[70] Corografía de Guipúzcoa: “No es creible si no se ve el mucho pan y cera que se ofrece.... Además en tales grandes funerales por modo de ofrenda se trae á la puerta de la iglesia un buey vivo en unos lugares y en otros un carnero también vivo que, acabado el oficio, se vuelve á la casería ó carnicería, y por esto se paga al cura una cantidad determinada en dinero.” He estimates the house expenses at 500 duros (or dollars), and the Church expenses at another 500, truly an immense sum for those days. When the burials took place in the church, the offerings of bread and wax would be made on the tomb.
[71] The music and words are by Iparraguirre.
[72] Sare.
[73] Urrugne, above the sun-dial on the church.
[74] Saint Jean de Luz.
[75] Saint Pée, formerly Stus. Petrus de Ivarren. “There is a little village called St. Pé, where I was stopped a day or two by very bad weather. I was lodged at the Curé’s, a good old man, from whose conversation about the state of France I received light which had important results. He was very clever and very well-informed, and took not only right, but large views of things.”—The Duke of Wellington to J. W. Croker.
[76] Near Louhossoa.
[77] “Remember death.”—Ossès.
[78] Vizcaya and Guipúzcoa are, with Barcelona and Pontevedra, the most densely populated provinces in Spain. The Basques have a genius for administration which is not to be found in other parts of the Peninsula. Their excellent roads and cleanly kept towns form a striking contrast. They have a true love of local independence, and in the eighteenth century we find two Basque frontier villages, Vera and Sare, styling themselves in a treaty the “two Republics.” The treaty concerned Yerbas y Aguas y Bellotas; grass, water and acorns. Similarly, to-day, in the Basque provinces groups of small villages and houses are joined in free “hermandades,” “universidades,” “anteiglesias,” “valles.” The few privileges that remain are jealously guarded. The Navarrese will tell you with pride that theirs is the only province where a man is allowed to find a substitute in the conscriptions.
[79] The Spanish Premier himself has said in the Senate (October, 1910), that if the Basque Provinces are more advanced than other parts of Spain this is due not to their merits, but to the favouritism of governments. A knowledge of the Basques, however, hardly warrants this statement. Since the abolition of the fueros, says the late Mr. Butler Clarke, in “Modern Spain,” “their efforts are restricted to making the administration of their provinces a model for the rest of Spain.”