Transcriber's Note:
Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the original document have
been preserved. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected.
On page 357, "On the verge of great beetling bastion" was changed
to "On the verge of the great beetling bastion".
On page 377, "on which occasion he have" was changed to "on which
occasion he gave".
On page 388, "the talisman that hangs around my neck" was changed
to the talisman that hangs around thy neck".
Italic text is denoted by _underscores_ and bold text by +plus
signs+.
THE ALHAMBRA
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO
ATLANTA . SAN FRANCISCO
THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD
TORONTO
[Illustration: _Washington Irving's rooms, overlooking the Garden of
Lindaraxa._]
THE ALHAMBRA
BY · WASHINGTON · IRVING
WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
ELIZABETH ROBINS PENNELL
ILLUSTRATED WITH DRAWINGS
OF THE PLACES MENTIONED
BY JOSEPH PENNELL
LONDON: MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD.
NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1911
RICHARD CLAY AND SONS, LIMITED,
BRUNSWICK ST., STAMFORD ST.,
AND BUNGAY, SUFFOLK.
_First Edition (Cranford Series), 1896. Reprinted, 1906, 1911.
Pocket Classics, 1908_.
[Illustration]
INTRODUCTION
It is not possible to forget Washington Irving in the Alhambra. With a
single volume, the simple, gentle, kindly American man of letters became
no less a figure in the Moor's Red Palace than Boabdil and Lindaraxa of
whom he wrote. And yet, never perhaps did a book make so unconscious
a bid for popularity. Irving visited Granada in 1828. He returned the
following year, when the Governor's apartments in the Alhambra were lent
to him as lodgings. There he spent several weeks, his love for the place
growing with every day and hour. It was this affection, and no more
complex motive, that prompted him to describe its courts and gardens and
to record its legends. The work was the amusement of his leisure moments,
filling the interval between the completion of one serious, and now all
but unknown, history and the beginning of the next.
Not many other men just then could write about Spain or anything Spanish
so naturally. For, in 1829, while, within the walls of Alhamar and
Yusef, he was listening to the prattle of Mateo and Dolores, in Paris,
Alfred de Musset was writing his _Contes d'Espagne_, and Victor Hugo was
publishing a new edition of his _Orientales_. A year later and the battle
of _Hernani_ was to be fought at the _Comédie Française_; a few more,
and Théophile Gautier would be on his way across the Pyrenees. Time had
passed since Châteaubriand, the pioneer of romance, could dismiss the
Alhambra with a word. Hugo, in turning all eyes to the East, had declared
that Spain also was Oriental, and to his disciples the journey, dreamed or
made, through the land where Irving travelled in single-minded enjoyment,
was an excuse for the profession of their literary faith. Irving, whatever
his accomplishments, was unencumbered with a mission and innocent of pose.
There is no reason to believe that he had ever heard of the Romanticists,
or the part Spain was playing in the revolution; though he had been in
Paris when the storm was brewing; though he returned after the famous red
waistcoat had been sported in the public's face. At any rate, like the
original genius of to-day, he kept his knowledge to himself.
Literary work took Irving to Spain. Several years before, in 1818, he had
watched the total wreck of his brother's business. This was the second
event of importance in his hitherto mild and colourless existence. The
first had been the death of the girl he was to marry, a loss which left
him without interest or ambition. There was then no need for him to work,
and his health was delicate. He travelled a little: an intelligent,
sympathetic and observant tourist. He wrote a little, discovering
that he was an author with _Knickerbocker_. But his writing was of the
desultory sort until, when he was thirty-five years old, his brother's
failure forced him to make literature his profession. It was after he had
published his _Sketch-Book_ and _Bracebridge Hall_ and _Old Christmas_,
after their reception had been of the kind to satisfy even the present
generation of writers who measure the excellence of work by the price
paid for it, that some one suggested he should translate the journeys
of Columbus, which Navarrete, a Spanish author, had in hand. Murray, it
was thought, would give a handsome sum down for the translation. Murray
himself, however, was not so sure: wanted, wise man, first to see a
portion of the manuscript. This was just what could not be until Irving
had begun his task. But already in Madrid, and assured of nothing, he
found the _rôle_ of translator less congenial than that of historian, and
the Spanish work eventually resolved itself into his _Life of Columbus_.
"Delving in the rich ore" of the old chronicles in the Jesuits' Library
of St. Isidoro, there was one side issue in the history he was studying
that enchanted him above all else. This was the Conquest of Granada,
the brilliant episode which had fascinated him ever since, as a boy at
play on the banks of the Hudson, his allegiance had been divided between
the Spanish cavalier, in gold and silver armour, prancing over the
Vega, and the Red Indian brandishing his tomahawk on the war-path. Now,
occasionally, Columbus was forgotten that he might collect the materials
for a new story of the Conquest to be told by himself. To consult further
documents he started one spring (1828), when the almond trees were
blossoming, for Andalusia; and Granada, of course, came into his journey.
Thus chance brought him to the Alhambra, while (1829) the courtesy of the
Governor and the kindness of old Tia Antonia put him in possession of the
rooms of the beautiful Elizabeth of Parma, overlooking the oranges and
fountains of the Garden of Lindaraxa.
The Alhambra reveals but half its charm to the casual visitor. I know, of
my own experience, how far custom is from staling its infinite variety,
how its beauty increases as day by day one watches the play of light
and shadow on its walls, as day by day one yields to the indolent dreams
for which it was built. There was one summer when, all through July and
August, its halls and courts gave me shelter from the burning, blinding
sunshine of Andalusia, and the weeks in passing strengthened the spell
that held me there. For Gautier, the place borrowed new loveliness
from the one night he slept in the Court of Lions. But by day and night
alike, it belonged to Irving; he saw it before it had degenerated into a
disgracefully managed museum and annex to a _bric-à-brac_ shop for the
tourist; and he had heard all its stories, or had had time to invent
them, before he was called away by his appointment to some useless and
unnecessary diplomatic post at the American Legation in London.
The book was not published until more than two years later (1832).
Irving, though a hack in a manner, had too much self-respect to rush into
print on the slightest provocation. Colburn and Bentley were his English
publishers, their edition preceding by a few months the American, brought
out by Lea and Carey of Philadelphia. The same year saw two further issues
in Paris, one by Galignani, and the other in Baudry's Foreign Library, as
well as a French translation from the house of Fournier. The success of
_The Alhambra_ was immediate. De Musset and Victor Hugo had left the great
public in France as indifferent as ever to the land beyond the Pyrenees.
Irving raised a storm of popular applause in England and America, where,
of a sudden, he made Spain, which the Romanticists would have snatched as
their spoils, the prey of the "_bourgeois_" they despised. Nor was it the
general public only that applauded. There were few literary men in England
who did not welcome the book with delight.
I think to-day, without suspicion of disloyalty, one may wonder a little
at this success. Certainly, in its first edition, _The Alhambra_ is
crude and stilted, though, to compare it with the pompous trash which
Roscoe published three years afterward, as text for the drawings of
David Roberts, is to see in it a masterpiece. Irving, more critical than
his readers, knew it needed revision. "It is generally labour lost,"
he said once in a letter to Alexander Everett, "to attempt to improve a
book that has already made its impression on the public." Nevertheless,
_The Alhambra_ was all but re-written in 1857, when he was preparing a
complete edition of his works for Putnam, the New York publisher, and it
gained enormously in the process. It was not so much by the addition of
new chapters, or the re-arrangement of the old; but rather by the changes
made in the actual text--the light touch of local colour here, and there
the rounding of a period, the developing of an incident. For example "The
Journey," so gay and vivacious in the final version, was, at first, but a
bare statement of facts, with no space for the little adventures by the
way: the rest at the old mill near Seville; the glimpses of Archidona,
Antiquero, Osuna, names that lend picturesque value to the ride; the talk
and story-telling in the inn at Loxa. Another change, less commendable,
is the omission from the late editions of the dedication to Wilkie. It
was a pleasant tribute to the British painter, who, with several of his
fellows--Lewis and Roberts--was carried away by that wave of Orientalism
which sent the French Marilhat and Decamps, Fromentin and Delacroix to
the East, and had not yet spent its force in the time of Regnault. The
dedication was well-written, kindly, appreciative: an amiable reminder
of the rambles the two men had taken together in Toledo and Seville, and
the interest they had shared in the beauty left by the Moor to mark his
passage through the land both were learning to love. As a memorial to the
friendship between author and artist, it could less well have been spared
than any one of the historical chapters that go to swell the volume.
Even in the revised edition it would be easy to belittle Irving's
achievement, now that it is the fashion to disparage him as author.
Certainly, _The Alhambra_ has none of the splendid melodrama of Borrow's
_Bible in Spain_, none of the picturesqueness of Gautier's record. It
is very far from being that "something in the Haroun Alraschid style,"
with dash of Arabian spice, which Wilkie had urged him to make it.
Nor are its faults wholly negative. It has its moments of dulness. It
abounds in repetitions. Certain adjectives recur with a pertinacity that
irritates. The Vega is blooming, the battle is bloody, the Moorish maiden
is beauteous far more than once too often. Worse still, descriptions are
duplicated, practically the same passage reappearing again and again, as
if for the sake of padding, or else as the mere babble of the easy writer.
Indeed, many of the purely historical chapters have been crowded in so
obviously because they happened to be at hand, and he without better means
to dispose of them, and then scattered discreetly, that there is less
hesitation in omitting them altogether from the present edition. An edited
_Tom Jones_, a bowdlerized Shakespeare may be an absurdity. But to drop
certain chapters from _The Alhambra_ is simply to anticipate the reader
in the act of skipping. There is no loss, since all important facts and
descriptions are given more graphically and entertainingly elsewhere in
the book.
Perhaps it may seem injudicious to introduce a new edition of so popular
a work by pointing out its defects. But one can afford to be honest about
Irving. _The Alhambra_ might have more serious blemishes, and its charm
would still survive triumphantly the test of the harshest criticism.
For, whatever subtlety, whatever elegance Irving's style may lack, it is
always distinguished by that something which, for want of a better name,
is called charm--a quality always as difficult to define as Lowell thought
when he found it in verse or in perfume. But there it is in all Washington
Irving wrote: a clue to the lavish praise of his contemporaries--of
Coleridge, who pronounced _The Conquest of Granada_ a _chef d'œuvre_,
and Campbell, who believed he had added clarity to the English tongue; of
Byron and Scott and Southey; of Dickens, whose pockets were at one time
filled with Irving's books worn to tatters; of Thackeray, who likened the
American to Goldsmith, describing him as "one of the most charming masters
of our lighter language."
Much of this power to please is due, no doubt, to the simplicity
and sincerity of Irving's style at its best. Despite a tendency to
diffuseness, despite a fancy for the ornate, when there is a story to be
told, he can be as simple and straightforward as the child's "Once upon a
time," with which he begins many a tale: appropriately, since the legends
of the Alhambra are but stories for grown-up children. And there is no
question of the sincerity of his love for everything savouring of romance.
For that matter, it is seldom that he does not mean what he says and does
not say it so truly with his whole heart, that you are convinced, where
you distrust the emotion of De Amicis, pumping up tears of admiration
before the wrong thing, or of Maurice Barrès seeing all Spain through
a haze of blood, voluptuousness, and death. It was the strength of his
feeling for the Alhambra that led Irving to write in its praise, not the
desire to write that manufactured the feeling. Humour and sentiment some
of his critics have thought the predominant traits of his writing, as of
his character. It is a fortunate combination: his sentiment, though it
often threatens, seldom overflows into gush, kept within bounds as it is
by the sense of humour that so rarely fails him. His power of observation
was of still greater service. He could use his eyes. He could see things
for himself. And he was quick to detect character. Occasionally one
finds him slipping. In his landscape, the purple mountains of Alhama
rise wherever he considers them most effective in the picture; and the
snow considerately never melts from the slopes of the Sierra Nevada,
which I have seen all brown at midsummer. He could look only through the
magnifying glass of tradition at the hand and key on the Gate of Justice:
symbols so gigantic in fiction, so insignificant in fact that one might
miss them altogether, did not every book, paper, and paragraph, every
cadging, swindling tout--I mean guide--in Granada bid one look for them.
But these are minor discrepancies. In essentials, his observation never
played him false. There may not be a single passage to equal in force and
brilliance Gautier's wonderful description of the bull-fight at Malaga;
but his impressions were so clear, his record of them so faithful, that
the effect of his book remains, while the accomplishment of a finer artist
in words may be remembered but vaguely. It is Irving who prepares one
best for the stern grandeur and rugged solemnity of the country between
Seville and Granada. The journey can now be made by rail. But to travel
by road as he did--as we have done--is to know that his arid mountains
and savage passes are no more exaggerated than the pleasant valleys and
plains that lie between. For Spain is not all gaiety as most travellers
would like to imagine it, as most painters have painted it, save Daumier
in his pictures of Don Quixote among the barren hills of La Mancha. And if
nothing in Granada and the Alhambra can be quite unexpected, it is because
one has seen it all beforehand with Irving, from the high Tower of Comares
and the windows of the Hall of Ambassadors, or else, following him through
the baths and mosque and courts of the silent Palace, crossing the ravine
to the cooler gardens of the Generalife, and climbing the Albaycin to the
white church upon its summit.
There have been many changes in the Alhambra since Irving's day. The Court
of Lions lost in loveliness when the roses with which he saw it filled
were uprooted. The desertion he found had more picturesqueness than the
present restoration and pretence of orderliness. Irving was struck with
the efforts which the then Commander, Don Francisco de Serna, was making
to keep the Palace in a state of repair and to arrest its too certain
decay. Had the predecessors of De Serna, he thought, discharged the
duties of their station with equal fidelity, the Alhambra might have been
still almost as the Moor, or at least Spanish royalty had left it. What
would he say, one wonders, to the Alhambra under its present management?
Frank neglect is often less an evil than sham zeal. The student, watched,
badgered, oppressed by red-tapeism, has not gained by official vigilance;
nor is the Palace the more secure because responsibility has been
transferred from a pleasant gossiping old woman to half a dozen indolent
guides. The burnt roof in the ante-chamber to the Hall of Ambassadors
shows the carelessness of which the new officers can be guilty; the
matches and cigarette ends with which courts and halls are strewn explain
that so eloquent a warning has been in vain. And if the restorer has
been let loose in the Alhambra, at the Generalife there is an Italian
proprietor, eager, it would seem, to initiate the somnolent Spaniard into
the brisker ways of Young Italy. Cypresses, old as Zoraïde, have already
been cut down ruthlessly along that once unrivalled avenue, and their
destruction, one fears, is but the beginning of the end.
But whatever changes the past sixty years have brought about in Granada,
the popularity of Irving's book has not weakened with time. Not Ford, nor
Murray, nor Hare has been able to replace it. The tourist reads it within
the walls it commemorates as conscientiously as the devout read Ruskin
in Florence. It serves as text book in the Court of Lions and the Garden
of Lindaraxa. It is the student's manual in the high _mirador_ of the
Sultanas and the court of the mosque where Fortuny painted. In a Spanish
translation it is pressed upon you almost as you cross the threshold.
Irving's rooms in the Palace are always locked, that the guide may get an
extra fee for opening--as a special favour--an apartment which half the
people ask to see. As the steamers "Rip Van Winkle" and "Knickerbocker"
ply up and down the Hudson, so the Hotel Washington Irving rises under
the shadow of the Alhambra. Even the spirits and spooks that haunt every
grove and garden are all of his creation, as Spaniards themselves will
be quick to tell you; though who Irving--or, in their familiar speech,
"Vashington"--was, but very few of them could explain. And thus his name
has become so closely associated with the place that, just as Diedrich
Knickerbocker will be remembered while New York stands, so Washington
Irving cannot be forgotten so long as the Red Palace looks down upon the
Vega and the tradition of the Moor lingers in Granada.
ELIZABETH ROBINS PENNELL.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
CONTENTS
PAGE
The Journey 1
Palace of the Alhambra 46
Important Negotiations.--The Author Succeeds to
the Throne of Boabdil 79
Inhabitants of the Alhambra 90
The Hall of Ambassadors 96
The Mysterious Chambers 106
Panorama View from the Tower of Comares 122
The Balcony 134
The Adventure of the Mason 144
The Court of Lions 151
Mementoes of Boabdil 163
The House of the Weathercock 172
Legend of the Arabian Astrologer 176
Visitors to the Alhambra 199
The Generalife 207
Legend of Prince Ahmed al Kamel, or, the Pilgrim
of Love 217
A Ramble Among the Hills 259
Legend of the Moor's Legacy 270
The Tower of Las Infantas 293
Legend of the Three Beautiful Princesses 297
Legend of the Rose of the Alhambra 326
The Veteran 346
The Governor and the Notary 350
Governor Manco and the Soldier 359
A Fête in the Alhambra 377
Legend of the Two Discreet Statues 383
The Crusade of the Grand Master of Alcántara 401
An Expedition in Quest of a Diploma 413
The Legend of the Enchanted Soldier 417
The Author's Farewell to Granada 432
[Illustration]
[Illustration: _Seville_]
THE ALHAMBRA
THE JOURNEY
In the spring of 1829, the author of this work, whom curiosity had brought
into Spain, made a rambling expedition from Seville to Granada in company
with a friend, a member of the Russian Embassy at Madrid. Accident had
thrown us together from distant regions of the globe and a similarity of
taste led us to wander together among the romantic mountains of Andalusia.
[Illustration: _A stern melancholy country._]
And here, before setting forth, let me indulge in a few previous remarks
on Spanish scenery and Spanish travelling. Many are apt to picture
Spain to their imaginations as a soft southern region, decked out with
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.
[Illustration]
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 is noble in its severity and in unison with 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.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
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
possess, in some degree, 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 horseman, 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.
[Illustration: _Picturesque Ronda._]
[Illustration]
[Illustration: _Roman Bridge, Ronda._]
[Illustration]
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 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!"
[Illustration: _Serrania de Ronda._]
As these men have often their whole fortune at stake upon the burden of
their mules, 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 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 inflections. 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 scene, 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
they illustrate; accompanied, as they are, by the occasional jingle of
the mule-bell.
[Illustration]
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
stuffs, 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.
[Illustration: _Approach to Granada. From near Elvira._]
The ancient kingdom of Granada, into which we were 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 sunburnt summits against a deep-blue
sky; yet in their rugged bosoms lie ingulfed verdant and fertile valleys,
where the desert and the garden strive 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.
[Illustration]
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 struggles 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 a herd of fierce Andalusian bulls,
destined for the combat of the arena. I have felt, if I may so express it,
an agreeable horror in thus contemplating, near at hand, 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.
I have been betrayed unconsciously into a longer disquisition than I
intended on the general features of Spanish travelling; but there is
a romance about all the recollections of the Peninsula dear to the
imagination.
As our proposed route to Granada lay through mountainous regions, where
the roads are little better than mule-paths, and said to be frequently
beset by robbers, we took due travelling precautions. Forwarding the most
valuable part of our luggage a day or two in advance by the _arrieros_,
we retained merely clothing and necessaries for the journey and money
for the expenses of the road; with a little surplus of hard dollars
by way of _robber purse_, to satisfy the gentlemen of the road should
we be assailed. Unlucky is the too wary traveller who, having grudged
this precaution, falls into their clutches empty-handed; they are apt
to give him a sound rib-roasting for cheating them out of their dues.
"_Caballeros_ like them cannot afford to scour the roads and risk the
gallows for nothing."
A couple of stout steeds were provided for our own mounting, and a third
for our scanty luggage and the conveyance of a sturdy Biscayan lad,
about twenty years of age, who was to be our guide, our groom, our valet,
and at all times our guard. For the latter office he was provided with
a formidable _trabuco_ or carbine, with which he promised to defend us
against _rateros_ or solitary foot-pads; but as to powerful bands, like
that of the "Sons of Ecija," he confessed they were quite beyond his
prowess. He made much vainglorious boast about his weapon at the outset of
the journey; though, to the discredit of his generalship, it was suffered
to hang unloaded behind his saddle.
According to our stipulations, the man from whom we hired the horses was
to be at the expense of their feed and stabling on the journey, as well
as of the maintenance of our Biscayan squire, who of course was provided
with funds for the purpose; we took care, however, to give the latter
a private hint, that, though we made a close bargain with his master,
it was all in his favour, as, if he proved a good man and true, both
he and the horses should live at our cost, and the money provided for
their maintenance remain in his pocket. This unexpected largess, with the
occasional present of a cigar, won his heart completely. He was, in truth,
a faithful, cheery, kind-hearted creature, as full of saws and proverbs
as that miracle of squires, the renowned Sancho himself, whose name, by
the by, we bestowed upon him, and, like a true Spaniard, though treated
by us with companionable familiarity, he never for a moment, in his utmost
hilarity, overstepped the bounds of respectful decorum.
Such were our minor preparations for the journey, but above all we laid
in an ample stock of good-humour, and a genuine disposition to be pleased;
determining to travel in true _contrabandista_ style; taking things as we
found them, rough or smooth, and mingling with all classes and conditions
in a kind of vagabond companionship. It is the true way to travel in
Spain. With such disposition and determination, what a country is it for
a traveller, where the most miserable inn is as full of adventure as an
enchanted castle, and every meal is in itself an achievement! Let others
repine at the lack of turnpike roads and sumptuous hotels, and all the
elaborate comforts of a country cultivated and civilised into tameness
and commonplace; but give me the rude mountain scramble; the roving,
hap-hazard, wayfaring; the half wild, yet frank and hospitable manners,
which impart such a true game-flavour to dear old romantic Spain!
[Illustration]
Thus equipped and attended, we cantered out of "Fair Seville city" at
half-past six in the morning of a bright May day, in company with a
lady and gentleman of our acquaintance, who rode a few miles with us, in
the Spanish mode of taking leave. Our route lay through old _Alcala de
Guadaira_ (Alcala on the river Aira), the benefactress of Seville, that
supplies it with bread and water. Here live the bakers who furnish Seville
with that delicious bread for which it is renowned; here are fabricated
those _roscas_ well known by the well-merited appellation of _pan de Dios_
(bread of God); with which, by the way, we ordered our man, Sancho, to
stock his _alforjas_ for the journey. Well has this beneficent little city
been denominated the "Oven of Seville"; well has it been called _Alcala de
los Panaderos_ (Alcala of the bakers), for a great part of its inhabitants
by lines of mules and donkeys laden with great panniers of loaves and
_roscas_.
[Illustration]
I have said Alcala supplies Seville with water. Here are great tanks or
reservoirs, of Roman and Moorish construction, whence water is conveyed
to Seville by noble aqueducts. The springs of Alcala are almost as much
vaunted as its ovens; and to the lightness, sweetness, and purity of its
water is attributed in some measure the delicacy of its bread.
[Illustration]
Here we halted for a time, at the ruins of the old Moorish castle, a
favourite resort for picnic parties from Seville, where we had passed many
a pleasant hour. The walls are of great extent, pierced with loopholes;
enclosing a huge square tower or keep, with the remains of _masmoras_, or
subterranean granaries. The Guadaira winds its stream round the hill, at
the foot of these ruins, whimpering among reeds, rushes, and pond-lilies,
and overhung with rhododendron, eglantine, yellow myrtle, and a profusion
of wild flowers and aromatic shrubs; while along its banks are groves of
oranges, citrons, and pomegranates, among which we heard the early note
of the nightingale.
[Illustration]
A picturesque bridge was thrown across the little river, at one end of
which was the ancient Moorish mill of the castle, defended by a tower of
yellow stone; a fisherman's net hung against the wall to dry, and hard
by in the river was his boat; a group of peasant women in bright-coloured
dresses, crossing the arched bridge, were reflected in the placid stream.
Altogether it was an admirable scene for a landscape-painter.
[Illustration]
The old Moorish mills, so often found on secluded streams, are
characteristic objects in Spanish landscape, and suggestive of the
perilous times of old. They are of stone, and often in the form of towers
with loopholes and battlements, capable of defence in those warlike days
when the country on both sides of the border was subject to sudden inroad
and hasty ravage, and when men had to labour with their weapons at hand,
and some place of temporary refuge.
Our next halting-place was at Gandul, where were the remains of another
Moorish castle, with its ruined tower, a nestling-place for storks,
and commanding a view over a vast _campiña_ or fertile plain, with the
mountains of Ronda in the distance. These castles were strongholds to
protect the plains from the _talas_ or forays to which they were subject,
when the fields of corn would be laid waste, the flocks and herds swept
from the vast pastures, and, together with captive peasantry, hurried off
in long _cavalgadas_ across the borders.
[Illustration]
At Gandul we found a tolerable _posada_; the good folks could not tell us
what time of day it was, the clock only struck once in the day, two hours
after noon; until that time it was guess-work. We guessed it was full time
to eat; so, alighting, we ordered a repast. While that was in preparation,
we visited the palace once the residence of the Marquis of Gandul. All
was gone to decay; there were but two or three rooms habitable, and very
poorly furnished. Yet here were the remains of grandeur: a terrace, where
fair dames and gentle cavaliers may once have walked; a fish-pond and
ruined garden, with grape-vines and date-bearing palm-trees. Here we were
joined by a fat curate, who gathered a bouquet of roses, and presented
it, very gallantly, to the lady who accompanied us.
Below the palace was the mill, with orange-trees and aloes in front, and a
pretty stream of pure water. We took a seat in the shade; and the millers,
all leaving their work, sat down and smoked with us; for the Andalusians
are always ready for a gossip. They were waiting for the regular visit
of the barber, who came once a week to put all their chins in order.
He arrived shortly afterwards: a lad of seventeen, mounted on a donkey,
eager to display his new _alforjas_ or saddle-bags, just bought at a fair;
price one dollar, to be paid on St. John's day (in June), by which time
he trusted to have mown beards enough to put him in funds.
By the time the laconic clock of the castle had struck two we had finished
our dinner. So, taking leave of our Seville friends, and leaving the
millers still under the hands of the barber, we set off on our ride across
the _campiña_. It was one of those vast plains, common in Spain, where for
miles and miles there is neither house nor tree. Unlucky the traveller who
has to traverse it, exposed as we were to heavy and repeated showers of
rain. There is no escape nor shelter. Our only protection was our Spanish
cloaks, which nearly covered man and horse, but grew heavier every mile.
By the time we had lived through one shower we would see another slowly
but inevitably approaching; fortunately in the interval there would be an
outbreak of bright, warm, Andalusian sunshine, which would make our cloaks
send up wreaths of steam, but which partially dried them before the next
drenching.
Shortly after sunset we arrived at Arahal, a little town among the hills.
We found it in a bustle with a party of _miquelets_, who were patrolling
the country to ferret out robbers. The appearance of foreigners like
ourselves was an unusual circumstance in an interior country town; and
little Spanish towns of the kind are easily put in a state of gossip
and wonderment by such an occurrence. Mine host, with two or three old
wise-acre comrades in brown cloaks, studied our passports in a corner
of the _posada_, while an _Alguazil_ took notes by the dim light of a
lamp. The passports were in foreign languages and perplexed them, but
our Squire Sancho assisted them in their studies, and magnified our
importance with the grandiloquence of a Spaniard. In the meantime the
magnificent distribution of a few cigars had won the hearts of all around
us; in a little while the whole community seemed put in agitation to
make us welcome. The _Corregidor_ himself waited upon us, and a great
rush-bottomed arm-chair was ostentatiously bolstered into our room by our
landlady, for the accommodation of that important personage. The commander
of the patrol took supper with us: a lively, talking, laughing _Andaluz_,
who had made a campaign in South America, and recounted his exploits in
love and war with much pomp of phrase, vehemence of gesticulation, and
mysterious rolling of the eye. He told us that he had a list of all the
robbers in the country, and meant to ferret out every mother's son of
them; he offered us at the same time some of his soldiers as an escort.
"One is enough to protect you, _señors_; the robbers know me, and know
my men; the sight of one is enough to spread terror through a whole
_sierra_." We thanked him for his offer, but assured him, in his own
strain, that with the protection of our redoubtable squire, Sancho, we
were not afraid of all the _ladrones_ of Andalusia.
[Illustration]
While we were supping with our drawcansir friend, we heard the notes of
a guitar, and the click of castanets, and presently a chorus of voices
singing a popular air. In fact, mine host had gathered together the
amateur singers and musicians, and the rustic belles of the neighbourhood,
and, on going forth, the court-yard or _patio_ of the inn presented a
scene of true Spanish festivity. We took our seats with mine host and
hostess and the commander of the patrol, under an archway opening into the
court; the guitar passed from hand to hand, but a jovial shoemaker was the
Orpheus of the place. He was a pleasant-looking fellow, with huge black
whiskers; his sleeves were rolled up to his elbows. He touched the guitar
with masterly skill, and sang a little amorous ditty with an expressive
leer at the women, with whom he was evidently a favourite. He afterwards
danced a _fandango_ with a buxom Andalusian damsel, to the great delight
of the spectators. But none of the females present could compare with
mine host's pretty daughter, Pepita, who had slipped away and made her
toilette for the occasion and had covered her head with roses; and who
distinguished herself in a _bolero_ with a handsome young dragoon. We
ordered our host to let wine and refreshment circulate freely among the
company, yet, though there was a motley assembly of soldiers, muleteers,
and villagers, no one exceeded the bounds of sober enjoyment. The scene
was a study for a painter: the picturesque group of dancers, the troopers
in their half military dresses, the peasantry wrapped in their brown
cloaks; nor must I omit to mention the old meagre _Alguazil_, in a short
black cloak, who took no notice of anything going on, but sat in a corner
diligently writing by the dim light of a huge copper lamp, that might have
figured in the days of Don Quixote.
The following morning was bright and balmy, as a May morning ought to
be, according to the poets. Leaving Arahal at seven o'clock, with all
the _posada_ at the door to cheer us off, we pursued our way through a
fertile country, covered with grain and beautifully verdant; but which
in summer, when the harvest is over and the fields parched and brown,
must be monotonous and lonely; for, as in our ride of yesterday, there
were neither houses nor people to be seen. The latter all congregate in
villages and strongholds among the hills, as if these fertile plains were
still subject to the ravages of the Moor.
At noon we came to where there was a group of trees, beside a brook in a
rich meadow. Here we alighted to make our mid-day meal. It was really a
luxurious spot, among wild flowers and aromatic herbs, with birds singing
around us. Knowing the scanty larders of Spanish inns, and the houseless
tracts we might have to traverse, we had taken care to have the _alforjas_
of our squire well stocked with cold provisions, and his _bota_, or
leathern bottle, which might hold a gallon, filled to the neck with choice
Valdepeñas wine.[1] As we depended more upon these for our well-being than
even his _trabuco_, we exhorted him to be more attentive in keeping them
well charged; and I must do him the justice to say that his namesake,
the trencher-loving Sancho Panza, was never a more provident purveyor.
Though the _alforjas_ and the _bota_ were frequently and vigorously
assailed throughout the journey, they had a wonderful power of repletion,
our vigilant squire sacking everything that remained from our repasts at
the inns to supplying these junketings by the road-side, which were his
delight.
[Illustration]
On the present occasion he spread quite a sumptuous variety of remnants
on the greensward before us, graced with an excellent ham brought from
Seville; then, taking his seat at a little distance, he solaced himself
with what remained in the _alforjas_. A visit or two to the _bota_ made
him as merry and chirruping as a grasshopper filled with dew. On my
comparing his contents of the _alforjas_ to Sancho's skimming of the
flesh-pots at the wedding of Camacho, I found he was well versed in the
history of Don Quixote, but, like many of the common people of Spain,
firmly believed it to be a true history.
"All that happened a long time ago, _Señor_," said he, with an inquiring
look.
"A very long time," I replied.
"I dare say more than a thousand years,"--still looking dubiously.
"I dare say not less."
The squire was satisfied. Nothing pleased the simple-hearted valet more
than my comparing him to the renowned Sancho for devotion to the trencher;
and he called himself by no other name throughout the journey.
[Illustration]
Our repast being finished, we spread our cloaks on the greensward under
the tree, and took a luxurious _siesta_, in the Spanish fashion. The
clouding up of the weather, however, warned us to depart, and a harsh wind
sprang up from the southeast. Towards five o'clock we arrived at Osuna, a
town of fifteen thousand inhabitants, situated on the side of a hill, with
a church and a ruined castle. The _posada_ was outside of the walls; it
had a cheerless look. The evening being cold, the inhabitants were crowded
round a _brasero_ in a chimney-corner; and the hostess was a dry old
woman, who looked like a mummy. Every one eyed us askance as we entered,
as Spaniards are apt to regard strangers; a cheery, respectful salutation
on our part, caballeroing them and touching our sombreros, set Spanish
pride at ease; and when we took our seat among them, lit our cigars, and
passed the cigar-box round among them, our victory was complete. I have
never known a Spaniard, whatever his rank or condition, who would suffer
himself to be outdone in courtesy; and to the common Spaniard the present
of a cigar _puro_ is irresistible. Care, however, must be taken never to
offer him a present with an air of superiority and condescension: he is
too much of a _caballero_ to receive favours at the cost of his dignity.
[Illustration]