The Bible in Spain Volume I Part 24

On hearing this history I no longer wondered that the receiver-general was eager to save a _cuarto_ in the purchase of the oil for the _gazpacho_ of himself and family of eleven daughters, one son, and a domestic.

We staid one week at Lugo, and then directed our steps to Corunna, about twelve leagues distant. We arose before daybreak in order to avail ourselves of the escort of the general post, in whose company we travelled upwards of six leagues. There was much talk of robbers, and flying parties of the factious, on which account our escort was considerable. At the distance of five or six leagues from Lugo, our guard, in lieu of regular soldiers, consisted of a body of about fifty Miguelets. They had all the appearance of banditti, but a finer body of ferocious fellows I never saw. They were all men in the prime of life, mostly of tall stature, and of Herculean brawn and limbs. They wore huge whiskers, and walked with a fanfaronading air, as if they courted danger, and despised it. In every respect they stood in contrast to the soldiers who had hitherto escorted us, who were mere feeble boys from sixteen to eighteen years of age, and possessed of neither energy nor activity. The proper dress of the Miguelet, if it resembles anything military, is something akin to that anciently used by the English marines. They wear a peculiar kind of hat, and generally leggings, or gaiters, and their arms are the gun and bayonet. The colour of their dress is mostly dark brown. They observe little or no discipline, whether on a march or in the field of action. They are excellent irregular troops, and when on actual service are particularly useful as skirmishers. Their proper duty, however, is to officiate as a species of police, and to clear the roads of robbers, for which duty they are in one respect admirably calculated, having been generally robbers themselves at one period of their lives. Why these people are called Miguelets {363} it is not easy to say, but it is probable that they have derived this appellation from the name of their original leader. I regret that the paucity of my own information will not allow me to enter into farther particulars with respect to this corps, concerning which I have little doubt that many remarkable things might be said.

Becoming weary of the slow travelling of the post, I determined to brave all risk, and to push forward. In this, however, I was guilty of no slight imprudence, as by so doing I was near falling into the hands of robbers. Two fellows suddenly confronted me with presented carbines, which they probably intended to discharge into my body, but they took fright at the noise of Antonio's horse, who was following a little way behind. This affair occurred at the bridge of Castellanos, a spot notorious for robbery and murder, and well adapted for both, for it stands at the bottom of a deep dell surrounded by wild desolate hills.

Only a quarter of an hour previous, I had pa.s.sed three ghastly heads stuck on poles standing by the way-side; they were those of a captain of banditti and two of his accomplices, who had been seized and executed about two months before. Their princ.i.p.al haunt was the vicinity of the bridge, and it was their practice to cast the bodies of the murdered into the deep black water which runs rapidly beneath. Those three heads will always live in my remembrance, particularly that of the captain, which stood on a higher pole than the other two: the long hair was waving in the wind, and the blackened, distorted features were grinning in the sun.

The fellows whom I met were the relics of the band.

We arrived at Betanzos late in the afternoon. This town stands on a creek at some distance from the sea, and about three leagues from Corunna. It is surrounded on three sides by lofty hills. The weather during the greater part of the day had been dull and lowering, and we found the atmosphere of Betanzos insupportably close and heavy. Sour and disagreeable odours a.s.sailed our olfactory organs from all sides. The streets were filthy-so were the houses, and especially the _posada_. We entered the stable; it was strewed with rotten seaweeds and other rubbish, in which pigs were wallowing; huge and loathsome flies were buzzing around. "What a pest-house!" I exclaimed. But we could find no other stable, and were therefore obliged to tether the unhappy animals to the filthy mangers. The only provender that could be obtained was Indian corn. At nightfall I led them to drink at a small river which pa.s.ses through Betanzos. My _entero_ swallowed the water greedily; but as we returned towards the inn, I observed that he was sad, and that his head drooped. He had scarcely reached the stall, when a deep hoa.r.s.e cough a.s.sailed him. I remembered the words of the ostler in the mountains.

"The man must be mad who brings a horse to Galicia, and doubly so he who brings an _entero_." During the greater part of the day the animal had been much heated, walking amidst a throng of at least a hundred pony mares. He now began to shiver violently. I procured a quart of anise {365} brandy, with which, a.s.sisted by Antonio, I rubbed his body for nearly an hour, till his coat was covered with a white foam; but his cough increased perceptibly, his eyes were becoming fixed, and his members rigid. "There is no remedy but bleeding," said I. "Run for a farrier." The farrier came. "You must bleed the horse," I shouted; "take from him an _azumbre_ of blood." The farrier looked at the animal, and made for the door. "Where are you going?" I demanded. "Home," he replied. "But we want you here." "I know you do," was his answer; "and on that account I am going." "But you must bleed the horse, or he will die." "I know he will," said the farrier, "but I will not bleed him."

"Why?" I demanded. "I will not bleed him but under one condition."

"What is that?" "What is it!-that you pay me an ounce of gold." {366a} "Run upstairs for the red morocco case," said I to Antonio. The case was brought; I took out a large fleam, and with the a.s.sistance of a stone, drove it into the princ.i.p.al artery of the horse's leg. The blood at first refused to flow; at last, with much rubbing, it began to trickle, and then to stream; it continued so for half an hour. "The horse is fainting, _mon maitre_," said Antonio. "Hold him up," said I, "and in another ten minutes we will stop the vein."

I closed the vein, and whilst doing so I looked up into the farrier's face, arching my eyebrows.

"_Carracho_! {366b} what an evil wizard!" {366c} muttered the farrier as he walked away. "If I had my knife here I would stick him." We bled the horse again during the night, which second bleeding I believe saved him.

Towards morning he began to eat his food.

The next day we departed for Corunna, leading our horses by the bridle.

The day was magnificent, and our walk delightful. We pa.s.sed along beneath tall umbrageous trees, which skirted the road from Betanzos to within a short distance of Corunna. Nothing could be more smiling and cheerful than the appearance of the country around. Vines were growing in abundance in the vicinity of the villages through which we pa.s.sed, whilst millions of maize plants upreared their tall stalks and displayed their broad green leaves in the fields. After walking about three hours, we obtained a view of the Bay of Corunna, in which, even at the distance of a league, we could distinguish three or four immense ships riding at anchor. "Can these vessels belong to Spain?" I demanded of myself. In the very next village, however, we were informed that the preceding evening an English squadron had arrived, for what reason n.o.body could say. "However," continued our informant, "they have doubtless some design upon Galicia. These foreigners are the ruin of Spain."

We put up in what is called the Calle Real, in an excellent _fonda_, or _posada_, kept by a short, thick, comical-looking person, a Genoese by birth. He was married to a tall, ugly, but good-tempered Basque woman, by whom he had been blessed with a son and daughter. His wife, however, had it seems of late summoned all her female relations from Guipuzcoa, who now filled the house to the number of nine, officiating as chambermaids, cooks, and scullions: they were all very ugly, but good natured, and of immense volubility of tongue. Throughout the whole day the house resounded with their excellent Basque and very bad Castilian.

The Genoese, on the contrary, spoke little, for which he might have a.s.signed a good reason: he had lived thirty years in Spain, and had forgotten his own language without acquiring Spanish, which he spoke very imperfectly.

We found Corunna full of bustle and life, owing to the arrival of the English squadron. On the following day, however, it departed, being bound for the Mediterranean on a short cruise, whereupon matters instantly returned to their usual course.

I had a depot of five hundred Testaments at Corunna, from which it was my intention to supply the princ.i.p.al towns of Galicia. Immediately on my arrival I published advertis.e.m.e.nts, according to my usual practice, and the book obtained a tolerable sale-seven or eight copies per day on the average. Some people, perhaps, on perusing these details, will be tempted to exclaim, "These are small matters, and scarcely worthy of being mentioned." But let such bethink them that till within a few months previous to the time of which I am speaking, the very existence of the Gospel was almost unknown in Spain, that it must necessarily be a difficult task to induce a people like the Spaniards, who read very little, to purchase a work like the New Testament, which, though of paramount importance to the soul, affords but slight prospect of amus.e.m.e.nt to the frivolous and carnally-minded. I hoped that the present was the dawning of better and more enlightened times, and rejoiced in the idea that Testaments, though few in number, were being sold in unfortunate benighted Spain, from Madrid to the furthermost parts of Galicia, a distance of nearly four hundred miles.

Corunna stands on a peninsula, having on one side the sea, and on the other the celebrated bay, generally called the Groyne. {368} It is divided into the old and new town, the latter of which was at one time probably a mere suburb. The old town is a desolate ruinous place, separated from the new by a wide moat. The modern town is a much more agreeable spot, and contains one magnificent street, the Calle Real, where the princ.i.p.al merchants reside. One singular feature of this street is, that it is laid entirely with flags of marble, along which troop ponies and cars as if it were a common pavement.

It is a saying amongst the inhabitants of Corunna, that in their town there is a street so clean that _puchera_ {369a} may be eaten off it without the slightest inconvenience. This may certainly be the fact after one of those rains which so frequently drench Galicia, when the appearance of the pavement of the street is particularly brilliant.

Corunna was at one time a place of considerable commerce, the greater part of which has lately departed to Santander, a town which stands a considerable distance down the Bay of Biscay.

"Are you going to St. James, {369b} _Giorgio_? If so, you will perhaps convey a message to my poor countryman," said a voice to me one morning in broken English, as I was standing at the door of my _posada_, in the royal street of Corunna.

I looked round and perceived a man standing near me at the door of a shop contiguous to the inn. He appeared to be about sixty-five, with a pale face and remarkably red nose. He was dressed in a loose green great-coat, in his mouth was a long clay pipe, in his hand a long painted stick.

"Who are you, and who is your countryman?" I demanded. "I do not know you."

"I know you, however," replied the man; "you purchased the first knife that I ever sold in the market-place of N---." {370a}

_Myself_.-Ah, I remember you now, Luigi Piozzi {370b}; and well do I remember also how, when a boy, twenty years ago, I used to repair to your stall, and listen to you and your countrymen discoursing in Milanese.

_Luigi_.-Ah, those were happy times to me. Oh, how they rushed back on my remembrance when I saw you ride up to the door of the _posada_! I instantly went in, closed my shop, lay down upon my bed and wept.

_Myself_.-I see no reason why you should so much regret those times. I knew you formerly in England as an itinerant pedlar, and occasionally as master of a stall in the market-place of a country town. I now find you in a seaport of Spain, the proprietor, seemingly, of a considerable shop.

I cannot see why you should regret the difference.

_Luigi_ (dashing his pipe on the ground).-Regret the difference! Do you know one thing? England is the heaven of the Piedmontese and Milanese, and especially those of Como. We never lie down to rest but we dream of it, whether we are in our own country or in a foreign land, as I am now.

Regret the difference, _Giorgio_! Do I hear such words from your lips, and you an Englishman? I would rather be the poorest tramper on the roads of England, than lord of all within ten leagues of the sh.o.r.e of the lake of Como, and much the same say all my countrymen who have visited England, wherever they now be. Regret the difference! I have ten letters from as many countrymen in America, who say they are rich and thriving, and princ.i.p.al men and merchants; but every night, when their heads are reposing on their pillows, their souls _auslandra_, hurrying away to England, and its green lanes and farmyards. And there they are with their boxes on the ground, displaying their looking-gla.s.ses and other goods to the hones, rustics and their dames and their daughters, and selling away and chaffering and laughing just as of old. And there they are again at nightfall in the hedge alehouses, eating their toasted cheese and their bread, and drinking the Suffolk ale, and listening to the roaring song and merry jests of the labourers. Now, if they regret England so who are in America, which they own to be a happy country, and good for those of Piedmont and of Como, how much more must I regret it, when, after the lapse of so many years, I find myself in Spain, in this frightful town of Corunna, driving a ruinous trade, and where months pa.s.s by without my seeing a single English face, or hearing a word of the blessed English tongue!

_Myself_.-With such a predilection for England, what could have induced you to leave it and come to Spain?

_Luigi_.-I will tell you. About sixteen years ago a universal desire seized our people in England to become something more than they had hitherto been, pedlars and trampers; they wished, moreover-for mankind are never satisfied-to see other countries: so the greater part forsook England. Where formerly there had been ten, at present scarcely lingers one. Almost all went to America, which, as I told you before, is a happy country, and specially good for us men of Como. Well, all my comrades and relations pa.s.sed over the sea to the West. I too was bent on travelling, but whither? Instead of going towards the West with the rest, to a country where they have all thriven, I must needs come by myself to this land of Spain; a country in which no foreigner settles without dying of a broken heart sooner or later. I had an idea in my head that I could make a fortune at once, by bringing a cargo of common English goods, like those which I had been in the habit of selling amongst the villagers of England. So I freighted half a ship with such goods, for I had been successful in England in my little speculations, and I arrived at Corunna. Here at once my vexations began: disappointment followed disappointment. It was with the utmost difficulty that I could obtain permission to land my goods, and this only at a considerable sacrifice in bribes and the like; and when I had established myself here, I found that the place was one of no trade, and that my goods went off very slowly, and scarcely at prime cost. I wished to remove to another place, but was informed that, in that case, I must leave my goods behind, unless I offered fresh bribes, which would have ruined me; and in this way I have gone on for fourteen years, selling scarcely enough to pay for my shop and to support myself. And so I shall doubtless continue till I die, or my goods are exhausted. In an evil day I left England and came to Spain.

_Myself_.-Did you not say that you had a countryman at St. James?

_Luigi_.-Yes, a poor honest fellow who, like myself, by some strange chance found his way to Galicia. I sometimes contrive to send him a few goods, which he sells at St. James at a greater profit than I can here.

He is a happy fellow, for he has never been in England, and knows not the difference between the two countries. Oh, the green English hedgerows!

and the alehouses! and, what is much more, the fair dealing and security.

I have travelled all over England and never met with ill usage, except once down in the north amongst the Papists, upon my telling them to leave all their mummeries and go to the parish church as I did, and as all my countrymen in England did; for know one thing, _Signor Giorgio_, not one of us who have lived in England, whether Piedmontese or men of Como, but wished well to the Protestant religion, if he had not actually become a member of it.

_Myself_.-What do you propose to do at present, Luigi? What are your prospects?

_Luigi_.-My prospects are a blank, _Giorgio_; my prospects are a blank.

I propose nothing but to die in Corunna, perhaps in the hospital, if they will admit me. Years ago I thought of fleeing, even if I left all behind me, and either returning to England, or betaking myself to America; but it is too late now, _Giorgio_, it is too late. When I first lost all hope I took to drinking, to which I was never before inclined, and I am now what I suppose you see.

"There is hope in the Gospel," said I, "even for you. I will send you one."

There is a small battery of the old town which fronts the east, and whose wall is washed by the waters of the bay. It is a sweet spot, and the prospect which opens from it is extensive. The battery itself may be about eighty yards square; some young trees are springing up about it, and it is rather a favourite resort of the people of Corunna.

In the centre of this battery stands the tomb of Moore, built by the chivalrous French, in commemoration of the fall of their heroic antagonist. It is oblong, and surmounted by a slab, and on either side bears one of the simple and sublime epitaphs for which our rivals are celebrated, and which stand in such powerful contrast with the bloated and bombastic inscriptions which deform the walls of Westminster Abbey:-

"JOHN MOORE, LEADER OF THE ENGLISH ARMIES, SLAIN IN BATTLE, 1809."

The tomb itself is of marble, and around it is a quadrangular wall, breast-high, of rough Gallegan granite; close to each corner rises from the earth the breech of an immense bra.s.s cannon, intended to keep the wall compact and close. These outer erections are, however, not the work of the French, but of the English government.

Yes, there lies the hero, almost within sight of the glorious hill where he turned upon his pursuers like a lion at bay and terminated his career.

Many acquire immortality without seeking it, and die before its first ray has gilded their name; of these was Moore. The hara.s.sed general, flying through Castile with his dispirited troops before a fierce and terrible enemy, little dreamed that he was on the point of attaining that for which many a better, greater, though certainly not braver man, had sighed in vain. His very misfortunes were the means which secured him immortal fame; his disastrous route, b.l.o.o.d.y death, and finally his tomb on a foreign strand, far from kin and friends. There is scarcely a Spaniard but has heard of this tomb, and speaks of it with a strange kind of awe.

Immense treasures are said to have been buried with the heretic general, though for what purpose no one pretends to guess. The demons of the clouds, if we may trust the Gallegans, followed the English in their flight, and a.s.sailed them with water-spouts as they toiled up the steep winding paths of Fuencebadon, whilst legends the most wild are related of the manner in which the stout soldier fell. Yes, even in Spain, immortality has already crowned the head of Moore;-Spain, the land of oblivion, where the Guadalete, the ancient Lethe, {375} flows.

CHAPTER XXVII.

Compostella-Rey Romero-The Treasure-seeker-Hopeful Project-The Church of Refuge-Hidden Riches-The Canon-Spirit of Localism-The Leper-Bones of Saint James.

At the commencement of August I found myself at Saint James of Compostella. To this place I travelled from Corunna with the courier or weekly post, who was escorted by a strong party of soldiers, in consequence of the distracted state of the country, which was overrun with banditti. From Corunna to Saint James the distance is but ten leagues; the journey, however, endured for a day and a half. It was a pleasant one, through a most beautiful country, with a rich variety of hill and dale; the road was in many places shaded with various kinds of trees clad in most luxuriant foliage. Hundreds of travellers, both on foot and on horseback, availed themselves of the security which the escort afforded: the dread of banditti was strong. During the journey two or three alarms were given; we, however, reached Saint James without having been attacked.

Saint James stands on a pleasant level amidst mountains: the most extraordinary of these is a conical hill, called the Pico Sacro, or Sacred Peak, connected with which are many wonderful legends. A beautiful old town is Saint James, containing about twenty thousand inhabitants. Time has been when, with the single exception of Rome, it was the most celebrated resort of pilgrims in the world; its cathedral being said to contain the bones of Saint James the elder, the child of the thunder, {378} who, according to the legend of the Romish church, first preached the Gospel in Spain. Its glory, however, as a place of pilgrimage, is rapidly pa.s.sing away.

The cathedral, though a work of various periods, and exhibiting various styles of architecture, is a majestic venerable pile, in every respect calculated to excite awe and admiration; indeed, it is almost impossible to walk its long dusk aisles, and hear the solemn music and the n.o.ble chanting, and inhale the incense of the mighty censers, which are at times swung so high by machinery as to smite the vaulted roof, whilst gigantic tapers glitter here and there amongst the gloom, from the shrine of many a saint, before which the worshippers are kneeling, breathing forth their prayers and pet.i.tions for help, love, and mercy, and entertain a doubt that we are treading the floor of a house where G.o.d delighteth to dwell. Yet the Lord is distant from that house; He hears not, He sees not, or if He do, it is with anger. What availeth that solemn music, that n.o.ble chanting, that incense of sweet savour? What availeth kneeling before that grand altar of silver, surmounted by that figure with its silver hat and breast-plate, the emblem of one who, though an apostle and confessor, was at best an unprofitable servant?

What availeth hoping for remission of sin by trusting in the merits of one who possessed none, or by paying homage to others who were born and nurtured in sin, and who alone, by the exercise of a lively faith granted from above, could hope to preserve themselves from the wrath of the Almighty?

Rise from your knees, ye children of Compostella, or, if ye bend, let it be to the Almighty alone, and no longer on the eve of your patron's day address him in the following strain, however sublime it may sound:-

"Thou shield of that faith which in Spain we revere, Thou scourge of each foeman who dares to draw near; Whom the Son of that G.o.d who the elements tames, Called child of the thunder, immortal Saint James!