Happily there are other memories carried away as well as this chief one of noisy confusion. Never to be forgotten was the Cathedral echoing at midnight to the sound of Eslava's "Miserere" sung by hundreds of trained voices. Every inch of the vast church was packed. Men and women stood in silence, with upraised faces, as they listened to the music of the old canon who once sat in this choir. The lightest mocker would be awed to silence under those soaring arches. For majesty, for a contagious religious emotion, the Cathedral of Seville at the time of its feasts is only to be rivaled by Santa Sophia during Ramazan, on that memorable Night of Power when eight thousand Mussulmans kneel prostrate under the floating circles of lamps. These two stand supreme; so different in the setting,--the one rich with color, an open blaze of light beneath the wide Byzantine dome, the other dim, mysterious Gothic,--they are alike in the genuine thrill of worship they give the onlooker of every creed.
Familiar with her Cathedral in its every-day aspect, having seen the celebrations of December 8th, the Christmas Midnight Mass, Epiphany, Ash Wednesday, it was cruel to find its grand tranquillity violated during the Holy Week. It is the processions, called the _pasos_, that are the cause of the disorder. A _paso_ is a huge platform, on which are placed carved statues representing scenes of the Passion. Each float is carried by some thirty men, and its weight must be enormous, for besides the statues there are silver candelabra, gold and silver vases, and usually a canopy of embroidered velvet upheld by silver poles. Could one but look on them as mere spectacular shows, they would be most picturesque pageants, but to dissociate them from religion is impossible. The custom is an ancient one and is still prevalent in many towns of Spain, through happily, in the smaller places, its original purpose to edify and rouse the people to rememberance of the holy season, has not been lost sight of in extravagant display as at Seville.
Each of Seville's numerous parishes has one or two of these _pasos_, and an unworthy rivalry exists between them as to which will make the best show. They are supposed to be scenes of the Passion, such as the Flagellation, Christ before Pilate, the Descent from the Cross, but for the most part they consist of single figures--a Crucifixion followed by a _Nuestra Señora de Dolores_, another Crucifixion followed by another single representation of Our Lady, and so on in monotonous sequence, a repetition that makes the spectator fix his attention, not on the scene represented but on details such as the embroidery of the robes, the display of rare jewels, the elaborate canopy. The _pasos_ struck me as the result of that regrettable tendency in Spain, the accentuated devotion to a special shrine or statue. No doubt it arose in reaction against the Moorish enemy's hatred of images, but the patriotic tendency has been carried too far. It will ever misrepresent the Spaniard's innate Christian belief. As these processions blocked the city streets, one heard on every side, not alone from those of differing creed, exclamations of "Pomp! Show! Childishness!" And the criticism was almost justified. Many strangers leave Seville confirmed in the wrong idea that its religion is an affair of tinsel and lights. Spain cares little what outsiders think of her, but here is a case in which she should consider the discredit that a degenerated custom brings on her religion; she should sacrifice an old tradition. Like the processions of Havana, the _pasos_ should go. The northern Spaniard agrees with the stranger in his dislike of the noisy spectacles that so incongruously commemorate the saddest death-scene of the ages, and there are many Andalusians, too, who wish for their abolition. In fact, it is the rabble and the innkeepers who agitate in their favor; these last keep petitions for their foreign guests to sign, begging that the processions be continued. Seville need not fear she will lose prestige should she drop them, that the tourists will no longer flock to her each spring; she is only beginning to be known for having a winter climate surpassing that of Rome and Naples; _pasos_ or not, visitors will inevitably increase.