It Has Been Ever Since A Most Tempting Summer-House To All The Bourbons.
When The Sun Is Calcining The Plains Of Castile, And The Streets Of
Madrid Are White With The Hot Light Of Midsummer, This Palace In The
Clouds Is As Cool And Shadowy As Spring Twilights.
And besides, as all
public business is transacted in Madrid, and La Granja is a day's
journey away, it
Is too much trouble to send a courier every day for the
royal signature, - or, rather, rubric, for royalty in Spain is above
handwriting, and gives its majestic approval with a flourish of the
pen, - so that everything waits a week or so, and much business goes
finally undone; and this is the highest triumph of Spanish industry and
skill.
We had some formal business with the court of the regent, and were not
sorry to learn that his highness would not return to the capital for
some weeks, and that consequently, following the precedent of a certain
prophet, we must go to the mountain.
We found at the Estacion del Norte the state railway carriage of her
late majesty, - a brilliant creation of yellow satin and profuse gilding,
a bovidoir on wheels, - not too full of a distinguished company. Some of
the leading men of New Spain, one or two ministers, were there, and we
passed a pleasant two hours on the road in that most seductive of all
human occupations, - talking politics.
It is remarkable that whenever a nation is remodelling its internal
structure, the subject most generally discussed is the constitutional
system of the United States.
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