The Valladolid road skirts the foot of the precipice on the larboard side and doubles back into the city, where the slope is easiest at the stern. But the straight path is taken by an irresponsible little bye-way, which rushes the steep ascent along the feet of the beetling ramparts, and succeeds in winning a footing inside the Santiago gate. Here the elegant horse-shoe arches look as if they might have been borrowed from the Alhambra; and as we issued from under their shadow we were confronted by the graceful campanile of the Church of San Estéban, a work of the thirteenth century,{253} and unique in Spanish architecture, though it may be mated in Provence. Were confronted, alas! for I fear it now stands no longer. The tower was badly cracked when first we saw it, and on the occasion of my second visit was being taken down as dangerous. As to its ultimate destiny it is quite impossible to prophesy: but Spaniards are capable restorers should they happen to think it worth while. It may be as reverently revived as the work at Leon Cathedral, or (Di meliora!) razed with as little compunction as the late leaning tower at Zaragoza.
The gateway of San Estéban is a little abaft the church, and, like its neighbour of Santiago, has distinctly a Moorish air. Not so the Arco San Andres, the other great gate, to the starboard. That is uncompromisingly Gothic, and large and massive enough to balance both the other two.
Upon this side the city is bounded by the little bourn of the Clamores, a scantier stream than the Eresma, but equally romantic and picturesque. It flows in a straight-sided gully like a natural moat, the upper reaches becoming gradually shallower and wider till they expand into the broad valley which is crossed by the aqueduct arcade. Here the most prominent feature is the cathedral, which{254} surges up out of the medley of houses, overtopping even the pinnacles of the Alcázar. It is the latest important Gothic monument ever erected upon Spanish soil, a sister church to the new cathedral of Salamanca, and, like it, of imposing and elegant proportions, though its details are less elaborately ornate.
We are far from exhausting the subject, but it is vain to continue the catalogue. The true fascination of the town must be felt and not described. I am afraid that even the Segóvians are not fully appreciative; for our host considered that we were wasting our time there, and wished to pack us off to la Granja to see the fountains play. “It was a shame,” he said, “to spend every day in Segóvia.” Segóvia!—where every street corner is worth a wilderness of fountains!
