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His words are hardly more now than the rustle of wings. He has said some unintelligible things about a Spanish painter, and some motionless portraits in the palaces the Escurial, Spain, Europe. Suddenly he is repelling with violence some beings who are in his past:
Suffice it to say that a curious connoisseur of all these different beauties might occupy himself there for three months without cessation, and then would not have examined all. There is not a door, a lock, or utensil of any kind, or a piece of plate, that is not marked with a gridiron. The distance from Madrid to the Escurial is much about the same as that from Paris to Fontainebleau.
Federigo Zuccaro was invited to Madrid by Philip II. to execute some frescos in the lower cloister of the Escurial, which, failing to give satisfaction to his royal patron, were subsequently effaced, and their place supplied by Pellegrino Tibaldi; the king nevertheless munificently rewarded him.
Yet, once strolling along through the crypt of the Church of the Escurial near Madrid, I could not repress the idea of a personal and physical resemblance between the effigies in marble and bronze looking down upon me whichever way I turned, to some of our contemporary public men and seeming to say: "My love to the President when you see him next," and "Don't forget to remember me kindly, please, to the chairmen of both your national committees!"
The armies might proceed to Vienna, pillage the Escurial, or subjugate all Europe, and I am convinced no emotion of pleasure would be excited equal to that manifested at the downfall of the Jacobins of Paris.
A romantic marriage with his cousin Mercedes, daughter of the Duke de Montpensier, to whom he was deeply attached, speedily took place. Only five months later Mercedes died and was laid in the gloomy Escurial. A marriage was then arranged with Christina, an Austrian Archduchess, who was brought to Madrid, and there was another marriage celebrated with much splendor.
I passed three days in the Escurial, lodged in a large and fine apartment, and all that were with me well lodged also. Our monk, who had always been in an ill-humour since the day of the Rotting-Room, did not recover himself until the parting breakfast came.
The precaution was well-timed; for shortly afterwards, Charles, losing the use of his faculties, descended into the vaults of the Escurial, where he had commanded the tombs of his father, mother, and first wife to be opened in order that he might consult their tenants upon the sacred obligations of the will he had just signed.
It has often been maintained that she would have gained more by permanently annexing to herself Guipuscoa, Naples and Sicily than by sending the Duke of Anjou or the Duke of Berry to reign at the Escurial. On this point, however, if on any point, respect is due to the opinion of William.
No house, though it were the Tuileries, or the Escurial, is good for anything without a master. And yet we are not often gratified by this hospitality. Everybody we know surrounds himself with a fine house, fine books, conservatory, gardens, equipage, and all manner of toys, as screens to interpose between himself and his guests.
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