Bruges has doubtless shared in the general prosperity which has
spread over the country since Belgium became an independent kingdom
after the revolution of 1830, but its progress has been slow. It
has never lost its old-world associations; and the names of the
streets and squares, and the traditions connected with numberless
houses which a stranger might pass without notice, are all so many
links with the past. There is the Rue Espagnole, for example, where
a vegetable market is held every Wednesday. This was the quarter
where the Spanish merchants lived and did their business. There
used to be a tall, dark, and, in fact, very dirty-looking old house
in this street known by the Spanish name of the 'Casa Negra.' It
was pulled down a few years ago; but lower down, at the foot of
the street, the great cellars in which the Spaniards stored their
goods remain; and on the Quai Espagnol was the Spanish Consulate,
now a large dwelling-house. A few steps from the Quai Espagnol is
the Place des Orientaux (Oosterlingen Plaats), where a minaret of
tawny brick rises above the gables of what was once the Consulate
of Smyrna, and on the north side of which, in the brave days of
old, stood the splendid Maison des Orientaux, the headquarters
of the Hanseatic League in Bruges, the finest house in Flanders,
with turrets and soaring spire, and marvellous facade, and rooms
inside all ablaze with gilding.
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