Cathedral Cities of Spain Part 9

The Cathedral is a late Gothic pile, built of a warm yellow stone, and looks particularly impressive from the shady walk among the rocks on the left bank of the Clamores, the stream which cuts off Segovia from the southern plateau. It was begun in 1525 by the builder of Salamanca's Cathedral which it greatly resembles, Juan Gil de Hontanon, and continued at his death by his son. The weak point in the exterior, which ma.s.ses very grandly, is the western facade. The interior is very striking. The wide span of the arches, the richness of the admirable vaulting, the splendid late Gothic windows and the feeling of light and s.p.a.ce are fine examples of the last stage of Gothic work, just before the influence of the oncoming Renaissance took hold of the architects of that day. The floor is beautifully laid with red, blue and white diamond-shaped slabs of marble; and the very necessary notice--"No escupir, la religiosidad y higiene la prohibur"--keeps it clean and decent.

In the _coro_, which occupies nearly the whole of the centre of the nave, there is a _retablo_ by Sabatini. The _silleria_ are very fine.

They were rescued from the old Cathedral, which was destroyed in Charles V.'s time by the Comuneros, who started business by pulling down churches, appropriating all they could lay hands on, plundering the wealthy and generally behaving as a mob that has the upper hand always does. The outer walls of the _coro_ are stucco, painted to represent different species of marble; described, by the way, in a reputable guide book--"beautifully coloured marbles"!

Most of the _rejas_ which shut off the side chapels are good gilded iron work. In that of la Piedad there is a good _retablo_ with life-sized figures by Juan de Juni, 1571; and in the chapel of the Segragrio a wooden figure of Christ by Alonso Cano. Through a fine Gothic portal in the Capilla del Cristo del Consuelo I entered the cloisters in company with a verger, who took great pride in his Cathedral. These cloisters are surpa.s.singly beautiful; a very good example of flamboyant Gothic. In vain did I search for a corner from which to make a sketch. The courtyard was overgrown with shrubs, tall cypresses and vines climbing at random shut out everything. The garden itself was a ma.s.s of rubbish and old timber. The well in the centre, overgrown with creepers and weeds; while in the cloisters themselves preparations were afoot for the coming Easter processions, and all available s.p.a.ce taken up by carpenters and painters at work on the Pasos.

In the little dark chapel of Santa Catalina on the west side, is the tiny tomb of the unfortunate Infante Pedro, the three-year-old son of Henry II. The poor little child was dropped by his nurse from a window in the Alcazar, and ended his young life on the rocks below. 'Tis a pitiful object this pathetic tomb, alone, here in this damp spot where daylight only enters when the door is opened.

In the sacristy there is a Custodia in the form of a temple, six feet high, silver and exquisitely chased. The vestments possessed by the clergy are most rarely worked and of great value.

Segovia was once rich in churches. Like the rest of the city, a great many have alas! fallen into decay, and those not in this state are rapidly approaching it. They are mostly small and retain the apse.

Several are cloistered and every one of them is architecturally of great interest. Here again is another charm of this romantic old city, evidence of past glories and ecclesiastical power, the history of Spain written in its stones.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SEGOVIA. PLAZA MAYOR]

San Millan, a Romanesque structure of the twelfth century, is the best preserved church in Segovia. The exquisite arcades on the north and south sides have coupled columns with elaborately carved capitals. Like most of the buildings of this period solidity rather than grace was the effect aimed at by their architects. It possesses a triple apse; the piers supporting the roof are very ma.s.sive, the capitals to the columns are formed of semi-grotesque figures of man and beast. The two doorways are good. In the church of San Martin there is a carved wooden Pa.s.sion.

Four life-sized figures take the place of shafts in the great doorway, and again a cloister forms the exterior of the south and west walls.

In the Dominican convent of Santa Cruz, founded by Ferdinand and Isabella, is still to be seen a sepulchral urn of one of the original companions of St. Dominic. "Tanto monta" the motto of the King and Queen is cut both inside and out on the walls. Over the west portal are good reliefs of the Crucifixion and the Pieta. La Vera Cruz, a church built by the Templars in 1204, is difficult of access. I procured the key after much trouble, and found the twelve-sided nave forming a sort of ambulatory round the central walled-in chamber. It is an imitation of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem. The Templars were suppressed in 1312, so this gem had but a short existence as their house of prayer.

Nestling amidst a grove of acacia trees, hidden away under the rock, is the Santuario de Fuencisla. Built to commemorate the miraculous rescue of Maria del Salto, a beautiful Jewess, this little sanctuary is much affected by pilgrims. The rock which overshadows it is known as La Pena Grajera, or "Crow's Cliff," taking this name from the mult.i.tude of carnivorous birds who always a.s.sembled here for a meal after a victim had been hurled down to expiate his crime in a death below. Maria, accused of adultery, was led to the top and pushed off the edge to find the fate of so many before her. With great presence of mind she called loudly on the Virgin, who hearing, came to her a.s.sistance; and so r.e.t.a.r.ded her downward flight that she alighted gently, escaping unhurt.

Here in days long gone by lived a hermit, whose good life and deeds are still a much-reverenced legend among Segovians.

The monastery of El Parral, once a wealthy and powerful house of the brotherhood of San Geronimo, contains a very good _retablo_ by Diego de Urbina. It was founded by a member of the great Pacheco family, who fought three antagonists one after another and came off successful. He vowed to build a church on the spot where his skill and prowess gave him so splendid a victory, and to endow it as well. It is now a convent of Franciscan nuns.

Next in importance to the Cathedral is the comparatively new building of the Alcazar. Standing high up on the crags, below which the Eresma and Clamores meet, it occupies an unrivalled position. A fine view of this truly Castilian fortress is obtained from the beautiful walk which encircles the city on the further bank of each stream. Above the tall poplars and thick scrub rise its turrets and spires. The ma.s.sive walls go sheer up from the rock on which their foundations rest. The huge embattled tower and drawbridge a.s.sist the feeling of strength; and it only requires the weathering of years, adding broken colour to the somewhat new-looking exterior, to make this a perfect specimen of mediaeval architecture.

The building was originally Moorish, but the many vicissitudes of troublous times saw it in a bad state when Henry IV., "el Impotente,"

repaired and made it his residence. Within its walls Isabella was proclaimed Queen of Castile in 1474. Cabrera, the husband of her greatest friend, Beatrice of Boabdilla, held the fortress and its treasure, and it was mainly through his valour that Isabella succeeded to the throne. During the Comuneros insurrection the Alcazar held out for Charles V. At the quelling of the revolt Charles did all in his power to thoroughly restore the building and furnish it with great splendour. His son Philip added much that the father's death had left unfinished. Our own King, Charles I., was here entertained, and Gil Blas confined a prisoner. The great fire, originated by some of the students of the military college, almost entirely destroyed the whole castle in 1862. The present edifice dates from shortly after that year and is now used as a storehouse for military archives and an academy for artillery officers.

A very good gateway spans the road that leads out past the Santuario de Fuencisla along the right bank of the Eresma. The river here is an ideal looking trout stream, but alas! fish are not as plentiful now as when Charles I. was entertained and fed on "fatte troute" in the Alcazar.

Follow the path over the bridge to the left, it soon narrows into a mere goat track as it skirts the rock; a few steps farther on and the wonderful position of the fortress-castle bursts into view. How fascinating it looked as I saw it one night in the moonlight with the silver beams glinting on its spires. All was very still as I entered the wood of stunted pines beyond. Across the ravine rose the mighty Cathedral silhouetted against a dark star-laden sky. A light here and there shone from a window in the houses beneath. I heard the distant cry of the watchman on his rounds. A faint scent from the heavy dew rose to my nostrils, a scent of mother earth. It was with unwilling steps I crossed the stream and sought my bed that night. Such moments are rare.

On the left bank of the Eresma, almost hidden in the trees, stands a building which once was the mint of Spain. Up till the year 1730 all Spain's money was coined here, the proximity to the impregnable Alcazar, which was used as the Treasury, affording security against untimely raids. The old mint is now a flour mill, but still bears the royal arms over its gateway.

At one time Segovia was the great Castilian mart for wool. The church, and monasteries of El Parral, El Paular, and the Escorial owning immense flocks. These were driven to the pure waters of the Eresma, to be cleansed before being shorn. After the sheep-was.h.i.+ng, the animals were put into the sweating house, and their legs tied together. The shearer then commenced operations, and as each sheep pa.s.sed out of his hands it was branded; the shepherds standing by made a selection of the older animals for the butcher, the remainder being taken away to their mountain pastures. Even now there are many flocks in the country around, particularly on the lower hills near La Granja, where I noticed a large number not at all unlike the Kentish breed of Romney Marsh.

Seven miles from Segovia the summer Royal Palace of La Granja lies in the midst of beautiful woods and clear streams. At the foot of the Sierra, the highest peak of which, La Penalara, raises its crest a few miles off, this elysium is a beautiful spot for those who have earned a holiday from the cares of State. The gardens are most charmingly arranged, and the fountains with a never ending supply of water, better than those at Versailles. Built by Philip V., whose tastes and inclinations were thoroughly French, La Granja has been the scene of important events in the history of the country. The treaty which handed Spain over to France in 1796 was here signed by G.o.doy. In 1832 Ferdinand VII. revoked the decree by which he had abolished the Salic law, and summoned Don Carlos to the palace as heir to the throne, a call which plunged his unhappy country into civil war. Four years later the Queen Regent was compelled within its walls, by the leader of the revolutionary soldiery, to accept the const.i.tution of Cadiz.

Every corner of Spain holds history, but none can compare with Segovia and its surroundings in romance and old-world charm.

SARAGOSSA

Saragossa lies midway on the railway between Madrid and Barcelona, and, having about it a touch of both these, can qualify as one of Spain's progressive cities. The unsightly factory chimney is beginning to sprout up in the suburbs; old and narrow streets are making way for broader and better; and insanitary quarters giving place to modern hygiene.

Aragon is the poorest portion of this fair land, and Saragossa is its capital. In every age this little kingdom has been torn by war and has suffered heavily, but its people have never wavered in their faith, and are still among the most pious and superst.i.tious of the many different races that people the Iberian Peninsula. They possess that strong attachment for their sterile plains and barren mountains so common to those who wring from Nature a bare existence.

The Emperor Augustus, in the year 25 B.C., vastly improved "Salduba,"

and gave it the t.i.tle of Caesarea Augusta. When in the occupation of Rome it was a free city and had a coinage of its own. The first place in Spain to renounce Paganism, Saragossa has always been a city of great holiness. When besieged by the French under Childebert in 540, the inhabitants carried the stole of San Vicente round the walls--and the invader fled.

The Infidel, however, proved less susceptible to a Christian relic, and the city fell to the weight of his arms in the eighth century. Being a Berber Infidel he recognised no Kalif of Cordova, and between the two there soon began one of those internecine conflicts that in the end led to the termination of Moorish rule.

It was in this connection that Charlemagne was implored to a.s.sist the Northern Moor against the Andalusian and crossed the Pyrenees with an eye, no doubt, in the long run, to the acquisition of new territory. No sooner had he reached the plains of Aragon than he was recalled to quell a rising in his own dominions. His back turned, and he being presumably in retreat, the ungrateful people, eager for plunder, followed and inflicted on his rearguard a terrible defeat in the most famous Pyrenean Pa.s.s, the Pa.s.s of Roncesvalles, a disaster in which Roland, that hero of romance, lost his life.

Thence onward, as the centuries went by, Saragossa was the scene of many a fight. Alfonso I. in 1118 recovered it from the Moor after a long siege, and Moslem rule was ended.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SARAGOSSA. LA SEO]

Saragossa is best known in the annals of its warfare for the heroic defence, immortalised by Byron, in the war with France. In the month of May 1808, the invader was close at hand, and the citizens organised themselves for defence. A young aristocrat, Jose Palafox, was chosen as the nominal leader, and had at his right hand the redoubtable peasant, Tio Jorge Ibort--Gaffer George. His two lieutenants were Mariano Cerezo and Tio Marin, while the courageous priest Santiago Sas a.s.sisted greatly, through his influence with the populace, to keep things together and prevent petty squabbles. One hundred _duros_ supplied the sinews of war! Sixteen cannon, a few old muskets and two hundred and twenty fighting men were all that the leaders could count upon to repel the army of Lefebvre.

The siege began in June and was abandoned in August, in consequence of the disaster to Dupont at Bailen. In the following December four Marshals of France, Junot, Lannes, Mortier and Moncey, with eighteen thousand men, invested the city, but it was not until February of the next year that, having driven the defenders out of the Jesuit convent across the river, the French were able to establish a foothold in the outskirts of the city itself.

Every one knows how the Maid of Saragossa took the place of her dead artillery lover who was killed at his gun; an episode that has since become a theme to instil the young with heroic ideals. Such was the spirit that gained for the city the proud t.i.tle of _siempre heroica_.

Her citizens fought from house to house, every street had barricades, and it was only that when decimated by pestilence and famine, with half the place a smoking ruin, one of the most celebrated sieges of history came to end.

As in Cadiz and Salamanca, there are two Cathedrals in Saragossa, La Seo and El Pilar. The former occupies the site of a church which stood here before the Moors took possession of the place and turned it into a mosque. A year after the advent of Alfonso I., Bishop Pedro de Lebrana reconsecrated La Seo, and its walls have witnessed many historical events in the life of Aragon before the kingdom became merged into one with Castile. It was before the High Altar that her Kings were crowned, and at the font many a royal babe baptized.

La Seo is constructed almost entirely of the dull brown brick with which the older part of the city is also built; the interior piers and vaulting alone being of stone. On the north-east wall, which faces the gloomy palace of the archbishop, there is still extant the most elaborate arrangement of brick work, inlaid with coloured glazed tiles, blue, green, red, white and yellow, forming a very harmonious and attractive scheme.

From the centre of the north-west facade, which is extremely ugly, rises a well-proportioned tower arranged in four stages, with Corinthian columns, the top of which is surmounted by a red tiled cupola and spire.

The colour of this took my fancy, it "sang out" so much against the blue of the sky--a contrast I thought worthy of an ill.u.s.tration.

Entering the building by the door in the facade, I was immediately nonplussed as to the orientation of the Cathedral. To add to the puzzle, for the structure is almost square, four rows of columns seemed mixed up in endless confusion, and the dim light admitted from the few windows only accentuated the mystery. Very beautiful, however, is this Gothic interior which runs north-east and south-west, and I soon found a spot from whence to make a sketch. The columns rise from marble bases of a rich crimson; the vaulting above was lost in gloom, the light coming in from the south-west window struck vividly on portions of the Renaissance _respaldos_, the niches of which are filled with saints and archbishops, and the pattern of the marble floor served but to heighten the general effect. In the picture may be seen a tabernacle with twisted black marble columns, this marks the spot where the Virgin suddenly appeared and held converse with Canonigo Fuenes.

Besides the archbishop's throne, the _coro_, which is not particularly interesting, contains a huge reading desk. There is a great deal of alabaster throughout the Cathedral, notably the very fine Gothic _retablo_ of the High Altar by Dalman de Mur, around which are many tombs of the Kings of Aragon. Close by, a black slab marks the place where rests the heart of Don Baltazar Carlos, the son of Philip IV., who was immortalised by the brush of Velasquez, and who died in Saragossa at the early age of seventeen.

Among the chapels, that used as the _segrario_, or parish church, has a magnificent Moorish ceiling, and the fine alabaster tomb of Bernardo de Aragon. The Cathedral is rich in splendid tapestries and ecclesiastical vestments. Among the former is certainly the best I have ever set eyes upon. It is a very early piece and has a wonderful blue sky. In it are woven the Last Supper, Christ bearing the Cross, the Agony in the Garden and the Crucifixion, while in the lower right-hand corner our Saviour is a.s.sisting with a long pole to stir up devils who are roasting in Hades.

Among the vestments is an extremely beautiful chasuble brought here at the time of the Reformation from Old St. Paul's in London. I wondered, when I looked at it, whether Catherine of Aragon, Henry VIII.'s consort, had been instrumental in its removal from England.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SARAGOSSA. IN THE OLD CATHEDRAL]

The Cathedral of El Pilar is thus named as it possesses the identical pillar on which the Virgin descended from Heaven and appeared to St.

James. At first a modest chapel, it has grown by the addition of cloisters and subsidiary chapels to the present stupendous building. The length is close on five hundred feet and the breadth two hundred. The possession of this miraculous pillar has brought untold wealth to the Cathedral. Votive offerings on the anniversary of the festival at the shrine often amount to many thousands of pounds. Jewelry, gems and costly objects of every description are given; these are now sold by auction, the large sum of 20,000 being realised a few years ago. To these sales we owe a fine rock crystal and gold medallion, given to the Virgin of El Pilar by Henry IV. of France, and now in South Kensington Museum. Many examples of old Spanish goldsmith's work have also been acquired for the same collection in this way.

The towers and pinnacles of El Pilar pile up grandly, and are best seen from the fine bridge which spans the yellow flood of the river Ebro.

Silhouetted against the evening sky, with the smooth running waters below, it seemed to me a worthy example in brick and stone of the church's magnificence.

The interior is an immense temple, the frescoes of which are from the brush of that extraordinary genius, Goya, who turned his talent to any job that was productive of the cash he spent so freely. The _retablo_ of the High Altar is a fine piece of work from the alabaster quarries at Escatron. Composed of three good Gothic canopies with tapering finials, it has seven smaller divisions below. Damian Forment was the artist who designed and carried out this, one of the most beautiful _retablos_ in the country. The _reja_ which stands in front of _coro_ is superb, and considered to be Juan Celma's masterpiece. Behind the High Altar is the celebrated chapel of the Virgin. The figure itself is of very old blackened wood, evidently a specimen of early Christian work. On October 12, the anniversary of her descent, thousands of pilgrims flock hither to kiss her foot through a hole in the wall at the back of the chapel.

The city is then full of visitors and it is next to impossible to find quarters or a room of any sort.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SARAGOSSA. EASTER PROCESSION]

I happened to be in Saragossa for _Semana Santa_. and watched the processions of groups of heavy wooden figures, ill.u.s.trative of our Lord's life-history, proceed through crowded streets. My sketch shows the last _paso_ of the Crucifixion, with a figure of the Virgin bringing up the rear, as they pa.s.sed the intensely devout throngs on Good Friday.

Masked members of different religious brother and sisterhoods, walk along keeping the route clear. The whole procession was led by soldiery, and "Romans," men attired in the garb of ancient Rome, while an infantry band followed the Virgin. The _pasos_ are deposited in the Church of Santiago built on the spot where St. James pa.s.sed a night. In the belfry of this church is an old Gothic bell of which the inhabitants are justly proud.