I reached the hotel, procured a room, threw open the window, and stood on the balcony listening to the intense stillness of a wonderful night. Suddenly a dull rumbling down some side street disturbed my reverie of the Santiago of days gone by. The only thing to be expected at this time of night was the station 'bus, but I heard no clattering hoofs and was lost in surmise, when out of the dark shadow of a narrow lane into the moonlight swung a yoke of oxen drawing a long cart with slow majestic pace. But what a cart! a low sort of wooden box balanced between two solid wooden wheels. The rumbling was explained. It was primitive and the most mediæval thing I had yet seen in a country which is barely European. The peasant owner, a few steps in advance, never turned his head, but guided his beasts with a long stick which he waved from side to side over his back. There was no shout, no cry of command. The _mise en scène_ was beautifully arranged, it was complete. There was the background of ancient grey houses, beyond them, tapering into the starry sky, the slender pinnacles of the great Cathedral. A row of stunted trees occupied places down one side of the little square which filled my stage. The subdued colour and silence of the moonlit night, and the slow passage of the ox-cart as it passed out of sight, bettered Irving's best effects at the Lyceum. A clock in a neighbouring tower struck the quarters, the moment had arrived for the anti-climax! I expected every minute to see a door open, a light stream across the square, a cloaked figure steal furtively out, and disappear down into the shadow of the lane. It was perfect, nothing could have been arranged better as an introduction to Santiago de Compostela. [Illustration: SANTIAGO. THE CATHEDRAL] The body of St. James landed itself at Padron on the coast not far from Santiago, and his bones were brought to the spot where now stands the Cathedral. In the course of time their whereabouts was forgotten and it remained for Bishop Theodomir to rediscover the sacred spot in 829, guided thither by a star. Hence the Campus Stellæ--or Compostela.