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32 DAYS IN THE SUN
were turned into a piggery. For can you not smell a
Capuchin further off than a pig, and is there any great
difference in color either? Every Sunday the Sevillano
journeys out of town to look over the hundreds of pigs
who now wallow in the cloister cells fattening hams
which, when soaked in wine and cured with herbs, will
bring a dollar the pound.
When the Teutonic custom of visiting cemeteries
and spending a few hours with the dear departed
reached Seville a few years ago, it was regarded simply
as a lark. All the respectable families, whether they
had relatives who were buried in the cemeteries or not,
would take their lunch baskets to the churchyard where
—as far away as they could get from the graves of
their loved ones—they held such feasts of joy that the
city authorities forbade the amusement.
In spite of its magnificent climate, Seville has the
highest mortality rate of all the large cities of Spain.
Other cities combat their death rate with sewerage
systems and sanitary measures; Seville has only its in-
destructible joy of life to oppose to death. The city
has also the highest birth rate, and suicide is unknown.
But these three facts, if we may trust the political
economists, are an unmistakable sign of cultural back-
wardness. Seville must have a low death rate, low
birth rate and more suicides before it may be counted
blessed with European civilization.
The rate of illegitimate births is also highest in
Seville, 17.4 per cent., as compared with 2.6 per cent.
for Barcelona. Priests elsewhere say this is an indica-
tion of moral corruption. But priests in Seville itself
say no such thing; they maintain that the city is the
foremost in Spain. Are not its women recognized as
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