and ranks as queen. Her household consists of the noblest and
haughtiest dames in the country, and she possesses landed estates, the
revenues of which are invested for the maintenance of her worship,
processions, &c.
[Illustration: [++] Decorative Image]