But This Is The Only Purely Civic Ceremony I Ever Saw In Spain.
The Church Is Lord Of The Holidays For The Rest Of The Year.
In the middle of May comes the feast of the ploughboy patron of
Madrid, - San Isidro.
He was a true Madrileno in tastes, and spent his
time lying in the summer shade or basking in the winter sunshine, seeing
visions, while angels came down from heaven and did his farm chores for
him. The angels are less amiable nowadays, but every true child of
Madrid reveres the example and envies the success of the San Isidro
method of doing business. In the process of years this lazy lout has
become a great saint, and his bones have done more extensive and
remarkable miracle-work than any equal amount of phosphate in existence.
In desperate cases of sufficient rank the doctors throw up the sponge
and send for Isidro's urn, and the drugging having ceased, the noble
patient frequently recovers, and much honor and profit comes thereby to
the shrine of the saint. There is something of the toady in Isidro's
composition. You never hear of his curing any one of less than princely
rank. I read in an old chronicle of Madrid, that once when Queen Isabel
the Catholic was hunting in the hills that overlook the Manzanares, near
what is now the oldest and quaintest quarter of the capital, she killed
a bear of great size and ferocity; and doubtless thinking it might not
be considered lady-like to have done it unassisted, she gave San Isidro
the credit of the lucky blow and built him a nice new chapel for it near
the Church of San Andres.
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