The toilettes of the ladies were even more ball-like than on Palm-Sunday; nearly every one wore low-necked dresses and short sleeves, and many white kid gloves. Rose-colored, pale blue, yellow, and white silk robes trimmed with lace and a multitude of bows, and sometimes disfigured by preposterous paniers, were general. The hair was artistically dressed and adorned with flowers, golden fillets, and bright ribbons, and the white or black lace mantilla thrown over the head was as small and transparent as possible.
At a quarter past eight, the bishop arrived with a numerous suite of clergy: as on Sunday, it was with difficulty he made his way through the sitting, kneeling, becrinolined, and betrained crowd that encumbered the centre of the church.
Very shortly after, a flourish of trumpets outside announced the coming of the captain-general. The great door was again thrown open, and he entered, preceded by the mace-bearers, and attended by Señor Don Dionisio Lopez Roberts, superior political governor of Havana, and a brilliant cortége of noblemen, gentlemen, and military and civil chiefs. When all were seated, the scene as viewed from my bench was very striking. The resplendent sepulchre; the illuminated altar, at which the mitred prelate and his assistant priests were officiating, all robed in white and gold; the long row of handsome uniforms on each side of the nave; the gay parterre of fair ladies, and the crowd of spectators of every shade of color from white to black that filled the spaces between the massive pillars and served as a background, all contributed to form a whole most picturesque and unique.
The beautiful service of Maundy-Thursday now commenced; during the celebration of it, the ceremony of blessing the holy oils was performed; and when the Gloria in excelsis was chanted, the bell was rung for the last time until Holy Saturday. At the elevation, I heard the silver staff of the pertiguero resound several times upon the pavement. The pertiguero is, like the perrero, a functionary peculiar to the cathedral; his duty is to enforce kneeling at the elevation on all strangers visiting that church at the moment. He carries a long silver staff, called a pertiga, which he strikes with a clang upon the marble floor when he perceives any one inattentive to the strict rule of the church—prostration in presence of the host.
After the mass, the blessed sacrament was carried in solemn procession to the sepulchre, the captain-general and the governor bearing the banner of the Agnus Dei, and all the grandees and municipality joining in it. The staves and cross-rods of the banner and of the magnificent dais held over the holy sacrament were all of silver, and appeared to be very heavy. The host was deposited in the sepulchre, which was then locked, and the golden key fastened to a chain suspended by the bishop around the neck of the captain-general, to be brought back to the church by him on Good-Friday. The beautiful hymn, Pange lingua, was sung very sweetly the whole time; the Latin, which seems so hard and harsh in our English pronunciation, sounding very grand and harmonious in these Spanish mouths.
The church cleared very rapidly after the mass; and when the last carriage had conveyed its last occupant home, no vehicle of any kind was permitted to pass through the streets of Havana. The soldiers now carried their arms reversed, and all Spanish flags were at half-mast. The city was in mourning.
I was taken possession of by some kind friends as I left the cathedral, and accompanied them to their house close by, where we found a welcome breakfast awaiting us. It consisted of fish and vegetables. We commenced with turtle-soup; but not of the kind so loved by Cockney aldermen, redolent of spiced force-meat balls and luscious green fat; this was an orthodox meagre soup, incapable of doing harm. Then came a nice fried fish called rabi rubio—red tail, and fried lobster, all hot, which, however, I did not like as well as boiled lobster cold with a mayonnaise sauce. To these succeeded shrimp fritters, roast turtle, and a very delicate fish, the pargo, the best in these seas, and sometimes caught as large as a large salmon, which it is not unlike in form. Our vegetables were white rice, eaten with black Mexican beans stewed; yam, yucca, and slices of green plantain fried of a fine gold color, and very delicious. Good bread, excellent claret, and native coffee with an aroma resembling that of the best Mocha, completed this agreeable repast, which had been enlivened by the pleasant conversation of an intelligent, generous-hearted Spaniard, and the smiles and jests of his pretty Cuban wife and children.
Breakfast over, my friend Pepilla and I, with the two eldest girls, Dolores and Luisita, sallied forth into the silent streets to visit some of the churches, previous to attending the ceremony of the Lavatorio—washing of feet—which was to be performed in the cathedral at three o'clock.
The quaint old church of San Juan de Dios was the first we entered. Its floor of hard-beaten earth was encumbered with kneeling worshippers, mostly colored, in earnest prayer before a figure as large as life, representing our blessed Saviour dressed in a dark purple velvet robe, embroidered with gold; his hands tied together with a rope; his head crowned with a gilded crown of thorns. Long black ringlets of shiny hair shaded his emaciated cheeks and fell far down on his shoulders behind.
The high altar, which is a curious work of bad taste, decorated with little carved wooden angels wearing black Hessian boots, was screened by hangings of gold and silver tinsel; and a gilded sepulchre, surrounded by a great number of wax tapers, to be lighted in the evening, was placed in front of it.