When her Majesty felt she was wounded by the poniard of this assassin, and saw him seized by her guards, her first words were, “Pray, spare the life of that man!” This is another proof of Isabella’s kind and forgiving disposition, especially when it is considered that she uttered the words spontaneously, without prompting or premeditation, but on the spur of the moment.
[116] Spaniards have greatly excelled in the sculpture of wood,—a branch of the fine arts which does not deserve the disdain with which modern writers have treated it. In many churches in Spain there are admirable productions of this kind, of a perfect execution, expression, and design. The statue of the Virgin of the Conception, placed in the choir of the cathedral of Seville, a work of the celebrated Montañes, will rival the most celebrated masterpieces of modern sculpture.
[125] The Roman Catholic Church has adopted, for its hymns, the poetry of the low Latinity of the middle ages. Among these is distinguished for its originality that which is generally sung in the office for the dead. The two principal verses are these:—
“Dies iræ, dies ilia,
Solvens sec’lum in favilla,
Teste David, cum Sybilla.
. . . . .
Tuba mirum spargens sonum,
Per sepulchra regionum,
Venient omnes ante thronum.”
We cannot resist the opportunity of giving the late Sir Walter Scott’s metrical translation of this sublime ode, a translation which, as a hymn, is generally sung in Protestant churches:—
I.
“The day of wrath: that dreadful day,
When heaven and earth shall pass away!
What power shall be the sinner’s stay?
Whom shall he trust that dreadful day?II.
“When, shriv’lling, like a parchëd scroll,
The flaming heavens together roll,
When louder yet, and yet more dread,
Swells the high trump that wakes the dead,—III.
“Oh, on that day, that wrathful day,
When man to judgment wakes from clay,
Be thou, O Christ! the sinner’s stay,
Though heaven and earth shall pass away!”
We also find in this collection the hymn which is sung to the Virgin of Griefs in the Holy Week, and which begins thus:—
“Stabat mater dolorosa
Juxta crucem lachrymosa,
Dum pendebat filius.”
[127] This game dance is repeated in the cathedral of Seville on the 8th of December, the day of the immaculate conception of the Virgin, and during eight days afterwards, which are called an octave. In the present day this cathedral, as we have said elsewhere, has also the singular privilege of using ornaments of a sky-blue colour, which is not permitted by the church on other feast-days. These ornaments are of an incomparable value, and the chief one of them, called capa pluvial, is richly embroidered with pearls and precious stones.
[148a] “Digo un responso por una peseta.”