Except the convents of nuns of the mendicant orders, the greater part of them, in Spain, possessed, prior to the constitutional regime, considerable inheritances. These, however, having been, by a decree of the Cortes, converted and sold as national property, all their means are reduced to a bare subsistence on a small pension which _ought_ now to be paid from the public treasury; but as that obligation has frequently been neglected in consequence of the repeated disturbances which have interrupted the peace of the monarchy, those unhappy women have often been overwhelmed with the greatest privations and misery. In such cases Christian charity has lent its succour, and all classes of the state have contributed to their relief. The government, on different occasions, has prohibited the admission of novices to these convents of nuns, in order that death itself might, without violence, extinguish those institutions, which are contrary to the ideas of the age. But this salutary provision has been imprudently eluded by the bishops, and recently modified by an article of the _concordat_ effected with the court of Rome a few years ago, and which is everywhere unpopular. One of the great evils resulting from the continuance of these nuns in Spain is, that they occupy numerous edifices worthy of a better purpose, and generally in the best situations in populous cities. Only one convent of this class deserves particular mention, on account of the great historical recollections connected with its existence, for the singularity of its organization, and for the pious object of its institution. It is called the Convent _de las Huelgas_, and is situated at a short distance from Burgos. This magnificent establishment, founded and enriched by ancient monarchs, maintained an hospital in which a great number of invalids were attended to with the greatest care. The abbess wore the mitre and _baculo_ like the bishops, and exercised both civil and criminal jurisdiction in the vast dominions belonging to the convent; she was called Señora de _horca y cuchillo_, {72} and was the chief of several ecclesiastical and secular officers. The sumptuous church of this convent contained within its walls the ashes of many of the kings and princes of ancient Spanish dynasties. CHAPTER III.