Church of La Rambla

San Juan de La Rambla, 1888 Here at Rambla, however, I was suddenly immersed in an atmosphere of perfume, when I pushed aside the heavy wooden door. It was the Friday before Palm Sunday; and in preparation for the day the pavement was littered with the petals of roses and red geraniums, and the many little altars of this little church were bedecked with boughs of bloom of various kinds. A number of women were kneeling among the rose leaves, and, in the far end, by the altar, there peeped from the eave of his confessional the round head of a priest, who was listening to the murmur of a penitent at his feet.

Of course the ladies for the moment forgot their devotions when they saw a man in riding dress and heavy boots come crushing amid and fanning themselves, and those of them who were very far gone in worldliness touched their faces, to ascertain if the powder still lay upon their cheeks in a comely manner. But, in justice to them and the father in his confessional, who peered forth several times with an unamiable expression on his broad countenance, and in justice to myself also, I did not stay long in the little church. Such a curious, unreal, manikin place of worship I never saw before.

Charles Edwardes, Rides and Studies in the Canary Islands (1888)