For this deplorable state of things a double influence was to blame; namely, the oriental narrowness of the street, and also the elaborate ornamentation, proceeding very largely from a northern Gothic and non-Spanish source, of these annoying yet impressive gratings. Some of them, sweeping the very soil, and boldly and fantastically curved, may yet be seen at Toro. Those of Granada are no more. Indeed, not only have the _rejas_ of the Spanish private house long ceased to show the decorative cunning of the craftsman, but even in their present unartistic form are largely limited to Andalusia. Yet even thus, they seem to guard a typical and national air, mixed with a subtle, semi-Mussulmanic poetry. Across them, while the term of courtship lasts, the lover whispers with his mistress, oblivious of the outer world, fixing his gaze within, until his sultaness emerges from the gloom, and holds his hand, and looks into his eyes, and listens to his vow. Therefore, in "April's ivory moonlight," beneath the velvet skies of Andalusia, one always is well pleased to pass beside these children of romantic Spain, warming the frigid iron with the breath of youth, and hope, and happiness, and telling to each other a secret that is known unto us all--at once the sweetest and the saddest, the newest and the oldest story of all stories. BRONZES The earliest objects of bronze discovered in this country are comparatively few. As in other parts of Europe, they consist mostly of weapons, such as spear-heads and hatchets (which will be noticed under _Arms_), or bracelets, necklaces, and clasps or brooches. Earrings (_inaures_), brooches (_fibulæ_), and other objects of a similar purpose dating from the Roman period have been discovered in Galicia, while plates of the same alloy[85] which imitate a shell were used as personal ornaments by the men and women of the ancient Spanish tribes. [85] Le Hon reminds us, in _L'homme fossile_, that before the Iron Age all bronzes of our western world contained one part of tin to nine of copper. The province of Palencia is a fertile field for archæological discovery. Here have been found some curious clasps, intended, it would seem, to represent the old Iberian mounted warrior, sometimes brandishing the typical Iberian lance. The following is a sketch in outline of an object of this kind, fashioned as clumsily and crudely as the cheapest wooden plaything of our time:-- [Illustration]