Spain, v. 2 (of 2)

by Edmondo De Amicis

Ceñid de perpetua gloria,

Para que diga la historia

—Fué grande el Rey Amadeo."

"God, Ruler over all, created mortals one day, and made all equal with His mighty hand. He recognized neither nations nor colors nor divisions, and to behold men happy was His desire. The king, who is His image, ought to imitate His goodness, and the people have no need to ask whether he be German or French. Why, then, with angry frown repulse him if he be good? A king abounding in good deeds holds the world as his country. Charles V., the emperor, came from a foreign nation, and by his valor won a thousand laurels for Spain. And the fortunate reign of Philip the Courageous is a glorious memory even though founded upon war.

"To-day a third king rules you born on a foreign soil, who comes to look upon our sky, a clear spark of God. His love is true and just and loyal to the light of our sun, and this is a good and liberal king Spanish people adore. And around your brows you shall wear the trophy of perpetual glory upon which history shall write, 'Great was King Amadeus.'"

Oh, poor little girl! how many wise things you have said! and how many foolish things others have done!

The city of Valencia, if one enters it with one's mind full of the ballads in which the poets sang of its marvels, does not seem to correspond to the lovely image formed of it; neither, on the other hand, does it offer that sinister appearance for which one is prepared if one considers its just fame as a turbulent, warlike city, the fomenter of civil strife—a city prouder of the smell of its powder than of the fragrance of its orange-groves. It is a city built in the midst of a vast flowery plain on the right bank of the Guadalquivir, which separates it from the suburbs, a little way from the roadstead which serves as a port, and consists all of tortuous streets lined with high, ungainly, many-colored houses, and on this account less pleasing in appearance than the streets of the Andalusian cities, and entirely devoid of that evasive Oriental grace which so strangely stirs one's fancy. Along the left bank of the river extends a magnificent promenade formed of majestic avenues and beautiful gardens. These one reaches by going out of the city through the gate of the Cid, a structure flanked by two great embattled towers named after the hero because he passed through it in 1094 after he had expelled the Moors from Valencia. The cathedral, built upon the spot where stood a temple of Diana in Roman times, then a church of San Salvador in the time of the Goths, then a mosque in Moorish times, afterward converted into a church by the Cid, changed a second time into a mosque by the Moors in 1101, and for the third time into a church by King Don Jayme after the final overthrow of the invaders, is a vast structure, exceedingly rich in ornaments and treasures, but it cannot bear comparison with the greater number of the other Spanish cathedrals. There are a few palaces worth seeing, besides the palace of the Audiencia, a beautiful monument of the sixteenth century in which the Cortes of the kingdom of Valencia assembled; the Casa de Ayuntamiento, built between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, in which are preserved the sword of Don Jayme, the keys of the city, and the banner of the Moors; and, above all, the Lonja—the Bourse of the merchants—notable for its celebrated hall consisting of three great naves divided by twenty-four spiral columns, above which curve the light arches of the vaulted roof in bold lines, the architecture imparting to the eye a pleasing impression of gayety and harmony. And, finally, there is the art-gallery, which is not one of the least in Spain.

But, to tell the truth, in those few days that I remained at Valencia waiting for the boat I was more occupied by politics than by art. And I proved the truth of the words I heard an illustrious Italian say before I left Italy—one who knew Spain like his his own home: "The foreigner who lives even for a short time in Spain is drawn little by little, almost insensibly, to heat his blood and muddle his brain over politics, as if Spain were his own country or as if the fortunes of his country were depending upon those of Spain. The passions are so inflamed, the struggle is so furious, and in this struggle there is always so clearly at stake the future, the safety, and the life of the nation, that it is impossible for any one with the least tinge of the Latin blood in his imagination and his system to remain an indifferent spectator. You must needs grow excited, speak at party meetings, take the elections seriously, mingle with the crowd at the political demonstrations, break with your friends, form a clique of those who think as you think—make, in a word, a Spaniard of yourself, even to the whites of your eyes. And gradually, as you become Spanish, you forget Europe, as if it were at the antipodes, and end in seeing nothing beyond Spain, as if you were governing it, and as if all its interests were in your hands."

Such is the case, and this was my experience. In those few days the Conservative ministry was shipwrecked and the Radicals had the wind behind them. Spain was all in a ferment; governors, generals, officials of all grades and of all administrations fell; a crowd of parvenus burst into the offices of the ministry with cries of joy: Zorilla was to inaugurate a new era of prosperity and peace; Don Amadeus had had an inspiration from heaven; liberty had conquered; Spain was saved. And I, as I listened to the band playing in front of the new governor's mansion under a clear starry sky in the midst of a joyous crowd,—I too had a ray of hope that the throne of Don Amadeus might finally extend its roots, and reproached myself for being too prone to predict evil. And that comedy which Zorilla played at his villa when he would by no means accept the presidency of the ministry, and sent back his friends and the members of the deputation, and finally, tired of continually saying no, fell into a swoon on saying yes, this, I say, gave me at the time a high opinion of the firmness of his character and led me to augur happily for the new government. And I said to myself that it was a sin to leave Spain just when the horizon was clearing and the royal palace of Madrid was tinted rose-color. And I had already considered the plan of returning to Madrid that I might have the satisfaction of sending some consoling news to Italy, and so be pardoned for the imprudence of sending unvarnished accounts of the situation up to that time. And I repeated the verses of Prati:

"Oh qual destin t'aspetta