The Population Of Burgos
Is Above Thirty-Seven Thousand And Of The Inhabitants At Least
Thirty-Six Thousand Are Small
Boys, as I was convinced by the
computation of the husband and brother of the Chilian ladies which
agreed perfectly
With my own hasty conjecture; the rest are small girls.
In fact large families, and large families chiefly of boys, are the rule
in Spain everywhere; and they everywhere know how to play bull-fighting,
to flap any-colored old shawl, or breadth of cloth in the face of the
bull, to avoid his furious charges, and doubtless to deal him his
death-wound, though to this climax I could not bear to follow.
One or two of the bull-fighters offered to leave the national sport and
show us the House of Miranda, but it was the cathedral which was
dominating our desire, as it everywhere dominates the vision, in Burgos
and out of Burgos as far as the city can be seen. The iron-gray bulk,
all flattered or fretted by Gothic art, rears itself from the clustering
brown walls and roofs of the city, which it seems to gather into its
mass below while it towers so far above them. We needed no pointing of
the way to it; rather we should have needed instruction for shunning it;
but we chose the way which led through the gate of Santa Maria where in
an arch once part of the city wall, the great Cid, hero above every
other hero of Burgos, sits with half a dozen more or less fabled or
storied worthies of the renowned city.
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