After him, Seville became the theatre of momentous deeds and events that had a far-reaching influence on the history of the country. Into her lap was poured the riches of the New World; within her halls Queen Isabella laid the foundation of her united kingdom; from Seville came the intellectual stimulus that revived the arts and letters of the whole Peninsula. Here were born and labored Pedro Campaña, Alejo Fernandez, Luis de Vargas, the several Herreras, Francisco de Zurbaran, Alfonso Cano, Diego de Silva [{196}]Velasquez, Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, and Miguel Florentino. The riches of the western world made of Seville a second Florence, where art found ready patrons, and literature, cultivated protectors. She rivaled the great schools of Italy and the Netherlands, but out of her secret council chambers came the Institution of the Holy Office, the scourge that withered the nation. In the latter half of the sixteenth century, forty-five thousand people were put to death in the archbishopric of Seville. Finally, under Philip II, Seville and her great church rose to stupendous wealth and power.
"When Philip II died, loyal Seville honored the departed king by a magnificent funeral service in the Cathedral. A tremendous monument was designed by Oviedo. On Nov. 25th, 1598, the mourning multitude flocked to the dim Cathedral while the people knelt upon the stones, and the solemn music floated through the air. There was a disturbance among a part of the congregation. A man was charged with deriding the imposing monument and creating disorder. He was a tax-gatherer and ex-soldier of the city named Don Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra. Some of the citizens took his side, for there was a feud between the civil and the ecclesiastical authorities in Seville. The brawler was expelled from the cathedral,—but he had his revenge. He composed a satirical poem upon the tomb of the King which was read everywhere in the city:—
To the Monument of the King of Seville
I vow to God I quake with surprise,
Could I describe it, I would give a crown,
And who, that gazes on it in the town
[{197}] But starts aghast to see its wondrous size;
Each part a million cost, I should devise:
What pity 'tis, ere centuries have flown,
Old time will mercilessly cast it down!
Thou rival'st Rome, O Seville, in my eyes!
I bet, the soul of him who's dead and blest,
To dwell within this sumptuous monument,
Has left the seats of sempiternal rest!
A fellow tall, on deeds of valour bent,
My exclamation heard. "Bravo," he cried,
"Sir Soldier, what you say is true, I vow!
And he who says the contrary has lied!"
With that he pulls his hat upon his brow,
Upon his sword-hilt he his hand doth lay,
And frowns—and—nothing does, but walks away!"[16]
Far more ineffaccable even than the record left by Philip's life upon the history of Seville and Spain is that of this immortal soldier and scribbler, who "believed he had found something better to do than writing comedies."
The soft, sonorous syllables of Guadalquivir (from the Arabic Wad-el-Kebir, or The Great River) would picture to the imaginative eye a river far more poetic than the sluggish stream that loiters across the wide plain and fruitful valley until it pierces the amber girdle of crenelated walls and embattled towers which enclose the treasures of Seville. On its broad bosom have swept the barks and galleys of Phœnicia and Greece, of Roman, Goth, and Moor. On its shores Columbus lowered the sails of his caravel and presented Spain with a new world on Palm Sunday, 1493; Pizarro and Cortez here first embarked their greedy and daring adventurers; hither Pizarro returned with hoards of gold and silver treasures from Mexico and Peru, for the Council of the Indies restricted{198} all the trade of the colonies to the port of Seville. The valley through which the river descends is sheltered from the cold tablelands lying northward by the Sierra Moreña chain. Gray olive trees, waving pastures, and fields of grain cover its slopes. A soft, tempered wind whispers through the grassy meadows of La Tierra de Maria Santissima, and the atmosphere is so dry and clear that far away against the horizon objects stand out in clear silhouette. So vivid are the colors that the smoky olive groves, the orange and lemon-colored walls, the fir trees, the chalky white of the stucco, the fleshy, prickly leaves of the cacti, and the tall standards of the aloes seem photographed on the brain.
In a fair and fruitful land lies the city, and her spires pierce a smokeless, unspotted sky.
In the heart of the city, set down in the very centre of her life of song and laughter and childish simplicity, surrounded by crooked streets and great airy courts, in the widest sunlit square, lies her Cathedral.
The first impression made by a building is generally not only the most distinct but the truest. That produced by Seville's Cathedral is its immensity of scale.
Toledo la rica,
Salamanca la fuerta,
Leon la bella,
Oviedo la sacra,
Sevilla la grande,
runs the Spanish saying. The size is overpowering. Each of the four side aisles is nearly as broad and high as the nave of Westminster Abbey, while the arcades of Seville's nave have twice the span. To the{199} impressionable sensitiveness of Théophile Gautier it was like a mountain scooped out, a valley turned topsy-turvy. Notre Dame de Paris might walk erect under the frightful height of the middle nave; pillars as large as towers appear so slender that you catch your breath as you look up at the far-away, vaulted roof they support.