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Title: Old Continental Towns

Author: Walter M. Gallichan

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Language: English

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OLD
CONTINENTAL
TOWNS

ROUEN, 1822.
A STREET SHOWING THE TOWER OF THE CATHEDRAL.

OLD CONTINENTAL
TOWNS

BY
WALTER   M.   GALLICHAN
Author of
“The Story of Seville,” “Fishing and Travel
in Spain,” “Cheshire,” etc.



LONDON
T.   WERNER   LAURIE
CLIFFORD’S   INN

CONTENTS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

{1}

OLD CONTINENTAL TOWNS

ROME

THE story of Rome is a mighty chronicle of such deep importance towards an understanding of the growth of Europe, that a feeling almost of helplessness assails me as I essay to set down in this limited space an account of the city’s ancient grandeur and of its monuments. It is with a sense of awe that one enters Rome. The scene gives birth to so much reflection, the pulse quickens, the imagination is stirred by the annals of Pompey and Cæsar, and the mighty names that resound in the history of the wonderful capital; while the ruins of the days of power and pomp are as solemn tokens of the fate of all great civilisations.

The surroundings of Rome, the vast silent Campagna, that rolling tract of wild country, may be likened to an upland district of Wales. Here are scattered relics of the resplendent{2} days, in a desert where the sirocco breathes hotly; where flocks of sheep and goats wander, and foxes prowl close to the ancient gates. Eastward stand the great natural ramparts of purple mountains, whence the Tiber rolls swiftly, and washing Rome, winds on through lonely valleys.

Dim are the early records of the city. Myth and legend long passed as history in the chronicles of the founding of Rome. We learn now from the etymologists and modern historians that the name of Rome was not derived from Roma, the mother of Romulus, nor from ruma, but, according to Niebuhr, from the Greek rhoma, signifying strength; while Michelet tells us that city was called after the River Rumo, the ancient name of the Tiber.

ROME, 1831.
THE BRIDGE AND CASTLE OF ST. ANGELO.

Romulus, the legendary founder, was supposed to have lived B.C. 752. The growth of the community on the Seven Hills began, according to the old annalists, with a settlement of shepherds. We are told that after the death of Romulus, the first king, the city was ruled by Numa Pompilius. This sovereign instituted nine guilds of industry, and united the mixed population. Tarquinius Superbus, the despotic king, reigned with fanatical religious austerity,{3} and after his banishment Rome became a republic.

The first system of rule was sacerdotal, the second aristocratic, and the third a state of liberty for the plebeians. Then came the Gauls who burned the city to the ground and harried the whole country. Hannibal and Scipio arose, and we enter upon the period of the great Punic Wars, followed by the stirring epoch of Cæsar and Pompey.

How shall we separate myth and simple tradition from the veracious chronicles of the Roman people? What were the causes of the downfall of their proud city, and the decadence of the great race that invaded all quarters of Europe? These are the questions which fill the mind as we wander to-day in Rome. We are reminded of the menace of wealth, the insecurity of prosperity, and the devastating influence of militarism and the lust of conquest. We meditate, too, on the spirit of persecution that flourished here, the love of ferocity, and the cruelty that characterised the recreations of the city under the emperors.

With all its eminence in art and industry, in spite of its high distinction in the science of warfare, and its elaborate jurisprudence and{4} codes, Rome, at one time terrorised by Nero, at another humanely governed by Aurelius, was in its last state a melancholy symbol of decrepitude and failure. The final stage of degradation was worse than the primitive period of barbarism and superstition.

In the Middle Ages, at the time when most of the wealth went to the Popes of Avignon, the city had fallen into pitiful decay. The majestic St Peter’s was threatened by destruction through lack of repair; the Capitol was described as on a level with “a town of cowherds.”

The monarchy of Rome is said to have endured for about two hundred and forty years. The city extended then over a wide area, and was protected by walls and towers. The Coliseum, the Pantheon, and the Forum were built as Rome grew in might and magnificence, and the Roman style of architecture became a model for the world. Happily these structures have survived. The Rome of pagan days and the Rome of the Renaissance are mingled here strangely, and the pomp and affluence of former times contrasts with the poverty of to-day that meets us in the streets.

Note the faces of the people; here are features stern and regular, recalling often old{5} prints of the Romans of history. The dress of the poorer women is ancient, while that of the upper classes is as modern as the costumes of Paris, Berlin, or London. On days of fête it is interesting to watch these people at play, all animated with a southern gaiety which the northerner may envy. The life of Rome is outdoor; folk loiter and congregate in the streets; there is much traffic of vehicles used for pleasure. Over the city stretches “the Italian sky,” ardently blue—the sky that we know from paintings before we have visited Rome—and upon the white buildings shines a hot sun from which we shrink in midsummer noons.

It is hard to decide which appeals to us the more strongly in Rome—the relics of Cæsar’s empire or the art of the Middle Ages. The Coliseum brings to mind “the grandeur that was Rome,” in the days of the pagan majesty, while St Peter’s, with its wealth of gorgeous decoration and great paintings, reminds us of the supreme power of the city under the popes.

In the Coliseum there is social history written in stone. We look upon the tiers rising one above the other, and picture them in all the splendour of a day of cruel carnival. We{6} may see traces of the lifts that brought the beasts to the arena from the dens below.

Ad leones! The trumpet blares, and a victim of the heretical creed is led into the amphitheatre to encounter the lions. How often has this soil been drenched in blood. How often have the walls echoed with the plaudits of the Roman populace, gloating upon a spectacle of torture, or aroused to ecstasy by the combats of gladiators.

Silence broods in the arena, and in every interstice the maidenhair fern grows rife among the decaying stones. The glory has departed, but the shell of the Flavian amphitheatre remains as a monument of Rome’s imperial days. Here were held the chariot races, the competitions of athletes, the tournaments on horseback, the baiting of savage brutes, the wrestling bouts, throwing the spear, and the fights of martyrs with animals. Luxury and cruelty rioted here on Roman holidays.

For a comprehensive view of the Coliseum, you should climb the Palatine Hill. The hundreds of arches and windows admit the sunlight, and the building glows, “a monstrous mountain of stone,” as Michelet describes it. Tons of the masonry have been removed by{7} vandals. The fountain in which the combatants washed their wounds remains, and the walls of the circus rise to a height of a hundred-and-fifty-seven feet. In yonder “monument of murder” there died ten thousand victims in a hundred days during the reign of Trajan.

The triumph of Christianity is symbolised in St Peter’s. An impartial chronicler cannot close his eyes to the truth written in the great cathedral. Both pagans and Christians persecuted in turn to the glory of their deities. Force was worshipped alike by emperor and pope. Pagans tortured martyrs in the arena; the Christians burned them in the square. In 1600 Giordano Bruno was tied to the stake, and consumed in the flames, by decree of the Church, after two years of imprisonment. His offence was the writing of treatises attempting to prove that the earth is not flat, and that God is “the All in All.” He also dared to opine that there may be other inhabited worlds besides our own. Bruno’s last words have echoed through the ages: “Perhaps it is with greater fear that you pass the sentence upon me than I receive it.”

Under Innocent IV. the Inquisition was established as a special tribunal against heretics.{8} Men of science soon came under its penalties. Copernicus was a teacher of mathematics in Rome, when he conceived his theory, “The Revolutions of the Heavenly Bodies,” which he dedicated to Pope Paul. Fearing the awful penalties of the Holy Office, he withheld publication of the work for many years, only seeing a copy of the printed volume in his last hours. The book was condemned by the Inquisition and placed on the index.

About a century later, Galileo wrote his “System of the World,” an exposition and defence of the theories of Copernicus. The Inquisition dragged him before its tribunal at Rome, where he was charged with heresy and compelled to recant or die. We know that he chose recantation, or the fate of Bruno would have been his. For ten years Galileo pined in the dungeon, and his body was flung into a dishonoured grave.

Not a man in Rome was safe from the Inquisition. Its courts travestied justice; its terrified witnesses lied, and the accusers were intimidated. Suspicion alone was sufficient to compel arrest and trial, and there was no possible appeal, and no hope of pity or leniency. The Church urged that while unbelief existed,{9} the Inquisition was a necessity, and the chief means of stamping out heretical doctrine. And yet, a few years ago, an International Free-thought Congress was held under the shadow of St Peter’s. How truly, “it moves!”

The Renaissance, with its mighty intellectual impetus, its reverence for the arts and culture, and its resistance against the absolutism of the Papacy came as the salvation of Rome from the terrors and the stagnation of the dark days.

The birth of Michael Angelo, in 1474, came with a new era of enlightenment. Angelo, painter, sculptor, poet, and philosopher, was commissioned by Pope Julius II. to carve a great work in Rome, and to adorn the Sistine Chapel with frescoes. Three years were spent on these superb paintings. This is the most wonderful ceiling painting in the world. In the centre are pictures of scenes of the Creation and Fall; in compartments are the prophets, and other portions represent the ancestors of the Virgin Mary and historical characters.

The figures are colossal, and wonderful in their anatomy, revealing the artist’s richness of imagination, as well as his unsurpassed technical skill. To see to advantage the frescoes of the roof, it is necessary to lie flat on the back, and{10} gaze upwards. The human figure is superbly imaged in “The Temptation, Fall and Expulsion.” The largest figures in the whole composition are among the prophets and sibyls.

“Here, at last, here indeed for the first time,” writes Mr Arthur Symons, in his “Cities,” “is all that can be meant by sublimity; a sublimity which attains its pre-eminence through no sacrifice of other qualities; a sublimity which (let us say it frankly) is amusing. I find the magnificent and extreme life of these figures as touching, intimate, and direct in its appeal, as the most vivid and gracious realism of any easel picture.”

The vast picture of “The Last Judgment,” on the wall of the Sistine Chapel, was painted by Michael Angelo when he was growing old. The work occupied about seven years. It is full of figures in every kind of action, and most of them are nude. Their nakedness affronted Paul IV., who commanded Da Volterra, a pupil of Angelo, to paint clothing on some of the forms, thus marring the beauty of the work.

In the Pauline Chapel of the Vatican are two mural paintings by Michael Angelo, “The Crucifixion of St Peter,” and “The Conversion of St Paul.{11}”

“I could only see and wonder,” writes Goethe, referring to the works of Angelo in a letter from Rome. The mental confidence and boldness of the master, and his grandeur of conception, are beyond all expression.

Sir Joshua Reynolds spent some time in Rome, in 1750, and recorded the result of his study of the work of Raphael and Michael Angelo. It was in the cold chambers of the Vatican that Reynolds caught the chill which brought about his deafness. He made many copies of parts of the paintings of Angelo. “The Adonis” of Titian in the Colonna Palace, the “Leda,” by Coreggio, and the works of Raphael, were closely studied by the English painter. Before he left Rome he declared that the art of Angelo represented the highest perfection.

Many critics affirm that St Peter’s is somewhat disappointing, architecturally considered, while some critics maintain that it is one of the finest churches in the world. The colonnades, with their gallery of sculptured images, are stately and impressive. It is the huge façade that disappoints. Nevertheless, St Peter’s is a stupendous temple, with a dignity and majesty of its own. The interior is garish; we miss the dim religious light and the atmosphere of{12} sober piety so manifest in the cathedrals of Spain. As a repository of masterpieces St Peter’s is world-famous. Here is “The Virgin and Dead Christ,” the finest of Michael Angelo’s early statues.

Angelo spent various periods in Rome, after his first stay of five years. He was in the city at the age of sixty, and much of his work was executed when he was growing old. It was in the evening of his days that he became the close friend of Vittoria Colonna, the inspirer of his poetry, and after her death, in 1547, he entered upon a spell of ill-health and sadness. But his activities were marvellous, even in old age. In 1564 he planned the Farnese Palace for Paul III., and directed the building of the Church of Santa Maria.

Immensity is the chief impression of the interior of St Peter’s. Even the figures of cherubs are gigantic. The great nave with its marble pavement and huge pillars, is long-drawn from the portal to the altar, and the space within the great dome is bewildering in its vastness.

The bronze statue of St Peter, whose foot is kissed yearly by thousands of devotees, is noted here among the numerous images. At the altar we shall see Canova’s statue of Pius VI.,{13} the chair of St Peter, and tombs of the Popes Urban and Paul.

Michael Angelo designed the beautiful Capello Gregoriana. His lovely “Pieta” is the Cappella della Pieta, and this is the most splendid work within the building. Tombs of popes are seen in the various chapels. In the resplendent choir chapel is Thorvaldsen’s statue of Pius VII.

The Vatican is a great museum of statuary, the finest collection in existence to-day. On the site of the building once stood a Roman emperor’s palace, which was reconstructed as a residence for Pope Innocent III. Besides the statues in the Vatican and the cathedral, there are many remarkable works of sculpture in the Villa Albani and the Capitoline. In the Capitoline Museum are, the “Dying Gladiator,” the “Resting Faun,” and the “Venus.”

Days may be spent in inspecting the minor churches of Rome. Perhaps the most interesting is San Giovanni Laterano, built on the site of a Roman imperial palace, and dating from the fourteenth century. The front is by Galileo, very highly decorated. Within, the chapels of the double aisles are especially interesting for their lavish embellishment. The{14} apse is a very old part of the structure, and the Gothic cloister has grace and dignity, with most admirable carved columns. It is a debated question whether the ceiling of this church was painted by Michael Angelo or Della Porta.

The Lateran Palace, close to San Giovanni, has a small decorated chapel at the head of a sacred staircase, said to have been trodden by Christ when he appeared before Pilate, and brought here from Jerusalem.

The Churches of San Clemente, Santi Giovanni Paolo, Santa Maria in Ara Coeli are among the other churches of note.

The memorials of pagan and Christian times stand side by side in Rome, and in roaming the city it is difficult to direct one’s steps on a formal plan. Turning away from an arch or a temple of Roman origin, you note a Renaissance church, and are tempted to enter it. If I fail to point out here many buildings which the visitor should see, it is because the number is so great.

The part of the city between the Regia and the Palatine Hill is very rich in antiquities. It is said that Michael Angelo carried away a great mass of stone from the Temple of Vesta to build a part of St Peter’s; but I do not{15} know upon what authority this is stated. A few blocks of stone are, however, all that remain of the buildings sacred to the vestals.

The tall columns seen as we walk to the Palatine Hill, are relics of the temple of Castor and Pollux. Behind the Regia is the temple of Julius Cæsar, built by Augustus; and here Mark Antony delivered his splendid oration. Near to this temple is the Forum, with traces of basilicas, and a few standing columns. The whole way to the Capitoline abounds in ancient stones of rich historical interest. Here are the walls of the Plutei, with reliefs representing the life of Trajan, the grand arch of Septimus Severus, the columns of the Temple of Saturn.

The Palatine Hill is crowned with the ruins of the Palace of the Cæsars. Mural decorations still remain on the walls of an apartment. Here will be seen relics of a school, a temple dedicated to Jupiter, and portions of the famous wall of the mythical Romulus. These are but a few of the antiquities of the Palatine, whence the eye surveys Rome and the rolling Campagna.

In the quarter of the Coliseum are ancient baths, once sumptuously fitted and adorned with images, now removed to the museum of the{16} city. Trajan’s Column towers here to about one hundred-and-fifty feet. Then there is the Pantheon, a classic building wonderfully preserved. All these are but a few of the ancient edifices of Rome.

Among the more important museums and picture galleries are the splendid Vatican, at which we have glanced, the Capitol Museum, the Palazzo del Senatore, with works by Velazquez, Van Dyck, Titian, and other masters, the National Museum, the Villa Borghese, the Dorian Palace, and the Kircheriano.

The art annals of the Rome of Christian times are of supreme interest. The greatest of the painters who came to study in Rome was Velazquez, who was offered the hospitality of Cardinal Barberini in the Vatican. He stayed, however, in a quieter lodging, at the Villa Medici, and afterwards in the house of the Spanish ambassador. Velazquez paid a second visit to Rome in 1649, where he met Poussin, and Salvator Rosa. To Rosa he remarked, “It is Titian that bears the palm.”

The Spanish painter was made a member of the Roman Academy; and at this time he painted the portrait of Innocent X., which occupies a position of honour in the Dorian{17} Palace. Reynolds described this as “the finest piece of portrait-painting in Rome.” Velazquez’ portrait of himself is in the Capitoline Museum in the city.

The art records of Rome are so many that I cannot attempt to refer to more than a small number of them. Literary associations, too, crowd into the mind as we walk the lava-paved streets of the glowing capital.

Goethe sojourned long in Rome, and wrote many pages of his impressions. In 1787 he writes of the amazing loveliness of a walk through the historic streets by moonlight, of the solemnity of the Coliseum by night, and the grandeur of the portico of St Peter’s. He praises the climate in spring, the delight of long sunny days, with noons “almost too warm”; and the sky “like a bright blue taffeta in the sunshine.” In the Capitoline Museum he admired the nude “Venus” as one of the finest statues in Rome. “My imagination, my memory,” he writes, “is storing itself full with endlessly beautiful subjects.... I am in the land of the arts.”

Full of rapture are the letters of Shelley from Rome: “Since I last wrote to you,” he says to Peacock, “I have seen the ruins of Rome, the{18} Vatican, St Peter’s, and all the miracles of ancient and modern art contained in that majestic city. The impression of it exceeds anything I have ever experienced in my travels.... We visited the Forum, and the ruins of the Coliseum every day. The Coliseum is unlike any work of human hands I ever saw before. It is of enormous height and circuit, and the arches, built of massy stones, are piled on one another, and jut into the blue air, shattered into the forms of overhanging rocks.”

Shelley was entranced by the arch of Constantine. “It is exquisitely beautiful and perfect.” In March 1819, he writes: “Come to Rome. It is a scene by which expression is overpowered, which words cannot convey.” The Cathedral scarcely appealed to Shelley; he thought it inferior externally to St Paul’s, though he admired the façade and colonnade. More satisfying to the poet’s æsthetic taste was the Pantheon, with its handsome fluted columns of yellow marble, and the beauty of the proportions in the structure.

The Pantheon is generally admitted to be the most noble of the ancient edifices of the city. It was erected by Agrippa 27 B.C., and sumptuously adorned with fine marbles. The dome is{19} vast and nobly planned, and the building truly merits Shelley’s designation, “sublime.”

Keats was buried in the Protestant cemetery in Rome, in a tomb bearing the inscription: “Here lies one whose name was writ in water.” His loyal and admiring friend, Shelley, wrote a truer memorial of the young poet:

In 1850 Robert Browning and his wife were in Rome, and it was then that Browning wrote the beautiful love poem, “Two in the Campagna,” telling of the joy of roaming in:

Poets and painters have through the centuries drawn inspiration from this wondrous city of splendid monuments and ancient grandeur. How{20} true was Goethe’s statement that wherever you turn in Rome there is an object of beauty and arresting interest.

The appeal of the city is strong, the variety bewildering, whether you elect to muse upon the remains of the imperial days, or to study the Renaissance art of the Christian churches. It is well, if possible, to make a survey of the antiquities in chronological order, beginning with an inspection of the ruins of the Romulean wall and the traces of the oldest gates. Then the Forum should be visited in its valley, and the art of the temple of Saturn, the Basilica Julia, and the Arch of Fabius examined. The Temple of Vespasian, the Palace of Caligula, Trajan’s Column, and the numerous arches will all arouse memories of the emperors and the splendid purple days.

The Campagna is not only a wilderness, but it is rich in historic memories. Here lived the cultured Cynthia, the friend of Catullus, the poet, and of Quintilius Varus. Numerous villas dotted the Campagna in the days of the emperors, and here, during the summer heats, retired many of the wealthy citizens of Rome. Valuable antiquities, vases, urns, and figures, have been unearthed from this classic soil.{21}

ASSISI

“THERE was a man in the city of Assisi, by name Francis, whose memory is blessed, for that God, graciously presenting him with blessings of goodness, delivered him in His mercy from the perils of this present life, and abundantly filled him with the gifts of heavenly grace.”

So speaks Saint Bonaventura of the noble character of the holy man of Assisi, whose figure arises before us as we tread the streets of the town of his birth. For Assisi is a place of pilgrimage, filled with fragrant memories of that saint of whom even the heterodox speak with loving reverence. St Francis stands distinct in an age of fanatic religious zeal, as an example of tolerance, a lover of mercy, and a practical follower of the teaching of Christian benevolence.

At the beginning of the thirteenth century, Pope Innocent III. offered indulgences to the faithful who would unite in a crusade against the Albigensian heretics of Languedoc. For{22} twenty years blood was shed plentifully in this war upon heresy; for twenty years the hounds of persecution were let loose on the hated enemies of papal absolutism. “Kill all; God will know,” was the answer of the Pope’s legate during this massacre, when asked by the crusaders how they could recognise the heretics. While Languedoc and Provence were ravaged by the truculent persecutors, and fires were lighted to burn the bodies of men, women and children, St Francis lived in Assisi, preaching humanity and good will. There is no testimony that he protested expressly against the Albigensian crusades; but we know from his life and his writings that he detested cruelty and violence, and never directly counselled persecution.

In “The Golden Legend” we read that “Francis, servant and friend of Almighty God, was born in the city of Assisi, and was made a merchant in the twenty-fifth year of his age, and wasted his time by living vainly, whom our Lord corrected by the scourge of sickness, and suddenly changed him into another man, so that he began to shine by the spirit of prophecy.”

Putting on the rags of a beggar, St Francis went to Rome, where he sat among the mendi{23}cants before St Peter’s. Then began the miraculous cures of lepers whose hands he kissed, and his many works of charity and healing. He extolled “holy poverty,” and called poverty his “lady.” When he saw a worm lying on the path, the compassionate saint removed it, so that it should not be trodden on by passers-by. The birds he called his brothers and sisters; he fed them, bade them sing or keep silence, and they obeyed him. All birds and beasts loved him; and he taught the birds to sing praises to their creator. St Francis was perhaps the first eminent Christian who showed pity and love for the lower animals. In the morass of Venice, he came upon a great company of singing-birds, and entering among them, caused them to sing lauds to the Almighty.

St Francis taught asceticism to his followers, but it was the asceticism of joy rather than of grief and pain. The saint had in him the qualities of poet and artist as well as of pious mystic. He lived for a time the life of the luxurious, and found it profitless and hollow; he passed through the ordeal of the temptations that beset a young man born of wealthy parents.

“The more thou art assailed by temptations,{24} the more do I love thee,” said the blessed St Francis to his friend Leo. “Verily I say unto thee that no man should deem himself a true friend of God, save in so far as he hath passed through many temptations and tribulations.”

Flung into the prison of Perugia, he rejoiced and sang, and when the vulgar threw dirt upon him and his friars, he did not resent their rudeness.

Trudging bare-footed through Umbria, scantily clothed, and subsisting upon crusts offered by the charitable, St Francis set an example of the holiness of poverty which impressed the peasants and excited their veneration for the preacher and his gospel.

He worked as a mason, repairing the decayed Church of St Damian, and preached a doctrine of labour and industry, forsaking all that he had so that he might reap the ample harvest of Divine blessing. In winter the saint would plunge into a ditch of snow, that he might check the promptings of carnal desire. He refused to live under a roof at Assisi, preferring a mere shelter of boughs, with the company of Brother Giles and Brother Bernard. A cell of wood was too sumptuous for him.

As St Francis grew in holiness there appeared{25} in him the stigmata of Christ’s martyrdom. In his side there was the wound of the spear; in his hands and feet were the marks of the nails. St Bonaventura relates that after his death, the flesh of the saint was so soft that he seemed to have become a child again, and that the wound in the side was like a lovely rose.

He died, according to this historian, in 1226, on the fourth day of October. His remains were interred in Assisi, and afterwards removed to “the Church built in his honour,” in 1230.

After the canonisation of the holy St Francis many miracles happened in Italy. In the church of his name in Assisi, when the Bishop of Ostia was preaching, a huge stone fell on the head of a devout woman. It was thought that she was dead, but being before the altar of St Francis, and having “committed herself in faith” to him, she escaped without any hurt. Many persons were cured of disease by calling upon the blessed name of the Saint of Assisi, and mariners were often saved from wrecks through his intervention.

St Francis lived when the fourth Lateran Council gave a new impetus to persecution, by increasing the scope and power of the inquisition. This gentlest of all the saints was sur{26}rounded by a host of influences that made for religious rancour, and yet he preached a doctrine of love, and was, so far as we can learn, quite untouched by the persecuting zeal that characterised so many of his sainted contemporaries. It is with relief, after the contemplation of the cruelty of his age, that we greet the tattered ascetic of Assisi, as, in imagination, we see him pass up the steps of the house wherein Brother Bernard was a witness of his ecstasy.

The little city of Assisi stands on a hill; a mediæval town of a somewhat stern character meets the eye as we approach it. Outside the town is a sixteenth-century church, Santa Maria degli Angeli, which will interest by reason of the Portinucula, a little chapel repaired by St Francis. It was around this church that the first followers of the saint lived in hovels with wattled roofs. Here was the garden in which the holy brother delighted to wander, and to watch his kindred the birds, and here are the rose bushes without thorns, that grew from the saint’s blood.

Entering Assisi, we soon reach the Church of San Francisco, in which is the reputed tomb of St Francis. This is not a striking edifice, but its charm is in the pictures of Giotto. Poverty,{27} Chastity, and Obedience are the subjects of these frescoes. Ruskin copied the Poverty, and made a long study of these works. The picture symbolises the Lady of Poverty, the bride of St Francis, who is given to him by Christ. This is one of Giotto’s chief pictures. Chastity is a young woman in a castle; she is worshipped by angels, and the walls of the fortress are surrounded by men in armour. In another fresco St Francis is dressed in canonical garb, attended by angels, who sing praise to him. It is said that Dante suggested this subject to Giotto.

The frescoes of Simone, in a chapel of the lower church, are of much interest to the art student. They are richly coloured and very decorative, and have been considered by some authorities as equal to the works of Giotto at Assisi. Simone was a painter of the Sienese School, and according to Vasari, he was taught by Giotto. His “Annunciation” is a rich work, preserved in the Uffizi Palace at Florence.

The twenty-eight scenes in the history of St Francis are in the upper church, and in these we see again Giotto’s noblest art in the harmonious grouping and the fluidity of his colour.{28}

The Cathedral of San Rufino is a handsome church. Here St Francis was baptised, and in this edifice he preached.

The father of the saint was a woollen merchant, and his shop was in the Via Portica. The house still stands, and may be recognised by its highly decorated portal. This was not the birthplace of St Francis, for the Chiesa Nuova, built in 1615, covers the site of the house.

In the Church of St Clare you are shown the “remains” of Saint Clare, in a crypt, lying in a glass case.

When Goethe was in Assisi, the building that interested him more than any other was the Temple of Minerva, built in the time of Augustus.

“At last we reached what is properly the old town, and behold before my eyes stood the noble edifice, the first complete memorial of antiquity that I had ever seen.... Looking at the façade, I could not sufficiently admire the genius-like identity of design which the architects have here as elsewhere maintained. The order is Corinthian, the inter-columnar spaces being somewhat above the two modules. The bases of the columns, and the plinths seem to{29} rest on pedestals, but it is only an appearance.” Goethe concludes his description: “The impression which the sight of this edifice left upon me is not to be expressed, and will bring forth imperishable fruits.{30}”

VENICE

THE very name breathes romance and spells beauty. Poets, artists, and historians without number have revealed to us the glories of this city. Dull indeed must be the perception of loveliness of form and colour in the mind of the man who is not deeply moved by the contemplation of the Stones of Venice. Yet it seems to me that no city is so difficult to describe; everything has been said, every scene painted by master hands. One’s impression must read inevitably like that which has been written over and over again. And in a brief enumeration of the buildings to be seen by the visitor, how can the unhappy writer avoid the charge of baldness and inefficiency?

VENICE, 1831.
THE GRAND CANAL.

Well, then, to say that Venice is supremely beautiful among the towns of Italy is to set down a commonplace. It is a town in which the matter-of-fact man realises the meaning of romance and poetry; a town where the phlegmatic become sentimental, and the poetic are stirred to ecstasies. George Borrow wept{31} at beholding the beauty of Seville by the Guadalquivir in the evening light. “Tears of rapture” would have filled his eyes as he gazed upon the splendours of the Grand Canal.

Some of the many writers upon Venice have found the scene “theatrical”; others assert that the influence of Venice is sad, while others again declare that the city provokes hilarity of spirits in a magical way. Whatever the nature of the spell, it is strong, and few escape it. Ruskin, Byron, the Brownings, and Henry James, are among the souls to whom Venice has appealed with the force of a personality.

The spirit of Venice has been felt by thousands of travellers. Its pictures—for every street is a picture—remain deeply graven on the mind’s tablet.

Perhaps there is nothing made by man to float upon the waters more graceful in its lines than a gondola. To think of Venice, is to recall these gliding, swan-like, silent craft, that ply upon the innumerable waterways. Like ghosts by night they steal along in the deep shadows of the palaces, impelled by boatmen whose every attitude is a study in lissome grace. To lie in a gondola, while the attendant noiselessly propels the stately skiff with his{32} pliant oar, is to realise romance and the perfection of leisurely locomotion.

What can be said of the sunsets, the almost garish colouring of sea and sky, and the witchery of reflection upon tower and roof? What can be written for the thousandth time of the resplendent churches, the rich gilding, the noble façades, the hundred picturesque windings of the canals between houses, each one of them a subject for the artist’s brush? Is there any other city that grips us in every sense like Venice? The eyes and the mind grow dazed and bewildered with the beauty and the colour, till the scene seems almost unreal, a fantasy of the brain under the influence of a drug.

The student of life and the philosopher will find here matter for cogitation, tinged maybe with seriousness, even sadness. Venetian history is not all glorious, and the city to-day has its social evils, like every other populous place on the globe. There are beggars, many of them, artistic beggars, no doubt; but they are often diseased and always unclean. Yet even the dirty faces of the alleys, in this city of loveliness, have, according to artists, a value and a harmony. There is the same obvious,{33} sordid poverty here as in London or Manchester. But the dress of the people, even if ragged, is bright, and the faces, even though wrinkled and haggard, fit the scene and the setting in the estimate of the painter.

If your habit is analytic and critical, you will find defects in the modern life of Venice that cannot be hidden. The city is not prosperous in our British sense of the word. There is an air of decayed grandeur, an impression that existence in this town of exquisite art is not happiness for the swarm of indigents that live in the historic purlieus.

On the other hand, there is the climate, a soft, sleepy climate, not very healthy perhaps, but usually kindly. The sun is generous, the sky rarely frowns. Life passes lazily, dreamily, on the oily waters of the canals, in the piazza, and in those tall tumble-down houses built on piles. No one appears to hurry about the business of money-getting; no one apparently is eager to work, except perhaps the unfortunate mendicants and the persuasive hawkers, who do indeed toil hard at their occupations.

When the evening breeze bears the interesting malodours of the canals, with other indescribable and characteristic smells, and the{34} sun sinks in crimson in a flaming sky, and music sounds from the piazza and the water, and the gondolas glide and pass, and beautiful women smile and stroll in streets bathed in gold, you will think only of the loveliness of Venice, and forget the terrors of its history and the misery of to-day. And it is well, for one cannot always grapple with the problems of life; there must be hours of sensuous pleasure. Sensuous seems to me the right word to convey the influence of Venice upon a summer evening, when, a little wearied by the heat of the day, you loll upon a bridge, smoking a cigar, and drinking in languidly the beauty of the scene, while a grateful breeze comes from the darkening sea.

Go to the Via Garibaldi, if you wish to lounge and to study the Venetians of “the people.” Here the natives come and go and saunter. The women are small, like the women of Spain, dark in complexion, and in manner animated. They are very feminine; often they are lovely.

You will be struck with the gaiety of the people, a sheer lightheartedness more evident and exuberant than the gaiety of Spanish folk. Perhaps the struggle for existence is less keen than it seems among the inhabitants of the more{35} lowly quarters of the city. At anyrate, the Venetians are lovers of song and laughter. A flower delights a woman, a cigarette is a gift for a man. They are able to divert themselves in Venice without sport, and with very few places of amusement.

“The place is as changeable as a nervous woman,” writes Mr Henry James, “and you know it only when you know all the aspects of its beauty. It has high spirits or low, it is pale or red, grey or pink, cold or warm, fresh or wan, according to the weather or the hour.”

Having given a faint presentment of the beauties of Venice, I will refer to some of the chief episodes of its great history. In the earliest years of its making, we are upon insecure ground in attempting to write accurately upon Venetia. The city probably existed when the Goths swept down upon Italy, about 420, and it fell a century later into the hands of the fierce Lombards. Under the Doges (dukes) the land was wrested here and there from the waves, the mudbanks protected with piles and fences, and the great buildings began to arise from a foundation of apparent instability.

The ingenuity of the architect and the builder in constructing this city is nothing short of{36} marvellous. In the sixth century the town was no doubt a collection of huts on sandbanks, intersected by tidal streams. There were meadows and gardens by the verge of the sea, and the inhabitants made the most of every yard of firm soil. St Mark’s Cathedral was built in the tenth century, to serve as a resting-place for the bones of the saint.

Under the wise rule of Pietro Tribuno, Venice withstood the attack of a Hungarian horde. The city was walled in and fortified, and the natives gathered at Rialto. The resistance was successful. The Doge who saved the city was one of the most honoured of all the rulers of Venice as a brave general and a man of scholarly parts.

Genoa and Pisa, formed into a powerful republic, warred with Venice in the eleventh century; but the Venetians won in the protracted warfare. Wars in Italy and wars in the East followed, and internal trouble reigned intermittently in the city.

The discovery of America by Columbus, and the opening up of trade with Hindustan, affected Venice injuriously. Until then the city had held a monopoly as a market for the products of the Orient. Her great power and{37} wealth were imperilled by the discoveries of Columbus, the Genoese voyager, and by the rounding of Cape Horn by the Portuguese adventurers.

Spain and Portugal were reaping the splendid golden harvest while Venice was impoverished. Consternation filled the minds of the citizens. The great Republic had reached the height of its glory in the fifteenth century, but from the falling off of her commerce she never recovered. It is curious that in the period of decline, Venice expended much wealth in works of art, and in the embellishment of the buildings and palaces. Several of the city’s greatest painters flourished at this time.

The Doge’s Palace, often burned down, was rebuilt in its present grandeur. St Mark’s was constantly repaired, decorations were added, and internal parts reconstructed. The palaces of the rich sprang up by the waterways of this city in the sea.

Printing was already an art and industry in Venice. John of Spires used movable type, and succeeding him were many distinguished printers, whose presses supplied the civilised world with books.

A terrible plague devastated the city in 1575.{38} Among the victims were the great painter, Titian, then nearly a hundred years of age. The epidemic spread all over Venice.

When Pope Paul V. endeavoured to bring the citizens under his autocratic rule, they resisted with much firmness. One of the causes of offence was that the Venetians favoured the principle of toleration in religious beliefs, and permitted the heretical to worship according to their consciences. The Pope, after fruitless negotiations, excommunicated Venice, sending his agents with the documents. With all vigilance, the government of the city forbade the exposure of any papal decree in the streets, while the Doge stoutly asserted that the people of Venice regarded the bull with contempt.

Nearly all Europe sided with Venice in this conflict between Pope and Doge. England was prepared to ally herself with France, and to assist Venice. Months passed without developments. Venice remained Catholic, but refused to become a vassal of the Pope of Rome. Paul was enraged and humiliated. One cannot admire his action; yet pity for the proud, sincere, and baffled Pontiff tinges one’s view of the struggle. Venice even refused to request{39} the abolition of the ban. She remained quietly indifferent to the thunderings of the See, and haughtily criticised the overtures of reconciliation offered through the French cardinals. Finally, with dignity and yet a touch of farce, the Senate handed over to the Pope’s emissaries certain offenders, “without prejudice,” to be held by the King of France.

Paolo Sarpi, the priest and born diplomat, was the hero of Venice during this quarrel with Rome. Sarpi was a man of unassailable virtue and integrity, a tactful leader of men, and possessed of intrepidity. He was, not unnaturally, detested by the adherents of the Pope for his defence of Venetian rights and privileges. One night, crossing a bridge, Brother Paolo was attacked by ruffians, and stabbed with daggers. The assailants had been sent from Rome to kill the obnoxious priest. But the scheme failed, for Paolo Sarpi recovered from his wounds, and the attempt upon his life endeared him still more deeply to the hearts of the Venetians.

Some years after he died in his bed, lamented by high and low in the city. Before the Church of Santa Fosca stands a memorial to this brave citizen.{40}

The Venice of the eighteenth century was a decaying city, with an enervated, apathetic population, given to gaming, and improvident in their lives. Many of the noble families sank into penury. Still the people sang and danced and held revelry; nothing could quench their passion for enjoyment. The Republic was now the prey of the great imperialist Napoleon, who adroitly acquired Venice by threats of war followed by promises of democratic rule. A few shots were fired by the French; then the Doge offered terms, which gave the city to the Emperor, while the citizens held rejoicings at the advent of a new government.

A few months later Venice was given to Austria by the Treaty of Campoformio. Between the French and the Austrians the city passed through a troublous period of many years. Venice was now a fallen state.

But what a memorial it is! The city is like a huge volume of history, and we linger over its enchanting pages. Let us now look upon the monuments that reveal to us the soul and genius of Venice of the olden times.

Several of the most important buildings in Venice border the fine square of San Marco, a favourite evening gathering-place of the Venetians.{41} Dominating the piazza is the Cathedral of San Marco, with its magnificent front, a bewildering array of portals, decorated arches, carvings in relief, surmounted by graceful towers and steeples. The style is Byzantine, and partly Roman, designed after St Sophia at Constantinople. In shape the edifice is cruciform, with a dome to each arm of the cross. High above the cathedral roof rises the noble Campanile.

Over the chief portal are four bronze horses, brought here in 1204 from Byzantium. The steeds are beautifully modelled, and the work is ascribed to Lysippos, a sculptor of Corinth. Napoleon took the horses to Paris, but they were restored to Venice in 1815.

The mosaic designs of the façade represent “The Last Judgment,” among other Scriptural subjects, while one of the mosaics depicts San Marco as it was in the early days. A number of reliefs and images adorn the arches of each of the five doorways of the main entrance.

Within the decorations are exquisite. Ruskin writes: “The church is lost in a deep twilight, to which the eye must be accustomed for some moments before the form of the building can{42} be traced; and then there opens before us a vast cave, hewn out into the form of a cross, and divided into shadowy aisles by many pillars. Round the domes of its roof the light enters only through narrow apertures like large stars; and here and there a ray or two from some far-away casement wanders into the darkness, and casts a narrow phosphoric stream upon the waves of marble that heave and fall in a thousand colours along the floor. What else there is of light is from torches or silver lamps, burning ceaselessly in the recesses of the chapels; the roof sheeted with gold, and the polished walls covered with alabaster, give back at every curve and angle some feeble gleaming to the flames, and the glories round the heads of the sculptured saints flash out upon us as we pass them, and sink again into the gloom.”

In the vestibule of the cathedral, the mosaic decoration depicts Old Testament scenes. In the apse are represented a figure of the Lord, with St Mark, and the acts of St Peter and St Mark. The mosaics of the east dome represent Jesus and the prophets. Tintoretto’s design is in an adjoining archway, and in the centre dome is “The Ascension.” The western dome has “The Descent of the Holy Ghost,” and an arch{43} here is decorated with “The Last Judgment.” There are more mosaics in the aisles, illustrating “The Acts of the Apostles.”

The high altar is a superb example of sculpture. The roof is supported by marble columns, carved with scenes from the lives of Christ and the Virgin Mary. The figures date from the eleventh century. A magnificent altarpiece of gold-workers’ design is shown for a fee. The upper part is the older, and it was executed in Constantinople. The lower portion is the work of Venetian artists of the twelfth century.

The baptistery contains early mosaics, a monument of one of the Doges of Venice; and the stone upon which John the Baptist is stated to have been beheaded is kept here.

“The Legend of San Marco” is the design in the Cappella Zen, adjoining the baptistery. Here are the tomb of Cardinal Zen, a Renaissance work in bronze, and a handsome altar.

In his rapturous description of the interior of San Marco, Ruskin continues: “The mazes of interwoven lines and changeful pictures lead always and at last to the Cross, lifted and carved in every place and upon every stone; sometimes with the serpent of eternity wrapt round it,{44} sometimes with doves beneath its arms, and sweet herbage growing forth from its feet.”

Venetian architecture has a character of its own. We find the Oriental influence in most of the buildings of Venice; the ogee arch is commonly used, and the square billet ornament is a distinguishing mark. The first Church of San Marco was built in 830.

The Palace of the Doge is in the Piazza. Its architecture has been variously described and classified. It has strong traces of Moorish influence, while in many respects it is Gothic. The decorated columns of the arcades are very beautifully designed. Archangels and figures of Justice, Temperance, and Obedience adorn the building, and there is an ancient front on the south side. Enter through the Porta della Carta, and you will find a court of wonderful interest, with rich façades and the great staircase, which is celebrated as the crowning-place of the Doges.

The architecture of the interior of the palace is of a later date than that of the exterior. In the big entrance hall are Tintoretto’s portraits of legislators of Venice. From here enter the next apartment, which contains a magnificent painting of “Faith” by Titian. In another{45} hall are four more of Tintoretto’s works, and one by Paolo Veronese. The Sala del Collegio is one of the principal chambers of the palace and its ceiling was painted by Veronese. Here is the Doge’s throne.

Tintoretto and Palma were the artists who executed the paintings in the Hall of the Senators. The adjoining chapel is decorated with another of Tintoretto’s pictures. Pass to the Hall of the Council of Ten, where the rulers of the city sat, and note the gorgeous ceiling by Paolo Veronese.

A staircase leads to the Hall of the Great Council below. From the window there is an inspiriting view. The walls are hung with portraits, but the glory of this hall is Tintoretto’s “Paradise,” an immense painting.

Before leaving the Palace of the Doges, I will devote a few lines to the Schools of Venice of the sixteenth century. Unfortunately most of the works of Giorgione, the most characteristic painter of Venice, have disappeared. He was the founder of a tradition, and the teacher of many painters, including Palma, while his work influenced a number of his contemporaries. Titian, born in 1477, was one of Giorgione’s admirers, and his early work shows his influence.{46} The pictures of the great Venetian master are one of the glories of the city. Some of his paintings are in the Academy, in the Church of Santa Maria dei Friari—where there is a monument to the artist—in the Church of Santa Maria della Salute, and in the private galleries of the city.

In the Academy collection, in a large building in the square of St Mark’s, are Titian’s much-restored “Presentation” and the “Pieta,” among the finest specimens of the Venetian School of painters. The celebrated “Assumption” has been also restored.

“There are many princes; there is but one Titian,” said Charles V. of Spain, who declared that through the magic of the Venetian painter’s pencil, he “thrice received immortality.” Forty-three examples of the art of Titian are in the Prado Gallery of Madrid. Sanchez Coello, Court artist to Philip II. was one of the students of the Italian master; indeed several of the great painters of Spain were influenced by Titian, and none of them revered him more than Velazquez.

Tintoretto’s “Miracle of St Mark” and “Adam and Eve” are two instances of his genius for colour, in the Academy, calling for{47} special study, and another of his works is to be seen in Santa Maria della Salute. We have just looked at a number of this painter’s pictures in the Doge’s Palace.

It has been said that Tintoretto inspired El Greco, whose pictures we shall see in Toledo. Tintoretto was a pupil of Titian, basing his drawing on the work of Michael Angelo, and finding inspiration for his colour in the painting of Titian. He was a most industrious and prolific artist.

Paolo Veronese, though not a native of Venice, was one of the school of that city. He surpassed even Tintoretto in the use of colour, and adorned many ceilings and altars, besides painting canvases. The “Rape of Europa” and others of Paolo’s mythical subjects display his gift of colour and richness of imagination.

Among the later Venetian painters, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo is perhaps the most remarkable. His conceptions were bizarre, and his fanciful style is manifest in his picture of the “Way to Calvary,” preserved in Venice. Canaletto may be mentioned as the last of the historic painters of Venice.

The work of Bellini must on no account be forgotten before we leave the subject of{48} Venetian art. His “Madonna Enthroned” is in the Academy, among other of the masterpieces of his brush; and one of his most exquisite paintings is in the Church of the Friari.

Let us also remember the splendid treasures of the art of Carpaccio, as seen in the picture of “Saint Ursula” in the Academy, and in the delightful paintings of San Giorgio, which moved Ruskin to rapture.

The many churches of Venice contain pictures of supreme interest. Most of them are in a poor light, and can only be examined with difficulty. San Zanipolo is a church of Gothic design, built by the Dominicans, abounding in tombs and monuments. San Zaccaria has Bellini’s altarpiece “The Madonna and Child.”

Many of the palaces, especially those of the Grand Canal, are exceedingly beautiful in design, whether the style is Renaissance or Byzantine-Romanesque. Among the oldest are the Palazzo Venier, the Palazzo Dona, and the Palazzo Mesto; while for elegance the following are notable: Dario, the three Foscari palaces, the Pesaro, the Turchi, and Ca d’ Oro, and the Loredan.

Some of these historic houses are associated{49} with men of genius of modern times. Wagner lived in the Palazzo Vendramin Calergi. In 1818 Byron resided in the Palazzo Mocenigo, and Browning occupied the Palazzo Rezzonico.

Robert Browning and his wife had a passionate love for Venice. As a young man the poet visited the city, and returned to England thrilled by his impressions. Mrs Bridell Fox, his friend, says that: “He used to illustrate his glowing descriptions of its beauties—the palaces, the sunsets, the moonrises, by a most original kind of etching. Taking up a bit of stray notepaper, he would hold it over a lighted candle, moving the paper about gently till it was cloudily smoked over, and then utilising the darker smears for clouds, shadows, water, or what not, would etch with a dry pen the forms of lights on cloud and palace, on bridge or gondola, on the vague and dreamy surface he had produced.”

William Sharp—from whose “Life of Browning” I cull the passage just quoted—tells us that his friend selected the palace on the Grand Canal as a corner for his old age. Browning was “never happier, more sanguine, more joyous than here. He worked for three or four hours each morning, walked daily for{50} about two hours, crossed occasionally to the Lido with his sister, and in the evenings visited friends or went to the opera.”

In 1889 Robert Browning died in Venice, on a December night, as “the great bell of San Marco struck ten.” He had just received news of the success of his “Asolando.” The poet was honoured in the city by a splendid and solemn funeral procession of black-draped gondolas, following the boat that held his body. Would he not have chosen to die in the Venice that he loved with such intense fervour?

Among the statuary in the streets is the image of Bartolomeo Colleoni on horseback, “I do not believe that there is a more glorious work of sculpture existing in the world,” writes Ruskin of this statue, which stands in front of SS. Giovanni e Paolo. In the Piazzetta by the Palace of the Doges are the two columns, which everyone associates with Venice, bearing images of the flying lion of St Mark, and of St Theodore treading upon a crocodile.

One other public building must be seen by the visitor. This is the beautiful library opposite the Doge’s Palace, an edifice that John Addington Symonds praises as one of the chief achievements of Venetian artists. The cathedral,{51} the ducal palace, the library, and the Academy of Arts are certainly four impressive and splendid buildings.

If you have seen the old roofed bridge that spans the river at the head of the Lake of Lucerne, you will have an impression of the famous Rialto of Venice. The historic bridge is charged with memories of the days when “Venice sate in state throned on her hundred isles,” and citizens asked of one another, in the words of Solanio, in The Merchant of Venice. “Now, what news on the Rialto?” The bridge is mediæval in aspect, and romantic in its associations. You cannot lounge there without an apparition of Shylock, raving at the loss of the diamond that cost him two thousand ducats in Frankfort.

All around this “Queen of Cities” are places of supreme interest to the student of architecture and the lover of natural beauty. Padua, and Vicenza, with its rare monuments of Palladio, Murano, Torcello, and other towns and villages with histories are within access of Venice. But do not hasten from Venezia. It is a town in which one should roam and loiter for long days.{52}

PERUGIA

A WHITE town, perched high on a bleak hill, is one’s first impression of Perugia. The position of the capital of Umbria is menacing, and without any confirmation of history, one surmises that this was once a Roman fortified town. After being built and held by the Etruscans, Perugia was taken by the Roman host, and called Augusta Perusia. For centuries the town was the terror of Umbria. Its citizens appear to have been a superior order of bold banditti, continually making raids on the surrounding towns and villages, and returning with spoil.

Mediæval traditions of Perugia are a romance of battle within and without the town. At one time one faction held sway, at another a rival faction gained the upper hand, and the natives spent much time and energy in endeavouring to kill one another. The story is perhaps more melodramatic than tragic. It reads almost like a novel of sensational episodes, related by{53} a fertile and imaginative writer in order to thrill his readers.

Pope Paul III. was the subduer of Perugia. He dominated the town with a citadel, now destroyed, and broke the power of its martial inhabitants with the sword and the chain.

The surroundings of the town are bare, except for the olive groves which give a cold green to a landscape somewhat devoid of warm colouring. You either climb tediously up a long hill to the city, or ascend in an incongruous electric tramcar. Entering the place, the chances are that your sense of smell will be affronted somewhat rudely, for Perugia is not very modern in its sanitary system.

Assisi is seen in the distance, bleached on its slope, and there are far-off prospects of high mountains. The Prefeturra terrace is over sixteen hundred feet above the sea, and is a fine view-point.

The setting of Perugia makes no appeal to the lover of sylvan charms. It stands on an arid height, constantly attacked by the wind, and in dry weather the town is very dusty. But there is hardly a narrow street nor a corner without quaintness and beauty for the eye that can appreciate them. Almost every{54}where are glimpses of elegant spires and tall belfries.

The cathedral, dedicated to San Lorenzo, is a fourteenth-century edifice, with an aged aspect, and not much beauty in its decorations. In the Chapel of San Bernardino is “The Descent from the Cross,” by Baroccio. This artist was a follower of Coreggio, fervent in his piety, and devoted to his art. He was born in Urbino, and painted several pictures in Rome. The example in the cathedral is one of his best-known paintings. Signorelli designed an altarpiece for this church. Three popes were buried here, Innocent III., Urban IV., and Martin IV.

Close to San Lorenzo is the Canonica, a palace of the popes, a huge, heavy building. The fortress-like Palazzo Pubblico is still used as the town hall. Its history is stirring. Many trials have been held in its halls, and we read that culprits were sometimes hurled to death from one of the windows.

The upper part of the Palazzo is a gallery of paintings, the works representing the Umbrian School. Here we may study Perugino, Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, Bonfigli, and other masters of the fifteenth century. Perugino instituted a school of painting in the town. In the Sistine Chapel,{55} in Florence, we may see some of his frescoes. We shall see presently examples of his works in other buildings in Perugia.

Fiorenzo di Lorenzo, Bonfigli, and Pinturicchio are represented in the secular buildings and churches of the town. An altarpiece by Giannicola, one of Perugino’s pupils, should be noticed.

But perhaps the most important of the paintings are Fra Angelico’s “Madonna and Saints,” “Miracles of San Nicholas,” and “The Annunciation.”

Perugino’s frescoes in the Exchange (Collegio del Cambio) are very beautiful, depicting the virtues of illustrious Greeks and Romans.

“Perugino’s landscape backgrounds,” writes Mr Robert Clermont Witt, in “How to look at Pictures,” “with their steep blue slopes and winding valleys are as truly representative of the hill country about Perugia as are Constable’s leafy lanes and homesteads of his beloved eastern counties.”

In the museum of the University, we shall find a number of antiquities of pre-Roman and Roman times. The Church of San Severo must be visited, for it contains a priceless early work by Raphael.{56}

The Piazzi del Municipio was the scene of many conflicts in the troublous days of Perugia. Here the austere Bernardino used to preach, and here were held the pageants of the popes upon their visits to the town. Around this piazzi is a network of narrow, ancient thoroughfares, with many curious houses.

The Piazzi Sopramuro is one of the oldest parts of the town. In this vicinity is the ornate, massive Church of San Domenico, with a magnificent window, and the Decorated monument of Benedict XI.

Passing through the Porta San Pietro, we approach the Church of San Pietro, considered to be the oldest sacred building in the town. It has a splendidly ornamented choir, and in the sacristy are some remarkable works of Perugino. The belfry of this church is of very graceful design.

About three miles from Perugia, towards Assisi, are some Etruscan tombs, with buried chambers, a vestibule, and several statues. This monument is of deep interest. It is a family cemetery of great antiquity, and the carvings are of exquisite art.{57}

FLORENCE

Firenze la bella, the pride of its natives, the dream of poet and painter and the delight of a multitude of travellers, lies amid graceful hills, clothed with olive gardens and dotted with white villas. In the clear distance are the splendid Apennines. Climb to the terrace of San Miniato, and you will gain a wide general view of this great and beautiful city of culture and the arts. The wonderful campanile of Giotto rises above the surrounding buildings, rivalling the height of the cathedral; the sunlight glows on dome and tower, and the valleys and glens lie in deep shadow, stretching away to the slopes of the mountains.

Very lovely, too, is the prospect from the Boboli Gardens, and finer still the outlook from Fiesole, whence the eye surveys the Cathedral, the Baptistery, the Campanile, the noble churches of Bruneschi, the Pitti Palace, and many fair buildings of the Middle Ages.

Gazing over Florence from one of the elevations of the environs, a vast pageant of history{58} seems revealed, and men of illustrious name pass in long procession in the vision of the mind. How numerous are the great thinkers and artists associated with the city from Savonarola to the Brownings! We recall Dante, Giotto, Boccaccio, Michael Angelo—the roll seems inexhaustible. Almost all the famous men of Italy are connected with the culture-history and the political annals of Florence. The city inspires and holds us with a spell; we are impelled to wander day after day in the narrow streets, to linger in the fragrant gardens, to roam in the luxuriant valleys of the surrounding country, and to climb the hill of classic Fiesole.

Rich and beautiful is the scenery between Florence and Bologna, with its glimpses of the savage Apennines. The glen of Vallombrosa is one of the loveliest spots in the vicinity, where the old monastery broods amid beech and chestnut-trees. It was this scene that Milton recalled when he wrote the lines:

FLORENCE.
PONTE SANTA TRINITA, 1832.

The history of the city is of abundant interest. Florence was probably an important station in the days of the Roman Triumviri. Totila{59} the Goth besieged and destroyed the town, and Charlemagne restored it two hundred and fifty years later. Machiavelli states that from 1215 Florence was the seat of the ruling power in Italy, the descendants of Charles the Great governing here until the time of the German emperors. In the struggle between the Church and the State, the city took sides with the popular party for the time being. There were, however, constant factions within Florence, due to the quarrels of the Buondelmonti and Uberti families. Frederick II. favoured the Uberti cause, and with his help, the Buondelmontis were expelled. Then came the remarkable period of the Guelfs and the Ghibellines, the former standing for the Pope, and the latter siding with the Emperor. Florence favoured the Guelfs, and the Ghibellines resolved to destroy the city; but the Guelf party again won ascendancy in Florence. The trouble was, however, not at an end. For years Florence was disturbed by the conflicting aims of these intriguing parties.

Grandees and commoners warred in Florence in the fourteenth century, and efforts were made by the aristocratic rulers to curtail the liberties of the people. This was frustrated by the{60} commoners, and the government was reformed on a more democratic basis. Peace followed during a period of about ten years, but calamity befell Florence in the form of the pestilence described by Boccaccio. Ninety-six thousand persons are said to have died from the ravages of this plague.

As early as the twelfth century there were many signs in Florence of intellectual liberty. The doctrine of the eternity of matter was openly discussed, and on to the days of Savonarola civilising forces were at work in this centre of culture.

Girolamo Savonarola arose at the end of the fifteenth century, and his reforming influence soon spread through Italy. “The church is shaken to its foundations,” he cries. “No more are the prophets remembered, the apostles are no longer reverenced, the columns of the church strew the ground because the foundations are destroyed—in other words because the evangelists are rejected.” Such heresy as this brought Savonarola to the stake.

Greater among the mighty of Florence was Dante, born in a memorable age of art and invention. “The Vita Nuova,” inspired by the gentle damsel, Beatrice, was written when Dante{61} had met his divinity at a May feast given by her father, Folco Portinari, one of the chief citizens of Florence. Beatrice died in 1290 at the age of twenty-four. Boccaccio states that the poet married Gemma Donati about a year after the death of Beatrice. Dante died in 1321, and was buried in Ravenna.

For me the chief appeal in Seville, Antwerp, or any old Continental town is in the human associations. In Florence, roaming in the ancient quarters, the figure of Dante, made so familiar by many paintings, arises with but little effort of the imagination, for the streets have not greatly changed in aspect since his day. The atmosphere remains mediæval.

Can we not see the moody poet, driven from his high estate by the quarrels of the ruling houses, pacing the alleys, repeating to himself: “How hard is the path!” Can we not picture him in company with Petrarch, who, after the merry-making in the palace, remarked that the wise poet was quite eclipsed by the mountebanks who capered before the guests? And do we not hear Dante’s muttered “Like to like!”

Two great English poets, Chaucer and Milton, made journeys to Florence.

Giovanni Boccaccio was born in 1313, in{62} Certaldo, a small town some leagues from Florence. He spent a few years in France and in the south of Italy, returning to Florence at the age of twenty-eight. Boccaccio was the close friend and the biographer of Dante, and a contemporary of Petrarch.

In the time of Lorenzo de Medici, Florence was a prosperous city and a seat of learning. Machiavelli writes of Lorenzo: “The chief aim of his policy was to maintain the city in ease, the people united, and the nobles honoured. He had a marvellous liking for every man who excelled in any branch of art. He favoured the learned, as Messer Agnola da Montepulciano, Messer Cristofano Landini, and Messer Demetrio; the Greek can bear sure testimony whence it came that the Count Giovanni della Mirandola, a man almost divine, withdrew himself from all the other countries of Europe through which he had travelled, and attracted by the munificence of Lorenzo, took up his abode in Florence. In architecture, music, and poetry, he took extraordinary delight.... Never was there any man, not in Florence merely, but in all Italy, who died with such a name for prudence, or whose loss was so much mourned by his country.{63}”

Machiavelli, the Florentine historian, lived for a while in retirement in the outskirts of Florence. We may gain a little insight into his character and tastes from a passage in one of his letters in which he mentions that it was his custom to repair to the tavern every afternoon, clad in rustic garments, where he played cards with a miller, a butcher and a lime-maker. In the evening he dressed himself in the clothes that he wore in town and at court, and communed with the spirits of the “illustrious dead” in the volumes of his library.

Over the entrance to the Casa Guidi is the inscription: “Here wrote and died Elizabeth Barrett Browning, who, in the heart of a woman, combined the learning of a scholar and the genius of a poet. By her verse she wrought a golden ring connecting Italy and England. Grateful Florence erected this memorial in 1861.”

Mrs Browning passed away in the Casa Guidi just before dawn, in June 1861. Her remains lie in the beautiful grounds of the Protestant cemetery.

Fierce old Walter Savage Landor lived for a time in Florence, and for a longer period in Fiesole, where the Brownings often visited{64} him. Swinburne came just before Landor’s death to see the poet.

Shelley was in Florence in 1819. A son was born to him here, and he records the event in a letter to Leigh Hunt. The poet writes of the Cascine Gardens, where he loved to walk and to gaze upon the Arno. Florence seems to have impressed Shelley almost as powerfully as Rome. “Florence itself,” he writes upon a first visit, “that is the Lung Arno (for I have seen no more) I think is the most beautiful city I have yet seen.” With this tribute from the poet, we will begin our survey of Florence.

In a magnificent square stands the cathedral, the baptistery, and the belfry. The oldest of the edifices is the baptistery, reared on the ground whereon stood a temple of Mars. Parts of the building are said to date from the seventh century. The glories of the baptistery are many, but perhaps the most appealing of the external decorations are the reliefs of the bronze door, which Michael Angelo so greatly admired. They illustrate scenes from the life of John the Baptist. The exterior of the Duomo or cathedral is the work of several great artists, including Giotto and{65} Andrea Pisano. A modern façade was added in 1875-1887.

The Porta della Mandoria, one of the most beautiful doorways in existence, is surmounted by a mosaic of Ghirlandaio, “The Annunciation.” There is not much to claim attention within the cathedral, except Michael Angelo’s incomplete and last work, the “Pieta,” behind the chief altar, a statue of Boniface VIII., and a painting of Dante reading his “Divina Commedia,” by Michelino. Savonarola preached in this church.

The triumph of Giotto, the famed Campanile, adjoins the duomo. The work was begun in 1335, and the structure and its decorations are a superb achievement of Giotto’s genius. Ruskin has written a glowing passage upon this wonderful example of “Power and Beauty” in decorative architecture. The edifice is of variously coloured marbles, adorned with splendid bas-reliefs, depicting the growth of industry and art in many ages. Another set of bas-reliefs represent Scriptural scenes. The statues are the work of Rosso and Donatello.

Giotto was born in the neighbourhood of Florence, and died in the city. He was the friend of Dante, who wrote an eulogy upon his supremacy as a painter. The bell-tower of{66} Florence is his finest work in architecture and the most treasured of all the monuments in the city.

Fra Angelico is intimately associated with Florence, and many of his pictures are preserved in the city. He was born in the vicinity of Florence, near the birthplace of Giotto. Vasari says: “Fra Giovanni was a man of simple and blameless life. He shunned the world, with all its temptations, and during his pure and simple life was such a friend to the poor that I think his soul must now be in heaven. He painted incessantly, but would never represent any other than a sacred subject. He might have been rich, but he scorned it, saying that true riches consisted in being content to be poor.”

The Academy of Arts in Florence contains many of Fra Angelico’s masterpieces. There are six of his paintings in the Uffizi Palace, and several in the Convent of San Marco. In this collection of pictures are numerous works of the fourteenth and fifteenth century painters, all claiming diligent study.

The Uffizi Palace and the Pitti Palace are rich storehouses of some of the most famous of the world’s pictures, and of several great statues. The chief pictures cannot even be{67} enumerated. Let me only mention Raphael’s “Madonna and Child,” Michael Angelo’s “Holy Family,” Titian’s “Venus,” Durer’s “Adoration of the Magi,” Andrea del Sarto’s “Assumption,” Ruben’s “Terrors of Wars,” and Velazquez’s “Philip IV.” These are but few indeed of the treasures of these two noble palaces of art.

The wonderful Venus de Medici, one of the greatest of classic works of art, is in this collection. In the seventeenth century the statue was unearthed in the villa of Hadrian, near Tivoli. It was in eleven pieces, and it was repaired and set up in the Medici Palace at Rome. In 1680 Cosmo III. had the treasure removed to the Imperial Palace at Florence.

In the north-eastern part of the city there are three buildings of historical interest. One is the Church of Santissima Annunziata, founded in the thirteenth century, but restored in modern times. Here will be seen sacred pictures by Andrea del Sarto, in the court, while in the cloisters is the “Madonna del Sacco.” The tomb of Benvenuto Cellini is here.

San Marco is now a repository of works of art. It was the monastery of Savonarola, and the edifice is haunted with the spirit of the zealous reformer. The fine frescoes by Fra Angelico{68} adorn the cloisters, and in the chapter house is his “Crucifixion,” one of the largest of the friar’s pictures.

Three of the cells were inhabited at different times by Savonarola, and contain memorials of the pious ascetic, a coat of penance, a crucifix, and religious volumes.

Sir Martin Conway writes, in “Early Tuscan Art”: “In Savonarola’s cell there hangs a relic of no small interest—the handiwork of Fra Angelico himself. It is stowed away in so dark a corner that one can hardly see it. Eyes accustomed to the gloom discover a small picture of the crucified Christ, painted on a simple piece of white stuff. When the great preacher mounted the pulpit, this banner was borne before him. In those impassioned appeals of his, that electrified for a time the people of Florence, collected in crowded silence within the vast area of the newly finished cathedral, it was to this very symbol of his faith that he was wont to point, whereon are written the now faded words, Nos predicamus Christum crucifixum.”

In the church of San Marco are the tombs of Sant Antonino and the learned Pico della Mirandola.

Among the other churches of note is Santa Trinita, originally an example of the art of Niccolo{69} Pisano, but it has been modernised. It contains a monument by Luca della Robbia, and some splendid mural paintings, depicting the career of St Francis, by Ghirlando. There are more paintings by this master in the Franciscan church of Ognissanti.

Santa Croce is a great burial-place, rich in monuments of illustrious Florentines. Michael Angelo’s tomb is here, and near to it is the resting-place of Galileo. A monument to Dante, the tomb of Alfieri, by Canova, the memorials of Machiavelli, Aretino, Cherubino, and many others are in this building. My necessarily scanty description of the splendours of this church are offered with an apology for want of fuller space to describe them.

Donatello’s “Crucifixion” is in the north transept, and the Capella Peruzzi and the Capella Bardi are decorated with frescoes by Giotto. Agnolo Gaddi’s paintings are in the choir. Reluctantly, one leaves this great treasure-house. A mere catalogue of its works of art would fill pages.

We have glanced at two of the palaces. Let us now visit the stern Palazzo Vecchio, once the Senate House of the city. The building dates from the thirteenth century, and was the home{70} of the Medici. Verrochio’s fountain beautifies one of the courts. Inside the palazzo are mural paintings by Ghirlando.

Another of the interesting buildings is the Bargello, an important museum. Michael Angelo’s “Dying Adonis” and “Victory” are in the court, and there are more works of the great artist within. Dante lectured in one of the halls of the Bargello. Benvenuto Cellini’s design for “Perseus” is in one of the rooms, and there are reliefs by Della Robbia.

The Riccardi Palace is redolent with memories of Lorenzo. It stands in the Piazza San Lorenzo, and in the same square is the church named after him, containing some very beautiful monuments. Donatello was buried here, and a stone marks the grave of Cosimo de Medici. Lippo Lippi’s “Annunciation,” and Michael Angelo’s works are the glories of this church. The New Sacristy contains Angelo’s “Day and Night” over the tomb of Giuliano Medici, and that of Lorenzo de Medici adorned with statues of “Dawn and Twilight.” These are among the most magnificent examples of Michael Angelo’s statuary.

Near to the railway station is the Church of Santa Maria Novella, a glorious specimen of{71} Gothic architecture, with a fine façade. In this church are paintings by Orcagna, Lippi, Cimabue Ghirlando, and other artists. The frescoes in the Strozzi Chapel, and the Spanish Chapel of this Dominican church are of great interest. Orcagna’s paintings in the Strozzi Chapel are of the fourteenth century. The chapel was dedicated to St Thomas Aquinas, who was greatly honoured by the Dominican order.

Modern Florence is a bright populous city, with wide main streets, squares, and pleasant gardens.{72}

VERONA

AMID surroundings of great beauty, in a northern corner of Italy, with a huge mountain barrier in the rear, and not far from the Lake of Garda, is the old city of Verona. Shakespeare called the place “fair Verona,” and made it the scene of Romeo and Juliet, while the city is again the background of drama in The Two Gentlemen of Verona.

VERONA, 1830.

Shall we not see, leaning from one of the old balconies, the lovely Juliet? Do Romeo, Mercutio, and Benvolio no longer roam these twisted ancient streets? And where shall we find Julia and Lucetta, and Valentine, and smile at the pleasantries of Launce, with his dog, Crab, on a leash? Shakespeare has peopled these courts and cloisters for us with characters that we knew when we were young. We resent the bare hint that there never were in Verona a fervent youth named Romeo and a gentle maid called Juliet. Verona is the home of Romeo and Juliet, and for this we have{73} known the town since we first turned the magic pages of Shakespeare.

One wishes that there were a better word than “picturesque.” How hackneyed seem adjectives and phrases in describing these old towns. Verona then is very beautiful; it is certainly one of the loveliest cities of Europe, both in its surroundings and within its confines. You will not soon tire of the Piazza della Erbe, with the flying lion on its column, the charming fountain, and the stately Municipio. Here you will watch the life of Verona of to-day, and reflect that it has not wholly changed since the time of the Scaligers, the mighty rulers of the city. There is, of course, the modern note. But the old buildings stand, and in their shade people in the dress of olden days pass continually. It is inspiring and a trifle unreal when the moon lights the square, and the silence of night lends mystery to the scene.

In Verona everyone strives to live and work in the open air. The streets are thronged on days of market, stalls are set up in the narrow lanes and in the piazzas, vegetables and fruit come in great store. The eternal garlic scents the street, but we learn to love its odour. In Spain a market is quiet and solemn; here the sce{74}ne is gay and noisy. Voices are raised, and there is lively bartering of wares. There are subjects at every turn for the brush of the painter—stern old buildings, winding alleys, and groups of garishly dressed peasants.

Diocletian’s glorious amphitheatre is the chief wonder of Verona. Few Roman monuments are so well preserved; the lower arches are almost perfect, and the stonework has been restored.

Great gladiators fought here during hundreds of centuries. The tiers had thousands of seats for spectators of all classes; and in later times the knights of chivalry contended in the circus. There is a fine view from the highest tier, overlooking the city and the varied landscape.

The structure is of a dull red marble, and signs of decay have been removed by repeated restoration, for the people of Verona take great pride in this monument. “The amphitheatre,” writes Goethe, “is the first important monument of the old times that I have seen—and how well it is preserved!”

Fra Giaconda designed the Palazza del Consiglio, and his fine arches and statuary deserve close inspection. The Tribunale and the Palazza della Ragione, both interesting,{75} should be visited; the tombs of Scaligers in the Tribunale are Gothic work of great beauty.

There are several important churches in the city. The cathedral was begun in the twelfth century, and is adorned with a number of exterior images and reliefs. One of the chief works of the interior is Titian’s “Assumption.” San Zeno Maggiore has a beautiful façade, with Theodoric the Goth as one of the carvings, and a doorway of noble decorations. The interior of this church is very impressive.

The Church of Sant Anastasia dates from the thirteenth century, and is one of the most striking buildings in Verona. In the Cavilli Chapel are some old frescoes, and there is a splendid statue of the last of the Scaliger rulers, Cortesia Sarega, on horseback.

San Giorgio has some famous paintings. Let us inspect first the great picture of Paolo Veronese, “The Martyrdom of St George.” Paolo Caliari, born in 1528, was a native of Verona, and came to be known as “The Veronese.” His model was Titian, and he excelled in colour effects, and in the brilliance of his scenes. Several of his chief works are in Venice, but the{76} example in this church is considered one of his greatest achievements. More of his pictures will be seen in the gallery of the Pompeii Palace. The art of Paolo Veronese appealed strongly to Goethe, who admired more than all his work in portraiture.

Jacopo Robusti, called Tintoretto, was the founder of the Venetian School. Like Veronese, he followed the method of Titian. He was a prolific painter. Venice abounds in his works, and there are several of his paintings in Verona. In San Giorgio is “The Baptism of Christ,” and Goethe refers to one of this artist’s pictures, called “A Paradise,” in the Bevilague Palace.

One of the finest works of Mantegna is in Verona. This is the altarpiece “The Madonna with Angels and Saints,” in the Church of San Zeno. The figures and features of the Virgin are very beautifully presented. Mantegna was by birth a Paduan, but he worked chiefly in Mantua. His magnificent cartoons, painted for a palace at Mantua, are now in the Hampton Court Gallery, England.

In the Church of Santa Maria in Organo there are some fresco paintings by Morone, depicting a Madonna accompanied by St Augustine{77} and St Thomas Aquinas. Dr Kugler, in his “History of Painting,” says that there is a “Madonna” by that painter in a house beyond the Ponta delle Navi in Verona.

Fra Giovanni designed the choir stalls in this church, and executed other decorations during his sojourn in the monastery of Verona.

From Santa Maria we may turn into the beautiful old Giusti Gardens, with their shady walks, their wealth of verdure, and ancient cypress-trees.

Besides the pictures in the churches, there is a collection of paintings in the picture gallery of the Palazzo Pompei. Here will be found examples of Paolo Veronese and other notable artists of his day. One of the Veronese School here represented is Girolomo dai Libri, who was a follower of Mantegna. His work is of a deeply religious character, and merits careful study.

The Church of San Fermo Maggiore should be seen for its handsome Gothic architecture, both in the exterior and interior.

There are one or two relics of the Roman period in the history of Verona, besides the splendid amphitheatre. The most noteworthy are the two gateways, the Arco dei Leoni, and the Porta dei Borsari.{78}

A. E. Freeman, the historian, has admirably described the variety of interest in this old town: “There is the classic Verona, the Verona of Catullus and Pliny; there is the Verona of the Nibelungen, the Bern of Theodoric; there is the mediæval Verona, the Verona of commonwealths and tyrants; the Verona of Eccelius and Can Grande; and there is the Verona of later times, under Venetian, French, and Austrian bondage, the Verona of congresses and fortifications.{79}”

SEVILLE

A HOUSE in Seville is the reward of those beloved by the gods. In Toledo you are made reflective, perchance a little melancholy, while in Granada you are infected by the spirit of a past long dead. But in fair, sunlit Seville you live in the present as well as in the past; and your heart is made light by the pervasive gaiety of the people and the cheerfulness of the streets and plazas.

Climb the beautiful Giralda—the brown tower of the Moors that rises above the cathedral dome—and look around upon the vegas, and away to the blue mountains of the horizon, and you will know why Borrow was moved to shed “tears of rapture,” when he gazed upon this delightful land of the Blessed Virgin and the happy city, with its minarets, its palm-shaded squares, its luxuriant gardens, and broad stream, winding between green banks to the distant marshes, where rice and cotton grow, and the flamingo and heron fly over sparkling lagoons amid a tropical jungle.{80}

Seville in spring is gay to hilarity. The great fair and the Easter ceremonials and fêtes attract thousands to the capital of Andalusia at the season when the banks of the Guadalquivir are white with the bloom of the orange-trees, and hundreds of nightingales make the evening breezes melodious; when the heat is bearable, the sky a deep azure, and the whole town festive, and bright with the costumes of many provinces. No blight of east wind depresses in early spring, and rarely indeed is the promise of roses and fruit threatened by frost in this region of perennial mildness and sunlight. “Only once have I seen ice in Seville,” said to me a middle-aged native of the place. It is only the winter floods, those great avenidas, that are dreaded in Seville; for now and then the river swells out of normal bounds, and spreads into the streets and alleys.

SEVILLE, 1836.
PLAZA REAL AND PROCESSION OF THE CORPUS CHRISTI.

Seville is a white city in most of its modern parts. Lime-wash is used profusely everywhere, and the effect is cool and cleanly; but we wish sometimes that the natural colour of the stonework had been left free from the brocha del blanquedor, or the whitewasher’s brush. Nevertheless, this whiteness hides dirt and dinginess. There are no squalid slums in{81} Seville. The poor are there in swarms, but their poverty is not ugly and obvious, and for the greater part they are clad in cotton that is often washed.

This is the town of beautiful southern doñas: the true types of Andalusian loveliness may be seen here in the park, on the promenade, and at the services in the cathedral—women with black or white mantillas, olive or pale in complexion, with full, dark eyes, copious raven hair, short and rather plump in form, but always charming in their carriage. More picturesque and often more lovely in features are the working girls, those vivacious, intelligent daughters of the people, whose dark hair is adorned with a carnation or a rose.

The lightheartedness of Seville has expression in music, dancing, and merry forgatherings each evening in the patios, when the guitar murmurs sweetly, and the click of the castanets sets the blood tingling. Everyone in Seville dances. The children dance almost as soon as they learn to toddle. In the cafés you will see the nimblest dancers of Spain, and follow the intricate movements of the bolero, as well as the curious swaying and posturings of the older Moorish dances. These strange dramatic dances{82} must be seen, and to witness them you should visit the Novedades at the end of Calle de las Sierpes.

Fashionable Seville delights in driving, and some of the wealthiest residents drive a team of gaily-decked, sleek-coated mules, with bells jangling on their bridles. Beautiful horses with Arab blood may be seen here. Even the asses are well-bred and big. But one sees also many ill-fed and sadly over-driven horses and mules. These people, so affectionate in their family life, so kindly in their entertainment of foreigners, and so graciously good-natured, have not yet learned one of the last lessons of humane civilisation—compassion for the animals that serve them.

Society in Seville takes its pleasure seriously, but the seriousness is not the dullness that attends the Englishman’s attempts at hilarity. The Spaniard is less demonstrative than the Frenchman, less mercurial than the Italian. Notwithstanding, the crowd at the races, at the battle of flowers, or watching the religious processions, or at the opera, is happy in its quiet intentness. The enthusiasm for bullfighting is perhaps the strongest visible emotion in Seville, the Alma Mater of the champions of the arena.{83} At the corrida the Sevillian allows himself to become excited. He loses his restraint, he shouts himself hoarse, waves his hat, and thrashes the wooden seats with his cane in the ecstasy of his delight, when a great performer plunges his sword into the vital spot of the furious bull that tears the earth with its foot, and prepares for a charge.

Bullfights, gorgeous ecclesiastic spectacles, and dancing—these are the recreations of rich and poor alike in Seville to-day. In this city of pleasure you will see the majo, the Andalusian dandy, as he struts up and down the Sierpes—the only busy street of shops—spruce, self-conscious, casting fervent glances at the señoras accompanied by their duennas. Go into the meaner alleys and market streets, and you will see the very vagrants that Murillo painted, tattered wastrels who address one another as Señor, and hold licences to beg. Cross the Bridge of Isabella to the suburb of Triana, and you will find a mixed and curious population of mendicants, thieves, desperadoes, and a colony of Gitanos, who live by clipping horses, hawking, fortune-telling, dancing and begging.

Peep through the delicate trellises of the Moorish gates of the patios, and you will see{84} fountains, and flowers, and palms, and the slender columns supporting galleries, as in the Alhambra and other ancient buildings. Very delightful are these cool courtyards, with their canvas screens, ensuring shade at noonday, their splash of water, and their scent of roses clustering on columns and clothing walls. Some of these courtyards are open to the visitor, and one of the finest is the Casa de Pilatos in the Plaza de Pilatos.

A pleasant garden within a court is that of my friend, Don J. Lopez-Cepero, who lives in the old house of Murillo, and allows the stranger to see his fine collection of pictures. Here Murillo died, in 1682, and some of his paintings are treasured in the gallery. The house is Number Seven, Plaza de Alfaro.

We will now survey the Seville of olden days. No traces remain of Seville’s earliest epochs. The Phœnician traditions are vague, and we know little indeed of the Hispolo of the Greeks, a town which was supposed to have stood on this ground. The Romans came here, and called the town Julia Romula, and the remains of that age, if scanty, are deeply interesting. Italica, five miles from the city, is a Roman amphitheatre, with corridors, dens for the lions,{85} and some defined tiers of seats. At this great Roman station, Trajan, Hadrian, and Theodosius were born. For other vestiges of the Roman rule, we must visit the Museo Provincial, where there are capitals, statues, and busts. The Pillars of Hercules in the Alaméda are other monuments of this period of the history of Seville.

Vandals and Goths ravaged the Roman city. Then came Musâ, the Moor, who besieged Seville, and captured it, afterwards marrying the widow of the Gothic monarch. A succession of Moorish rulers governed the city for several hundred years. One of the greatest was Motamid II., under whose sway Seville became a prosperous and wealthy capital, with a vast population.

The Christians took the city in 1248, and expelled thousands of the Mohammedans. Under the Spanish kings, Seville remained, for a considerable spell, a royal city; and one of the most renowned of its Christian sovereigns was Pedro the Cruel, who, while democratic in some respects, was, on the other hand, a truculent tyrant. In administration he was jealous and energetic, and though called “The Cruel,” he has also been named “The Just.” Pedro lived{86} in the Alcázar, the old palace which we shall presently visit.

The monuments of the Moors in Seville are numerous. In the Alcázar are courts of resplendent beauty, gilded and coloured in hundreds of fantastic designs; arcades with horseshoe arches and graceful columns, marble floors, fountains, and richly decorated doorways. The Giralda, which is seen from many open spaces in the city, is a magnificent specimen of the minaret, dating from 1184; and this tower, and the adjoining Court of the Oranges, are parts of an ancient mosque. The lower portion of the Golden Tower, by the Guadalquivir, was built by the Moors. Many of the churches are built in the Mudéjar, or late Moorish style, and most of them have elegant minarets, arched windows, and interior decorations of an Oriental character.

The power of Seville diminished under the domination of the Catholic kings, until the discovery of America by Cristoforo Colombo (Columbus), who sailed from the city on his bold expedition, and was welcomed with fervour upon his triumphal return. We think of the explorer setting forth for a second voyage, with vessels equipped at the cost of Isabella the{87} Catholic, who profited so liberally by the conquest of the New World, and we picture him in the days of neglect, when he suffered the lot of those who put their trust in the promises of princes. It was Columbus who made the Seville of the fifteenth century. The commercial importance of the city, after the expulsion of the Moors, was re-established through the great trade opened with America.

The fortunes of Seville at this period were bound up with those of the revered Queen Isabel. Shakespeare styled her “queen of earthly queens,” and Sir Francis Bacon praised her. She was tall, fair, and of most amiable bearing, and she possessed many of the qualities of one born to command. Unfortunately for Seville, the young queen was under the domination of Cardinal Mendoza, and of Torquemada. It was Torquemada who urged her to purify Spain from her heresy by means of torture and the flame. Let it be said that Isabel did not comply willingly, and that she strove more than once to check the cruelties of the Holy Office. The first to suffer from the Inquisition in Seville were the Jews; then followed a long and bitter persecution of heretics of the Protes{88}tant faith, and a reign of terror among men of learning.

The Chapel of the Alcázar was built in the time of Isabel, and her bedroom is still to be seen.

Charles V. loved the retirement of the Alcázar, and his marriage with Isabella of Portugal was celebrated in the gorgeous Hall of the Ambassadors. He made several additions to the palace, and directed the planning of the exquisite gardens. Philip V. lived here for a time, and he also caused alterations, and added to the curious mixture of buildings within the walls of the Moorish palace.

There are so few signs of commercialism in the city that we gain an impression that Seville only lives to amuse itself, and to entertain its host of visitors. There are, however, industries of many kinds, and a considerable export trade in various ores, in olive oil, fruit, wine, and wool. The population is over one-hundred-and-fifty thousand. There are several factories, and many craftsmen working in their homes.

The illustrious natives are numerous. Velazquez, the greatest painter of Spain, if not of the world, was born here in 1599. Murillo was a Sevillian, and so were the artists Pacheco, Herrera, and Roelas, and the sculptor, Montañez.{89} Lope de Rueda, one of the earliest Spanish dramatists, lived here. Cervantes spent a part of his life in Seville, and described the characters of the Macarena Quarter in his shorter tales.

The house of the gifted Dean Pacheco, in Seville, was the resort of many artists and notable men. This painter and cleric is chiefly remembered as the teacher of Velazquez. He wrote discourses on the art of painting, and trained a number of the Sevillian artists. The art of Murillo was influenced by Juan del Castillo, who also taught Alonso Cano. Castillo was born in Seville.

Francisco Herrera, born in 1622, studied in Rome, and upon his return to Spain painted many pictures in Madrid. The Cordovan painter, Juan Valdés Leal, lived for many years in Seville, and worked with Murillo to establish an academy of painting in the city. There are many specimens of his art in Seville. Juan de las Roelas was a Sevillian by birth (1558-1625) and his “Santiago destroying the Moors” is in the chapter of the cathedral, while many of the churches contain his pictures.

The Provincial Museum has an instructive collection of paintings of the Andalusian School{90} as well as the works of many artists of other traditions. Murillo is represented by several paintings. There are some fine examples of the art of Zurbaran, a sombre and realistic artist whose work conveys the mediæval spirit of Spain, and is esteemed by many students as more sincere than the art of Murillo. His finest pictures are, perhaps, “San Hugo visiting the Monks,” “The Virgin of Las Cuevas,” and “St Bruno conversing with Urban II.”

In the Museo is a portrait by El Greco, supposed erroneously to be the painter himself. This is often appraised as the chief treasure of the collection. Among the most admirable of the Spanish primitive painters is Alejo Fernandez, whose work is to be seen in the cathedral, in the churches of Seville and Triana. Fernandez is scarcely known out of Spain, but art students will delight in his work, and everyone should see the beautiful “Madonna and Child” in the Church of Santa Ana in Triana, and the large altarpiece in San Julian.

The sculpture of Montañez merits very careful attention. His figure of “St Bruno” stands in the Museo Provincial, and “St Dominic” is in the south transept. “The Virgin and Child{91}” and “John the Baptist” are in this collection. In the sacristy of the cathedral is Montañez’ “Statue of the Virgin.” This artist died in 1649, after a busy life. He carved many images for the Church, and founded a school of wood-carving. Among his pupils was the gifted Alonso Cano. The single figures by Montañez are considered finer art than his groups. Most of his effigies are lavishly coloured.

The cathedral is a magnificent building, the largest in Spain, and greater than St Paul’s in London. Gautier said that “Notre Dame de Paris might walk erect in the middle nave.” There are seven naves with monstrous columns, the loftiness of the interior conveying a sense of vastness which has been often described by travellers. More than a hundred years were spent in the building of this great church, and several architects planned the various parts during that period. Ruiz and Rodriguez designed the greater portion, and the last of the architects was Juan Gil de Houtañon, who planned the cathedral of Salamanca. The chief front is finely decorated, and has three portals, with statue groups and reliefs. There is so much of beauty and interest in the interior that I can only write briefly of a few of the most{92} notable objects. The stained windows number over seventy, and they are chiefly by Aleman, a German, and by Flemish artists of the sixteenth century. The choir altar has pictures, and a handsome plateresque screen. There are splendidly carved stalls, and a notable lectern. The sacristy is near the chief façade, with a high dome, several chapels, and some interesting statues. The retablo is by Roldan, a follower of Montañez.

Murillo’s “Vision of the Holy Child” is in the Capella del Bautisterio. In the Royal Chapel, which is interesting Renaissance work, richly ornamented, there are the tomb of Alfonso the Wise, and an old figure of the Virgin. Pedro Campaña’s altarpiece, in the Capilla del Mariscal, should be seen. In the south transept is the noted “La Gamba,” a painting by Luis de Vargas. The ornate Sala Capitular has the “Conception,” by Murillo, and a painting by Pablo de Céspedes, who was a sculptor, poet, and painter, born at Cordova, and made a canon of the cathedral in that city. Céspedes was a fine portrait painter, and has been described as “one of the best colourists of Spain.”

The Sacristy de las Calices of the Capilla de Nuestra Senora de las Dolores contains Goy{93}a’s well-known painting of Saints Justa and Rufina, the potter-girls who were martyred by the Romans. Here also will be seen a picture by Zurbaran; “The Trinity,” by El Greco, the crucifix carved by Montañez, and a “Guardian Angel,” by Murillo. The Capilla de Santiago has paintings by the early artists Valdés Leal and Juan de las Roelas.

Close to the cathedral is the semi-Moorish Alcázar, with its strangely mingled styles of architecture. The buildings are in part a fortress, while within the walls are portions of a palace of the sultans and a residence of Christian kings. The rich frontage of Pedro’s palace is composite, and probably only the gate is purely Moorish. In the Court of the Maidens there is much gorgeous decoration. As in the Alhambra, we see the characteristic gallery with delicate columns, and arches with ornamental inscriptions. The Hall of the Ambassadors is the pride of the Alcázar. Here again we shall notice several orders of architecture, but the effect is impressive. The portals are sumptuous, and the whole place and decorations suggest the opulence and might of the early Catholic kings.

I like the old gardens of the Alcázar, with their tiled walks, their clustering roses, their{94} alcoves and arbours, and quaint fountains, all enclosed by an ancient wall. Here sultans dreamed, and kings retired from the cares of government, to breathe the scented air of evening. Quiet reigns in these flowery courts, only the voices of birds are heard among the orange-trees and tangled roses.

There are many beautifully adorned chambers in this palace of delight. Alfonso, Pedro, Isabel, Charles, and Philip all reconstructed or added to the wonderful pile first erected by Yusuf. The old buildings once stretched to the river, the Golden Tower forming one of the defences. Before the Moors came to Seville, a Roman prætorium stood on this ground, and it was in 1181 that the Morisco architects began to plan the Alcázar. Much of the present building is of Mudéjar, or late Moorish, origin. The details that should be studied are the pillared windows, the marble columns, the fine stalactite frieze, the arches, the azulejos of dazzling colour, the choice decoration of the doors, the marble pavements, and the half-orange domes—all representative of the art of the Mudéjares.

We must now inspect some more of the monuments of Seville. King Pedro’s Church,{95} Omnium Sanctorium, is an example of mixed Christian and Mohammedan architecture, with a minaret and three portals. The Ayuntamiento is an exceedingly flamboyant building in the Plaza de la Constitucion, with two façades, one of them fronting the Plaza de San Fernando. The older and finer front was designed by Riaño.

The Archbishop’s Palace, which dates from the seventeenth century, is not a good example of the plateresque style. The only picture in Seville by Velazquez, a much restored canvas, is in the palace. The Lonja (Exchange) was built by Philip II., and finished about 1598. It is a square, imposing structure, but scarcely beautiful in form or decoration. A splendid doorway, very luxuriantly decorated, is that of the Palace of San Telmo, where there are very lovely gardens.

The modern life of Seville concentrates in the two principal plazas, in the Calle de las Sierpes, and in the Park of Maria Luisa. Very pleasant are the palm-shaded squares and the walks by the Guadalquivir. In the tortuous white alleys you come unexpectedly upon charming wrought-iron gates, through which you catch glimpses of cheerful patios.{96} Some of these lanes are so narrow that a pannier-mule almost bars your road. And above this fair city the sun shines almost perpetually, while the smokeless air has a wonderful clarity.{97}

CORDOVA

CORDOVA, like Seville and Granada, is a memorial of the Moors. It is a city that sleeps, living in the memory of its past.

Its history since the last of the sultans in Spain is comparatively uneventful, its glorious days were before the expulsion of the Morisco inhabitants, when the city was a seat of learning, a great centre of art and industry, and the place of residence of illustrious caliphs.

The somnolence of Cordova is like an eternal siesta. You wander in ancient streets, with houses guarded from the ardent rays of the sun, and marvel how the people live, for there is no outward sign, as in Seville, of commercial activity.

Yet the inhabitants who saunter in the Paseo del Gran Capitan, under the orange-trees, and flock to the bullfights, do not appear so “dull and ill-provided,” as O’Shea found them in 1868. There is even an air of prosperity among the residents, despite the long centuries of slumber. Nor does the aspect of the city convey an{98} impression of neglect. The houses are white and clean, the streets brighter than the thoroughfares of sombre Toledo, and the charming courtyards inviting and pleasant, with clustering roses and spreading palms. There is colour everywhere, Cordova is a painter’s paradise.

In summer the heat is extreme. The glare of the whitened houses reflects the brilliant sapphire of the sky, and becomes painful to the eyes; the city is in a plain, exposed to every ray of the Andalusian sun. To escape the enervating heat of summer, the wealthier inhabitants migrate to the uplands and the beautiful sierras, at whose base the city lies.

The country around Cordova is fertile. Olives, vines, and many fruit-trees flourished in the valley of the Guadalquivir, and on the foothills, and there are large tracts of pasture-land. Vegetables are grown in profusion. Before the time of the Moors, Cordova had repute for its succulent artichokes. On the grassy plains the Moorish settlers led great flocks of cattle, and here grazed the splendid horses of Arab breed, which were long famous throughout Spain.

CORDOVA, 1836.
THE PRISON OF THE INQUISITION.

But the immediate surroundings of the city are{99} almost treeless. Here and there a slope is clothed with olive-trees, and the broad paseos are shaded by young trees, newly planted; but the Spanish peasant, dreading the harbourage that woods afford to birds, ruthlessly fells and stubs up trees. For league upon league stretches a monotonous tract of grass, watered by sluggish yellow streams, upon whose banks grows the cold grey cactus.

Most English travellers reach Cordova by rail from Madrid or Seville. The journey from Madrid is by way of Alcazar and Linares, passing the wine-growing districts of Manzanares and Valdepeña, and crossing the waste territory of La Mancha, in which Don Quixote roamed in quest of knightly adventure. From Seville the rail journey occupies about four hours, and the line runs through a fairly cultivated track of Andalusia, following the Guadalquivir for the greater part of its course.

To the north of Cordova, some leagues away, stretch the grey-blue heights of the Sierra Morena, whence wild winds sweep the plain in winter. Between this range and the Sierra Nevada there are fertile districts, watered by the Genil and other streams. At Cordova the Guadalquivir is a wide, somewhat turgid stream,{100} washing the southern side of the town, around which it sweeps in a mighty circle. The rushing water is spanned by a great bridge of many arches, whose gateway, the Puerta del Puente, a Doric triumphal arch, erected by Philip II. on the site of the Moorish Bâb al-Kantara, gives entrance to the city. The bridge, with its sixteen arches, is Moorish, and stands on Roman foundations. This is one of the best points from which to view the city. The great mosque is seen well from here, and the city stretching away from the water’s edge, white-gleaming in the blaze of the sun, is beautiful and strangely suggestive. The rugged heights of the Sierra de Cordoba rise in the far distance; the water of the river tumbles and eddies in its wide bed. A little way up the stream are the Moorish mills that have stood unchanged through the centuries. This is the spot to learn the peace of sleeping Cordova. The history of Cordova dates back to the pre-Christian era: Corduba was the most important of the ancient Iberian cities. It was made a Roman settlement about 200 B.C., and later the city was extended, and under the name of Colonia Patricia was made the capital of Southern Spain. Always the history of the city has been a record of struggle and the shedding of blood.{101} There was a great massacre of the people in the time of Cæsar, through their allegiance to Pompey.

Cordova has been ruled by many masters. After the Romans, the city came into the possession of Goths, and from them it was captured by the Moors. Roderick the Goth was defeated by Tarik in 711, on the Guadelete River, and the valiant Mughith, one of Tarik’s commanders, was sent to Cordova with a force of horsemen. In a heavy hail shower, Mughith rode into Cordova, taking the natives by surprise, and capturing the town without resistance.

Ruled later by the caliphs of Damascus, Cordova became the centre of the Moorish dominion in Spain. In the tenth century, the city was in the height of its splendour and renown. For three centuries the Omeyyads held sway, and these rulers, descendants of the sovereign family of Damascus, vied with one another in enlarging and adorning the city. The three caliphs of the name of Abderahman were distinguished for their courage in their administrative capacity, and their love of the arts, and of learning. The last of the trio of great rulers, though brave, was described as “the mildest and most enlightened sovereign that ever ruled{102} a country.” Abderahman III. was, in every sense, a potent monarch. None of the caliphs who succeeded him equalled this wise and tactful Moor. Intrigues, factions, and treachery marked the reigns of his successors.

For a time Almanzor, the unconquerable minister, saved Cordova. The career of this man is witness to the romance which meets us so often in Spain; beginning his life as a professional letter-writer, he ended as sole ruler of an empire. Almanzor died in 1002, and from this time Cordova’s history is a monotonous record of revolt and disorder. Hisham III. was imprisoned in the great vault of the mosque, and the rule of the Omeyyads was at an end. Caliph after caliph was set up. Arabs, Moors, and Spaniards fought for the city. Once for four days Cordova was turned into a shamble, when “the Berber butchers” ransacked the city, slaying the people, and burning its splendid buildings. Az-Zahra, the summer palace, with all its exquisite treasures of art, was left a heap of charred ruins.

Afterwards Yusuf, the Berber, founded the dynasty of the Almoravides. But his rule was brief.

In 1235 Cordova fell. Fernando had pledged{103} himself to recover Spain for the Christians. The king advanced into Andalusia, with a mighty army of fervent crusaders, and the splendid city of the Moors was seized by the warriors of the Cross. A host of the Morisco natives quitted the city for Africa; many were killed, and a proportion remained as “reconciled” Spanish subjects. Fernando’s victory was a triumph for Catholicism; but it brought about the slow decay of Cordova. The population dwindled, the arts and crafts were neglected, the fields untilled. Learning was discountenanced, libraries of precious volumes burned; and in their zeal for cleansing Cordova from all traces of the Moslem, the reformers even destroyed the baths.

To read of the Cordova of the Moors is like reading a chapter of Oriental romance. But the story is not legendary. This marvellous city, equal in grandeur to Baghdad, was a great beacon-light of culture for three hundred years. Its mosques, its schools, and its hospitals were famous throughout the world. Sages, poets, artists found here every scope and assistance for the development of their philosophy and their art. There were no ignorant natives, and no class living in penury and squalor. The{104} Moors were almost perfect masters of the art of civilisation. They esteemed education; they taught tolerance; they inculcated a love of beauty in daily life, and lived cleanly, and on the whole, sanely.

The life was jocund, but sober, for the Moors abstained from wine. “The City of Cities,” “The Bride of Andalus,” are the names bestowed on the beautiful city of Cordova by the Moorish writers of that age.

In the twelfth century Abu Mohammed wrote of Cordova as “the Cupola of Islam, the convocation of scholars, the court of the sultans of the family of Omeyyah, and the residence of the most illustrious tribes of Yemen. Students from all parts of the world flocked thither at all times to learn the sciences of which Cordova was the most noble repository, and to derive knowledge from the mouths of the doctors and ulemas who flourished in its cultured life. Cordova was ‘to Andalus what the head is to the body.’”

The city once boasted of fifty thousand resplendent palaces, and a hundred thousand inferior houses. Its mosques numbered seven hundred, and the cleanly Moors built nine hundred public baths. The city stretched for{105} ten miles along the banks of the Guadalquivir, flanked with walls, battlements, and towers, and approached by guarded gates. Throughout the world men spoke in veneration of its four great wonders—the immense and gorgeous mosque, the bridge over the Guadalquivir, the suburb city of Az-Zahra, and the sciences which were studied in the colleges.

Abderahman III. built a palace a few miles from the city, called Medinat-az-Zahra. It was named after the beautiful Zahra, one of the sultan’s mistresses. A figure of Zahra was carved over the chief gateway of this fairy city. Medinat-az-Zahra was a town rather than a royal residence. There was a splendid mosque upon the site; the suburb had colleges, baths and marts.

Forty years were spent in building this retreat for the caliph and his favourite. Upon the decoration of its buildings Abderahman spent large sums of money. El Makkari, the Arab historian, states that the columns of the buildings came from the east, and that the marble walls of the palace were shining with gold. The caliph even proposed to remove the dark background of hills, but instead the slopes were planted with fruit-trees.{106}

This palace, one of the four great glories of the city, has vanished. The savage host of Berbers, in 1010, attacked Medinat-az-Zahra and burned it to the ground. The natives were slaughtered with fearful cruelty, even within the precincts of the mosque the pursuers cut them down. It is said that portions of the caliph’s palace were afterwards used in erecting the Convent of San Jerónimo, to the north-west of the city. At this time Cordova was assailed, its buildings burnt, much of its treasure was despoiled or carried away by the troops of Abd-l-Jabbar, the Berber leader.

There is one wonder that conquest has left unspoiled to Cordova, and one cannot survey the imperishable mosque of the caliph without veneration for the race that set an example to the world in virtue, culture, and the joy of beautiful living. It is to see this wonder of Moorish art that the stranger visits Cordova.

The way to the mosque (mezquita) is readily discovered, for every stranger is recognised by the street urchins who are eager in offering directions.

The first religious edifice upon this site was a Roman temple. In 786 the building of the Moorish mezquita was begun by the first Abderahman.{107} The work was carried on by the next sultan, Hishem, and by Abderahman III. For more than two centuries the mosque grew in size and splendour, as each succeeding caliph added some new beauty.

The mosque is a magnificent example of Moorish architecture. Vast, massive, bewildering, and beautiful are not extravagant terms to use in describing this edifice. It is worth while to walk round the outside of the building to gain an impression of its vast size and the strength of its structure. Like all Moorish buildings the exterior is plain, with the fine primitive severity of Byzantine work. The interior structure is enclosed by walls of about fifty feet in height, buttressed, and very stout, with numerous towers. The bronze doors are of finest Moorish work. There is a handsome portal on the north side, built in the time of Hakam between 988 and 1000.

The Gate of Pardon which gives entrance to the Court of Oranges has a horseshoe arch, surmounted by three smaller arches, and which are decorated with paintings of no value. This gateway is not Moorish, but a later addition built by the Christians in imitation of the gate at Seville Cathedral.{108}

The Court of Oranges was used by the Moslems for ablution before entering the mosque. It is a wide space, with palms, orange-trees, and fountains, and a colonnade. It is the most beautiful spot in Cordova, cool and gracefully shaded, and when the orange-trees are in flower a fragrance pervades the place. Once there were nineteen beautiful gateways leading into the court, and these were uniform with the nineteen aisles. The famous fountain of Abderahman stands in the centre of the court. Here all day the women of Cordova are gathered. They come one by one, or in groups together. Each carries her red-brown pitcher for water. It is the meeting-place where the day’s gossip is exchanged. Always there is the sound of laughter and gay chattering. All the Cordovese appear to be happy.

We enter the mosque by the Puerta de las Palmas; the eyes are dazed by the endless columns and profusion of arches, numbering nearly nine hundred. Nowhere are there such columns and arches as these. Every stone has its history. Marble, porphyry, and jasper are the material, and the arches are painted red and white. The effect is indescribable. I believe{109} that there are not two columns alike in point of decorative detail. Some of the arches are of horseshoe shape, and some are round. But symmetry is retained; the whole interior gives a delightful impression of grace and elegance.

Look up at the wondrous ceiling. Its wealth of colour is dazzling. When the thousands of lamps were lit, the ceiling shone with gold and brilliant colours. In some parts the ceilings of the mosque are embellished with paintings, and a number of cufic inscriptions are seen among the decorative designs.

De Amicis, writing of the Mosque of Cordova, says: “Imagine a forest, fancy yourself in the densest part of it, and that you can see nothing but the trunks of trees. So in this mosque, on whatever side you look, the eye loses itself among the columns. It is a forest of marble, whose confines one cannot discover. You follow with your eye, one by one, the very long rows of columns that interlace at every step with numberless other rows, and you reach a semi-obscure background, in which other columns seem to be gleaming. There are nineteen aisles, which extend from north to south, traversed by thirty-three others, supported, among them all by more than nine{110} hundred columns of prophyry, jasper, breccia, and marbles of every colour.”

The walls and ceiling of parts of the building are in marvellous preservation. They gleam with an infinite opulence of colour; they are elaborately embellished with almost every conceivable form of arabesques, bas-reliefs, and Moorish designs, painted in wonderful hues and rich in gilt.

The Mihrâb is the prime glory of the building. It was first erected and adorned by Abderahman I., and a second prayer-recess was constructed by the second Abderaham. The third Mihrâb dates from 961, and was erected in the time of the Caliph Hakam II. It is one of the finest specimens of Moorish art extant. Here the Koran was kept, and the most solemn rites were performed in the days of the great caliphs.

The cupola of this superb sanctuary is carved in the shape of a pine-apple, decorated with shell-like ornaments, and painted lavishly in gold, blue, and red. There are delicate pillars of marble, with gold capitals. The niches of the dome are beautifully painted, and the chief arch is decorated with mosaics. Over the arch is an inscription in gold on a ground of blue.{111}

The slender pillars and graceful double arches of the entrance to the vestibule of the Mihrâb are examples of Moorish architecture in its finest manifestation. Very gorgeous and intricate is the design of the façade of the Mihrâb. The portal is a horseshoe arch, handsomely ornamented, and above runs a tier of smaller horseshoe arches. This is surmounted by other arches, gracefully interlaced, and adorned with a profusion of mosaics and decorations in colour.

When the mosque was converted into a Christian cathedral under the name of Santa Maria, the side aisles were divided into about forty chapels. The variety of the architectural styles in this great building range from the Moorish to the baroque and the plateresque. Charles V. was partly responsible for the choir, which gives a strange note of discord to the harmony of the Moorish temple. But the emperor lamented having granted leave to the Chapter to build the Coro, for upon seeing the structure, he exclaimed: “You have built what you or others might have built anywhere, but you have destroyed something that was unique in the world.” To construct the choir, a part of the beautiful Morisco ceiling was{112} destroyed, and commonplace vaulting took its place.

None of the Christian chapels are of especial interest, except perhaps the Chapel of Villaviciosa which is Morisco in design. In the Capilla de la Cena is a painting by Céspedes, who was buried in the cathedral. The choir of the Christian church is very ornate, and of sixteenth-century date. Lope de Rueda, the dramatist, was buried here. The stalls are by Cornejo, a celebrated carver, who also designed the beautiful silleria. The massive chandelier is of silver. Over the altar is a painting by Palomino.

The Sala Capitular contains a statue of Santa Teresa by Alonso Cano, and images of saints by J. de Mora.

The Bell Tower is a substitute for the elegant minaret of Abderahman III. This tower resembled the Giralda of Seville in design, having lilies and golden balls at its summit. This minaret was despoiled after the capture of Cordova by the Spanish, and the present tower is the work of Ruiz. It is surmounted with a figure of Saint Raphael. Architecturally considered, the Campanario or Belfry of Cordova is an anomaly.{113}

Apart from its mosque, Cordova contains few buildings of interest to the stranger. Gautier speaks of the city, once famed for its wonderful beauty as “le squelette blanché et calcin.” The churches demand the visitor’s inspection alone for their instructive evidence of the decline of architectural taste. San Hipolito is the burial-place of the historian, Ambrosia de Morales, and the original building dates from the fourteenth century. San Jacinto has a somewhat handsome doorway, and Santa Marina is externally ancient. San Nicolas has a pseudo-Moorish tower.

There are one or two Christian buildings of interest. The bishop’s palace was built originally in the fifteenth century. The Ayuntamiento or town hall is not a very impressive edifice. Some of the old residences of the city are in the Mudéjar style, and many have charming courtyards, with delicate ironwork gates, through which one may peep at a fountain set among pillars upon which roses twine.

The Renaissance doors of the house of Don Jeronimo Paez and that of the Foundling Hospital are handsomely decorated; and in the House of Don Luque, in the Plaza de la Campania, there are some ancient mosaics.{114}

It is worth while to inspect the walls, which have survived a number of severe sieges, and are still standing, though often repaired. The Gate of Almodovar and the Tower of Mala Muerte are in good preservation, and there are instructive examples of Moorish fortification in the turrets and battlements.

The old Alcazar of the Moors was a noble building of great extent. Very little of the original structure remains to-day, but one or two towers, a conduit, and a bath still exist. Alfonso XI. built a modern Alcazar. On this site stood a Gothic palace, and this was reconstructed by the caliphs. Historians have described the old Alcazar as a sumptuous palace, with courts of marble, verdant gardens decked with fountains, and wonderful apartments, adorned with mosaics and gems. The palace was heated in winter, and kept temperate in summer with scented air from the gardens. Here the caliphs surrounded themselves with luxury. Lovely women resided in the harem, musicians composed and played their melodies on string instruments; writers recounted romances amid the palms, roses, and orange-trees, and philosophers discoursed in the courts of marble and jasper.{115}

The decline of trade in Cordova that followed upon the ravages of Berber and Christian aroused the dread of the inhabitants that disaster would result. The citizens who had clamoured for the expulsion of the Moors, now begged that a few Morisco artisans might be permitted to remain in the city. All the chief industries of Cordova were decaying. In 1797 De Bourgoanne writes: “In so fine a climate, in the midst of so many sources of prosperity, it (Cordova) contains no more than 35,000 inhabitants. Formerly celebrated for its manufactories of silks, fine cloths, etc. it has now no other industrious occupations but a few manufactories of ribbons, galoons, hats, and baize.”

What a contrast this account affords from that of the Arabian historians. In the days of Abderahman III. there were fifty thousand palaces in Cordova, and three hundred mosques of noble architecture. A palace on arches was built across the river. There were academies, schools, and libraries in the city of the Ommeyads. To-day there are thousands of illiterate persons in Spain.

But the Cordovese do not appear to ponder upon time’s changes. They concern themselves{116} with other things—the affairs of the house—and regard their city with its history and wonderful mosques as a valuable asset which brings the stranger to their impoverished city. The Cordovese are a contented people.

On bullfight days Cordova is en fête, and all classes of the inhabitants throng the Plaza de Torres, the hidalgo and the peasant showing the same enthusiasm for the national sport. Formerly bull-baiting took place in the Corredera, now used as a market. There is now a large bull-ring in Cordova, in the Ronda de los Tejares. Near to the amphitheatre are the public gardens. There is a theatre in the city, but few other places of amusement.

Cordova is rich in its record of great men. Seneca was born here under the Roman dominion, and so was Lucan. In the twelfth century, Averroes, the greatest philosopher of Islamism, was born. His doctrine pervaded Europe, inciting the fury of the Dominicans, who regarded Averroes as an arch-blasphemer and infidel. In Paris and in the north of Italy, however, the Franciscans accepted the philosophy of the learned Cordovan. But Averroes, the detestation of the Dominican order, is often depicted in the frescoes of{117} contemporary painters, as a heretic and a victim of the burning pit. Notwithstanding, Averroism was a fashionable cult in Venice.

Among the authors of Cordova the poet Gongora must be remembered. He was born here in 1561, and educated at the college of Salamanca, where he studied law. Showing little capacity for the law, he turned his attention to verse, writing satires and lyrics. In later life Gongora’s poetry became stilted and pompous to the point of absurdity. Lope de Vega, however, held that Luis de Gongora was as great as Seneca or Lucan.

At the age of forty-five Gongora left his native town, and entered the Church. In Madrid he was the favourite of Philip III. and of the nobles of the city. He returned to Cordova when he was sixty-five, and there he died in 1627.

Gonsalvo, “the Great Captain,” was a native of the city, “nursed amid the din of battle.” In the esteem of Spaniards he ranks next to the Cid in valour and high integrity as a general. Gonsalvo’s manners were described as amiable and conciliatory. He was cool in action, courageous, and firm. More than once the great captain’s life was imperilled in battle,{118} especially at Granada, where his horse was killed beneath him. Fernandez Gonsalvo was in the height of his military fame about the year 1495.

Four painters of note are associated with Cordova. The first in chronological order was Pedro de Cordova, who executed “the Annunciation,” which is in the Capilla del Santo Cristo of the cathedral. The picture is in poor preservation. It is interesting as an example of Gothic art.

Cordova was early a centre of painting in the days of the Christian recovery of the city. The eminent Pablo de Céspedes was born here in 1538, and became a canon of the cathedral. He studied the Italian artists, and painted mural pictures in Rome. In the mosque are three of his works. They are notable for their seriousness and power. Céspedes was very skilful in colouring.

The remarkable Juan de Valdés Leal, born in 1630, spent most of his life in Seville, where he was a contemporary of Murillo. In the Church of the Carmen at Cordova is a retablo representing the “Life of Elijah,” painted by Valdés Leal. Many of this painter’s pictures are in Seville.{119}

The fourth painter of Cordova is Antonio de Castillo, born in 1603, who was an early exponent of the art of landscape painting in Spain. Some of his pictures are in the museo of the city. Castillo was said to be an imitator of Murillo. He died in 1667. The Picture Gallery of Cordova, in the School of Fine Arts, is not a very important collection of paintings. There are, however, some of the works of Ribera, Céspedes, and Castillo, which should be seen. In the museo are a few Moorish antiquities. The ancient tiles are good examples of the exquisite Moorish art.{120}

TOLEDO

SINCE visiting Toledo I have read that masterly novel by Blasco de Ibañez, “The Cathedral,” a work of genius, which has brought the city vividly to my recollection. I see the old dun-coloured houses on the slopes, the gorge of the yellow Tagus, and the commanding steeple of the cathedral, and I recall the Oriental landscape, viewed from the walls, under a blue, burning sky in June. I know that the goats still wander forth to their feeding-grounds in the early morning, returning at dusk, with softly tinkling bells, that the guitar sounds melodious and low outside the barred window when it is dark, that beggars, wrapped in tattered cloaks, solicit alms “For the Love of God,” and that the voice of the watchman rings clear at midnight, as he goes his rounds with his lantern and keys, and a sword at his side.

TOLEDO, 1837.

“Romantic” is the word that describes Toledo; the setting of the city, its labyrinthine alleys, its guarded houses, its Moorish fortress,{121} and its dreaming mood make appeal to the most apathetic of strangers.

The aspect of the city is hardly beautiful. It is too stern, too sombre, even in sunlight, and it lacks the colour and gaiety of the Andalusian towns. And yet Toledo is one of the most fascinating cities in Europe, holding you with a strong spell, a grim, irresistible invitation to remain within its gates. There is so much to behold, so much to think upon, in this old Moorish place. The cathedral alone claims long days of your sojourn, for it is a great monument, haunted with memories, and richly stored with treasures of art.

Many legends surround the making of Toledo, one of them relating that Tubal, grandson of Noah, built the city, and another that it was reared by Jews driven from Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. We know, however, that Toledo was chiefly noted as the stronghold of the Catholic faith in Spain, that it was in existence in the time of the Romans, held by the Moors, wrested from them, and restored to the Spanish after many bloody conflicts, and that it is now the seat of the primate. For four centuries the Moors held sway here, and everywhere in the city they have left their traces.{122} Before the Moors, King Roderick the Goth sat on his throne in the strongly fortified town, and thither came Tarik and his hordes, coveting the rich capital. Later, the great Abd-er-Rahman advanced upon Toledo, and laid siege, establishing a mighty camp on the hillside facing the city, where he waited until famine compelled the courageous natives to surrender.

In the days of its might Toledo could boast of nearly two hundred thousand inhabitants. The city lost power when the capital of Spain was transferred to Valladolid. It is now scarcely more than a museum and resort of tourists and students of art. The streets are silent and unfrequented; there is but little evidence of commerce, and the manners and customs of the people have escaped the influences of to-day. Toledo is indeed old-world, a veritable relic of antiquity, in spite of its railway station and large hotel, often thronged with Americans.

The history of Toledo under the Moors is constantly recalled by the gates, defences, and buildings that remain. We enter Toledo by two arches and a bridge, over the swirling Tagus, and immediately we are, as it were, projected into the period of the Moorish conquest. This bridge, the Puente de Alcantara,{123} was first built by the conquerors, but the present structure, though Moorish in design, was made in the thirteenth century. Older is the Puerta del Sol, a work of the Mudéjares, with the typical horseshoe arches and towers.

The arch of the Zocodover, the bridge of San Martin, and the Church of Santa Maria la Blanca each show the Moorish spirit in their architecture. In the Casa de Mesa is a room in the design of the Mudéjares, the reconciled Moors, who remained and followed their crafts in Spain, after the reconquest of the country by the Spaniards. The ceiling is a fine specimen of Arabian art. At the School of Infantry are further traces of the Moors, while in the Church of El Transito will be found treasures of the east. Many of the churches have Morisco towers, such as San Roman, Santo Tomé, San Miguel, and San Servando. Santo Tomé was once a mosque; it is now a Gothic church. The interior of El Cristo de la Luz is typically Moorish.

The magnificent cathedral stands on the site of an earlier church which the Moors shattered, erecting in its place a mosque. In 1227 Fernando laid the stone of the present edifice; and over two hundred years were spent in the{124} labour of erecting and adorning it, while vast wealth was employed in the work, and thousands of artists, craftsmen and labourers employed. Under Mendoza and other prelates, Flemish artists worked in the cathedral.

The architecture is Gothic, with many traces of Baroque and Mudéjar art. There is a very lofty and beautiful tower, with a steeple surmounting it. The flying buttresses are exceedingly graceful; the eight doorways of great beauty. A splendid façade, with a wealth of statues, faces the west. It has three portals and a fine rose window, and is flanked by towers. The Puerta de los Leones is noble Renaissance work, splendidly sculptured with rich ornaments.

Entering the cathedral we are impressed by its vastness and the simplicity of the aisles. But the numerous chapels are highly ornamented in a bewildering variety of styles. The hand of the artist has been lavish. We are dazzled, astonished, by the wealth of decoration, the carving, the metal work, the jewels, the colouring. The choir stalls are very beautifully carved work by Borgoña and Berruguéte. The choir, with its jasper columns and decorations, is impressive. The carving of the stalls is superb.{125}

How shall the visitor know where to turn for those objects that appeal to him, amid such a wealth of treasures? There are twenty-seven side chapels besides the chief chapel, and in all of them are works of art that will repay inspection. The retablo of the principal chapel is a gorgeous piece of work upon which many artists expended their labour and skill. Cardinal de Mendoza was buried here in 1495.

The Capilla de Santiago is Gothic, and splendidly decorated. There is a superb retablo in this chapel. In the Capilla Mozarabe there is a painting by Juan de Borgoña. This was the chapel built for Cardinal Ximénez, and it is handsomely ornamented. Another of Borgoña’s works will be seen in the Capella de San Eugénio, an altarpiece representing scenes in the life of Christ.

In the Sacristia is a notable work painted by El Greco, whose paintings we shall presently see in the gallery. The subject of this picture is “Casting Lots for the Raiment of the Saviour.” “The Betrayal of Christ,” by Goya, is another important painting in the Sacristia.

In the cloisters we shall find some frescoes by Bayeu, representing incidents in the lives of several saints. Francisco Bayeu (1734-1795),{126} who so often worked with Maella, was not a great artist, though he was commissioned to paint mural pictures in many parts of Spain.

The City Hall (Ayuntamiento) was first erected in the fifteenth century, and has an ornate frontage. The portraits of Charles II. and Marianne within the hall were painted by Carreño, a pupil of Velazquez.

Proudly perched above the city is the Alcazar, a stout fortress of the Goths, the residence of the mighty Cid, and afterwards a palace of kings. The old building was almost destroyed during the war of 1710, but was restored some years later. It was attacked and damaged in the wars with France, and little of the pristine edifice remains except the eastern façade.

Toledo was the scene of fierce persecution during the Inquisition. In 1560 there was a burning of heretics in the city, a display arranged for the entertainment of the young queen, Elizabeth de Valois. Several Lutherans were committed to the flames on this occasion.

In the days of ecclesiastic splendour, the wealth of the cathedral of Toledo was enormous. There were six hundred clerics in the city, and{127} the revenues of the high dignitaries were said to amount to a hundred thousand pounds. The first archbishop was Don Bernardo, who broke faith with the Moors by desecrating the sacred objects which they were permitted to retain in their mosque.

The excellence of the sword blades of Toledan steel were known all over Europe. To-day the sword-making industry is scarcely flourishing, and Théophile Gautier was unable during his visit to purchase a weapon as a memento. “There are no more swords at Toledo,” he writes, “than leather at Cordova, lace at Mechlin, oysters at Ostend, or pâtés de foie gras at Strasburg.” According to Henry O’Shea, in his “Guide to Spain,” sword blades were made in Toledo in his day, but he states that the quality of the steel had deteriorated.

One of the most illustrious of the world’s painters, Dominico Theotocupuli, called El Greco (the Greek), worked for years in the city. Mystery encompasses the strange character of El Greco; we know not when he was born, but we learn that he died in Toledo, in 1614, and that he was a native of Crete. While a youth he was a pupil of Titian; but he was chiefly influenced in his art by Tintoretto.{128} About the year 1576, Theotocupuli came to Toledo, where he was employed in adorning the church of Santo Domingo, securing one thousand ducats for his eight pictures over the altars.

In character El Greco was independent to the point of obstinacy. His mind was sombre and pietistic, and his imagination bizarre and vivid. Men said that he was mad, but his alleged madness was the originality of genius. “His nature was extravagant like his painting,” wrote a contemporary, Guiseppe Martinez. “He had few disciples as none cared to follow his capricious and extravagant style, which was only suitable for himself.”

We read that El Greco loved luxury, and that he hired musicians to play to him while he took his meals. He was, however, retiring, almost morbid in his desire for quietude; and there are many matters concerning his life and his personality that will always remain enigmas. For a very long period the work of El Greco was scarcely known beyond the borders of Spain, and indeed his rare merit was hardly recognised in that country except by a few students.

{129}His name now arouses interest among the cultured in every part of Europe, and there are admirers of his art who would place him on the highest pedestal. But the more temperate discern in El Greco a powerfully intellectual painter, not without defects and mannerisms, a master of colour, with a curiously modern method in portraiture.

In the Provincial Museum at Toledo there are several paintings by “The Greek.” The portraits of Antonio Covarrubias and of Juan de Avila give example of El Greco’s capacity for seizing the characteristics of his sitters. Covarrubias has a fine, rugged, thoughtful face. The canvas seems alive. Very strange are the pictures of “Our Saviour,” “St Paul,” “St Peter,” and other saints in this collection. The figures in many of the artist’s paintings are curiously lean and attenuated, the faces long and pinched. In the picture of “Our Saviour” the hands are large, the fingers remarkably thin and pointed.

The most fantastic of El Greco’s pictures is “The Assumption” in San Vicente at Toledo, in which the ascending figure seems literally flying in the air. “The Burial of Gonzalo Ruiz,” in the Church of Santo Tomé, is another splendid composition, revealing amaz{130}ing skill in portraiture, for each of the figures in the row of Castilian caballeros was drawn from life. The sixth figure, from the right-hand side, is the artist himself. There are technical faults in the picture; there are mannerisms and extravagances; but the work is strongly individual, and we may echo the words of Ponz, the historian, who states that “the city has never tired of admiring it, visiting it continually, always finding new beauties in it.”

“The Expolio,” in the cathedral, we have already seen. If the work of El Greco begins to arouse a desire to study more of his paintings, a day may be spent in visiting the gallery and the churches that contain examples of his different periods. “San José and the Child Jesus” is in the Parish Church of St Magdalen. “Jesus and St John” in St John; portrait of Tavera, in the Hospital of St John; In Santo Domingo there are four pictures by El Greco. The museum has twenty paintings from his brush.

“Very few paintings interest me so much as those of El Greco,” writes Théophile Gautier, “for his very worst have always something unexpected, something that exceeds the bounds{131} of possibility, that causes astonishment, and affords matter for reflection.”

Toledo expresses Castile, as Seville reflects Andalusia. For, like its stern surroundings of rocky sierras, the city is austere, even gloomy. Heavy iron gates protect the courtyards, bars screen the windows of the ancient houses, high, stout walls and towers guard the frowning town. The natives are reserved, a little proud in their demeanour, but not inhospitable to the strangers who come and go constantly, and lose their way in the tortuous streets, in spite of plans and guide-books. Persistent beggars hang about the cathedral, and squat, blinking in the sun, along the ramparts. The children pursue the visitor, uttering a few words of broken English, French, and German, asking for a copper in the English tongue, and thanking you for it in French or Spanish.

I must not forget that there is another Toledan more widely known than El Greco, and that is Lope de Vega, the dramatist, the most prolific writer of Spain, for it is said that he wrote three thousand plays. We are told that the playwright would compose a comedy in one night. His plays were often topical, and many of them must be regarded as ephemeral and{132} poor; but De Vega’s stage-craft was excellent, though few of his works are great in a literary sense. Cervantes styled the dramatist “a monster of nature,” and envied him as “sole monarch of the stage.” Lope de Vega probably wrote for a space of fifty-two years, for he died at the age of seventy-two, and during that period he produced not only plays, but epic poems and twenty-one volumes of miscellaneous writings.

Cervantes, by the way, spent some time in Toledo, where he lodged in an inn, and wrote industriously. Some historians have claimed Cervantes as a Toledan, but his birthplace was Alcala de Henares.

Berruguéte, the great sculptor, the favourite of Charles V., worked long in Toledo, where he died, in the Hospital of St John the Baptist. There are many of this artist’s work in Toledo. The fine portal of the hospital, and the monument within, to Juan de Tavéra, were designed by him.

Alonso Berruguéte was born at Valladolid about 1480. He was a pupil of Michael Angelo, and studied the arts of architecture, painting and sculpture in Italy. Professor Carl Justi refers to the Italian influence and the{133} “Raphaelesque forms” in Berruguéte’s pictures. But it was as a sculptor that he excelled.

Writing of Toledo in the eighteenth century, the Chevalier de Bourguanne describes the city in these words: “Houses out of repair, fine edifices going to ruin, few or no manufactures, a population reduced from two hundred thousand to twenty-five thousand persons, and the most barren environs are all that now offer themselves to the sight of the traveller drawn thither by the reputation of the famous city. Under the present reign some successful efforts have been made to recover it from the universal decay into which it is fallen.”

About the time when the chevalier wrote this, the Alcazar was being restored, and the silk industry in the city was reviving; but Toledo, even to-day, is not a flourishing mart. It is a place of dreams and memories, set upon a rock among savage hills.

The Tagus, which rushes through its rough gorge, was once made navigable between Lisbon and Toledo, and in last century small boats sailed now and then from the city to the sea. There are many fish in the upper Tagus, and its tributaries provide trout for the markets. The surrounding country is bare, and in many{134} districts, savage and unfrequented, the hills affording sparse pasturage for sheep and goats. These desolate uplands were formerly haunted by bands of the most bloodthirsty bandits in all Spain.{135}

GRANADA

THAT which is lacking in sober Toledo is evident everywhere in glowing Granada. The fiery Andalusian sun gilds and colours the city, and the whitened houses cast a deep blue shade in the narrow streets. No forbidding portals bar the way to the flowing patios, those courtyards that are to-day one of the chief charms of the Andalusian towns. The climate is soft and languorous; the air laden with the scent of blossoms and roses, and the people gayer in their garb and bearing than the natives of Castile.

On twin outlying hills stands Granada, divided into two parts by the deep ravine of the Darro River, whose waters flow into the Genil at the base of an eminence crowned by the noble Alhambra Palace and the old mosque.

Around stretches a territory of singular fertility, where fruits of many kinds are plentiful, and the earth yields lavish crops of grain, with scarcely any period of inactivity. Grapevines and olive-trees flourish here, and the orange,{136} lemon, and pomegranate thrive. In the distance gleam the snow-capped peaks and blue ridges of the Sierra Nevada, a savage range, with foothills here and there under cultivation, glens of exceeding beauty, and rocky streamlets that swell to torrents when the snows melt. The vegas (plains) are dotted with hamlets and farms; vineyards clothe the lower slopes; the ferruginous soil is well watered by innumerable runnels from the hills, and so made richly productive.

Christianised Granada remains Moorish in aspect to this day, and so it will remain until the end, a mighty “living ruin.” We cannot escape in modern Granada from signs of the Moslem influence; the architecture, the decorations of the houses within, the utensils of daily use—everything recalls the Moors. Before the coming of the North African hordes to Spain, there was probably a city on the banks of the Darro and Genil, called Illiberis, which was seized by the invaders. Rival tribes of Moslems strove for Granada for centuries until Al Ahmar, a doughty general and ruler, became the sovereign. It was he who began the building of the splendid palace during his long sway. Al Ahmar was succeeded by{137} Mohammed, his son, in 1273, who, like his father, was cultured, and an encourager of learning and the arts.

Another great monarch of Granada, who added to the Alhambra, was Yusuf I. He was murdered in the palace by a fanatic, and following him came a line of Mohammedan rulers, all more or less distinguished in arms and in the art of governing.

Granada was the last stronghold of the Moorish sovereigns in Spain; and hither, in 1491, came the Christian host, led by the zealous Queen Isabel, who camped within a few miles of the walls. No succour came during the long siege for the imprisoned Moors, who at last besought their leaders to make a sortie on the foe. This course was, however, disapproved by Boabdil, the leader, and a treaty was made with the Christians, in which it was enjoined that the city should yield within two months. But the starving populace preferred to surrender at once, and the last of the sultans in Spain went forth to bend the knee to Fernando, the Christian king.

The capitulation of Granada broke the last link of the Moorish chain of dominion in southern Spain. A Christian governor was appointed,{138} and soon the “reconciled” Moors learned that their conquerors were faithless in their promises of toleration. Libraries of Arabian literature were destroyed, and force was used in imposing the rites of the Christian Church on the subdued Mohammedans.

To quell the Moorish malcontents, Cardinal Ximenes was sent to Granada, with the royal permission to enforce baptism or to compel exile. The Cardinal carried terror into the city. There was no more clemency for the heretics and “heathen”; their temples were desecrated, and they were coerced into acceptance of the Catholic religion. “The Knights of Granada, gentlemen, though Moors,” as the Spanish poets had written of them, were treated with callous cruelty. Some fled to the fortresses of the Alpujarras; others remained in ignominy in the city of their birth, exposed to harsh exactions.

It was the humane Archbishop Talavera of Granada who opposed, with all his courage and energy, the importation of the Inquisition into Spain. Let it be clearly remembered that this{139} tyrannous institution was resisted by all the enlightened Spaniards, and that the mass of the people regarded its introduction with horror. Many of the chief Inquisitors went in fear of their lives through the hatred which they aroused in the people.

Ximenes was of a very different cast from Talavera. He was sufficiently powerful to have contested the establishment of the tribunal, but he was, on the contrary, responsible for many of its worst excesses of persecution.

The Moors in Granada, after the reconquest by Fernando, were commanded to wear the garb of Christians, to speak the Castilian language, and to abandon their ritual of cleanliness. Philip II. even destroyed the baths of the Alhambra, to prevent the ablutions of the “infidels.” The beautiful Morisco painting and decorative work were plastered over with whitewash. Christian vandalism ran riot in the fair city of the art-loving sultans.

The Moors who sought refuge in the glens of the mountains soon began to till the land, and to transform the wilderness into a garden. After a spell of peace, and a recovery of some measure of wealth, the community of refugees rebelled. Terrible is the tale of reprisal.{140} Christians were driven to bay and slaughtered ruthlessly. The Moors gained sway over the district until their leader was slain by one of his own race. Then came the final routing by the Christian soldiery by means of the sword and firebrand, and Moorish might was for ever crushed in Andalusia.

For what counted all this bloodshed? The answer is written in the history of Spain after the expulsion of the intelligent, industrious Moriscoes. The lesson is plain. The fall of Granada was the beginning of the decline of Spain, and not, as the Spaniards thought, the dawn of a golden epoch. With the Moors went their culture, the arts and industry; and only traditions in craftsmanship remained among the Spanish artisans. The half million inhabitants at the time of the surrender of Granada very quickly dwindled under the Catholic kings. To-day there is scarcely a sign of industrial and commercial energy in this city of the past. The population seem to subsist principally upon providing for the continual influx of visitors, while there are hundreds of beggars in the place.

The Alhambra was considerably marred by Charles V., who used it as a residence. Philip V.{141} and his consort were the last of the sovereigns of Spain who sojourned in Granada. In the wars of 1810-1812, the French troops were quartered in the Alhambra, and they are responsible for the destruction of the mosque built in the fourteenth century.

The architecture of the Alhambra is of a late Morisco order. If we enter by the Puerta de Judiciaria we shall see the inscription of Yusuf I., who built the gateways and the towers. There are two arches to this entrance, the inner one is smaller than the outer, and both are of horseshoe design, with decorations above the curves. The inner side of this portal is an extremely beautiful example of Moorish art.

The several buildings enclosed within the walls form the Alhambra, the palace itself being only a comparatively small part of the whole. Towers guard the walls, and starting from the eastern side of the puerta, before which we now stand, we come to the Prisoner’s Tower. The next tower is known as Siete Suelos, and the others, in their order, are Agua, Las Infantas, Cantivá, Candil, Picos, Comares, Puñales, Homenage, De-las Armas, Vela Guardia, and Polvora.

The Palace of Charles V. was reared in the{142} midst of these Morisco surroundings, and to the injury of the Alhambra. It is, however, a fine quadrangular building, with richly decorated puertas. Around the centre court are a number of apartments. At the back of the palace is the fish pond, overshadowed by the imposing Comares Tower, and from here we enter the Court of the Lions, so called from the twelve lions supporting the fountain in the centre. This beautiful court dates from the time of Mohammed V. It is surrounded by an arcade with very delicate columns and horseshoe arches.

Writing of the lions, in “The Soul of Spain,” my friend Havelock Ellis says: “I delight in the Byzantine lions who stand in a ring in the midst of the court which bears their name. No photograph does justice to these delicious beasts. They are models of a deliberately conventional art, which yet never becomes extravagant or grotesque. They are quite unreal, and yet have a real life of their own.”

The Sala de los Mocarabes is approached from this court. Its walls are decorated in the vivid colours used by the Moors, and it has a ceiling of later Gothic style.

The Hall of the Abencerrages has fine stalactite arches, and a bewildering wealth of{143} decoration. The wooden doors are beautifully ornamented, and the whole effect is fairylike and enchanting. A fountain plays in the centre of the chamber.

The Hall of Justice has been likened to a grotto. It is one of the most wonderful of these apartments, approached by a range of exquisite arches from the Court of the Lions. The pictures on the walls are said to be portraits of the sovereigns of Granada. There is a brilliant centre painting on the ceiling, with quaint Moorish figures, and the gilding and colouring of the arches and alcoves are gorgeous. The Apartment of the Two Sisters has a marvellous roof of honeycomb pattern, the walls are decorated with blue tiles, and the floor is of marble. This was the room occupied by the brides of the kings of Granada.

The inscriptions in this chamber are numerous, and I quote two specimens:

“Look upon this wonderful cupola, at sight of whose perfection all other domes must pale and disappear.”

“How many delightful prospects I enfold! Prospects, in the contemplation of which a mind enlightened finds the gratification of its desire.”

The Hall of the Ambassadors was built by Yusuf. It is domed, and the roof is exquisitely{144} carved, while the decorations here surpass those of any apartment in the Alhambra, and are of an infinite variety of design. From the windows there are fine views of Granada. Many of the patterns on the walls of the palace are really inscriptions ingeniously employed as decorations. The reproduction of animal forms in the adornment of buildings was prohibited by Mohammedan law.

The Council Chamber (the Mexuar) has been restored. The palace proper contains, besides the apartments described, the Bath Court, the Court of the Reja, and the Court of Daxara, a very charming patio, shaded by trees, with apartments surrounding it.

The mosque was reconsecrated by Charles V. and used as a Christian chapel. There is a fine carved roof, and superb colouring on the walls, with an inscription, extolling the power of Allah.

An oratory adjoins the chapel. The court of the mosque is elaborately embellished, and has graceful columns and arches.

Several of the towers are provided with chambers, and those of Las Infantas were occupied by the princesses of the Moorish rulers. This tower was erected in the time of{145} Mohammed VII. Within, Las Infantas Tower is delightfully decorated. The interior of the Torre de la Cautiva is even more brilliantly adorned.

The Generalife, the “Palace of Recreation,” or, as other authorities have it, “the Garden of the Architects,” was originally an observation tower, and was used afterwards by the sultans as a villa. This summer residence is separated from the Alhambra by a gorge, and approached by a path through a garden. The Acequia Court is one of the most beautiful of the patios in the buildings comprising the Alhambra. A gallery surrounds it, supported by tall pillars and arches, most richly ornamented. We look between the slender columns upon a lovely Oriental garden, with a series of fountains playing in jets. The gardens of the Generalife are delightful; the trees are luxuriant from the moisture of the soil, and the flowers grow in riotous profusion. Here the very trees are aged, for the cypresses were planted in the days of the sultans. There is an expansive and impressive view from the belvedere adjoining.

Unfortunately most of the internal beauties of the Generalife have suffered decay, and the brush of the whitewasher has coated the walls.{146} But the cypress court, the curious gardens, the fountains, and the beautiful arches and pillars must be seen.

The Darro that flows beneath the hill of the Alhambra contains gold, and it is said that when Charles V. came with his empress, the inhabitants presented him with a crown made from the precious grains collected from the bed of the stream. A little silver has been found in the Genil into which the Darro flows.

Looking back at the magnificent Alhambra on its proud summit, we can imagine the distress of the Moors when their city was captured by the army of Fernando. We leave this monument behind, and, as we descend to the Cathedral, our thought turns to the period of Christian domination, and of the triumph of the old faith of Spain.

The first architect was Diego de Siloe, and the work was continued by his pupils, and by the renowned Alonso Cano, who designed the west front. As a specimen of Renaissance work, the Cathedral of Granada is one of the most splendid churches of Spain. The dome is vast and magnificent, there are five naves and many side chapels, all containing splendid works of art. Over the principal doorway are relief{147} carvings, dating from the eighteenth century. But a finer portal is that of Del Perdon, where we shall see some of Siloe’s characteristic decoration.

Alonso Cano, painter and sculptor, was buried in the choir. This artist was a native of the city, and the only great painter that Granada produced. Before his day, the artists of Spain painted with an intensity of religious seriousness, to the end of leading men to worship God and the Virgin. Their work was sombre and dramatic. Alonso Cano struck a secular note; he had a relish of the life of this world, and his fervent temperament found expression in depicting love episodes, and portraying the women of his day in the guise of saints and madonnas. His “Virgin and Child,” in the Saville Cathedral, expresses his emotional art. Cano has been called “the least Spanish of all the painters of Spain.”

He was born in 1601, and the register of the Church of St Ildefonso records his baptism. In his sixty-sixth year he died. As a lad he studied painting in Seville, in the studio of Pacheco, at the time when Velazquez was a student, and afterwards he learned the methods of Juan del Castillo. He was patronised by Philip IV., and{148} he painted many pictures for the cathedrals of his country, among others at Madrid, Toledo, and Granada. Alonso Cano was made a priest, and afterwards a prebendary of Granada, where an apartment was assigned to him in the cathedral.

In the Capella Mayor the frescoes of the cupola are by Cano, depicting episodes in the life of the Virgin. The paintings are joyous in temper, and brilliant in colouring. “The Purisima,” one of his most finished statues, is in the sacristy, and among other examples of his carving are the wooden painted figures of “Adam and Eve”; and “The Virgin and Child with St Anna” is most probably the work of Cano. “St Paul,” in the Chapel of our Lady of Carmen, is also one of his pieces. The pictures in Granada from Cano’s brush are in the Capella Mayor, the Church of the Trinity, the altar of San Miguel, and in the Chapel of Jesus Nazareno. His carved work is seen in the lectern of the choir, the west façade, and the doors of the sacristy.

El Greco, whose work we have seen in Toledo, is represented by a picture over the altar of St Jesus Nazareno, “St Francis.” The other pictures are by Ribera. Montañez designed the crucifix in the sacristy.{149}

In the Chapel Royal we trace late Gothic work. There is a beautiful reja here (lattice or grating) by Bartolomé, and the altar is adorned with statues of Ferdinand and Isabella. The ornate memorial of these sovereigns is by an Italian, Fancelli.

These are but a few of the objects of art in the cathedral. There are still many churches and historic places to visit in the city, and I must perforce hurry in my descriptions. Siloe’s architecture is seen in the Church of Santa Ana, and other churches should be inspected, though few of them are important. The Charterhouse or Cartuja stands on the site of a monastery, and the church is a very resplendent example of later Gothic decoration, the effects being gained within by a lavish use of pearl, ebony, tortoise-shell, and marble. The Audencia is a handsome building with a gorgeous façade. In the Church of San Geronimo is the burial-place of El Gran Capitan, whose effigy and that of his wife are at the altar.

If we wish to see the types of Andalusian character among the poorer class—such as Murillo painted—we must stroll in the Albaicin Quarter. This is a district of picturesque squalor, and not over-sweet are the odours that{150} may assail sensitive nostrils. But the Albaicin must be seen. It was the resort of the Moors who remained after the taking of Granada by Fernando, and it is now largely populated by gypsies such as George Borrow describes in “The Bible in Spain.” The city has been a haunt of Gitanos for about three hundred years, and many of the swarthy tribe live in caves, which they have delved in the hillsides. For a “consideration,” the gypsies will perform one of their curious symbolic dances.

“One of the most enchanting prospects I ever beheld,” writes the Chevalier de Bourgoanne, in the eighteenth century, after his visit to Granada. Travellers of all nationalities since that time have praised the wonderful spell of the city. Washington Irving, Ford, O’Shea, and many others have depicted its beauties with the pen, while a large gallery could be filled with the pictures painted here by artists from all parts of Europe.

There are quaint Moorish-looking towns and villages within reach of Granada, some within walking distance. “In Granada God gives all the necessaries of life to those by whom He is beloved.” So runs a local proverb, and it seems a justifiable statement from the evidence of{151} plenty that delights the gaze of the traveller through the richly fertile province. The vega that lies betwixt the city and Cadiz is screened by mountains, and thoroughly irrigated by hundreds of rivulets. Here the cactas is grown for the sake of the cochineal insect. The vegetation is marvellous; the earth is so generous that lucerne can be cut from ten to twelve times in the year. No wonder that Romans and Moors craved this sunny land of plenty.{152}

OPORTO

WHEN Bacchus and Lusus came to the Peninsula, sundered from Italy by the Mediterranean Sea, they discovered a delightful region of mountains and glens, well-watered and fertile, which they called Lusitania. Between the rivers Minho and Douro is a glowing tract of country, not unlike the finest parts of North Wales, with a varied sea coast, bright little villages nestling among the hills, and well-tilled fields, vineyards, and gay gardens. Mountains screen this district on the north and east, and the vast Atlantic washes it on the west. Here is the chief wine-growing quarter of Portugal, a land appropriately colonised by Bacchus; and in the centre of the wine-making and exporting industry is Porto, the capital of the province of Entre-Douro-e-Minho.

OPORTO, 1832.
FROM THE QUAY OF VILLA NOVA.

“Oporto the Proud” is a very old city and seaport on the right bank of the impetuous Douro, and within a few miles of the coast. The river is tidal and broad, and big ships come to the busy quays below the great {153}suspension bridge. At the mouth of the Douro is a bar, much dreaded by sailors, for it is rocky at this point, and generally a rough sea breaks and foams at the outlet.

Oporto is one of the most beautiful cities in Europe. I visited it in June, when the terraces and gardens were aglow with flowers, the streets steeped in perpetual sunshine, the sky a deep blue, and the sunsets gorgeous. It is a bright city, seen from the opposite bank, with houses rising one above the other on slopes that are almost precipitous. Here and there the rock juts out among the villas that overhang the river, while verdure shows on the high banks. In parts of the gorge the cliffs rise to three hundred feet.

Oporto is a city of squares. There are several of these open spaces, all planted with trees, well-paved, and surrounded by tall buildings which lend a Moorish atmosphere to the towns. It is a centre of craftsmen. In one thoroughfare you will find harness-makers and hatters busily employed; in another goldsmiths and jewellers ply their trade. The markets are thronged with peasants from the vineyards, the women dressed in the gaudiest garments, with huge earrings and great gold brooches.{154} Perhaps nowhere in Europe can so many prosperous and cheerful country-folk be seen assembled as in the streets of Oporto on a market day. Ox carts come laden with barrels; the river is dotted with the curiously shaped barcos that bring the wine from the rustic presses far up the valley; and up the steep alleys clamber the pannier-donkeys, with fruit heaped in the baskets.

The yoked oxen, led by sedate men—with large sallow faces, their loose limbs clothed in short jackets, and wearing the ancient hats of the district—the mule carts and the pack-donkeys appear mediæval and strangely out of accord with the modern motor cars of the fashionable citizens. Oporto is both old and new. Paris and London fashions in dress may be seen in the shopping quarters. There is a large colony of English people in the city, and many French and German merchants. Here you will see a native of the hills in his national garb; there a lady clad in the newest Parisian apparel; here an English sailor, and there a Spaniard. All is movement, animation, colour, when the streets are gay and crowded on a holiday.

The climate of Oporto is pleasant and healthy.{155} In the height of summer the heat is tempered by breezes from the Atlantic, and from the mountains on the east. There is a high average of sunshine. During the winter there is a considerable rainfall, and occasional snow. Around the city is a delightfully varied country of hills and valleys, watered by clear streams, and highly cultivated in the straths. On the slopes are roads of oak, chestnut, and birch. In the sheltered vales oranges, figs, lemons, and many other fruits thrive excellently. Strawberries are large in size and abundant. Vegetables grow with but little culture in this fertile land, and there are flower gardens with an opulence of colour.

On the south bank of the Douro there was probably an early Roman settlement. The Vandals swept down upon Lusitania when the power of the Romans waned, and after them came other Teuton hordes—the Suevi and the fierce Visigoths. About the middle of the eighth century the Moors conquered Portugal, and held it for three centuries. The Asturians of northern Spain appear to have reconquered this part of Portugal in the time of Ferdinand I. of Castile. After the subduing of the Moors, Alfonso I. was proclaimed king{156} of Portugal. Until about 1380 the House of Burgundy held the throne, and from that date the country rose in power, and became commercially prosperous. John I. of Portugal married the daughter of John of Gaunt, and became a staunch ally of England, receiving the Order of the Garter.

This was a stirring period in the history of the country, a time of strenuous warfare with Castile, and the last remnant of the Moors.

In the reign of Juan of Castile, Portugal became one of the chief exploring nations of Europe. Henry, third son of the king, was studious, and learned in astronomy and geography. He obtained royal subsidies, and gathered about him travellers and seamen whom he inspired to set forth on voyages of discovery. Two vessels were sent by the prince to round the southernmost point of Africa, with the object of reaching the East Indies. In 1418 the voyagers discovered Madeira, which was made a Portuguese settlement; but they dreaded the rounding of the south Cape of Africa, a point greatly dreaded by all mariners in those days. The Canary Islands passed at this time into the hands of a French adventurer, De Bethancourt, whose heirs{157} afterwards sold the colony to Henry of Portugal.

Vasco de Gama’s famous expedition to India was undertaken in 1497, and this bold explorer, unlike his predecessors, doubled the Cape of Good Hope, and travelled as far as Mozambique, where he found pilots who offered to direct his course to India. The pilots, however, proved treacherous. Eventually, after many delays, a trustworthy pilot was found at Melinda, and De Gama reached India, where he opened trading relations with the natives. At the end of two years the discoverer returned to Portugal and was received with great honour.

The prosperity of Oporto was largely due to the maritime enterprises of this period. Cabral discovered Brazil in 1500, and De Cortereal is said to have reached Greenland. The sea-rovers were the makers of modern Portugal. The great empire of Brazil was colonised by Juan III. in 1531; and the Portuguese claimed great territories in the East, which yielded splendid revenues. This was the most illustrious epoch in the history of Portugal. Parts of India and China were colonised. Art and learning flourished in the time of Manuel I., and the architectural style known as the Arte{158} Manoelina was developed. This style is a flamboyant Gothic, with Indian and Morisco influence, full of fantasy and often extravagant.

The colonisers attempted to convert the people of India to Christianity, and the zealous St Francis Xavier conducted a mission to that country in the reign of Juan III. Trade with Japan was opened at this time.

After a long spell of fortune, disaster fell upon Portugal. Philip II. of Spain envied the western strip of the Peninsula, and in 1580 he seized Portugal and annexed it to Spain. It was not until 1640 that the Portuguese regained their territory, and placed the Duke of Braganza on the throne.

During the Peninsular War, the city of Oporto was the scene of severe fighting, when the troops of Marshal Soult were surprised and routed by the force of Wellington. In 1832 the Miguelites besieged the city, and were defeated, with much loss, by the Pedroites. Civil disturbances have frequently shaken the town.

In 1838 the powerful Oporto Wine Company was re-established. The port wine, for which Oporto is famed throughout the globe, is the staple product of the district. There is little{159} doubt that the port of our grandfathers was a light wine without much “body,” and this kind of port is consumed in the country districts of Portugal. The tipplers who could consume three or four bottles of port, in the days of the Georges, probably drank this light wine, which was imported new, and was not a keeping wine. The prowess of our ancestors, “the six-bottle men,” has been overrated. Old port cannot be drunk in such quantities. The export trade in wine is enormous, and the chief trade is with England and the United States. Besides port, Oporto sends to foreign markets cattle, mineral ores, fruits, and olive oil. The population of the city in 1900 was 167,950.

In his account of his travels in Portugal and Galicia, the Earl of Carnarvon writes of the city, in 1848: “At length I reached Oporto, an ancient and very picturesque town; the streets with a few noble exceptions, are narrow, and the houses high and ornamented with handsome balconies. That part of the city which overhangs the Douro is strikingly beautiful; the river itself is fine and clear, and the banks bold and partially wooded.”

Since this was written new and wider thoroughfares have been made in Oporto.{160} The city has been modernised in many respects, but it still retains a savour of the eastern influence. Many of the houses are faced with striped tiles, painted blue. These tiles, or ajuléjos, are one of the staple manufactures of Portugal, and are Moorish in origin.

The cathedral, or the Sé, stands in a dominating position on the crest of a hill. It is in the pointed Gothic style, built of granite. There is an imposing tower, and a fine rose window. In the cloisters there are interesting specimens of ajuléjo work, and highly ornamented pillars. The mosaics represent “The Song of Solomon,” and are well worth attention.

The cathedral is in the form of a cross, with a wide nave, and several chapels. There is a marble floor. The interior is without any impressive objects of art, and much of it is modern. Close to the Cathedral is the Bishop’s Palace, with an interesting staircase.

Some of the churches of Oporto are notable for their lavish internal decoration. San Francisco dates from the early fifteenth century, and has a rose window of great beauty. The wood carving within is very interesting, and there is a gorgeous memorial to Pereira. The Bolsa is a striking building close to this{161} church. São Pedro is another old church which should be seen. The Renaissance Church of the Convent of Nossa Senhora de Serra do Pilar has beautiful cloisters, and a remarkable dome.

The bridge is one of the wonders of Oporto. It connects the banks of the Douro with a single arch, over five hundred feet in length, and is nearly as long as the Cernavoda Bridge across the Danube. At both ends are towers. The bridge is immensely strong, and though of iron, elegant in design. It is crossed by an upper and a lower roadway, and from the higher road there is a magnificent view up and down the swirling river.

In the busiest part of the city is the space known as the Praça de Dom Pedro from which several streets radiate. A modern city hall is on one side. In the middle of the square is a bronze statue of Pedro IV. on horseback, the work of Calmels. The Torre dos Clerigos, close to the Praça, is a splendid outlook point, with a bird’s-eye view of the city, the gorge of the Douro, and the shimmering Atlantic in the distance.

For a riotous wealth of flowers the visitor should see the Jardim da Cordoaria. The{162} grounds of the Crystal Palace are also very lovely. The gardens are on the slopes descending to the Douro, and the mingling of natural beauty with cultivation is charming. Nowhere have I seen such splendid roses. The winding paths afford many delightful glimpses of the river and the ocean.

One of the quaintest parts of Oporto, where there are still many ancient houses, is the Rua Cima do Muro. But in all the old quarters of the city there are interesting streets and corners. The markets should be visited by travellers interested in the customs of the people. They are bright and animated on market days.

The Picture Gallery will disappoint the student who expects to see a representative collection of Portuguese art. In the Largo de Viriato is the Museum, endowed by Allen, an Englishman, and given to the city. The pictures preserved here are not of much interest, except the few works ascribed to Rubens and Van Dyck. There is a collection of natural history specimens in the museum.

The public library has a large collection of volumes, numbering many thousands, and is an excellent institution. It was founded by{163} Pedro IV. and stands on the site of a convent near the Garden of São Lázaro.

For art-work in gold, visit the Rua das Flores, the street of goldsmiths. The windows contain highly interesting gold ornaments of infinite variety of design, in filigree, and enamelled. Huge earrings, worn by the women of the vineyards, are displayed here in lavish array.

A pleasant excursion may be made to São João da Foz, a favourite Sunday and holiday resort of the Oporto people in summer time. The road runs by the Douro, and upon approaching the mouth of the river, the dangerous bar will be seen. The seaside village, with the difficult name, has fine sands and an interesting coast stretching northwards. The Atlantic thunders along this shore in stormy weather, but the bathing is safe.

At Mattosinhos, to the north of Foz, there is a wonderful crucifix, said to have been picked up from the sea after floating from the Holy Land. It is an object of great veneration among the peasantry and working-class.

Another excursion may be made to Villa de Feira, where there is an ancient castle.{164}

POITIERS

A STUDY in grey and green is the impression left upon my mind by a first view of the old town of Poitiers. There is a sternness in the aspect of the place as you approach it by rail through the pastures of Vienne. But peace now rests upon Poitiers; the town dreams in this quiet French landscape, and the chronicles of arms are old and faded memories.

Crécy and Poitiers! Every English school-boy remembers the names of these great battlefields, and thrills at the story of the Black Prince and his encounters with King John of France. Poitiers sets the reflective visitor musing upon martial valour, and the vast futile exercise of the bellicose instincts of the French and British nations in the time of the Hundred Years’ War. Fighting was then the proper and exclusive occupation of gentlemen. The age that gave birth to Chaucer was the age of vainglorious warfare with Scotland and France, followed by intellectual stagnation, and all the bitter fruitage of battle.{165}

POITIERS.
THE CHURCH OF NOTRE DAME, 1845.

In 1355 the Black Prince, at the head of an army, advanced from Bordeaux towards Poitiers, laying waste the fertile regions of the south, where no war had ever been waged until this aggression. Aided by the turbulent Gascons, the English prince came on 19th September 1356 to some vineyards and fields about four miles from Poitiers. The French host, sixty thousand strong, awaited him. Hedgerows and vines formed cover for the English bowmen; the warriors in armour held a point where a narrow lane led to the encampment. Up this lane the French soldiers, in their heavy mail, charged to the attack, meeting a terrific rain of arrows from men in ambush.

Very soon the narrow roadway was choked with the wounded and the dying. The French were arrayed in three strong divisions, and probably outnumbered the troops of the Black Prince by seven to one. But their position was open and exposed, whereas the English had entrenched themselves and made a barricade of waggons. Moreover, the French were worn with long marches.

A sally of English archers, under Captal de Buch, wrought havoc among the French on the{166} left flank of their force, and from that moment the enemy wavered.

A great and final charge was led by the Black Prince and Sir Denis de Morbecque, a knight of Artois. The French drew back, routed, and in disorder, to the gates of Poitiers. After a valiant stand, King John was taken captive. The victory was complete for England; the vanquished king was a prisoner, his troops lay in thousands on the field. Eleven thousand of the flower of French chivalry perished in this fierce carnage.

Petrarch gives us a picture of the harvest of this strife: “I could not believe that this was the same France which I had seen so rich and flourishing. Nothing presented itself to my eyes but a fearful solitude, an utter poverty, land uncultivated, houses in ruin.”

The Black Prince treated his royal captive with courtesy, entertaining him at his own table, and praising his bravery. In May 1357 the French king was brought to England, and, seated on a charger, he rode side by side with his victor through the streets of London. As a first residence, King John was given the Savoy Palace, and afterwards he and his son spent some time in Windsor Castle.{167}

Watered on three sides by the Rivers Boivre and Clain, and standing on rising ground, Poitiers was chosen as the site of a Roman settlement. Not far from the town are the ruins of a Roman burial-place, and antiquities that have been discovered may be seen in the interesting Museum of Antiquaries de l’Ouest.

In 1569 the Count du Lude valiantly defended Poitiers against the seven weeks’ siege of troops led by Coligny, finally repulsing the enemy, and retaining the town.

Protestantism seems to have gained ground in Poitiers, for we read that in the days of Calvin there were many “conversions” among the inhabitants.

In September 1559 the justices of the city published a proscription of religious gatherings, and bade all strangers to quit the place in twenty-four hours. No preaching was permitted, the inhabitants were enjoined not to give necessities of life to the pastors under penalty of punishment for sedition. This persecution, directed against the Lutherans, was the result of the edict of Villars-Cotteret, and of an order made in Blois, which decreed that all the attenders at religious assemblies should be put{168} to death, “without hope of pardon or mitigation.” France was at this time the scene of the fierce religious intolerance which led to the Massacre of St Bartholomew.

Gaspard de Coligny, Admiral of France, who led the siege of Poitiers, was a convert to the teaching of Calvin, and the leader of the reformed party. Touched with fanaticism, he was a valorous soldier, and was never daunted by his reverses. After a long conflict with the Church, the admiral was murdered brutally, and his body mutilated, and dragged through the streets of Paris by a rabble.

The oldest church in the town is St Jean. A basilica once stood where St Peter’s massive bulk overshadows the houses around. The towers of this church date from the thirteenth century. There are some very old stained-glass windows; in one of them are portraits of Henry II. and Eleanor of England.

Portions of the Church of St Radegonde are probably of the eleventh century. St Porchaine is another ancient church worth visiting.

The Dukes of Aquitaine lived in the city, and their palace is now a court of law. One of the halls has a fine vaulted wooden roof.{169}

Poitiers has many winding, narrow lanes of curious old houses. It is not a busy commercial city, but it does not lack an air of comfort and prosperity. The town has to-day a population of over thirty thousand souls.{170}

ROUEN

THE fascination of this ancient city of Normandy consists not only in its historical associations and its splendid cathedral, but in the fine setting, colour, and aspect of the place. Rouen should be approached, if possible, by boat on the Seine. The steamboat journey from the mouth of the river is very delightful, and there is no better way of gaining an impression of one of the most beautiful of the provinces of France. Hills, with frowning rocks, begirt the Seine in its tortuous course. Woods and tilled fields alternate with primitive, untamed ravines, watered by rivulets, and old sombre-hued houses and churches peer among woods. Parts of the valley recall Wales or Scotland in their ruggedness; while here and there we are reminded of the softer scenes of southern England.

The Rouen of obscure days of antiquity was probably a colony of the tribe of the Roths-magi. Many place-names in Normandy suggest that the Danes held this district, and they,{171} rather than Norwegians, were the early conquerors. From Rouen we derive our word “roan” for a horse of a reddish colour, for the first imported Norman horses were known as “Rouens.”

In the eighth century this was a city of ecclesiastics, who erected many churches and convents. A long line of celebrated bishops ruled here, and the first church of St Ouen was probably built at this period. The Normans harried the country in 912, under the valiant Rollo, and Rouen was then made the capital of Normandy.

In the days of Duke William of Normandy, our gallant conqueror, Caen was of greater importance than Rouen, and at the first city the sovereigns built their palaces. William the Conqueror died in Rouen, but his body was taken to Caen for burial. Rufus invaded the territory in 1091, and obtained possession of all the chief forts on the Seine, up to Rouen.

The attempt to recover Normandy, under Henry of England, is a stirring chronicle of battle. The city of Rouen was at this time stoutly fortified, while it was famed for its wealth and power. Led by the brave Alan{172} Blanchard, the people of Rouen made a fierce defence. But Henry had cut off approach from the sea; he held, too, the roads to Paris. He encompassed the walls of Rouen with his army; he brought boats up the river, constructed a floating bridge, and dug trenches for his troops.

The soldiers and citizens within the city resisted for six terrible months. Many were the victims of famine, and those who strove to escape were at once struck down by the besiegers. “Fire, blood and famine” were Henry’s handmaids of war, and he declared that he had chosen “the meekest maid of the three” to subdue Rouen.

At length the starving and desperate citizens resolved to burn the city, and to fling themselves on the English. This threat caused Henry to offer terms of pacification. Blanchard, the valorous defender of Rouen, was, however, killed by order of the English monarch.

The immortal Joan of Arc appears later on the scene. We cannot follow the strange and inspiring page of her career. Betrayed at length, and given into the hands of the English, she was imprisoned in Rouen, where a charge of heresy was made against her. To{173} escape from the military to the ecclesiastic prison Joan pleaded guilty to the accusation of heresy. The story of her martyrdom is not a theme upon which one cares to dwell. The English cause was lost, though Joan of Arc was burned. “Oh, Rouen, Rouen, I have great fear lest you suffer for my death. Yes! my voices were of God; they have never deceived me.” And as the maid dropped in the writhing flames, the soldiers cried: “We are lost! We have burned a saint!”

The French recaptured Rouen in 1499. There is now no trace of the proud castle built by Henry V. of England. The prophetic cry of the soldiers had been fulfilled.

Before the end of the thirteenth century a cathedral was built in the city, and by the sixteenth century the stupendous edifice was finished. Notre Dame has a splendid west front, and very ornamental entrances to the transepts. The decorated rose windows are exceedingly fine. The choir has thirteenth-century stained windows, which must be seen in the sunlight. Here, too, are the monuments{174} of Henry II. and Richard I. Unfortunately, much of the external decoration of Notre Dame has been disfigured by weathering, and some of the images have disappeared. But the rose windows are very celebrated, and the tower of the sixteenth century is richly ornamented.

The Lady Chapel contains the tomb of two cardinals, with beautifully sculptured figures, and carvings of exquisite craftsmanship. The tomb of the Duke of Brézé is attributed to Jean Goujon, and the images are true works of genius.

Saint-Owen is perhaps more interesting than the cathedral. It is an immense building, and though so huge, finely proportioned. The south portal is rich and exquisite in its decoration.

For an example of Goujon’s work, you must inspect the remarkably decorated door of the Church of St Madou. There are other notable churches in Rouen; and the fine stained-glass windows of St Godard must not be overlooked.

Among other buildings of interest is the Palace of Justice, with a stately frontage.

In Rouen was born Corneille, and upon a bridge over the Seine you will find his statue.{175} Fontenelle was also one of the illustrious natives of the city.

Readers of Gustave Flaubert will remember his pictures of the country around Rouen, in “Madame Bovary.” Charles Bovary was sent to school in the city. “His mother selected a room for him, on a fourth floor, overlooking the Eau-de-Robec, in the house of a dyer she was acquainted with.” It was in Yonville-L’Abbage, “a large village about twenty miles from Rouen,” that Charles and Emma Bovary settled after their marriage.

“The river which runs through it,” writes Flaubert, “seems to have imparted to it two distinct characters. On the right bank it is all grass-land, whilst on the left it is all arable. The meadow-land spreads at the foot of some high-lying ground until it meets the pastures of Bray on the other side; on the east the gently rising ground loses itself in the distance in fields of golden wheat. The water running through the grass-land divides the colours of the meadows and of the furrows by a white streak, and so the landscape looks like a great unfolded cloak, with a green velvet collar bordered with silver.”

Such is the country that the genius of{176} Flaubert has peopled with his types of provincial character.

Municipal enterprise has “improved and beautified” Rouen in modern times. The new, broad thoroughfares are undoubtedly admirable, according to the standard of to-day; but the reconstruction of many streets has meant the destruction of a large number of those old gabled houses that delighted the travellers of sixty years ago. Fortunately, a few charming ancient corners remain, and the authorities of the city have preserved some of these weather-worn buildings as monuments of mediæval Rouen.

Jean Goujon, the most notable sculptor of his period, is associated with Rouen, but it has not been proved that he was a native of the city. Mystery surrounds the life of this genius. We do not even know the date of his birth. His sculpture is imaginative and powerful art, and he is very successful in presenting nude figures. It is supposed that Goujon was one of the victims of the Massacre of St Bartholomew.

A picture of the monastic life of Normandy, in the thirteenth century, has been drawn in the remarkable Regestrum Visitationum of Eude Rigaud, Archbishop of Rouen. This wonderful{177} diary has over five hundred pages, and covers a period of about twenty years. In 1248, Rigaud was appointed Archbishop of Rouen by Innocent IV. He proved a zealot for reforms in the Church; he undertook periodic inspection of the monasteries and nunneries, and his journals contain much “sensational” reading. The archbishop records that the rule in many of the convents was exceedingly lax, and that fasts and penances were not duly observed. He found that a number of the clergy were addicted to tippling, and he made clerical drunkenness an offence punishable by the deprivation of a living. Incontinence was very common among the monks. In the convents, Rigaud discovered “great disorders.” But the archbishop relates that the offenders were so numerous that had he expelled them all, no priests would have been left in the diocese.

When wandering in the streets of Rouen, we remember that Saint-Amant was born here in 1594. The life of this wine-loving poet is full of rare adventure and colour. He was a scholar, wit, soldier, statesman, and man of business by turn. Saint-Amant visited England, went to Rome with the fleet, and afterwards to Spain. He also started a glass factory, and was{178} for a period a diplomat in Poland. His career is a long romance.

Saint-Amant’s name in full was Marc Antoine de Gérard, Sieur de Saint Amant. The name by which he is best known was taken from the abbey of Saint-Amant. He was one of the greatest of good livers, with an unquenchable thirst, and an infinite capacity for absorbing liquor. It is said that he and his boon companions often sat for twenty-four hours over their bottles. In those days of tavern revelry, the poet was respected as a master of deep-drinking and a model for the bibulous.

Théophile Gautier wrote of the poet of Rouen: “Saint-Amant is assuredly a very great and very original poet, worthy to be named among the best of whom France can boast.” This exquisite singer and devoted worshipper of Bacchus died in Paris in 1661.{179}

CHARTRES

THE city of Chartres stands on a bold hill, rising from a wide plain on the south-west of Paris, watered by the River Eure, a tributary of the Seine. This commanding position was favourable for a fortified town, and long before the Romans came to Gaul, kings had a stronghold here of great importance.

Chartres is dominated by its ancient cathedral towers, that rise grey and massive, forming an outstanding landmark for leagues around. The old low-built houses of the city are dwarfed by this mighty church, which overshadows a number of twisting, narrow alleys of mediæval aspect. Many of the houses in Chartres are weather-worn, and give an impression of extreme age, and sometimes of decay. Parts of the town, it is true, have been rebuilt and made modern; but one’s recollection is of an aged, somnolent place, dreaming of its past, though it strives to advance in line with progressive ideas of municipal improvement.

According to Mr Henry James, it is not so long{180} ago that sedan-chairs were used in Chartres; and during his visit in 1876, he saw only two vehicles—the omnibuses of the rival hotels.

For the student of early Gothic architecture in France, Chartres is a most profitable field. The older forms of the arch, the foliated window-circles, the boldly decorated doorways, the twelfth-century decorative details, and the massive, as well as the light, buttress can be seen here in perfection. Few, if any, cathedral portals in Europe can excel in richness those of Chartres. Here is to be seen the noblest examples of twelfth-century sculpture.

After the Romans, the city was ruled by Christian princes up to the day of Charlemagne. Before the tenth century, the first Christian church in Chartres was burned down, and very little of the pristine fabric was spared by the flames.

The pious Saint Bernard preached here, and many illustrious bishops presided over the see. Henry V. of England came to the city; and so did Mary of Scotland. There have been two or three notable sieges, and the city was a scene of slaughter during the great Revolution.

The legends surrounding the first building consecrated to the Christian faith in Chartres{181} are numerous. Saint Aventin was probably the first bishop of the see. Fulbert, who received tribute from a number of monarchs, was the founder of the new cathedral, after the wreckage by fire about the year 1021. There were two or three attacks from fire, for Fulbert’s structure was seriously damaged in the twelfth century.

The crypt is part of a very early building. In the chapels are bare traces of the old mural paintings, and several remarkable remains of the more ancient edifice. The crypt forms a church in itself, for it contains no less than fourteen chapels.

There are several points of difference between the early Gothic styles of England and France, and height is a characteristic of the French cathedrals; the architects delighted in lofty vaultings, and seemed to vie with one another in attaining great height. Double aisles and double flying buttresses are other features of the French Gothic churches, distinguishing them from the churches of England of the same date.

The French pillars are heavy, and not so highly ornamented as those of England. In the windows we find chiefly in France the{182} lancet; and the circle, with trefoils and quatre-foils, is a common form. Specimens of round windows may be studied to advantage in the Cathedral of Chartres.

The most beautiful examples of early French Gothic architecture, in detail, are the ornate portals, especially of the western façades, the spires, the imposing towers, the rose windows, and the high vaulting.

The west front at Chartres is early twelfth-century work. Few façades present such a bewildering wealth of decoration and of impressive height. The windows are enormous, and the central rose window is remarkably rich in design. Each of the three doorways is full of most interesting statuary, with luxuriant decorations.

The north portal was once gilded and coloured, but this embellishment has disappeared. Many figures adorn this doorway, and every one of them will repay close inspection. The central door on this side is exquisite. Another impressive front is on the south. Here are the statues of Christ trampling on the lion, and of Christ as Judge. Innumerable figures cluster on this porch. Every façade and doorway of the Cathedral of Chartres is a gallery of statuary.{183}

Very noble are the two huge towers. The north tower is the more majestic of the two, and dates from the sixteenth century. It is literally covered with delicious ornament and mediæval statuary. The south tower is massive, but plainer, rising to a height of about three hundred and fifty feet. It is adorned with some quaint symbolic figures. There were once two immense bells within this tower.

The interior of the cathedral impresses by its vastness and height. A wider nave is not to be found among the cathedrals of France, and the aisles are proportionate in width. The eye ranges upwards to the wonderful roof, with its opulent decoration, to the beautiful triforium, and the tall, narrow windows of the clerestory.

The magnificent choir screen is finely sculptured. Among the host of figures are the Virgin, Saint Joachim, and the Adoration of Wise Men. Several groups, representing scenes from Scripture, deck the screen. The effigies are far too numerous to describe in detail. There is a monument within the choir, “The Assumption,” by Bridan. The pavement is of variegated marble.

In the south aisle of the choir is a tall{184} stained-glass window of an early date. Several of the painted windows were executed before the fourteenth century, and these are to be seen in the nave, the clerestory, and the transcepts. The chapels have several interesting stained windows, fine roof decorations, and handsome portals. In the sacristy there is a notable window; and in the ambulatory will be seen the clothed figure of the Virgin Mary, one of the chief treasures of the cathedral.

The sixteenth-century Church of Saint Aignan ranks next to the cathedral in interest. It has a fine, but somewhat worn, front, still rich in examples of Renaissance art. More than once fire has ravaged this church, and during the Revolution the edifice was despoiled and damaged. Saint Aignan is the burial-place of the bishop whose name it bears. There are many stained windows in the church. The interior is in other respects somewhat plain.

There are some interesting old churches in Chartres. In the Church of San Pierre there are dazzling stained windows which should be seen by the visitor, as they are among the finest examples in Chartres. There is an old portal on the north side, and the great buttresses should be noted. Many of the{185} decorations of the interior were destroyed by the Revolution.

There are some old houses of historical and architectural interest in Chartres, and one will be seen near Saint Aignan’s.

The Museum is in the town hall. Among the objects of interest collected here are some examples of tapestry that were formerly in the cathedral. There are also many relics of the Roman days. In the library are several old missals.

Chartres is the birthplace of two poets, Desportes and Mathurin Regnier, his nephew. Desportes, born in 1546, travelled in Italy and Poland, and was court bard to Henri III. He died in 1606. Mathurin Regnier was a poet of a higher order. He composed a number of fine satires and many lyrical poems.

A general impression of Chartres is gained by following the tree-shaded walk which surrounds the old town, a promenade that gives many delightful glimpses of the plain and of narrow ancient streets, with here and there a trace of the crumbling walls.{186}

RHEIMS

BY the side of the River Vesle, in the province of Marne, and on the verge of a famous champagne producing country, is one of the oldest towns of France. Rheims, with its ancient gates, its memorials of Roman times, and monuments of illustrious kings of Gaul, has a history of much interest. Its cathedral ranks with the finest ecclesiastic buildings of the world, and is celebrated as the scene of many great pageants of the coronations of French sovereigns. The Romans captured a city here, and called it Durocortorum, and in Cæsar’s day this was an important station. It is recorded that Attila, the fierce conqueror, ravaged the town with fire.

The Consul, Jovinus of Rheims, was an early convert to Christianity, which was preached here by two missionaries from Rome in the fourth century. The marble cenotaph of the Christian consul is to be seen in the city. Then came the Vandals, who seized the town, and murdered the bishop at the door of the first cathedral.{187}

When King Clovis conquered the fair territory of Champagne, St Rémi was made bishop of Rheims, and henceforward the kings of France were crowned here. Many famous prelates lived in the city during the succeeding centuries; one, the most celebrated, Gerbert, became pope.

Joan of Arc is an important figure in the drama of Rheims during the great war with England. The peasant’s daughter, born on the borders of Champagne, at Domremy, a hamlet which is now a shrine, reached the height of her triumph in 1429, when she led a vast army to the gates of Rheims. “O gentle king, the pleasure of God is done,” cried the white maid, as she knelt before Charles VII. after his coronation in the gorgeous cathedral.

A yearning for home and the old tranquil life was in the heart of Joan; she wished to leave the tented field, and to return to her sheep-folds and pastures. But, at the battle of Compiegne, she fell into the hands of the treacherous Bastard of Vendôme, and about a year later Joan la Pucelle was burned to death.

The focus of interest in Rheims is the cathedral. Notre Dame was built on the situation of a Roman basilica. Parts of the present{188} building were first constructed in 1231, but the façade is of the fourteenth century. This magnificent front has a gorgeous portal, with pointed arches of great grace, rising to a large and handsome rose window. There are two towers over two hundred and fifty feet high, very finely decorated. A number of statues adorn this façade, on the portals and in the arch of the rose window. The figure of the Virgin is over the principal doorway, bending to receive the crown from the hands of Christ.

“The three great doorways,” writes Mr Henry James, in “Portraits of Places,” “are in themselves a museum of imagery, disposed in each case in five close tiers, the statues in each of the tiers packed perpendicularly against their comrades. The effect of these great hollowed and chiselled recesses is extremely striking; they are a proper vestibule to the dusky richness of the interior. The cathedral of Rheims, more fortunate than many of its companions, appears not to have suffered from the iconoclasts of the Revolution; I noticed no absent heads nor broken noses.”

The rose windows of the transepts are exceedingly lovely, and attention should be paid to the design of the buttresses, and the very{189} remarkable gargoyles. One of the towers contains an enormous bell. In the exterior of the south transept are several good statues.

An immense nave stretches for nearly five hundred feet. This part of the edifice was repeatedly extended to make space for the great crowds that attended the imposing coronation ceremonies. Around the choir are several chapels. In numerous niches and corners are statues of interest. “The long sweep of the nave, from the threshold to the point where the coloured light-shafts of the choir lose themselves in the grey distance, is a triumph of perpendicular perspective,” writes Mr Henry James.

Perhaps the greatest treasures preserved in Notre Dame are the tapestries. There are pieces representing the life of the Virgin, while several depict scenes in the life of Christ. The Canticles form the subject of other examples. Two pieces of Gobelins, after designs by Raphael, represent the life of St Paul. These tapestries are exceptionally fine specimens of this art.

During the coronation celebrations, the sovereigns occupied the archbishop’s palace, which is close to the cathedral. The building{190} was begun about 1499. In the museum of the palace is the famous cenotaph of Jovinius, adorned with sculpture. A large hall contains portraits of kings.

Among the churches of importance in Rheims are St Jacques, St André, and St Thomas. The Church of St Rémi, named after the great bishop, dates from the eleventh century. During the Revolution this church was terribly damaged; many of the splendid relics and statues were destroyed, and but a few images were spared.

The tomb of St Rémi is modern, except the images that decorate it. There are some rich tapestries in the church. The doorway of the south transept is handsome, and there are beautiful windows of an early date. The cloister of the abbey is now enclosed by a hotel. In the seventeenth century the present Town Hall was erected. It contains a gallery of paintings and a museum.

The chief Roman monument in the town is the great arch of triumph, the Porte de Mars. This structure was probably erected by Agrippa on the occasion of the opening of the highways leading to the city. Near to the arch stood a temple of Mars. The Gate of Mars is over{191} a hundred feet long, and over forty feet high. There are several figures under the archways. Parts of a Roman pavement are near the triumphal arch. These are the only memorials of Roman times, but it may be noted that the gates of the city still retain their original names.

Rheims was fortified after the Franco-Prussian War; and in recent years many of the streets have been widened and modernised. Henry James notes “a prosperous, modern, mercantile air” in the Rheims of to-day. Considerable business is transacted in the city. It is a centre of the woollen industry, and there are several weaving and spinning works, and a large trade in flannel and blankets.

The chief ancient charm of Rheims is in the great cathedral, with its highly interesting architecture, the old church of St Rémi, and the Roman arch. The streets are clean and bright, and the town has its tramcars among other tokens of modernity. There are not many statues of importance. The monument to Louis XV. stands in the Place Royale.{192}

BRUGES

THE air of prosperity which is so apparent in Amsterdam and Antwerp is missing in Bruges, once populated by a busy multitude of craftsmen and weavers. Early in the seventh century, the city contained as many as fifty thousand weavers, and this was probably the period of its greatest splendour. For several centuries, however, Bruges held its position as a trading town, and in the fourteenth century, under the rule of the dukes of Burgundy, its market was known throughout Europe, and was visited by the wealthy merchants of Italy and Greece.

If the greatness of the industrial power has long since declined, Bruges can still boast of its ancient monuments, which invite visitors from all parts of the world. The town is much visited by strangers. It is easily reached from England by way of Ostend, and ships of five hundred tons can sail up to Bruges on its wide artificial waterway.

For the causes of the decay of the town, we must refer to the early wars that disturbed the{193} country, to the penalty which the natives suffered for rebellion against the Archduke Maximilian in 1488, when the trade was transferred to Antwerp, and finally to the ravages of the Duke of Alva’s army.

Peter Titelmann harried the burghers in the days of religious strife to such an extent that the Catholic burgomasters and senators of the town petitioned the Duchess Regent to protect them. They complained that the Inquisitor of the Faith brought before them men and women, and forced them to confess; and that, without warrant, he dragged his victims from the church itself.

In 1583 the French, under Captain Chamois, having seized Ostend and other towns, came to the gates of Bruges. The burgomaster refused to admit the fifteen hundred troops, and rallying the townsmen, he made a stand against the invading force, compelling Chamois to retire.

The city was famed for its workers in tapestry, an art known early in the Netherlands, and probably borrowed from the Saracens. In 1606 Flemish artists, invited by Henri IV., introduced the working of tapestry into France, and a few years later the industry was established in England.{194}

Philip the Good, of Burgundy, who died in 1467, was scarcely worthy of his title of virtue. He was, however, in spite of his adroitness in deception, an encourager of industry and commerce, and a protector of the arts. He invited the brothers, John and Hubert Van Eyck, to Bruges, and he patronised men of science and scholars. “Lord of so many opulent cities and fruitful provinces, he felt himself equal to the kings of Europe.” Upon his marriage with Isabella of Portugal, he founded at Bruges the celebrated order of the “Golden Fleece.” This Order played a great part in Flemish history. The symbol of the Golden Fleece was both religious and industrial, and the Lamb of God, hung upon the breast of the twenty-five knights, represented not only devotion, but also the woollen trade of the country. Motley gives the number of the knights as twenty-five, but another authority states that it numbered thirty-one, and that the members of the Order wore a distinguishing cloak, lined with ermine, and the cipher of the Duke of Burgundy in the form of a B, with flints striking fire. The motto was: Aute ferit, quam flamma micat.

The memorials of the days of splendour are many in this city of the past. The cathedral{195} is not of the finest Gothic work externally, but it is rich in monuments, and lavishly decorated within. Its earlier portions date from the twelfth century, the fine nave is of a later period. The pictures are not of much importance.

Notre Dame has a lofty spire, and many interesting details will be found in its architecture of the early and the later Gothic periods. One of the chapels contains the tombs of Charles, Duke of Burgundy, and his daughter, Mary. The images are in copper, and recumbent on marble.

Memories of Charles the Bold crowd into the mind as we stand before his effigy. His vast ambition led him into rash adventures, and his career, if brilliant, was also tragic in its failures. Charles would have made Burgundy a kingdom, but he lacked the essentials of a conqueror, in spite of his courage. His rapacity was a drain on the resources of the Netherlands; his love of power made him an oppressor, and caused discontent and rebellion. Through his want of the true kingly qualities he brought disaster upon the country, and destroyed the peace of the small republics.

In his forty-fourth year, in 1477, he died, leaving his people impoverished, and the{196} industries decaying. His realm was given into the charge of his daughter, Mary, who married the Emperor Maximilian.

The monument of Mary of Burgundy is an example of the work of De Beckere, an eminent sculptor. A painting by Porbus of “The Crucifixion and Last Supper” is in this church. The carved pulpit is a good specimen of this Flemish craft.

The Town Hall and Palace of Justice contain several important pictures, and both buildings are architecturally instinctive; the former is very highly decorated Gothic, with a fine façade, and several statues of the Flemish counts. There is a library in the town hall with a beautiful roof. Here are some missals and manuscripts, and a large collection of books.

The Palace of Justice has been restored, but parts of the older building remain. It has a spacious hall, and an elaborate fireplace, with statues of some of the rulers of Burgundy.

La Chapelle du Saint Sang is finely decorated, and has an ancient crypt, containing early treasures.

We must now visit the academy of painting, and inspect the pictures, though not without{197} regret that there are so few works of the illustrious artists of Bruges, the brothers Van Eyck, in the collection. There is, however, one of J. Van Eyck’s greatest pictures in the academy. This is the famous “Portrait of his Wife,” a rarely finished piece of work, with a singular history, for it was found in one of the markets of Bruges, thickly coated with filth. The permanent quality of the colour used by the Flemish artists of this period is instanced in the case of this portrait, which has been most successfully cleaned. The tints are in splendid preservation.

In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, the art of Flanders flourished, and the brothers Van Eyck were the pioneers of oil painting. Many painters had tried oil as a medium, but none succeeded till Hubert and Jan Van Eyck discovered a suitable oil. Working with this new medium, they produced wonderfully durable pictures. It is supposed that the medium was a mixture of oils and resin, which dried rapidly. The colours of our modern artists cannot compare with those of the old Flemish school in respect to durability, which is seen in some of the works of the Victorian period in England.{198}

The other paintings by Jan Van Eyck are “The Virgin and Child, with St George and St Donatus,” and “A Head of Christ,” dated 1440. Of these two pictures, the former is by far the more representative of the painter’s genius.

J. Van Eyck died, and was buried in Bruges, in a church which the French destroyed. There is a poor statue of the painter on the ground whereon the church stood.

Memling’s altarpiece is in the collection, a much restored painting of “St Christopher and the Infant Jesus.” For other works of this artist, we must visit the Hospital of St John, which stands near to Notre Dame. The pictures are very remarkable and marvellously preserved. “The Adoration of the Magi,” “The Virgin and Child,” “The Head of Zambetha,” “The Virgin,” and other examples are in this collection.

Memling and his school used landscape, as seen through windows, in many of their portrait works, and his architectural backgrounds were painted from the houses in Bruges. We may still see houses that recall his period. Hans Memling was probably born in 1425, and appears to have lived in the town until{199} 1495. His statue is in the Place du Vieux Bourg.

Among the old houses of the town is the Prissenhof, though now it is only a ruined memorial of its past grandeur. Here Charles the Bold wedded Margaret of York, and here lived several of the counts of Flanders.

An idea of the fortifications of the town in the Middle Ages is gained by a walk around the ramparts which enclose Bruges. The many canals, that intersect the city, lend beauty to Bruges. Besides the great waterway to Ostend there are a canal to Ghent and other streams.

Lace-making is one of the industries of Bruges, and there is a trade in linen and woollen goods and pottery. The city to-day is not a bustling, commercial place, as in mediæval times, and to some visitors it may savour of sadness.

Mr Harry Quilter is a traveller who finds the Gothic towns “more than ordinarily depressing,” by reason of their monotony. “Perhaps it is the effect of the angular roofs and windows, wearying to the eye as the diagrams in a book of Euclid. Perhaps it is the low-browed shops, the irregularly paved streets, the dull unrelieved{200} brown and grey of the houses. But for whatever reason, the effect is certainly dreary.”

If we do not find Bruges a town of dull aspect it is due to personal temperament and taste. There may be greyness in these old Gothic towns, there may be a suggestion of decay in Bruges; but there is also a strong fascination, a charm that appeals to those whose eyes have grown weary of modern streets with their regular outlines and monotonous architecture. These tortuous lanes of Belgium and Holland, the gables, and the tall irregular houses, are steeped in an old-world atmosphere, and every corner suggests a subject for the painter’s brush. Certainly, the term “picturesque” may be used in speaking of Bruges.

It is still a large town, with a big population; but the thoroughfares seem rarely thronged, and there is slumber in the by-lanes. There appears to be no demand for new houses, and no indication that Bruges will grow. Its hotels prosper through the number of strangers that visit the city. Few tourists in Belgium neglect to visit this old town.{201}

GHENT

FROM Bruges to Ghent the distance is about twenty-eight miles. The railroad runs by the side of a placid canal, with banks planted with rows of tall trees—such as Hobbema painted—and traverses a fertile country, a verdant district of West Flanders, famous for its gardens and orchards. Though an inland town, Ghent can be approached by large vessels, by way of the Schelde and a big canal draining from the river.

From the top of the belfry tower the eye wanders over the countless spires and towers of the city, and a vague, distant expanse of flat country. There are few city views in Europe to be compared with this. The prospect is vast and impressive; the town below presents a curious scene, partly old-world, and yet bustling and modern in many aspects; for Ghent, with over one hundred and sixty thousand inhabitants, is one of the largest centres of Belgian commerce, and was once the capital of Flanders. In the fourteenth century it was said that over seventy{202} thousand of its citizens were trained to arms, while the industrial population was large and thriving.

Prince John, third son of Edward III. of England, was born here, and took the name of John of Ghent. The Emperor Charles V. was also born in Ghent, in the old palace that has disappeared. The history of this city, which was probably founded in the days of the Nervii, is nebulous until the tenth century, but in 1297 the town was strong enough to resist a big English army, and the prosperity of Ghent was envied by the rest of Europe.

Its busy looms gave employment to many thousands of weavers, and most of the wool used was supplied by England. Edward III. invited Flemish weavers to his country, and kept up friendly relations with Flanders. English wool was, however, still the chief supply of Bruges and Ghent, and the trade in one year enriched the coffers of Edward III. with £30,000 in duties.

GHENT, 1832.

Erasmus declared that there was no other town in Christendom that could be compared with Ghent, in “size, power, political constitution, or the culture of its inhabitants.” The city was practically a republic, ruled by{203} representatives, elected yearly by fifty-two guilds of manufacturers and thirty-two corporations of weavers, and by a principal senate selected from all classes. It appears that these legislative authorities were often at strife, for outbreaks of factions within the walls of the town were frequent.

When Charles V. was in need of money to conduct a war against France, he made a very heavy claim upon Ghent. The natives rebelled at the extortion; they even offered to fight with Francis against the emperor. Francis I. was, however, not disposed to ally himself with the people of Ghent, and he communicated with Charles, telling him of the defection of the burghers.

Hurrying from Spain, through the territory of the enemy, Charles V. advanced on Flanders, and on 14th February 1540 he appeared unexpectedly at the walls of Ghent. Surrounded by his great army of lancers, archers, halberd-men and musketeers, and attended by prelates and barons, with many of the knights of the Golden Fleece, the emperor marched into the rebellious city. The inhabitants were awed by this pomp and display. As a punishment, the Duke of Alva proposed to destroy Ghent; but{204} Charles was too cultured and rational to allow such destruction of a noble city. Calling the leaders of the revolt before him, the emperor commanded that they should be executed, and he humiliated the chiefs of the trade guilds by causing them to bend before him, with halters tied around their necks, and to ask his leniency. All the privileges and charters of the city were made null, and the rents and revenues confiscated; while the subsidy demanded for the war was to be rendered in full. A fine was also levied, to be paid annually.

This was how Charles V. punished Ghent for its show of independence, and from that day the city suffered in prosperity. The republican form of government was banished; in its stead the emperor gave the town into the despotic control of the supreme court of Mechlin.

Nine miles of walls encompassed Ghent in this day. It was a well-armed city, protected on all sides, and furnished with drawbridges over the streams that flowed through it. The population in the height of its glory was probably two hundred thousand.

In 1376 a great congress was held in Ghent, to draw up a document of pacification, in order to end the great struggle between the{205} adherents of the old faith and the reformed religion. All the edicts of Alva were withdrawn; all prisoners were to be freed, and compensation paid for confiscated property. Saint Aldegonde, with several commissioners, signed the treaty at Ghent on 8th November. Thus ended the Inquisition in Flanders. The publication of the treaty was received with the utmost joy throughout the land. Hymns of praise were sung, cannons boomed the news, and beacon fires were lighted.

A year later there was trouble in Ghent, through the appointment of the Duke of Aerschot as governor of Flanders. The duke was an ardent Roman Catholic, and the city abounded with converts to Protestantism. A grand ceremony was witnessed when the new ruler, attended by several companies of infantry and three hundred horse soldiers, came to Ghent. Aerschot was regarded as an emissary of Romanism by a large part of the inhabitants, and by the rest he was distrusted.

A young noble named Ryhove vowed that he would deliver Ghent from the duke; so he went to William of Orange with a plan for carrying out the extinction of Aerschot’s power. He stated that he was prepared to{206} lead a cause which would result in the expulsion of “the Duke with his bishops, councillors, lords, and the whole nest of them.” On the day following Ryhove’s interview with the prince, he was visited by Saint Aldegonde, who informed him that the Prince of Orange did not strongly discountenance his plan, nor did he strongly approve of it.

Meanwhile, Imbize, another young aristocrat of the city, had confronted Aerschot, and the governor had threatened the rebellious citizens with a rope for their necks. When Ryhove arrived, he called on the citizens to make a fight for their old charters and rights, and to banish for ever all vestiges of the Spanish Inquisition. Incited by the ardent Ryhove, the burghers arose and rushed through the streets to the house of Aerschot, demanding admission. Refused by the guards, they threatened to burn down the residence. But the duke surrendered in time, and Ryhove protected him from the violence of the crowd, at the same time commanding that he should be taken prisoner. Half naked, the governor was conveyed to the house of Ryhove.

So began an anti-Catholic campaign, which shattered the supremacy of the older form of{207} religion. Aerschot was released. The Prince of Orange came to Ghent, and strove to restore peace in the city. He was received with honour, pageants were arranged, a spectacular drama was displayed, and the prince was entertained generously.

In 1579 Imbize again led the inhabitants in revolt, and incited them to attack and plunder the Catholics. William of Orange successfully stemmed the conflict for a time, but Imbize put himself at the head of a regiment, and actually arrested the magistrates of the city and other dignitaries, and established a board of rulers. William the Silent again intervened. He came to Ghent, reprimanded the riotous burghers, and had Imbize brought before him. With his customary clemency, the prince pardoned the young man, after chiding him for his intolerance and folly.

We read again of the fanatical Puritan, Imbize, in 1584, when he allied himself with the Catholic party, and plotted against his country. His scheme was, however, discovered; he was charged with treason, and brought to the gallows.

Ghent was early a stronghold of powerful trade guilds, and one of the meeting-places of{208} these unions was in the Market Square. These organisations of craftsmen were probably established first by the Flemish weavers to protect the woollen industry. All over Europe the guilds were instituted by artisans working in walled towns during the Middle Ages. Chaucer mentions them in England in his day. The guilds had their masters or wardens, who exercised an almost despotic sway over the members, and watched their interests zealously. The election of the wardens was made a pompous ceremony, accompanied by a religious service which was attended by the mayor and corporation, and followed by a banquet. No doubt the Market Square of Ghent saw many of these ceremonies in days of old.

The power of the merchants and manufacturers of Ghent was great in the time of the city’s affluence. We gain an idea of their sumptuous houses and their costly apparel from many paintings of the Dutch School. Often the merchant was wealthier than the feudal baron, and kings were known to borrow from them.

Jacques Van Artevelde, “the brewer” of Ghent, was an important burgher in his day, though he was not, strictly speaking, a brewer,{209} but a patrician who joined the Brewer’s Guild, and headed a riotous faction against a rival guild. A fierce fight broke out in the square, and several hundreds of the combatants were slain. Van Artevelde was a staunch friend of Edward III. of England. He was killed by the populace for plotting to make Edward ruler of Flanders.

Such, briefly, are some of the main historical events of this old town of martial and industrial renown. Let us now inspect some of the works of art preserved in the Cathedral of St Bavon. Perhaps the masterpiece here is “The Adoration of the Lamb,” the marvellous altar-picture painted by Jan and Hubert Van Eyck. The colour is glowing, though the picture was painted in 1432. The Lamb is attended by angels, and worshipped by a company of the devout. There are hundreds of heads in the composition, which has several compartments. The landscape is exquisitely rendered, both in the effect of distance and in the flowers of the foreground. Parts of the altarpiece are elsewhere, in Berlin and Brussels, and the whole was carried away by the French, only a portion being restored. Portraits of the brothers Van Eyck are among the Just Judges in the picture.{210}

Among other paintings in the cathedral are works of Roose, Jansen, Porbus, and a Rubens, highly praised by Sir Joshua Reynolds. There are several monuments, notably the statue of St Bavon by Verbruggen, and the effigies of bishops of Ghent. In the crypt is the tomb of Hubert Van Eyck.

In the Academy the pictures chiefly claiming inspection are “St Francis,” by Rubens, some works by Grayer, and Jordaen’s “Woman taken in Adultery.”

St Michael’s Church contains a painting by Vandyk, “The Crucifixion,” which is in poor preservation, and several modern pictures by Flemish artists.

The Hotel de Ville and the University of Ghent are both fine buildings; the first has highly decorated frontages on two sides, that on the north showing the greater wealth of detail and ornament. A more modern, but very noble, structure is the university, containing a museum and library.{211}

ANTWERP

THREE centuries ago the city of Antwerp had in Europe scarcely a rival in commerce and affluence. To-day Antwerp remains one of the most populous commercial cities of Belgium, although the period of its greatest splendour passed with the Spanish persecution under the Duke of Alva. Not only as a busy port and mart is the city on the Schelde famous. It has renown as a centre of the arts, as the home of several of the most illustrious painters of the Flemish school, and as the birthplace of one of the first academies of painting. As a fortified town, it has always been of first importance in the defence of Belgium.

The traveller from England, as the Harwich boat steams up Goldsmith’s “lazy Scheld” at daybreak, in summer-time, sees long grey vistas, on either side of the estuary, of flat pastures and fertile fields of grain, spreading away to Bruges to the south, and across the island of Walcheren, to the north. Flushing comes into sight, its roofs and spires lit by the rising sun,{212} which quickly lends colour to the landscape, and reveals a picturesque town, intersected by canals, lined with vessels. Past islets and sandbanks, upon which sea-birds congregate, the steamer follows the line of buoys and beacons, until the river, though still tidal, becomes narrower, and in sixty odd miles from its mouth, washes the quays of Antwerp.

During this approach to the city by the Schelde an impression is formed in the mind of the voyager of the ingenious methods of dyke-making, canal construction, and damming which have so greatly aided in the prosperity of Holland and Belgium. Antwerp owes its wealth as much to the toil of the engineer and the agriculturist as to the merchant and craftsman. Rural Belgium is well populated, except in some parts of the Ardennes; the farms are tilled with science, the towns and villages of the Schelde-side are bright and clean, and inhabited by industrious, thrifty people.

ANTWERP, 1832.
THE CATHEDRAL.

Antwerp probably derives its name from “an t’ werf,” “on the wharf.” Its position on a deep navigable river was one of the principal causes of the early commercial supremacy of the city. When Venice, Nuremberg, and Bruges were declining, the port on the{213} Schelde was in the height of its repute, and second to Paris in the number of its inhabitants, among whom but few were poor. In education Antwerp excelled in these fortunate days, for the schools were admirable, and every burgher’s child could benefit by the teaching provided by the senate.

Philip II. of Spain, who despised the Flemings and Walloons, and disliked their loquacity, was received joyously in Antwerp, as hereditary sovereign of the seventeen Netherlands. The city was gay with triumphant arches and splendid banners; a gorgeous assemblage of dignitaries and their servants, with a great troop of soldiers, met the Spanish sovereign without the gates. His coldness and reserve disturbed the minds of the citizens. After Philip came the Duke of Alva with his reign of tyranny, the setting up of the Inquisition in Antwerp, the ruin of the silk trade, and the vast emigration of the oppressed workers to other countries, especially to England.

In 1566, William of Orange was in Antwerp, and two years later, as soon as the prince had left the city, the natives bent to the rule of the oppressor. The Spaniards, defeated at Brussels, prepared some years after for an{214} attack upon Antwerp, then the richest city of Belgium. On a grey wintry morning, the enemy encompassed the walls of the city, the besieged having been reinforced by an army of Walloons. The fight was one of the most desperate ever recorded in history. Gaining entrance, the Spaniards swept up the chief thoroughfares; “the confused mob of fugitives and conquerors, Spaniards, Walloons, Germans, burghers,” writes Motley, “struggling, shouting, striking, cursing, dying, swayed hither and thither like a stormy sea.”

A frightful massacre followed upon the conquest of Antwerp, no less than eight thousand men, women, and children were put to death by the ferocious victors.

Merchants were tortured in order to extort from them the hiding-places of their gold; the poor were killed because they had no store for the plunderer; and a young bride was torn from the arms of the bridegroom, and conveyed to a dungeon, where she tried to strangle herself with her long gold chain. She was stripped of her jewels and dress, beaten, and flung into the streets, to meet death at the hands of a rabble of soldiers. Such were the horrors of the capture of Antwerp, to be{215} followed by the “Spanish Fury,” in which more persons were slain than in the terrible massacre of St Bartholomew.

The siege of 1830, on 27th October, was one of the most sanguinary conflicts in modern warfare. Attacked by the implacable General Chassé, the inhabitants had to face a terrible cannonade. The cathedral was damaged, the arsenal fired, and the townsfolk crouched in terror in vaults and cellars, while many of them fled into the open country.

Again in the revolution of 1830, and in 1832, Antwerp was the scene of battle.

From such records of carnage and cruelty, it is a relief to turn the pages of history till we read of the arts that flourished for so long in Antwerp. Not only were the wealthy classes of the city cultivated beyond the standard of many countries of Europe, but the artisans also shared in the general culture, and cherished respect for art.

Quentin Matsys, whose pictures may be studied in the museum, was one of the early painters of Antwerp. Rubens and Teniers were both associated with the city, and their statues stand in the streets. Vandyk is another famous artist upon the roll of honour of{216} Antwerp, and his image in marble is in the Rue des Fagots.

Peter Paul Rubens was born in 1577, in Siegen. He was the pupil of Verhaecht and Van Nort, and afterwards of Otto Van Veen, whom he assisted in the decoration of Antwerp at the time of the visit of Albert and Isabella. Rubens travelled in Italy, where he pursued his art studies, afterwards settling in Antwerp at the beginning of the twelve years’ truce. Here he painted most of his chief pictures. The works in the cathedral were finished in 1614.

Under the patronage of Charles I. Rubens visited England, and was commissioned to embellish the banqueting hall in Whitehall. His fame also reached Spain, and his “Metamorphoses of Ovid” was painted for the royal hunting seat of that country.

Sir Joshua Reynolds, though a somewhat prejudiced critic of Dutch and Belgian painting, visited the Low Countries more than once, and brought back art treasures to England. In 1781, he wrote to Burke from Antwerp, where he inspected the pictures in the churches.

The Museum contains some of the masterpieces of Rubens, and notable examples of the work of Vandyk, Teniers, Rembrandt, and{217} Van Eyck. Here is the great work of Quentin Matsys, “The Descent from the Cross.” For the best-known painting by Rubens, “The Descent from the Cross,” we must visit the Cathedral of Notre Dame. It has been said that the painting of the picture was suggested to Rubens by an Italian engraving, for there are traces in it of Italian influence. Parts of the painting have been restored and cleaned. It is seen to good advantage from a short distance, for the painting was planned for a large building. “The Elevation of the Cross” is another of the treasures in the cathedral. This, in the opinion of Sir Joshua Reynolds, is one of the chief pictures by Rubens. “The Assumption of the Virgin” was painted rapidly, and decorates the choir.

The cathedral is Gothic, and one of the finest in Europe. The interior is impressive, with its wide nave and aisles. The choir stalls are beautifully carved, and should be carefully examined as examples of Gothic art. The pulpit is also carved, but the work is indifferent. The steeple, one of the highest in Christendom, is very exquisite, like lace work rather than stone and metal. In the tower are the many tuneful bells that ring{218} out chimes, and one huge bell with a sonorous note.

In the churches of St Paul and St Jacques, and of the Augustines, are paintings of great interest by Rubens, Vandyk, and Teniers.

A ramble around the fortifications will show how strong are the defences of the city, which have been constructed since the last siege in 1832. Walls and citadels, well provided with points of vantage for artillery fire, begirt Antwerp to-day. The forts and barriers cost an enormous sum. Guns and ammunition are made in the city, which is the chief fortress of the country, and an important military centre.

In the Grande Place stands the town hall, a florid building, containing several paintings, though none of remarkable note, except some frescoes by Leys, one of the most eminent of modern Belgian painters.

Our tour of the city must include a visit to the house of Rubens, in the street named after him. The archway is from the designs of the painter, whose studio was in the grounds.

The first Exchange was erected in 1531, and destroyed by fire in 1858. It was from this building that the plan of the London Royal{219} Exchange was taken. The modern Bourse is in the Rue de la Bourse.

Antwerp is architecturally a handsome city, with several fine squares, wide promenades, and well-planned streets. The docks are extensive, and the long quays stretch thence to the old fort on the south side. There is a triangular park with sheets of water, beyond the great Boulevard, and in the zoological garden is a fairly representative collection of animals. In the Rue Leopold is the botanic garden.

The Plantin Museum, containing relics and volumes of one famous printer, is one of the public institutions that must be visited.

Such are the chief monuments and objects of interest in the old city of Antwerp, where the ancient and the modern are both represented side by side in odd contrast.{220}

AMSTERDAM

A HORN of flatland, bounded by the North Sea and the Zuyder Zee, juts northward, with Haarlem and Amsterdam at its base. Sundered by a channel from the point of the horn is Texel, the biggest of the curious line of islands that stretches along the coast to Friesland. This Helder, or “Hell’s Door,” the tidal channel leading to the broad inlet of the Zuyder Zee, runs like a mill-race, and the passage is deep enough to admit large vessels travelling to the port of Amsterdam.

The capital of Holland is built upon logs driven into the firm earth through morass and silt. It is a city of canals and dykes, spanned by hundreds of bridges, a northern Venice, dependent for its safety upon the proper control of sluices. The devouring sea is kept at bay by a mighty dam. Truly, Amsterdam is one of the wonders of men’s ingenuity.

The plan of its streets is remarkable; the thoroughfares are a series of semi-circles with their points to the Zuyder Zee. The flow of{221} the canals and waterways that wind about the city is impelled by artificial means. The number of the piles upon which the palace of Amsterdam stands is reckoned at nearly fourteen thousand.

About the thirteenth century, the building of the city began around the castle of Amstel, on a tidal marsh. During the siege of Haarlem by the Spanish, Amsterdam depended upon its waterway for food supplies. The Duke of Alva wrote: “Since I came into the world, I have never been in such anxiety. If they should succeed in cutting off the communications along the dykes, we should have to raise the siege of Haarlem, to surrender, hands crossed, or to starve.”

In 1787 when the King of Prussia brought his troops to Holland, in favour of the stadtholder, Amsterdam surrendered its garrison. And in 1795 the French entered the city without the resistance of the inhabitants.

Sir Thomas Overbury, who wrote in 1609, describes Amsterdam as surpassing “Seville, Lisbon, and any other mart-town in Christendom.” The city maintained a great fleet of vessels trading to the East Indies, the German ports, and the towns of the Baltic Sea.{222}

The historian relates that the people were not “much wicked,” though disposed to drink; they were hard bargainers, but just, thrifty, hardworking, and shrewd in commerce. To-day the natives of Amsterdam are assuredly “inventive in manufactures,” and eminently capable in all affairs of trading and finance.

The fishing industry has declined seriously, but the export trade of Amsterdam is enormous, the products being chiefly butter, cheese, cotton goods, glass manufactures, leather goods, bread, stuffs, and gin. In 1900 the population of the city was 523,558.

Amsterdam is still a metropolis of capitalists, many of whom are of the Jewish race, while it is a principal European centre of the diamond trade. The famous banking system, established under guarantee of the city, in 1609, is described at length by Adam Smith in his “Wealth of Nations.”

“Public utility,” he writes, “and not revenue was the original object of this institution. Its object was to relieve the merchants from the inconvenience of a disadvantageous exchange.” The bank was under the control of four reigning burgomasters, who were changed every year.

The opulence of Amsterdam is apparent to{223} the stranger who roams its streets to-day. Factories abound, artificers are numerous, and everywhere there are evidences of a prosperity that recalls the day when most of the business of Europe was transacted in these narrow, twisted streets, and a large fleet of vessels traded with the Indies.

Here several renowned printers set up their presses in the seventeenth century, and many famous books were printed in the city. During the following century Amsterdam still remained the great commercial capital of Europe.

The immigration of Spanish and Portuguese Jews into Holland brought to the city a fresh class of artisans, and gave an impulse to several crafts. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries there was a vigorous intellectual development in Amsterdam. Several notable men were natives. Spinoza was born here, in 1632, after the routing of the Spanish forces. His parents were traders, Jewish fugitives from Spain.

Baruch, or Bendictus, Spinoza excelled even his tutors at the age of fourteen, and the Rabbin Saul Levi Morteira was astounded by the boy’s capacity for learning. A troubled, but resplendent life lay before this dark-eyed Hebrew youth. He was of the order of reformers, and{224} shared the griefs and the trials of all who strive to benefit humanity.

Persecution pursued Spinoza from the day when he conflicted with Morteira in the synagogue, uttering opinions which were regarded as dire heresy. We read of attempts upon his life, of excommunication, and of ostracism. The philosopher supported himself by polishing lenses for telescopes and optical instruments, until he was able to leave Amsterdam for the University of Leyden. Later came recognition with the publication of the great “Tractatus.”

When offered a pension by the King of France, the philosopher refused it, fearing that if he became a slave of the State, he might sacrifice his liberty of thought. Spinoza lived in extreme simplicity, it is said that he spent only twopence-farthing a day on his needs. His temper was equable. “Reason is my delight,” he declared. “A virtuous life is not a sad and gloomy one.”

Strange that this noble and tolerant thinker should have been described as an enemy of humanity. “The God-intoxicated man,” as Novalis said of Spinoza, was accused of atheism in a day when philosophic doubt was synonymous with crime. It was only such thinkers as{225} Hegel, Lessing, Goethe and Schelling who were able to appraise Spinoza at his true value. For the uncultured he remained for generations an enemy of virtue.

In Amsterdam Spinoza formed at least a measure of toleration among the citizens. He writes: “In the midst of this flourishing republic, this great city, men of all nations and all sects live together in the most perfect harmony.”

A monument to Spinoza was unveiled by Renan at the Hague, in 1877.

Amsterdam abounds in memories of Rembrandt, though many of his paintings are distributed in the galleries of other cities. The rich capital of Holland encouraged painters, poets, and men of science; and in the year when Spinoza was born, Rembrandt settled in Amsterdam, and soon became noted as a painter of portraits. His house is in the Breestraat. In his day, it was beautifully adorned with works of art, and he owned a large collection of engravings. Like many great artists, Rembrandt lived absorbed in his labours, seldom frequenting society. After a spell of reverses he went to live on the Rozengracht, and in this house on the quay he spent his last days.

We think of Rembrandt, in the busy{226} Amsterdam of his day, writing to a friend: “In this great town wherein I am, there being no man, save me, who does not pursue commerce; everyone is so attentive to his own profit that I might remain here all my life unseen of any.” Here, leading a life of strenuous simplicity, content with his labour, a piece of cheese and a crust, Rembrandt painted many memorable pictures. He soon became one of the most respected of Amsterdam’s citizens. His pupils were many, and they paid high fees for their tuition. But Rembrandt remained almost a recluse, and seldom forsook his studio for festive company.

In the Fodor Museum in Amsterdam may be seen the “Tribute Money,” some portrait drawings, and “Mars and Venus in the Net.” Several of Rembrandt’s works are in private collections in the city. The picture gallery also contains some of the painter’s famous pictures.

For a glimpse of the business life of Amsterdam, we must stroll in the Kalver Straat, an interesting thoroughfare, running from the palace to the sea, and then along the harbour and the quay. The great dyke encloses a number of docks, all thronged with{227} ships, and the fish market should be seen. Herring-curing, by the way, was the invention of a native of the Low Countries.

Among the public buildings that will repay inspection, are the Town Hall, the Bourse, and two churches, the old church and the new church. The older church dates from about 1300. Its beautiful stained windows were painted at a later date. There are some tombs here of illustrious naval conquerors, and these, and the magnificent organ, in its very ornate gallery, are the chief objects of interest.

The new church is scarcely “new,” for it was built in 1408. This is a fine edifice, with a number of monuments, an interesting carved pulpit, and metal-work screen.

Admiral De Ruyter lived here, the great adversary of Blake, and the gallant commander who held us at bay off the coast of Suffolk, and did such damage to our ships in the Medway.

The pictures in the Museum are representative of the Dutch school, and the collection includes many masterpieces; the chief artists represented are Teniers, Rembrandt, Paul Potter, Gerard Douw, and Vandyk.

The situation of Amsterdam, on a salt marsh, with a stratum of mud below its houses, would{228} seem dangerous to the health of the city. It is, however, a very healthy capital, and the inhabitants do not apparently suffer from the specific diseases that are said to flourish in low, wet lands.

Amsterdam leaves a picture in the mind of mediæval lanes and alleys, with curious turrets and gables, shadowing slow canals; of sunlight and vivid colour; of ships coming and going, and bustling quays, and streets with old and new houses quaintly jumbled.{229}

COLOGNE

IN the days of Roman dominion, a city called Civitas Ubiorum was built by the Rhine upon the site where now stands the fortified mediæval town of Cologne. Remains of the Roman occupation are still to be traced in the city in the bases of walls, but the amphitheatre was demolished long ago. Agrippina was born here, and Trajan ruled in the fortress.

In the Middle Ages Cologne was a prosperous city, with a wide trading repute, and celebrated for its arts and learning. William Caxton came here to learn printing, an industry which he introduced into England. Militarism and clerical domination appear to have been the chief causes of the long spell of misfortune that fell later upon Cologne. Persecution was one of the principal occupations of a number of the people at this period; and much zeal was expended in expelling heretics, Jews and Protestants from the city.

Cologne also suffered decline through the closing of the Rhine as a navigable waterway{230} by the Dutch, and it was not until 1837 that the river was re-opened to trading vessels plying to foreign ports. To-day the city is an important commercial and industrial centre.

Perhaps the best general view of Cologne is from the opposite bank of the Rhine. The city is a forest of spires and towers; there were at one time over two thousand clerics within the walls, and religious buildings were more numerous then than to-day.

The wide river is spanned by two bridges; the more important is a wonderful structure, over thirteen hundred feet in length, and made of iron.

The Cathedral was begun in the thirteenth century, but it remained for a considerable time in an unfinished state, and portions fell into decay. Frederick William III. restored the building, and added to it; and since this time the work has been continued in several parts of the edifice. Externally the Cathedral is a stately building with its flying buttresses, host of pinnacles, and splendid south doorway. The architecture is French—rather German—Gothic.

COLOGNE.
ST. MARTIN’S CHURCH, 1826.

In the choir are very brilliant stained windows, some mural pictures, and numerous statues of{231} Scriptural characters. The painted windows here, and in the aisles, are extremely gorgeous examples of this art. Among the objects of interest in the chapels are memorials of the archbishops of the city, and an early painting, known as the Dombild, depicting the saints of Cologne.

The Church of St Ursula and of the Eleven Thousand Virgins is remarkable for its treasury of the bones of the adventurous virgins of the famous legend. These relics are embedded in the walls of the choir. There are a few pictures, but none of note, in this church.

St Maria Himmelfahrt, the church of the Jesuits, is highly flamboyant in its embellishments. Amongst its treasures are the rosary of St Ignatius and the crozier of St Francis Xavier. In St Gereon’s Church is a collection of the bones of the martyrs killed during the persecution by the Romans. Architecturally, this church deserves careful attention for it has ancient portions, and presents several styles. The baptistery and sacristy are very ornate in design.

One of the works of Rubens is in St Peter’s Church. This is the well-known altar picture of “The Crucifixion of St Peter.” Sir Joshua{232} Reynolds and Wilkie have both recorded their impressions of this great work. Rubens esteemed this as the best picture that he ever painted; but Reynolds thought the drawing feeble, and surmised that it was finished by one of the pupils of Rubens, after the master’s death.

The Church of Santa Maria is on the site of the Roman capital, and on the same ground stood a palace at a later date. It is interesting for its decorated choir, and the old doorways. There are several other churches in Cologne that should be visited.

In the museum there are many pictures, including one by Durer, “St Francis,” by Rubens, “A Madonna,” by Titian, and a work by Vandyk.

The paintings of the Cologne school are numerous, and demand attention, as they represent the art of the period when painting began to flourish in Germany. Some of the pictures were painted as early as the thirteenth century. There are many modern paintings in the museum. A number of Roman antiquities, statuary, and pottery, are also preserved here.

Among the secular buildings of note are the Rathaus, with varied architectural styles, and{233} the Kaufhaus, where the Imperial councils were held in former days.

The noble historic stream upon which the city stands, “Father Rhine,” flows through its finest scenery above Cologne, among the Siebengebirge heights.

So wrote Byron in his verses upon the majestic river, whose “castle crags,” and wooded glens have been described again and again by poets of many nations.

The Rhine has a life and a population of its own. On its banks are the homesteads of vine-growers and farmers, while fishermen ply their craft in its prolific waters. Upon the river itself float the voyagers in sea vessels, and the enormous timber-rafts, which are one of the curious sights of the Rhine. A steamboat trip on the river will delight the tourist, but he{234} should leave the boat at Bonn, for below that old town the stream flows through a tame, featureless country.

I must not forget the celebrated perfume for which Cologne is famous. The spirit known as Eau de Cologne was the invention of Farina in the seventeenth century. It is still manufactured in the city, and provides an industry for a large number of people. George Meredith’s novel, “Farina,” comes to mind as we wander in Cologne, and note the name of the discoverer of the world-famous scent.

Every visitor to the city should read “Farina,” for its vivid description of the life there, “in those lusty ages when the Kaisers lifted high the golden goblet of Aachen, and drank, elbow upward, the green-eyed wine of old romance.”

Here is Meredith’s picture of Cologne, on the eve of battle: “The market-places were crowded with buyers and sellers, mixed with a loitering swarm of soldiery, for whose thirsty natures wine-stalls had been tumbled up. Barons and knights of the empire, bravely mounted and thickly followed, poured hourly into Cologne from South Germany and North. Here staring Suabians, and red-featured warriors{235} of the East Kingdom, swaggered up and down, patting what horses came across them, for lack of occupation for their hands. Yonder huge Pomeranians, with bosks of beard stiffened out square from the chin, hurtled mountainous among the peaceable inhabitants.{236}”

HEIDELBERG

TO think of Heidelberg is to think of learning. One of the first of European universities was established in this town by the Elector Rupert; and here culture has flourished for centuries, in spite of repeated sieges and a long history of disasters. What a grim story is that of yonder old grey castle that frowns upon Heidelberg across the River Neckar. Wars and rumours of wars form the chief chronicles of this ancient town from the days of the Electors Palatine of the Rhine to the invasion of the French.

Besieged by Tully after a protracted siege, held by the Imperialists, seized by the Swedish troops, burnt by the French, who ravaged it again a few years later—Heidelberg has been the scene of many calamities and much bloodshed.

Again and again has the castle been bombarded and fired. The last catastrophe happened in 1764, when the fortress-palace was struck by lightning, set on fire, and almost destroyed.{237} It is now a great ruin; the part least injured dates from the sixteenth century. The massive tower, with walls over twenty feet thick, was hurled down by the French in their last assault.

Such architectural details as remain are of great interest. The chief gateway has parts of the old portcullis; there are some statues of the sixteenth century, and a triumphal arch. From whatever point of view the Castle of Heidelberg is seen, it is a striking red pile, proudly dominating the surrounding country, and overshadowing the Neckar.

A part of the castle is known as the English Palace. Here lived Elizabeth Stuart, daughter of James I. and grand-daughter of Mary Queen of Scots, who was united to the Elector Frederick V. This palace was built in 1607, and the garden was made about this time for the enjoyment of the young bride.

The celebrated great Tun of Heidelberg is in one of the cellars of the castle. This prodigious cask was originally made in the fourteenth century, and contained twenty-one pipes of Rhenish wine. A second tun was constructed in 1664, and this held six hundred hogsheads. The French emptied this, and demolished it. A third cask was made to hold{238} eight hundred hogsheads, and when filled, the citizens held a dance upon a stage erected on its top.

Viewed as a work of architecture, the University is not an inspiring structure. It stands in a small square about the middle of the town. In the library are missals and a large collection of books. Attached are the botanic gardens of the college. The vandal Tully, during his campaign, ravaged the university, and destroyed a number of valuable volumes and manuscripts.

One of the greatest names associated with the University of Heidelberg is the philosopher George Frederick William Hegel, born in 1770. He was a native of Stuttgart, and at eighteen years of age he entered the University of Tübingen. There Hegel met Schelling, for whom he had a deep admiration. After a time of struggle as a tutor, the philosopher came to Heidelberg, in 1816, as professor. His theses do not seem to have attracted the students of that date, for we read that only four persons attended his opening courses of lectures.

Hegel found time during two years in Heidelberg to write a part of his “Encylopædia of{239} Philosophical Science,” a great work, which obtained for the author a chair at the University of Berlin, where he lectured for about thirteen years. He died of cholera, in 1831, at the age of sixty-one.

Another illustrious man of Heidelberg was the poet Viktor Von Scheffel, to whose memory a monument stands in the terrace of the castle.

The castle and the university are the two historic buildings in Heidelberg that attract the traveller. One does not easily tire of the view from the hill three hundred feet above the ruins of the castle, nor of the beauties of the environs, and the banks of the Neckar.

The city is made cheerful by its law and medical students, who drink their lager beer with gusto, sing their staves, and keep up the old university traditions and customs. There are bright clean streets, and many shops that prosper through the college and the host of summer visitors.

Two fine bridges span the Neckar. The older bridge was constructed in 1788, and the new bridge was built about a hundred years later. It connects Heidelberg with Neuenheim.

The old town is curiously elongated, stretch{240}ing along the riverside. Modern suburbs are extending to-day, to provide for a population numbering about forty thousand.

Unfortunately, very little of old Heidelberg has survived the devastation of wars and conflagrations. Even the churches were despoiled of their monuments by the French soldiery, and scarcely one of the ancient houses remains as a memorial of the Middle Ages.

Climb the hill of Anlagen, and you will reach the church associated with Jerome of Prague, the contemporary of Huss. To the door of this church Jerome affixed his heretical affirmations, and in the graveyard he preached to a vast crowd.

Olympia Morata is buried here. This beautiful and cultured Italian woman was a second Hypatia, who, however, escaped the too common fate of innovating philosophers. She married a German doctor, after a flight from her native land, and lived in Heidelberg, where her lectures were attended by the learned of the town.{241}

NUREMBERG

FEW towns in Europe have preserved so much of the spirit of the Middle Ages as Nuremberg. Its history is pregnant with romance, and its annals of mediæval art are of marked interest. Amsterdam recalls Rembrandt; Antwerp calls to mind Rubens, and with the town of Nuremberg, the student of painting associates its illustrious native, Albert Durer.

The craftsmen of this town were among the most skilful of any European nation during mediæval times. Goldworkers, armourers, clock-makers, and artists in stained glass worked here in the days of the trade guilds. Brass was founded in this city at an early date. Nuremberg was famed, too, for its metalworkers and goldsmiths. It is still a town of industrious artificers.

The architecture of the churches is of the highest Gothic order; the façade of the Rathaus is a noble specimen of late Renaissance work; and the castle and fortifications are feudal structures of much historical interest.{242} There are few towns that can compare with Nuremberg in the charm and variety of its memorials of the past.

We cannot be certain concerning the date of the founding of the town, but probably it was in existence in the tenth century. In the reign of Henry II., Nuremberg was already a place of some importance, and its prosperity advanced until it became one of the chief markets of Europe. The castle was the residence of many rulers of the country, and it was one of the favourite palaces of Henry IV.

In the thirteenth century, Nuremberg had a large number of Jews among its population, who enjoyed all the rights of citizens. But under Karl IV. a policy of oppression was adopted, and at a later period, the Jewish inhabitants were bitterly persecuted.

NUREMBERG.
1832.

John Huss was received here by an enthusiastic populace; but when the reformer’s army laid waste the country, the people of Nuremberg valiantly withstood the enemy. When the wave of the Reformation swept the land, Nuremberg gave a welcome to Martin Luther, and his revised ritual of worship was used in the churches. Melanchthon also came to the town, and established a school there, though{243} the institution was not successful. A statue of the “gentle” reformer was set up in Nuremberg.

Civil strife disturbed the town in 1552, but a period of peace followed, and a few years later saw the founding of the university.

The Thirty Years’ War brought disaster upon Nuremberg. The army of Wallenstein attacked the ancient walls, and the outer entrenchments which had been constructed by the inhabitants upon the rumour of war. Led by Gustavus, the soldiers and people of the town opposed the vast forces of Wallenstein that encompassed the fortifications in a series of camps.

Hunger and plague assailed the besieged within the gates, while without the foe cut off escape, and barred the entrance of food supplies. For weeks the siege endured. Thousands died from disease, thousands were slain by the enemy. In a valiant sally, Gustavus led his troops to the attack. The battle raged for hours, and both sides suffered terrible losses. Nuremberg might have fallen had Wallenstein been able to rally his hungry soldiers, but, as it was, he withdrew his force.{244}

Let us now review the peaceful arts of the city. The record of Albert Durer’s life shows the character of a deeply religious man, devoted to his faith, and absorbed by his art. He was reared in Nuremberg, and was the son of a working goldsmith. Born in 1471, Durer was apprenticed at an early age to his father’s craft, in which, however, he did not excel, for his heart was set upon following the profession of a painter. His first master in the art was Wolgemut, whose portrait is one of Durer’s finest works. The young artist spent some time in Italy, studying, among other paintings, the work of Mantegna, and, on returning to his native town, he applied himself most industriously to his art.

Albert Durer’s pictures are scattered among the galleries of the world. Durer, in painting landscape, showed a singular modern feeling. In his portraits he was a realist, analytical in the use of his brush, and especially painstaking in painting fine hair, for which he used ordinary brushes with extreme dexterity, much to the amazement of Bellini.

In the Germanic Museum at Nuremberg there are five pictures by the master, and some copies of his works. The bulk of his{245} paintings are in other galleries at Munich, Berlin, London, and elsewhere.

An interesting memorial of Albert Durer is the old gabled house in which he lived and worked. Here he toiled with the brush and the graver’s tools, and received as his guests the cultured men of the city. His life was simple and industrious, and his nature gentle and retiring. Durer had several pupils at Nuremberg, who carried on his tradition in painting and copper and wood engraving.

The art treasures of the churches are very numerous. St Sebald’s Church is a splendid Gothic pile, with many architectural triumphs, such as the highly decorated bride’s door, with its finely carved effigies, the high pillars, Krafft’s statuary and reliefs, and the crucifix by Stoss.

The splendid western door of the Frauenkirche must be seen by the visitor, for it is an instructive example of Gothic work of the richest design. St Lawrence has two figures, Adam and Eve, on its chief doorway; and some Scriptural reliefs adorn the entrance. The windows are beautifully painted.

There is a notable picture of “Christ and Mary” in the Imhoff Gallery.{246}

There are several other churches in Nuremberg containing works of art, and offering study for the lover of architecture and painting. The work of the craftsmen of the Middle Ages is seen everywhere in these buildings, and a detailed description would fill a volume.

The Museum is in an ancient monastery, and in its numerous rooms will be found Roman antiquities, old metal work, pottery, furniture of the Middle Ages, weapons, a collection of books, some of them illustrated by Durer, and an array of paintings of the German school. A full and excellent catalogue is issued.

The castle, with its stirring chronicle, is a feudal fortress dominating the plain, and forming the chief rampart of the town’s defences. Walls and towers protect Nuremberg on every side, as in the ancient days of peril. The view from the towers is very remarkable, and from one of these points of outlook, one gains a long-remembered impression of the old town, with its towers and steeples, and the surrounding country, watered by the Pegnitz and clothed with forests. The fortifications were finished in the fifteenth century, and provided a strong protection to the town in time of siege.{247}

Among the buildings of this “quaint old town of art and song,” as Longfellow describes it, the Rathaus must be visited. The west façade is very handsome Renaissance work by the Brothers Wolf, with three towers, and three ornate entrances. The fresco paintings within are the work of Durer and his pupils, but they are in poor preservation. There is a beautiful ceiling, by Beheim, in the council chamber. A fountain, with a statue of Apollo, by Peter Vischer, is in one of the courtyards. The god is splendidly modelled, and graceful, and the pedestal of the statue has several mythological figures.

The most pleasing quarters of the town for the lover of antiquity are below the Fleischbrücke, where the ancient houses overhanging the stream are exceedingly quaint, the narrow alleys surrounding the Rathaus, and the castle and its environs. The fountain in the fruit market, Albert Durer’s house, the churches, and the Imhoff house should all be inspected if you wish to gain a comprehensive recollection of old and new Nuremberg.

Nuremberg was celebrated for its sculpture, an art that awakened here and in Würzburg at the Renaissance. While Donatello was living,{248} Stoss, Krafft and Vischer were gaining repute as image-makers in stone, wood, and bronze. A volume has been published lately in France, “Peter Vischer et la Sculpture Franconienne,” by Louis Réan, which tells the story of the rise of the Nuremberg craftsmen. Adam Krafft was no doubt an influence in the work of Albert Durer. The South Kensington Museum contains several examples of the work of these German artists.

We must not quit Nuremberg without recalling the great poet, Wolfram, who was born at Eschenbach, a village near the city. It was to Wolfram that Wagner owed the subjects for his two great works, “Parsifal” and “Lohengrin.”

Nuremberg stands high, on the verge of an ancient forest, long famous for its hunting. Its river is the Pegnitz, which flows through the town about its centre, and is crossed by several fine bridges. Besides its rambling lanes and main thoroughfares, there are several open spaces and squares; but the houses retain, for the greater part, their mediæval air and irregularity of structure, with carved balconies, gables, and turrets. It is the second important town of Bavaria in point of population.{249}

WITTENBERG

TO the south-west of Berlin, between that city and Leipzig, is the old town of Wittenberg. The rolling Elbe, which rises in the wild range of the Erz Gebirge, and crosses Germany on its long course to Hamburg and the sea, flows by the town, and spreads itself into a wide stream. Saxony, the third in importance of the kingdoms of Germany, is a fertile land, cultivated from an early date, and famed as a granary and orchard. It is noted, too, for its minerals—coal, tin, cobalt, iron, lead, and marble.

The town is still fortified, and bears a somewhat grim aspect. It was much damaged by the Austrian artillery in 1760, and has suffered the ravages of war before, and since the Electors of Saxony lived in the mediæval castle.

Here was founded an important university, afterwards removed to Halle. It was at the University of Wittenberg that Martin Luther taught as professor of theology.

The supreme interest of these rambling streets are the associations with the great{250} Protestant reformer. Wittenberg is a place of pious pilgrimage for those who revere the memory of Luther and Melanchthon. The Schloss Kirche contains the ashes of the two preachers of the reformed faith; and it was on the door of this church that Luther nailed his bold indictment of papal corruption. The town abounds with memories of that stupendous battle for religious liberty which spread into all parts of Christendom.

How vast were the issues in the balance when Martin Luther defied the power of Rome! Long before the theologian of Wittenberg, several reformers had uttered protests against the sale of indulgences by the Church of Rome. Huss, Jerome of Prague, John of Wessel, John of Goch, all raised their fervent voices upon the evils of the system.

The Bible was now coming into the hands of the laity; Wicliff’s versions were in use in England, and in Germany, Reuchlin and others had made Hebrew the study of the educated. Erasmus, too, had satirised the vicious lives of the monks. The way was prepared for a popular reformer, such as the ardent priest and theologian of Wittenberg.

Archbishop Albert of Mayence and Magde{251}burg was indebted to Pope Leo X. for his investiture, and was unable to raise the money. The Pope was in need of funds. He therefore gave permission to the archbishop to establish a wide sale of indulgences in Germany. The bulk of the people, reared in obedience to Rome, made no complaint of the practice, and were quite ready to purchase absolution for their sins. But Luther contended that indulgences only brought the remission of penalties, and refused to offer complete pardon for indulgences alone.

Tetzel, the agent of Leo X., was naturally enraged. He thundered anathemas upon the presumptuous Luther. The reformer met his denunciations by affixing his defiant propositions to the door of the Schloss Kirche.

So began the historic struggle between Catholics and Protestants. Luther merely impeached the sale of indulgences; he was still loyal to the papal authority. The Pope was, however, headstrong and tyrannous. He showed neither tact nor diplomacy, but issued a bill of excommunication against the unruly priest. The document was burned in contempt by Martin Luther.

Let us glance at the character of this doughty{252} heretic. The birthplace of Luther was Eisleben, in Saxony, and he was born in 1483. His first school was at Magdeburg, and he was educated for the law. But the early trend of his mind was pietistic; he aspired to become a teacher of religion. He joined the Augustine Order, and observed devoutly all the canons of the Catholic creed. We read that Luther was appointed professor at the University of Wittenberg; that he taught many students, and discoursed eloquently.

Luther’s temperament was hostile to asceticism. He had a capacity for enjoying life; he delighted in music, and sang daily. He was not opposed to the custom of drinking wine with company. More than all, he impeached, by precept and example, the teaching of the virtue of celibacy. He said that true manhood finds joy in womanhood; and he married an ex-nun, Catherine de Bora, who bore him children.

This sane indictment of the unnatural practice of celibacy was accounted one of Martin Luther’s most enormous iniquities. His clerical opponents arose and denounced him. He was described as a man of immoral life; it was circulated that he drank wine to excess, and{253} wrote hymns praising drunkenness. He was labelled an atheist, a blasphemer, and a charlatan, who did not believe in the doctrines that he taught.

But Martin Luther soon gathered about him a band of zealous followers, and his fame went forth to the farther ends of Europe.

Philip Melanchthon, a man in some respects more admirable than Luther, joined in the crusade of reform. “The gentle Melanchthon” had studied in Heidelberg and Tubingen. He was the author of many religious volumes, and it was he who composed the “Augsburg Confession.”

The effect of Luther’s teaching was not without its evils. Guided by their own reading of the Bible, zealots found authority for violence and persecution. There were risings of peasants, which Luther denounced, even urging their suppression with the extremity of force. This brave assailant of Rome was unwisely aggressive in his attitude towards those sects that differed from him in their beliefs. He was a bitter enemy of the followers of Zwingli, the reformer of Zurich. The sectaries were sundered and torn with dissensions and quarrels. Melanchthon died rejoicing that he{254} was leaving a world made hideous by the hatreds of the pious disputants.

For the Jews Luther had no toleration. He detested the spirit of science, which was spreading even among the Catholics; and declared that the study of Aristotle was “useless.” He described the great Athenian as “a devil, a horrid calumniator, a wicked sycophant, a prince of darkness, a real Apollyon, a beast, a most horrid impostor on mankind, and a professed liar.” This contempt for the discoveries of science was a mark of the ignorance that led Luther to prescribe that a “possessed” child should be thrown into the water to sink or be restored to sanity.

The extortionate demands of the popes were no doubt the chief cause of that enthusiasm that burst like a flame when Luther withstood the exactions of Rome. Germany had long been bled to fill the coffers. The country was prepared for revolt. Leo X. was one of the most extravagant of the sovereign pontiffs, and it was said that he wasted as much as the revenue of three popes. He created thousands of new livings, which he sold. The office of cardinal was purchasable. But none of the wealth of the Curia found its way to Germany;{255} on the contrary, that nation was constantly called upon to contribute heavily to the funds of the church.

In Wittenberg, the flame of revolt burst forth, and all Germany soon rallied to the support of Luther, who showed himself a born leader of men. The propaganda spread even to Spain, that ancient stronghold of Catholicism. In 1519 a number of tracts by Luther were sent into that country from Basle, where they were printed in Latin. These disquisitions fell into the hands of the learned. Valdes, secretary to Charles V., sent to Spain an account of Luther’s proclamation against indulgences, together with an acknowledgment that reform was needed in the Church.

As soon as the discovery was made that Lutheran literature was entering Spain, the inquisitors diligently sought for those who had copies of the proscribed tracts. Valdes, the emperor’s secretary, though then a staunch Catholic, was brought before the holy office because he had discoursed with Melanchthon.

It was well for Luther that he was defended by Frederick, the Elector of Saxony. We wonder that the rebellious monk, who raised such venomous hatred, escaped with his life. But{256} even the tribunal of the Diet of Worms could not daunt Luther. He flatly refused to retract. Nothing was left but to banish him from the town; and under the protection of the Elector of Saxony, he was kept in the Wartburg.

In England the Lutheran heresy had been checked by Henry VIII., who wrote against it, and won the esteem of the Pope for his defence of the faith. Cardinal Wolsey’s efforts were of no avail in stemming the tide of reformation; and the King, enraged with the Pope for refusing a divorce from Catherine, suppressed his anti-Lutheran scruples of conscience without difficulty. The flame kindled in Wittenberg spread over England. Monasteries were suppressed; the new creed, first the religion of the poorer educated classes, was soon adopted by all classes.

The story of the Reformation is of strangely absorbing interest. In Wittenberg, the annals of the historic conflict are recalled as we stand before the church door upon which Luther nailed his ninety-five theses, and read the inscriptions on bronze that his Protestant successors have set there. Martin Luther was the man for his age, and whatever were his faults, he served humanity. Little did he anticipate the{257} terrible wars and the fierce religious persecution that followed upon his challenge to Leo X., and the burning of the bull of excommunication outside the walls of Wittenberg.

The memorials of the vast struggle arising from the resistance of Luther to be seen in the town are first the Schloss Kirche, and then the house of the reformer in the old buildings of the University. In the house, which has been little altered since the death of Luther in 1546, are a few relics, a chair and table, some utensils, and the portraits by Kranach.

A tree marks the spot where Luther burned the bull of excommunication in 1520. In the market place is the statue in bronze of the founder of Protestantism.

The house of Melanchthon is also to be seen. His statue was set up about forty years ago.

The tombs of Luther and Melanchthon in the Schloss Kirche are marked by tablets. In this church is the grave of the Elector Frederick, the trusty friend of Luther, adorned with a magnificent monument by Peter Vischer. This is one of the notable works of that artist. There is also a relief by Vischer in the church.

In the Stadt Kirche Luther preached. There are some pictures here ascribed to Kranach.{258} One of them represents Melanchthon performing baptism, and another, Martin Luther preaching to his converts.

Kranach’s works will interest students of painting. Some more of his portraits of Luther and Melanchthon will be found in the Rathaus. This artist was court painter to the Elector Frederick. He was one of the most gifted of Bavarian painters, and his son inherited his talent. The elder Kranach was born in Kranach, the town after which he is named. He was a friend of Luther and Melanchthon. His death occurred in 1553.

Such are the chief mementoes of Luther and his colleague in Wittenberg, “The Protestant Mecca.{259}”

PRAGUE

IN the valley of the Moldau, a beautiful tributary of the Elbe, in a setting of hills clothed with pines, lies the old capital of Bohemia. Great mountain barriers enclose an undulating and wild tract, with Prague in its centre. In the valleys there is verdure, and the fields are well tilled. The river flows through the heart of the city, broad and powerful, yet navigable. Very delightful and inviting are the banks of the Moldau on a summer’s evening when Prague gives itself to music and idling. Handsome bridges span the stream, and through their arches glide the great rafts of timber and the fishermen’s boats.

Viewed from one of the hills of the environs, the city is a scene of colour, with spires and mediæval gables, green open spaces, and narrow lanes. Prague is one of the most historically interesting cities in Europe, and its aspect to-day still suggests the Middle Ages, though in spirit its natives are progressive. The atmosphere of olden days remains. There are many{260} buildings here with romantic histories, and instructive works of art are stored within them, though Prague is not rich in pictures.

Let me compress some of the history of the town into a few lines before we inspect the monuments.

One of the first rulers of Bohemia was a woman, Libussa, who probably built a city on the Hradcany Hill in the eighth century. Under the pious King Wenceslas the city became a stronghold of the Christian faith, and in his time the first cathedral was built. When Charles IV. was made ruler of Bohemia, the city of Prague was enlarged and strongly fortified. The university was then instituted, and there were many guilds of craftsmen within the walls.

The prosperity of Prague at this period seems to have brought about those conditions which aroused the reforming zeal of Huss, who found the people addicted to pleasure and demoralised by luxury. Attacks had been made upon the Roman Catholic creed by Mathew of Cracow, and other reformers before Huss and Jerome of Prague, who were followers of Wicliff.

PRAGUE, 1832.
THE CITY AND BRIDGE.

Huss was an ardent nationalist, and a hater{261} of Germany; and there is no doubt that his martyrdom was the result of his political sympathies, as well as of his indictment of the corruption of religion. This great preacher lived in Prague, and thundered his monitions from the pulpit of a chapel. His teaching was a defence of Wicliff, and the reform of the Church, and for this he was excommunicated.

Wicliff’s works were thrown into the flames. Huss was forced to fly from Prague, taking shelter in the house of one of his followers in the country.

Through a treacherous invitation to Constance, the reformer fell into a snare prepared for him. He was cast into prison, and before long he was taken to the stake, and burnt to death for his heresies.

The execution of the reformer of Prague aroused the deepest resentment among the citizens. This indignation was the first spark of the great flame that spread through the land, causing a religious war, and the siege of Prague by Sigismund. This king favoured the papal authority, and so rendered himself unpopular among the citizens during his brief reign.

One of the monarchs of Bohemia who aided in the extension and the adornment of Prague{262} was Rudolph. He was an encourager of learning and the arts, and a dabbler in science. Rudolph was succeeded by Matthias, whose reign was greatly disturbed by religious strife in the city.

During the Thirty Years’ War, Prague was besieged by a Swedish force, and a part of the city fell into the hands of the invaders. The history of the city is largely a chronicle of combats, for it was constantly assailed by armies and disturbed within. Protestantism received its deathblow in Prague, in 1621, after the great battle of the White Mountain.

The Austrian War of Succession was scarcely at an end before the outbreak of the Seven Years’ War of Frederick the Great, when the famous “Battle of Prague” was fought. We now enter upon a more tranquil period of Bohemian history.

Writing of the architects of Prague, in “Cities,” Mr Arthur Symons asserts that “there is something in their way of building, fierce, violent, unrestrained, like the savagery of their fighting, of their fighting songs, of their fighting music.” One of the most interesting of the sacred buildings is the Gothic Cathedral of St Vitus, designed by Petrlik. The decora{263}tion is still unfinished, but the edifice has beautiful slender spires, and an ornate tower. The chapels of the Cathedral contain several memorials of note, but there are no paintings of great artistic value. Several sovereigns and their consorts are buried here.

The Tyn Church has a very fine front. Within is the grave of Tycho Brahe. A church of a later period is St Nicholas. The Strahov Monastery has been reconstructed repeatedly since the days when it was founded in the twelfth century. A “Madonna” by Albrecht Durer is one of the treasures of the monastery. There is a very richly painted and carved ceiling in the library. The Capuchin Monastery, and the Emaus Monastery, are both of historic importance, and the Church of St George is one of the handsomest in the city.

Palaces abound in Prague, and one of the most characteristic is that of Count Clam-Gallas, with a noble gateway, decorated with statuary. On the Hradcany is the Castle, which was the residence of many of Bohemia’s kings and queens. It is approached by two fine courts and an ancient doorway; the older part of the building dating from the period of Vladislav, whose magnificent hall is of great{264} architectural interest. There are several more old palaces in Prague, such as the Kinsky and the Morzin, which all invite a lengthy inspection.

All the bridges spanning the river are beautifully planned. One of the finest is the Karl Bridge, dating from the fourteenth century, and adorned by many images of saints and heroes.

The Powder Gate (Prãsna Brana) was erected by Vladislav II. and served as a storehouse for ammunition. It is a strangely ornamented structure, with carved escutcheons, many effigies, and flamboyant decorations on each of its sides. The gate or tower is surmounted by a wedge-like steeple.

The Bohemian Museum is a modern building, finely adorned with statuary. It contains a large collection of arms and armour, coins, books, and manuscripts of interest.

Bohemia has a state theatre, and the building is one of the finest in modern Prague. I have had the pleasure of meeting the cultured director of the National Theatre, Herr Mŭsek, from whom I learned how the Bohemian people subscribed, in a few hours, a sufficient sum for the rebuilding of the theatre after its destruction by fire.{265}

In Prague the drama is esteemed as a real educational force as well as a means of diversion. The actors are artists who regard their calling seriously, and the plays represented are by foreign and Bohemian authors. Bernard Shaw, Pinero, and John Galsworthy are among the contemporary English playwriters whose works have been performed in Prague. Ibsen’s plays are frequently presented by the national company.

There are occasional performances of grand opera, and the theatre has a large and excellent orchestra. The sum granted by government for the support of the theatre is about ten thousand pounds yearly.{266}

ATHENS

THE decay of a great civilisation causes in the reflective the reconsideration of many problems of human life. We who live in Great Britain, in security and prosperity, and boast of the power of our empire, should feel somewhat humbled by the contemplation of the ruins of Athens. The story of the rise and fall of ancient Greece abounds with lessons and warnings for those who ponder seriously upon the destiny of great nations. That little country jutting into the sea, and broken up by gulfs and inlets, at the southern extremity of Europe—with an area not so large as that of Portugal—once dominated wide territories in Persia and Egypt, tracts of Turkey and Asia Minor, parts of Italy, and the shores of the Black Sea.

ATHENS, 1824.
A SUPPOSED APPEARANCE IF RESTORED.

Attica and its capital covered a district that could be crossed to-day in its widest part, by a railway train in less than one hour. The capital of this small but powerful region was a city with a population less than that of{267} Sheffield. Yet Athens stood for the whole of the civilised world as a token of might, wealth, and culture, united in a city of limited dimensions, situated in the midst of natural surroundings not wholly kindly for the development of tillage. The Athenians, descendants of tribes of the North, and of the old race of Pelasgians, were a vigorous, adventurous, and highly intelligent race when western Europe was inhabited by rude primitive tribes. Long before the introduction of Christianity in the East, Athens was a beacon-light of religious and ethical culture. Three hundred years before the birth of Christ, the Greeks had made Alexandria the chief seat of learning and refinement in the world, and “the birthplace of modern science.” And while other states of Europe were ruled by autocrats and tyrants, the Athenians adopted an advanced republican form of government.

The light of Athens shone dazzlingly for centuries. Its many splendid buildings, and the glorious Parthenon, were erected in the days of its proudest prosperity; in the days of gifted architects and sculptors, such as the world had never known, and in the days long before the apostles of Christianity had set foot on Attic{268} soil. The light, and not too generous, soil of this limestone tract had been wrested from nature, irrigated, and tilled to perfection. Around Athens was a land of gardens and vineyards, with groves and pastures by pleasant streams. The Piraeus, on the Saronic Gulf, was connected with Athens by walls and roads, and used as a port for vessels of war and commerce. In the city were superb temples, theatres, halls of learning, and academies; while the open spaces were adorned with statues carved by Praxiteles and Phidias.

During this period of magnificence, Socrates discoursed in the city, and the plays of Sophocles were performed in the vast theatre. We tread to-day on venerable ground as we wander amid the shattered pillars upon which Demosthenes and Aristotle gazed, and stand where Plato stood in contemplation. Athens is haunted in every corner with the spirits of mighty philosophers, poets, artists, and statesmen of eternal fame.

The passionate admirer of Grecian civilisation sometimes fails to detect any imperfection in the Athenians of the immemorial epoch. But there were grave faults in the populace of Athens even in the days of its rarest enlightenment.{269} The democracy showed at times the same irrationality then as to-day. The statesmen fell into our errors, and were often as prejudiced as our modern politicians. Miltiades was thrown into prison; Aristides was ostracised; and Thucydides and Herodotus were banished. Themistocles became unpopular, and had to fly from his country to Persia. Socrates was made to drink the bitter cup. Even in this era of culture and science, the reformer and the innovator of moral and social customs ran the risk of persecution. And then, as in our own time, the flippant scoffer, such as Aristophanes, was admired and applauded, while the serious thinker was exposed to the ingratitude and cruelty of the less earnest and educated.

Although the cultured of Athens were rationalists in the main, the masses were prone to monstrous and hurtful superstitions. There were in Athens, as in modern cities to-day, a number of persons who lived upon the credulity of their neighbours. Seers, soothsayers, and charlatans preyed on the foolish, in spite of the ridicule of the philosophers. No wonder that Socrates was misunderstood by the mob!

In their treatment of women, the Athenians{270} were not entirely just and sensible. Aristotle held that women were “inferior beings,” though he justly demanded the same measure of chastity for men as for their wives. Plato was one of the most “feminist” of the philosophers, as we may gather from his “Republic”; but Plutarch went further, and stated that women should be educated equally with men, a teaching directly opposed to that of Xenophon, who declared that young girls should know “as little as possible.” We learn, however, that at one period the women of Greece were, in civic matters, on a level with their husbands, and could act without their consent in political affairs. The finest and most educated women were the courtesans.

The Athenians bought and sold slaves, without the least consciousness of injustice. No doubt the serfs were treated fairly well, on the whole. But no Athenian appears to have recognised the moral evil of the system of slavery.

Yet, despite these blemishes, what a resplendent state was that of Attica, and how wise and sane in many important respects were the laws, the home life, and the recreations of the people of Athens. Perhaps one cannot{271} convey in a better manner an idea of the life of the city in its days of noblest fame than by giving a page or two out of the lives of a few of the heroes of war, the lawgivers, and the artists of the capital who were the makers of its glory.

One of the famous victors in battle among the Athenians was Cimon, son of Miltiades, who passed a wild youth in the city, but became a great admiral. “In courage he was not inferior to Miltiades,” writes Plutarch, “nor in prudence to Themistocles, and he was confessedly an honester man than either of them.”

Cimon was “tall and majestic,” and had an abundance of hair which curled upon his shoulders. The Athenians admired the young and handsome man, and elected him a commander of battleships. One of his victories was over the invading Persian hosts, who harassed the Thracians.

A picture of his daily life is given by Plutarch, who tells us how the admiral kept open house each night for his friends and any citizens who chose to join the repast. Cimon had a following of young men; and when walking out, if he met a poor man in meagre garments, he enjoined one of his friends to give him his clothes in{272} exchange for the rags. “This was great and noble,” says Plutarch. The admiral loved riches, but not from a passion for amassing money. It was his pleasure to distribute money to the needy.

His naval skill and enterprise were the wonder of the inhabitants of Athens. In one engagement with the Persians, Cimon captured two hundred vessels.

During the siege of Citium, the great warrior died, either from a wound, or from natural causes. His body was brought to Athens, where a monument was erected in memory of his prowess on land and sea.

During the rule of Pericles, Athens was beautified by the building of a new Parthenon under the direction of Callicrates and Ictinus. At this time the walls of the city were extended, the Odeum, or music theatre, erected, and numerous statues set up in the buildings. Phidias was chosen by Pericles as superintendent of all public buildings in Athens.

The name of Phidias is spoken with reverence by every student of sculpture. He was a supreme artist of varied parts; he carved in marble, made images of ivory and gold, and cast effigies in bronze, besides exercising the art of{273} the painter. Some of his matchless statuary has been happily preserved for us in the British Museum. It was the chisel of Phidias that adorned the frieze of the Parthenon. It was this genius who made the famous statue of Minerva, and the image of Athene in ivory, thirty feet high, for the Erechtheum.

Unfortunately, the Minerva image was the cause of the undoing of Phidias. A man so eminent was sure to evoke envy among his contemporaries. First he was falsely charged with theft; then his work was condemned on the score that he had introduced his own image upon the shield of Minerva.

For this breach of convention, in representing a modern figure in a historical subject, the sculptor was deemed disloyal to the ancient fame of Athens. He was sent to prison, where he died. “Some say poison was given to him,” writes Plutarch.

Praxiteles, another mighty image-maker of Athens, lived over a hundred years before the days of Phidias. He carved the youthful figure with surpassing delicacy and grace. His Aphrodite was one of the world’s masterpieces; and among his finest works were statues of Hermes and Niobe and her children.{274}

We must now glance at an Attic social phenomenon of much importance. The power of the courtesan among the cultured Athenians is instanced in the life of Pericles. We can learn but little of the Grecian social life, without inquiring into the status of the hetæræ at this period in the history of Athens. Xenophon and Socrates were the visitors of Aspasia, the friend and adviser of Pericles. The influence of this clever woman was almost unbounded. Philosophers, soldiers, and poets were of her court; she was one of the causes of the Median faction, and her sway over Pericles was supreme.

“The business that supported her was neither honourable nor decent,” writes Plutarch. She was, indeed, of Mrs Warren’s profession. Pericles never set out upon important affairs, nor returned from them, without waiting upon this fascinating mistress, who combined beauty of body with much wit and skill in conversation. At the advice of Aspasia, the ruler of Athens proclaimed war against the Samians, in which memorable conflict battering-rams were first used by the Greeks. And it was through the intervention of Pericles that Aspasia was acquitted of the charge of impiety, adduced by Hermippus, a comic rhymer. In the court{275} Pericles “shed many tears” for the woman he loved, and thus obtained her pardon.

Alcibiades, “the versatile Athenian,” friend of Socrates, was another of the makers of Athens. He was a model of manly beauty, with a vigorous frame, and active in exercises. His lisping speech gave a charm to his oratory. He was ambitious, variable, passionate, and withal lovable. Socrates was one of the first to discover his virtues of character, and his rare qualities of mind. Like Pericles he was the companion of courtesans, and his excesses provoked his wife Hippareté, who left him on that account and went to the house of her brother. When Hippareté appeared before the archon, with a bill of divorce, Alcibiades rushed forward, seized her in his arms, and carried her home, where she remained apparently contented until her death.

Alcibiades was the most eloquent orator of his day. His versatility was great. He bred fine horses, which ran in the competitions at the Olympic Games, and often won prizes for their owner. He loved display and handsome apparel; he invented a luxurious hanging bed. In warfare he distinguished himself by immense courage and a knowledge of tactics. Timanda, daughter{276} of the famous Lais, was the mistress of Alcibiades, and near her house he was assassinated by hirelings, sent by his political enemies.

Such are a few pages culled from the annals of some of the illustrious natives of Athens in the days of its grandeur. They may serve to throw a slight reflection of the temper and the lives of the people of this ancient republic. Anyone who treads the streets of Athens, even if only superficially acquainted with Grecian history, will find a host of memories crowding the brain.

War was an occupation and a trade with the Greeks, and the Athenians were not often at peace with neighbouring countries. Thrice at least was Athens besieged. When Xerxes came to Greece, the citizens consulted the oracle of Delphi, who counselled that they should find security “in walls of wood.” Led by Themistocles, the citizens manned the vessels, after sending the old, the infirm, and the women and children to Troezene. But the counsel of the oracle proved futile. The Persians entered Athens, killed the few remaining soldiers, and burnt the splendid city to ruins.

Upon these ruins grew a second Athens. Then came Lysander and laid siege for eight{277} months, until the citizens yielded. Harshly ruled for a time by the Spartan victors, Athens regained liberty through the valour of a small force collected by Lysias.

In the third siege the city was assailed by the Roman Sylla, who strove to expel Archelaus, King of Pontus, who had entered Athens by strategy and deception, and usurped government.

Sylla’s attack on the walls of Athens, the tremendous bulwarks erected by Pericles, was terrific. The general employed thousands of mules in working the powerful battering-rams. Often the defenders rushed out of the city to combat with their assailants in the open. The conflict was deadly and hand-to-hand. Sylla’s soldiers endeavoured to fire the city, the Athenians still resisted, and the troops withdrew for a spell, while their leader reconsidered his plans.

Worn out with famine, the people within the city begged that their ruler would surrender. His answer was cruel punishment to the deputies. The inhabitants were now actually feeding upon human flesh. Sylla finally captured Athens, secured the port, and became the ruler of the proud and fallen city.

So came about the conquest of Attica by the Romans. From that day her glory faded. One{278} after another came the invaders, and her liberty was no more the envy of the civilised world, for she became the vassal of Turkey, and later of Venice.

It was the Venetians who destroyed the noble Parthenon, leaving only two pediments standing. Siege, the ravages of time, and constant spoliation, have removed nearly all the great historic edifices from the Acropolis. But the pillars and stones that remain are picturesque, if mournful, memorials of Athens in the period of splendour.

The city stands on the ground where in remote days the Phœnicians made a settlement. Acropolis, the upper town, or citadel, contains to-day several interesting vestiges of Attic art. From the plateau we survey mountains of about the height of Ben Lomond or Snowdon, the famed Hymettus, the Parnes, and the Corydallus. The inferior Hill of Mars, where St Paul preached, is dwarfed by these heights. On this hill ruled the awful deities of Olympus, and upon it is a monument of Philopappus.

Amid the waves in the distance are the isles of Salamis and Ægina. The scene is beautiful beneath the glowing southern sky. In Greece the atmosphere is very clear and bright and the{279} sun shines ardently on the bleached ruins, the gleaming sea, and the roofs of the modern city.

The rivers Ilissus and Cephissus lave the city. Away in the level country is the wood where Plato had his academy. The whole territory is classic soil. We stand in front of the site of the Erechtheum, burned by the Persians, and rebuilt by Pericles. It was an edifice of superb architecture, dedicated to the virgin goddess, the adored Athene. Within stood a figure of the goddess, and there hung a lamp that burned by day and night.

The Athenians worshipped Erechtheus and Athene in this temple of majestic form. Athene was to them the inventress of the plough, the giver of the olive-tree, the goddess of war. She was the daughter of the mighty Zeus. The god who shared in her honour was the legendary ruler of Athens, and son of the earth by Hephæstus.

The Parthenon was also sacred to Athene. The remains of this edifice are very impressive. Huge fluted columns support the roof, and parts of the frieze and metopes have survived. Five years were spent in the building of the temple. The style was Doric, and the whole structure{280} was a splendid example of this imposing style of architecture.

The porticoes and colonnades were constructed as promenades, sheltered from the sun and wind, and the columns were erected in double rows. Within was the Maiden’s Chamber, beautifully embellished, and provided with altars. Everywhere the genius of Phidias was displayed in marble friezes, stone images, and bronze casts. The Elgin Marbles, in the British Museum, give an example of the elegance of the decorations of the frontages; and parts of the sculptured eastern frieze are to be seen in the Acropolis Museum, near to the temple. The carvings represented the war between gods and giants, the victory of the Athenians over the Amazons, the birth of the goddess Athene, the destruction of Troy, and other historical and mythical subjects.

Among the relics of the Acropolis are grottoes dedicated to the gods, several traces of temples, and shrines of Pan, Apollo, and other deities. In the Acropolis Museum is a collection of treasures, portions of bas-reliefs and statuary rescued from the ruins of the old buildings. The remains of the Temple of{281} Wingless Victory, and the monument of Lysiantes, are among the ancient stones of the Acropolis.

Modern Athens preserves in a measure the spirit of antiquity; but it is not so ancient in aspect as many of the towns that we have visited. A wide thoroughfare, called Hermes, is the chief street of the city. There are several modern buildings of excellent design, such as the University, the Academy, and the National Museum. In the museum will be found a very fine collection of relics of the ancient buildings, statues, and utensils.

Schools for the study of Hellenic art and culture have been established in Athens by the British, Americans, and French. Every endeavour is now made by the learned societies of the city to preserve the Acropolis monuments, those triumphs of the sculptor’s art and mason’s craft of which Plutarch wrote: “That which was the chief delight of the Athenians and the wonder of strangers, and which alone serves for a proof that the boasted power and opulence of ancient Greece is not an idle tale, was the magnificence of the temples and public edifices.... The different materials, such as stone, brass, ivory, gold, ebony, and cypress, furnished{282} employment to carpenters, masons, brasiers, goldsmiths, painters, tanners, and other artificers.... Thus works were raised of an astonishing magnitude and inimitable beauty and perfection, every architect striving to surpass the magnificence of the design with the elegance of the execution, yet still the most wonderful circumstance was the expedition with which they were completed.”

The superb art of the Athenians set an example to the whole of Europe. Everywhere its influence was manifested in architecture and sculptured decoration. Artists with pencil and brush are inspired by the matchless line and form of Phidias. The great English painter, G. F. Watts, haunted the Greek corridors of the British Museum until he became steeped in the beauty of the Elgin Marbles. “The academy training taught him very little; the art of Phidias taught him how to produce great works.” Albert Moore, another of our modern painters of genius, found his æsthetic ideal in the art of the Greeks.

And so from the little nation of Attica came the mightiest influences of morality, wisdom, and art that the world has known.{283}

INDEX

AMSTERDAM
Alva, Duke of, 221
Banking system, 222
Canals, 221, 228
Churches, 227
Haarlem, siege of, 221
Helder, 220
Museum, 226
Pictures, 227
Rembrandt, 225
Ruyter, de, 227
Spinoza, 223-225
Town hall, 227
Trade, 222-223
Zuyder Zee, 220

ANTWERP
Alva, Duke of, 211, 213
Cathedral, 217
Chassé, General, 215
Churches, 218
Forts, 218
Matsys, Quentin, 215
Museum, 216
Painters, 211, 215-216
Philip II., 213
Plantin, 219
Quays, 219
Reynolds, Sir J., 216
Schelde, 211
Siege of, 215
William of Orange, 213
Zoological Garden, 219

ASSISI
Chiesa Nuova, 28
Dante, 27
Giotto, 26, 27
Goethe, 28, 29
Ruskin, 27
San Francisco, church of, 25, 26
San Rufino, cathedral of, 28
Santa Maria, church of, 26
Simone, 27
St Bonaventura, 21, 25
St Clare, church of, 28
St Damian, church of, 24
St Francis, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28
Via Portica, 28
Vasari, 27
Vespasian, temple of, 20

ATHENS
Acropolis, 278, 280, 281
Ægea, isle of, 278
Alcibiades, 275, 276
Alexandria, 267
Archelaus, 277
Apollo, 280
Aristides, 269
Aristotle, 268
Aristophanes, 269
Aspasia, 274
Athene, 279
Attica, 266, 270, 277, 282
Callicrates, 272
Cephissus River, 279
Cimon, 271, 272
Delphi, oracle of, 276
Demosthenes, 268
Erechtheum, 273, 279
Hephæstus, 279
Hermes, street of, 281
Hermippus, 274
Herodotus, 269{284}
Hippareté, 275
Hissus River, 279
Ictinus, 272
Lais, 276
Lysander, 276
Lysias, 277
Mars, Hill of, 278
Miltiades, 269, 271
Moore, Albert, 282
Museum, National, 281
Olympus, 278
Pan, 280
Parthenon, 267, 272, 273, 278, 279-280
Pelasgians, 267
Pericles, 272, 274, 275, 277, 279
Phidias, 268, 272, 273
Philopappus, 278
Piræus, 268
Plato, 268, 270, 279
Plutarch, 270, 271, 272, 273, 274
Praxiteles, 268, 273
Salamis, isle of, 278
Socrates, 268, 269, 274, 275
Sophocles, 268
Sylla, 277
Themistocles, 269, 271, 276
Timander, 275
Watts, G. F., 282
Xenophon, 270, 274
Xerxes, 276
Zeus, 279

BRUGES
Alva, Duke of, 193
Canals, 192, 199
Cathedral, 195
Chamois, Captain, 193
Chapelle du St Sang, 196
Dukes of Burgundy, 192, 194
Forts, 199
“Golden Fleece,” 194
Lace-making, 199
Market, 192
Mary of Burgundy, 196
Motley, 194
Memling, 198
Philip the Good, 194
Prissenhof, 199
Tapestry, 193
Titchmann, 193
Town hall, 196
Van Eyck brothers, 194, 197, 198

CHARTRES
Aignan, St, 184
Bernard, St, 180
Bishops of, 181
Cathedral, 181-184
Charlemagne, 180
Churches, 184
Desportes, 185
Eure River, 179
Gothic art, 180, 181-183
Museum, 185
Pierre, St, 184
Regnier, Mathurin, 185
Romans, 179, 180, 185

COLOGNE
Agrippina, 229
Bridges, 230
Caxton, 229
Cathedral, 230
Churches, 231, 232
Durer, 232
Eau de Cologne, 234
“Farina,” 234
Museum, 232
Painters, 231, 232
Rathaus, 232
Rhine, 233
Romans, 229
Titian, 232
Trajan, 229
Vandyk, 232

CORDOVA
Abderahman, 101, 105, 108, 112, 115
Abu Mohammed, 104
Alcazar, 114{285}
Almanzor, 102
Averroes, 117
Az-Zahra, 102
Berbers, 102, 115
Bridge of, 100
Castillo, 119
Céspedes, 118
Charles V., 111
Climate, 98
Court of Oranges, 108
De Amicis, 109
Fernando, 103
Gate of Pardon, 107
Gongora, 117
Gran Capitan, 97, 117
Guadalquivir, 98, 99
Gautier, 113
Hakam, 107, 110
Hisham III., 102
Leal, Valdés, 118
Lucan, 116
Mihrâb, 110
Moors, 97, 98, 103
Mosque, 106-113
Picture Gallery, 119
Puerta de las Palmas, 108
Ribera, 119
Roderick, 101
Sala Capitular, 112
Seneca, 116
Villaviciosa Chapel, 112
Yusuf, 102.

FLORENCE
Angelo, Michael, 58, 64, 65, 70
Apennines, 57
Aquinas, Thomas, 71
Beatrice, 60
Bargello, 70
Boboli Gardens, 57
Boccaccio, 58, 60, 61
Browning, 58
Bruneschi Palace, 57
Buondelmonti, 59
Campanile, 57
Cellini, 67
Croce, 69
Dante, 58, 60, 65
Delia Robbia, 70
Donatello, 65, 69
Fiesole, 57, 58
Fra Angelico, 66, 67
Ghibellines, 59
Giotto, 57, 58, 65, 69
Guelfs, 59
Hunt, Leigh, 64
Lorenzo, 70
Machiavelli, 59
Marco, San, 67
Maria Santa, 70
Milton, 58, 61
Orcagna, 71
Petrarch, 61
Pisano, 69
Pitti Palace, 57, 66
Porta Mandoria, 65
Raphael, 67
Riccardi Palace, 70
San Miniato, 57
Savonarola, 58, 60, 67, 68
Shelley, 64
Strozzi Chapel, 71
Titian, 67
Totila the Goth, 59
Uberti, 59
Uffizi Palace, 66
Vallombrosa, 58
Vasari, 66
Vecchio Palace, 69
Velazquez, 67

GHENT
Aldegonde, St, 205, 206
Aerschot, Duke, 205, 206
Alva, Duke of, 203, 205
Belfry, 201
Charles V., 203-204
Edward III., 202, 209
Erasmus, 202
“Golden Fleece,” 203
Hotel de Ville, 210
Imbize, 206-207{286}
John of Ghent, 202
Museum, 210
Pictures in, 210
Rubens, 210
Ryhove, 205
Trade guilds, 207
Walls, 204
Weaving, 203
University, 210
Van Artevelde, 208
Van Eyck brothers, 209

GRANADA
Albaicin Quarter, 149, 150
Alhambra, 135, 140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146
— baths, 139
— Court of Lions, 142, 143
— Council Chamber, 144
— fish pond, 142
— Hall of Ambassadors, 143
— — Abencerrages, 142
— — Justice, 142
— palace of Charles V., 141, 142
— Puerta de Judiciaria, 141
— towers, 141, 142
Al-Ahmar, 136
Audencia, 149
Boabdil, 137
Borrow, George, 150
Bourgoanne, Chevalier de, 150
Cano, Alonso, 146, 147, 148
Cartuja, 149
Castillo, Juan del, 147
Cathedral, 146, 147, 148
Charles V., 140, 146
Darro River, 135, 136, 146
Fancelli, 149
Fernando, King, 137, 139
Ford, 150
Generalife, 145
Genil, 135, 136, 146
Gran Capitan, El, 149
Greco, El, 148
Isabel, Queen, 137
Irving, Washington, 150
Mohammed, 137
Montañez, 148
O’Shea, Henry, 150
Pacheco, 147
Philip IV., 147
Philip V., 141
Ribera, 148
San Geronimo, church of, 149
Sierra Nevada, 136
Siloe, Diego de, 146
St Ildefonso, church of, 147
Talavera, Cardinal, 138, 139
Yusuf I., 137
Ximenes, Cardinal, 138, 139

HEIDELBERG
Anlagen, 240
Castle of, 237
Hegel, 238-239
Huss, 240
Jerome of Prague, 240
Mary of Scotland, 237
Morata, Olympia, 240
Neckar River, 236
Rupert, Elector, 236
Students, 239
Tully, 236, 238
Tun, great, 237
Wars, 240

NUREMBERG
Bridges, 248
Churches, 241, 245
Craftsmen, 241
Durer, 244-245
Forts, 246
Gustavus, 243
Huss, 242
Imhoff Gallery, 245
Karl IV., 242
Krafft, 245
“Lohengrin,” 248
Luther, 242
Melanchthon, 242{287}
Old houses, 248
“Parsifal,” 248
Pegnitz River, 246, 248
Rathaus, 247
Stoss, 248
Vischer, Peter, 247, 248
Wagner, 248
Wars, 243
Wolf-brothers, 247
Wolfram, 248

OPORTO
Alfonso I., 155
Art, 157, 162, 163
Bridge, 161
Cathedral, 160
Churches, 160
Climate, 154-155
Douro, 152, 155, 159, 161, 162
English in, 154
Explorers of, 157
Exports, 159
Foz, 163
Gama, de, 157
Gardens, 161
John I., 156
Juan of Castile, 156
— III., 157
Lusitania, 155
Manuel I., 157
Markets, 153
Mattosinhos, 163
Museum, 162
Pedro IV., 163
Pedroites, 158
Peninsular War, 158
Philip II., 158
Pictures in, 162
Port wine, 158
Romans, 155
Teutons, 155
Visigoths, 155

PERUGIA
Baroccio, 54
Bernardino, 56
Bonfigli, 54, 55
Canonica, 54
Collegio del Cambio, 55
Coreggio, 54
Fra Angelico, 55
Fiorenzo di Lorengo, 54
Giannicola, 55
Palazzo Pubblico, 54
Paul III., Pope, 53
Perugino, 54, 55, 56
Piazzi del Municipio, 56
Piazza Sopramuro, 56
Pinturicchio, 55
Prefeturra terrace, 53
Raphael, 55
San Domenico, church of, 56
San Lorenzo, cathedral of, 54
San Pietro, church of, 56
San Severo, church of, 55

POITIERS
Battle of, 164-166
Black Prince, 164
Buch, Captal, 165
Coligny, 167, 168
Churches, 168
Dukes of Aquitaine, 168
John of France, 164
Lude, Count, 167
Morbecque, de, 166
Museum, 167
Petrarch, 166
Population, 169
Protestantism, 167
Romans, 167

PRAGUE
Bridges, 259, 264
Capuchin Monastery, 263
Cathedral, 262
Charles IV., 260
Church, 263
Craftsmen, 260
Drama in, 264{288}
Emaus Monastery, 263
Huss, 260
Libussa, 260
Mathew of Cracow, 260
Moldau River, 259
Museum, 264
National Theatre, 264-265
Palaces, 263
Petrlik, 262
Powder Gate, 264
Rudolph, King, 262
Siege of, 261
Sigismund, 261
Symons, Arthur, 262
Thirty Years’ War, 262
Austrian War, 262
Vladislav, 263
Wenceslas, 260
Wicliff, 261

RHEIMS
Cathedral, 187-190
Cæsar, 186
Churches, 190
Clovis, 187
Consul of, 186
Gate of Mars, 190
James, Henry, 188, 191
Joan of Arc, 187
Louis XV., 191
Museum, 190
Romans, 186, 190
St Remi, 187, 190
St Jacques, 190
St Thomas, 190
Tapestries, 189
Trade, 191
Vandals, 186

ROME
Agrippa, 18
Albani, Villa, 13
Augustus, 15
Antony, Mark, 15
Aurelius, 4
Berbini, Cardinal, 16
Borghese, Villa, 16
Browning, Robert, 19
Bruno, Giordano, 7, 8
Cæsar, 3
Cæsar, Julius, temple of, 15
Cæsars, palace of, 15
Campagna 1, 15, 20
Canova, 12
Capitoline, 13, 15
Capitol Museum, 16, 17
Castor and Pollux, temple of, 15
Catullus, 20
Caligula, palace of, 20
Coliseum, 4, 5, 6, 15, 17, 18
Colonna Palace, 11
Colonna, Vittoria, 12
Constantine, arch of, 17
Copernicus, 17
Coreggio, 11
Cynthia, 20
Della Porta, 14
Dorian Palace, 16
Fabius, arch of, 20
Farnese Palace, 12
Forum 4, 15, 18, 20
Galileo, 8, 13
Gauls, 3
Gœthe, 11, 17, 20
Hannibal, 3
Julia, Basilica, 20
Jupiter, 15
Keats, 19
Kircheriano, 16
Lateran Palace, 14
Medici, Villa, 16
Michael Angelo, 9, 10, 11, 12
Michelet, 2, 6
National Museum, 16
Nero, 4
Niebuhr, 2
Palatine Hill, 6, 14, 15
Pantheon, 4, 18
Pauline Chapel, 10
Plutei, walls of the, 15
Pompey, 1, 3
Pompelius, Numa, 2{289}
Poussin, 16
Protestant cemetery, 19
Raphael, 11
Regia, 14, 15
Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 11, 17
Romulus, 2, 15
Rosa, Salvator, 16
San Clemente, 14
San Giovanni, 14
San Giovanni Laterno, 13
Santa Maria, 12, 14
Santi Giovanni Paolo, 14
Saturn, temple of, 15, 20
Scipio, 3
Senatore, Palazzo del, 16
Septimus Severus, arch of, 15
Shelley, 17, 18, 19
Sistine Chapel, 9, 10
St Peter’s, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 17, 18
Symons, Arthur, 10
Tarquinius Superbus, 2
Thorvaldsen, 13
Tiber, 2
Titian, 11, 16
Trajan, 7, 15
Trajan’s Column, 16, 20
Van Dyck, 16
Varus, Quintilius, 20
Vatican, 13, 16
Velazquez, 16
Vespasian, temple of, 8
Vesta, temple of, 14

ROUEN
Arc, Joan of, 172-173
Blanchard, Alan, 172
Bovary, Madame, 173
Cathedral, 173-174
Churches, 171, 174
Corneille, 174
Danes, 170
Flaubert, 175
Gautier, 178
Godard, St, 174
Goujon, 174
Henry V., 173
Rigaud, Bishop, 176
Roan horses, 171
Rollo, 171
St Amant, 177-178
William the Conqueror, 171

SEVILLE
Alcazar, 86, 88, 93
Bolero, 81
Borrow, G., 79
Bullfighting, 82
Campaña, P., 92
Casa Pilatos, 84
Cathedral, 91-93
Charles V., 88
Climate, 80
Columbus, 86
Dancing, 81
Easter fêtes, 80
Gautier, 91
Giralda, 79, 86
Gitanos, 83
Golden Tower, 86
Greco, El, 93
Guadalquivir, 86, 95
Horses of, 82
Mendoza, 87
Moors, 85, 86, 94
Montañez, 90, 92
Murillo, 83, 90, 92
— house of, 84
Pacheco, 89
Painters of, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93
Park, 95
Pedro the Cruel, 85, 93
Romans, 84, 94
Telmo Palace, 95
Torquemada, 87
Trajan, 85
Triana, 83
Velazquez, 88, 95
Women of, 81
Zurbaran, 93

TOLEDO
Abd-er-Rahman, 122
Alcantara Bridge, 122{290}
Alcazar, 126, 133
Ayuntamiento, 126
Bayeu, 125
Bernardo, Don, 127
Berruguéte, 124, 132, 133
Borgoña, 124, 125
Bourgoanne, Chevalier de, 133
Carreño, 126
Casa de Mesa, 123
Cathedral, 121, 124, 130
Cervantes, 132
Cid, 126
El Cristo de la Luz, church of, 123
El Transito, church of, 123
Elizabeth de Valois, 126
Gautier, 127, 130
Goya, 125
Greco, El, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131
Ibañez, Blasco de, 120
Infantry, school of, 123
Justi, Carl, 132
Martinez, Guiseppe, 128
Maella, 126
Mendoza, Cardinal, 124, 125
Museum, Provincial, 129
O’Shea, Henry, 127
Ponz, 130
Puerta de los Leones, 124
Puerta del Sol, 123
Roderick, King, 122
San José, church of, 130
San Juan, church of, 130
San Juan, hospital of, 130
San Martin, bridge of, 123
San Miguel, church of, 123
San Roman, church of, 123
San Sevando, church of, 123
San Vicente, church of, 129
Santa Maria la Blanca, church of, 123
Santo Domingo, church of, 130
Santo Tomé, church of, 123, 129
St Magdalen, church of, 130
Tagus, 122, 133
Tarik, 122
Tintoretto, 127
Tubal, 121
Vega, Lope de, 131, 132
Ximenes, Cardinal, 125

VENICE
Academy of Arts, 46, 48, 51
Brownings, 49, 50
Byron, 49
Bellini, 47, 48
Borrow, George, 30
Canaletto, 47
Coello, Sanchez, 46
Columbus, 37
Doge, palace of, 37, 44, 45, 50, 51
Giorgione, 45
Grand Canal, 48, 49
Greco, El, 47
Goths, 35
James, Henry, 35
Lido, the, 50
Lysippos, 41
Murano, 51
Napoleon, 40, 41
Padua, 51
Palazzo Dario, 48
— Dona, 48
— Ca d’Oro, 48
— Foscari, 48
— Loredan, 48
— Mesto, 48
— Mocenigo, 49
— Pesaro, 48
— Rezzonico, 49
— Vendramin, 49
— Venier, 48
Palma, 45
Palladio, 51
Paul V., Pope, 38
Piazzetta, 50
Pietro Tribune, 36
Rialto, 36, 51
Ruskin, 31, 41, 43, 50
San Marco, cathedral of, 36, 37, 41, 51
San Marco, square of, 40
San Zaccaria, church of, 48
San Zanipolo, church of, 48{291}
Santa Fosca, church of, 39
Santa Maria dei Friari, church of, 46
Santa Maria della Salute, church of, 46, 47
Sarpi, Paolo, 46, 47
Sharp, William, 49
Spires, John of, 37
Symonds, J. A., 50
Tiepolo, Giovanni Battista, 47
Tintoretto, 42, 44, 45, 46, 47
Titian, 44, 46
Torcella, 51
Veronese, Paolo, 45, 47
Via Garibaldi, 34
Vicenza, 51
Wagner, 49

VERONA
Amphitheatre, 74
Anastasia Church, 75
Caliari, 75
Catullus, 78
Cavilli Chapel, 75
Consiglio Palace, 74
Diocletian, 74
Eccelius, 78
Fermo, San, 77
Freeman, A. E., 78
Garda, lake of, 72
Giaconda, 74
Giorgio, San, 75
Libri, dai, 77
Mantegna, 76, 77
Maria, Santa, 77
Municipio, 73
Piazza della Erbe, 73
Pliny, 78
Ragione Palace, 74
Roman period, 77
Romeo and Juliet, 72
Scaligers, 73, 75
Shakespeare, 72-73
Tribunale, 74
Veronese, 76, 77
Zeno, San, 76

WITTENBERG
Augsburg Confession, 253
Bishop Albert, 250
Diet of Worms, 256
Elbe, 249
Frederick, Elector, 255, 257, 258
Henry VIII., 256
History of, 249
Kranach, 257, 258
Leo X., 251, 254
Luther, 250-257
Melanchthon, 253, 255, 257
Rathaus, 258
Reuchlin, 250
Schloss Kirche, 250, 251, 257
Stadt Kirche, 257
Tetzel, 251
Tubingen, 253
University, 249
Valdes, 255
Vischer, 257
Wicliff, 250
Zwingli, 253

THE RIVERSIDE PRESS LIMITED, EDINBURGH

{292}

{293}

A Catalogue of the Publications of T. Werner Laurie.

{297}

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