It Is Very Ancient, And In Some Part In So
Ruinous A Condition As To Be Dangerous.
Leaving San Vincente behind us, we travelled for some leagues on
the sea-shore, crossing occasionally a narrow inlet or firth.
The
country at last began to improve, and in the neighbourhood of
Santillana was both beautiful and fertile. About a league before
we reached the country of Gil Blas, we passed through an extensive
wood, in which were rocks and precipices; it was exactly such a
place as that in which the cave of Rolando was situated, as
described in the novel. This wood has an evil name, and our guide
informed us that robberies were occasionally committed in it. No
adventure, however, befell us, and we reached Santillana at about
six in the evening.
We did not enter the town, but halted at a large venta or posada at
the entrance, before which stood an immense ash tree. We had
scarcely housed ourselves when a tremendous storm of rain and wind
commenced, accompanied with thunder and lightning, which continued
without much interruption for several hours, and the effects of
which were visible in our journey of the following day, the streams
over which we passed being much swollen, and several trees lying
uptorn by the wayside. Santillana contains four thousand
inhabitants, and is six short leagues' distance from Santander,
where we arrived early the next day.
Nothing could exhibit a stronger contrast to the desolate tracts
and the half ruined towns through which we had lately passed, than
the bustle and activity of Santander, which, though it stands on
the confines of the Basque provinces, the stronghold of the
Pretender, is almost the only city in Spain which has not suffered
by the Carlist wars.
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