the flying
buttresses,--astonishes; the _factura_ is severe and beautiful in its
grand simplicity.

Not so the chapels, which are decorated in all manner of styles, and
ornamented in all degrees of lavishness. The largest is the Muzarab
chapel beneath the dome which substitutes the missing tower; except the
dome, this chapel, where the old Gothic Rite (as opposed to the
Gregorian Rite) is sung every day in the year, is constructed in pure
Gothic; it contains a beautiful Italian mosaic of the Virgin as well as
frescoes illustrating Cardinal Cisneros's African wars, when the
battling prelate thought it was his duty to bear the crucifix and
Spanish rights into Morocco as his royal masters had carried them into
Granada.

The remaining chapels, some of them of impressive though generally
complex structure, will have to be omitted here. So also the sacristy
with its wonderful picture by the Greco, and the chapter-room with the
portraits of all the archbishops, the elegant carved door, and the
well-preserved _Mudejar_ ceiling, etc. And we pass on to the central
nave, and stand beneath the _croisee_. To the east the high altar, to
the west the choir, claim the greater part of our attention. For it is
here that the people centred their gifts.

The objects used on the altar-table are of gold, silver, jasper, and
agate; the _monstrance_ in the central niche of the altar-piece is also
of silver, and the garments worn by the effigy are woven in gold, silk,
and precious stones. The two immense grilles which close off the high
altar and the eastern end of the choir are of iron, tin, and copper,
gilded and silvered, having been covered over with black paint in the
nineteenth century so as to escape the greedy eyes--and hands!--of the
French soldiery. The workmanship of these two _rejas_ is of the most
sober Spanish classic or plateresque period, and though the black has
not as yet been taken off, the silver and gold peep forth here and
there, and show what a brilliancy must have radiated from these
elegantly decorated bars and cross-bars in the eighteenth century.

The three tiers of choir stalls, carved in walnut, are among the very
finest in Spain, both as regards the accomplished craftsmanship and the
astonishing variety in the composition. The two organs, opposite each
other and attaining the very height of the nave, are the best in the
peninsula, whilst the designs of the marble pavement, red and white in
the high altar, and