Wanderings in Spain

by Théophile Gautier

On beholding such wretched hovels, you feel yourself full of pity for the robbers who are obliged to live by marauding in a country where you might make a round of ten leagues and not find wherewithal to cook an egg. The resources offered by the diligences and galleys are really insufficient, and the poor brigands who vegetate in La Mancha are often obliged to be contented with a supper composed of a handful of those sweet acorns which were the delight of Sancho Panza. What is it possible to take from people who have neither money nor pockets, who live in houses of which the whole furniture is composed of four bare walls, and whose only utensils are a saucepan and an earthenware pitcher? To pillage such villages appears to me one of the most lugubrious fancies which can well enter the head of a robber out of work.

A little beyond Puerto Lapiche you enter La Mancha, where we perceived to our right two or three windmills, which lay claim to having victoriously sustained the shock of Don Quixote's lance, and which, for the moment, were listlessly turning their fans with the aid of an asthmatic breeze. The venta at which we stopped to imbibe two or three jars of fresh water, also boasts of having entertained the immortal hero of Cervantes.

We will not fatigue our readers with a description of our monotonous route through a stony, flat, and dusty country, only enlivened, at long intervals, with a few olive-trees, whose foliage is diseased and of a bluish green; where nothing is seen but tawny, haggard, mummified peasants, with scorched, rusty hats, short breeches, and coarse gaiters of darkish cloth, carrying a tattered jacket on their shoulders, and driving before them a mangy ass whose coat is white with age, whose ears are enervated, and whose back is pitiful to behold; and where you see at the entrance of the villages nothing but half-naked children, as dark as mulattoes, and who view you with wild and astonished looks as you pass by.

Dying of hunger, we arrived at Manzanares in the middle of the night. The courier who preceded us, profiting by his right as first comer and his acquaintance with the people of the hotel, had exhausted all the provisions, which consisted, it is true, but of three or four eggs and a piece of ham. We uttered the most piercing and heart-rending cries, and declared that we would set fire to the house and roast the landlady herself, if there were no other dish forthcoming. This display of energy procured us, at about two in the morning, some supper, to prepare which they had been obliged to wake up half the town. We had a quarter of kid, eggs with tomato-sauce, ham and goat's-milk cheese, with some pretty good white table-wine. We all supped together in the yard by the light of three or four brass lamps, very much like the funereal lamps of antiquity. The flame of each lamp producing, through the caprices of the wind, fantastic shades and lights, gave us the appearance of so many lamiæ and ghouls tearing asunder pieces of disinterred children: and that the repast might have a perfect appearance of magic, a tall blind girl, guided by the noise, approached the table, and began singing couplets to a plaintive and monotonous air, like a vague sibylline incantation. On learning that we were French, she improvised, in honour of us, some eulogical stanzas, which we rewarded with a few reals.

Before getting into our conveyance, we went to take a turn in the village; we were obliged to grope our way, it is true, but that was better than remaining in the yard of the inn. We reached the Market-place, not, however, without having stumbled over some one sleeping in the open air. In the summer, the people generally sleep in the street, some under their cloaks, and some beneath mule-cloths, while others have a sack filled with chopped straw (these are sybarites); and then again there are some who lie on the bare bosom of their mother Cybele, with a stone for a pillow. The peasants who had arrived in the night were asleep, pell-mell, in the midst of curious vegetables and wild productions, or between the legs of their mules and donkeys, where they were waiting for daylight, which was soon to appear.

By the moon's faint light, we indistinctly perceived in the obscurity a sort of embattled antique edifice, where, by the whiteness of the plaster, we recognised the defences made during the last civil war, and which time had not yet succeeded in harmonizing with the main building. As a conscientious traveller, this is all we can say of Manzanares.

We got into our conveyance again; sleep crept over us, and when we again opened our eyes we were in the environs of Val-de-Peñas, a town celebrated for its wine: the ground and hills, studded with constellated stones, were of a red hue and singularly crude, and we began to distinguish on the horizon ranges of mountains serrated like saws, and whose outline was very plainly marked, in spite of their great distance.

Val-de-Peñas possesses nothing above the common, and owes all its reputation to its vineyards. Its name—the Valley of Stones—is perfectly justified. We stopped here to breakfast, and, by an inspiration from Heaven, I first of all took my own chocolate, and then that intended for my companion, who had not yet risen; and, foreseeing future famines, I crammed into my cup as many bunuelos (a kind of small fritter) as it would hold, so as to make a sort of pretty substantial porridge; for I had not yet learned the abstemiousness of the camel, which, I did some time afterwards by dint of practising abstinence worthy of an anchorite of the primitive times. I was not then used to the climate, and I had brought from France a most unnatural appetite, which inspired the natives of the country with respectful astonishment.

In a few minutes we set off all in a hurry, for we were obliged to keep close to the correo real, in order not to lose the advantage of its protection. On leaning out of the vehicle to take a last survey of Val-de-Peñas, I let my cap fall into the road: a muchacho of twelve or fifteen years of age perceived this, and, in order to get a few cuartos, picked it up, and began running after the diligence, which was now at some distance from him; he overtook it, however, though he was barefooted and running on a road paved with sharp-pointed stones. I threw him a handful of sous, which certainly made him the most opulent urchin in the whole place. I mention this insignificant circumstance merely because it is characteristic of the swiftness of the Spaniards, who are the best walkers in the world, and the most active runners to be met with. We have already had occasion to speak of those foot-postilions called zagales, who follow carriages, going at full speed, for leagues together, without appearing to be in the least fatigued, or without even perspiring.

At Santa Cruz we were offered for sale all sorts of small knives and navajas: Santa Cruz and Albacete are renowned for this fancy cutlery. These navajas, of Arabian and very characteristic barbarous taste, have brass handles, which are cut through, and in the perforations of which are seen red, green, and blue spangles. Coarse enamel work, but cleanly executed, decorates the blades, which are made in the form of a fish, and are always very sharp; most of them bear some such motto as the following: Soy de uno solo, "I belong to one only;" or Cuando esta vivora pica, no hay remedio en la botica, "When this serpent stings, there is no remedy in medicine." Sometimes the blade has three parallel lines cut down it, the hollows of which are painted red, and then it presents a truly formidable appearance. The length of these navajas varies from three inches to three feet; a few majos (smart peasants) have some which, when open, are as long as a sabre; the blade is kept open in its place by a jointed spring, or a sliding ring. The navaja is the favourite arm of the Spaniards, especially of the people of the lower class; they handle it with wonderful dexterity, and form moreover a shield by rolling their cape round their left arm. This is an art which, like fencing, has its laws, and navaja-masters are as numerous in Andalusia as fencing-masters are at Paris. Every one who uses the navaja has his secret thrusts, and his particular ways of striking: adepts, they say, can, on viewing a wound, recognise the artiste who has inflicted it, as we recognise a painter by his touch.