ch has moved its eyes. In some places they pretend to
believe that bells are rung without being touched; in others, roses grow,
out of their proper season, to serve the festivals of the church. At the
time of the expedition of the Earl of Essex to Cadiz, the English took
their swords and cut asunder a certain painting of a religious subject in
one of the churches, whereupon the edges of the cut canvas began to
bleed, and the blood remains there to this day, and may be seen by the
curious in one of the parish churches of that city! They relate numerous
cases in which the host when profaned has, when broken, sent forth blood.
If a sacristan omits to light the lamp which burns at night before the
eucharist, the lamp lights itself. There are innumerable persons in
Spain who believe that he who is born on Good-Friday has a cross on the
roof of his mouth, and the faculty of curing diseases by mere contact
with his hands, or even a piece of his garment. The palms which are
blessed on Palm-Sunday, and the candles burnt on Good-Friday before the
sacrament, have power to preserve houses from thunderbolts. The same
faculty is attributed to a small bell blessed by the priest. In times of
drought, which are the greatest calamities that afflict the Spanish soil,
a favourite image is taken out and conducted in procession, in order to
implore genial showers of rain. Thanks to the invention of the
barometer, and a practical knowledge of the aspect of the weather, it
almost always happens that this ceremony is followed a few days
afterwards by a copious supply. But it would require an entire volume to
enumerate all the errors and superstitions of this description which have
been propagated by the clergy in Spain, and which form the chief props of
their power.

Relics have served as efficacious instruments to accomplish that end.
The _lignum crucis_, pieces of the cross on which the Saviour suffered,
are profusely distributed not only in the churches, but in the private
houses of many persons. In most of the cathedrals are preserved and
shown to the public, on certain occasions, some of the thorns which
composed our Saviour's crown; in others, fragments of the Virgin's veil;
and in the cathedral of Jaen, _the face of God_. A description of this
last-named wonder may not be unacceptable to some of our readers, and
therefore we give a description of it in the words of a living English
writer:--"According to the tradition of the Ro