Part 26

[5] The blood of the Cid flows to-day in the veins of Alfonso XIII through his descent both from the French Bourbons and from Spain's earlier royal house. A daughter of the Campeador married an infante of Navarre, whose granddaughter married Sancho III of Castile. The son of this king was the good and great Alfonso VIII _él de las Navas_, who, married to Eleanor of England (they both lie buried in Las Huelgas), was grandfather alike of St. Ferdinand III of Castile and St. Louis IX of France.

[6] Translated by Ormsby.

[7] "Ancient Spanish Ballads," translated by Lockhart.

[8] Llorente, a bitter assailant of the Inquisition, gives the number of victims as 31,900. Llorente was traitor to his country during the invasion of the French and fled ignominiously on their defeat, pensioned during his later years by the freemasons of Paris; he falsified Basque history to win the corrupt Godoy's favour (von Ranke's statement); an ex-priest he assisted in church robbery. Would Benedict Arnold be accepted as an authority on the American Revolution? The Encyclopedia Brittanica, even in its ninth edition, has in its sketch on Spain, the following curious assertion--"bigotry and fanaticism which led to the destruction of hundreds of thousands of victims at the hands of the Inquisition." Even the political victims in the Netherlands under the inexorable Alba, who did to death some 18,000 people, cannot swell the number to a fraction of this statement. And if the Netherlands' victims are to be laid to the door of religious persecution, then must the massacres in Ireland of the inexorable Cromwell come under the same heading: as an Englishman judges Cromwell apart from his crimes, so a Spaniard sees more in Alva than his felonies. History presented to us in parallel columns would do much toward giving us fairer views.

[9] Described by an eyewitness, the brave gentlewoman, Mrs. Willoughby. See: "English Martyrs," Vol. I and II of the C. T. S. Publications: 22 Paternoster Row: London. Dr. Thomas Addis Emmet in "Ireland under English Rule" (Putnam's Sons, N. Y. 1903) gives occurrences equally terrible.

[10] I do not mention in this list Archbishop Cranmer and his fellow prelates, Latimer and Ridley, since having been persecutors themselves they may be said to have reaped under Mary Tudor what they had sowed under Edward VI. They were condemned and executed by the laws which they had made and put in force against Unitarians and Anabaptists.

[11] H. C. Lea, whose ill-digested mass of facts torn from their proper context are as representative of Spain as the accounts of a foreigner who had studied only the police reports of America, would be of us.

[12] "L'Inquisition fût, d'abord, plus politique que religieuse, et destinée à maintenir l'Ordre plutôt qu'à défendre la foi," says the Protestant historian Guizot (Hist. Mod. Lect. II).

[13] Every Spanish child knows the story of Guzmán _el bueno_ at Tarifa. The rebel infante threatened to kill Guzmán's son, were the city not surrendered, whereupon the hero flung his own knife down from the walls; rather the death of him he loved best than disloyalty to his trust and king. The boy was killed under his father's eyes.

When the tomb of this national hero was opened in 1570, the skeleton discovered was nine feet long, just as Jaime I _el Conquistador_, a contemporary of Guzmán, was found to be of gigantic proportions when the pantheon of the Aragonese kings in Poblet was sacked in 1835.

[14] "León Cathedral is indeed in almost every respect worthy to be ranked among the noblest churches in Europe. Its detail is rich and beautiful throughout, the plan very excellent, the sculptures with which it is adorned quite equal in quality and character to that of any church of the age, and the stained glass with which its windows are filled some of the best in Europe."

G. E. STREET: "Gothic Architecture in Spain."

[15] "Libro del Paso Honroso" written by an eye witness, Pero Rodríguez de Lena. Prescott says that no country has been more fruitful in the field of historical composition than Spain. The chronicles date from the twelfth century, every great family, every town and every city had its chronicler. Compare the minute details we have of Cortés in Mexico about 1517, with the meager accounts we find of the North American settlers some generations later.

[16] It is amusing to find Napier, whose "History of the Peninsula War" is one of the most one-sided of chronicles, laying down the law in this fashion: "The English are a people very subject to receive and to cherish false impressions, proud of their credulity, as if it were a virtue, the majority will adopt any fallacy, and cling to it with a tenacity proportioned to its grossness."

[17] Frequently in Spain one comes on Irish names among the leading families. The O'Donnells, Dukes of Tetuán, have had several generations of distinguished men. In the 18th century Count Alexander O'Reilly led the Spanish armies in the New World and the Old, and when Governor of Andalusia, he so reformed economic conditions in Cadiz that a beggar was unknown on the streets. He too was followed by an able son. Reading Spanish books the traces of Irish exiles are many: thus a Doña Lucía Fitzgerald organized and drilled a woman's regiment during the siege of Gerona in 1808; and the beautiful wife of the poet Campoamor was a Doña Guillermina O'Gorman.

"We're all over Austria, France, and Spain, Said Kelly, and Burke, and Shea."

[18] "L'un des signes distinctifs des mystiques c'est justement l'équilibre absolu, l'entier bon sens." J.-K. Huysmans: "_En Route_."

[19] "La Mystique est une science absolument exacte. Elle peut annoncer d'avance la plupart des phénomènes qui se produisent dans une âme que le Seigneur destine à la vie parfaite; elle suit aussi nettement les opérations spirituelles que la physiologie observe les états différents du corps. De siècles en siècles, elle a divulgué la marche de la Grâce et ses effets tantôt impétueux et tantôt lents; elle a même précisé les modifications des organes matériels qui se transforment quand l'âme tout entière se fond en Dieu. Saint Denys l'Aréopagite, saint Bonaventure, Hugues et Richard de Saint Victor, saint Thomas d'Aquin, saint Bernard, Ruysbroeck, Angèle de Foligno, les deux Eckhart, Tauler, Suso, Denys le chartreux, sainte Hildegarde, sainte Catherine de Gênes, sainte Catherine de Sienne, sainte Madeleine de Pazzi, sainte Gertrude, d'autres encore ont magistralement exposé les principes et les théories de la Mystique." J.-K. Huysmans: "_En Route_."

[20] It has been said that there never was a spiritually minded man, who, knowing Saint Teresa's works, was not devoted to them. In his "Journal Intime," that most distinguished prelate of modern France, Mgr. Dupanloup, wrote: "La vie de Sainte Térèse m'y a charmé.... J'ai rarement reçu, dans ma vie, une bénédiction, une impression de grâce plus simple et plus profonde."

[21] "Just as the Church of Rome has absorbed Platonism in the doctrine of the Logos and of the Trinity, and has absorbed Aristotelianism in the doctrine of Christ's real presence in the Eucharist, so we may naturally expect that in its doctrine of its own nature, it will some day absorb formally, having long done so informally, the main ideas of that evolutionary philosophy, which many people regard as destined to complete its downfall; and that it will find in this philosophy--in the philosophy of the Darwins, the Spencers, and the Huxleys--a scientific explanation of its own teaching authority, like that which is found in Aristotle for its doctrine of Transubstantiation.... It may be said that the Roman Church itself developed without being conscious of its own scientific character, just as men were for ages unconscious of the circulation of their own blood.... Like an animal seeking nutriment it put forth its feelers or tentacles on all sides, seizing, tasting, and testing all forms of human thought, all human opinions, and all alleged discoveries. It absorbs some of these into itself, and extracts their nutritive principles; it immediately rejects some as poisonous or indigestible; and gradually expels from its system others, condemned as heresies, which it has accidentally or experimentally swallowed." W. H. Mallock: "Doctrine and Doctrinal Disruption." 1900.

[22] Moro made a replica of this portrait (or perhaps the Prado picture is the replica) which Mary gave to her Master of Horse. It now fortunately is in America, in Mrs. J. L. Gardner's notable collection in _Fenway Court_, Boston. It is hard to recognize in the Mary of the Flemish Master the queen of whom Motley wrote in his "Dutch Republic": "tyrant, bigot, and murderess ... small, lean and sickly, painfully nearsighted yet with an eye of fierceness and fire, her face wrinkled by lines of care and evil passions."

[23] "Io cristiano viejo soy, y para ser Conde esto me basta"--old Spanish proverb, quoted by Sancho Panza. Proverbs, which Cervantes called "short sentences drawn from long experience," often show the qualities of a race. In many of the popular sayings of Castile is found the strong feeling of manhood's equality:

"Cuando Dios amanece, para todos amanece."

"Mientras que duermen todos son iguales."

"No ocupo más pies de tierra el cuerpo del Papa que el del sacristan."

[24] See the frontispiece: Portrait of an Hidalgo, by El Greco.

[25] "Nunca la lanza embotó la pluma, ni la pluma la lanza,"--old Spanish proverb.

[26] "The Hound of Heaven": Francis Thompson.

[27] "Donde hay música, no puede haber cosa mala."--Spanish proverb.

[28] "Spain is one of the few countries in Europe where poverty is not treated with contempt, and I may add, where the wealthy are not blindly idolized."--George Borrow: "The Bible in Spain."

[29] Our Lady of Victory is the patroness of the _cigarreras_.

[30] "O trois fois saints chanoines! dormez doucement sous votre dalle, â l'ombre de votre cathédrale chérie, tandis que votre âme se prelasse au paradis dans une stalle probablement moins bien sculptée que celle de votre ch[oe]ur!"

THÉOPHILE GAUTIER: "Voyage en Espagne."

[31] "One of the commonest types among the Greek figurines, certainly representing the average Greek lady, might be supposed to represent a Spanish lady, so closely does the face, the dress, the mantilla-like covering of the head, the erect and dignified carriage, recall modern Spain."

"The Soul of Spain."--HAVELOCK-ELLIS.

[32] The same trait is shown in the astonishingly fecund theater of Spain, where is found for one golden century the indelible mark of the race. First came Lope de Vega with his dashing picaresque comedies _de capa y espada_, that more induce to laughter than to vice, the vigorous and supple Lope, whom all nations have "found good to steal from." Then followed the powerful Tirso de Molina, a dramatist of vision and passion, and Ruiz de Alacón with his high ethical aim and equal execution, and finally Calderón, who in the midst of his plays shows himself an exquisite lyric poet. In Seville we used to see what would here be a dime-museum crowd pouring into an hour's bit of frolic, such as Benevente's "Intereses Creados," of the true cape-and-sword type. Those plays which we personally saw proved to us Valera's words, that erotic literature rises in sadness and pessimism, not in the hearty bravura and zest of life of the Spanish theater.

[33] "Es menester mucho tiempo para venir á conocer las personas," is one of Sancho Panza's wise saws.

[34] See "L'Espagne Littéraire" by Boris de Tannenberg (Paris, 1903).

[35] "Surely chivalry is not dead!" exclaimed Lieut. R. P. Hobson when describing the courteous treatment he, as prisoner, had received from the Spanish officers: "The history of warfare probably contains no instance of chivalry on the part of captors greater than that of those who fired on the 'Merrimac.'" The gallant American's account of his feat in Santiago harbor proves that Spínola's spirit survives on both sides of the Atlantic.

[36] "In Gerona Cathedral there was a cat who would stroll about in front of the _capilla mayor_ during the progress of Mass, receiving the caresses of the passers-by. It would be a serious mistake to see here any indifference to religion, on the contrary, this easy familiarity with sacred things is simply the attitude of those who in Wordsworth's phrase, "lie in Abraham's bosom all the year," and do not, as often among ourselves, enter a church once a week to prove how severely respectable, for the example of others, we can show ourselves."

"The Soul of Spain"--HAVELOCK ELLIS (1908).

[37] An idea of Spain's romance of soul can be gathered from the rules and regulations of her national police, the Civil Guard, who may be called the descendants of Isabella's _Santa Hermandad_.

"1. Honour must be the chief motive for the Civil Guard, to be preserved intact and without a flaw. Once gone, honour can never be regained.

" ... 3. The force must be an example to the country of neatness, order, bearing, good morals and spotless honour....

"8. The Civil Guard ought to be regarded as the protector of the afflicted, inspiring confidence when seen approaching.... For the Civil Guard must freely give his life for the good of any sufferer.

" ... 9. Whenever a member of the Civil Guard has the good fortune to render a service to anyone, he must never accept, if offered, a reward, bearing in mind that he has done nothing but his simple duty.

" ... 27. The Civil Guard will refrain with the greatest scrupulousness from drawing near to listen to any knot of people in street, shop, or private house, for this would be an act of espionage, altogether outside the office and beneath the dignity of any member of the force."

That such rules have molded her exemplary constabulary, no one will deny who has traveled much in Spain. They are loved and respected by the people; witness this popular song:

"Atenta á la vida humana Siempre la Guardia Civil ... Y por eso en todas partes Benediciones la acompañan, Por eso Dios la protege Cuando al peligro se lanza, Por eso la canto yo Con el corazón y el alma: Viva la Guardia Civil Porque es la gloria de España!"

[38] This most beautiful church, dating before the Crusades, one of the most ancient, with the Asturian churches, Santa María de Naranco and San Miguel de Lino, in all the Peninsula, was totally destroyed by the socialist mob, in the riots of July, 1909.

[39] "El principio de la salud está en conocer la enfermedad."--Old Spanish proverb.

End of Project Gutenberg's Heroic Spain, by Elizabeth Boyle O'Reilly