Anecdotes of Spain. 
uncommonly beautiful lady, who had 
married a Swifs officer in the Spanith fer- 
vice, and was, moit unfortunately, a vic- 
tim to this fyftem of precipitation, being 
buried alive, and left to perith in her cot- 
. fing deferves to be particularly noticed. 
The corpfe was afterwards, at the defire 
of her friends, conveyed to her native 
country, and interred in a town in the 
«anton of Berne. All travellers who pafs 
near the place make a point of viliting 
her tomb; and numbers go canfiderably 
out of their way for this exprefs purpofe; 
I, among others, have contemplated it 
with peculiar admiration and fatisfaétion, 
The monument, which appears to open, 
reprefents Madame Langhans, who died 
in child bed, after being delivered of a 
dead infant, in the aét of raifing the 
broken tomb, difencumbering herfelt trom 
her grave clothes, and whilft fhe fondly 
preffes her reanimated child to her paren- 
tal bofom, foaring from her late prifon 
' to the glorious manfions of eterna] blifs. 
All this, and more than this, is de- 
pictured in this beautiful maufoleum. 
The figures feem to move, to breathe; 
every gefture is faithfully portrayed, 
every motion ftrongly characterized. The 
enraptured. ljook.of aftonifhment with 
which the rifen faint eyes the near prof- 
pect of opening heaven, is marked with 
a ftrength of expreffion, which nothing 
but the infpiration of native genius could 
dictate. It is a genuine emblem of the 
refurreétion, or rather, it is the refurrec- 
tion itielt perfonified. 
This original and {pivited effufion of 
elevated genius, this lively conception, 
this ode im marble, if I may be allowed 
the expreffion, is the production of a 
young Swedifh artift, who, after having 
travelled all Europe, and, in the courfe of 
his peregrimations, animated, as it were, 
with his chizzel, ftone and bronze, in va- 
rious fhapes, was left at laft to perifh in 
a London prifon, where he was confined 
for debt. | 
Theabufes of luxury appear in all their 
native abfurdity, in the funeral pomp and 
parade which characterizes the Spaniards. 
Upwards of a hundred carriages, five or 
fix hundred priefts and monks, with at 
leaft 2000 flambeaus, form the ordinary 
appendage of a. common funeral. 
By virtue of a late edict, which a due 
zegard to the health of the living cer. 
tainly renders neceffary, it is enacted, 
that no burials fhall be permitted within 
the gates of Madrid. In opendefiance, 
however, of this falutary law, the clergy 
continue to bury in the churches, in the 
“MONTHLY Mac. No, XXVI. 
97 
view of doubling and tripling the bequetts 
‘they are in the habit of receiving on thefe 
occafions, or to pay their court to the 
relatives of the deceafed. For this pur- 
pole, grave-diggers are engaged to dif 
inter the corpie during the night, and 
convey it into the church. ‘This evafiom 
of the law is tolerated ina country, where 
the clergy may be faid to have ufurped 
all power and rule into their own hands, 
The ancient cuftom of burning the bo- 
dies of the deceafed is long fince totally 
abrogated. ‘There are many perfons who 
regret this circumftance, and to their 
number I muft honeftly avow mytfelf to 
belong. Death, in itfelf, has little or ne 
terrors. It is the concomitant ideas of 
putrefaction, a coffin, worms, &c. which 
difmay. Thefe are the magic {pells which 
appal the heart ; all thefe would be ef- 
feétually done away, by readopting the 
practice of cremation. Add to this, the 
unfpeakable confolation it muft afford to 
the furvivors, to preferve, not only the 
remembrance, but the relics of their-de- 
parted relatives and friends ; to be in pof- 
feflion of their facred afhes; to have 
their remains continually before their 
CyEsei kt 
Gladly would I give a hundred Louis 
dors, with my rmg and watch, to boot, 
in exchange for a box filled with theafhes 
of my deceafed mother. Her picture, 
however ftriking, however animated the 
refemblance, is but her picture; it 1s not 
herfeif, it is not the fmalleft particle of 
her; it is an aflemblage of colours, 2 
proportion of oil and canvas. 
In Spain, the domeftics wait at table 
in their jackets, and with their hair in 
papers. They are fo filthy, that one has 
not the ftomach to call for drink at their 
hands; fo horribly hideous, that they 
{trike terror into the beholders, and fo 
deformed and ftinted in their growth, that 
one might be tempted to conclude nature 
had only half finifhed her work in their 
formation. 
A long retinue of valets conftitutes 
the higheft luxury and ambition of a 
Spaniard. But no mafters under heaven 
are fo badly ferved by their domeitics, 
who are conftitutionally aukward, and 
flow toa proverb in their motions. They 
are fure to break whatever they lay their 
hands upon; they have not the {mallet 
idea of drefling hair; and will {carcely 
make a bed in a couple of jours. Even 
then, the job is fo wretchedly performed, - 
that it is necefiary to make it over again. 
If you fend them with a letter, er a mef- 
fage, you muft never hope to fee them 
Q again, 
