The chill, little city was far from stimulating; at another time it may appear differently, impressions are so dependent on weather and health. The peasants wrapped in their blankets had a beggarly aspect after the dandy _majo_ of Andalusia. I daresay were Seville three thousand feet above the sea, the bolero would be worn less jauntily. The Cathedral visited, there was little to detain us, so we bade a ready farewell to glacial sheets and ice-crusted water pitchers to continue the route to Aragon, west past Medinaceli, where a Roman arch stood boldly on the edge of its hill.
The semi-royal family of Cerda, Dukes of Medinaceli, has possessions all over the country: forests near Avila, the _Casa de Pilatos_ in Seville, lands near Cordova, a castle at Zafra, and vast tracts in Catalonia. It descends from Alfonso _el Sabio_, whose eldest son, called _la Cerda_, from a tuft of hair on his face, was married to a daughter of St. Louis of France, and left two infant sons, who were dispossessed by their uncle, Sancho _el Bravo_. For generations they continued to put forward their claims on every fresh coronation.
After entering Aragon the climate grew warmer. We were descending gradually, and soon fruit trees in blossom, and vineyards, appeared among the broken, irregular hills. Calatayud, birthplace of the Roman poet Martial, was extremely picturesque, with castle and steeples. The long hours of the journey were whiled away watching the Sunday crowds in the stations, many of the men and women in the astonishingly original costume of the province. By the time we had reached Saragossa we had descended to about five hundred feet altitude, and it was pleasantly warm.
The capital of Aragon is commonplace in appearance, flat, modern, and prosperous. The noisy electric cars and the bustling streets made it an abrupt change from the small Castilian cities just left. As always, our first walk was to the Cathedral--Saragossa has two, and the chapter lives for six months in each alternately. The _Seo_ is an ancient and beautiful structure, the _Pilar_ is a tawdry, cold-hearted object, such as the eighteenth century knew how to produce, a mixture of the styles of Herrera and Churriguera. It is a pity that one of the most revered shrines in Spain should be housed in such vulgarity. Outside, seen from the bridge over the Ebro, the many domes of different sizes, covered with glazed tiles of green, yellow, and white, are not bad, but within is a soul-distressing mass of plaster walls, and ceilings of Sassoferrato-blue. The High Altar, however, has a treasure, the celebrated alabaster _retablo_ of Damián Forment, one of the best of national sculptors, who worked between the Gothic and Renaissance periods, and who was helped to ease of expression by Berruguete, lately returned from Italy.