Gil Gonzalez Dávila[136] says that Bishop Fernando gave permission for the foundation of the convent of San Domingo in A.D. 1318, and that _circa_ A.D. 1350-58 the Dominican Fray Pedro Lopez de Aguiar founded it; and this date appears to me to accord very well with the peculiar character of the work. There is little more to be seen in Lugo. The old walls, though they retain all their towers, have been to some extent altered for the worse to fit them for defence in the last war; they have been also rendered available as a broad public walk,--very pleasant, inasmuch as it commands good views of the open country beyond the city. The people here and at Santiago all go to the fountains armed with a long tin tube, which they apply to the mouths of the beasts which discharge the water, and so convey the stream straight to their pitchers placed on the edge of the large basins. The crowd of water-carriers round a Spanish fountain is always noisy, talkative, and gay; and many is the fight and furious the clamour for the privilege of putting the tube to the fountain in regular order. I travelled between la Coruña and Lugo by night, so that I am unable to say anything as to the country or scenery on the road, save that for some distance before reaching Lugo it is cold, bare, and unattractive. Betanzos, the only town of importance on the road, has two or three good churches, which I missed seeing by daylight. They are of early date, with apsidal east ends, and somewhat similar, apparently, to the churches at la Coruña, though on a larger scale. La Coruña is charmingly situated, facing a grand landlocked bay, but on the inner side of a narrow ridge, a short walk across which leads to the open sea, which is here very magnificent. The views of the coast, and the openings to the grand bays or rios of Ferrol, Betanzos, and la Coruña, are of unusual beauty, and it is rarely indeed that one sees a more attractive country. But there is not very much to detain an architect. The town is divided into the old and the new; and in the former are two old churches, which, though small, are interesting; whilst in the latter there is absolutely nothing to see but shops and cafés. The Collegiata of Sta. Maria del Campo was made a parish church by King Alonso X. in A.D. 1256, and in A.D. 1441 was made collegiate: it has a nave and aisles of five bays, and a short chancel, with an apse covered with a semi-dome vault.[137] The nave and aisles are all covered with pointed waggon-vaults springing from the same level; and as the aisles are narrow, their vaults resist the thrust of the main vault, without exerting a violent thrust on the aisle walls. The capitals are rudely carved with foliage, and the arches are perfectly plain. The bay of vaulting over the chancel is a pointed waggon-vault, with ribs on its under side, arranged as though in imitation of a sexpartite vault.[138] [Illustration: Churches at LA CORUÑA:--SEGOVIA:--LÉRIDA: and BENAVENTE: Plate VIII.