FROM VERGARA TO BURGOS.
Vergara--Vittoria; the Baile National and the French
Hercules--The Passage of Pancorbo--The Asses and the
Greyhounds--Burgos--A Spanish Fonda--Galley Slaves in Cloaks--The
Cathedral--The Coffer of the Cid.
At Vergara, which is the place where the treaty between Espartero
and Maroto was concluded, I saw, for the first time, a Spanish
priest. His appearance struck me as rather grotesque, although,
thank heaven, I entertain no Voltairean ideas with regard to the
clergy; but the caricature of Beaumarchais' Basile involuntarily
suggested itself to my recollection. Just fancy a black cassock,
with a cloak of the same colour, and to crown the whole, an
immense, prodigious, phenomenal, hyperbolical, and Titanic hat, of
which no epithet, however inflated and gigantic, can give any idea
at all approaching the reality. This hat is, at least, three feet
long; the brim is turned up, and forms, before and behind the hat,
a kind of horizontal roof. It would be difficult to invent a more
uncouth and fantastic shape; this, however, did not prevent the
worthy priest from presenting a very respectable appearance, and
walking about with the air of a man whose conscience is perfectly
tranquil about the form of his head-dress; instead of bands, he
wore a little collar (_alzacuello_), blue and white, like the
priests in Belgium.
Beyond Mondragon, which is the last small market-town, the last
_pueblo_ of the province of Guipuzcoa, we entered the province of
Alava, and were not long before we found ourselves at the foot of
the hill of Salinas. The _Montagnes Russes_[3] are nothing compared
to this, and, at first sight, the idea of a carriage passing over
it appears as preposterous as that of your walking head downwards
on the ceiling like a fly. This prodigy was however effected,
thanks to six oxen which were harnessed on before the mules.
Never in my whole life did I hear so horrible a disturbance;
the mayoral, the zagal, the escopeteros, the postilion, and the
oxen-drivers, tried which could excel each other in hooting,
swearing, using their whips, and exercising their goads; they
thrust forward the wheels, held up the body of the coach behind,
and pulled on the mules by their halters and the oxen by their
horns, with a most incredible amount of fury and vehemence. The
coach thus placed at the end of this long string of animals and
men, produced a most astonishing effect. There were, at least,
fifty paces between the first and last beast in the team. I must
not forget to mention, _en passant_, the steeple of Salinas, which
has a very pleasing Saracenic form. From the top of the hill the
traveller beholds on looking back, the Pyrenees rising one above
the other until lost in the distance; they resemble immense pieces
of rich velvet drapery, thrown together by chance and rumpled by
the whim of a Titan. At Royane, which is a little further on, I
observed a magical effect in optics. A snowy mountain-top (_Sierra
Nevada_), that the proximity of the other mountains had till
then veiled from our sight, suddenly appeared standing out from
the sky, which was of a blue so dark as to be almost black. Soon
afterwards, at all the edges of the table-land we were traversing,
more mountains raised, in a most curious manner, their summits
loaded with snow and bathed in clouds. This snow was not compact,
but divided into thin veins like sides of gauze worked with silver;
it appeared still whiter from the contrast it formed with the
azure and lilac tints of the precipices. The cold was tolerably
severe, and became more intense in proportion as we advanced. The
wind had not warmed itself by caressing the pale cheeks of these
beautiful and chilly virgins, and came to us as icy as if it had
arrived direct from the North or South Pole. We wrapped ourselves
up as hermetically as we could in our cloaks, for it is extremely
scandalous to have your nose frost-bitten in a torrid clime; I
should not have cared had we been merely fried.
The sun was setting when we entered Vittoria; after threading all
sorts of streets, of but middling architectural style and very bad
taste, the coach stopped at the _parador vejo_, where our luggage
was scrupulously examined. Our Daguerreotype especially alarmed the
worthy custom-house officers a good deal; they approached it with
the greatest precautions, like people who are afraid of being blown
up; I think they imagined it to be an electrifying machine, and I
took care not to undeceive them.
As soon as our things had been searched and our passports stamped,
we had the right to scatter ourselves over the pavement of the
town. We immediately took advantage of this, and, crossing a
fine square surrounded by arcades, proceeded straightway to the
church. The shades of night already filled the nave, and lowered
with a mysterious and threatening look in obscure corners, where
phantom-like forms might now and then be seen. A few small lamps,
yellow and smoky, trembled ominously like stars in a fog. A sort
of sepulchral chill came over me, and it was not without a slight
feeling of dread that I heard a mournful voice murmur, just at
my elbow, the stereotyped formula "_Caballero, una limosina por
l'amor de Dios._" It was a poor wretch of a soldier who had been
wounded, and who was asking an alms of us. In this country the
soldiers beg; this is excusable on account of their miserable state
of destitution, for they are paid very irregularly. In the church
at Vittoria I became acquainted with those frightful sculptures in
coloured wood, the use of which the Spaniards carry to such excess.
After a supper (_cena_) which caused us to regret that at
Antigarraga, we suddenly thought of going to the play. We had been
allured, as we passed along, by a pompous poster announcing the
extraordinary performances of two French Herculeses, which were to
terminate with a certain _baile nacional_ (national dance), which
we pictured to ourselves big with cachuchas, boleros, fandangos,
and other diabolical dances.
The theatres in Spain have generally no façade, and are only
distinguished from the houses around by two or three smoky
lamps stuck before the door. We took two orchestra-stalls,
surnamed _places de lunette_ (_asientos de luneta_), and bravely
precipitated ourselves into a corridor, where the floor was neither
planked nor paved, but was nothing more or less than the bare
earth. The frequenters of the place are not very particular about
the uses to which they turn the walls of the corridor, but, by
hermetically sealing our noses, we reached our places not more than
half suffocated. When I add that smoking is perpetually practised
between the acts, the reader will not have a very fragrant idea of
a Spanish theatre.
The interior of the house is, however, more comfortable than the
approaches to it promise; the boxes are tolerably arranged, and
although the decorations are simple, they are fresh and clean. The
_asientos de luneta_ are armchairs placed in rows and numbered;
there is no checktaker at the door to take your tickets, but a
little boy comes round for them before the end of the performance;
at the outer door you are merely asked for the card that admits you
within the theatre.
We had hoped to find the true type of the Spanish woman, of which
we had as yet seen but few specimens; but the ladies who filled
the boxes and galleries had nothing Spanish about them save the
mantilla and the fan: this was a good deal, it is true, but not
sufficient. The audience was mostly composed of the military, which
is the case in all garrison towns. In the pit, the spectators
stand as in the most primitive theatres. There was, in truth, but
a row of candles and a candle-snuffer wanting to give the place
the appearance of the Hôtel de Bourgogne; the lamps, however,
were enclosed by thin plates of glass, disposed in the shape of a
melon, and united at the top by a circle of tin: this was certainly
no great sign of an advanced state of the industrial arts. The
orchestra, which consisted of one row of musicians, almost all
of whom played brass instruments, blew most valiantly on their
cornets-à-piston an air which was always the same, and recalled to
one's recollection the flourishes of the band at Franconi's.
Our Herculean compatriots raised immense weights, and bent a
considerable number of iron bars, to the great delight of the
assembly; while the lighter of the two made an ascent upon the
tight rope, and performed a variety of other feats, rather stale
in Paris, but new, probably, to the population of Vittoria. During
this time we were dying with impatience in our stalls, and I was
cleaning the glass of my _lorgnette_ with a furious degree of
activity, in order not to lose anything of the _baile nacional_.
At last, the supports of the tight-rope were loosened, and the
stage-carpenters, dressed as Turks, cleared away the weights and
all the other paraphernalia of the Hercules_es_. Think, dear
reader, of the frightful anxiety of two enthusiastic and romantic
young Frenchmen about to behold, for the first time, a Spanish
dance ... in Spain!
At last the curtain rose upon a scene which seemed to entertain
a feeble desire, which was certainly not gratified, of being
enchanting and fairy-like. The cornets-à-piston played, with more
fury than ever, the strain already described, and the _baile
nacional_ advanced in the form of a _danseur_ and _danseuse_,
armed with a pair of castagnettes each. Never have I seen anything
more sad and lamentable than these two miserable ruins _qui ne
se consolaient pas entre eux_: a penny theatre never bore upon
its worm-eaten boards a couple more used-up, more worn-out, more
toothless, more blear-eyed, more bald, and more dilapidated.
The wretched woman, who had besmeared herself with bad Spanish
white, had a sky-blue complexion, which recalled to your mind the
Anacreontic pictures of a person who had died of cholera, or been
drowned some time; the two dabs of rouge that she had placed upon
her prominent cheek-bones, to add a little brilliancy to her fishy
eyes that seemed as if they had been boiled, contrasted strangely
with the aforesaid blue. With her veiny and emaciated hands she
shook a pair of cracked castagnettes, which chattered like the
teeth of a man who has got a fever, or like the wires of a skeleton
in motion. From time to time, she stretched, with a desperate
effort, the relaxed fibres of her calves, and managed to raise her
poor old baluster-looking leg, so as to produce a nervous little
capriole, like a dead frog submitted to the operation of the
voltaic battery, and, for a second, to cause the copper spangles
of the doubtful rags which served her for a robe, to sparkle and
glisten. As for the man, he kept fluttering about most horribly in
his own corner; he rose and fell flatly, like a bat crawling along
upon its stumps; he looked like a grave-digger burying himself. His
forehead, wrinkled like a boot, and his goat-like cheeks, gave him
a most fantastic air: if, instead of castagnettes, he had only had
a Gothic rebec in his hands, he might have set up to lead the Dance
of Death at Basle.
During all the time the dance lasted, they did not once raise their
eyes on one another; it struck you that they were frightened of
their reciprocal ugliness, and feared lest they should burst into
tears at seeing themselves so old, so decrepit, and so mournful.
The man, especially, avoided his companion as if she had been a
spider, and appeared to shiver in his old parchment skin every time
the figure of the dance forced him to approach her. This lively
bolero lasted five or six minutes, after which the fall of the
curtain put an end to the torture of these two wretched beings, ...
and to ours.
Such was the specimen of the bolero which greeted our poor eyes,
so enamoured of "local colouring." Spanish dancers exist only at
Paris, like the shells which are only found at the curiosity-shops,
and never on the sea shore. O Fanny Elssler, who art now in
America, among the savages! even before going to Spain, we always
had an idea that it was thou who inventedst the cachucha!
We went to bed rather disappointed. In the middle of the night we
were woke up to resume our journey. The cold was still intense,
to a Siberian extent; this is accounted for by the height of
the table-land we were crossing, and the snow by which we were
surrounded. At Miranda, our trunks were once more examined, and
then we entered Old Castile (_Castilla la Vieja_), the kingdom of
Castile and Leon, symbolically represented by a lion holding a
shield studded with castles. These lions, which are repeated until
you are sick of them, are generally of a greyish granite, and have
rather an imposing heraldic appearance.
[Illustration: PASS OF PANCORBO.]
Between Ameyugo and Cubo, small insignificant towns, where we
changed mules, the landscape is extremely picturesque; the
mountains contract and draw near one another, while immense
perpendicular rocks, as steep as cliffs, rise up at the road-side.
On the left, a torrent, crossed by a bridge with a truncated ogive
arch, whirls round and round at the bottom of a ravine, turns a
mill, and covers with spray the stones that stop its course. That
nothing may be wanting to complete the effect, a gothic church,
falling to ruin, with its roof staved in, and its walls covered
with parasite plants, rises in the midst of the rocks; in the
background is seen the vague and bluish outline of the Sierra. The
view is certainly very fine, but the passage of _Pancorbo_ carries
off the palm for singularity and grandeur. There the rocks leave
only just room enough for the road, and there is one point where
two immense granite masses, leaning towards one another, give you
the idea of a gigantic bridge, which has been cut in the middle, to
stop the march of an army of Titans. A second, but smaller, arch,
pierced through the thickness of the rock, adds still more to the
illusion. Never did a scene-painter imagine a more picturesque and
more admirably-contrived scene. When you are accustomed to the flat
views of plains, the astonishing effects met with at every step,
in the mountains, appear impossible and fabulous.
The posada where we stopped to dine had a stable for a vestibule.
This architectural arrangement is invariably repeated in all
Spanish posadas, and to reach your room you are obliged to pass
behind the cruppers of the mules. The wine, which was blacker than
usual, had a certain taste of goat-skin sufficiently local. The
maidservants of the inn wore their hair hanging down to the middle
of their backs, but, with this exception, their dress was the
same as that of French women of the lower classes. The national
costumes are, in general, seldom preserved, save in Andalusia,
and, at present, there are very few ancient costumes in Castile.
The men wore the pointed hat, edged with velvet and silk tufts,
or a wolf-skin cap of rather ferocious shape, and the inevitable
tobacco or dirty-coloured mantle. Their faces, however, had nothing
characteristic about them.
Between Pancorbo and Burgos we fell in with three or four little
villages, such as Briviesca, Castil de Peones, and Quintanapalla,
half in ruins, as dry as pumice-stone, and of the colour of a
toast. I doubt whether Decamps ever found in the heart of Asia
Minor, any walls more roasted, more reddened, more tawny, more
seedy, more crusty, and more scratched over, than these. Along
these said walls wandered carelessly certain asses, who are
decidedly well worth the Turkish ones, and which I would advise him
to go and study. The Turkish ass is a fatalist, and, as is evident
from his humble air, resigned to the blows which Fate has in store
for him, and which he endures without a murmur. The Castilian ass
has a more philosophical and deliberate look; he is aware that
people cannot do without him; he makes one of the family; he has
read Don Quixote, and he flatters himself that he is descended in a
straight line from the celebrated donkey of Sancho Panza. Side by
side with these asses were also dogs of the purest blood and most
superb breed, with splendid claws, broad backs, and beautiful ears,
and among the rest some large greyhounds, in the style of Paul
Veronese and Velasquez, of most magnificent size and beauty, not to
speak of some dozen _muchachos_, or boys, whose eyes glistened in
the midst of their rags, like so many black diamonds.
Old Castile is, doubtless, so called, on account of the great
number of old women you meet there; and what old women! The witches
in "Macbeth" crossing the heath of Dunsinane, to prepare their
diabolical cookery, are charming young girls in comparison: the
abominable hags in the capricious productions of Goya, which I had
till then looked upon as monstrous nightmares and chimeras, are
but portraits frightfully like; most of these old women have a
beard like mouldy cheese, and moustaches like French grenadiers;
and then, their dress! You might take a piece of cloth, and work
hard ten years to dirty, to rub, to tear, to patch, and to make it
lose all traces of its original colour, and you would not even then
attain the same sublimity of raggedness! These charms are increased
by a haggard and savage look, very different from the humble and
piteous mien of the poor wretches in France.
A little before reaching Burgos, a large edifice, situated upon
a hill, was, in the distance, pointed out to us. It was the
_Cartuja de Miraflores_ (Carthusian convent), of which I shall
have occasion, later, to speak more at length. Soon afterwards
the spires of the Cathedral displayed their embrasures more and
more distinctly against the sky, and in another half-hour we were
entering the ancient capital of Old Castile.
The public place of Burgos, in the midst of which stands a very
middling bronze statue of Charles III., is large, and not without
some character. Red houses, supported by pillars of bluish granite,
inclose it on all sides. Under the arcades and on the place, are
stationed all sorts of petty dealers, besides an infinite number of
asses, mules, and picturesque peasants who promenade up and down.
The rags of Castile are seen there in all their splendour. The
poorest beggar is nobly draped in his cloak, like a Roman emperor
in his purple. I know nothing better with which to compare these
cloaks, for colour and substance, than large pieces of tinder
jagged at the edges. Don Cæsar de Bazan's cloak, in the drama of
"Ruy Blas," does not come near these proud and haughty rags. They
are all so threadbare, so dry, and so inflammable, that it strikes
you the wearers are very imprudent to smoke or strike a light. The
little children, also, six or eight years old, have their cloaks,
which they wear with the most ineffable gravity. I cannot help
laughing at the recollection of a poor little wretch, who had
nothing left but a collar which hardly covered his shoulder, and
who draped himself in the absent folds with an air so comically
piteous, that he would have unwrinkled the countenance of the
Spleen in person. The men condemned to the _presidio_ (convicts)
sweep the town and clear away the filth, without quitting the rags
in which they are swathed. These convicts in cloaks are the most
astonishing blackguards it is possible to behold. After each stroke
of their broom, they go and sit down, or else recline upon the
door-steps. Nothing would be easier for them than to escape; and on
my hinting this, I was informed that they did not do so on account
of the natural goodness of their disposition.
The fonda where we alighted was a true Spanish fonda, where no
one spoke a word of French; we were fairly obliged to exert our
Castilian, and to tear our throats with uttering the abominable
_jota_--a guttural and Arabian sound which does not exist in our
language. I must confess that, thanks to the extreme intelligence
which distinguishes the people, we made ourselves understood pretty
well. They sometimes, it is true, brought us candles when we
asked for water, or chocolate when we desired ink; but, with the
exception of these little mistakes, which were very pardonable,
everything went on beautifully. We were waited on by a population
of masculine and dishevelled females, with the finest names in the
world; as, for instance, Casilda, Matilda, and Balbina. Spanish
names are always charming. Lola, Bibiana, Pepa, Hilaria, Carmen,
Cipriana, serve to designate some of the most unpoetical beings it
is possible to imagine. One of the creatures who waited on us had
hair of the most fiery red. Light haired, and especially red haired
persons abound in Spain, contrary to the generally-received idea.
We did not find any holy box-wood in the rooms, but branches of
trees, in the shape of palms, plaited, woven, and twisted with
great elegance and care. The beds possess no bolsters, but have two
flat pillows placed one on the other. They are generally extremely
hard, although the wool of which they are composed is good; but the
Spanish are not accustomed to card their mattresses, merely turning
the wool with the aid of two sticks. Opposite our windows hung a
strange kind of sign-board. It belonged to a surgical practitioner,
who had caused himself to be represented in the act of sawing off
the arm of a poor devil seated in a chair; we also perceived the
shop of a barber, who, I can assure my readers, did not bear the
least resemblance to Figaro. Through the panes of his shop-front we
could see a large and rather highly-polished brazen shaving-dish,
which Don Quixote, had he still been of this world, might easily
have mistaken for Mambrino's helmet. It is true that the Spanish
barbers have lost their ancient costume, but they still retain
their former skill, and shave with great dexterity.
Although Burgos was long the first city of Castile, there is
nothing peculiarly Gothic in its general appearance. With the
exception of one street, in which there are a few windows and
door-ways of the time of the Renaissance, and ornamented with coats
of arms and their supporters, the houses do not date further back
than the commencement of the seventeenth century, and merely strike
the observer by their very commonplace look; they are old, but
they are not ancient. Burgos, however, can boast of its Cathedral,
which is one of the finest in the world; but, unfortunately, like
all Gothic cathedrals, it is hemmed in by a number of ignoble
structures, which prevent the eye from appreciating the general
disposition of the building and seizing the whole mass at one
glance. The principal entrance looks out upon a large square,
in the middle of which is a handsome fountain, surmounted by a
delicious statue of Our Saviour in white marble. This fountain
serves as a target to all the idle vagabonds of the town who can
find no more amusing occupation than to throw stones at it. The
entrance, which I have just mentioned is magnificent, being worked
and covered with a thousand different patterns like a piece of
lace. Unfortunately it has been rubbed and scraped down to the
outer frieze by some Italian prelates or other, who were great
admirers of architectural simplicity, of plain walls and ornaments
in "good taste," and wished to arrange the cathedral in the Roman
style, pitying very much the poor, barbarous architects, for not
employing the Corinthian order, and not appearing to have been
alive to Attic beauty and the charm of triangular frontons.
There are still many people of this way of thinking in Spain, where
the so-called _Messidor_ style flourishes in all its purity. These
persons prefer to the richest and most profusely carved specimens
of Gothic architecture, all sorts of abominable edifices riddled
with windows, and _ornamented_ with Pæstumian columns, exactly as
was the case in France before the disciples of the Romantic School
had caused the public to appreciate once more the style of the
Middle Ages, and understand the meaning and the beauty of their
cathedrals. Two pointed spires, carved in zigzag, and pierced as
if with a punch, festooned, embroidered, and sculptured with most
delicate minuteness, like the bezel of a ring, spring upwards
towards Heaven with all the ardour and impetuosity of unshakable
conviction. It is very certain that the campaniles of our
incredulous times would never dare to rise thus into the air with
nothing to support them, save so much stone lacework and nerves as
thin as a spider's web. Another tower, which is also adorned with
an unheard-of profusion of sculpture, but which is not so high,
marks the spot where the arms of the cross join, and completes
the magnificence of the outline. A countless number of statues,
representing saints, archangels, kings, and monks, ornament the
whole; and this population of stone is so numerous, so crowded, so
multitudinous, that it must most certainly exceed the population in
flesh and blood that inhabit the town.
Thanks to the charming politeness of the political chief, Don
Enrico de Vedia, we were enabled to visit the cathedral most
minutely. An octavo volume of description, a folio of two thousand
plates, and twenty rooms filled with plaster casts would not be
sufficient to convey a complete idea of this prodigious production
of Gothic art with its immense mass of sculptures, more thick and
more complicated than a virgin forest in Brazil. Such being the
case, we shall, perhaps, be pardoned for some few slight omissions
and instances of seeming negligence, having been obliged to
scribble these lines hastily and from recollection, on the table of
a posada.
The moment the visitor enters the church, he is forcibly arrested
by a _chef-d'œuvre_ of incomparable beauty, namely, the carved
wooden door leading to the cloisters. Among the other bas-reliefs
upon it, there is one representing our Saviour's entry into
Jerusalem: the jambs and crosspieces are covered with delicious
little figures, so elegant in their form, and of such extreme
delicacy, that it is difficult to understand how so heavy and
solid a substance as wood could ever be made to lend itself to so
capricious and ethereal a production of the imagination. It is
certainly the most beautiful door in the whole world, if we except
that executed by Ghiberti, at Florence, and which Michael Angelo,
who understood something about these matters, pronounced worthy of
being the door of Paradise. There certainly ought to be a bronze
copy taken of this admirable work of art, so that it might at least
live as long as the work of men's hands can live.
[Illustration: CLOISTERS, BURGOS CATHEDRAL.]
The choir, in which are the stalls, called in Spanish _silleria_,
is enclosed by gates of wrought iron of the most wonderful
workmanship; the pavement, as is the custom in Spain, is covered
with immense mats made of spartum, besides which, each stall
has its own little carpet of dry grass or reeds. On looking up,
you perceive a kind of dome formed by the interior of the tower
to which I have before alluded. It is one mass of sculptures,
arabesques, statues, columns, nerves, and pendentives, sufficient
to make your brain turn giddy. Were a person to gaze for two
years, he still would not be able to see everything in it. The
various objects are as densely crowded together as the leaves of a
cabbage; there is as much open work as in a fish-slice; it is as
gigantic as a pyramid, and as delicate as a woman's earring. How
such a piece of filigree work can have remained erect during two
centuries surpasses human comprehension! What kind of men could
those have been who raised these marvellous buildings, which not
even a fairy palace could ever surpass in profuse magnificence? Is
the race extinct? Are not we, who are always boasting of our high
state of civilization, but decrepit barbarians in comparison? I am
always oppressed with a profound sentiment of melancholy whenever
I visit any of these prodigious edifices of the past; my heart is
overwhelmed by a feeling of utter discouragement, and the only wish
I have is to withdraw to some retired spot, to place a stone
upon my head, and, in the immovability of contemplation, to await
death, which is immovability itself. Why should I work? Why should
I exert myself? The most mighty effort of which man is capable
will never produce anything more magnificent than what I have just
described; and yet we do not even know the name of the divine
artists to whom we owe it; and, if we wish to obtain the slightest
information concerning them, we are obliged to seek it in the dusty
leaves of the monastical archives. When I think that I have spent
the best part of my life in making ten or twelve thousand verses,
in writing six or seven wretched octavo volumes, and three or four
hundred bad articles for the newspapers, and that I feel fatigued
with my exertions, I am ashamed of myself and of the times in which
I live, when so much exertion is required in order to produce so
little. What is a thin sheet of paper compared to a mountain of
granite?
If the reader will take a turn with me in this immense madrepore,
constructed by the prodigious human polypi of the fourteenth and
fifteenth centuries, we will commence by visiting the little
sacristy, which, notwithstanding its name, is a very good-sized
room, and contains an "Ecce Homo" and a "Christ on the Cross" by
Murillo, as well as a "Nativity" by Jordäens. It is lined with
the most beautifully carved woodwork. In the middle is placed a
large brazero, which serves to light the censers, and perhaps
the cigarettes also, for many of the Spanish priests smoke, a
practice that does not strike me as being more unbecoming than
that of taking snuff, in which the French clergy indulge, without
the slightest scruple. The brazero is a large copper vessel,
placed upon a tripod, and filled with burning embers, or little
fruitstones covered with fine cinders, which produce a gentle heat.
In Spain, the brazeros are used instead of fireplaces, which are
very rare.
In the great sacristy, which is next to the little one, the visitor
remarks a "Christ on the Cross" by Domenico Theotocopuli, surnamed
_El Greco_, an extravagant and singular painter, whose pictures
might be mistaken for sketches by Titian, if there were not a
certain affectation of sharp and hastily-painted forms about them,
which causes them to be immediately recognised. In order that
his works may appear to have been painted with great boldness,
he throws in, here and there, touches of the most inconceivable
petulance and brutality, and thin sharp lights which traverse
the portions of the picture which are in shadow, like so many
sword-blades. All this, however, does not prevent El Greco from
being a fine painter. The good specimens of his second style
greatly resemble the romantic pictures of Eugène Delacroix.
The reader has seen, no doubt, in the Spanish Gallery at Paris,
the portrait of El Greco's daughter; a magnificent head that no
master would disown. It enables us to form an opinion as to what
an admirable painter Domenico Theotocopuli must have been when he
was in his right senses. It appears that his constant wish to avoid
any resemblance to Titian, whose scholar he is said to have been,
troubled his understanding, and led him to adopt an extravagance
and capriciousness of style, that allowed the magnificent faculties
with which nature had endowed him to gleam forth only at rare
intervals. Besides being a painter, El Greco was also an architect
and a sculptor,--a sublime union, a triangle of light, which is
often met with in the highest region of art.
The walls of this apartment are covered with panelled wainscoting,
with florid and festooned columns of the greatest richness. Above
the wainscoting there is a row of Venice mirrors; for what purpose
they are placed there, unless it is simply for ornament, I am at a
loss to say, as they are hung too high for any one to see himself
in them. Above the mirrors are ranged, in chronological order,--the
most ancient touching the ceiling,--the portraits of all the
bishops of Burgos, down from the very first, to the prelate who now
occupies the see. These portraits, although in oil-colours, look
like crayon drawings, or sketches in distemper. This is occasioned
by the practice they have in Spain of never varnishing their
pictures, a want of precaution which has been the cause of a great
number of very valuable masterpieces having been destroyed by the
damp. Although most of these portraits present a tolerably imposing
appearance, they are not first-rate paintings; besides, they are
hung too high for any one to form a just opinion of the merit of
the execution. The middle of the room is occupied by an immense
side-board and enormous baskets, made of spartum, in which the
church ornaments and sacred vessels are kept. Under two glass cases
are preserved, as curiosities, two coral trees, whose branches,
however, are far less complicated than the smallest arabesque in
the cathedral. The door is ornamented with the arms of Burgos in
relief, sprinkled with small crosses, gules.
Juan Cuchiller's room, which we traverse after the one I have just
described, offers nothing remarkable in the way of architecture,
and we were hastening to leave it as soon as possible, when our
guide requested us to raise our eyes and look at an object of
the greatest curiosity. This object was a large chest, firmly
attached to the wall by iron cramps: it would be difficult to
conceive anything more patched, more worm-eaten, or more rotten.
It is decidedly the oldest chest in the world; but the following
inscription, in black letters, _Cofre del Cid_, instantly
imparted, as the reader may imagine, an immense degree of
importance to its four planks of mouldering wood. This chest, if
we can believe the old chronicle, is the very same that the famous
Ruy Diaz de Bivar, more generally known under the name of the Cid
Campeador,--being once, hero though he was, pressed for money,
exactly as a mere author might be,--caused to be filled with sand
and stones, and left in pledge at the house of an honest Jewish
usurer, who made advances on this kind of security. The Cid forbad
him, however, to open the mysterious deposit until he, the Cid
Campeador, had paid back the sum borrowed. This proves that the
usurers of that period were of a much more confiding disposition
than those of the present time. We should now-a-days find but
few Jews, and I believe but few Christians either, so innocent
and obliging as to accept a pledge of this description. Monsieur
Casimir Delavigne has used this legend in his piece entitled "La
Fille du Cid;" but, for the enormous chest, he has substituted an
almost imperceptible coffer, which, in sober truth, could only
contain _the gold of the Cid's word_; and there is no Jew, and
there never was one, not even in those heroic times, who would
have lent anything upon such a toy. The historical chest is high,
broad, massive, deep, and garnished with all sorts of locks and
padlocks. When full of sand, it must have required at least six
horses to move it; so that the worthy Israelite might have supposed
it to be crammed with apparel, jewellery, or plate, and thus have
been more easily induced to humour the Cid's caprice, which is one
that, like many other heroical freaks, is duly provided for by the
criminal law. The real chest being such as I have described, I feel
myself necessitated, without wishing to hurt the feelings of Mons.
Antenoz Joly, to pronounce the _mise en scène_ at the Théâtre de la
Renaissance to be inexact.