Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-04-21
GRAVES OF GRANADA
PILED ON MOUNTAIN TOP LIKE
AN ANCIENT ALTAR.
The Incongruous and Pitiful Litter
Upon the Notwithstanding
Upon the ''Niche' Tombs.
From the New York Evening Post.

| From the New York Evening Post
| 1t was only after loafing a few days In
| the Alhambra that l found. on the crest
| of the hill that holds the Alhambra on its
| slope. the square crown of walls which
| inclosed the graves of Granada. The yell
| low road by which l had climbed among
the English elms of the Alhambra Park
! sagged level at last to a gateway built of
brick and iron, and the walls uncovered
| gradually the roofs of chapeIs and the
spires of expresses. Beyond the walls and
| the chapels and the Expresses a splendid
white wave Of the Sierra Nevada surged
| into the sky. and beneath the cold air
and the cold CLEAN of the mountain snow
the stony fields along the roadside seemed
| yellow and sterile with winter Yet with
| In the walls when | entered a summer of
| roses bloomed on the trees or died on the
graves, and the nightingales sang in the
| daylight.
There was something remote unreal
| and spectacular in that Spanish grave
yard. built like an acropolis. piled on a
| mountain head like some ancient altar
| where a strange people had brought their
oead ana laid them as sacrifices to the
| sun and the wind and the vultures And,
! indeed. when few days later | saw a
spanish funeral procession piodding up
| the hill with the burden of a corpse L
| lett that L was witnessing the climb and
! the labor of some humber 'grammarian's
! funeral"
The Funeral.
| Cemeteries and funerals in a foreign land
| excite a traveller with an interest he seldom
feels at home. for they appeal TO the deep
curiosity with which every living creature
| regards the dead. without at the same time
| troubling him too deeply with sympathy.
| 1t was some such interest, perhaps that
| made me return so often to the Cementerio
| of Granada. When L entered that gate
| which might have borne above it the in
| a darker Mortal ms ST va
| nella ctta dolente." l passed down an alley
| of expresses, the vista of which was inter-
| rupted by the marble of a mortuary chapel
| and yelled finally in the distance by the blue
| of the cloudless sky and the white of the
| cloudy mountains. The door of the chapel
| swung open with kind of hospitality. I'm
| mediateiy opposite, with her back to
| great window that admitted the cleaning
| surge of the distant Sierra, stood terra
| Gotta madonna, draped in cloth and with
! painted face, mounted erect on an altar.
| Hers the only human form in the
| empty room. Beneath the altar two black
| tressles waited and the floor was strewn
| with whitening roses. The roses had fallen
| and the tressles had been showed aside in
| the struggle of lifting and carrying away
| a coffin to its grave. No priest nor sexton
| had returned to purify the chapel and hide
| the traces of that final passage.
Trinkets on the Grave.
The graves among which l walked when
| I had turned away were decorated with
the toys. the trinkets and the religious en-
| blems of the dead who were buried be-
| neath-with dolls stuck over with rags and
| hair. with Autographs of saints and cruel
| fixes fnlaid with pebbles. There some
| thing barbaric and pathetic in the custom
| of covering the graves with objects shaped
| for human use. 1t seemed a survival of
| some ancestral belief that. beneath the
mounds Of earth. the deal We're still I'M
| easily living, and that they might still take
| comfort in the night or at an hour when no
| their old human s.
| sions. Probably. too, the custom has
| vived through some more modern desire to
! make the graves look cheerful and domes-
| tic, like comfortable little homes Yet the
| desire must here have been disappointed.
| The dolls and the crosses and the saints
| confessed more than they concealed.
| Touched only by the wind and rain and the
| burning sunlight, the rags rotted, the clay
| crumbled and the painted colors grew
gray. They were like the flowers laid be-
| side them Whitening flowers and weather.
| withered playthings bore witness alike to
the decay which they Were intended to con-
ceal.
Finding the .'Niche" Tombs.
! From the gate of the Cementerio the
| decorated graves among which 1 had wan
dered were hidden by a series of doorless
and windowless structures. which inclosed
| the graves in a quadrangle, and which at
| first seemed only TO serve a kind OF
j screen. Built of yellow brick in long, low
( rectangles, and blind with the lack of doors
| and windows they presented the blank
| surface of a garden wall. But they were
! too thick to be walls, and their surfaces
| were covered curiously with large squares.
| each depressed below the surface by about
| three inches, and extending from top to
| bottom in parallel rows. l had almost made
| the tour of all these curious structures be-
| fore L discovered that some OF the squares
| extended backward to the depth of six feet.
| 1t was then that recognized the niche
! graves of Granada. Each of the squares
covered a pigeon hole, filled now with a
coffin and sealed. A rich man might buy
| his pigeon hole for eternity; a poor man
| rented his for the space of four years. Then
| he must move and make room for another
| tenant. These are the rules of the only
apartment houses in Granada.
No Women Mourners.
On my return from my second visit to the
| Cementerio l saw in the distance what
seemed to be struggling mob. 1t was a
Spanish funeral, and 1 made out first. as the
procession slowly climbed by me- the bulk
| of the coffin swaying over the heads of the
men. The mournerS were walking gathered
not in an order of procession, but in a
shapeless crowd. Two priests, distinguished
| by the flowing black of their stoIes and the
burning tapers which they carried now in
the right hand, now in the left marched
before. The light of their candles paled Ii.
the daylight.
Immediately behind the priests was the
coffin. swinging slowly the shoulders of
four men AS they passed me / saw they
carried the corpse Of woman with q veil
draped about her. long and white, like the
veil of a bride. Behind the uncovered cof-
fin two men trudged. carrying the coffin lid
Among all the mourners, who scattered like
herd, irregularly over the whole width of
the road, there was not a single woman
With the exception OF the priests and the
pallbearers. the men were smoking cigar
cites. 1t was funeral of the poor, and the
mourners were clothed in all their daily
shabbiness None of the faces showed a
trace of emotion. Trudging the long hill
and laboring under the coffin had driven out
sorrow with physical WEAKNESS.