Chapter XXXV.

Granada And The Alhambra.

Mateo Ximenez, the Younger--The Cathedral of Granada--A Monkish
Miracle--Catholic Shrines--Military Cherubs--The Royal Chapel--The Tombs
of Ferdinand and Isabella--Chapel of San Juan de Dios--The
Albaycin--View of the Vega--The Generalife--The Alhambra--Torra de la
Vela--The Walls and Towers--A Visit to Old Mateo--The Court of the
Fish-pond--The Halls of the Alhambra--Character of the
Architecture--Hall of the Abencerrages--Hall of the Two Sisters--The
Moorish Dynasty in Spain.

"Who has not in Granada been,
Verily, he has nothing seen."

_Andalusian Proverb_.

Granada, _Wednesday, Nov._ 17, 1852.

Immediately on reaching here, I was set upon by an old gentleman who
wanted to act as guide, but the mozo of the hotel put into my hand a card
inscribed "Don Mateo Ximenez, Guide to the celebrated Washington Irving,"
and I dismissed the other applicant. The next morning, as the mozo brought
me my chocolate, he said; "Senor, _el chico_ is waiting for you." The
"little one" turned out to be the son of old Mateo, "honest Mateo," who
still lives up in the Alhambra, but is now rather too old to continue his
business, except on great occasions. I accepted the young Mateo, who spoke
with the greatest enthusiasm of Mr. Irving, avowing that the whole family
was devoted to him, in life and death. It was still raining furiously,
and the golden Darro, which roars in front of the hotel, was a swollen
brown flood. I don't wonder that he sometimes threatens, as the old
couplet says, to burst up the Zacatin, and bear it down to his bride, the
Xenil.

Towards noon, the clouds broke away a little, and we sallied out. Passing
through the gate and square of Vivarrambla (may not this name come from
the Arabic _bob er-raml,_ the "gate of the sand?"), we soon reached the
Cathedral. This massive structure, which makes a good feature in the
distant view of Granada, is not at all imposing, near at hand. The
interior is a mixture of Gothic and Roman, glaring with whitewash, and
broken, like that of Seville, by a wooden choir and two grand organs,
blocking up the nave. Some of the side chapels, nevertheless, are splendid
masses of carving and gilding. In one of them, there are two full-length
portraits of Ferdinand and Isabella, supposed to be by Alonzo Cano. The
Cathedral contains some other good pictures by the same master, but all
its former treasures were carried