148 A SPRING TOUR IN PORTUGAL. 



Blessed Lord, admirably performed by a first-rate operatic 

 company, while lie describes the acting and scenic effects, 

 especially that of the Crucifixion with the darkening of the 

 sun and rising of the dead, as perfectly wonderful ; and 

 the singing of a supposed chorus of angels as exquisite : 

 and he adds, that the representants of our Lord and our 

 Lady looked just as if they had walked straight out of one 

 of Murillo's pictures. This was undoubtedly a refined 

 adaptation of the rude miracle play of the oNIiddle Ages to 

 the tastes and feelings of the inhabitants of a large Spanish 

 city in the nineteenth century, though to our English 

 ideas such a representation at all seems quite shocking and 

 profane ; but my friend tells me that the audience at Bar- 

 celona, on the whole, behaved well, and some were even 

 moved to tears. 



To a still greater extent, but with far more homeliness, 

 is carried the periodical performance, though at wide in- 

 tervals of ten years between each representation, of the 

 ' Ammergau Mystery ' in the Tyrol, which is described, by 

 those of our countrymen who have witnessed it, as some- 

 thing quite shocking and repulsive to the English mind ; 

 though, countenanced and indeed directed as it is by the 

 ecclesiastics of the district, we cannot doubt that it has the 

 effect intended, of rekindling the faith of the people, and 

 bringing home to their understandings, and stamping on 

 their hearts vivid impressions of some of the most striking 

 events in the Passion of our Blessed Lord. Indeed, such 

 is very much the verdict of an unexceptionable witness of 

 the last representation in 1860, no other, we believe, than 

 Dean Stanley, who, after a graphic description of the 

 whole performance, sums up his reflections upon it as 

 follows :* ' Any person interested in national religious 

 education must perceive the effect of such a life-like repre- 



* ' The Ammergau 3Iystery or Sacred Drama of I860,' by a Spectator : 

 Macmillan's Magazine, October 1860, pp. 463-477. 



