a glance from floor to ceiling, and it seems as if you could almost count the moments it would take for the eye to climb them. There are five aisles, each one of which might form a church. In the centre one, another cathedral, with its cupola and bell tower, could easily stand. All of them together form sixty-eight bold vaulted ceilings, which seem to expand and rise slowly as you look at them. Every thing is enormous in this cathedral. The principal chapel, placed in the centre of the great nave, and almost high enough to touch the ceiling, looks like a chapel built for giant priests, to whose knees the ordinary altars would not reach. The paschal candle seems like the mast of a ship, and the bronze candlestick which holds it, like the pillars of a church. The choir is a museum of sculpture and chiselling. The chapels are worthy of the church, for they contain the masterpieces of sixty-seven sculptors and thirty-eight painters.... The chapel of San Ferdinand, which contains the sepulchres of this king and his wife Beatrice, of Alonso the Wise, the celebrated minister, Florida Blanca, and other illustrious personages, is one of the richest and most beautiful of all. The body of Ferdinand, who redeemed Seville from the dominion of the Arabs, clothed in his uniform, with crown and mantle, rests in a crystal casket, covered with a veil. On one side, is his sword which he carried on the day of his entrance into Seville; on the other, a staff of cane, an emblem of command. In that same chapel is preserved a little ivory Virgin, which the holy king carried to war with him, and other relics of great value.” And here also, although De Amicis makes no mention of them, are the keys of Seville which Abdul Hassan handed to Ferdinand at the surrender of the city. One key is of silver, and bears the inscription, “May Allah grant that Islam may rule for ever in this city.” The other key is made of iron gilt, and is of Mudejar workmanship. It is inscribed, “The King of Kings will open; the King of the Earth will enter.”
In its churches and its old houses, Seville is rich in Moorish influences, and exhibits abundant traces of Morisco art, which prevailed against the material dominancy of the Christian conquerors. The reconciled Arabs who remained as subjects of Ferdinand became the chief of the most lavishly-remunerated artisans of the city. They pursued their craft in the dwellings of the rich; and in the churches of the “infidel.” Untrammelled by religion and uninspired by faith, they worked for art’s sake, and the substantial pecuniary award that sweetened their labours. The church of San Marco has a beautiful Moorish tower built in imitation of the Giralda, and second only to the minaret tower of the cathedral in point of height; San Gil is a Christianised Mezquita; Santa Catalina reveals the survival of Moorish art in its façade, while its principal chapel is Gothic. In nearly all the sacred edifices of antiquity the combination of Moorish and Renaissance architecture betrays an incongruity of style and sentiment which is only to be found among the Christian churches of Spain. And if the Catholic kings, who were sworn to the extirpation of the Moslems, allowed the Moors to build their churches in the style of temples devoted to Allah, it is not surprising that many of the finest private residences of the city retain a Moorish design, and possess a distinctly Oriental atmosphere.
The Casa de Pilatos, which has been pronounced the fourth great monument of older Seville, was commenced in 1500 by Don Pedro Enriquez, in the then popular decadent Saracenic style, and was completed by his son, Fadrique, in imitation of Pilate’s palace at Jerusalem. In accordance with this scheme, he fashioned a reception-hall, called the
PLATE XLII.
Frieze in the Upper Chamber, House of Sanchez.