Gatherings From Spain Part 18

CHAPTER XX.

What to observe in Spain--How to observe--Spanish Incuriousness and Suspicions--French Spies and Plunderers--Sketching in Spain--Difficulties, How Surmounted--Efficacy of Pa.s.sports and Bribes--Uncertainty and Want of Information in the Natives.

[Sidenote: DIFFICULTIES OF OBSERVING.]

Now that the most approved methods of travelling, living, and being buried in Spain have been touched on, our kind readers will naturally inquire, what are the peculiar attractions which should induce gentlemen and ladies who take their ease at home, to adventure into this land of roughing it, in which _rats_ rather than hares jump up when the least expected. "What to observe" is a question easier asked than answered; who indeed can cater for the mult.i.tudinous variety of fancies, the differences by which Nature keeps all nature right? Who shall decide when doctors disagree, as they always do, on matters of taste, since every one has his own way of viewing things, and his own hobby and predilection? Say not, however, with Smellfungus, that all is a wilderness from Dan to Beersheba,--nor seek for weeds where flowers grow. The search for the excellent is the high road to excellence, as not to appreciate it when found is the surest test of mediocrity. The refining effort and habit teaches the mind to think; from long pondering on the beautiful world without, s.n.a.t.c.hes are caught of the beautiful world within, and a glimpse is granted to the chosen few, of glories hidden from the vulgar many. They indeed have eyes, but see not; nay, scarcely do they behold the things of external nature, until told what to look for, where to find it, and how to observe it; then a new sense, a second sight, is given. Happy, thrice happy those from whose eyes the film has been removed, who instead of a previous vague general and unintelligent stare, have really learnt to _see_! To them a fountain of new delights, pure and undefiled, welling up and overflowing, is opened; in proportion as they comprehend the infinite form, colour, and beauty with which Nature clothes her every work, albeit her sweetest charms are only revealed to the initiated, reserved as the rich reward of those who bow to her shrine with singleness of purpose, and turn to her wors.h.i.+p with all their hearts, souls, and understandings.

It was with these beneficent intentions that our good friend John Murray first devised Handbooks; and next, by writing them himself, taught others how to dip into inkstands for red books, which tell man, woman, and child what to observe, to the ruin of _laquais de place_, and discomfiture of authors of single octavos and long vacation excursions.

Few gentlemen who publish the notes of their Peninsular gallop much improve their light diaries by discussing heavy handbook subjects; skimming, like swallows, over the surface, and in pursuit of insects, they neither heed nor discern the gems which lurk in the deeps below; they see indeed all the sc.u.m and straws which float on the surface, and write down on their tablets all that is rotten in the state of Spain.

Hence the sameness of some of their works; one book and bandit reflects another, until writers and readers are imprisoned in a vicious circle.

Nothing gives more pain to Spaniards than seeing volume after volume written on themselves and their country by foreigners, who have only rapidly glanced at one-half of the subject, and that half the one of which they are the most ashamed, and consider the least worth notice.

This constant prying into the nakedness of the land and exposing it afterwards, has increased the dislike which they entertain towards the _impertinente curioso_ tribe: they well know and deeply feel their country's decline; but like poor gentlefolks, who have nothing but the past to be proud of, they are anxious to keep these family secrets concealed, even from themselves, and still more from the observations of those who happen to be their superiors, not in blood, but in worldly prosperity. This dread of being shown up sharpens their inherent suspicions, when strangers wish to "observe," and examine into their ill-provided a.r.s.enals and inst.i.tutions, just as Burns was scared even by the honest antiquarian Grose; so they lump the good and the bad, putting them down as book-making Paul Prys:--

[Sidenote: DISLIKE TO OBSERVERS.]

"If there's a hole in a' your coats, I rede ye tent it; A chiel's amang ye, taking notes, And faith! he'll prent it."

The less observed and said about these Spanish matters, these _cosas de Espana_--the present tatters in her once proud flag, on which the sun never set--is, they think, the soonest mended. These comments heal slower than the knife-gash--"_Sanan cuchilladas, mas_ NO _malas palabras_." Let no author imagine that the fairest observations that he can take and make of Spain as she is, setting down nought in malice, can ever please a Spaniard; his pride and self-esteem are as great as the self-conceit and low consequence of the American: both are morbidly sensitive and touchy; both are afflicted with the notion that all the world, who are never troubling their heads about them, are thinking of nothing else, and linked in one common conspiracy, based in envy, jealousy, or ignorance; "you don't understand us, I guess." Truth, except in the shape of a compliment, is the greatest of libels, and is howled against as a lie and forgery from the Straits to the Bidasoa; Napier's history, for example. The Spaniard, who is hardly accustomed to a free, or rather a licentious press, and the scavenger propensity with which, in England and America, it rakes into the sewers of private life and the gangrenes of public, is disgusted with details which he resents as a breach of hospitality in strangers. He considers, and justly, that it is no proof either of goodness of breeding, heart, or intellect, to be searching for blemishes rather than beauties, for toadstools rather than violets; he despises those curmudgeons who see motes rather than beams in the brightest eyes of Andalucia. The productions of strangers, and especially of those who ride and write the quickest, must savour of the pace and sources from whence they originate. Foreigners who are unacquainted with the language and good society of Spain are of necessity brought the most into contact with the lowest scenes and the worst cla.s.s of people, thus road-sc.r.a.pings and postilion information too often const.i.tute the raw-head-and-b.l.o.o.d.y-bones material of their composition. All this may be very amusing to those who like these subjects, but they afford a poor criterion for descanting on whatever does the most honour to a country, or gives sound data for judging its real condition. How would we ourselves like that Spaniards should form their opinions of England and Englishmen from the Newgate calendars, the reports of cads, and the annals of beershops?

[Sidenote: DISLIKE TO OBSERVERS.]

Various as are the objects worth observing in Spain, many of which are to be seen there only, it may be as well to mention what is _not_ to be seen, for there is no such loss of time as finding this out oneself, after weary chace and wasted hour. Those who expect to meet with well-garnished a.r.s.enals, libraries, restaurants, charitable or literary inst.i.tutions, ca.n.a.ls, railroads, tunnels, suspension-bridges, steam-engines, omnibuses, manufactories, polytechnic galleries, pale-ale breweries, and similar appliances and appurtenances of a high state of political, social, and commercial civilization, had better stay at home.

In Spain there are no turnpike-trust meetings, no quarter-sessions, no courts of _justice_, according to the real meaning of that word, no treadmills, no boards of guardians, no chairmen, directors, masters-extraordinary of the court of chancery, no a.s.sistant poor-law commissioners. There are no anti-tobacco-teetotal-temperance-meetings, no auxiliary-missionary-propagating societies, nothing in the blanket and lying-in asylum line, nothing, in short, worth a revising-barrister of three years' standing's notice, unless he be partial to the study of the laws of bankruptcy. Spain is no country for the political economist, beyond affording an example of the decline of the wealth of nations, and offering a wide topic on errors to be avoided, as well as for experimental theories, plans of reform and amelioration. In Spain, Nature reigns; she has there lavished her utmost prodigality of soil and climate, which Spaniards have for the last four centuries been endeavouring to counteract by a culpable neglect of agricultural speeches and dinners, and a non-distribution of prizes for the biggest boars, a.s.ses, and labourers with largest families.

[Sidenote: WHAT TO OBSERVE.]

The landed proprietor of the Peninsula is little better than a weed of the soil; he has never observed, nor scarcely permitted others to observe, the vast capabilities which might and ought to be called into action. He seems to have put Spain into Chancery, such is the general dilapidation. The country is little better than a terra incognita, to naturalists, geologists, and all other branches of ists and ologists.

Everywhere there, the material is as superabundant as native labourers and operatives are deficient. All these interesting branches of inquiry, healthful and agreeable, as being out-of-door pursuits, and bringing the amateur in close contact with nature, offer to embryo authors who are ambitious to _book something new_, a more worthy subject than the old story of dangers of bull-fights, bandits, and black eyes. Those who aspire to the romantic, the poetical, the sentimental, the artistical, the antiquarian, the cla.s.sical, in short, to any of the sublime and beautiful lines, will find both in the past and present state of Spain, subjects enough in wandering with lead-pencil and note-book through this singular country, which hovers between Europe and Africa, between civilization and barbarism; this land of the green valley and barren mountain, of the boundless plain and the broken sierra; those Elysian gardens of the vine, the olive, the orange, and the aloe; those trackless, vast, silent, uncultivated wastes, the heritage of the wild bee;--in flying from the dull uniformity, the polished monotony of Europe, to the racy freshness of that original, unchanged country, where antiquity treads on the heels of to-day, where Paganism disputes the very altar with Christianity, where indulgence and luxury contend with privation and poverty, where a want of all that is generous or merciful is blended with the most devoted heroic virtues, where the most cold-blooded cruelty is linked with the fiery pa.s.sions of Africa, where ignorance and erudition stand in violent and striking contrast.

[Sidenote: WHAT TO OBSERVE.]

"There," says the Handbook, in a style which qualifies the author for the best bound and fairest edited alb.u.m, "let the antiquarian pore over the stirring memorials of many thousand years, the vestiges of Phnician enterprise, of Roman magnificence, of Moorish elegance, in that storehouse of ancient customs, that repository of all elsewhere long forgotten and pa.s.sed by; there let him gaze upon those cla.s.sical monuments, unequalled almost in Greece or Italy, and on those fairy Aladdin palaces, the creatures of Oriental gorgeousness and imagination, with which Spain alone can enchant the dull European; there let the man of feeling dwell on the poetry of her envy-disarming decay, fallen from her high estate, the dignity of a dethroned monarch, borne with unrepining self-respect, the last consolation of the innately n.o.ble, which no adversity can take away; let the lover of art feed his eyes with the mighty masterpieces of ideal Italian art, when Raphael and t.i.tian strove to decorate the palaces of Charles, the great emperor of the age of Leo X. Let him gaze on the living nature of Velazquez and Murillo, whose paintings are truly to be seen in Spain alone; let the artist sketch frowning forms of the castle, the pomp and splendour of the cathedral, where G.o.d is wors.h.i.+pped in a manner as nearly befitting his glory as the arts and wealth of finite man can reach. Let him dwell on the Gothic gloom of the cloister, the feudal turret, the vasty Escorial, the rock-built alcazar of imperial Toledo, the sunny towers of stately Seville, the eternal snows and lovely vega of Granada; let the geologist clamber over mountains of marble, and metal-pregnant sierras; let the botanist cull from the wild hothouse of nature plants unknown, unnumbered, matchless in colour, and breathing the aroma of the sweet south; let all, learned and unlearned, listen to the song, the guitar, the castanet; or join in the light fandango and spirit-stirring bullfight; let all mingle with the gay, good-humoured, temperate peasantry, free, manly, and independent, yet courteous and respectful; let all live with the n.o.ble, dignified, high-bred, self-respecting Spaniard; let all share in their easy, courteous society; let all admire their dark-eyed women, so frank and natural, to whom the voice of all ages and nations has conceded the palm of attraction, to whom Venus has bequeathed her magic girdle of grace and fascination; let all--but enough on starting on this expedition, 'where,' as Don Quixote said, 'there are opportunities, brother Sancho, of putting our hands into what are called adventures up to our elbows.'"

[Sidenote: SUSPICION OF OBSERVERS.]

Nor was the La Manchan hidalgo wrong in a.s.signing a somewhat adventurous character to the searchers in Spain for useful and entertaining knowledge, since the natives are fond, and with much reason, of comparing themselves and their country to _tesoros escondidos_, to hidden treasures, to talents buried in napkins; but they are equally fond of turning round, and falling foul of any pains-taking foreigner who digs them up, as Le Sage did the soul of Pedro Garcias. Nothing throughout the length and breadth of the land creates greater suspicion or jealousy than a stranger's making drawings, or writing down notes in a book: whoever is observed _sacando planes_, "taking plans," _mapeando el pais_, "mapping the country,"--for such are the expressions of the simplest pencil sketch--is thought to be an engineer, a spy, and, at all events, to be about no good. The lower cla.s.ses, like the Orientals, attach a vague mysterious notion to these, to them unintelligible, proceedings; whoever is seen at work is immediately reported to the civil and military authorities, and, in fact, in out-of-the-way places, whenever an unknown person arrives, from the rarity of the occurrence, he is the observed of all observers. Much the same occurs in the East, where Europeans are suspected of being emissaries of their governments, as neither they nor Spaniards can at all understand why any man should incur trouble and expense, which no native ever does, for the mere purpose of acquiring knowledge of foreign countries, or for his own private improvement or amus.e.m.e.nt. Again, whatever particular investigations or questions are made by foreigners, about things that to the native appear unworthy of observation, are magnified and misrepresented by the many, who, in every place, wish to curry favour with whoever is the governor or chief person, whether civil or military.

The natives themselves attach little or no importance to views, ruins, geology, inscriptions, and so forth, which they see every day, and which they therefore conclude cannot be of any more, or ought not to be of more, interest to the stranger. They judge of him by themselves; few men ever draw in Spain, and those who do are considered to be professional, and employed by others.

[Sidenote: OFFICIAL SUSPICION.]

One of the many fatal legacies left to Spain by the French, was an increased suspicion of men with the pencil and notebook. Previously to their invasion spies and agents were sent, who, under the guise of travellers, reconnoitred the land; and then, casting off the clothing of sheep, guided in the wolves to plunder and destruction. The aged prior of the Merced, at Seville, observed to us, when pointing out the empty frames and cases from whence the Messrs. Soult and Co. had "removed" the Murillos and sacred plate,--"_Lo creira usted_--Will your Grace believe it, I beheld among the _ladrones_ a person who grinned at me when I recognised him, to whom, some time before the invaders' arrival, I had pointed out these very treasures. _Tonto de mi!_ Oh! simpleton that I was, to take a _gabacho_ for an honest man." Yet this worthy individual was decorated with the legion of honour of Buonaparte, whose "first note in his pocket-book" of agenda, _after_ the conquest of England, was to "carry off the Warwick vase;" as Denon, who too had spoiled the Egyptians, told Sir E. Tomason. We English, whose shops, "bursting with opulence into the streets," have not yet been visited, although the temptation is held out by royal pamphleteers, can scarcely enter into the feelings of those whose homes are still reeking with blood, and blighted by poverty. The Castilian cat, who has been scalded, flies even from cold water.

Some excuse, therefore, may be alleged in favour of Spanish authorities, especially in rarely visited districts, when they behold a strange barbarian eye peeping and peering about. Their first impression, as in the East, is that he may be a Frank: hence the shaking, quaking, and ague which comes over them. At Seville, Granada, and places where foreign artists are somewhat more plentiful, the processes of drawing may be pa.s.sed over with pity and contempt, but in lonely localities the star-gazing observer is himself the object of argus-eyed, official observation. He is, indeed, as unconscious of the portentous emotions and ill-omened fears which he is exciting, as was the innocent crow of the meanings attached to his movements by the Roman augurs, and few augurs of old ever rivalled the Spanish alcaldes of to-day in quick suspicion and perception of evil, especially where none is intended.

Witness what actually occurred to three excellent friends of ours.

[Sidenote: DRAWING IN SPAIN.]

The readers of Borrow's inimitable 'Bible in Spain' will remember his hair-breadth escape from being shot for Don Carlos by the miraculous intervention of the alcalde of Corcubion, who, if still alive, must be a phnix, and clearly worth observation, as he was a reader of the "grand Baintham," or our ill.u.s.trious Jeremy Bentham, to whom the Spanish reformers sent for a paper _const.i.tution_, not having a very clear meaning of the word or thing, whether it was made of cotton or parchment. Another of the very best investigators and writers on Spain, Lord Carnarvon, was nearly put to death in the same districts for Don Miguel; Captain Widdrington, also one of the kindest and most honourable of men, was once arrested on suspicion of being an agent of Espartero; and we, our humble selves, have had the felicity of being marched to a guard-house for sketching a Roman ruin, and the honour of being taken, either for Curius Dentatus, an alligator, or Julius Caesar,--as there is no absurdity, no inconceivable ignorance, too great for the local Spanish "Dogberries," who rarely deviate into sense; when their fears or suspicions are roused, they are as deaf alike to the dictates of common reason or humanity as adders or Berbers; and here, as in the East, even the best intentioned may be taken up for spies, and have their beards, at least, cut off, as was done to King David's envoyes. All cla.s.ses, in regard to strangers, generally get some hostile notions into their heads, and then, instead of fairly and reasonably endeavouring to arrive at the truth, pervert every innocent word, and twist every action, to suit their own preconceived nonsense, until trifles become to their jealous minds proofs as strong as Holy Writ. In justice, however, it must be said, that when these authorities are once satisfied that the stranger is an Englishman, and that no harm is intended, no people can be more civil in offering a.s.sistance of every kind, especially the lower cla.s.ses, who gaze at the magical performance of drawing with wonder: the higher cla.s.ses seldom take any notice, partly from courtesy, and much from the _nil admirari_ principle of Orientals, which conceals both inferiority and ignorance, and shows good breeding.

[Sidenote: CAPTAIN-GENERAL'S Pa.s.sPORT.]

The drawing any garrison-town or fortified place in Spain is now most strictly forbidden. The prevailing ignorance of everything connected with the arts of design is so great, that no distinction is made between the most regular plan and the merest artistical sketch: a drawing is with them a drawing, and punishable as such. A Spanish barrack, garrison, or citadel is therefore to be observed but little, and still less to be sketched. A gentleman, nay, a lady also, is liable, under any circ.u.mstances, when drawing, to be interrupted, and often is exposed to arrest and incivility. Indeed, whether an artist or not, it is as well not to exhibit any curiosity in regard to matters connected with military buildings; nor will the loss be great, as they are seldom worth looking at. The troops in our time were in a most admired disorder. If they wore shoes they had no stockings; if they had muskets, flints were not plentiful; if powder was supplied, b.a.l.l.s were scarce; nothing, in short, was ever according to regulation. Nay, the b.u.t.tons even on the officers' coats were never dressed in file: some had the numbers up, some down, some awry; but uniformity is a thing of Europe and not of the East. At this moment, when the church is starved, when widows' pensions are unpaid, when governmental bankruptcy walks the land, whose bones, marrow, and all are wasted to support the army, whose swords uphold the hated men in office, the bands of the Royal Guard, the Praetorian bands, do not keep tune, nor do the rank and file march in time. However painful these things to pipe-clay martinets, the artist loses much, by not being able to sketch such tumble-down forts and ragged garrisons, each _Bisono_ of which is more precious to painter eye than the officer in command at Windsor; while his short-petticoated _querida_ is more Murillo-like than a score of patronesses of Almack's.

[Sidenote: ORIENTAL a.n.a.lOGIES.]

The safest plan for those who want to observe, and to book what they observe, is to obtain a Spanish pa.s.sport, with the object of their curiosity and inquiries clearly specified in it. There is seldom any difficulty at Madrid, if application be made through the English minister, in obtaining such a doc.u.ment; indeed, when the applicant is well known, it is readily given by any of the provincial Captains-General. As it is couched in the Spanish language, it is understood by all, high and low; an advantage which is denied in Spain to those issued by our amba.s.sadors, and even by the Foreign Office, who, to the _credit_ of themselves and nation, give pa.s.ses to Englishmen in the French language, whereby among Spaniards a suspicion arises that the bearer may be a Frenchman, which is not always pleasant. We preserve among rare Peninsular relics a pa.s.sport granted by our kind patron the redoubtable Conde de Espana, and backed by the no less formidable Quesada and Sarsfield, in which it was enjoined, in choice, intelligible Castilian, to all and every minor rulers and governors, whether with the pen or sword, to aid and a.s.sist the bearer in his examination of the fine arts and antiquities of the Peninsula. These autocrats were more implicitly obeyed in their respective Lord Lieutenancies than Ferdinand himself; in fact, the pashas of the East are their exact types, each in their district being the heads of both civil and military tribunals; and as they not only administer, but suit the law according to the length of their own feet, they in fact make it and trample upon it, and all in any authority below them imitate their superiors as nearly as they dare.

These things of Spain are managed with a gravity truly Oriental, both in the rulers and in the resignation of those ruled by them; these great men's pa.s.sport and signature were obeyed by all minor authorities as implicitly as an Oriental firman; the very fact of a stranger having a Captain-General's pa.s.sport, is soon known by everybody, and, to use an Oriental phrase, "makes his face to be whitened;" it acts as a letter of introduction, and is in truth the best one of all, since it is addressed to people in power in each village or town, who, true sheikhs, are looked up to by all below them with the same deference, as they themselves look up to all above them. The worth of a person recommended, is estimated by that of the person who recommends; _tal recomendacion tal recomendado_. To complete this thing of Oriental Spain, these three omnipotent despots, who defied laws human and divine, who made dice of their enemies' bones, and goblets of their skulls, have all since been a.s.sa.s.sinated, and sent to their account with all their sins on their heads. In limited monarchies ministers who go too far, lose their places, in Spain and Turkey their heads: the former, doubtless, are the most severely punished.

Those who wish to observe Spanish man, which, next to Spanish woman, forms the proper study of mankind, will find that one key to decipher this singular people is scarcely European, for this _Berberia Cristiana_ is a neutral ground placed between the hat and the turban; many indeed of themselves contend that Africa begins even at the Pyrenees. Be that as it may, Spain, first civilized by the Phnicians, and long possessed by the Moors, has indelibly retained the original impressions.

Test her, therefore, and her males and females, by an Oriental standard, how a.n.a.logous does much appear that is strange and repugnant, if compared with European usages. Take care, however, not to let either the ladies or gentlemen know the hidden processes of your mind, for nothing gives greater offence. The fair s.e.x is willing, to prevent such a mistake, to lay aside even their becoming _mantillas_, as their hidalgos doff their stately Roman cloaks. These old clothes they offer up as sacrifices on the altar of civilization, and to the mania of looking exactly like the rest of the world, in Hyde Park and the Elysian Fields.

[Sidenote: INDIFFERENCE TO THE BEAUTIFUL.]

Another remarkable Oriental trait is the general want of love for the beautiful in art, and the abundance of that ?f????a??a with which the ancients reproached the genuine Iberians; this is exhibited in the general neglect and indifference shown towards Moorish works, which instead of destroying they ought rather to have protected under gla.s.ses, since such attractions are peculiar to the Peninsula. The _Alhambra_, the pearl and magnet of Granada, is in their estimation little better than a _casa de ratones_, or a rat's hole, which in truth they have endeavoured to make it by centuries of neglect; few natives even go there, or understand the all-absorbing interest, the concentrated devotion, which it excites in the stranger; so the Bedouin regards the ruins of Palmyra, insensible to present beauty, as to past poetry and romance. Sad is this non-appreciation of the Alhambra by the Spaniards, but such are Asiatics, with whom sufficient for the day is _their to-day_; who care neither for the past nor for the future, who think only for the present and themselves, and like them the ma.s.ses of Spaniards, although not wearing turbans, lack the organs of veneration and admiration for anything beyond matters connected with the first person and the present tense. Again, the leaven of hatred against the Moor and his relics is not extinct; they resent as almost heretical the preference shown by foreigners to the works of infidels rather than to those of good Catholics; such preference again at once implies their inferiority, and convicts them of bad taste in their non-appreciation, and of Vandalism in labouring to mutilate, what the Moor laboured to adorn. The charming writings of Was.h.i.+ngton Irving, and the admiration of European pilgrims, have latterly shamed the authorities into a somewhat more conservative feeling towards the Alhambra; but even their benefits are questionable; they "repair and beautify" on the church-warden principle, and there is no less danger in such "restorations" than in those fatal scourings of Murillo and t.i.tian in the Madrid gallery, which are effacing the lines where beauty lingers. Even their tardy appreciation is somewhat interested: thus Mellado, in his late Guide, laments that there should be no account of the Alhambra, of which he speaks coldly, and suggests, as so many "English" visit it, that a descriptive work would be a _segura especulacion!_ a safe speculation!

Thus the poetry of the Moorish Alhambra is coined into the Spanish prose of profitable s.h.i.+llings and sixpences.

[Sidenote: FAMILIARITY BREEDS CONTEMPT.]

Travellers however should not forget, that much which to them has the ravis.h.i.+ng, enticing charms of novelty, is viewed by the dull sated eye of the native, with familiarity which breeds contempt; they are weary, oh fatal la.s.situde! even of the beautiful: alas! exclaimed the hermit on Monserrat, to the stranger who was ravished by exquisite views, then and there beheld by him for the first and last time, "all this has no attraction for me; twenty and nine are the years that I have seen this unchanged scene, every sunrise, every noon, every sunset." But _sordent domestica_, observes Pliny, nor are all things or persons honoured in their own homes as they ought to be, since the days that Mahomet the true prophet failed to persuade his wife and valet that his powers were supernatural. Can it be wondered that ruins and "old rubbish" should be held cheap among the Moro-Spaniards? or that their so-called "guides"

should mislead and misdirect the stranger? It cannot well be avoided, since few of the writers ever travel in their own country, and fewer travel out of it; thus from their limited means of comparison, they cannot appreciate differences, nor tell what are the wants and wishes of a foreigner: accordingly, scenes, costumes, ruins, usages, ceremonies, &c., which they have known from childhood, are pa.s.sed over without notice, although, from their pa.s.sing newness to the stranger, they are exactly what he most desires to have pointed out and explained. Nay, the natives frequently despise or are ashamed of those very things, which most interest and charm the foreigner, for whose observation they select the modern rather than the old, offering especially their poor pale copies of Europe, in preference to their own rich, racy, and natural originals, doing this in nothing more than in the costume and dwellings of the lower cla.s.ses, who happily are not yet afflicted with the disease of French polish: they indeed, when they dig up ancient coins, will rub off the precious rust of twice ten hundred years, in order to render them, as they imagine, more saleably attractive; but they fortunately spare themselves, insomuch that Charles III., on failing in one of his laudable attempts to improve and modernise them, compared his loving subjects to naughty children, who quarrel with their good nurse when she wants to wash them.

[Sidenote: WANT OF INFORMATION.]

Again, no country in the world can vie with Spain, where the dry climate at least is conservative, with memorials of auld lang syne, with tower and turret, Prout-like houses and toppling balconies, so old that they seem only not to fall into the torrents and ravines over which they hang. Here is every form and colour of picturesque poverty; vines clamber up the irregularities, while below naiads dabble, was.h.i.+ng their red and yellow garments in the all-gilding glorious sun-beams. What a picture it is to all but the native, who sees none of the wonders of lights and shadows, reflections, colours, and outlines; who, blind to all the beauties, is keenly awake only to the degradation, the rags and decay; he half suspects that your sketch and admiration of a smuggler or bullfighter is an insult, and that you are taking it, in order to show in England what Mons. Guizot will never be forgiven for calling the "brutal" things of Spain; accordingly, while you are sincerely and with reason delighted with sashes and _Zamarras_, he begs you to observe his ridiculous Boulevard-cut coat: or when you sit down opposite to a half-ruined Roman wall, some crumbling Moorish arch, or mediaeval Gothic shrine, he implores you to come away and draw the last spick and span Royal Academical abortion, coldly correct and cla.s.sically dull, in order to carry home a sample which may do credit to Spain, as approximating to the way things are managed at Charing Cross.

Without implicitly following the advice of these Spaniards of better intention than taste, no man of research will undervalue any a.s.sistance by which his objects are promoted, even should he be armed with a captain-general's pa.s.sport, and a red Murray. Meagre is the oral information which is to be obtained from Spaniards on the spot; these incurious semi-Orientals look with jealousy on the foreigner, and either fence with him in their answers, raise difficulties, or, being highly imaginative, magnify or diminish everything as best suits their own views and suspicions. The national expressions "_Quien sabe? no se sabe_,"--"who knows? I do not know," will often be the prelude to "_No se puede_,"--"it can't be done."

[Sidenote: DIFFICULTIES OF SIGHT-SEEING.]

These impediments and impossibilities are infinitely increased when the stranger has to do with men in office, be it ever so humble; the first feeling of these Dogberries is to suspect mischief and give refusals.

"No" may be a.s.sumed to be their natural answer; nor even if you have a special order of permission, is admission by any means certain. The keeper, who here as elsewhere, considers the objects committed to his care as his own private property and source of perquisite, must be conciliated: often when you have toiled through the heat and dust to some distant church, museum, library, or what not, after much ringing and waiting, you will be drily informed that it is shut, can't be seen, that it is the wrong day, that you must call again to-morrow; and if it be the right day, then you will be told that the hour is wrong, that you are come too early, too late; very likely the keeper's wife will inform you that he is out, gone to ma.s.s, or market, or at his dinner, or at his _siesta_, or if he is at home and awake, he will swear that his wife has mislaid the key, "which she is always doing." If all these and other excuses won't do, and you persevere, you will be a.s.sured that there is nothing worth seeing, or you will be asked why you want to see it? As a general rule, no one should be deterred from visiting anything, because a Spaniard of the upper cla.s.ses gives his opinion that the object is beneath notice; he will try to convince you that Toledo, Cuenca, and other places which cannot be matched in Christendom, are ugly, odious, old cities; he is ashamed of them because the tortuous, narrow lanes do not run in rows as straight as Pall Mall and the Rue de Rivoli. In fact his only notion of a civilized town is a common-place a.s.semblage of rectangular wide streets, all built and coloured uniformly, like a line of foot-soldiers, paved with broad flags, and lighted with gas, on which Spaniards can walk about dressed as Englishmen, and Spanish women like those of France; all of which said wonders a foreigner may behold far better nearer home; nor is it much less a waste of time to go and see what the said Spaniard considers to be a real lion, since the object generally turns out to be some poor imitation, without form, angle, history, nationality, colour, or expression, beyond that of utilitarian comfort and common-place convenience--great advantages no doubt both to contractors and political economists, but death and destruction to men of the pencil and note-book.

[Sidenote: HOW TO BE ADMITTED.]

[Sidenote: OFFICIAL CORRUPTION.]

The sound principles in Spanish sight-seeing are few and simple, but, if observed, they will generally prove successful; first, persevere; never be put back; never take an answer if it be in the negative; never lose temper or courteous manners; and lastly, let the tinkle of metal be heard at once; if the chief or great man be inexorable, find out privately who is the wretched sub who keeps the key, or the crone who sweeps the room; and then send a discreet messenger to say that you will pay to be admitted, without mentioning "nothing to n.o.body." Thus you will always obtain your view, even when an official order fails. On our first arrival at Madrid, when but young in these things of Spain, we were desirous of having daily permission to examine a royal gallery, which was only open to the public on certain days in the week. In our grave dilemma we consulted a sage and experienced diplomatist, and this was the oracular reply:--"Certainly, if you wish it, I will make a request to Senor Salmon" (the then Home Secretary), "and beg him to give you the proper order, as a personal favour to myself. By the way, how much longer shall you remain here?"--"From three to four weeks."--"Well, then, after you have been gone a good month, I shall get a courteous and verbose epistle from his Excellency, in which he will deeply regret that, on searching the archives of his office, there was no instance of such a request having ever been granted, and that he is compelled most reluctantly to return a refusal, from the fear of a precedent being created. My advice to you is to give the porter a dollar, to be repeated whenever the door-hinges seem to be getting rusty and require oiling."

The hint was taken, as was the bribe, and the prohibited portals expanded so regularly, that at last they knew the sound of our footsteps. Gold is the Spanish _sesame_. Thus Soult got into Badajoz, thus Louis Philippe put Espartero out, and Montpensier in. Gold, bright red gold, is the sovereign remedy which in Spain smooths all difficulties, nay, some in which even force has failed, as here the obstinate heads may be guided by a straw of bullion, but not driven by a bar of iron. The magic influence of a bribe pervades a land, where everything is venal, even to the scales of justice. Here men who have objects to gain begin to work from the bottom, not from the top, as we do in England. In order to ensure success, no step in the official ladder must be left unanointed. A wise and prudent suitor bribes from the porter to the premier, taking care not to forget the under-secretary, the over-secretary, the private secretary, all in their order, and to regulate the douceur according to each man's rank and influence. If you omit the porter, he will not deliver your card, or will say Senor Mon is out, or will tell you to call again _manana_, the eternal to-morrow. If you forget the chief clerk, he will mislay your pet.i.tion, or poison his master's ear. In matters of great and political importance, the sovereign, him or herself, must have a share; and thus it was that Calomarde continued so long to manage the beloved Ferdinand and his counsels. He was the minister who laid the greatest bribe at the royal feet. "Sire, by strict attention and honesty, I have just been enabled to economise 50,000_l._, on the sums allotted to my department, which I have now the honour and felicity to place at your Majesty's disposal."--"Well done, my faithful and good minister, here is a cigar for you." This Calomarde, who began life as a foot-boy, smuggled through the Christinist swindle, by which Isabel now wears the crown of Don Carlos. The rogue was rewarded by being made _Conde de S. Isabel_, a t.i.tle which since has been conferred on Mons. Bresson's baby--a delicate compliment to his sire's labours in the transfer of the said crown to Louis Philippe--but Spaniards are full of dry humour.

[Sidenote: SPANISH IGNORANCE.]

In the East, the example and practice of the Sultan and Vizier is followed by every pacha, down to the lowest animal who wields the most petty authority; the disorder of the itching palm is endemic and epidemic, all, whether high and low, want, and must have money; all wish to get it without the disgrace of begging, and without the danger of highway robbery. Public poverty is the curse of the land, and all _empleados_ or persons in office excuse themselves on dire necessity, the old plea of a certain gentleman, which has no law. Some allowance, therefore, may be made for the rapacity which, with very few exceptions, prevails; the regular salaries, always inadequate, are generally in arrear, and the public servants, poor devils, swear that they are forced to pay themselves by conniving at defrauding the government; this few scruple to do, as all know it to be an unjust one, and that it can afford it; indeed, as all are offenders alike, the guilt of the offence is scarcely admitted. Where robbing and jobbing are the universal order of the day, one rascal keeps another in countenance, as one goitre does another in Switzerland. A man who does not feather his nest when in place, is not thought honest, but a fool; _es preciso, que cada uno coma de su oficio_. It is necessary, nay, a _duty_, as in the East, that all should live by their office; and as office is short and insecure, no time or means is neglected in making up a purse; thus poverty and their will alike and readily consent.

Take a case in point. We remember calling on a Spaniard who held the highest office in a chief city of Andalucia. As we came into his cabinet a cloaked personage was going out; the great man's table was covered with gold ounces, which he was shovelling complacently into a drawer, gloating on the glorious haul. "Many ounces, Excellency," said we. "Yes, my friend," was his reply--"_no quiero comer mas patatas_,--I do not intend to dine any more on potatoes." This gentleman, during the _Sistema_, or Riego const.i.tution, had, with other loyalists, been turned out of office; and, having been put to the greatest hards.h.i.+ps, was losing no time in taking prudent and laudable precautions to avert any similar calamity for the future. His practices were perfectly well known in the town, where people simply observed, "_Esta atesorando_, he is laying up treasures,"--as every one of them would most certainly have done, had they been in his fortunate position. Rich and honest Britons, therefore, should not judge too hardly of the sad s.h.i.+fts, the strange bed-fellows, with which want makes the less provided Spaniards acquainted. _Donde no hay abundancia, no hay observancia._ The empty sack cannot stand upright, nor was ever a sack made in Spain into which gain and honour could be stowed away together; _honra y provecho, no caben en un saco o techo_; here virtue itself succ.u.mbs to poverty, induced by more than half a century of mis-government, let alone the ruin caused by Buonaparte's invasion, to which domestic troubles and civil wars have been added.