From Burgos to the Gate of the Sun; The Lost City; Cordovan Pilgrims; Andalusia and the Alhambra; Mediterranean Ports and Gardens
The two great Mediterranean peninsulas which, in opposite quarters, jut southward where--as George Eliot says, in her “Spanish Gypsy”--
“Europe spreads her lands
Like fretted leaflets, breathing on the deep,”
may not inaptly be likened to a brother and sister, instead of taking their places under the usual similitude of “sister countries.” They have points of marked resemblance, in their picturesqueness, their treasures of art, their associations of history and romance; but, just as the physical aspect of Spain and its shape upon the map are broader, more thick-set and rugged than the slender form and flowing curves of Italy, so the Spanish language--with its Arabic gutturals interspersed among melodious linguals and vowel sounds--has been called the masculine development of that Southern speech of which the Italian presents the feminine side. The people of both countries exhibit a similar excitable, ardent quality in their characters; but the national temperament of the Spaniards is, perhaps, somewhat hardier, more virile, and sturdier in its passionateness.
It seems to be true that, while the Greek spirit transferred itself to Italy in the days of Augustus, renewing its influence at the period of the Renaissance, and leaving upon people and manners an impress never since quite effaced--an influence tending toward a certain feminine refinement--the spirit of Rome also transferred itself to the subject country, Hispania, and imbued that region with the strong, austere, or wilful characteristics of purely Latin civilization, which are still traceable there.
But, however we may account for the phenomena, it is likely that the mingled contrasts and resemblances of Italy and Spain will more and more induce travellers to visit the Iberian Peninsula. Italy has now been so thoroughly depicted in all its larger phases, from the foreigner’s point of view, that investigation must hereafter chiefly be concerned with the study of special and local features. Spain, on the other hand, offers itself to the general observer and to the tourist as a field scarcely more explored than Italy was forty or fifty years ago; and the evidence is abundant that the current of travel is setting vigorously in this direction. With the extension of a railroad system and the incursion of sight-seeing strangers in larger number, we must of course expect that many of the most interesting peculiarities of the people will undergo modification and at length disappear. This, however, cannot be helped; and the following chapters, at the same time that they may encourage and aid those who are destined to bring about such changes, may also serve to arrest and preserve for future reference the actual appearance of Spain to-day.
