MALAGA.
THE wind blowing from the north-west,—that is, a land breeze, at Malaga,
excites the nervous system so much, that in courts of law it is held to
be an extenuating circumstance in case of crime. It is therefore of
great importance to know which way the wind blows when you are proposing
to kill your neighbor or to commit a forgery. In our country we have
hardly got to that point, but in Boston, where easterly winds prevail,
the phrenologists set up a plea in behalf of the Malden murderer that
was quite as absurd as the Malaga weather. In New York, the doctrine of
mental and moral disturbance is held to be an extenuating circumstance
in crime. And some of our eminent citizens, merchants, bankers, lawyers,
doctors, and ministers have united in representing the strong excitement
engendered by stock speculation, as an excuse for forgery. From all of
which it is fair to infer that the guilt or innocence of a man in the
New World, as well as the Old, depends very much upon the way the wind
blows.
Malaga is one of the most celebrated resorts for invalids. It is not a
resort of fashion, like Nice and Mentone, and perhaps Sicily is more
sought by those whose maladies are partly imaginary and the other part
nervous. But Malaga is a place to which intelligent physicians send
hundreds of patients who are in a bad way, and yet have a fair chance of
getting well if they spend a few winters in this uniform, genial, mild,
but not enervating clime. The warm south wind comes in upon it from the
sea, on whose shore it lies, and the mountains in the rear shield it
from the northern blasts. In an ordinary room, without fire, the
thermometer (Fahr.) ranges all winter long from fifty-two to seventy
deg., never higher or lower, unless when an extraordinary fit of weather
is on, and the average temperature is about fifty-five deg. from
November to March. It is six degrees warmer than Rome, which is one of
the dampest, chilliest, and most disagreeable places for an invalid to
winter in. I tried hard to get well in Florence and Rome and Nice, and
then fled to Spain, and found what neither Italy nor Southern France
would furnish,—an equable clime; warm, but not debilitating. Nature has
a laboratory for making mineral waters that chemists in vain attempt to
imitate, and there are peculiar combinations of atmospheric elements in
divers places, that must be tried on the spot if you would get the good
of them. The invalid who wishes a climate that braces him up without
exciting him to cough, will have to breathe in a great many places,
perhaps, before he finds those opposite qualities blended, and if an
unprofessional opinion is worth any thing, it is here given, that the
south of Spain is the paradise desired. But nothing is more important
for consumptives than uniformity of climate, and the argument in favor
of Malaga is complete, when you learn that the range or variation of its
temperature is _less_ than that of any other place on the continent of
Europe! Pau, that beautiful little nest in the Pyrenees, so sheltered by
the hills that no wind visits it too roughly, has a range of no less
than sixty-eight degrees during the year, and Rome has sixty-two, and
even Nice, fairest of watering-places for winter, ranges sixty, but
Malaga has only a range of forty-nine degrees in the year.
It rained almost every day in Rome. It rains in Florence implacably,
just when you wish it would not. Nice is fairer, but not always fair.
Malaga is so uniformly pleasant, that a day without sunshine is very
unusual in the months of November, December, and January. Good authority
says there are not, during the whole year, more than ten days on which
rain would prevent an invalid from taking exercise. It seemed to me that
the winter weather in Malaga is more nearly like to that of Cairo, in
Egypt, than any other place, and there are but four degrees of
difference in the average temperature.
But take it summer and winter through, and in the last nine years it has
rained only 262 times, or thirty-nine times in the course of each year:
and think of it, O ye dwellers in London, or Paris, or New York, it has
been foggy or misty but sixteen days in three times three years! And
this bright, beautiful atmosphere gives a blue sky so deep and pure,
that it would take a poet of more than average fancy power to invent a
firmament of superior glory, or to find a sunset in Greece or Italy to
be mentioned in the same day with the gorgeous splendors that clothe the
skies of Southern Spain at shut of day.
If you have consumption, or bronchitis, or any malady that is working
mischief with your breathing apparatus, do not be governed, nor even
guided, by the hasty generalizations of a man who writes from what he
sees and hears in a tour for health and pleasure through half a dozen
countries in the course of a season. The most that he can tell you is
that such a climate as this is said to be excellent for those who have
consumption already, and is likely to engender it where it is not; and
if you cannot reconcile those two sayings of the books and the people,
it is well enough to know that a sickly plant may be saved by being
cared for in a hot-house, that might have been made to droop if taken in
when it was in healthful vigor. Dr. Lee, whose opinion is of great
weight, regards the climate of Madeira, Pau, or Pisa better than that of
Malaga, for incipient tubercular disease, in persons of an excitable
habit. And so much caution is to be used in deciding upon the means to
be used for saving life by change of clime, that I would not write a
line on this subject if I supposed that any one would be foolish enough
to make a voyage on the strength of it.
When a miserly client attempted to get an opinion out of a lawyer by
asking him at dinner, “What would you advise me to do in such and such a
case?” the lawyer answered, “I should think the best thing you could do
would be to take advice.” And this is what I advise.
No finer grapes than those of Malaga do we enjoy at home in the winter
season, and the trade in raisins is enormous. We have been familiar with
a raisin-box, but it was something quite novel to see extensive
factories making nothing else but these rude little cases, all to be
used for packing raisins. The raisin stores or depots where the boxes
are waiting to be exported were so vast as to astonish me, but when one
thinks of the extent to which they are distributed throughout the
civilized world, it is only wonderful that the trade is not far greater.
The country around is flowing with wine and oil. It might easily be made
to yield cotton and sugar enough to supply the market of Europe. But it
is in _Spain_, and nothing thrives in Spain but Romanism and its sister.
Through a succession of streets so narrow that no wheel carriages can
pass, and designed only for bipeds and quadrupeds to go on foot, reeking
with smells that made fragrant the memory of Cologne, we wound our way,
meeting Moors from Morocco, in their picturesque costume, caps, togas,
or shawls, with bare legs and sandals; meeting gypsy women and gypsy men
whose home is Spain, and whose story is part of life in Spain, we plied
our devious walk on Sunday into the little square in front of the Malaga
Cathedral. Built of white stone, on the site of a mosque, and still
retaining part of the old Mahometan structure, it rises in a mass about
three hundred feet square, to the height of 130 feet, and the tower
rises 220 feet above the roof. High mass was celebrated when we entered,
and few worshippers were present: most of these were women of some
“religious” order, and some priests, not serving at the altar but on
their knees before it, on the beautiful pavement of blue and white
marble. Perhaps the interior is too light and florid: the various
decorations have been added at periods so remote from each other that
they lack harmony. But what is wanting in severity and solemn majesty is
made up in the variety of ornament, portals, statues, and wood carvings.
The tribes of Jordan, in Palestine, once held this city and region,
reigning and rejoicing in the climate, the soil, and the sea. They sent
the luscious grapes away to China, and Ibu Bathula, who was here in
1630, was quite as delighted with what he had to eat and see as we are,
who come 230 years after him, for he says: “I have seen eight pounds of
grapes sold for twopence; its pomegranates are like rubies, and
unequalled in the whole world; its courts have no rivals in beauty, and
are shaded by wonderful groves of oranges.” He adds that he saw a
preacher collecting money to ransom some Moors whom a Spanish fleet had
captured. He rejoiced in the wine of Malaga, and all the more, it is
probable, because its use was forbidden by the Koran: for we have the
highest authority to say that stolen waters are sweet. And is it not
Al-Makkari who tells the story of a dying Moor who prayed: “O Lord, of
all things which thou hast in Paradise, I only ask for two; grant me to
drink Malaga and Muscat wine!”
The old fortress once stood here, from which the beautiful Florinde
threw herself into the sea, and by her death roused the rebellion that
was headed by her father, and drove from the throne her betrayer,
Roderick, the last of the Gothic kings. But all these stories, are they
not written in the chronicles of Washington Irving, and is there any one
so incredulous as to doubt the truthfulness of the thousand-and-one
legends of that fascinating and most learned historian? For my part,
since I have been dreaming here in the Alhambra, I have no more doubt of
the Spanish tales that he told than I have of the verities of the
Arabian Nights or the legend of Sleepy Hollow.
What travel was in Spain before the invention of _diligences_ I know
not, but probably the rich rode on horse or mule back, and the poor
footed it; now that railroads have brought distant cities near each
other, it is only occasionally that you are treated to an old-time ride
in a coach, and perhaps you may be glad that once at least, in Spain, it
was necessary for us to undergo this species of locomotion.
Between Malaga, a great seaport, and Granada, the ancient and glorious
city of the Alhambra, there is no communication except by _diligence_.
The time is fourteen hours. And the hour for starting is six in the
evening! You have before you this luxury, of one long, jolting,
execrable night ride, with no rest, no change from dewy eve till morn.
You may be a delicate lady, or a feeble old man, or a middle-aged
invalid, seeking rest and finding none; but you must go by the
diligence, and go in the night and all night, or hire a carriage for
yourself, and then there is no certainty that you will ever get to the
other end of your journey.
The Spanish _diligence_ is divided into two inside compartments, the
_berlina_ or _coupe_ of three seats in front, and interior of six. By
waiting over a day or two, we were able to get possession of the three
seats in front, and though the fare was more than in the interior, we
had the comfort of escaping suffocation by tobacco smoke, and of seeing
the fun ahead.
At least a hundred ladies and gentlemen, evidently of the higher class,
assembled at the coach office to take leave of some one who was going to
Malaga to hold an office under government. It was a genteel and decorous
company, and a sight quite peculiar to the country. In America or
England, men are often escorted to and from the station, but this was a
social, rather than a public ovation, and was a quiet and handsome
farewell to a popular man in society.
[Illustration: THE DILIGENCE.]
Wherewithal shall I give you an idea of the team that took us out of
Malaga that lovely winter evening! Ten mules, the most refractory,
ill-mated, and discordant beasts that have served a master since the
days of Balaam, were hitched together and to the diligence with rope
harness of primitive construction. On one of the leaders rode a
postilion: by the side of the midway pairs ran a man whose duty and
privilege it was to beat them; and the wheel mules were guided by reins
in the hands of the driver on the top of the diligence. The driver
thrashed the mules at his feet; the whipper thrashed the three pairs in
the middle of the team, and the postilion thrashed the leaders. All
thrashing at once as fast and as hard as they could. All shouting at
once at the top of their voices, the lumbering vehicle is at last fairly
launched and away it goes. The postilion on the forward beasts blows his
horn to signal the people in the narrow and crooked streets that the
thing is coming. The driver snaps his whip like a revolver, and after
the snap brings the lash around the flanks of the lazy brutes: the
whipper is now on one side and now on the other; whip, whip, whip all
the while; kicking, punching, shouting, the mules spread themselves all
abroad, never pulling in concert, but each one on his own hook, and as
we got along out of the suburbs and into the broader ways of the
country, the rebellious creatures seemed to grow frantic under the
ceaseless blows rained upon them by their tormentors, and plunged and
kicked till one of them made confusion all confounded by turning a
somerset out of his harness and bringing the whole concern to a
standstill. It was a short process, putting him in again, and then away
they all scampered, more like a drove of cattle than a harnessed team,
but the beating was redoubled the more they ran, till I really began to
think it was time for these dumb beasts to open their mouths and speak
some words of remonstrance. And yet how soon we became so demoralized,
as rather to enjoy the excitement and frolic of the ride.
Night was drawing on. We begin to ascend the mountains behind Malaga.
The city lies at their feet, all glorious in the golden light of a
setting sun. The bay is a lake of loveliness; and the sea, unbounded,
stretches off under the southern sky. Orchards of olives, always green,
and hills that are vineyards in the season of grapes, and orange-trees,
are around us,—evidence of a rich and fertile country. Yet every half
mile or so an armed patrol guards the road to make it safe for
travellers, and we have two or three on the top of the diligence with
their guns loaded to give a welcome to any “gentleman of the road” who
might be disposed to make free with unsuspecting travellers. And so,
with the excitement of the novel mode of transportation, and listening
with ears erect to the tales of robbers with which Antanazio beguiled
the mortal hours, we passed a long and wretched night, winding among
craggy mountains on the verge of precipices, and crossing deep ravines.
It was three o’clock in the morning when we reached Loja, where we were
to stop for refreshments! out of the _diligence_ tumbled a miserable set
of people, sleepy but sleepless, cross and hungry, and made a general
rush to the hostelry—by courtesy called an inn. Nobody was up, but in
the course of ten or fifteen minutes a dirty old man brought in a pot of
chocolate and put a plate of cakes in the middle of a table which had
been spread with a cloth overnight. I noticed little black spots around
on the cloth, and putting my finger at one of them, away hopped a flea,
and a flock of them were soon in motion. The chocolate was good, and the
fleas were stimulating. In twenty minutes we were caged again, and, with
fresh teams and good spirits, set off for Granada.
About six o’clock in the morning we were passing through Santa Fé,—a
large town—in the streets of which hundreds of men and women were seen
standing, about to march off in gangs to distant fields to work. The
inhabitants do not live in scattered houses over the country,—here and
there a farmer’s cottage, as with us,—but, dwelling for safety in
villages, they must go miles and miles away to and from their fields of
daily labor. This Santa Fé has a history. It was built by Ferdinand and
Isabella while laying siege to Granada, and here Columbus came and
successfully made his plea for their royal favor and help to go out into
the ocean in search of a new world. He found it that same year. Granada
fell in 1492, and the last of the Moorish strongholds yielded to Spanish
power.
As we rode across the wide and fertile plain that lies in front of
Granada, the lofty mountains appeared; the east was in shadow, and the
west tinged with the rising sunlight. Soon the city on a hill rose on
the right, crowned with the Alhambra. One could not fail to be excited
as the dreams of childhood and youth were becoming real. An hour more
and we were in peaceful possession of Granada, and comfortably lodged
within the grounds of the Alhambra.