The Sunny South: An Autumn in Spain and Majorca

by John William Clayton

The Spaniards, in fact, are an indolent people, and have no desire to correct their slothful habits by the bracing effects of cold water; and although the great ladies, in the utter absence of all occupation, have no other task than that of fostering their beauty and pampering their vanity, they do not consider water necessary to these ends: moreover, water is scarce, and therefore dear. The medical men beyond the Pyrenees, who might be expected to correct so grave an error, are creatures of habit, conservative from force of education, and comparatively cut off from the remainder of the scientific world. The Spaniard too, besides being an hydrophobist, has always a shivering dread of fresh air. Whenever he is asked to go anywhere, it is always muy frio with him. And yet in spite of these customs he is not, we suppose, more unhealthy than other men.

Lounging one day on the Prado, a great clattering of hoofs was heard, and the Queen of Spain, in an open carriage, drawn by six magnificent mules, all over silver and gold, dashed past, escorted by a detachment of cavalry. By her side sat an ordinary-looking young man, who, we were informed, was the King-Consort. Every Saturday afternoon, Her Majesty visits the Church Atocha [11] to pay her respects to a coarse, black wooden doll, which is wrapped, in a very grotesque manner, in garments encrusted with gold and stiff with precious stones of sufficient value to build half a dozen hospitals and endow the poor of Madrid for life. This image, which is supposed to have been carved by St. Luke, is said to have been brought from Antioch, and popular superstition ascribes to it the power of performing miracles.

Within this church we were shown the court dress in which the Queen was arrayed some years ago when an attempt was made upon her life. It is, of course, very splendid, and the blood-stained robes were presented to the Virgin as an offering of the Queen's gratitude for her deliverance from the arm of the assassin. As the gift is repeated every year on the anniversary day, the Virgin [12] has now about as splendid a wardrobe as any modern Queen of Sheba.

While the verger, or whatever he called himself, was explaining this remarkable exemplification of his Monarch's piety, we observed that he was smoking a cigarette; upon which we, naturally thinking it was the correct thing, proceeded to do likewise. That functionary, however, put an end to our delusion at once, by observing,—

"Señor, the profane may not smoke here. I am within the bosom of the church, and my actions are consecrated."

Regarding this as one of those singular cosas de España to which the stranger must submit, we presented the holy, but rather dirty, gentleman with the cigarette from which our too confiding lips were so cruelly divorced.

Within the Royal Armeria are many interesting objects. Although the veneration with which we regard a sword which the hand of Cortes once upon a time touched, or a particular suit of armour in which the body of Columbus was once encased, like a jelly in a mould, may savour, perhaps, of hero-worship, idolatry, and superstition, we must acknowledge the imputation that we are subject to it. Here are the swords of Philip II. and of Francisco Pizarro, conquerors of Peru, and there that of Charles V., Emperor of Germany, together with his entire armour—the actual suit in which he was painted by Titian. Several revolvers of the seventeenth century, and a war-saddle of the Cid, are also exhibited.

For anyone who wishes to enjoy a feast of pictures uninterruptedly, and we suppose that is not an unnatural taste, the Madrid gallery is the place. Few but English travellers go there, the Spaniards seeming to care as little about the glories of their Murillos and Velasquez', as they do about Leech or Cruikshank, and perhaps not so much. There is plenty of space for the loiterer in the gallery, and in its silence he may dream away in peace a few happy hours. There are pictures here, of course, on which genius has stamped its impress, and on which all who are capable of appreciating the beauty of art gaze with admiration. That wondrous Crucifixion, for instance, by Velasquez, produces at once an impression which roots one to the spot. In the midst of a waste of lonely darkness, hangs heavily on a coarse stake of wood the dead form of the wearied man. The end of all his misery, the relief brought by death, seems to be distinctly delineated in the attitude of that forsaken, emaciated form,—with half its face veiled by the dank hair which falls over it as the head bows forward at the last mortal spasm,—a sight at which the words "It is finished" rise instinctively to our lips while we gaze at that marvellous production of perfect art. The next picture on which the eye falls is one of a brighter character—The Assumption of the Virgin, by Murillo. The look of childish, confiding innocence in the gentle face is beyond expression. As there have been inspired writers, surely there have been also inspired painters, and this Spanish master must have been one of them, during the composition of this immortal work. Close at hand is the famous picture of the infant St. John, by the same hand. Beside the beautiful boy is a gentle lamb. The little animal has crept confidingly, without a symptom of fear, to the child's side. As it should be with so pure a subject, the colouring and general treatment are nobly simple, and that is the source of its beauty.

Velasquez, of course, is represented in all his strength. Whether the subject of his portraiture be the haughty noble or the loathsome pauper, he is the quintessence of strength and truth, and the highest delineator of national character. The splendid colouring and fine chiaroscuro of Ribera can be recognised in several of his most beautiful productions. In the centre of the long gallery the steps are suddenly arrested before a painting which really deserves the title that the catalogue gives it—a marvel, El Pasmo de Sicilia, one of the masterpieces of Raffaelle. The subject is that of Christ falling under the cross; and in truth, it is a noble example of power, colouring, and harmony. The development of the human form is at once muscular and graceful, and the sufferer's sorrow is expressed with wonderful force. The grouping of the figures, most of which are nearly, if not quite, the size of life, is perfection. For force of treatment the work is a worthy rival of the Transfiguration in the Vatican, albeit the latter is celestial and mystic; while this represents the pure earthly side of Christ's nature, depicting him as a man ennobled by sorrow, untainted by sin, and purified by suffering. The expression of the Saviour's countenance, as his eyes meet those of his mother, at the moment when, smarting under blow and taunt, he faintly endeavours to rise from his bruised knees, is beyond everything that has been depicted on canvas.