It was on February 2, 1907, that I had the good fortune to assist at the celebration of Candlemas, one of the four principal festivals of the year, at Santiago Cathedral; and on that occasion the “king of censers,” as Victor Hugo called it in his poem, swung before my admiring eyes. The service began at 9.30. The Archbishop with his red cap (for he is now a Cardinal) and ermine cape, presided. Standing in the transept close to the choir in the midst of a large congregation, all standing or kneeling, I saw two men come forward bearing “the largest incense-burner in the world” suspended by its chains to a horizontal pole. They placed it on the pavement, exactly under the central cupola, from the triangle of which hung the two ends of a rope worked by a pulley. The chains of the great silver censer were now attached to one end of the rope, while seven strong men clutched the other end, and, pulling it, caused the cauldron to rise in the air above our heads till it was about ten feet from the ground. Then it began to swing gently. Every eye was fixed on it, and there was for a moment the perfect silence of universal expectation, but only for a moment, for then the silver tones of a couple of clarions (_chirimias_) fell upon our ears.[91] At length the great censer, as if taking courage at the sound of the music, swung boldly out across the transept. It swung higher and higher, and the clear voice of the silver-voiced clarions sounded more and more triumphant. At last it swung so high that I thought it must turn a somersault, and pour its glowing charcoal upon our upturned faces. We saw its perforated top filled with tongue-like flames fanned by the wind. And, in the midst of it all, the sight of those hundreds of eager, upturned faces. What a study! When Borrow visited Galicia he heard of “the mighty censers, which are at times swung so high by machinery as to smite the vaulted roof of the Cathedral,” but he did not have the privilege of assisting at one of those extraordinary ceremonies. “It is one of the things to see,” said a professor of the University to whom I mentioned it. “It is one of the sights of Santiago.” I do not know for how long the censer swung above our heads, covering at each gigantic swing the whole length of the transept,--perhaps ten minutes, perhaps fifteen,--but at last it began to swing more gently and to rise less high, and then it gradually subsided till it ceased swinging altogether. While the five men were detaching it from its rope the congregation began to press into the central nave, where a large ring had been formed by the priests. Here the ecclesiastical musicians had taken their stand, and here they gave us a (violins and ’cellos) repertoire of church music, to which the congregation listened with rapture. The two clarionets or _chirimias_ are only heard while the censer swings. It is their sacred privilege to accompany its flight, and give by their clear