Chapter IV

It is not surprising that Isabella the Catholic, who had so completely thrown her heart into the conquest of Granada, should have wished to be buried in that city, though dying far away. Her marble semblance rests beside that of Ferdinand in the Royal Chapel, which serves as vestibule to the ugly Renaissance cathedral. The statues are peculiarly impressive, and sleep on high sepulchres of alabaster, beautifully chased. Both of them are placed with their heads where, if sentient, they might contemplate the astonishing reredos of the altar--a wooden mass piled to the roof, and containing many niches filled by figures carved, gilded, and painted with flesh-color. Among them is John the Baptist standing upright, with blood gushing from his severed neck, while the head which has just quitted it is being presented on a charger to Herodias's daughter. There are other hideous things in this strange and brutal church ornament, which is a museum of monstrosities; but parts of it depict the triumphs of the royal pair, and it was no doubt accordant with their taste. Their bodies lie in a black vault under the floor, which we visited by the light of a single candle. Two long bulks of lead, with a simple letter F. on one and an I. on the other; that was all that marked the presence of two great monarchs' earthly part. Juana the Mad, Charles V.'s mother, rests in another leaden casket--the poor Queen, whom her famous son probably reported crazy for his own political purposes, but whose supposed mania of watching her dead husband's body, in jealous fear that he could still be loved by other women, has been effectively treated in Padilla's picture. Her husband, Philip the Fair, lies on the opposite side. Hardly could there be a more impressive contrast than that between this tomb under the soft, musty shadows of the chapel--all that is left of the conqueror--and that glorious sun-imbued ruin on the hill--all that is left of the conquered. Two mighty forces met and clashed around Granada in 1492; and, when the victory was won, both receded like spent waves, leaving the Alhambra to slow burial in rubbish and oblivion, under which Washington Irving literally rediscovered it. How fine a coincidence that the very spot from which Isabella finally despatched Columbus on his great quest should owe so much to a son of the new continent which Columbus discovered!

Another edifice of no small interest, although seldom heard of at a distance, is La Cartuja, the Carthusian church and monastery, lying upon a hill-slope called Hinadamar, across the city and on its outskirts, due west from the Alhambra. The monks who formerly occupied it have, in common with those of other orders, been driven out of Spain; so that we approached the church-steps through an old arched gate-way, no longer guarded, and by way of a grass-grown enclosure that bore the appearance of complete neglect. The interior, however, is very well preserved. It was curious to walk through it, under the guidance of a pursy old woman, and, afterward, of the lame sacristan, who did his best with chattering gossip to rob the place of whatever sanctity remained to it. The refectory (fitly inhabited by an echo) stands bare and empty, save for the reading-desk, from which the monks used to be refreshed with Scripture while at their meals; and on the wall at one end of this long, high hall hangs apparently a wooden cross, which at first it is impossible to believe is only painted there. The barren, round-arched cloisters are frescoed with an interminable series of scenes by Cotan, the same artist who painted the cross; and in this case he was given a free commission, of which he availed himself to the utmost in depicting the most distressing incidents of Carthusian martyrology. Especially does he seem to have delighted in the persecutions inflicted by English Protestants under Henry VIII. on San Bruno, the founder of this order. How strange the conception of a holy and exalted life which led men in religious retirement to keep before their eyes, in these corridors meant for mild exercise and recreation, representations so full of blood and horror! In fact, one cannot escape the impression, stamped more vividly on the mind here in Granada than anywhere else, except perhaps in Toledo, that Christianity in Spain meant barbarism. But where it was released from the immediate purposes of ecclesiastic dogma, Christian art showed a taste not so much barbarous as barbaric, and the results of its activity were often beautiful. In this same monastery is a splendid example of that tendency. The church is not remarkably fine or impressive; but the sacristy is a marvel of sumptuous decoration, and decoration very peculiar in kind. Its walls are wholly incased in a most effective species of green and white marble, cut in smooth, polished slabs, the natural veinings of which present grotesque resemblances to human and other forms, which are somewhat trivially insisted upon by the custodian and guide, and should be allowed to lose themselves in the general richness of aspect. The great doors of this sacristy are inlaid with ebony, silver, mother-of-pearl, and tortoise-shell, in designs of much intricacy and richness; and all around the room (which is provided with an altar, so that it becomes a sort of sub-church or chapel, adjoining the main church) are low closets fitted into the wall. These were originally used for holding the vestments of the brotherhood. Made of sweet-scented cedar, they are adorned on the outside with the same inlaid work that appears on the doors. The dim, veiled shimmer of the mother-of-pearl, the delicate, translucent browns of the tortoise-shell, and the wandering threads of silver, form a decorative surface wonderful in its refinement, its perfection of elegance. I scarcely know how to give an idea of its appearance, unless I say that it was somewhat as if layers of spider-webs had been spread, with all their mystery of exact curves and angles, over the wood-work, and then had had their fibres changed by some magic into precious and enduring materials. The frail but well-adjusted fabric has outlasted the dominion of those for whose selfish and secluded pride of worship it was made; and, seeing it, one may pardon them some of their mistakes. It is pleasant also to find that the art of making this inlay, after having long fallen out of use, has been revived in Granada; for in these days of enlightened adaptation and artistic education there seems to be no reason why such a handicraft should be lost or even confined to Spain.

The gypsies of Granada are disappointing, apart from their peculiar quivering dance, performed by _gitanas_ in all Spanish cities under the name of _flamenco_.[10] Their hill-caves, so operative with one's curiosity when regarded from across the valley, gape open in such dingy, sour, degraded foulness on a nearer view, that I found no amount of theory would avail to restore their interest. Yet some of the fortune-telling women are spirited enough, and the inextinguishable Romany spark smoulders in their black eyes. Perhaps it was an interloping drop of Celtic blood that made one of them say to me, "Señorito, listen. I will tell you your fortune. But I speak French--_I come from Africa!_" And to clinch the matter she added, "You needn't pay me if every word of the prediction isn't true!" Much as I had heard of the Spanish bull, I never knew until then how closely it resembled the Irish breed.

Fortuny's model, Marinero, who lives in a burrow on the Alhambra side, occasionally starts up out of the earth in a superb and expensive costume, due to the dignity of his having been painted by Fortuny. Dark as a negro, with a degree of luminous brown in his skin, and very handsome, he plants himself immovably in one spot to sell photographs of himself. His nostrils visibly dilate with pride, but he makes no other bid for custom. He expands his haughty nose, and you immediately buy a picture. Velveteen chanced upon Marinero's daughter, and got her to pose. When he engaged her she was so delighted that she took a rose from her hair and presented it to him, with a charming, unaffected air of gratitude, came an hour before the time, and waited impatiently. She wore a wine-colored skirt, if I remember, a violet jacket braided with black, and a silk neckerchief of dull purple-pink silk. But that was not enough: a blue silk kerchief also was wound about her waist, and in among her smooth jet locks she had tucked a vivid scarlet flower. The result was perfect, for the rich pale-brown of her complexion could harmonize anything; and in Spain, moreover, combinations of color that appear too harsh elsewhere are paled and softened by the overpowering light.

Episodes like these tinged our dreams of the Alhambra with novel dashes of living reality. Even the tedious bustle of a Spanish town, too, has its attractions. The moving figures on the steep Albaycin streets, that perpetually break into flights of steps; the blocks of pressed snow brought in mule panniers every night from the Sierra to cool sugar-water and risadas of orange at the cafés; peasants coming in to the beautiful old grain market with gaudy mantles over their shoulders, stuffing into their sashes a variety of purchases, and becoming corpulent with a day's transactions; the patient efforts of shop-keepers to water the main street, Zacatin, with a pailful at a time--all this was amusing to watch. The Generalife was another source of pleasure, for in its topmost loggia one may sit like a bird, with the Alhambra spread out below in all the distinctness of a raised map. In the saloons of the Generalife hang the portraits of the Moorish and the Christian ancestors of the present owner. Their direct descendant is a woman; therefore she has married an Italian count, and flitted from this ideal, quite unparalleled eyry, returning to her ancestral home only at rare intervals.

There came an hour when we too flitted. To oblige an eccentric time-table we had to get up at dawn; but the last glimpse of the Alhambra at that early hour was a compensation. The dim red towers already began to soften into a reminiscence under this tender blending of moonlight and morning; but a small constellation in the east sparkled on the blue like a necklace of diamonds, and Saturn still flamed above the mountains, growing momently larger, as if it were a huge topaz in the turban of some giant Moor advancing in the early stillness to reclaim the Alhambra throne.

_MEDITERRANEAN PORTS AND GARDENS._