“This is a beautiful day,” said Dr. Winstock, as they left the museum. “They call it very cold here, when the mercury falls below the freezing point. It does not often get below twenty-four, and seldom so low as that. I think the glass to-day is as high as fifty-five.”
“I call it a warm day for winter,” added Sheridan.
“But the air of this city is very subtle. It will kill a man, the Spaniards say, when it will not blow out a candle. I think we had better take a berlina, and ride over to the Prado. The day is so fine that we may possibly see some of the summer glories of the place.”
“What are they?” asked Murray.
“To me they are the people who walk there; but of course the place is the pleasantest when the trees and shrubs are in foliage.”
A berlina was called, and the party drove through the Calle Mayor, the Puerta del Sol, and the Calle de Alcala, which form a continuous street, the broadest and finest in Madrid, from the palace to the Prado, which are on opposite sides of the city. A continuation of this street forms one end of the Prado; and another of the Calle de Atocha, a broad avenue reaching from the Plaza Mayor, near the palace, forms the other end. These are the two widest streets of Madrid. The Calle de Alcala is wide enough to be called a boulevard, and contains some of the finest buildings in the city.
“That must be the bull-ring,” said Sheridan, as the party came in sight of an immense circular building. “I have read that it will hold twelve thousand people.”
“Some say sixteen thousand; but I think it would not take long to count all it would hold above ten thousand. Philip V. did not like bull-fights, and he tried to do away with them; but the spectacle is the national sport, and the king made himself very unpopular by attempting to abolish it. As a stroke of policy, to regain his popularity, he built this Plaza de Toros. It is what you see; but it is open to the weather in the middle; and all bull-fights are held, ‘Si el tiempo no lo impide’ (if the weather does not prevent it). This is the Puerta de Alcala,” continued the doctor, pointing to a triumphal arch about seventy feet high, built by Charles III. “The gardens on the right are the ‘Buen Retiro,’ pleasant retreat. Now we will turn, and go through the Prado, though all this open space is often called by this name.”
“But what is the ‘pleasant retreat’?”
“It is a sort of park and garden, not very attractive at that, with a pond, a menagerie, and an observatory. It is not worth the trouble of a visit,” added the doctor, as he directed the driver to turn the berlina.