scantiness and difficulty." Connelly and Higgins' Dictionary;
A.D. 1798.
Two very important Spanish glass factories were founded in the
eighteenth century. The first, which was under Crown protection, was
established by Don Juan Goyeneche in the year 1720 at a place called
Nuevo Baztán, in the province of Toledo. The royal privilege allowed
this factory to produce "all articles of glass up to a height of twenty
inches, working and polishing the same, embellishing, and coating them
with metal; to make looking-glasses and similar ornaments, glass vessels
of all descriptions, white glass for window-panes, and glass objects of
any kind or shape, whether already known to us, or that may be invented
in the future."
The factory of Nuevo Baztán continued working for some years, and turned
out excellent glass for exportation to America and other parts; but it
was killed eventually by the rising price of fuel, and above all by
competition from abroad. "When the foreigners," says Larruga in his
_Memorias políticas y económicas_, "saw that the factory was in full
swing, they conspired to bring about its ruin, and begged their
ambassadors to communicate against it with the ministers; but finding
this of no avail, and recognising the importance to themselves of
overthrowing this manufacture, they decided to sell glassware at a price
at which it would be impossible to sell the products of Nuevo Baztán.
The amount of this reduction was the one-third part of the entire value.
By this means the foreigners made it impossible for the factory to
support itself, since the objects it produced were laid away and found
no purchaser for years. This, and the cost of the wood required to keep
the ovens burning day and night, not excepting feast-days (for to stop
the fires for a moment would have meant the spoiling of the oven),
induced the downfall of this celebrated factory, as soon as the fuel of
all the neighbouring forests had been consumed."
Nevertheless, upon the closing of these works, one of the experts who
had been employed there, a Catalan named Ventura Sit, attracted by the
forests of Valsain and the excellent and abundant sand obtainable in
this locality--principally from near the villages of Espirdo and Bernuy
de Porreros--decided to open another glass-works at La Granja. Here is
the royal summer residence of San Ildefonso, and Sit was fortunate
enough to secure at the outset--that is, in 1728--the firm protection of
Philip the Fifth and of his consort, Isabel Farnese. Instructed by the
sovereigns to make some mirrors, he produced these objects of a moderate
size at first, increasing it, after the year 1734, to a maximum length
of 145 inches by 85 in breadth. Larruga says that these mirrors were the
largest produced anywhere at that time, and they continued to be made
until very nearly the end of the century. They are often referred to in
the narratives of travellers. Swinburne wrote in 1776: "Not far from
Carthagena is a place called Almazaron, where they gather a fine red
earth called Almagra, used in the manufactures of Saint Ildephonso, for
polishing looking-glasses. In Seville, it is worked up with the tobacco,
to give it a colour, fix its volatility, and communicate to it that
softness which constitutes the principal merit of Spanish snuff."
Describing the royal palace at Madrid, the same author says that the
walls of the great audience-chamber "are incrustated with beautiful
marble, and all round hung with large plates of looking-glass in rich
frames. The manufactory of glass is at Saint Ildefonso, where they cast
them of a very great size; but I am told they are apt to turn out much
rougher and more full of flaws than those of France."
According to Townsend (1786), "The glass manufacture is here carried to
a degree of perfection unknown in England. The largest mirrors are made
in a brass frame, one hundred and sixty-two inches long, ninety-three
wide, and six deep, weighing near nine tons. These are designed wholly
for the royal palaces, and for presents from the king. Yet even for such
purposes the factory is ill-placed, and proves a devouring monster in a
country where provisions are dear, fuel scarce, and carriage exceedingly
expensive."
Laborde wrote of the same factory a few years later: "There is also a
glass-house, in which bottles are wrought of a superior quality; and
white glasses, which are carved with much ingenuity (Plates lxxvi. and
lxxvii.). Near this glass-house has been founded a manufactory for
mirrors, in a large and well-arranged edifice. There are two furnaces,
and a considerable number of stoves, in which the plates are left to
cool after they have been precipitated. They are of all dimensions, and
the largest that have yet been fabricated. They are sometimes from a
hundred, a hundred and thirty, or a hundred and thirty-five inches in
height, to fifty, sixty, or sixty-five inches in breadth: they are
expanded in the hand. The process for polishing them is performed by a
machine;[118] they are then transported to Madrid, for the purpose of
being metallised. It is not uncommon to see tables of bronze, on which
mirrors are extended, a hundred and sixty inches in length, and ninety
in breadth."
[118] This machine was invented by a Catalan named Pedro Fronvila.
These tables are described by Bowles: "The largest measures a hundred
and forty-five inches in length by eighty-five in breadth, and weighs
four hundred and five _arrobas_. The smallest measures a hundred and
twenty inches in length, and seventy-five in breadth, and weighs three
hundred and eighty _arrobas_."
[Illustration: LXXVI
GLASS OF THE FACTORY OF SAN ILDEFONSO]
The best account of any is contained in the _Nouveau Voyage en Espagne_
(1789) of Bourgoing. This author wrote: "A côté de cette Fabrique
naissante de première nécessité" (_i.e._ the royal linen factory at La
Granja) "il y en a une de luxe qui remonte au regne de Philippe V; c'est
une Manufacture de glaces, la seule qu'il y ait en Espagne. On s'étoit
d'abord borné à une Verrerie qui subsiste encore, et donne des
bouteilles d'une assez bonne qualité, et des verres blancs qu'on y
cisele avec assez d'adresse. J'en ai rapporté quelques-uns où l'on a
gravé des chiffres, des lettres, et jusqu'à de jolis paysages. Cette
Verrerie étoit un acheminement à une entreprise plus brillante. La
Manufacture de glaces de Saint Ildephonse est comparable aux plus beaux
établissements de ce genre; on en peut voir les dessins dans les
Planches de l'Encyclopédie. L'édifice est vaste et très bien distribué;
il contient deux fourneaux et une vingtaine de fours où l'on fait
refroidir lentement les glaces après les avoir coulées. On y en coule
dans toutes les dimensions depuis les carreaux de vitres jusqu'aux plus
grands trumeaux. Elles sont moins blanches et peut-être moins bien
polies que celles de Venise et de St-Gobin; mais nulle part on n'en a
encore coulé d'aussi grandes. L'opération du coulage s'y fait avec
beaucoup de précision et d'ensemble. Monseigneur Comte d'Artois eut la
curiosité d'y assister; la glace qu'on y coula devant lui avoit, autant
que je puis m'en souvenir, cent trente-trois pouces de long, sur
soixante-cinq de large, et l'on m'a assuré qu'il y en avoit encore de
plus grandes. On les dégrossit à mains d'hommes dans une longue galerie
qui est attenante à la Fabrique, et il y a à un quart de lieue une
machine que l'eau fait mouvoir, et où on acheve de les polir; on les
porte ensuite à Madrid pour les étamer. Le Roi consacre les plus belles
à la parure de ses appartements; il en fait des cadeaux aux Cours qui
ont des relations intimes avec lui. En 1783, S.M.C. en fit joindre
quelques-unes aux présens qu'il envoyoit à la Porte Ottomane, avec
laquelle elle venoit de conclure un traité. C'est une idée agréable pour
un cosmopolite tolérant, de penser qu'en dépit des préjugés de religion
et de politique qui divisoient autrefois les Nations, la main des arts a
établi entr'elles un échange de jouissances d'un bout de l'Europe à
l'autre, et que les beautés du serrail se mirent dans les glaces coulées
à Saint-Ildefonse, tandis que les tapis de Turquie sont foulés par des
pieds François. Ce qui sort d'ailleurs de la Manufacture de
Saint-Ildefonse est vendu, pour le compte du Roi, à Madrid et dans les
provinces; mais on sent bien que ce profit est trop mince pour couvrir
les frais d'un établissement aussi considérable qui, le bois excepté,
est éloigné de toutes les matières premières qu'il employe, qui est
situé fort avant dans l'intérieur des terres, au sein des montagnes, et
loin de toute rivière navigable; aussi doit il être compté parmi ces
fondations de luxe qui prosperent à l'ombre du Trône, et qui ajoutent à
son éclat."[119]
[119] Vol. I., pp. 144-147.
A few more details are added by Swinburne: "Below the town is the
manufactory of plate-glass belonging to the crown, carried on under the
direction of Mr Dowling; two hundred and eighty men are employed. The
largest plate they have made is one hundred and twenty-six Spanish
inches long; the small pieces are sold in looking-glasses all over the
kingdom; but I am told the king makes no great profit by it; however, it
is a very material point to be able to supply his subjects with a good
commodity, and to keep in the country a large sum of money that
heretofore went out annually to purchase it from strangers. They also
make bottles and drinking-glasses (Plates lxxvi., lxxvii.); and are now
busy erecting very spacious new furnaces to enlarge the works. To
provide fuel for the fires, they have put the pinewoods under proper
regulations and stated falls; twenty-seven mule-loads of fir-wood are
consumed every day; and four loads cost the king, including all the
expenses of cutting and bringing down from the mountains, about forty
reals."
[Illustration: LXXVII
GLASS OF THE FACTORY OF SAN ILDEFONSO]
In 1736, the first factory which had been established at San Ildefonso
was nearly destroyed by fire; but the damage was repaired, and the
factory placed under state control. Its finances were at no time
prosperous. In 1762 Charles the Third granted a privilege reserving to
it the exclusive sale of glass within a radius of twenty leagues from
Madrid and Segovia; but the sales did not improve. In spite of this, the
monarch, a few years later, erected a new and costly factory from
designs by Villanueva and Real. There were two departments in this ample
building. One, for the manufacture of the plainest glass, was
directed by a Hanoverian, named Sigismund Brun; and the other, devoted
to smaller and more elaborate articles, by Eder, a Swede. "The greater
number of the objects made at these important works were of transparent,
colourless glass, possessing a marked French style, and were either
richly engraved and cut, or gilded, or sometimes (though less often)
they were made of coloured and enamelled glass. At this time, too, were
manufactured mirrors for the royal palaces, as well as candlesticks and
chandeliers of great beauty, following the Venetian method, and
embellished with coloured flowers."[120]
[120] Breñosa and Castellarnau; _Guide to San Ildefonso_ (1884), p. 53.
Rico y Sinobas observes that in the objects produced at the
factory of La Granja, the glass itself is inferior to the
engraving or cutting with which it is adorned. This leads him to
infer that the foreigners brought over by the kings of Spain to
superintend the factory, were cutters and engravers of glass,
rather than skilled glass-makers. He also draws attention to the
fact that the Spanish monarchs chose these foreign craftsmen from
too limited a class, entrusting the most important posts at all
the royal factories to Frenchmen who were stated to descend from
the old nobility of their native country. In this manner the
progress and welfare of the craft itself was sacrificed to an
insane prejudice in favour of the aristocratic origin of the
craftsman.
In spite of all these efforts, the works at the dawn of the nineteenth
century were in a moribund condition. In 1829 they passed into the
hands of private persons, who also failed to make them pay, and
subsequently, owing to the ineptitude of Spanish governments and the
severity of foreign competition, have definitely closed their doors.
"In Catalonia," wrote Laborde, towards the year 1800, "are two glass
houses; but the glass blown in them is dark, and destitute of lustre.
Aragon has four, one at Alfamen, one at Peñalva, one at Utrillas, and
one at Jaulin, which is the largest; but the quality of the glass is not
superior to that of Catalonia. The glass-house at Utrillas produces both
flint and common glass. Glass houses are also established at Pajarejo
and at Recuenco in Castile, which manufacture the most beautifully white
and transparent glass."
In 1791 there were six glass-ovens in the kingdom of Valencia, situated
at Valencia, Alicante, Salines, Olleria, and Alcira. They turned out
2100 pieces in this year, some of which were exported to Castile and
Aragon.[121]
[121] Ricord; _Noticia de las varias y diferentes Producciones del
Reyno de Valencia, etc.: segun el estado que tenían en el
año 1791._ Valencia, 1793.
Early in the eighteenth century the glass of Barcelona was praised by
Alvarez de Colmenar ("Il s'y fait de belles verreries"), and we know
that all through this period her _forns de vidre_ continued to produce
good work, including holy-water vessels of uncoloured glass relieved
with blue or with the fine white _latticinio_, the local _arruixadors_
or _borrachas_, and the typical _porrón_. The former of these vessels is
of small size, and has several spouts. Commonly it is filled with
scented water for gallants to sprinkle on girls at dances in the public
square. The _porrón_ invariably excites the curiosity of
foreigners,[122] and is often thought to be of purely Spanish origin.
This is not so. Upon a Roman lampstand in Naples museum is a figure of
Bacchus riding on a tiger and "holding in his hand the horn from which
the ancients drank, using it as, among some other peoples, do the modern
Catalans--that is, not placing the vessel in their mouth, but holding it
aloft and thus imbibing it; a method which requires no small amount of
practice." In fact, there is reason to believe that the _porrón_ is
derived from a similar vessel in use among the ancient Persians, who
poured their liquor from it into the hollow of the hand, and thence
imbibed it in the fashion called, in Cataluña and Valencia, _al gallet_.
For just as a certain class of American displays his marksmanship in
spitting, so does the Catalan who is accomplished in the art, amuse
himself and others by causing the ruby wine to spout from his _porrón_
on to the very apex of his nose, continuing from this point, in the form
of a fine and undulating rivulet, over his upper lip and down his
throat.
[122] "The mode of drinking in this country is singular; they hold a
broad-bottom'd glass bottle at arm's length, and let the liquor
spout out of a long neck upon their tongue; from what I see,
their expertness at this exercise arises from frequent practise;
for the Catalans drink often and in large quantities, but as yet
I have not seen any of them intoxicated."--Swinburne.
Windows of Spanish houses were seldom glazed until about one hundred
years ago. When Bertaut de Rouen travelled here in 1659, this fact
impressed him disagreeably. Even in the royal palace at Madrid he found
that there were chambers "qui n'ont point du tout de fenestrés, ou qui
n'en ont qu'une petite, et d'où le jour ne vient que d'enhaut, le verre
estant fort rare en Espagne, et la pluspart des fenestrés des maisons
n'ayant pas de vitres." In 1787, Arthur Young was no less horrified at
the glassless condition of the houses in Cataluña. "Reach Sculló; the
inn so bad that our guide would not permit us to enter it, so he went to
the house of the Curé. A scene followed so new to English eyes, that we
could not refrain from laughing very heartily. Not a pane of glass in
the whole town, but our reverend host had a chimney in his kitchen; he
ran to the river to catch trout; a man brought us some chickens which
were put to death on the spot.... This town and its inhabitants are, to
the eye, equally wretched, the smoke-holes instead of chimneys, the
total want of glass windows--the cheerfulness of which, to the eye, is
known only by the want."
However, as an exception to this doleful rule, the town of Poeblar had
"some good houses with glass windows, and we saw a well-dressed young
lady gallanted by two monks."
PRINTED BY
NEILL AND COMPANY, LIMITED,
EDINBURGH.
* * * * * *
Transcriber's note:
The original spelling and minor inconsistencies in the spelling and
formatting have been maintained.
Inconsistent hyphenation and accents are as in the original if not marked
as an misprint.
The table below lists all corrections applied to the original text.
p. x: LIX -> LIX.
p. 20: Mr Cunninghame Graham -> Mr.
p. 23: avec leurs enfans -> enfants
p. 32: feu. L'hôte -> L'hôtel
p. 33: choses est règlé -> réglé
p. 39: fort peuplée autresfois -> autrefois
p. 71: pp. 161, 162 -> pp. 161, 162.
p. 72: León Cathedral_ -> León Cathedral_)
p. 96: peintures variées de bon gôut -> goût
p. 98: on the cover. -> on the cover."
p. 104: (see Vol. I. Plate xi.) -> (see Vol. I., Plate xi.)
p. 132: appear to be galloping. -> galloping."
p. 139: and "Pisano." -> and "Pisano".
p. 139: "_de relieve_." -> "_de relieve_".
p. 159: les plus compliqúes -> compliqués
p. 159: qu'un bal masqúe -> masqué
p. 169: the journal of Bertant -> Bertaut
p. 180: Quarte, Vilallonga -> Villalonga
p. 183: degree of delicacy. -> delicacy."
p. 188: says Señor Osmo -> Osma
p. 188: and another [Illustration] -> [Illustration].
p. 213: style of Capo-di-Monte. -> Capo-di-Monte."
p. 225: in France and Spain. -> Spain."
p. 228: albeit the the -> albeit the
p. 236: VESSELS OF CATALAN GLASS -> LXXV VESSELS OF CATALAN GLASS
p. 254: GLASS OF THE -> LXXVI GLASS OF THE