Valladolid Is Seated In The Midst Of An Immense Valley, Or Rather
Hollow Which Seems To Have Been Scooped By Some Mighty Convulsion
Out Of The Plain Ground Of Castile.
The eminences which appear in
the neighbourhood are not properly high grounds, but are rather the
sides of this hollow.
They are jagged and precipitous, and exhibit
a strange and uncouth appearance. Volcanic force seems at some
distant period to have been busy in these districts. Valladolid
abounds with convents, at present deserted, which afford some of
the finest specimens of architecture in Spain. The principal
church, though rather ancient, is unfinished: it was intended to
be a building of vast size, but the means of the founders were
insufficient to carry out their plan: it is built of rough
granite. Valladolid is a manufacturing town, but the commerce is
chiefly in the hands of the Catalans, of whom there is a colony of
nearly three hundred established here. It possesses a beautiful
alameda, or public walk, through which flows the river Escurva.
The population is said to amount to sixty thousand souls.
We put up at the Posada de las Diligencias, a very magnificent
edifice: this posada, however, we were glad to quit on the second
day after our arrival, the accommodation being of the most wretched
description, and the incivility of the people great; the master of
the house, an immense tall fellow, with huge moustaches and an
assumed military air, being far too high a cavalier to attend to
the wants of his guests, with whom, it is true, he did not appear
to be overburdened, as I saw no one but Antonio and myself. He was
a leading man amongst the national guards of Valladolid, and
delighted in parading about the city on a clumsy steed, which he
kept in a subterranean stable.
Our next quarters were at the Trojan Horse, an ancient posada, kept
by a native of the Basque provinces, who at least was not above his
business. We found everything in confusion at Valladolid, a visit
from the factious being speedily expected. All the gates were
blockaded, and various forts had been built to cover the approaches
to the city. Shortly after our departure the Carlists actually did
arrive, under the command of the Biscayan chief, Zariategui. They
experienced no opposition; the staunchest nationals retiring to the
principal fort, which they, however, speedily surrendered, not a
gun being fired throughout the affair. As for my friend the hero
of the inn, on the first rumour of the approach of the enemy, he
mounted his horse and rode off, and was never subsequently heard
of. On our return to Valladolid, we found the inn in other and
better hands, those of a Frenchman from Bayonne, from whom we
received as much civility as we had experienced rudeness from his
predecessor.
In a few days I formed the acquaintance of the bookseller of the
place, a kind-hearted simple man, who willingly undertook the
charge of vending the Testaments which I brought.
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