``And that statue of Christopher Colomb, whose installation will be accomplished in a very short time, whose price may be 500,000 francs?
``Are not there still a number of proud buildings, richly ornamented, and splendid theaters? one of them, perhaps the most beautiful, surely the largest (it contains 5000 places) the Liceo, is truly a master-pi<e!>ce, where the spectators are lost in admiration of the riches, the ornaments, the pictures and feel a true regret to turn their eyes from them to look at the stage.
``You will see coffee houses, where have been spent hundreds of thousands to change their large rooms in enchanted <p 197>halls with which it would be difficult to contest even for the palaces of east.
``And still in those little streets, now very few, so narrow that the inhabitants of their opposite houses can shake hands together, do you not know that doors may be found which open to yards and staircases worthy of palaces?
``Do you not know there are plenty of sculptures, every one of them masterpieces, and that, especially the town and deputation house contain some halls which would make meditate all our great masters?
``If we walk through the Catalonia- square to reach the Ensanche, our astonishment becomes still greater.
``In this Ensanche, a newly-born, but already a great town, there are no streets: there are but promenades with trees on both sides, which not only moderate the rays of the sun through their follage, but purify the surrounding atmosphere and seem to say to those who are walking beneath their shade: You are breathing here the purest air!
``There display the houses plenty of <p 198>the rarest sorts of marble. Out and indoors rules marble, the ceilings of the halls, the staircases, the yards command and force admiration to the spectator, who thought to see only houses and finds monumental buildings.
``Join to that a Paseo de Gracia with immense perspective; the promenade of Cortes, 10 kil. long; some free squares by day- and night-time, in which the rarest plants and the sweetest flowers enchant the passengers eyes and enbalm his smell.
``Join lastly the neighbourhoods, but a short way from the town and put on all sides in communication with it by means of tramways-lines and steam-tramways too; those places show a very charming scenery for every one who likes natural beauties mingled with those which are created by the genius of man.