They are black and white monks, whose dress resembles that of the Celestins; very idle, ignorant, and without austerity, who, by the number of their monasteries and their riches, are in Spain much about what the Benedictines are in France, and like them are a congregation.  They elect also, like the Benedictines, their superiors, local and general, except the Prior of the Escurial, who is nominated by the King, remains in office as long as the King likes and no more, and who is yet better lodged at the Escurial than his Catholic Majesty.  ’Tis a prodigy, this building, of extent, of structure, of every kind of magnificence, and contains an immense heap of riches, in pictures, in ornaments, in vases of all kinds, in precious stones, everywhere strewn about, and the description of which I will not undertake, since it does not belong to my subject.  Suffice it to say that a curious connoisseur of all these different beauties might occupy himself there for three months without cessation, and then would not have examined all.  The gridiron (its form, at least) has regulated all the ordonnance of this sumptuous edifice in honour of Saint-Laurent, and of the battle of Saint-Quentin, gained by Philippe II., who, seeing the action from a height, vowed he would erect this monastery if his troops obtained the victory, and asked his courtiers, if such were the pleasures of the Emperor, his father, who in fact did not go so far for them as that.

There is not a door, a lock, or utensil of any kind, or a piece of plate, that is not marked with a gridiron.

The distance from Madrid to the Escurial is much about the same as that from Paris to Fontainebleau.  The country is very flat and becomes a wilderness on approaching the Escurial, which takes its name from a large village you pass, a league off.  It is upon an eminence which you ascend imperceptibly, and upon which you see endless deserts on three sides; but it is backed, as it were, by the mountain of Guadarama, which encircles Madrid on three sides, at a distance of several leagues, more or less.  There is no village at the Escurial; the lodging of their Catholic Majesties forms the handle of the gridiron.  The principal grand officers, and those most necessary, are lodged, as well as the Queen’s ladies, in the monastery; on the side by which you arrive all is very badly built.

The church, the grand staircase, and the grand cloister, surprised me.  I admired the elegance of the surgery, and the pleasantness of the gardens, which, however, are only a long and wide terrace.  The Pantheon frightened me by a sort of horror and majesty.  The grand-altar and the sacristy wearied my eyes, by their immense opulence.  The library did not satisfy me, and the librarians still less:  I was received with much civility, and invited to a good supper in the Spanish style, at which the Prior and another monk did the honours.  After this fast repast my people prepared my meals, but this fat monk always supplied one or two things that it would not have been civil to refuse, and always ate with me; for, in order that he might conduct us everywhere, he never quitted our sides.  Bad Latin supplied the place of French, which he did not understand; nor even Spanish.