Seis crónicas inéditas - THE SPANISH VOLCANO

IV ) THE SPANISH VOLCANO

The Molten Lava and Scoria Within Its Crater Rumbling Preceeding An Eruption

There is nothing more grateful to the heart than a warm reception in a strange land. The smallest favors seem the greatest kindnesses. A friendly feeling springs toward the man who shows you friendship without knowing you. We find these good souls everywhere. In all great cities there are circles that receive lonely strangers with encouraging smiles and a warm grasp of the hand. There is not a town in the world more gracious in this respect than the good old city of Madrid. Intelligence, elegance, and beauty, no matter from what country they come, invariably find her doors open. If you know how to please, how to appreciate the hand that is offered to you, you are more than welcome. Spanish character, like flowers warmed by the sun, opens softly in the warmth of friendship. In Spain women are good and men are honorable. Their faults spring from a national fermentation, from poverty, from lack of employment, from an excess of imagination, from the necessities of life, and from an excessive love of luxury; but the essence of their character, a rude Gothic vigor combined with Moorish effeminacy, still remains. Good nature is truly Spanish. You find a warm welcome in every household. Without knowing you, they invite you to dine. Should you accept, you may be sure that you will annoy nobody. Every Spaniard feels like a feudal lord.

Paris is the Circe that has tainted the old-fashioned frankness and genial manners of the Spaniards. By imitating the French they have lost their originality, and have not replaced it with the inimitable ease and exquisite refinement of Parisian life. As in the days of Bolieau, nothing to-day is splendid that is not genuine. The foreign invasion is complete. You must have a French name to be a modiste, and an Italian name to be a singer. Shopping is done only in foreign stores, and fashionable watering places are those where Spanish is not spoken. But the women of Spain, born for love, are not made for vice. Ennui, the great tempter, poverty, and the desire for sight-seeing which devours Spanish women may throw them into vice; but when they fall, they fall into the arms of lovers really loved. The world is blotted out. The glorious sun shuts his eyes and covers them with his great blue cloak. Sometimes they awake to reality and weep, but they are so thoroughly enmeshed that they again return to dreamland. Although they give themselves entirely to love, they are chaste and proud toward those whom they do not love. Vice is really repugnant to them. Parisian life, however, is contagious. The women who return from the French capital are giddy. Mlle. Ghinazzi threw herself into a cage of lions to draw attention to her pretty Chinese face. Her example is powerful. There are women in Spain, just as there are in Paris, who go so far as to employ men to perform the functions of a femme de chambre. This, however, is not fashionable. In the streets, however, you see only French signboards. The very shop girls try to speak the language of Racine. Women with a smattering of the new language sometimes buy lace for velvet, and take what is offered rather than allow it to be known that they have made a mistake in the word. Dandies have their garments sent from the Boulevards. At balls they speak a pretty patois. The finest subjects are discussed in the most incorrect language. Vainly have the academinicians written an elaborate volume over the absence of the national dish, olla podrida, from the royal table. The olla is vanishing like the old oil lamps, like the fat and smiling monks, like the monarchy itself.

Madrid is a French town. It is deplorable, but the heavy breath of the great Gallic city is bewildering and perverting the women of the people weak creatures who hold within their bosoms the secret of the happiness of nations. In a land where the wives and daughters of workingmen are not honest, all is lost and lost forever. In Madrid those poor birds of the street, though famishing with hunger, are seated upon their work benches, in love with their poor students, dreaming of rides in closed carriages in winter and in open victorias in summer. When living is high and wages are low they cannot always close their ears to a voice that fuses the recklessness of a Parisian with the fire of a Spaniard. Knowing that they are being deceived, they yield, resolved in their turn to deceive. A low standard of morals is gnawing the virtue of the women of the poorer classes as a false conception of socialism is gnawing that of the men. "If we cannot stand," they say, "we must fall. We must live!" It is a despairing cry in a country where the bountiful land of nature is unappreciated. In this way the honor and grandeur of nations perish.

This pernicious influence and the visible distress created by a servile imitation of manners and customs only superficially known create uneasiness among the upper classes. Nevertheless, the people retain the Andalusian freedom, the familiar ease, and the confidence in the honesty of strangers, that have always been the special charms of Spanish society. Their virtue is not prudish, and their vice is not shameless. A Spanish woman fills her lack of education with the charm of her flashing eyes, with her sparkling repartee, and with her naive use of the fan. Her fan is usually covered with the autographs of illustrious persons, with vague lines written by poets, and with sketches drawn by famous artists. Fans are winged albums. Enter a parlor and a lady offers you both her hand and her fan. Etiquette requires that you should write a friendly line or a flowery couplet on the latter. A poor barefooted match vender in a ragged cloak, with a face half covered with the singular handkerchief worn by chulillos one of those wretched children who follow all trades owned one of the most curious fans in Madrid. Poets and painters who frequented the Café Surgo adorned it with artistic chefs d'oeuvre.

These gamins are interesting creatures. Like Hugo's Gyroche, they are heroes in rags. They sell newspapers, matches, and flowers. They live on bread, grapes, and cherries no meat, for it is too expensive. They know neither heat nor cold, for they have the strength that is born with gayety. On a cold night in December a shivering child stood at the door of the Café Surgo with a bundle of newspapers under his arm, crying "La Correspondencia!" This favorite journal of Madrid, contains all the news of the day, accounts of abortive duels, love dramas, fashionable gossip, compliments at so much a line, and insults at a proportionate rate. Everything personal, however puerile, finds a place in its columns. It is the servile valet of the government. Its proprietor, a Hebrew, has bagged all sorts of honors and decorations, including a seat in the Senate, with which he knows not what to do. This was the newspaper which the poor child was selling. The icy blast almost froze the words on his lips. A gentleman came out of the café. "You must be cold, my child," he said. He wrapped him in his ample cloak, took him home, gave him a good supper, and clothed him in garments taken from the wardrobe of his own little son. On the ensuing evening the icy wind again whistled through the streets. The café was filled, and the same urchin stood in its door clothed in rags. The same benevolent gentleman again came out, and was astonished to find the little fellow almost naked. "Where are your clothes?" he asked.

"Caballero," the child replied. "I sold them to buy a cloak for my mother."

"And you don't feel the cold yourself?"

"Caballero, does your face feel the cold."

"No" the benevolent gentleman answered.

"Well, I am all face," said the boy, and he trotted away in his bare feet, shouting "La Correspondencia!" He had told the truth. His mother was wearing a new cloak. From the ranks of these children come the toreros, the workmen, the idlers, and the brigands.

Unique are Spanish cafés. There orators make their débuts. There they discuss the essence of love, the Darwidian theory, the escapades of a marchioness, and politics. There they read poetry and dissect the best written plays. There painters make the first sketches of their pictures, reveal their designs, and cover marble-topped tables with their work. The names of Schelling, Hegel, Frascuelo the matador, and of Calderon the picador are on a par in these cafés. They speak of Michael Angelo and of the superb and shameless danseuse Rotena in the same breath. They hitch Sagasta to Homer. But despite a sprinkling of oaths so dear to Spaniards, everything that is said is well said. Each table has its orator, and frequently a single table is surrounded by orators.

Place yourself at the windows of one of these cafés in winter about 3 o'clock in the afternoon, when the sun gives a lukewarm heat, and you will be astonished at the luxury displayed in the streets. Everybody, rich or poor, is promenading, and everybody is well dressed. The fresh-faced women and noisy Spanish children present a picture pure and beautiful. Here moves the carriage of the Marchioness of Santa Cruz, a most noble and sympathetic old lady: there rolls the equipage of the Countess de Supernada, a favorite of the palace. Here comes the chaise of the adorable Countess Guagui; there goes the vehicle of Zenobia O'Donnell, the proud daughter of the great Marshal, married to the Marquis de Veja Armijo. Here are the footmen of the Marchioness de Santiago, once a danseuse; there is the coachman of the Duchess de Santona, a woman of the people, married to a duke who was a hatter. On the Retiro all these ladies wave their hands to the Marchioness Portugalette, who, proud of her monumental castle, looks down upon the crowd from her stone balcony. Here you see the carriages of the young sports. Though thoroughly blasé, they are to be pitied, because they have neither the strength to fling a bull by the tail like a Cid, nor money to lose at race courses like Lorillard. The despised people smile when they see the carriage of a certain marchioness, and whisper over her scandalous intrigue with the toreador Frascuelo. When he was wounded in the arena an anxious crowd filled the street, eager to hear the latest news from his bedside. It recalled the anxiety of the Parisians when the great Mirabeau lay on his deathbed. The King sent his Ministers to visit Frascuelo, but the Marchioness was the first to write her name in the toreador's registry. Frascuelo was once a butcher and a gamin. He now appears in the ring mounted upon a magnificent black horse, a present from the Marchioness. The lace fluttering from his blue silk jacket is a souvenir of her love. When a dying bull falls at the feet of this strong and vulgar man, a ring, a handkerchief, a fan, or a scarf from the Marchioness flies through the air and drops at the side of the bleeding animal.

At times a charming Creole is seen among the promenaders. Although nearly fifty years old, she is remarkable for grace and beauty. She is the Marchioness Serrano. Her little daughters always accompany her. At the marriage feast of Alphonso and Christine this Marchioness was sorrounded by witty admirers. Her rival was a Hungarian, famous at the court of Vienna, a proud and perfect Diana, whose national dress displayed more than it concealed. She was Irma Andrassy, a living statue. Her beauty fascinated the elegant guests gathered in the salons of Marshal Martinez Campos, in whom the monarchy pays its respects to the people triumphant. As she had come as a lady of honor to the Queen, she was said to be less rich than beautiful. Women whom she eclipsed pretended to despise her, saying that "she came to look for a husband." Ah, these women of the court!

Two men in Madrid are as well known for the beauty of their wives as for their roles in the history of Spain. They are Gen. Serrano, a drawing-room soldier, and the poet Echegaray. When their lovely wives appear in their boxes at the Theatre Español they magnetize all eyes. The wife of the poet is a Greek statue with Indian hair. How opposite are the husbands! The Marshal is buried in honors. He is the reputed father of the King. He is still a ladies' man, neat in person, courteous, discreet, and an adept in flattery. He has a sweet voice and a winning smile. Impatiently he awaits the day when he shall again become the arbiter of the destinies of Spain. At his estates in Andalusia he dreams of becoming a MacMahon.

Don José Echegaray is a fiery genius, who is shouting in royal palaces for reform. "We need fresh air," he cries, "and we must have it." The voice is terrible and prophetic. Echegaray is a bold orator. He is not looking for ministerial power. He is too self-respecting and independent to accept power where it is the price of abasing concessions. In the days of Amadeus he shook the throne from the tribune. In wise silence he awaits the fall of Alphonso. Philosophers who do not believe in poets are astonished at the depth of his mind, and the restless poets who do not believe in philosophers are overmastered and charmed by his splendid intellect. Echegaray wishes to reform the drama and to infuse young blood into the sluggish blood of the Spaniards. He detests the tiresome dramas and miserable limitations of French plays that are lowering the standard of the Spanish stage. A man of the present age, in which nothing is certain and nothing established, he knows not where to find the fountain of new and vigorous inspirations. His eyes are turned to the great days of the past. In striving to remain the man of a period that he despises, but which he has honestly tried to improve, he has longed to treat the sorrows and trials of the present day with the tongue of a Calderon and the incisiveness of a Shakespeare. He is troubled because a Frenchman has immortalized the finest trait in Castilian honor. After Victor Hugo wrote "Hernani," Echegaray produced "El Punto de la Espada," a drama in which a son kills himself with a poniard to hide the dishonor of his mother. When it was said that the language of the days of Lope de Vega was dead, he wrote "La Esposa del Vengador," in which the ancient dagger of Spain sparkles like a diamond. In the face of his own conscience he displays brutally but superbly the truths and charms of the most terrible problems. Nobody has so deftly analyzed the shameful transactions of men who do what they like under cover of mutual recriminations, and nobody has so boldly told them what they ought to do.

Marshal Serrano is an epicure. Echegaray is an orator, a poet, a practical engineer, and a swordsman. He is a rare reformer: one who works for the renewal of past glories with the calm authority of reason, and not with the childish zeal of a fanatic. Serrano dreams of succeeding the King. All recognize the importance of his illustrious name, of his real insignificance, and of his white moustache. He would make a fitting president for a republic of nobles and rich citizens. Echegaray, whose eyes flash like fire behind his spectacles, aims to become the King of the Spanish drama, preparatory to the overthrow of the bourgeoise King of Spain.

Another famous man in Madrid hides blazing eyes behind his spectacles. Some men embody themselves with professed ideas without regard to consequences. They are martyrs. Others only go half way. Though the exercise of either prejudice or weakness they make themselves conciliators in matters irreconcilable. They are the ministers of transitory and revolutionary times. Cristino Martos is one of these men. He is a son of talent, self-made, and strong. A powerful orator, the Mephistopheles of King Amadeus, the great opportunist, the man who with a word uttered in the Cortes destroyed the fame of his chief and master, Don Nicolas Rivero. Martos is almost an ignorant man. His knowledge is, in a great measure, based on intuition. He despises the study of enigmas that at a given moment he can divine. As lazy as a Neapolitan, his round eyes follow the universal movement toward progress. With powerful intellect he works out future problems. In clear and vigorous language he lays bare the result of his investigations. Good politicians must possess one great talent the talent of inertia, which is sometimes action. Martos possesses it. He believes in the future in the inevitable. He is instinctively prepared for what is to happen. He would not sacrifice a single hour of his morning's sleep to be a single day in advance of what must inevitably arrive. He cherishes and never betrays his ideas. He knows how to divide his enemies and how to ensnare his cleverest adversaries; but in the self-consciousness of power he sometimes allows his pride to open an abyss among his friends after he has created one among his enemies. He has the aim, without the activity, of Gambetta, and is without his great popular qualities. He is docile, suave, eloquent, terrible, but he is not strong. He has the talent of a destructive politician, although his good taste and artistic sense have always steered him clear of the ways of the demagogue. But he has neither the tenacity, the greatness, nor the power of resistance necessary in these times to organize a people. The problem is everywhere the same. The old world has fallen, and we are all born upon its ruins. Who will be the first to unite and keep united the elements that form nations anew?

Martos has the talents and the eloquence of Don Sebastian Olosaga, the orator who first shook the throne of Queen Isabella with the memorable phrase, "May God save the Queen!" Martos has achieved splendid triumphs as a lawyer: His intelligence, his true genius at improvisation, and his wonderful capacity cloak his lack of knowledge. In pleading for political offenders he has shown marvellous tact, using language so forcible that its faults were imperceptible. He will be the most prominent in the coming Spanish revolution mirrored in the transitory monarchy of Alphonso. To-day he is associated with democrats of various hues to combat the common enemy: To-morrow, when the throne will be cast down, when different theorists will dispute for power, when the great question now raised in France will be raised in Spain, Martos will head the opportunists, the nearest neighbors to radicalism. And, heavens, how many parties there will be! Each will have its illustrious leader. Social forces spring from divers interests and prejudices, and, allied to personal interests, determine beforehand the results of party struggles.

Here is Sagasta at the head of a moderate and intelligent party, bending readily to the wind of power. In this position he does not frighten those who cling to a spine-broken monarchy in the hope of preserving their threatened riches. All classes have their statesmen. For the military officers, once cadets, but now inflated by successes and the unhealthy fear that they inspire, and unwilling to relinquish their authority even under an essentially civil and republican form of government, there is the Marshal Serrano; for the simple and glorious party which purified Europe as long ago as 1812 with the air of liberty, for the instinctive liberals who love liberty better than they understand it, and for the infants, despite their years, who were cut short in their first heroic and childish movement, and who are followed today by the farmers and small grocers still lingering on the threshold of the nineteenth century, there is Ruiz Zorilla; for the Spartan, philosophical, and monumental republic there is the man of steel, Salmeron; for the impossible republic terrible, destructive, renovating, socialistic there is the man of marble, Pi y Margall; and for the literary republic elegant, coquettish, reassuring, brilliant, conservative there is the man of wax, Castelar. In his day he will balance many opposing elements, and establish only that which has already been established; but with his literary gentleness and almost feminine grace he will soften anger and either lessen or avoid many catastrophes. He is the Serrano of the mind. Confident of future power, he bides his time, hiding his impatience under the pretense of conservatism. His formidable opponent, Martos, less imaginative but more able, less eloquent but endowed with more tact, will find a bond of utility in the coming struggle. Castelar will share the triumph with Sagasta, but Martos will prove the most useful to liberty.

The sons of the poor are inevitably coming into power. All these orators and party leaders, like the directors, inspirers and orators of the reigning monarchy, are men of the people. Among them all only two can be both ministers and martyrs Salmeron and Pi y Margall. The glances of some women pierce the heart; the eyes of Salmeron stir the soul. The mind has its Napoleons; Salmeron is one of them. His eye, like the hand of a physician, anatomizes, separates, and examines all that it reaches. He sweeps the mind in a glance and sounds its depth. To be imposing he has only to speak. The first Canovas felt the presence of Castelar in the Cortes; he would have been crushed by the sculptured eloquence of Salmeron. It is the thunder of Mount Sinai. You should have heard him in his chair in the university a chair which he did not desert even in the days when he was the chief of the nation. Famous and honored as he is, he had never more than a dozen auditors in his class. He entered the chapel erect and severe, his eyes illuminated with electric fire. The words of this professor of philosophy at first drop slowly, painfully, and heavily, like the waters of a rock-ridden rivulet; but the flow increases under the force of thought until it sweeps along like the flow of a mighty river, ample, limpid, and vigorous. Although wedded to the oratorical style of the university, his thoughts are so replete, and his conception of humanity is so vast and comprehensive, that his style, so tiresome and affected in others, seems natural and sincere with this great thinker. He cannot bend, for he is a man of iron. He loves a republicanism as pure and as austere as himself, because he wishes it pure. He abandoned power amid the hisses of the envious and the applause of the strong, refusing to confirm the death sentences of three citizens. Castelar lives quietly in elegant quarters in Madrid; Salmeron lives poorly in exile in Paris. He is a man worthy of glory. Beyond a doubt he is the most energetic of Spaniards. A German in philosophy, a Saxon in method, sobriety, and maturity, he is a Latin in enthusiasm and in eloquence.

Pi y Margall is another apostle of Spain. He is a fine old man, with a long beard and a massive face. He uses simple but profound language. All the storms of the age are hidden beneath its apparent calmness. You can't convince him. He is the great convinced. Thoroughly versed, he writes history admirably. He is a connoisseur in sentiment and a wise philosopher. His modesty alone is a subject of pride. Social reform is his only passion. He imperiously and urgently insists that the unhappy must be made happy; but he does not conceal his belief that it can only be done by laying violent and destructive hands upon all existing systems. He holds that the people when they kill in politics must kill outright. His republic is a virgin with a book in one hand and a pike in the other. She inspires more respect for the theorist than sympathy for the theory.

Castelar has only to foresee and wait. Sure to revel in the débris, he allows the storm to pass. The country, already republican, will return to the republic; but the first Presidency must be given to the good Marshal, who has almost been King, who is the friend and son of nobles, and who has an infusion of royal blood in his veins. A conservative and military administration would calm the fears of the rich nobles, check popular impatience, and habituate the soldiers to republican customs. When the republic is established on this basis, when the monsters are tamed and the tamers are hated, Castelar will advance proud, splendid, and calm, and take possession of the Government, sustained by conservatives, who believe in him, and saluted by republican Europe, who loves him. It may, however, prove only a glorious dream, for the strength of the monsters must not be underestimated.

It is curious to observe Sagasta. His sentences are whips. When he addresses the Chamber he creates general uneasiness. Few escape his lash. His tongue tears the flesh like a Russian knout. Sprung from the people, he apparently serves the kings; really he serves only the people. He aided in bringing the King Alphonso; he will aid in sending him away. He laughs at everything. He even laughs at himself. Although his sarcasm stifles his accuracy, he is a good speaker. After he has driven many people to insanity he will die with the cruel words of Augustus upon his lips, "Have I not well played my comedy?" He is performing it well, but he has shown his hand. The kings no longer give him their confidence. Nevertheless he sails through the tempests with a double reef, and he may eventually arrive at power. If so, he will prove of some advantage to the country. He is a marvel of shrewdness, and a worthy opponent of the proud Canovas del Castillo. Sagasta dreams of becoming a Thiers; Canovas dreams of being a Bismarck; Pi y Margall of being a Proudhon, and everybody dreams of being a Gambetta.

There are no more fraternal adversaries than Spaniards. Their discussions are violent, but friendly. They make the most terrible accusations without interrupting their social relations. Bad passions never warp good characters. Nearly all the disputants have a common mother, poverty, and are bound by a common tie, intelligence. Like a true Spaniard, each is proud of the talent of his adversary. The hideous head of hatred is rarely seen in their discussions.

But can a people who love bloodshed, who bring their wives and daughters to see cruel sport in the red arena, and who fill the air with enthusiastic shouts over the dying agonies of a gory bull become a peaceful and industrious people? Can blood be seen so often without being photographed on the eyes? Does not the association with bulls tend to make bulls of the men? Ah, light-hearted ladies, idle young nobles, poor dishonored shopgirls, savage toreros, imitative authors, brilliant orators, dark-eyed and burning-lipped gitanos, women who die of ennui, and clever but lazy men, would to heaven that your bull-fighting arenas were forever closed! would that your drunken and vulgar singers were silent! would that your desires for luxury were tempered by a love of labor! would that your works of science were as valuable as your charming poetry! would that you used your intelligence in a manner worthy of the gifts you have received from nature! would that the time may soon come when none of your proud and independent men on returning home to seek repose from the trials of life may hear his wife exclaim as did a sweet lady not long ago who saw a bull actually break in two pieces the bleeding carcass of a horse: "Jesu, what a divine bull!"

A Spanish Republican

The Sun, September 19, 1880