And now the sad time came for our travellers to leave Seville. In fact, the exorbitant prices of everything at the hotel made a longer stay impossible, though it was difficult to say what it was that they paid for: certainly not food; for, excepting the chocolate and bread, which are invariably good throughout Spain, the dinners were uneatable, the oil rancid, the eggs stale; even "el cocido," the popular dish, was composed of indescribable articles, and of kids which seemed to have died a natural death. One of the party, a Belgian, exclaimed when her first dish of this so-called meat was given her at Easter: "Vraiment, je crois que nous autres nous n'avons pas tant perdu pendant le Carême!" An establishment has lately been started by an enterprising peasant to sell milk fresh from the cow, a great luxury in Spain, where goat's milk is the universal substitute; and four very pretty Alderneys are kept, stall-fed, in a nice little dairy, "à l'Anglaise," at one corner of the principal square, which is both clean and tempting to strangers. At every corner of the streets, water, in cool, porous jars, is offered to the passers by, mixed with a sugary substance looking like what is used by confectioners for "meringues," but which melts in the water and leaves no trace. This is the universal beverage of every class in Spain.
There is little to tempt foreigners in the shops of Seville, and, with the exception of photographs and fans, there is nothing to buy which has any particular character or "chique" about it. The fans are beautiful, and form, in fact, one of the staple trades of the place; there is also a sweet kind of incense manufactured of flowers, mixed with resinous gums, which resembles that made at Damascus. But the ordinary contents of the shops look like the sweepings-out of all the "quincaillerie" of the Faubourg St. Denis.
It was on a more lovely evening than usual that our travellers went, for the last time, to that glorious cathedral. The sorrow was even greater than what they had felt the year before in leaving St. Peter's: for Rome one lives in hopes of seeing again; Seville, in all human probability, never! The services were over, but the usual proportion of veiled figures knelt on the marble pavement, on which the light from those beautiful painted windows threw gorgeous colors. Never had that magnificent temple appeared more solemn or more worthy of its purpose; one realized as one had never done before one's own littleness and God's ineffable greatness, mercy, and love. Still they lingered, when the inexorable courier came to remind them that the train was on the point of starting, and with a last prayer, which was more like a sob, our travellers left the sacred building. At the station all their kind Seville friends had assembled to bid them once more good-by, and to re-echo kind hopes of a speedy return; and then the train started, and the last gleam of sunshine died out on the tower of the Giralda.
Original.
Il Duomo
A Vision.
IL DUOMO, being interpreted, signifies "The Cathedral," and the subject of the following poem is the picturesque and beautiful cathedral of Milan. This splendid building is adorned externally by nearly five thousand white marble statues, life size, of knights, martyrs, monks, etc. etc., the roof being ornamented also externally with sculptured buds and flowers in great profusion. Upward of fifty massive pillars support the roof internally, and over the grand altar is suspended a casket containing a nail from the true cross, and other relics. On the topmost pinnacle of the cathedral stands, serene and splendid, a glittering, gilded statue of the Madonna, who, with her eighteen feet of stature, towers nobly above her magnificent body-guard of saints, knights, and martyrs.
Faint with the sunny splendors of the king of light,
Nature disrobes, and from her wearied shoulders casts
The oppressive mantle of the burning day;
Flings to the glowing west her regal diadem of fire;
Upon her drooping brow all gladly binds
The calm and holy moon;
And with a zone of stars loops round her languid form
The cool sweet robe of night:
The placid moonbeams, o'er that stately fane,
Pour the rich affluence of their silvery light,
And with a chaste soft lustre, tint
The graceful slender spires,
The marble phalanx of the white-robed saints,
The silent knights, the multitudinous flowers,
The mother of our Lord,
And all the wonders of that wondrous roof!
With hushed and reverent step, through the wide doors I passed!
Passed from the outer splendors to the inner mystic gloom
Of the majestic pile;
Through the emblazoned windows streams the tempered light,
Showing dimly forth the shrines of holy men,
The sacred emblems, and the fifty marvellous pillars,
Dumb stony giants, who, with patient strength,
Bear up the ponderous roof;
Upon the altar steps I bend me down, and, awe-struck, rest.
Suddenly, through the deep stillness
Breathed a solemn sound, as sweet as mournful;
A hand unseen ran o'er the organ's keys,
And o'er the broad, dark air the harmonious waves
Rolled grandly on!
Entranced I heard, and soon the subtle strains
Distilled within my soul a deep oblivion
Of things terrestrial.