The Sunny South: An Autumn in Spain and Majorca

by John William Clayton

A small crowd gradually gathered around us as we sat upon our pieces of baggage, like Marius among the ruins of Carthage, and then everybody began to talk at once with the most frightful velocity and alarming gestures. The chorus, not very unlike that of evil demons in some weird opera, continued for several minutes, raging with great vigour and such rapidity that we could not make even the wildest guess at their meaning, because, amidst the babel no words of their patois could be distinctly singled out. However, directed we suppose by the special providence which presides over British tourists, we eventually made a desperate resolution to follow our luggage and cling to it to the last. Following these tactics, we found ourselves in a short time seated in an elongated vehicle, innocent of all springs, which had some resemblance to a schoolroom on wheels, with all the candles put out. In this conveyance we had the further advantage of the uninterrupted society of a monkish gentleman with sandals, cowl, rope, and what seemed to be a long hairy dressing-gown. Now, we have often heard of the odour of sanctity, but if the odour by which this holy person was accompanied was the article in question, we must say we didn't think much of it.

The vehicle in which we were seated started with a shout, a crack, and a jerk, very suddenly, and, to any one a little absent, without sufficient warning. After rattling over the most fearful pavement, past grey, gaunt buildings, and through dark, narrow, shadowy streets, illuminated at long intervals by a misty lamp swung across from house to house, we were landed at the door of the Fonda del Norte.

At this juncture, the fact that in this life confidence in things as they should be, instead of suspicion of things as they are, is a mistake, was forced upon us very decisively; for had we, on descending from the omnibus, not considered it natural that there should be a step upon which to place the foot, instead of regarding it as possible that there might not be one,—especially if it was at all required,—we should not have fallen heavily out into the road, and been smeared all over with dirt and mire.

After holding out a handful of small coins, thus simplifying matters by letting the omnibus-driver help himself, we were escorted in slow procession,—the luggage going first,—by a train of four damsels, and a very brown old woman, bearing candles, through winding passages all whitewashed, up cold stone flights of stairs, the walls of which seemed to be covered with any amount of black-beetles, until we were ushered into a small double-bedded room, also whitewashed, and adorned with violently coloured prints of saints and martyrs, with what appeared to be fireworks fizzing and exploding out of the backs of their heads. We were then presented with a cup of some darkly red and rather muddy-looking fluid called chocolate, highly flavoured with what to us is the most nauseous thing in the world,—cinnamon. A piece of black bread, and a pat of something which might once have been butter, but now resembled railway wheel-grease, or cheese, was then given to us. Half of a cold bird, of a species, we should imagine, nearly extinct, seemed as little calculated to please the appetite as the bread, butter, and chocolate. These luxuries were placed upon a chest of drawers, there being no table; and as no chair could be found of sufficient altitude to raise us to a proper level with these delicacies, we were constrained to stand at our feast.

The procession of curious followers had now halted, and deployed into a semicircle around us, doubtless to watch the effects of this astonishing banquet upon our weak minds and empty stomachs. To taste of the half-bird was at once to come to the conclusion that the poultry in Spain is fed chiefly on gravel. The black-eyed young ladies who lingered round us wonderingly while we were regaling ourselves, as if we were two specimens of some remarkable race of men, or inhabitants of the planet Jupiter dropped into their hotel, were at length swept off tittering by the brown old female, and we were left alone with the pyrotechnical saints, the whitewashed walls, a couple of iron bedsteads, two chairs, and the chest of drawers, which still groaned beneath the weight of the remains of the viands that had formed our initiatory banquet in the land of Spain. The wild cry of the watchman moaning through the narrow, silent streets, the distant clang of the great cathedral bell sounding the hour, and the misty moonlight streaming through the casement, gave a peculiar finish to our novel experiences of men and things; and so to bed—to a sleep confused with all sorts of impressions, blurred and running into each other on the palette of the mind.

Here we were in Spain; Spain, the land of historical memories—Iberian, Celtic, Phœnician, Greek, Carthaginian, and Roman. From the Phœnicians sprang Cadiz, Seville, Malaga, and Cordova. From the Greeks, Rhodians, and Zanteans, arose Rosas in Cataluña, the populations of the Balearic Isles, and the immortal Saguntum (Murviedro), which heroically resisted Hannibal, and caused the second Punic war. From the Carthaginians, who conquered Southern Spain (b.c. 237), sprang Carthagena, and also Barcelona. All Spain fell beneath the Roman yoke, and continued under it for a period of four centuries.

Spain, the land of historic memories, Gothic, Moorish, French, British; the land of the Cid and of chivalry; the land of the Inquisition and of bigotry, of the religious monster, Torquemada, [3] and of the great and cruel Duke of Alva; the land of the conquerors of Mexico and Peru, of Cervantes, Lope de Vega, and Calderon; the land of Velasquez, Murillo, and the Ideal, not to speak of extortionate hotel-keepers who are much attached to the Real; [4] the land of impecuniosity, bigotry, intolerance, and fleas; the land of love and revenge, mantillas and stilettos; the land of plenty and horror, gazelle-eyed women, and the blue cholera; the land of bull-fights, cigarettes, blue blood, beggars, monks, and dinners cooked in oil; the land of the wondrous architecture of the sombre Goth and sensuous Moor; the land of a corrupted and vicious court—of lounging, intrigue, procrastination, and pride; the land of staunch, changeless, and noble characters, and of pure and chivalrous hearts; the land of the vine, orange, and cypress—of purple mountains and dreaming sea; the land of light and shadow, of love and hatred, glory and gloom;—in fine, the land of a sensitive, generous, warm-hearted, and graceful people, but the worst government in Christendom.

We are in Spain, certainly; but how cold and sepulchral a city Burgos is! It is chill and damp, and subject to violent attacks of wind, being situated on an elevated, exposed, and treeless plain, 3075 feet above the level of the sea, and surrounded by a wide Arabian-like yellow desert, which, however, waves one vast sea of corn in summer, for it is the granary of Spain. It is sepulchral because, for all the purposes of an advanced and enlightened age, it is a buried city; and there is nothing a Burgolese hates so much as improvement. We are many hundred miles south of England; but how much more bleak and inhospitable is the climate than that of our temperate Northern isle; and we can well understand the proverb relating to the weather in this place, "Diez meses de invierno y dos de infierno."

Burgos is, as we have said, much behind its time. There is no particular trade, excepting in the simple articles considered necessary for the population. The hotels are but second-rate, and are used chiefly as eating-houses for the higher class of tradespeople. Few foreigners seek their shelter.