CHAPTER VII

THE KINGDOM OF MURCIA

The province of Murcia resembles the home of the Arab race more closely than does any other part of Europe. It is a wild, fierce region, hot and tawny like a lion's hide, furrowed by deep winding ravines, intersected by serrated mountains, on whose flanks, for the heat of the sun, no green thing can grow. Much of the land is occupied by plateaux, bare and rocky like great altars on which all that lives is offered to and consumed by the sun. From these uplands you survey vast expanses of sheer desert--fulvid, rocky, and scorching. Your gaze may travel far before you descry any fitting resting-place for man. The mountains afford no shade, even in the deepest cañons the streams are often traceable only by a narrow path of sand and pebbles, yet here and there has man successfully wrested from harsh Nature a secure foothold, an oasis kept ever green by some more constant rivulet. The waters of the Segura and the Sangonera are the life-blood of the province. Wayward and Arethusa-like, the rivers have with infinite pains been coaxed into conformity with the needs of man. To the science of irrigation the province owes its existence. Water here is above all things prized and sold like treasure to the highest bidder. Mr. Jean Brunhés in a lately published work gives some most curious and interesting particulars relating to the system of irrigation in force in Murcia and the adjoining province of Alicante. The volume of the Monegre is divided into old water and new water, the former belonging of right to the ancient riparian proprietors, the latter to the owners of the locks and reservoirs. A very vicious system prevails at Lorca. There a private company is the owner of all the water of the Guadalentin, subject to the condition of supplying the old proprietors of the adjoining lands with 500 litres per second every day. In consequence, in times of drought the company is mistress of the situation and can force up prices to a figure absolutely ruinous to the cultivators. Only in this way can it make good the losses incurred in rainy seasons. The precious fluid being sold, too, by public auction, the rich farmer is in a position to deprive his poorer rivals of their means of subsistence. To palliate this evil to some extent, the rule now obtains that the bidder who has bought the first lot can buy as many of the lots following as he may desire at the same figure. The price therefore is not forced up too rapidly. Moreover, if the company's barrage at a certain point is swept away or broken through by the current, the water which thus escapes becomes public property. This accident occurs five or six times a year, and the company is not allowed to make the barrage any stronger when it is rebuilt. Notwithstanding these concessions, it seems that the principle of private enterprise has been pushed too far in this part of the world.

Mr. Brunhés described the sale of water at Lorca in the following words:

"The sale takes place in a badly-lit hall with naked walls, on a level with the street, with which it communicates by an immense door almost its own breadth. This door remains open during the sale and the crowd of bidders stand partly in the street. The hall has no floor--you stand on the bare ground. Opposite the door at the end of the hall is a railed-off dais entered by a side door, and without any direct communication with the public side. On the dais the secretaries are seated at a large table covered by a threadbare green cloth. Behind the table are five arm-chairs. In one is seated the presiding officer (a civil engineer who must own no land in the 'Vega'). On a stool is stationed the crier.

"At eight o'clock in the morning, at a sign from the presiding officer, the crier pronounces these words in a singing monotonous voice and without any pause between the two phrases: 'In honour of the Holy Sacrament of the altar, who buys the first lot of Sotellana?' Immediately shouts go up 'Eight, nine, ten reals!' One voice overpowers the other, wide-open mouths vociferate loudly, necks are strained, muscles grow tense with excitement. The bidders press and crush each other against the iron railing, for the one nearest has the best chance of being heard. The presiding officer listens, and follows the frantic shouting with sovereign calm. Suddenly, with a quick gesture, he designates the highest bidder. At once the clamour ceases. Amid absolute silence the man indicated calls out his name, which the clerks write down.

"The men are hatless. Some wear black or dark-coloured handkerchiefs bound round their heads, but all hold their broad-brimmed hats in their hands. No one smokes or talks till the bidding recommences, and even those in the street are silent and bare-headed. It is easy to see that all are peasants. Heads are closely cropped; here are no beards or moustaches, no one wears a collar, and most carry a cloak other than the aristocratic 'Capa' on the shoulders or arm. It is a curious and impressive sight enough, these bronzed physiognomies animated by one desire to obtain possession as cheaply as may be of the supreme good, water."

Before the industry of man had harnessed the wayward streams this hot land must have been little better than an arid wilderness, yet it has been inhabited from the remotest times, and its possession was keenly contested between the great powers of antiquity. The natives were known to the ancients as the Mastiani, and are credited with the virtues which were so long supposed to have been characteristic of primitive man. This simple, blameless race fell an easy victim to the wily Phœnicians, who scented the precious metals within these barren hills. Elche, Guadix, and Jijona betray in their etymology a Semitic origin. Next came the Greek Vikings from Samos and Rhodes and Phokaia, establishing themselves at many points along the eastern shore of the Iberian land. The rivalry between the Phœnician and Hellenic colonies precipitated a contest between their respective allies, the Carthaginians and the Romans. Hasdrubal founded the port of New Carthage, the name of which is still preserved in Cartagena, whence, with a host of 90,000 foot and 12,000 horse, Hannibal started on his famous march to Rome. The fall of the city, which was bravely defended by Mago against Scipio, entailed the destruction of the Punic power in Spain.

Under the Roman yoke Carthago Nova became the capital of the vast province of Tarraconensis, and the adjoining district in consequence felt the full force of all the attacks made by rebels and barbarians on the tottering empire. Under the Visigoths it was erected into a duchy by the name of Aurariola. The Duke Theodomir, unlike most of his peers, offered a strenuous resistance to the Moslem arms, and when defeated in battle and besieged in Orihuela, succeeded by a stratagem in preserving his territory. By disguising all the women as warriors and parading them on the walls, he so deceived the Moors as to the strength of the garrison as to obtain from them a recognition of the independence of the duchy, subject to the suzerainty of the khalifa.

The province became known after its chief by the name of Todmir. It endured as an autonomous state for some sixty-eight years, its final absorption in the Moslem empire being brought about by the last dukes espousing the cause of Charlemagne or his Moorish allies. Arabic colonists poured in and soon out-numbered the Christian inhabitants. The last province of Spain to bow before the Crescent became rapidly the most Moorish of any.

Cartagena and Orihuela, the old Visigothic centres, declined, and Murcia, practically a Mohammedan foundation, took their place. The city rivalled Toledo and Cordova as a manufactory of arms and munitions of war. It underwent the usual vicissitudes of Moorish states, forming now part of one kingdom, now of another, at times independent, more often subject to Valencia, Granada, or Cordova. Finally, in 1243, Abu Bekr, the titular amir of Murcia, acknowledged the suzerainty of Castile, only to repudiate it in 1252. The war lasted some time, but the desertion of Al Ahmar of Granada left Abu Bekr at the mercy of the Christians. Murcia was taken in 1266 by Don Jaime of Aragon, who immediately handed over his conquest to his son-in-law, Alfonso of Castile. The step, though probably not dictated by motives of policy, was a wise one, for it left a sort of buffer state between Aragon and Granada, and preserved the frontiers of the former kingdom from molestation by the Moors for the next two centuries.

The town of Murcia has completely rid itself of all outward evidences of its erstwhile subjection to Islam. Gone is the Alcazar, where the amirs mimicked the state of Cordova and Toledo, gone is the wall which kept the Christian out, gone is the mosque wherein thousands of turbaned heads were bowed daily towards Mecca. Yet in the narrow dark streets like the Sierpes of Seville, across which awnings are stretched, we might recognize something of the East, were not such thoroughfares equally characteristic of the Christian South. The Calles de la Traperia and de la Plateria, however, irresistibly recall Smyrna. They lead into one of those dazzling white, dusty squares which every Southern and Eastern city boasts, and which is always named in Spain after the Constitution, in Italy after Victor Emmanuel, and in France after the Republic. Murcia is hotter than Seville, and the passage of this plaza between eleven in the forenoon and five in the afternoon requires the courage of a Mutius Scævola. In the evening you may join the citizens in their promenade upon the Malecon, which affords a charming view of the rich "huerta" or vale of the Segura. This is described by Mr. Brunhés as "an admirable zone of model agricultural establishments. The soil is levelled and prepared for irrigation with geometrical precision. To each particular crop corresponds a design with little shelving beds of special forms." Not an inch of ground is wasted; on the summit of the slopes, for instance, sweet potatoes are planted at regular intervals. The cereals and vegetables are tended with special care, almost individually. The melons are protected by coverings. No one can visit the environs of Murcia without being impressed by the extraordinary industry and thriftiness of its people. And field labour in this climate must be arduous in the extreme. But no doubt the mythical "dolce far niente" Spaniard will continue for many years to haunt the back streets of literature in company with the big-toothed English girl, her red-whiskered parent, and other creations of ignorance and prejudice.

Murcia cannot be called an interesting town. It has only one "sight"--and that not of first-class interest--the Cathedral. This occupies, as usual, the site of the mosque, and dates in its oldest part from 1368. The west front was restored in the seventeenth century, fortunately before the decay of Spanish art had become too conspicuous. The interior produces a good effect, though robbed of much of its interest by a fire some sixty years ago. The choir stalls are good, as they generally are in this country of clever wood-carvers, and came from a suppressed monastery in the neighbourhood. The reredos is modern and poor. With a glance at the urn containing the internal organs of Alfonso the Learned, we pass on to the beautiful and interesting Junteron Chapel. This was founded in 1515 by the Archdeacon of Lorca, Don Gil Junteron, and is in the most exuberant Renaissance style. It is astonishing that where the figures and designs are so numerous, so intermingled, and so complicated, each should be sculptured with such exquisite skill and correctness. The Velez Chapel is a little earlier, and was evidently modelled on the Constable's Chapel at Burgos. The style, as might be expected, reminds one also of the Chapel Royal at Granada. Parts of it, says Don Rodrigo Amador de los Rios, evidence the painful caprices and aberrations which announce the death agony of a powerful art in its decline. It would be dangerous to express such an opinion in Murcia, where the chapel is accounted the eighth and greatest wonder of the world. In somewhat more restrained terms the sacristan will call your attention to the panelling and lockers in the Sacristy, which occupies the centre of the graceful steeple, and certainly deserves the epithet of sumptuous, so liberally bestowed in Spain.

Much older than Murcia, Cartagena has preserved even fewer monuments of antiquity, though it has not lost the military character first impressed upon it by its founder Hasdrubal. For this is the first arsenal of Spain, and perhaps its strongest fortress. Its splendid sheltered harbour is defended by powerful forts and formidable batteries. Their fire has not always been directed upon the enemies of Spain. For many months in the year 1873 over them waved the red flag of the "Intransigentes," the extreme communistic republicans, who, simultaneously with the Carlists of the north, threatened ruin to Castelar's government at Madrid. The acquisition of the great national arsenal without firing a shot was, of course, of the utmost advantage to these determined revolutionaries. They disposed of 583 pieces of ordnance, including twenty-eight Krupp guns, with 180,000 shells and 4,332 quintals of powder. In addition they were supported by the ironclad frigates Numancia, Vittoria, Tetuan, and Mendez Nuñez. The garrison, in addition to the enthusiastic population, included several revolted battalions of regular troops under the command of General Contreras. The communist Junta was presided over by Don Antonio Gálvez.

Against this terrible stronghold of the revolution, General Martinez Campos advanced with an army from Madrid with orders to reduce the place with the utmost despatch. This was easier said than done. Supplies were lacking; the advantage in artillery lay entirely with the besieged. The Carlists effected diversions in favour of the Intransigentes--an odd coalition. Meantime, three of the revolutionary vessels were seized by the Prussian squadron as pirates--an utterly unjustifiable interference with the domestic affairs of another State. We might as reasonably have seized the vessels of the Confederate States in 1864. The Prussians and Italians exacted, moreover, a war indemnity of 50,000 pesetas from the Cantonal Junta, which body became a prey to internal dissensions. One of its members was assassinated. Taking advantage of these embarrassments of the besieged, the republican troops redoubled their efforts. Señor Castelar came down from Madrid to assume the supreme command, and Martinez Campos was superseded by General Lopéz Dominguez. An incessant bombardment was kept up, the besieged responding shell by shell. In January the frigate Tetuan was burnt to the water's edge, and a day or two later the explosion of the gun park destroyed hundreds of the garrison. The end was near. The city had for half a year defied almost the whole kingdom, and withstood the covert attacks of foreign Powers. Among the revolutionaries were men who burned to emulate the Numantians, and to make of themselves, the whole population, and the city, one vast blazing hecatomb. Before this desperate resolution could be executed, the Government troops forced their way into wretched, blood-drenched Cartagena. Gálvez, Contreras, and the leaders of the cantonal movement escaped by sea in the ironclad Numancia, which far exceeded the Government vessels in speed, and took refuge in Algeria. Thus collapsed a movement which was, after the Commune of Paris, the most determined organized attempt ever made to subvert the existing constitution of European society.

I have given at some length this chapter in the history of Cartagena, partly because the town has little interest in itself, and partly because these events, though so recent and so significant, are never so much as alluded to by most writers of travel books. Out of so much evil good came at last, for these wellnigh fatal disorders opened the eyes of the Spaniards to the instability of the Madrid Government, and formed the prelude to the reign of peace inaugurated by the accession to the throne of King Alfonso XII.

Apart from its historical associations, Murcia repays the attention of the traveller less than any other province of Spain. Fortunately, almost the only places of interest it contains--the ones I have mentioned--lie on or close to the direct route from Granada into the old kingdom of Valencia.