Early in the morning I was awoke by music; a regiment of soldiers, stretching far and wide, were marching towards La Rambla. I was soon down [dormía en la Fonda del Oriente], and in the long promenade which divides the town into two parts from Puerta del Mar, from the terraced walk along the harbour, to Puerta Isabel Segunda, beyond which the station for Pamplona lies. It was not the hour for promenading, it was the early business time. There were people from the town and people from the country, hurrying along; clerks and shopkeepers’ assistants on foot, peasants on their mules; light carts empty, wagons and omnibuses; noise and clamour, cracking of whips, tinkling of the bells and brass ornaments which adorned the horses and the mules; all mingling, crying, making a noise together: it was evident that one was in a large town. Handsome, glittering cafes stood invitingly there, and the tables outside of them were already all filled. Smart barbers’ shops, with their doors standing wide open, were placed side by side with the cafes; in them soaping, shaving, and hairdressing were going on. Wooden booths with oranges, pumpkins, and melons, projected a little farther out on the foot-paths here, where now a house, now a church wall, was hung with farthing pictures, stories of robbers, songs and stanzas, ‘published this year.’ There was much to be seen. Where was I to begin, and where to end, on Rambla, the Boulevard of Barcelona?
When, last year, I first visited Turin, I perceived that I was in the Paris of Italy; here it struck me that Barcelona is the Paris of Spain. There is quite a French air about the place. One of the nearest narrow side streets was crowded with people, there were no end of shops in it, with various goods—cloaks, mantillas, fans, brightcoloured ribands, alluring to the eyes and attracting purchasers; there I wandered about wherever chance led me. As I pursued my way, I found the side and back streets still more narrow, the houses apparently more adverse to light; windows did not seem in request; the walls were thick, and there were awnings over the courts. I now reached a small square; a trumpet was sounding, and people were crowding together. Some jugglers, equipped in knitted vests, with party-coloured swimming small-clothes, and carrying with them the implements of their profession, were preparing to exhibit on a carpet spread over the pavement, for they seemed to wish to avoid the middle of the street. A little darkeyed child, a mignon of the Spanish land, danced and played the tambourine, let itself be tumbled head over heels, and made a kind of lump of, by its half-naked papa. In order to see better what was going on, I had ascended a few steps of the entrance to an old dwelling, with a single large window in the Moorish style; two horse-shoe-formed arches were supported by slender marble pillars; behind me was a door half-open. I looked in, and saw a great geranium hedge growing round a dry dusty fountain. An enormous vine shaded one half the place, which seemed deserted and left to decay; the wooden shutters hung as if ready to fall from the one hinge which supported each in their loose frames: within, all appeared as if nothing dwelt there but bats in the twilight gloom.
I proceeded farther on, and entered a street, still narrow, and swarming with still more people than those I had already traversed. It was a street that led to a church. Here, hid away among high houses, stands the Cathedral of Barcelona: without any effect, without any magnificence, it might easily be passed by unheeded; as, like many remarkable personages, one requires to have one’s attention drawn to them in order to observe them. The crowd pressed on me, and carried me through the little gate into the open arcade, which, with some others, formed the approaches to the cathedral, and enclosed a grove of orange-trees, planted where once had stood a mosque. Even now water was splashing in the large marble basins, wherein the Musselmen used to wash their faces before and after prayers.
The little bronze statue here, of a knight on horseback, is charming; it stands alone on a metal reed out in the basin, and the water sparkles behind and before the horse. Close by, gold fishes are swimming among juicy aquatic plants; and behind high gratings, geese are also floating about. I ought perhaps to have said swans, but one must stick to the truth, if one wishes to be original as a writer of travels.
The horseman of the fountain, and the living geese, were not much in accordance with devotion; but there was a great deal that was ecclesiastical to outweigh these non-church adjuncts to the place. Before the altars in the portico, people were kneeling devoutly; and from the church’s large open door issued the perfume of incense, the sound of the organ, and the choral chant, I passed under the lofty-vaulted roof; here were earnestness and grandeur: but God’s sun could not penetrate through the painted windows; and a deep twilight, increased by the smoke of the incense, brooded therein, and my thoughts of the Almighty felt depressed and weighed down. I longed for the open court outside the cathedral, where heaven was the roof—where the sunbeams played among the orange-trees, and on the murmuring water; without, where pious persons prayed on bended knees. There the organ’s sweet, full tones, bore my thoughts to the Lord of all. This was my first visit to a Spanish church.
On leaving the cathedral, I proceeded through narrow streets to one extremely confined, but resplendent with gold and silver. In Barcelona, and in many Spanish towns, the arrangement prevalent in the middle ages still exists, namely, that the different trades—such as shoemakers, workers in metal, for instance—had their own respective streets, where alone their goods were sold. I went into the goldsmiths’ street; it was filled with shops glittering with gold and splendid ornaments.
In another street they were pulling down a large, very high house. The stone staircase hung suspended by the side of the wall, through several stories, and a wide well with strange-looking rings protruded betwixt the rubbish and the stones; it had been the abode of the principal inquisitor, who now no longer held his sway. The inquisition has long since vanished here, as now-a-days have the monks, whose monasteries are deserted.
From the open square, where stand the queen’s palace and the pretty buildings with porticos, you pass to the terrace promenade along the harbour. The view here is grand and extensive. You see the ancient MONS JOVIS; the eye can follow the golden zigzag stripe of road to the Fort Monjuich, that stands out so proudly, hewn from and raised on the rock: you behold the open sea, the numerous ships in the harbour, the entire suburb, Barcelonetta, and the crowds in all directions.
The streets are at right angles, long, and have but poor-looking low houses. Booths with articles of clothing, counters with eatables, people pushing and scrambling around them; carriers’ carts, droskies, and mules crowded together; half-grown boys smoking their cigars, workmen, sailors, peasants, and all manner of townsfolk, mingled here in dust and sunshine. It is impossible to avoid the crowd; but, if you like, you can have a refreshing bath, for the bathing-houses lie on the beach close by.
Though the weather and the water were still warm, they were already beginning to take down the large wooden shed, and there only now remained a sort of screening wooden enclosure, a boarding down from the road; and it was therefore necessary to wade through the deep sand before reaching the water, with its rolling waves, and obtaining a bath. But bow salt, how refreshing it was! You emerged from it as if renewed in youth, and you come with a young man’s appetite to the hotel, where an abundant and excellent repast awaits you. One might have thought that the worthy host had determined to prove that it was a very untruthful assertion, that in Spain they were not adepts at good cookery.
Early in the evening we repaired to the fashionable promenade—the Rambla. It was filled with gay company: the gentlemen had their hair befrizzled and becurled; they were vastly elegant, and all puffing their cigars. One of them, who had an eye-glass stuck in his eye, looked as if he had been cut out of a Paris ‘Journal des Modes.’ Most of the ladies wore the very becoming Spanish mantilla, the long black lace veil hanging over the comb down to the shoulders; their delicate hands agitating with a peculiar grace the dark spangled fans. Some few ladies sported French hats and shawls. People were sitting on both sides of the promenade in rows on the stone seats, and chairs under the trees; they sat out in the very streets with tables placed before them, outside of the cafes. Every place was filled, within and without.
In no country have I seen such splendid cafes as in Spain; cafes so beautifully and tastefully decorated. One of the prettiest, situated in the Rambla, which my friends and I daily visited, was lighted by several hundred gas lamps. The tastefully-painted roof was supported by slender, graceful pillars; and the walls were covered with good paintings and handsome mirrors, each worth about a thousand rigsdalers. Immediately under the roof ran galleries, which led to small apartments and billiard-rooms; over the garden, which was adorned with fountains and beautiful flowers, an awning was spread during the day, but removed in the evening, so that the clear blue skies could be seen. It was often impossible, without or within, above or below, to find an unoccupied table; the places were constantly taken. People of the most opposite classes were to be seen here—elegant ladies and gentlemen, military of the higher and lower grades, peasants in velvet and embroidered mantles thrown loosely over their arms. I saw a man of the lower ranks enter the cafe with four little girls. They gazed with curiosity, almost with awe, at the splendour and magnificence around them. A visit to the cafe was, doubtless, as great an event to them as it is to many children for the first time to go to a theatre. Notwithstanding the lively conversation going on among the crowd, the noise was never stunning, and one could hear a solitary voice accompanied by a guitar. In all the larger Spanish cafes, there sits, the whole evening, a man with a guitar, playing one piece of music after the other, but no one seems to notice him; it is like a sound which belongs to the extensive machinery. The Rambla became more and more thronged; the excessively long street became transformed into a crowded festival-saloon.
The usual social meetings at each other’s houses in family life, are not known here. Acquaintances are formed on the promenades on fine evenings; people come to the Rambla to sit together, to speak to each other, to be pleased with each other; to agree to meet again the following evening. Intimacies commence; the young people make assignations; but until their betrothals are announced, they do not visit at each other’s houses. Upon the Rambla the young man thus finds his future wife.
The first day in Barcelona was most agreeable, and full of variety; the following days not less so. There was so much new to be seen—so much that was peculiarly Spanish, notwithstanding that French influence was perceptible, in a place so near the borders.
During my stay at Barcelona, its two largest theatres, Principal and Del Liceo, were closed. They were both situated in Rambla. The theatre Del Liceo is said to be the largest in all Spain. I saw it by daylight. The stage is immensely wide and high. I arrived just during the rehearsal of an operetta with high-sounding, noisy music; the pupils and chorus-singers of the theatre intended to give the piece in the evening at one of the theatres in the suburbs.
The places for the audience are roomy and tasteful, the boxes rich in gilding, and each has its ante-room, furnished with sofas and chairs covered with velvet. In the front of the stage is the director’s box, from which hidden telegraphic wires carry orders to the stage, to the prompter, to the various departments. In the vestibule in front of the handsome marble staircase stands a bust of the queen. The public green-room surpasses in splendour all that Paris can boast of in that portion of the house. From the roof of the balcony of the theatre there is a magnificent view of Barcelona and the wide expanse of sea.
An Italian company were performing at the Teatro del Circo; but there, as in most of the Spanish theatres, nothing was given but translations from French. Scribe’s name stood most frequently on the play-bills. I also saw a long, tedious melodrama, ‘The Dog of the Castle.’
The owner of the castle is killed during the revolution; his son is driven forth, after having become an idiot from a violent blow on the head. Instinct leads him to his home, but none of its former inmates are there; the very watch-dog was killed: the house is empty, and he who is its rightful owner, now creeps into it, unwitting of its being his own. In vain his high and distinguished relatives have sought for him. He knows nothing of all this; he does not know that a paper, which from habit he instinctively conceals in his breast, could procure for him the whole domain. An adventurer, who had originally been a hair-dresser, comes to the neighbourhood, meets the unfortunate idiot, reads his paper, and buys it from him for a clean, new five-franc note. This person goes now to the castle as its heir; he, however, does not please the young girl, who, of the same distinguished family, was destined to be his bride, and he also betrays his ignorance of everything in his pretended paternal home. The poor idiot, on the contrary, as soon as he sets his foot within the walls of the castle, is overwhelmed with reminiscences; he remembers from his childhood every toy he used to play with; the Chinese mandarins he takes up, and makes them nod their heads as in days gone by; also he knows, and can show them, where his father’s small sword was kept; he alone was aware of its hidingplace. The truth became apparent; protected by the chamber-maid, he is restored to his rights, but not to his intellects.
The part of the idiot was admirably well acted; nearly too naturally—there was so much truthfulness in the delineation that it was almost painful to sit it out. The piece was well got up, and calculated to make ladies and children quite nervous.
The performances ended with a translation of the well-known Vaudeville, ‘A Gentleman and a Lady.’
The most popular entertainments in Spain, which seem to be liked by all classes, are bull-fights; every tolerably large town, therefore, has its Plaza de Toros. I believe the largest is at Valencia. For nine months in the year these entertainments are the standing amusements of every Sunday. We were to go the following Sunday at Barcelona to see a bull-fight; there were only to be two young bulls, and not a grand genuine fight: however, we were told it would give us an idea of these spectacles.
The distant Plaza de Toros was reached, either by omnibus or a hired street carriage taken on the Rambla; the Plaza itself was a large, circular stone building, not far from the railroad to Gerona. The extensive arena within is covered with sand, and around it is raised a wooden wall about three ells in height, behind which is a long, open space, for standing spectators. If the bull chooses to spring over the barrier to them, they have no outlet or means of exit, and are obliged to jump down into the arena; and when the bull springs down again, they must mount, as best they can, to their old places. Higher above this open corridor, and behind it, is, extending all round the amphitheatre, a stone gallery for the public, and above it again are a couple of wooden galleries fitted up in boxes, with benches or chairs. We took up our position below, in order to see the manners of the commoner class. The sun was shining over half the arena, spangled fans were waving and glittering, and looked like birds flapping their bright winga. The building could contain about fifteen thousand persons. There were not so many present on this occasion, but it was well filled.
We had been previously told of the freedom and licence which pervaded this place, and warned not to attract observation by our dress, else we might be made the butts of the people’s rough humour, which might prompt them to shout, ‘Away with your smart gloves! Away with your white city-hat!’ followed by sundry witticisms. They would not brook the least delay; the noise increased, the people’s will was omnipotent, and hats and gloves had to be taken off, whether agreeable to the wearers or not.
The sound of the music was fearful and deafening at the moment we entered; people were roaring and screaming; it was like a boisterous carnival. The gentlemen threw flour over each other in the corners, and pelted each other with pieces of sausages; here flew oranges, there a glove or an old hat, all amidst merry uproar, in -which the ladies took a part. The glittering fans, the gaily-embroidered mantles, and the bright rays of the sun, confused the eyes, as the noise confused the ears; one felt oneself in a perfect maelstrom of vivacity.
Now the trumpet’s blast sounded a fanfare, one of the gates to the arena was opened, and the bull-fight cavalcade entered. First rode two men in black garments, with large white shirt fronts, and staffs in their hands. They were followed, upon old meagre-looking horses, by four Picadores, well stuffed in the whole of the lower parts, that they might not sustain any injury when the bull rushed upon them. They each carried a lance with which to defend themselves; but notwithstanding their stuffing, they were always very helpless if they fell from their horses. Then came half a score Banderilleros, young, handsome, stage-clad youths, equipped in velvet and gold. After them appeared, in silken attire, glittering in gold and silver—Espada; his blood-red cloak he carried thrown over his arm, the well-tempered sword, with which he was to give the animal its death-thrust, he held in his hand. The procession was closed by four mules, adorned with plumes of feathers, brass plates, gay tassels, and tinkling bells, which were, to the sound of music, at full gallop, to drag the slaughtered bull and the dead horses out of the arena.
The cavalcade went round the entire circle, and stopped before the balcony where the highest magistrate sat. One of the two darkly clad riders—I believe they were called Alguazils—rode forward and asked permission to commence the entertainment; the key which opened the door to the stable where the bull was confined was then cast down to him. Immediately under a portion of the theatre appropriated to spectators, the poor bulls had been locked up, and had passed the night and the whole morning without food or drink. They had been brought from the hills fastened to two trained tame bulls, and led into the town; they came willingly, poor animals! to kill or be killed in the arena. To-day, however, no bloody work was to be performed by them; they had been rendered incapable of being dangerous, for their horns had been muffled. Only two were destined to fall under the stabs of the Espada; to-day, as has been mentioned, was only a sort of sham fight, in which the real actors in such scenes had no strong interest, therefore it commenced with a comic representation—a battle between the Moors and the Spaniards, in which, of course, the former played the ridiculous part, the Spaniards the brave and stout-hearted.
A bull was let in: its horns were so bound that it could not kill any one; the worst it could do was to break a man’s ribs. There were flights and springing aside, fun and laughter. Now came on the bull-fight. A very young bull rushed in, then it suddenly stood still in the field of battle. The glaring sunbeams, the moving crowd, dazzled its eyes; the wild uproar, the trumpet’s blasts, and the shrill music, came upon it so unexpectedly, that it probably thought, like Jeppe when he awoke in the Baroness’s bed, ‘What can this be! What can this be!’ But it did not begin to weep like Jeppe; it plunged its horns into the sand, its backbones showing its strength, and the sand was whirled up in eddies into the air, but that was all it did. The bull seemed dismayed by all the noise and bustle, and only anxious to get away. In vain the Banderilleros teased it with their red cloaks; in vain the Picadores brandished their lances. These they hardly dared use before the animal had attacked them; this is to be seen at the more perilous bull-fights, of which we shall, by-and-bye, have more to say, in which the bull can toss the horse and the rider so that they shall fall together, and then the Banderilleros must take care to drive the furious animal to another part of the arena, until the horse and its rider have had time to arise to another conflict. One eye of the horse is bound up; this is done that it may not have a full view of its adversary, and become frightened. At the first encounter the bull often drives his pointed horn into the horse so that the entrails begin to well out; they are pushed in again; the gash is sewed up, and the same animal can, after the lapse of a few minutes, carry his rider. On this occasion, however, the bull was not willing to fight, and a thousand voices cried, ‘El ferro!’
The Banderilleros came with large arrows, ornamented with waving ribands, and squibs; and when the bull rushed upon them, they sprang aside, and with equal grace and agility they contrived to plunge each arrow into the neck of the animal: the squib exploded, the arrow buzzed, the poor bull became half mad, and in vain shook its head and its neck, the blood flowed from its wounds. Then came Espada to give the death-blow, but on an appointed place in the neck was the weapon only to enter. It was several times either aimed at a wrong place, or the thrust was given too lightly, and the bull ran about with the sword sticking in its neck; another thrust followed, and blood flowed from the animal’s mouth; the public hissed the awkward Espada. At length the weapon entered into the vulnerable spot; and in an instant the bull sank on the ground, and lay there like a clod, while a loud ‘viva’ rang from a thousand voices, mingling with the sound of the trumpets and the kettle-drums. The mules with their bells, their plumes of feathers, and their flags, galloped furiously round the arena, dragging the slaughtered animal after them; the blood it had shed was concealed by fresh sand; and a new bull, about as young as the first, was ushered in, after having been on its entrance excited and provoked by a thrust from a sharp iron spike. This fresh bull was, at the commencement of the affray, more bold than the former one, but it also soon became terrified. The spectators demanded that fire should be used against him, the squib arrows were then shot into his neck, and after a short battle he fell beneath the Espada’s sword.
‘Do not look upon this as a real Spanish bull-fight,’ said our neighbours to us; ‘this is mere child’s play, mere fun!’ And with fun the whole affair ended. The public were allowed, as many as pleased, to spring over the barriers into the arena; old people and young people took a part in this amusement; two bulls with horns well wrapped round, were let in. There was a rushing and springing about; even the bulls joined the public in vaulting over the first barrier among the spectators who still remained there; and there were roars of laughter, shouts and loud hurrahs, until the Empressario the manager of that day’s bull-fight, found that there was enough of this kind of sport, and introduced the two tame bulls, who were immediately followed by the two others back to their stalls. Not a single horse had been killed, blood had only flowed from two bulls; that was considered nothing, but we had 6een all the usual proceedings, and witnessed how the excitement of the people was worked up into passionate feelings.
It was here, in this arena, in 1833, that the revolutionary movement in Barcelona broke out, after they had commenced at Saragossa to murder the monks and burn the monasteries. The mass of the populace in the arena fired upon the soldiers, these fired again upon the people; and the agitation spread abroad with fiery destruction throughout the land.
Near the Plaza de Toros is situated the cemetery of Barcelona, at a short distance from the open sea. Aloes of a great height compose the fences, and high walls encircle a town inhabited only by the dead. A gate-keeper and his family, who occupy the porter’s lodge, are the only living creatures who dwell here. In the inside of this city of the dead are long lonely streets, with boxlike houses, of six stories in height, in which, side by side, over and under each other, are built cells, in each of which lies a corpse in its coffin. A dark plate with the name and an inscription is placed over the opening. The buildings have the appearance of warehouses, with doors upon doors. A large chapel-formed tomb is the cathedral in this city of the dead. A grass plot, with dark lofty cypresses, and a single isolated monument, afford some little variety to these solemn streets, where the residents of Barcelona, generation after generation, as silent, speechless inhabitants, occupy their gravechambers.
The sun’s scorching rays were glaring on the white walls; and all here was so still, so lonely, one became so sad that it was a relief to go forth into the stir of busy life. On leaving this dismal abode of decay and corruption, the first sound we heard appertaining to worldly existence was the whistle of the railway; the train shot past, and, when its noise had subsided, was heard the sound of the waves rolling on the adjacent shore; thither I repaired.
A number of fishermen were just at that moment hauling their nets ashore; strange-looking fishes, red, yellow, and blueish-green, were playing in the nets; naked, dark-skinned children were running about on the sands; dirty women—I think they were gypsies— sat and mended old worn-out garments; their hair was coal-black, their eyes darker still; the younger ones wore large red flowers in their hair, their teeth was as glittering wbite as those of the Moors. They were groups to be painted on canvas. The city of the dead, on the contrary, would have suited a photographer, one picture of that would be enough; for from whatever side one viewed it, there was no change in its character: these receptacles for the dead stood in uniform and unbroken array, while cypress trees, here and there, unfolded what seemed to be their mourning banners.