On July 25th the scene near these two churches is a striking one. The village of Naranco is emptied of its folk that pious morn, as the peasants, in the same tranquil beauty as in old Greece, lead their garlanded oxen and heifers up to San Miguel. So unchanging are Spain's customs that the festival is paid for out of the spoils taken at the battle of Clavigo (in 846), where tradition says the loved patron of the Peninsula, the Apostle St. James, "él de España," came to fight in person. We were not so fortunate as to see this feast of Sant Jago, but we stumbled on a beautiful minor scene. As we returned by Santa María de Naranco, a group of peasants stood round the priest on the raised porch of the church, the center of interest being a baby three days old. Few women can resist a baptism, that solemn first step in a Christian life, so we drew near. The father was a superb-looking youth of about twenty, in a black velvet jacket; his crisp curly hair, his glow of color, and the proud outline of his features made him fit subject for the artist. The godmother, his sister it seemed from the resemblance, was a buxom girl in Sunday finery; the godfather was a younger brother of fourteen, who awkwardly held the precious burden. The old priest wore the wooden clogs of the people and made a terrible racket with every step. From the porch he led the way into the church, and after pausing half way to read prayers,—a scuffling old sexton held aslant a dripping candle,—they came to the baptismal font in the raised chamber at the west end. The young father went forward to the altar steps to kneel alone, and the godfather, with great earnestness, gave the responses. Then the cura poured the blessed water on the tiny head, and to prevent cold wiped it gently. The ceremony over, his wooden shoes clattered into the sacristy, the sexton blew out the candle, and the agile godmother claimed her woman's prerogative and tossed and crooned to the young Christian as she tied ribbons and cap-strings. The two strangers who had witnessed this moving little scene under the primitive carving of the Visigothic church wished to leave a good-luck piece for the small Manuela. But when they put the coin into the hand of the young parent who still knelt before the altar, he returned it with a beautiful, flashing smile. In halting Spanish they explained their good-luck wishes, and in that spirit the gift was accepted.
Seen from Naranco, the red-tiled roofs of Oviedo encircled by far-stretching mountains made a romantic enough scene. Seated on the trunk of a chestnut tree we watched the sun set over the exquisite valley. Immediately round us on the hillside had once stood the city of King Ramiro, obliterated as completely as the earlier Phœnician and Roman settlements in Spain. The dead city where we sat, the town below, distant from the bustle of the world yet fast approaching it, the glow and sweep of the sunset,—it is at moments such as these that the mind enlarges to a swift comprehension, untranslatable in speech, of the passing breath the ages are. The mountains change, the rivers capriciously leave their beds,—especially in Spain, where bridges stand lost in green meadows and are left undisturbed, for does not a proverb say, "Rivers return to forsaken beds after a thousand years?" And Spain has patience to wait! Whether it was the new-born child, the forgotten city, the up-to-date town below, or just the sun setting over that illimitable expanse of mountains, Santa María Naranco gave one an hour of the higher philosophy.
In the after-glow we walked back to Oviedo. Along the way the returning country people greeted us with ease and dignity: "Vaya Usted con Dios," the beautiful salutation, "Go thou with God," heard from one end of the land to the other. The beggar gives you thanks with it, the shop man dismisses you, the friend takes farewell, but its pleasantest sound is in the country, heard from the lips of clear-eyed peasants passing in the evening light.
This peasantry is by instinct well-bred, proud of a pure descent, by nature a gentleman, a caballero. A traveler's life and pocket are absolutely secure in these unfrequented northern provinces of "dark and scowling Spain." For a century those who have turned aside from the beaten track have brought back the same tale of courtesy and hospitality. There is much of Arcadian gentleness among these unlettered people. The Spanish labrador may not read or write, but he cannot be called ignorant; statistics here do not guide one to a true knowledge. The country people hand down in the primitive way, from one generation to the other, a ripe store of human wisdom, that often gives them a wider outlook on life and a deeper strength of character than that of the educated man who shallowly criticises them. They are unspoiled and very human, the women essentially feminine, the men essentially manly; daily this note of virility strikes one,—one grows to love their expressive, beautiful word, varonil. "The man in the saloon steamer has seen all the races of men, and he is thinking of the things that divide men,—diet, dress, decorum, rings in the nose as in Africa, or in the ears as in Europe. The man in the cabbage field has seen nothing at all; but he is thinking of the things that unite men,—hunger, and babies, and the beauty of women, and the promise or menace of the sky." When one can say a thing like that, one is born to appreciate Spain. Will not Mr. Gilbert Chesterton go there and study some day her untamable grand old qualities and describe her as she should be described? If such a country population had had good government during the past three hundred years instead of the worst of tyrannies, where would it stand to-day? Though such a surmise is foolish, for perhaps it is because of its isolation that the Spanish peasantry is racy and vigorous. Knowing the hopelessness of battling against corruption in high places in Madrid, it lived out of touch with modern life, elevated by its intense faith, the hard-won inheritance from the Reconquista,—and a peasant's faith is his form of poetry and ideality, which when taken from him makes him lose in refinement and charm.
Back in the Basque provinces the new idea had dawned on us that this was not a spent, degenerate race, but a young unspoiled one, and every excursion in the country parts of Spain made deeper the assurance of red blood coursing in her veins. Corrupt government has deeply tainted the city classes, has made loafers, and men who open their trusts to the silver key, but the heart of the people is sound. It has been tragically wounded by rulers to whom, an heroic trait, it has ever been loyal. If a country after centuries of misrule had the same power to govern herself as a nation that had had enlightened government for the same length of time, would not one of the best arguments for good government be lost? It may be a long time before Spain learns the restraint of self-rule. But go among the vigorous mountaineers of the north, talk with the patient, sober Castilian labrador, watch the Catalan men of industry and you will see the possibility of her future. A noble esprit de corps controls the Guardia Civil who are the keepers of law and security in Spain, to whom a bribe is an insult. Let the same spirit extend to the other departments,—to the post, to the railway, the civil government; let the judge sit on an impregnable height; let the priest of Andalusia have as solemn a realization of his office as the priest of Navarre, of Aragon, of old Castile; let the women be given a wider education (though may nothing ever change their present qualities as wives and mothers), and Spain is on the right road.
Cavadonga was merely a two days' trip from Oviedo, yet we had to forego it. The weather was too abominable; while Málaga on the southern coast of Spain has an average of but fifty-two rainy days in the year, this city on the northern coast has only fifty-two cloudless days. The thought of a rickety diligence over miles of muddy roads kept enthusiasm within bounds. After a short pause in the Asturian capital we took the train back to León. The valleys were a veritable paradise; now we skirted a wide river flowing under heavily-wooded hills, now we crossed fields covered with the autumn crocus, and saw from the balconies of the farmhouses yellow tapestries of corn cobs hung out to dry.
Some day, not so far distant as an ideal government in Spain, the lover of independence and untouched nature will come to these northern provinces instead of going to hotel-infested Switzerland. The temperate climate, the trout and salmon rivers, the courtesy of the people, make these valleys between the mountains and the sea an ideal tramping and camping ground for the summer.
THE SLEEPING CITIES OF LEÓN
"I stood before the triple northern porch
Where dedicated shapes of saints and kings,
Stern faces bleared with immemorial watch,
Looked down benignly grave and seemed to say:
'Ye come and go incessant; we remain
Safe in the hallowed quiets of the past;
Be reverent, ye who flit and are forgot
Of faith so nobly realized as this.'"
JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.
THERE have been many efforts to divide Spain into right-angled departments similar to those of her neighbor France. The individual land throws off such efforts to bring her into geometric proportion: never can her thirteen immemorial divisions, her thirteen historic provinces be wiped out. Each is an entity with ineradicable characteristics and customs. Their boundaries may seem confused on a paper map, but they are reasonable in the flesh and blood geography of mountains and river valleys, or the psychological geography of early affiliation and conquest.