We started in the evening for Cordova, a long distance; but as it was accomplished in darkness, I noticed nothing by the way, except stoppages at stations and a change of trains. We crossed the Sierra Morena, which, in some places, at least, must be very magnificent, if one may judge from an engraving of tall rocks facing each other, leaving scarcely room for muleteers to pass between. The approach to Cordova is inviting, and the Moorish city is beheld amidst a fertile region, across which runs the Guadalquivir.
We had been invited to take up our abode with an exemplary Scotch missionary in the city. The sojourn was in a quiet street at a comfortable dwelling, with an open space in the middle of the residence, planted with shrubs. Upon this we looked down from windows in our apartments. One room on the ground floor is sufficiently large to receive a congregation of about fifty people. We were there on a Sunday and attended worship in the evening.
The Mosque of Cordova, now a cathedral, is one of the most wonderful buildings in the world. The surrounding walls are from thirty to sixty-feet high. The courtyard measures 430 feet by 210. Once there were nineteen entrance gates, now there is but one. Formerly there were inside the mosque 1200 monolithic columns, now there are only 850. What is the coro, or choir, of the cathedral, was erected in the sixteenth century, after the Mohammedan mosque had become a Catholic church. We had pleasant walks and drives in the neighbourhood.
The next celebrated place in our route was the far-famed Granada, of which expectations were highly raised, without any disappointment. We wandered about the Alhambra for several days. The Hall of the Lions, the Hall of the Ambassadors, and the Hall of the Abencerrages,—with their arches and columns, courts and colonnades, fountains and flowers,—kept us spel-bound day by day. We read Washington Irving on the fascinating spots which he describes so vividly. We could but bow to his relentless fidelity, where he assures us that, after examining Arabic authorities and letters, written by Boabdil’s contemporaries, he was convinced, that the whole collection is fictitious with a few grains of truth at the bottom.
The fame of the Alhambra swallows up all which is wonderful in Granada, but, the city retains much besides worthy of a traveller’s attention. The prospect you have of the place, the plain, and the surrounding hills, is magnificent; and the cathedral, commenced in 1529, after the defeat and banishment of the Moors, is a building of architectural interest. It contains the Capella Real, with the tomb of Ferdinand and Isabella; also of Philip the Handsome, and his wife Juana, “Crazy Jane,” as she was called, mother of the famous Charles V. The granddaughter tells us: “She committed her soul to God and gave thanks to Him, that, at length, He delivered her from all her sorrows.” In connection with the cathedral, we meet with Fernando de Talavera, better known by Spaniards than by Englishmen. Though he remained a Roman Catholic, he deviated from the common opinions and usages of his age. The Carthusians have a monastery outside the city, and on visiting it, I found pictures of English priests, reported to have been martyrs at the period of the Reformation. No doubt their sufferings are exaggerated on the monastic walls, but it is a fact, beyond reasonable doubt, that there were Roman Catholics put to death by English Protestants.
We started one morning from Granada for Seville, and, on crossing the Vega by the railway, we saw a good barley crop in the month of April. At Bobadillo, we got on the Seville line, and found the country improve as we came near to the city on the banks of the Guadalquivir. There, instead of antique and uncomfortable fondas, travellers meet with spacious and well-furnished hotels. We tarried several days in the city.
The cathedral, of course, was the first object of interest; and, as soon as possible, we repaired to it, and received an overpowering impression, as we looked above, beneath, around. Above there is the magnificent roof, spanning the breadth of the temple; beneath there lies a large slab covering the remains, not, as sometimes supposed, of Columbus, who discovered America, but of Fernando, his son. In Holy Week an immense Greek cross, carved in wood, is raised over the spot, and lighted up so as to produce an indescribable effect. The coro, or choir, is as grand, though in another way, as the nave which leads up to it. In an upper part of the edifice there are preserved MSS. and other memorials of unrivalled Spanish discoveries, and they were freely shown to us. We went to the Museum, and feasted on Murillo’s pictures. We were also taken by a friend to see another work of the same artist, since presented, I am told, to the Pope.
Seville was headquarters of the Protestant cause. The Reformation did not penetrate much below the hidalgo class. It left the masses almost untouched. In Seville stood the Inquisition prison, till it was removed to a palace in the Calle san Mario. “Here,” says Mr. Wiffen in 1842, “while gazing on the edifice with feelings of awe, I recalled to remembrance those martyrs for the truth, and, at the same time, I listened with painful interest to the narration made to me by a Spanish gentleman, of an attack on those very premises at a recent period by an infuriated populace, who suffered but few of the friars confined there for political offences, to escape with life. The building having taken fire some perished in the flames, while others fell by the hands of the assassins.” The tables were turned just then, priests were in prison for political crimes, as heretics had been incarcerated in the sixteenth century.
Old Venetian political policy was carried out against Protestantism, and the Inquisition office, with opened ears, listened for whisperings of heresy. Horrors went on in secret places. I cannot relate them, but they may be found in what is written by Limborch and Llorente. A few miles from Seville is the monastery of San Isidore—the cradle of the Spanish Reformation—and I visited the building with deep interest. The chapel remains in tolerable repair, and is used as a parish church. The chapter-house, sacristy and cloisters are preserved. Ancient pictures hang on the walls, and old embroidered vestments are shown to visitors. Bibles and Protestant books were of old secretly brought within the walls, and monks began to read them.
I have described Seville Cathedral and its treasures at some length in my volume on “Spanish Reformers, their Memories and Dwelling Places.” I cannot repeat here what has been said there. But let me say, the city is full of interest to travellers, hotels are comfortable, shops are well stocked with curiosities, manufactories are hives of industry, and pictures by great masters are found in churches and private houses. I was enchanted with some of the Murillos, and would advise every traveller to visit the Sala de Murillo in Seville.