House and Garden 
is directed to make a garden in a bad soil 
overrun with sour grasses: The lord of the 
land roots out the weeds, sows seeds, and 
plants herbs and fruit trees. The gardener 
must then care for them and water them, 
that they may thrive and blossom, and that 
the lord may find pleasure in his garden and 
come to visit it. There are four ways in 
which the watering may be done. There is 
water which is drawn wearily by hand from 
the well. There is water drawn by the ox- 
wheel, more abundantly and with lighter 
labor. There is water brought in from the 
river, which will saturate the whole ground; 
and, last and best, there is rain from heaven. 
Four sorts of prayer correspond to these. 
I'he first is weary effort with small returns; 
the well may run dry ; the gardener then 
must weep. The second is internal prayer 
and meditation upon God ; the trees will 
then show leaves and flower-buds. The 
third is love of God. The virtues then be¬ 
come vigorous. We converse with God face 
to face. The flowers open and give out fra¬ 
grance. The fourth kind cannot be described 
in words. Then 
there is no more 
toil, and the seasons 
no longer change ; 
flowers are always 
blowing, and fruit 
ripens perennially!’ 
H owever a Car¬ 
melite abbess might 
avail herself of the 
symbol, the fact re¬ 
mains that irriga¬ 
tion was one of the 
Moslem gifts to 
Spain. The van¬ 
ished race has writ¬ 
ten its name in 
water ail over An¬ 
dalusia, and in the 
Alcazar gardens 
the name, as befits 
a royal autograph, 
is written large. 
Fountains,in basins 
of simple, pure de¬ 
sign, lakelets and 
runnels make a ver¬ 
itable oasis to which A VISTA IN THE PARTERRE 
legions of birds gather fronrfar and near, flood¬ 
ing the air with song. Travelers who say that 
there are no birds in the Iberian peninsula 
have not learned to seek them in the gardens. 
Fernan Caballero, the pioneer novelist of 
Spain, who was honored for the last twenty 
years of her life with a residence in the Alca¬ 
zar, noted how the many varieties of song¬ 
birds would turn the solemn cypresses into 
“green towers of Babel.’’ 
At the very entrance of the gardens, in the 
angle formed by- the palace facade and by 
Pedro’s Gallery, is a large cistern—shown 
partially on the opposite page — which 
collects the water necessary for irrigation. 
This pool, in which a fountain plays and water- 
lilies float, should still reflect the melancholy 
image of Philip V., who would fish here for 
hours together, imagining that he thus was 
realizing the peaceful existence of a monk. 
The marble Baths of Maria de Padilla, 
originally the Sultana’s Bath, are beneath 
the palace, but the Bath ot Joanna the Mad, 
the unhappy daughter ot “ the Catholic 
Kings,” is pointed out in the southern part 
ot the garden— 
an oblong tank 
wrought in colored 
tiles and screened 
only by the loyal 
orange-trees. 
I n the midst of 
the orange-grove 
and near the Bath 
o t his mother 
stands the Pavilion 
of Charles V., who 
seems to have had 
a genuine love for 
the gardens. It 
was in the Alcazar 
that he had wedded 
the bride of his 
youth, Isabella of 
Portugal, and at 
intervals through¬ 
out his stormy 
career he came 
back to Seville, 
widowed and 
world-weary, to be 
comforted, one 
of maria de padilla likes to think, by 
5 
