MY recollections of Tarragona can be summed up in three words—blue sea, sunshine, and peace.

Some fifteen or twenty years ago the quays of its fine harbour were full of life and bustle, ships entered the port and ships went out. The trade with France in light wines was good, and with England and America in those of heavier quality, better still.

Nowadays it is cheaper to send wines by rail. Reus, a railway centre a few miles inland, has captured a great deal of Tarragona's trade, and modern history repeats itself once more. Cheap and quick delivery are the watchwords. Hurry and hustle are leaving the old trading towns behind. Barcelona is not far away. Centralisation is everything, and thus it happened that I found very few places in Spain so reposeful as Tarragona. And I might add so beautifully situated as this old city which climbs and crowns a hill that rises from the very edge of the blue Mediterranean.

Very few cities in Spain can boast of prehistoric walls still extant. Tarragona can do so. The huge uneven blocks of granite, which may be seen in my sketch of the Archbishop's Tower, occupy the lower portion of the old Roman walls. On the north side of the city they are even more visible than in the sketch. Some of the blocks measure thirteen by seven by five feet. Three of the ancient portals, the stone of which is faced inside, still exist, but apparently no records do, to tell us who placed these Cyclopean defences where they stand to-day.

Many remains of Roman days may be seen built into the houses of the old and higher town, tablets, mural inscriptions, bits of columns, &c. The Cathedral possesses numerous plinths and pillars of marble from the quarries at Tortosa, built into its walls, and the Font in the Baptistery is an old Roman basin. What a glorious city it must have been when the Emperor Augustus made it his capital! and the overland trade met the sea-going in the harbour below.

Twenty miles away at GayÁ the Romans tapped a continuous supply of fresh water, and their aqueduct, a good deal of which remains, ranks next to that of Segovia in size, and stands as an example of how the Romans built. Roman villas with incomparable views out to sea, dotted the hillsides; temples to every god and goddess rose in the city, which contained a million inhabitants. It possessed a mint of its own, and, favoured by nature and art, became known as "Colonia victrix togata turrita."

TARRAGONA
TARRAGONA

The Moslem sacked Tarragona, and for four centuries one of the glories of Colonial Rome lay a heap of ruins. In 1089, at the commencement of the building of the Cathedral, the see, much to the disgust of Toledo, was raised to metropolitan dignity. Thenceforth, between the two cities, endless disputes have arisen as to the Primacy of Spain.

Though begun at the above date, most of the Cathedral is of twelfth and early thirteenth-century work. It is not known who designed this magnificent church, the finest example of Transition in Spain. The interior is very simple and very dignified. The roof is borne by grand piers, thirty-five feet in circumference. Their bases are broken by four seats, one in each corner, placed thus to enhance the line of the composition, and break the otherwise too great severity of the foundations.

There is no triforium; but an early pointed clerestory of large bays, and a superb rose window in the west, of date 1131, admit a flood of light. Nothing could well be simpler than the pairs of massive columns which carry the centre arches of the vaulting, nor finer than the delicate single attendant at their sides from which spring the transverse sections. All these are capped with square Romanesque capitals.

The chancel is pure Romanesque and very beautiful. The semicircular end of the Capilla Mayor and the two small apses are the oldest part of this noble building. The retablo of the High Altar is alabaster, and carved with reliefs of the martyrdom of Santa Tecla, Tarragona's patroness. The delicate tapering finials and the figures under canopies below, are carved in wood. Behind the High Altar is a very interesting urn which contains the ashes of Cyprian, a Gothic archbishop.

The fine cimborio which rises above the crossing has eight windows of three and four lights alternately, which contain fragments of very brilliant coloured glass. In the transepts are two magnificent wheel windows full of good glass, indeed I know of no better scheme of colour than that which adorns this window on the south side.

The silleria del coro are the work of Francisco Gomar and date from 1478. The body of James I. of Aragon lies in a tomb at the west end of the trascoro, having been brought here from the ruined Monastery of Poblet—the Escorial of Aragon. A ruin where still lie under their much despoiled and mutilated tombs some of the rulers of that kingdom.

TARRAGONA. THE ARCHBISHOP'S TOWER
TARRAGONA. THE ARCHBISHOP'S TOWER

This grand Cathedral is not dependent on gloom or subdued light for its great impressiveness. On the contrary it is the best lit of any of Spain's Cathedrals, and it is on its excellent proportions and scale alone that its reputation for solemnity will always rest, and its majesty be ever remembered.

The west faÇade, commenced in 1248, is constructed of a light-coloured stone, which time has improved into a very beautiful sienna brown. The upper portion is unfinished. In the centre is a fine and deeply recessed Gothic portal, flanked by two massive buttresses. Under Gothic canopies stand statues of the Apostles and Prophets, the lintel of the doorway is supported by a Virgin and Child, above which is the Saviour, and a row of figures rising out of their tombs on the Judgment Day. Above all is the already-mentioned rose window. So well does the mass of the building rise above the adjacent roofs that this window is visible from the breakwater of the harbour. The two doorways on either side of the faÇade are pure Romanesque. Each is surmounted by a small wheel window. The iron work which covers the doors is of a very intricate design; and the huge iron knockers with grotesque heads, the hinges of the doors, and the copper work as well, gave me many pleasant moments in marvelling at the skill of the smiths of days gone by.

It was in the cloisters however that I found the greatest charm of the whole Cathedral. The court is a veritable garden, where date palms, fig trees and oleanders crowd one another in the neatly arranged beds behind box hedges. I spent many pleasant hours in this delightful spot, my solitude broken by occasional visits from the Sacristan, who, in his faded and patched purple cassock, came in at odd times for a chat. Very proud of his Cathedral was this quiet custodian, and I shall never forget his soft voice and winning smile, nor the great interest he evinced in my sketch. The swifts rushed screaming past, the bees hummed from flower to flower, the scent of the plants was delicious, the warm sun and the splash of the fountain—turned on for my benefit—all went to help the welcome repose and forgetfulness of the outer world that overcame me as long as I was at work in this little Paradise.

The double doorway in the north transept through which one enters the cloisters from the Cathedral, is the finest of all. The capitals of its detached shafts are wonderfully carved. They represent the Awaking of the Three Kings by an Angel, the Nativity and the Journey of the Magi. The arcading of the cloisters consists of six bays on all four sides, these bays are subdivided into three round arches, with a couple of circular openings above and enclosed within the arch. Some of these openings contain very beautifully carved tracery.

TARRAGONA. THE CLOISTERS
TARRAGONA. THE CLOISTERS

The capitals of the columns are a museum of quaint fancy and good carving. In one set, all the incidents of a sea voyage are cut, in another, mice are seen carrying a cat to his grave, who, shamming death, turns and devours some of them before his obsequies are complete. There is a Descent from the Cross, where one of the Faithful wields a pair of pincers much longer than his own arms, so determined is he to pull out the nails that cruelly wound Christ's hands.

Many fragments of Roman sculpture are let into the walls; and a lovely little Moorish arch, with a Cufic inscription and date 960, reminds one of the Infidel's rule over the city.

To reach times nearer our own, there are two inscriptions telling of the occupation by British troops, which run—5th Company and further on 6th Company—obviously pointing to the fact that these lovely cloisters sheltered some of our own troops during the Peninsular War. Like many other Cathedrals, Tarragona's possesses a grand series of tapestries, which are hung round the columns and walls during certain festivals. They are mostly Flemish and not in any way ecclesiastical. One indeed that I saw was anything but this. Cupid was leading a lady, who was in dÉshabille, into her chamber, wherein, by a four-post bed, stood a gentleman with a lighted taper in his hand!

It was pleasant in the evening to stroll down to the harbour and out along the mole, to watch the deep-sea fishing fleet race home with the long sweeps out in every boat as the wind dropped and the sea became an oily calm. I must own it was with great regret I left this now peaceful spot—a city that once boasted of a million inhabitants, and prior to that was a great Phoenician port! Of all the Cathedral Cities of Spain I would rather return to Tarragona than any other, hold converse with my friend the Sacristan, who knows and loves his Cathedral so well, and end the day as the sun goes down watching the boats return from long hours of toil.