Besides this we
saw, much against our will, a great many ecclesiastical vestments of
silk and damask richly wrought in gold and silver. But if we were
reluctant there was a little fat priest there who must have seen them
hundreds of times and had still a childish delight in seeing them again
because he had seen them so often; he dimpled and smiled, and for his
sake we pretended a joy in them which it would have been cruel to deny
him. I suppose we were then led to the sacrifice at the several side
altars, but I have no specific recollection of them; I know there was a
pale, sick-looking young girl in white who went about with her father,
and moved compassion by her gentle sorrowfulness.
Of the University, which we visited next, I recall only the baroque
facade; tha interior was in reparation and I do not know whether it
would have indemnified us for not visiting the University of Salamanca.
That was in our list, but the perversity of the time-table forbade. You
could go to Salamanca, yes, but you could not come back except at two
o'clock in the morning; you could indeed continue on to Lisbon, but
perhaps you did not wish to see Lisbon. A like perversity of the
time-table, once universal in Spain, but now much reformed, also kept us
away from Segovia, which was on our list.
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