chalices and crosses of massive gold; there is one choir made all of
burnished brass; pictures and statues like giants; and a world of
glorious things that purely ravished me. By this mighty monument it may
be inferred that Philip the Second, though he was a little man, yet he
had vast gigantic thoughts in him, to leave such a huge pile for
posterity to gaze upon and admire in his memory."




III


Perhaps this description is not very exact, but precision of statement
is not to be expected of a Welshman; and if Howell preferred to say
Philip built the place in fulfilment of that vow at the battle of St.
Quentin, doubtless he believed it; many others did; it has only of late
been discovered that Philip was not at St. Quentin, and did not "batter
a monastery of St. Lawrence friars" there. I like to think the rest is
all as Howell says down to the man and mule for every monk. If there are
no men and mules left, there are very few monks either, after the many
suppressions of convents. The gardens are there of an unquestionable
symmetry and beauty, and the "company of craggy hills" abides all round
the prodigious edifice, which is at once so prodigious, and grows larger
upon you in the retrospect.

Now that I am this good distance away, and cannot bring myself to book
by a second experience, I feel it safe to say that I had a feeling of
St. Peter's-like immensity in the church of the Escorial, with more than
St. Peter's-like bareness. The gray colorlessness of the architecture