528 SPAIN. 



or profane history, or have relation to the sciences o£ which the 

 shelves below present to us the elements. Thus, the council of Nice 

 is represented above the books which treat of theology ; the deatn of 

 Archimedes, at the siege of Syracuse, indicates those which relate to 

 the mathematics ; and Cicero pronouncing his oration in favour of 

 Rabirius, the works relative to eloquence and the bar. A very 

 singular circumstance in this library may be agreeable to the curious 

 reader to know, which is, that, on viewing the books, he will find 

 them placed the contrary way, so that the edges of the leaves are 

 outwards, and contain their titles written on them. The reason for-* 

 this custom is, that Arius Montanus, a learned Spaniard of the six- 

 teenth century, whose libraiy had served as a foundation for that of 

 the Escurial, had all his books placed and inscribed in that manner, 

 which no doubt appeared to him to be the most commodious method 

 of arranging them. He introduced his own method into the Escurial ; 

 and since his time, and for the sake of uniformity, it has been follow- 

 ed with respect to the books afterwards added. Here are also large 

 apartments for all kinds of artists and mechanics. The fathers that 

 live in the convent are in number 200, and they have an annual 

 revenue of 100,000 dollars. The mausoleum, or burying place of 

 the kings and queens of Spain, is called the Pantheon, because it is 

 built upon the plan of that temple at Rome, as the church to which 

 it belongs is upon the model of St. Peter's. It is thirty-six feet in 

 diameter, and incrusted with fine marbles. 



Allowing to the Spaniards their full estimate of the incredible 

 sums bestowed on this palace, and on its furniture, statues, paint- 

 ings, columns, vases, and the like decorations, which are most amaz- 

 ingly rich and beautiful, yet we hazard nothing in saying, that the 

 fabric itself discovers a bad taste upon the whole. The conceit of 

 building it in the form of a gridiron, because St. Lawrence, to whom 

 it was dedicated, was broiled on such an utensil, and multiplying 

 the same figure through its principal ornaments upon the doors, 

 windows, altars, rituals, and saceixlotal habits, could have been formed 

 only in the brain of a tasteless bigot, such as Philip II, who erected 

 it to commemorate the victory he obtained over the French (but by 

 the assistance of the English forces) at St. Quentin, on St. Lawrence's 

 day, in the year 1557. The apartment where the king resides, forms 

 the handle of the gridiron. The building is a long square of 640 

 feet by 580. The height of the roof is 60 feet. It has been enrich- 

 ed and adorned by his successors, but its outside has a gloomy ap- 

 pearance, and the inside is composed of different structures, some of 

 which are master pieces of architecture, but forming a disagreeable 

 whole. It must, however, be confessed, that the pictures and statues 

 that have found admission here, are excellent in their kind, and some 

 of them not to be equalled even in. Italy itself. 



Cadiz is the great emporium of Spanish commerce. It stands on an 

 island separated from the continent of Andalusia, without the Straits 

 of Gibraltar, by a very narrow arm of the sea, over which a fortified 

 bridge is thrown, and joins it to the main land. The entrance into 

 the bay is about 500 fathoms wide, and guarded by two forts, called 

 the Puntals. The entrance has never been of late years attempted by 

 the English in their Avars with Spain, because of the vast interest our 

 merchants have in their treasures there, which they could not reclaim 

 from the captors. The streets are narrow, ill paved and filthy, and 

 full of rats in the night ; the houses lofty, with flat roofs, and few are 



