Coruna - Crossing the Bay - Ferrol - The Dockyard - Where are we now? -Greek Ambassador - Lantern-light - The Ravine - Viveiro - Evening -Marsh and Quagmire - Fair Words and Fair Money - The Leathern Girth -Eyes of Lynx - The Knavish Guide.
From Corcuvion I returned to Saint James and Coruna, and now began to make preparation for directing my course to the Asturias.In the first place I parted with my Andalusian horse, which I considered unfit for the long and mountainous journey I was about to undertake; his constitution having become much debilitated from his Gallegan travels.Owing to horses being exceedingly scarce at Coruna, I had no difficulty in disposing of him at a far higher price than he originally cost me.A young and wealthy merchant of Coruna, who was a national guardsman, became enamoured of his glossy skin and long mane and tail.For my own part, I was glad to part with him for more reasons than one; he was both vicious and savage, and was continually getting me into scrapes in the stables of the posadas where we slept or baited.An old Castilian peasant, whose pony he had maltreated, once said to me, "Sir Cavalier, if you have any love or respect for yourself, get rid I beseech you of that beast, who is capable of proving the ruin of a kingdom." So I left him behind at Coruna, where Isubsequently learned that he became glandered and died.Peace to his memory!
From Coruna I crossed the bay to Ferrol, whilst Antonio with our remaining horse followed by land, a rather toilsome and circuitous journey, although the distance by water is scarcely three leagues.I was very sea-sick during the passage, and lay almost senseless at the bottom of the small launch in which I had embarked, and which was crowded with people.The wind was adverse, and the water rough.We could make no sail, but were impelled along by the oars of five or six stout mariners, who sang all the while Gallegan ditties.
Suddenly the sea appeared to have become quite smooth, and my sickness at once deserted me.I rose upon my feet and looked around.We were in one of the strangest places imaginable.Along and narrow passage overhung on either side by a stupendous barrier of black and threatening rocks.The line of the coast was here divided by a natural cleft, yet so straight and regular that it seemed not the work of chance but design.The water was dark and sullen, and of immense depth.This passage, which is about a mile in length, is the entrance to a broad basin, at whose farther extremity stands the town of Ferrol.
Sadness came upon me as soon as I entered this place.
Grass was growing in the streets, and misery and distress stared me in the face on every side.Ferrol is the grand naval arsenal of Spain, and has shared in the ruin of the once splendid Spanish navy: it is no longer thronged with those thousand shipwrights who prepared for sea the tremendous three-deckers and long frigates, the greater part of which were destroyed at Trafalgar.Only a few ill-paid and half-starved workmen still linger about, scarcely sufficient to repair any guarda costa which may put in dismantled by the fire of some English smuggling schooner from Gibraltar.Half the inhabitants of Ferrol beg their bread; and amongst these, as it is said, are not unfrequently found retired naval officers, many of them maimed or otherwise wounded, who are left to pine in indigence; their pensions or salaries having been allowed to run three or four years in arrear, owing to the exigencies of the times.A crowd of importunate beggars followed me to the posada, and even attempted to penetrate to the apartment to which I was conducted."Who are you?" said I to a woman who flung herself at my feet, and who bore in her countenance evident marks of former gentility."A widow, sir," she replied, in very good French; "a widow of a brave officer, once admiral of this port." The misery and degradation of modern Spain are nowhere so strikingly manifested as at Ferrol.
Yet even here there is still much to admire.
Notwithstanding its present state of desolation, it contains some good streets, and abounds with handsome houses.The alameda is planted with nearly a thousand elms, of which almost all are magnificent trees, and the poor Ferrolese, with the genuine spirit of localism so prevalent in Spain, boast that their town contains a better public walk than Madrid, of whose prado, when they compare the two, they speak in terms of unmitigated contempt.At one end of this alameda stands the church, the only one in Ferrol.To this church I repaired the day after my arrival, which was Sunday.I found it quite insufficient to contain the number of worshippers who, chiefly from the country, not only crowded the interior, but, bare-headed, were upon their knees before the door to a considerable distance down the walk.
Parallel with the alameda extends the wall of the naval arsenal and dock.I spent several hours in walking about these places, to visit which it is necessary to procure a written permission from the captain-general of Ferrol.They filled me with astonishment.I have seen the royal dockyards of Russia and England, but for grandeur of design and costliness of execution, they cannot for a moment compare with these wonderful monuments of the bygone naval pomp of Spain.I shall not attempt to describe them, but content myself with observing, that the oblong basin, which is surrounded with a granite mole, is capacious enough to permit a hundred first-rates to lie conveniently in ordinary: but instead of such a force, I saw only a sixty-gun frigate and two brigs lying in this basin, and to this inconsiderable number of vessels is the present war marine of Spain reduced.
