As the present is the last occasion on which, in this volume at least, I may have to speak of mediæval metal work, and especially iron work, I may be allowed to allude very briefly to the two principal tools by which it was worked, viz.: the hammer and the pliers. In England and in France the first was used in preference at least to the last; while in Germany, Burgundy and the Low Countries, the last was specially affected, and by its means foliage, both natural and conventional, was rendered with great skill, facility and taste. The Spaniards, as is proved by the present sketch, and that which follows it, were at an early period dexterous in the use of both tools; uniting the massive style engendered by the predominant use of the hammer with the more florid and fanciful manner springing out of the light and convoluted forms created by a more liberal use of the pliers. [Illustration: PLATE 95 BARCELONA KNOCKER TO OLD HOUSE IN THE CALLE SANTA LUCIA. MDW 1869] PLATE XCV. _BARCELONA._ KNOCKER TO AN OLD HOUSE IN THE CALLE SANTA LUCIA. IN this fanciful little object we meet with another illustration of the spirit of humour as well as of dexterity in their craft, manifested in abundance by the excellent old ironworkers of Spain. Still good as the blacksmiths unquestionably were, the triumphs of Spanish metal working were chiefly embodied in the precious metals. It is rather in the cabinets of connoisseurs than in the churches of the country that specimens should be sought for to justify the splendid reputation those artist-workmen enjoyed in the palmy days of the Spanish Court and Church. Everywhere the traveller comes now only upon exhausted treasuries and emptied sacristies. Even since the days of Ford's inimitable handbook the spoiler has been rampant, and of the custodias and virus, the "blandones" and "portapaces" in which he delighted, so far as my perquisitions extended, scarcely a vestige was to be met with. Even since my sketches were made, the contents of the treasury of "Nuestra Señora del Pilar" have been brought to the hammer; and the pressure of other engagements alone prevented my return to Saragossa empowered to secure a share of those artistic curiosities for our National collection. No doubt many beautiful specimens of Gothic precious metal work once adorned the principal mediæval ecclesiastical structures of Spain, but it was not till a later date that the most important and famous works, other than those already noticed (by Henrique de Arfé,) were produced. A brief notice of some of these from the pen of a contemporary may not be altogether uninteresting.