Scarcely a stone’s throw from the Alcazar is the cathedral, overtopped by the old Moorish minaret, the Giralda, which was built by the Sultan Yacub Al-Mansur in 1184. It rests upon a triangular base composed of all the statues of pagan deities and other idolatrous fragments of antiquity that could be collected by the zealous iconoclasts who founded it. The tower is fifty feet square, and the original height was two hundred cubits; modern additions, however, have increased it somewhat, and it now measures three hundred and fifty feet from the pavement to the head of the statue. For eighty-seven feet the walls are of polished blocks of stone; above this the material is brick, relieved by tracery and arabesques of the most capricious designs, different on each side, yet so artfully combined and blended that it requires close observation to detect the variations. The interior is lighted by double windows, divided by columns of white marble and alabaster. The Giralda is ascended by a series of ramps, or inclined planes, so wide, and of such easy slope, that two horsemen with lances poised could ride to the top and back again without dismounting, a feat that was more than once accomplished by the wild cavaliers of the Spanish court.
The Campanile of St. Mark’s at Venice has similar ramps, the invention being of Byzantine origin. It is curious that the walls increase in thickness as the summit is approached, an anomaly which has never been satisfactorily explained.
Late in the fourteenth century the upper portion of the Giralda was injured by an earthquake, and remained half ruined until 1568, when the present belfry was built. It is encircled by the biblical quotation, “Fortissima turris nomen Domini,” and supports a colossal bronze statue of Faith, which acts as a weathercock, moving with the lightest breath of air.
The Court of the Oranges, with the walls enclosing its northern and eastern sides, compose the existing portions of the mosque, upon whose site the cathedral was erected. It contains cool arcades, a grove, and a battered marble fountain, which for three hundred years served the Moor for his ablutions, and where now the sturdy water-carriers fill their kegs, trudging away with their cheerful “A’ua! a’ua! quien quiere a’ua? templ’a y muy ’uena!”[A] a cry that is most welcome upon a sultry day....
A suite of rooms in the upper story of the old mosque contains the precious collection of books and manuscripts bequeathed by Don Fernando Columbus to the cathedral. Of rare interest is this library, the greater number of whose musty volumes, bound in vellum, were once the property of the most renowned of navigators. In a glass case are preserved the original journals of Columbus, partly written in the dungeons of the Inquisition, and the “Travels of Marco Polo,” his vade-mecum during his voyages.
This book, which bears evident marks of study and hard usage, is said to have been the first that suggested to him the probable existence of another world. There is scarcely a page that is not enriched with notes jotted down from time to time by this wonderful man, whose handwriting is as legible as print, the ink he used being but little faded after a lapse of four hundred years. I should have been glad to have examined these memorials more closely, and tried to induce the custodian to unlock the case; but the tempting bribe I offered failed, to my surprise, to accomplish the desired end, as he sorrowfully informed me that he was not intrusted with the key.
The Cathedral of Seville is worthy of its reputation as the grandest in Spain, and one of the most elaborate ever constructed. Inside the walls it measures three hundred and seventy-nine by two hundred and seventeen feet, the central dome rising one hundred and seventy-three feet from the floor. Begun in 1402, it is not yet finished, the delay affording a convenient pretext for continually soliciting funds, which, by a pious fiction, are presumed never to be adequate for the purpose.
The enormous pillars, disposed in groups, impart an air of great solidity to the edifice, whose dimensions, like those of all similar structures, are not at the first glance appreciated. To several of the pillars are attached iron coffers as large as ordinary trunks, for the reception of donations for holy uses. Little is dropped into them now but copper; but, at the time when the treasures of a world were pouring into Seville, they were too small for the piles of doubloons with which returning adventurers hoped to purchase immunity for revolting crimes against God and man.
Just inside the main entrance is the grave of Don Fernando Columbus, the last of his illustrious race, who died in 1539. A simple marble slab covers his remains; the Latin epitaph recites his own and his father’s deeds,—deeds that were so ill requited by the jealousy and ingratitude of his sovereign.
The three caravels which achieved the discovery of the Bahamas are sculptured there, with the unique device, a globe belted with the famous motto,—