Portugal of the Portuguese

By Aubrey F. G. Bell

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Title: Portugal of the Portuguese

Author: Aubrey F. G. Bell

Release date: October 19, 2024 [eBook #74608]

Language: English

Original publication: New York: Charles Scribner's Sons

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Portugal of the Portuguese

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ITALY OF THE ITALIANS

BY HELEN ZIMMERN

FRANCE OF THE FRENCH

BY E. HARRISON BARKER

SPAIN OF THE SPANISH

BY MRS. VILLIERS-WARDELL

SWITZERLAND OF THE SWISS

BY FRANK WEBB

GERMANY OF THE GERMANS

BY ROBERT M. BERRY

TURKEY OF THE OTTOMANS

BY LUCY M. J. GARNETT

BELGIUM OF THE BELGIANS

BY DEMETRIUS C. BOULGER

SERVIA OF THE SERVIANS

BY CHEDO MIJATOVICH

JAPAN OF THE JAPANESE

BY PROF. J. H. LONGFORD

AUSTRIA OF THE AUSTRIANS, AND HUNGARY OF THE HUNGARIANS

BY L. KELLNER, PAULA ARNOLD, AND ARTHUR L. DELISLE

RUSSIA OF THE RUSSIANS

BY H. W. WILLIAMS, PH.D.

AMERICA OF THE AMERICANS

BY HENRY C. SHELLEY

GREECE OF THE HELLENES

BY LUCY M. J. GARNETT

HOLLAND OF THE DUTCH

BY DEMETRIUS C. BOULGER

SCANDINAVIA OF THE SCANDINAVIANS

BY H. GODDARD LEACH

EGYPT OF THE EGYPTIANS

BY W. LAWRENCE BALLS

[Illustration: GENERAL VIEW, LISBON]

Portugal of the Portuguese

By
Aubrey F. G. Bell
AUTHOR OF “THE MAGIC OF SPAIN,” “IN PORTUGAL,” ETC

NEW YORK
CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS
597-599 Fifth Avenue

1917

PRINTED BY
SIR ISAAC PITMAN & SONS, LTD., LONDON, ENGLAND

PREFACE

Since the murder of King Carlos and of the Crown Prince Luis Felipe on
the 1st of February, 1908, Portugal has been in the limelight. A swarm of
writers have descended like locusts on the land, and the printing-presses
of Europe have groaned beneath the mass of matter concerning this
unfortunate country. Yet most often the matter has been necessarily
superficial, and a few outstanding features, a murder, a revolution,
the methods of a secret society, have laid hold on public attention.
The Portuguese is, therefore, apt to be regarded less as a poetical
dreamer, heir of the glories of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries,
than as a political schemer, with a pistol in one pocket and a bomb in
another. And since in the matter of political disturbances the end is not
yet, and a strident minority is likely for some years to come to impose
itself in Portugal and attempt to impose itself on public opinion abroad,
crying out that all criticism of it springs from hatred of Portugal,
it is of importance to distinguish between this minority of misguided,
unscrupulous and half-educated persons, and the true people of Portugal.
We do not usually mistake a little yellow froth on the surface for the
sea, and only the ignorant will saddle the Portuguese people with the
words and deeds of a political party with which it has no connection
whatever, not even that of the vote. Great Britain has everything to
gain from a better understanding of a people with which she has so many
dealings, and which is in itself so extraordinarily interesting and
attractive. Prejudices rather easily formed against it vanish in the
light of better knowledge. In intellectual matters at present Portugal
turns almost exclusively to France, but there is no reason why the
business connection between Great Britain and Portugal should not lead
to closer ties. A needful preliminary is that Englishmen should be at
pains to learn something more of her ancient ally than is manifested in
its politics, often as representative of Heligoland or Honolulu as of
Portugal.

AUBREY F. G. BELL.

S. JOÃO DO ESTORIL, _June, 1915_.

CONTENTS

CHAP. PAGE

PREFACE v

I. CHARACTERISTICS 1

II. POPULATION AND EMPLOYMENT 25

III. LIFE IN TOWN AND COUNTRY 41

IV. RELIGION AND EDUCATION 61

V. A LAND OF FLOWERS 76

VI. CONVENTS AND PALACES 88

VII. HISTORICAL SURVEY 107

VIII. LITERATURE 133

IX. PLAYS—GIL VICENTE 152

X. POLITICS AND THE PRESS 164

XI. FROM MONARCHY TO REPUBLIC 183

XII. RECENT EVENTS 199

XIII. GREAT BRITAIN AND PORTUGAL 216

XIV. PORTUGAL OF THE FUTURE 229

GLOSSARY 259

INDEX 263

MAP _end of book_

ILLUSTRATIONS

GENERAL VIEW, LISBON _Frontispiece_

ROMAN TEMPLE, EVORA _facing page_ 2

WOMEN AT WORK ” 8

A FARMHOUSE, MINHO ” 30

A FARMER ” 32

THE VINTAGE, DOURO ” 38

TERREIRO DO PAÇO, LISBON ” 42

BOM JESUS DO MONTE, BRAGA ” 50

A SHEPHERD ” 60

CONVENTO DE JERONYMOS, BELEM ” 88

CASTELLO DA PENA, CINTRA ” 90

CLOISTER OF D. DINIZ, ALCOBAÇA ” 92

TOMB OF D. INÉS DE CASTRO, ALCOBAÇA ” 94

GENERAL VIEW, OPORTO ” 102

THE CONVENT, MAFRA ” 128

THE CHURCH, BATALHA ” 130

THE CATHEDRAL, BRAGA ” 140

GENERAL VIEW, COIMBRA ” 146

THE WASHING-PLACE, COIMBRA ” 164

CASTLE OF ALMOUROL ” 170

GENERAL VIEW, VILLA REAL ” 174

TOWER OF CASTLE, BEJA ” 178

RUINED CASTLE, LEIRIA ” 182

DOORWAY OF THE UNFINISHED CHAPELS, BATALHA ” 208

INTERIOR OF THE CHURCH, BATALHA ” 214

CONVENTO DE CHRISTO, THOMAR ” 216

GENERAL VIEW, FARO ” 232

A SQUARE, LISBON ” 236

CEDAR AVENUE, BUSSACO ” 240

A STUDY IN COSTUMES ” 248

Portugal of the Portuguese

CHAPTER I

CHARACTERISTICS

[Sidenote: The People.]

Too many judge the character of the Portuguese from a hasty study of what
Beckford nearly a century ago impolitely called the Lisbon _canaille_.
The life of the Portuguese in a political and literary (written
literature) sense is concentrated in Lisbon, but outside this narrow
circle exists the Portuguese people proper, to the foreigner almost an
unknown quantity, taking no concern for the latest political party formed
or the latest volume of second-rate verse published, yet constituting in
its strength or weakness the political future of Portugal and containing
within itself a whole literature of prose and poetry, legend and song.
In some measure those who know the Irish peasant know the Portuguese,
and those who know the Irish will realise from this comparison what a
delightful mine of interest is here to hand. Indeed, if you take the
Irish peasantry, add hot sun, a spice of the East, and perhaps something
of the negro’s vanity and slight hold on life, you have the Portuguese.
The quick intelligence, the dreaming melancholy, the slyness and love of
intrigue, the wit and imagination are here, and the power of expression
in words. Generosity, too, and habits as unpractical as could be desired.

[Sidenote: Patriotism.]

The politician in Portugal who looks at the statistics, and, seeing that
75 per cent. of this people are illiterate, shrugs his shoulders—_non
ragionar di lor_—makes a great mistake, for it is here that those who
have considered the political intrigues of the capital and despaired of
Portugal’s present find a new hope: a population hard-working, vigorous,
and intelligent, increasing fairly rapidly, content with little,
not willingly learning to read or write, but in its own way eagerly
patriotic, each loving Portugal as represented by his own town or village
or farm, though he may not have grasped the latest shades of humanity,
fraternity, or irreligion.

A minha casa, a minha casinha,
Não ha casa come a minha.

From the earliest times the inhabitants of this western strip of the
Iberian peninsula had shown themselves capable of heroic deeds and at the
same time impressionable, open to new ideas and foreign influences, more
ready to co-operate with the French and English than with their inland
neighbours the Castilians. Had the characters of these two neighbours
been less incompatible, Portugal might have come to recognise the
hegemony of Castille, as sooner or later did all the other regions of
the Peninsula, some of which were separated from the central plains by
natural barriers more difficult than was Portugal. But to the Portuguese
the Castilian too often was and is a stranger and an enemy.

[Sidenote: King Manoel the Fortunate.]

As the power of Castille grew, Portugal called in a new world to redress
the balance of the old. Unfortunately in reaching out for this support
Portugal fatally overstrained her strength, and the brilliant reign
(1495-1521) of King Manoel I (“that great, fortunate, and only Emanuel
of Portugall,” Sir Peter Wyche called him) resembled the Cid’s famous
coffers, all crimson and golden without, but containing more sand than
gold. Those who look at the bedraggled coffer hanging in Burgos Cathedral
wonder how it can have deceived the two Jews, and those who see the
present somewhat penniless and forlorn condition of Portugal are apt to
forget that it was once a great world-empire. Before Portugal became that
we have glimpses of the Portuguese as a contented people, fond of song
and dance, a pipe and drum at every door, living rustic, idyllic lives as
cultivators of the soil in a “land abounding in meat and drink, _terra
de vyandas e beveres muyto avondosa_” (fifteenth century).

[Illustration: ROMAN TEMPLE, EVORA

[_See p. 105_]

[Sidenote: Discovery of the Indies.]

But the discoveries and conquests followed, the magic of the sea, the
mystery of the East wove a spell over the imagination of the Portuguese,
the country was drained of men, devastated by plague and famine. Lisbon
and the East absorbed energies hitherto given to the soil. Portugal,
moreover, was doomed to share Spain’s losses during the period 1580-1640,
and later was ravaged by frequent civil wars. In fine one might expect to
find a dwindling miserable population, dying out from sheer exhaustion.
But this would be very far from being a true statement of the case.
Portugal is only lying fallow. There are reserves of health and energy,
especially in the north, in the sturdy peasants of Beira and Minho.
Politically it is only a potential strength, and the real people of
Portugal has never yet come into its own, although it was on the point of
doing so at the beginning of the sixteenth century. It was not allowed
to develop naturally after the first third of that great century. Even
to-day there are said to be certain politicians who would dress it up
in a suit of ready-made clothes which has caught their fancy in some
shop window when they were on a visit to Paris. The Portuguese people
deserves better than that, and if it can be given a national government,
and a national policy and ideals, it may yet surprise Europe. It is a
question of encouraging the indigenous side of Portuguese civilisation—in
language, literature, dress, legislation, drama, cookery, in
everything—which since the sixteenth century has been set aside for the
imported foreign-erudite; to develop as it were the Saxon element at the
expense of the Norman. The people have succeeded in keeping many of their
old and excellent customs—but by the skin of their teeth now—as they have
their own names for many of the Lisbon streets and their own words side
by side with those of learned origin.

[Sidenote: Foreign Ingredients.]

But in order to become acquainted with the Portuguese people it is
necessary to go far afield, to the remote villages of Alemtejo or Minho
or of the Serra da Estrella, and, the means of doing this being often
primitive or non-existent, the traveller contents himself with swift
generalities derived from observation of the inhabitants of the towns,
precisely, that is, where the Portuguese most displays his weaknesses
and where the population is most mixed. Reclus considered the Portuguese
“_très fortement croisés de nègres_,” and other foreign observers have
denied the existence of a Portuguese nationality, dismissing it as a
mere _pot pourri_ of many races. If this is an exaggeration, it cannot
be denied that the many peaceful or warrior invaders—Phoenician, Celt,
Carthaginian, Greek or Goth—attracted by this lovely land from age to
age, and the numerous slaves imported from Portugal’s overseas dominions
have contributed to form a mixed population, especially in and around
Lisbon. At Lisbon many persons evidently have negro blood in their veins,
and others are of Jewish descent. Sobieski, the Polish traveller, wrote
in 1611: “There are in Portugal very many Jews, so many that various
houses have a Jewish origin. Although they have burnt and expelled them,
many live hidden among the Portuguese.” This was 114 years after the
expulsion of the Jews from Portugal.

[Sidenote: The Provinces.]

But Lisbon is a country in itself, divorced in many ways from the rest of
Portugal. The Portuguese provinces present many differences of character
among their inhabitants, from the lively chattering _algarvio_ in the
south to the duller, quietly poetical and dreamy _minhoto_ on the border
of Galicia, unfairly described by Oliveira Martins as “without elevation
of spirit, dense, the Dutch of Portugal,” the fervent, hardy _beirão_
mountaineer or the stolid farmers of Alemtejo.

Taking the character of the Portuguese as a whole, its main feature seems
to be vagueness. Their minds are not inductive.

[Sidenote: General Character.]

They think in generalities and abstractions, and their deductions often
have a closer relation to these than to the facts of life. No doubt the
dreamy climate (King Duarte in the fifteenth century noted the effect of
climate on character), the misty blue skies and wide sea horizons have
exercised as much influence on the character of the inhabitants as the
many foreign ingredients, the uncertain land boundaries, the fear of
attacks from the sea, the indefinite dangers of earthquake and plague.
Everywhere in Portugal is this lack of precision evident, in the fondness
for abstractions and unsubstantial grandeur, the counting in _réis_ (most
transactions continue to be made in _réis_, which though apparently
clumsy is really simpler than the new system of _centavos_—10 _réis_—and
_escudos_—1,000 _réis_), the love of the lottery, the perpetual tendency
to exaggerate, the inexhaustible and vague good-nature which some more
direct minds find so trying, the facile criticism which encourages the
existence of too many poets, politicians and other nonentities, the
absence of discipline, the belief in the efficacy of words and rhetoric,
the idle expectation of better things, the _sebastianismo_ which looks
for the return of the ill-fated king—a later Arthur—“on a morning of
thick mist”—the universal cult of undefined melancholy and _saudade_. The
French saying, “_Les portugais sont toujours gais_,” should be rendered—

Nos labios chistes,
No coração tristes.

(On their lips a smile,
Sad at heart the while.)

[Sidenote: “Saudade.”]

None but a nation with a beautiful land and delightful climate could
be so sad. Less favoured peoples are fain to be content with what they
can get, and, in their necessary efforts to obtain something, often
obtain much. The Portuguese, living in a land where it is possible to
support life on almost nothing, has little incentive to effort. Moreover,
the Portuguese turns his imagination to the ideal, and comparing it
with the real, is saddened. His pessimism is essentially that of the
idealist: disillusion. He wishes for all or nothing, aims at a million
and misses an unit, whereas men more practical with less intelligence
it may be, and certainly less imagination, set themselves to the work
before them, and prosper. But it must not be thought that, because the
Portuguese cultivates a gentle melancholy, he has a poor heart that
never rejoices. His sadness is often as superficial as the Englishman’s
impassivity. He is, generally, far too intelligent to find life ever
dull, or if he yields to _ennui_ it is of the gorgeous philosophical kind
which takes a subtle pleasure in saying that “Vanity, vanity, all is
vanity.” As a rule, his sense of ridicule on the one hand and his nervous
self-consciousness on the other make of life for him a perpetual feast
of little comedies and tragedies. But in practical matters, failing to
realise his ideal, he does not attempt to idealise the real, but views it
with laughter or disdain. The ideal is usually vague and set apart from
practical life.

[Sidenote: Humanity.]

Thus the humanity of the Portuguese is real, they have no love of
violence or bloodshed, but it is a state of mind rather than a course
of action, and can be curiously combined with cruel persecutions in
practice. The expulsion of the Jews came to Portugal from Spain, and
it is difficult to believe that the Portuguese people ever viewed the
Inquisition fires in the _Rocio_ with anything but horror. But Vasco da
Gama, Affonso d’Albuquerque, Dom João de Castro and other Portuguese
in the East perpetrated cruelties as terrible as any practised by the
Inquisition. It was the habit of the early discoverers to seize a few
natives and, if they desired information, put them to the torture.
For sheer callousness the following deed recorded of Vasco da Gama is
remarkable (the date might almost be 1915): “Namen wi een scip van Mecha
daer waren in drie hondert mannē en̄ tachtich en̄ veel vrouwen en̄
kinderen. En̄ wi namen daar wt wel xii. dusent ducaten en̄ noch wel
x. dusent an comanscap. En̄ wi verbranden dat scip en̄ al dat volc te
pulwer den tersten dach in October.” (That is: Having captured a peaceful
trading ship from Mecca, and taken thereout the ducats and merchandise,
the Portuguese under Vasco da Gama blew up the ship with 380 men and many
women and children in her.) The Flemish sailor chronicles the fact with
more directness than would have marked a Portuguese account. What is so
striking is that the dreamy humanity of the Portuguese does not desert
him in such an event. To take a recent instance—the murder of Lieutenant
Soares in Lisbon—no foreigner could ever forget the gentle good-nature of
the assassins, apparently _bonhommes_ and affable, nor the indifference
and equanimity of the small crowd that collected. Few Portuguese would
consider Stevenson anything but a pagan when he exclaims, at the idea of
loving all men: “God save me from such irreligion!” Such directness is
foreign to their temperament. They would understand better the cry of
the Canadian poet, Émile Nelligan, “_J’ai voulu tout aimer et je suis
malheureux_,” or Corneille’s strange recommendation, “_Aimez-les toutes_
(all women) _en Dieu_.”

[Sidenote: Women.]

The position of women in Portugal is another instance of vague ideals.
Woman is set on a pedestal, but women are not always treated with
consideration, and in some parts of the country are little better than
slaves. Over and over again you will meet a man and a woman, husband
and wife, perhaps, the man in lordly fashion carrying a small parcel or
nothing at all, the woman bowing under a huge load. No one thinks of
protesting against this, it passes without notice, nor has the Republican
Parliament, which has shown itself copious in legislation, bestirred
itself to introduce a bill dealing with the position of women, although
it has denied them the right to vote. The peasant women continue to do
twice the work of the men, and to receive half the wages. Frei João dos
Santos at the beginning of the seventeenth century noted (_Ethiopia
Oriental_, 1609) that it was “as natural for Kaffir women to work in the
fields as to the women of Minho to spin,” but at the present day it is
the women in Portugal who do a heavy part of out-of-door work. To their
semi-slavery and Moorish toil may perhaps be ascribed partly the fact
that the women in Portugal are less graceful and good-looking than the
men. On the other hand, Portuguese women of all classes often display a
common sense and strength and firmness of character to a greater degree
than do the men.

[Sidenote: Liberty.]

Another good instance of the gulf between the ideal and the real is to
be found in the conception and the practice of liberty. Abstract Liberty
with a great L goes to the head of the Portuguese like wine, and in its
name they have effected many a revolution and committed many a crime. In
practice it can still be used, as two thousand years ago, “for a cloak of
maliciousness.” “Luminous in its virginal essence rises the beneficent
aspiration of a _régime_ of liberty.” No doubt these celebrated words of
Dr. Theophilo Braga on the occasion of the proclamation of the Republic
were sincere, in so far as words so abstract can have any concrete
quality, but their vagueness was characteristic and ominous. Equally
indefinite had been the poet Snr. Guerra Junqueiro’s description of the
future Republic in 1897. The Republic was to be “a high road towards a
new formula of civilisation.” Such phrases, hollow and resounding like an
empty barrel, have an immense success in Portuguese politics.

[Illustration: WOMEN AT WORK]

[Sidenote: Business Capacity.]

But the same vagueness pervades business. In business the Portuguese
appears incurably careless and combines with this fault the most
meticulous scruples. The result is too often delay and confusion. There
as in other matters the Portuguese shows a genius for setting himself
in the wrong, his real ability is eclipsed by superficial errors, the
mistakes in estimates or accounts are not always in his favour, and the
unscrupulous can easily take advantage of his hesitations and candour.
The personal element is always present, and vanity, together with much
real delicacy of feeling, enters into business matters. A fact this
which Englishmen dealing with Portuguese have been slower to recognise
in the past than other nations. Moreover the Portuguese is harassed
out of his wits by the details of business, he likes a good lump sum
down rather than much larger but gradual profits, he goes for the
pounds and leaves the pennies to look after themselves. If he sees the
advantage of an enterprise, he rarely combines with this intelligence
the necessary perseverance and force of character to carry it through.
Yet here as always the Portuguese shows a marvellous inclination to
fritter away his energies in matters of the minutest interest and minor
importance, an inability to omit, to leave off. They either have no
method or a method so minutely conceived that it is almost certain to
break down in practice. Portuguese scholarship sometimes vies with
German in unprofitable minuteness. For instance, Alexandre Herculano,
the historian, wrote a few fine poems: one of his Portuguese critics has
taken the trouble to ascertain the number of verses (6,800) contained in
all his original poems and translations.

[Sidenote: Religion.]

In religion, again, the same vagueness. Many Portuguese prefer an
undefined pantheism and a mystic love of Nature or Humanity to dogmatic
beliefs. The ostentatious art of Roman Catholic ceremonies and the exact
precision of Protestant services are both in a sense congenial to them,
the former appealing to their fondness for pomp and show, the latter to
their quiet thoughtfulness. But neither the one nor the other affects
them with sufficient force to fasten upon their minds a fanaticism which
is foreign to dreamy and comfortable natures. The Roman Catholic religion
exercises a greater influence on the dramatic character of the Spanish
than on the essentially lyrical and idyllic nature of the Portuguese. Nor
do the latter show any marked enthusiasm for Protestantism, although the
number of Protestants is certainly larger than it is in Spain. Perhaps
it is too clear and reasonable for them. They require vagueness and
mystery.

[Sidenote: Contrasts.]

The character of a Portuguese is much more rarely than that of a Spaniard
all of one piece. The Spaniard’s, clear-cut and angular, admits less
readily of contrasts and contradictions, whereas the very vagueness
of the Portuguese enables it to combine opposing elements. Certainly,
at least, there would seem to be many puzzling inconsistencies in the
character of the Portuguese people. For they are like a quiet stream with
sudden falls. They are fatalists, but with moments of heroic rebellion
and effort, apathetic, with bursts of energy in private and revolution
in public life; kindly and docile, yet with outbreaks of harshness and
arrogance, indifferent yet with fugitive enthusiasms and a real love
of progress and change. They are mystic and poetical with intervals
of intense utilitarianism, erratically practical, falling from idle
dreams to a keen relish for immediate profit. They combine vanity with
diffidence and pessimism; _naïveté_, which makes them the butt of Spanish
stories, with slyness, whereby they have their revenge; indolence with
love of sport and adventure; respect for the feelings of others with
fondness for satire, sarcasm, and ridicule. They go easily from heights
of rapture to depths of melancholy and suicidal despair, from frank
trustfulness to extremes of suspicion and intrigue, and their dreamy
thoughtfulness passes at rare intervals to explosions of passion and
abuse.

[Sidenote: The Real and the Ideal.]

The fact is that both in life and literature they are incorrigibly
romantic, and when they turn from their romantic dreams to reality they
are peculiarly exposed to the danger of not considering it worth an
effort. They let things be, they easily persuade themselves that things
must be as they are, or that they are as they in words imagine them; and
so in their _saudade_ for some impossible ideal they sink into _desleixo_
and drift (_deixarse-ir_, _deixarse-estar_). Or the Portuguese will
continue to live in his romanticism and ignore reality altogether; his
vanity helps him to ignore it; he will wear cheap and garish chains and
rings and trinkets and imagine himself rich, he will eke out the picture
by the help of his quick imagination and ever-ready flow of words,
heaping rhetoric and exaggeration, and in his vagueness drifting ere he
is aware into falsehood. Then, if his efforts to impose the picture of
his imagining on others at his own valuation fail, he will feel hurt by
their brutal directness, their incapacity to see that a mere string of
words may move mountains.

[Sidenote: “Desleixo.”]

They are taxed with laziness, but it should at least be observed that the
laziness is not due to lack of energy, but rather to the conviction that
“it is not worth while”—_desleixo_. When a thing does appear to be worth
while the _desleixo_ disappears like a cast-off mask. The amount of work
achieved, for instance, by some Portuguese politicians or men-of-letters
is extraordinarily large.

More serious is the accusation that they do not know what the word
justice means, hate or love, acquit or condemn, fawn or bully, persecute
or place on a pinnacle as occasion offers, and lose all sense of fair
play in their vindictiveness. But after all it is the attraction of
the Latin temperament that it is quick and impulsive, even if it
therefore rarely attains that impartial justice which is all-important
for the ruling of an Empire, but the absence of which certainly adds a
picturesque and unforeseen element to life.

[Sidenote: Attitude to Foreigners.]

Unhappily the Portuguese delicacy often meets with rougher manners in
foreigners and shrinks as from a rebuff. The Portuguese himself is
excessively sensitive and he will go out of his way and sacrifice his
own comfort and indolence in order not to hurt the feelings of others,
perhaps in some trifling matter of which the person thus contemplated,
especially if he is a foreigner, remains serenely unaware. The Portuguese
do not know how to treat foreigners. This may seem a strange statement
to those who have visited Portugal and experienced the kindness and
courtesy of high and low on all sides. But they make too great a
difference between themselves and foreigners, and have an almost morbid
desire to stand well in the eyes of the stranger, to appear civilised
and _bien élevés_. On one occasion when a spirited affray was proceeding
in the _Rocio_ of Lisbon, and several persons were killed and wounded,
a Portuguese spectator did not seem in the least concerned by the fact
that men were being shot down, but much concerned that it should be
witnessed by foreigners. “A nice thing for foreigners to see,” was all
he said. Outwardly he pays too much deference to the foreigner, and one
cannot help suspecting that all the time he is aware of his own greater
delicacy and of the poor foreigner’s ill manners. Being self-conscious
and susceptible and, moreover, himself intimately persuaded that Portugal
is a backward country unworthy of Paris or London’s civilisation, he does
not conceive that the foreigner may be making comparisons favourable to
the country he is visiting, but easily imagines that he is slighting or
smiling at him and his customs. His own love of satire and ridicule which
is apt to paralyse his private initiative and political action, makes him
prone to suspect ridicule in others. He will then brood silently over
his offended feelings, and nurse his susceptibilities till they have
vent in one of those sudden outbreaks not unknown to quiet natures. But
the Portuguese, despite his exaggerated politeness towards the stranger
in his land, and a very real and hospitable wish to be of help to him,
does not love foreigners. A Spanish writer in the seventeenth century,
Vicente Espinel, described the Portuguese as “_gente idólatra de si
propria, que no estima en nada el resto del mundo_.” If he despised
foreigners then, it is scarcely to be wondered at if he should dislike or
distrust them now. Vast colonies and the lordship of the sea, which were
once Portugal’s, are now in the hands of other nations, and she never
forgets this. She considers herself to be, like the fallen Napoleon, at
once “conqueror and captive of the earth.” Were Germany mistress of the
seas, and London fallen from its high estate to a provincial destiny, the
English would probably feel some bitterness towards not only their German
conquerors but all foreigners.

[Sidenote: Dream of Vanished Splendour.]

And if the Portuguese does not easily forget that Portugal was once the
greatest empire in Europe, he considers that other nations forget it too
often. It may be that other nations sometimes do not allow sufficiently
for the fact that without pioneer Portugal their own empires had been
less easy of acquisition, but it would certainly be to Portugal’s
advantage were she herself to forget it occasionally. Under modern
conditions it is of little use for a penniless person to dwell on the
fact that his ancestors possessed vast estates: he must make the best of
his present poverty, and, if he has some estates left which cost him more
than they bring in, he will think no shame to sell part in order to be
able to administer the rest—always provided he can find a purchaser. But
the majority of Portuguese reject indignantly the idea of parting with
an inch of their Indian or African possessions. Rather their thoughts
run to extending their territory, to the construction of a fleet, or the
conquest of Spain. Even the idea of a general subscription among the
whole population is not unknown, with a view to securing one or more
of these objects. Dr. Affonso Costa knew his countrymen well when he
promised them a large surplus, to be employed in building a fleet. Such
is the great but misguided patriotism of the Portuguese people, while
the interests and well-being of Portugal itself, which only needs proper
development to become a flourishing country, are overlooked. They dream
of high-flown projects and the work immediately to hand is—postponed. The
Portuguese people is not really indifferent, or at least its indifference
is confined to the play of party politics in Lisbon. In the fall and rise
of a ministry, in the debates of Parliament or in the elections, the
interest of the country at large is of the slightest. The expectations
of the people have been too frequently disappointed for it to set great
store now by political promises, but the Portuguese have a real love of
their country for which they are willing to sacrifice much—everything, it
sometimes seems, except personal vanity and party intrigues.

[Sidenote: Forms of Address.]

Another apparent inconsistency is the democratic feeling which, in
private life, prevails in Portugal to a greater degree than perhaps in
any other country, social distinctions being often ignored there, not
only by those who are not distinguished but by those who are, to an
extent that would be utterly impossible in England. For this democratic
usage has to be reconciled with the widespread vanity of the Portuguese.
In place of the plain “you” employed in England in addressing king or
cobbler, there are in Portugal all kinds of gradations, from _Vossa
Excellencia_ to _O senhor_ (in the third person), _Vossemecé_, or the
more familiar _Vossé_, which even so is a contraction of “Your Worship.”
Ladies are always addressed as _Vossa Excellencia_, and are given the
title of _Dona_ (= the Spanish _Doña_). The title _Dom_ is only given
to men belonging to old aristocratic families, whereas in Spain the
use of _Don_ is, of course, far more general, and in South America it
descends still further, corresponding there, indeed, to the English
use of “Mr.” instead of “Esq.” Letters are often addressed to the Most
Illustrious, Most Excellent, _Senhor_, and, generally, the Portuguese
are more ceremonious even than the Spanish. The humanist, Luis Vives,
in the sixteenth century, complained of the pomposity of address then
beginning in Spain (_i.e._, Spain and Portugal) and Italy: and soon,
he said, we shall be saying “Your Deity”—_mox, ut opinor, Deitas_. But
the fiery Spanish dignity is absent, although the Portuguese have a
quiet resolution and dignity of their own, and their gentle sadness
rarely sinks to a spiritless despondency, and still more rarely to the
grovelling abjection—lowest of the low—described by Byron.

[Sidenote: The Peasants.]

The Portuguese peasantry, especially, is gifted with a delicacy and
intelligence which make life pleasant and poverty no hardship in that
climate. The illiterate are often the flower and cream of the nation.
They are able to express themselves with fluency and correctness, in fact
you will often find a peasant’s speech purer and more refined in accent
than that of an educated Portuguese, and will be amazed at the clearness
and delicacy of tone and expression coming from a person barefoot and
in tatters. Thrice fortunate they who can associate and converse with
the peasants during the summer _romaria_ or village _festa_, or as
they sit round the winter fire (_a lareira_), or gather for some great
common task, a shearing (_tosquia_) or _esfolhada_ (separating the maize
cob from its sheath), for they are certain to glean a rich store of
proverbs, folk-lore, and philology, and will learn much about spirits
and witches. These peasants have poetical imagination, witty speech, no
dearth of ideas, a ready sympathy, and, moreover, a sobriety, patience
and self-control which are the more remarkable in that by nature,
although not quick, they are impulsive and extraordinarily sensitive. It
may be said without exaggeration that the Portuguese people, for all its
colossal ignorance and lack of letters, is one of the most civilised and
intelligent in Europe.

[Sidenote: Folk-Lore.]

It is full of superstitions, and in few countries—Ireland again naturally
occurs to the mind—can there be more legends and charms and incantations,
ignorance thus fostering an immense popular literature in prose and
verse. The varieties of sorcerers and diviners are many: there are
_benzedores_ and _imaginarios_, _magicos_ and _agoureiros_, _bruxas_ and
_feiticeiras_, etc., etc. Only during the last thirty years has this
begun to be a written literature, thanks to the brilliant initiative
and untiring researches of Z. Consiglieri Pedroso, A. T. Pires, Snr. F.
Adolpho Coelho, Snr. Leite de Vasconcellos, Snr. Theophilo Braga and
others. Round every hill and stream of the country has the people woven
some quaint fancy or preserved some ancient myth or fact. To take a
solitary instance: the great rock (_Pedra Amarella_), above the convent
of Pena Longa, at the foot of the Serra de Cintra, is covered with yellow
moss. What is the explanation of this? That the moss grew there, you say.
But the Portuguese people is not likely to dismiss anything in heaven
or earth with four words. The fact is that an old woman, believing this
rock to contain a hidden treasure, was anxious to break it open and to
that purpose kept throwing eggs at it. She did not succeed in her object,
but the rock remains covered with the yolks of the eggs. The Portuguese
people is especially devoted to music, flowers, dance and song. The
humblest, most ramshackle cottage will have an old tin of carnations on
its window ledge or hanging anyhow from the wall. Many of the flowers
have popular names of no little charm. _Goivo_, the old Portuguese word
for joy, is given both to the stock and the wallflower, the fuchsia is
_lagrimas_ (tears), anemones _beijinhos_ (little kisses), the roadside
iris is _lirio_ (lily), any downhanging creeper is _chorão_ (weeper). A
common creeper of that name grows extraordinarily fast, and once boasted
that it would scale heaven, whereupon it was sentenced to advance always
in a downward direction.

[Sidenote: Popular “Cantigas.”]

Of the fascinating popular quatrains (_quadras_) an immense collection
might be formed, indeed some of those already in existence are not
trifling, as, for instance, the _10,000 Cantos populares portuguezes_,
collected in four volumes by A. Thomaz Pires (Elvas, 1902-10). Those
who are alarmed by so great a number may read the _Cancioneiro popular_
(Porto, 1914), selected by Snr. Jaime Cortesão, which contains 563. Or,
still better, make a selection of their own, writing them down at the
dictation of many a peasant who can himself neither write nor read.
These _cantigas_ or _quadras_ spring up continually like mushrooms, and
perish unrecorded, or go from mouth to mouth of the illiterate in endless
variation. They are delightful examples of unpremeditated art, many of
them showing real delicacy and poetical imagination, more so than the
melancholy _fado_ or ballad of fate of the professional _fadistas_. A
vague melancholy underlies most of these _cantigas_. Sadly in the soft
summer evenings many a _canção perdida_ is sung to the slow and plaintive
accompaniment of the guitar—

Triste canta uma voz na syncope do dia.

(Guerra Junqueiro, _Os Simples_, 1892):

Com os passaros do campo
Eu me quero comparar:
Andam vestidos de pennas,
O seu allivio é cantar.

(With the birds of the air
I compare
My plight:
’Tis their solace to sing,
Dark of wing
Is their flight.)

The pun on the words _pennas_ (feathers) and _penas_ (woes) is
untranslatable.

Ó mar alto, ó mar alto,
Ó mar alto sem ter fundo:
Mais vale andar no mar
Do que na boca do mundo.

(O sea so deep, O sea so deep,
O sea so deep beyond our ken:
Better to go upon the sea
Than upon the lips of men.)

Os teus olhos, ó menina,
São gentias da Guiné:
Da Guiné por serem pretos
Gentios por não terem fé.

(Heathen are thine eyes, O maiden,
And from Guinea must they be:
From Guinea eyes that are so black,
Heathen that look so faithlessly.)

With this _cantiga_ readers of Julio Diniz may be already familiar. It
occurs in his _Ineditos_ (1900).

Ó rosa d’este canteiro,
Deixa-te estar até ver,
Que eu vou ao Brazil e volto,
Rosinha, p’ra te colher.

(O rose that flowerest here,
Here till we meet remain,
For, little rose, to Brazil I go,
Then to cull thee come again.)

Chamaste me trigueirinha,
En não me escandalizei:
Trigueirinha é a pimenta
E vae á mesa do rei.

(Brown of hue you called me,
Nor to sting were able:
Brown of hue is pepper,
Yet it goes to the King’s table.)

Ó vida de minha vida,
Quanto tenho tudo é teu,
Só a minha alminha não:
Hei de da-la a quem m’a deu.

(Life thou in whom I live,
All that I have is for thee:
Only my soul (_animula_) must I give
Unto Him who gave it me.)

Quando era solteirinha,
Trazia fitas e laços!
Agora que sou casada
Trago os meus filhos nos braços.

(When I was unwed,
O the ribbons and the laces!
Now each arm instead
A fair babe embraces.)

Nos mais rijos temporaes;
O vento solta gemidos:
Gemidos soltam eguaes
Amantes quando trahidos.

(In the stress of the tempest
The wind makes moan:
So moaneth the lover
Betrayed and alone.)

O annel que tu me deste
Era de vidro e quebrou-se:
O amor que tu me tinhas
Era pouco e acabou-se.

(The ring that thou gav’st me
Was of glass and is broken,
And ended the love
By thy lips lightly spoken.)

Eu direi que em peito amante
Inda amor excede o mar:
Pois que o mar tem a vazante,
E amor tem só preamar.

(Love is more ev’n than the sea
In a lover’s breast, I know:
For love is ever at the full
While the sea’s tides ebb and flow.)

Aqui estou á tua porta
Como o feixinho de lenha,
A espera da resposta
Que de teus olhos me venha.

(Here like a bundle of sticks
Stand I still at thy door,
An answer from thy eyes
Awaiting evermore.)

Cada vez que vejo vir
Gaivotas a beira-mar,
Creio que são os meus amores
Que me desejão fallar.

(When the seagulls come flying
In from the sea,
I think ’tis my love
That would speak with me.)

Cantas tu, cantarei eu
Que o cantar é alegria,
Tambem os anjos cantaram
Canções á Virgem Maria.

(I will sing as thou art singing,
Joy is in the heart of song;
Songs, too, to the Virgin ringing
Came once from the angel throng.)

[Sidenote: Illiterate Poets.]

Anyone with a spirit of enterprise and a thorough knowledge of Portuguese
might collect a goodly crop of such _cantigas_, together with thousands
of delightful expressions and sayings peculiar to each region of
Portugal. Minho especially, that charming province of crystal streams
and cool maize-fields, offers a wide scope. But it is a narrowing
opportunity, since education, however slow its progress in Portugal,
is gradually advancing. Many of the _cantigas_, composed by illiterate
persons, are not intended to survive the occasion that gave them birth.
Hence their naturalness and charm. The lovely Greek epigrams show a more
conscious art. They are the perfect daffodils and hyacinths, whereas
the Portuguese _cantigas_ are the forgotten celandines and primroses of
the lanes and woods. In 1911 died an old workman of Setubal, Antonio
Maria Euzebio (born in 1820), who could neither read nor write, but had
composed verses with great ease from an early age. A volume of his verses
was published in 1901, with introduction by Snr. Theophilo Braga and Snr.
Guerra Junqueiro. Of a poetic art as such he had no glimmering, but, in
Portugal at least, such ignorance would help rather than injure him as a
poet.

[Sidenote: Nature and Art.]

The Portuguese are richly gifted by nature, but, in matters of art or in
artificial surroundings, their natural taste sometimes seems to desert
them. _Corruptio optimi_. Under circumstances which do not allow them
to be themselves some of the aspersions of an eighteenth century writer
may be true of them: “Ils sont jaloux au suprême degré,” wrote the
author of the _Description de la ville de Lisbonne_ (Amsterdam, 1738),
“dissimulés, vindicatifs, railleurs, vains et présomptueux sans sujet.”
(The same writer admits that they have great virtues: “Ils ont avec
beaucoup de vivacité et de pénétration un attachement extraordinaire pour
leur Prince; ils sont fort secrets, fidèles amis, généreux, charitables
envers leurs parens, sobres dans leur manger, ne mangeant presque que
du poisson, ris, vermicelli, légumes, confitures, et ne buvant pour
l’ordinaire que de l’eau.”) The family life of a Portuguese, especially
in some country _quinta_, is extremely attractive, and he only becomes
uninteresting when he follows the customs of foreign nations. So long as
he is natural, few nations excel him; when he ceases to be natural he
lags woefully behind in the ruts of foreign imitation. There was a grain
of truth in the remark of a critic that Camões, with a great lyrical
gift, was unsuccessful in the sonnet owing to his attempt to introduce
naturalness into an essentially artificial form. The Portuguese, where
their love of nature does not help them, are left at the mercy of
extravagance and tawdriness.

[Sidenote: Artistic Sense.]

Not that the ordinary artisan does not turn out much good honest work.
Indeed, while the Spanish make things for show rather than for use, and
the French for a little of both, the Portuguese agrees with the English
in making them with a regard for comfort and a sublime unconcern for the
look of them. And in this no doubt they show their good sense. But they
are not artistic. This is shown in a thousand ways, in the curve of a
chair, the finish of a book-case, in their buildings, in the colour of
their dress and of the wash for their houses, in which squashed hues,
and especially pink, predominate; in the shape of the water-jars, in
which the soul of a Latin people is often expressed. (The Portuguese jars
are often rather useful than ornamental, squat in shape, fashioned to
contain the greatest possible quantity of water, and with but one handle,
for use, instead of two, for art’s sake.) In the construction of modern
houses, as in many matters of daily life, the Portuguese makes comfort or
a saving of trouble the principal consideration. Their ancient buildings
in which, indeed, foreign architects had no little part—Batalha, for
instance, or Alcobaça—can vie in beauty with those of any country. But,
although Manoeline architecture in some cases may have justified its
existence, in principle it was an outrage against pure Gothic, and a
similar tastelessness may be noted in daily life at the present time. The
undertakers add a horror to death in other cities besides Lisbon, but
in no other can the grandest funerals be marked by a more grotesque and
fantastic ugliness. Nor is it easy to forget a coffin at a funeral in the
provinces—not that of a child. It was bright pink with silver scales. It
is most curious, this tendency to tinsel on the part of a people which
appears to have natural good taste. Perhaps it is an importation from the
East.

[Sidenote: Soft Wax.]

Certainly foreign influences and a half-education are extremely dangerous
in Portugal. In many parts of the country the people is still unspoilt,
and the demagogue and politician appear like a bull in a china shop, with
vast possibilities of damage and destruction. Portugal is but a little
wax, wrote the novelist Eça de Queiroz (1843-1900). The Portuguese people
is “soft wax” repeated Snr. Guerra Junqueiro in 1896: “What we need is
a great sculptor.” The history of Portugal has been the history of a
few great men who have passed on the torch of her glories from century
to century, a Nun’ Alvares, the soldier-saint, or the splendid Affonso
d’Albuquerque, who often found it as difficult to cope with his own
followers as with the enemy in the East. But for all that Portugal is
a land of strongly-rooted and noble traditions, and these the required
sculptor must take into account if he is to be successful in his task. It
would be wrong to infer that the anonymous mass that forms the background
to those great figures of the past is characterless. For, beneath the
apathy, the docility, the contradictions of the Portuguese people remains
something perhaps not very easy to define, but which has an intimate
peculiar flavour, something pliant, adaptable, insinuating but with
a real will and persistency of its own. Potential, it may be, rather
than actual, but certainly a sound and promising basis for growth and
development, if properly directed.

“What is urgent,” to quote again Snr. Guerra Junqueiro, “is not a social
or a political but a moral revolution.” “Quant à la moralité,” wrote M.
Léon Poinsard later, in 1910, “elle semble plutôt en voie de diminuer”
(_Le Portugal Inconnu_). A few years earlier a Lisbon newspaper, _O
Diario de Noticias_, in a leading article (16th September, 1902) deplored
the _podridão moral_ of Portuguese society, the “_perversão de caracteres
e desbragamento dos costumes politicos_.” Such remarks apply usually to
Lisbon rather than to Portugal as a whole. In village life, considering
the circumstances, the absolute lack of direction, the landed gentry
absentee, the authority of the priest undermined, morality may be said
to stand remarkably high. And the great mass of the Portuguese people
is, emphatically, _désorienté_ rather than degenerate. They would answer
readily—yes, even Beckford’s Lisbon _canaille_—to a leader capable of
leading something more than a pack of yelping political parasites.

[Sidenote: The Portuguese at Home.]

It must always be remembered that the foreigner often views the
Portuguese at his worst, in an artificial atmosphere, rarely in his
natural life and surroundings. He seldom has occasion to see him in his
home life, in which the real affectionateness of his nature is evident,
nor to realise the nobility and delicacy of his dreams and ideals which
are so often shattered by harsh reality, and the genuine kindliness which
proves that his politeness and courtesy are not merely superficial.
If they have not the immediate attraction of some other nations, they
prove, on longer acquaintance, to be a people not only pleasant but of
a real good-nature, of a child-like simplicity beneath their vanity,
and with a certain strength and determination for all their apparent
pliancy. Intensely susceptible and easily driven by rudeness and violence
into furtive, hypocritical and vindictive tactics, they answer with
extreme goodwill to any show of friendliness and respect. If they are
capable rather of occasional heroic actions than of securing a gradual
prosperity, they are nevertheless a people peculiarly gifted, under
proper guidance, to achieve what, presumably, is the end to which modern
civilisation aspires—a state of peace and culture with ever-widening and
deepening international relations. Only, of course, such relations can
never be set on a satisfactory basis by sacrificing anything that is
genuinely Portuguese. For a nation can hardly look for respect which has
nothing of its own to offer, and prides itself exclusively on its foreign
imitations. And the Portuguese of all peoples will find their best models
in their own past history and literature. Voltaire, not a bad judge in
the matter of wit, called the Portuguese “_une nation spirituelle_,” and,
in spite of all their national misfortunes, a witty nation they remain.
It will be well if their wit be directed not to pull down national
customs and institutions, but—as by many writers of the sixteenth
century—against those who ape foreign manners.

CHAPTER II

POPULATION AND EMPLOYMENT

[Sidenote: Census of 1911.]

The latest census of the population, that is, the returns at the end of
the year 1911,[1] presents some interesting figures. This is the fifth
census taken in Portugal. The first, in 1864, gave the population as
4,118,410, in the census of 1878 it was 4,698,984, of 1890 5,049,729, and
of 1900 5,423,132. That of 1911 gives a population of 5,960,056. Thus, in
fifty years the population of Portugal has increased by nearly a third,
and, although something must be allowed for the more accurate returns
in recent years, is evidently in no danger of diminishing, in spite of
increasing emigration. Moreover, there are no less than 211,813 families
(over a seventh of the whole number, 1,411,327) of seven or more persons.

[Sidenote: Increasing Population.]

The density is 65 persons to the square _kilomètre_, as compared with
44 for the average of all Europe, Portugal coming eleventh on the list
of European countries, Spain nineteenth (39 persons to the square
_kilomètre_). The district which shows the largest increase is that of
Minho (including the country between the rivers Douro and Minho), which
was already overcrowded in 1900 with 162 inhabitants to the square
_kilomètre_. It now has 178. Estremadura (which includes Lisbon) has
also risen considerably—from 68 to 80. The other provinces show a much
slighter increase (Beira Alta from 88 to 95, Algarve from 50 to 54, Beira
Baixa from 39 to 42, Traz os Montes from 39 to 40, Alemtejo from 17 to
20).

[Sidenote: Foreigners.]

Other points of interest are the increase of the city population[2] at
the rate of 15 per cent., one-third more, that is, than the rate of
increase for the country population, and the decrease in the number of
foreigners by some 500 since the beginning of the century (41,197 in
1911, 41,728 in 1900, 41,339 in 1890). The number of Spaniards has fallen
from 27,029 in 1900 to 20,517 in 1911, the French from 1,841 to 1,832,
Italians from 561 to 547, Belgians from 188 to 170. On the other hand,
the number of Brazilians has increased from 7,594 to 12,143, of English
from 2,292 to 2,516, Germans from 929 to 969.

[Sidenote: Details of Population.]

In the census of 1900 there were 108·8 women to 100 men in the population
of Portugal. During the next ten years the percentage slightly increased,
so that there are now 110 women to 100 men, that is, 4 per cent. more
than in any other country of Europe. The census of 1911 gives the number
of persons over eighty years of age in Portugal as nearly one per cent.
of the entire population: 52,783. Of these 31,891 were women, and 20,892
men. These figures are subdivided as follows: Women, between 80 and 84
years, 21,154; from 85 to 89 years, 6,489; from 90 to 94 years, 2,900;
from 95 to 99 years, 992; over 100 years, 265. The corresponding numbers
of men are 14,256, 4,452, 1,554, 500, 130. This says much for the
excellence of the climate and the hardiness of the race. On the other
hand, the mortality among the children of the poor is enormous: it is
quite common for two to grow up out of a family of seven or nine.

[Sidenote: Emigration.]

Emigration from Portugal has increased on a vast scale in recent years.
The official statistics for 1909 (published in 1912) gave the number of
emigrants as 30,288. Other statistics for the same year gave 38,213, of
whom 30,580 were bound for Brazil. Both figures are well below the truth
if the clandestine emigration is taken into account. It is impossible
to keep count of those who cross the frontier into Spain, and many even
of those who emigrate by sea succeed in escaping registration. In 1908
the number of registered emigrants was 35,731, in 1907 31,312, in 1906
27,332, in 1905 25,594. Of the 30,288 emigrants of 1909 25,039 were male
(of whom 12,822 could read) and 5,249 women (of whom only 804 could
read). Since 1909 the emigration has doubled and trebled. A Republican
newspaper, _O Seculo_,[3] printed some figures in 1913. The writer
pointed out that there were whole regions in Portugal without labourers
for the fields, and that whole families were now emigrating as never
before. Emigration agencies _pululam por todo o Norte_, fourteen agencies
being established in Oporto alone. The _Diario de Noticias_[4] declared
that there were tens of leagues of uncultivated land in Portugal, while
over two millions sterling of cereals were imported annually. In 1912 the
number of emigrants had more than trebled since 1902 in the districts of
Oporto, Coimbra, Guarda, Vianna, Vizeu, Villa Real, Bragança, Leiria and
Santarem. In the last five districts it had more than doubled since 1910.
The figures given for the district of Bragança were 10,504 in 1912, 6,331
in 1907, and 550 in 1902! (the other chief increase being at Villa Real,
respectively 7,732, 3,140, and 1,356). These are the two principal towns
of Traz os Montes. The total number of emigrants in 1912 bordered on
100,000; but in 1914 there was a notable decrease. A large number of the
emigrants go to Brazil (and indeed they are totally unfitted to go to any
country of which they do not know the language), and maintain relations
with the mother country, sending money home and sometimes returning as
enriched _Brazileiros_.

[Sidenote: Salaries.]

In Portugal the salaries are low and give no great incentive to labour,
especially as they have remained almost stationary, while the price of
food and rent has risen. Even during the long harvest days the women
receive only a shilling a day or even less for working perhaps sixteen
hours in the fields, the men two shillings or less. Some instances of
wages are given in M. Poinsard’s _Le Portugal Inconnu_. A day labourer
of the Douro district receives 200 _réis_ (= tenpence), an agricultural
labourer in Alemtejo 250 (500 in time of harvest), a carpenter of the
Serra da Estrella 320 _réis_, a miner in a lead-mine near Aveiro 350, a
mason of Minho 400, a carpenter of Braga 400, a weaver of Guimarães 500,
a mason of Lisbon 700, a weaver of Lisbon 700, a shoemaker’s assistant
at Coimbra from 220 to 440, a carpenter in Alemtejo 400, a dressmaker’s
assistant in Lisbon 240.

[Sidenote: Poverty and Ignorance.]

Many families live from day to day and from hand to mouth by odd jobs,
and the tendency to live thus precariously has been increased by the
recent unrest. They live on little or nothing, and devote all their
energy and wits to pay arrears of rent sufficient to prevent them from
being turned out of their houses, which often consist of but one or two
rooms. In one instance a family of seven lives in a single room, the
entire furniture consisting of an old mattress in one corner. Needless
to say, the windows are kept closed at night and there is no fire-place,
a comparatively rare thing in the Portuguese climate. (The cooking is
done over three stones.) Far worse than their poverty is their ignorance
and carelessness of health and hygiene. Not that these deficiencies
are confined to the peasants of Portugal, but they are most serious in
a hot climate. Little attention is given to the advantages of air and
water, and what wonder when even educated persons pay little heed to
them. During some days of exceptional heat, in the summer of 1913, the
correspondent of a Lisbon newspaper at Oporto wrote that the heat there
had been so terrible that windows had to be kept open at night. And
this in a climate which rarely gives excuse for closed windows. There
is no direction from above; many villages have not a single educated
inhabitant, and but few inhabitants who can write or read, and have not
even a church.

[Sidenote: Sanitation.]

The mayors of many a town and village are too much occupied with high
politics to think of such sublunary matters as the cleanliness of the
streets. Rubbish is left in the burning sun for children to play in,
street, river, and cliff being polluted with it, and many small towns
are in a truly miserable state. The mayor of one of them was asked why
a cart was not sent to collect the rubbish, and his answer was typical.
Although it was well known that no such cart was in existence, he did not
say that a cart would be sent or that he would see what could be done or
any other such polite evasion. He merely said that a cart is sent every
day, and there was an end of the matter. With such simplicity are these
questions solved. It is worth while to dwell on such matters since they
are of more importance than fine-sounding party programmes. The local
authorities, appointed for party reasons, would no doubt scout the idea
that anti-clericalism may be of less value than the destruction of flies.
They drive out the “ominous _soutane_,” and the land, as Egypt of old,
is “corrupted by reason of the swarm of flies.” “The unhealthiness of a
great part of the country, the crowded and sometimes wretched houses, the
complete absence of any hygienic discipline among the rural population,
are other probable causes of the lack of energy of the agricultural
labourer, who for the rest is constitutionally capable of great
endurance.... With notable power of endurance, a climate which permits
an almost uninterrupted activity, both for labourers and vegetation, the
agricultural population of Portugal will have a wide future before it
when food, houses, and hygiene are improved, and many regions rendered
more healthy, when irrigation and technical instruction are extended,
crops better adapted to the soil, machinery more generally employed and
agrarian societies organised.”[5]

[Sidenote: Overcrowding and Starvation.]

In many houses such a thing as a bed is unknown, but in houses that
can afford it the articles are far more numerous (and ugly) than, for
instance, in Spain, and in the kitchen an infinite variety of pots and
pans fills up the room to the exclusion of cleanliness. Many families
subsist on bread, potatoes, mussels, sardines, with occasional rice and
_bacalhau_, meat being unknown. Their state has not changed much since
the sixteenth century, when many of the Portuguese are represented as
“ne vivant quasi d’autre chose que de caracolles, de moulles et petits
poissons”—a people “non adonné aux superfluités.”[6] With overcrowding in
unhealthy quarters in the towns and gnawing poverty in the country it is
not surprising that the mortality is high.

[Sidenote: Absentee Landlords.]

The evils are increased by the total lack of direction. Sometimes at
the very gates of a large and flourishing property one comes across a
village of tumble-down hovels like so many walls of loose stones built
irregularly and picturesquely along a “street” of stone and rock which
becomes a torrent in winter; and one is inclined to compare them with the
neat, comfortable cottages in villages under the supervision of those
“harassing” English squires. Yet in each case it needs only the interest
and goodwill of one person to alter the state of the whole village and
give an impetus to cleanliness and comfort and education, but that person
will certainly not be the agent of an absentee landlord.

[Illustration: A FARMHOUSE, MINHO]

[Sidenote: Small Holdings of Minho.]

In the size of holdings there is the same difference between the north
and south of Portugal as between Galicia and Andalucía in Spain. In
Minho the land is all dividing walls and hedges round diminutive fields,
the average size of holdings being under an acre, and many of them
mere patches the size of a pocket handkerchief. In 1908 for 5,423,132
inhabitants the number of holdings was given as 11,430,740! “And if it
is considered that this division is increased in, and almost confined
to part of the centre and to the north, the extent of the evil will
be clear. I know of many proprietors who, to obtain a total rent of
fifteen or twenty _escudos_,[7] have over a hundred properties scattered
over the parish, the rent of some of them representing fractions
of a halfpenny.... In many parishes of the north there are olives,
chestnut-trees and oaks in the property of one person but belonging to
someone else, and sometimes these trees are divided between more than one
owner.”[8]

[Sidenote: Large Estates.]

In Alemtejo the average size of a property is forty or fifty times
greater than in the north, properties of 20,000 acres being not unknown.
Alemtejo, under the Romans flourishing with corn, has large tracts of
waste land, and when the land is cultivated modern machinery is rarely
in use. When introduced by the owner of the land it is allowed to fall
out of use, if possible, by the workmen, and at harvest time one has the
picturesque sight of an interminable row of labourers at work without any
of the noise and bustle of machinery. It has been suggested that some
of the emigrants from the north of the country should be encouraged to
go to Alemtejo instead of Brazil, and that the cultivation of seven or
eight hundred more acres of Alemtejo as corn-land would put an end to the
importation of corn which now drains the country of hundreds of thousands
of pounds yearly, and seems to belie the undoubted fact that Portugal
is above all an agricultural country. There are difficulties in the way
of the scheme, since Alemtejo is a little too near home to form the
Eldorado of the peasant of Minho and Traz os Montes. Moreover, if a part
of Alemtejo were subdivided into small holdings for peasant colonists,
whatever advantages were given to them the probability is that the
holdings would gradually accumulate in the hands of one or two persons
and form a few more Alemtejan _montes_ and _herdades_. At least this was
the result of a similar experiment in Andalucía.

[Sidenote: Irrigation.]

There is also the difficulty of water, Alemtejo more than the rest of
Portugal standing in need of irrigation (artesian wells), although
irrigation is welcome to agriculture throughout the country in view of
the long summer droughts. Given water, vegetation of all kinds grows and
prospers with marvellous rapidity in this land of hot sun and warm air.

[Sidenote: Afforestation.]

A requirement that goes hand in hand with irrigation is that of
afforestation. It is true that woods cover above 22 per cent. of the
total area of Portugal, which is double the average in Spain and
two-thirds of the average in Europe. The cultivated area was given as
5,068,454 _hectares_ in 1906, the uncultivated as 3,842,186. Trees
were calculated to occupy some 1,700,000 _hectares_,[9] and most of
these trees are of a valuable kind. Those of widest extension are pines
(about 430,000 _hectares_[10]), evergreen oaks (_azinheiras_: 416,000
_hectares_), cork-trees (366,000[11]), and olives (329,000). Chestnuts
cover some 84,000 _hectares_, and oaks 47,000.[12] But, especially in
Traz os Montes, Alemtejo, and the Serra da Estrella, there is plenty of
scope for afforestation. In the latter, which compares so unfavourably
with the well-wooded Serra do Gerez, something has been done. Near
Manteigas about 2,000 acres have been afforested (chiefly with pine
and oak). In 1913 alone some four hundred bushels of acorns were sown.
Altogether since the law of 1901, which placed the woods under the
Department of Public Works, some 12,000 acres have been afforested[13]
by the State, and private individuals are said to afforest almost as
many acres annually, the State selling 30,000 kilos (at threepence the
kilo)[14] of pine seed yearly. The State itself possesses comparatively
little land, and the town councils have shown no inclination to be
dispossessed of their commons. The more enlightened Portuguese from
King Diniz onwards have always been keenly alive to the advantages of
afforestation, but the more remote town councils have done nothing to
counteract the destruction of trees at the hands of the peasants.[15] At
the new annual “Festival of the Tree” trees are planted throughout the
country by the school-children. The yield of a _hectare_ of the famous
Leiria pine woods is estimated at four _milreis_, and the expense at one
_milreis_, giving a net profit of about twelve shillings. This would be
increased by easier and cheaper means of transport.

[Illustration: A FARMER]

[Sidenote: Roads.]

The state of the Portuguese roads has recently been attracting much
attention, and during the last sixty years has been the constant care of
Ministers of Public Works. (This department was created in 1852.) About
13,000 miles of roads have been projected by the State, only about a half
of which have been constructed[16]—almost all in the second half of last
century. The worst is, however, not that roads are not made, but that
there is apparently no money to keep them in repair. Yet an average of
over a thousand contos has been spent on roads annually during the last
sixty years. A writer recently in _O Seculo_[17] remarks that Portugal
“is imperfectly equipped with roads and, moreover, those which exist
are in such a state, in most districts, that they can scarcely be used.
We know various places which are so to say isolated from neighbouring
towns, and can only be approached easily by railway. The state of the
roads with ruts and holes in which carts sink has in certain parts given
rise to a curious industry, that of rescuing vehicles which have stuck
fast. It is exercised by peasants possessing yokes of oxen, who at
sunrise, armed with hooks and ropes, lead them to the worst places, and
there wait patiently for a motor-car or other vehicle to sink in, and
then immediately offer their assistance, in return for a few shillings
or pence, according to the quality of the vehicle and its occupants.”
Motor-cars, which are surprisingly numerous in Portugal, and are all
imported from abroad, deserve a better fate than this, considering that
they pay a tax of £24 at the Customs.

[Sidenote: Propaganda de Portugal.]

But, on the whole, the roads of Portugal compare favourably with those
of Spain, and any improvement to encourage tourists must be carried out
in connection with Spain, that is, with the roads between the Portuguese
frontier and Irun. Now, both in Portugal and Spain, societies are
established to watch over the interests of tourists. The Sociedade de
Propaganda de Portugal, which is doing good work, has its headquarters at
the _Largo das duas Igrejas_, Lisbon, and is most prompt and willing in
answering any inquiries. It may be hoped that improvement will be rapid,
and of course it is equally important for agriculture, which especially
requires the construction of a large number of small by-roads. The
construction of roads in both countries has been too often intimately
connected with politics, and their repair, when entrusted to the local
authorities, has been a disastrous failure. Were a first-rate road to
prolong to the Portuguese frontier the road of five hundred miles from
Paris to the Bidasoa, and could the roads in Portugal be compared with
those of the Basque provinces (both in France and in Spain), a country
so beautiful and with so many famous buildings would be overrun with
motor-cars (so that quiet people would flee to the mountains).

[Sidenote: Railways.]

The railways are even more deficient. When those in construction have
been completed the total will amount to a little over two thousand miles.
The whole of the south of Portugal is served by but one line, which goes
from Lisbon (_i.e._, from Barreiro across the Tagus) to Faro, branching
off midway to Evora and Villa Viçosa and again to Moura. The journey
to Faro requires over twelve hours, with the result that Algarve is
practically cut off from the capital. The desert of Sahara is scarcely
more remote. A briefer route and a bridge over the Tagus at Lisbon are
in contemplation. Hitherto facilities given to travel have chiefly taken
into consideration persons leaving Portugal or coming so far as Lisbon
and Oporto only, and many of the most delightful and characteristic parts
of the country are left unvisited.

The postal service between Lisbon and foreign countries is good, but in
the provinces it differs little from the service in Spain, where the
receipt of a letter is as hazardous as the winning of a prize in the
lottery.[18]

[Sidenote: Mines.]

Besides tourists and agriculture, improvement in the communications would
encourage the development of the mining industry. At present the number
of miners in Portugal is small, although the subsoil is known to be
rich in minerals. Many of the mines that are worked are in the hands of
foreigners, and the minerals are often exported in the condition in which
they leave the mine. The statistics for 1912 show an increase in the
production of coal (70 _contos_), iron (21), copper (254), and tin (33).
The mineral obtained in largest quantities is wolfram; gold, antimony,
uranium, zinc, and other minerals are produced on a very small scale.
The total yearly output of the mines in Portugal is estimated at under
£400,000.

[Sidenote: Fishing Industries.]

About 60,000 persons, or one per cent. of the entire population, are
engaged in fishing or in selling or preparing fish. Sardines are very
plentiful, and donkeys laden with them are driven far inland. The number
of Portuguese who go to the north seas to fish for _bacalhau_ has greatly
increased in recent years, and in 1911 amounted to 1,400, in forty-five
boats of an average size of 280 tons, whereas in 1902 there were but
fifteen boats with an average size of 180 tons.

[Sidenote: Portuguese Manufactures.]

The number of workmen employed in the cutting and preparation of cork may
be 5,000, but, even if these be included, the total industrial population
of Portugal will scarcely exceed three per cent. of the whole population.
The largest number are employed in cotton and woollen factories of the
north (Covilhã Guimarães, Portalegre, etc.), the former with some 30,000,
the latter with some 10,000 workmen. A far smaller number are engaged
in factories of paper, glass, glazed tiles (_azulejos_), silk, etc.[19]
Portuguese industries, although they are bolstered up by an excessive
protection, are not congenial to the climate or the character of the
people, and but for protection many of them could not exist for a month,
while under protection they tend to vegetate and to raise the prices
rather than the quality of their products. It is sometimes complained
that the Methuen treaty killed Portuguese cottons and woollens, but as
a matter of fact an even more exaggerated protection could not enable
them to compete with foreign goods. They are exported chiefly to the
Portuguese colonies; the woollen goods supplied in Portugal are mostly
of a very rough sort, such as peasants’ caps and cloaks, excellent of
their kind. The Portuguese have always shown a preference for English
stuffs.[20] In the same way the paper produced is of the commonest;
perhaps the only manufacture in which they excel is that of the glazed
tiles, with which so many houses are lined within and without.

[Sidenote: Agriculture.]

The main business of the Portuguese is not industry, not even politics,
but agriculture,[21] the number of persons engaged in agriculture being
calculated at about three-fifths of the whole population. Agriculture
often, too often, means vineyards. The soil and sun of Portugal combine
to make it a land of the grape; and along the sea vines can grow where
other crops cannot, dying down to escape the winter storms, then
receiving the spring rains till the grapes begin to swell and sweeten in
the summer months of drought.

[Sidenote: Wines.]

Nearly every other village seems to be celebrated for its wines—common
wines prepared without care, and selling for twopence or threepence the
_litre_ bottle. The yearly average of production is about a hundred
_litres_ to every inhabitant in Portugal. The wines chiefly exported are
of course port wine and Madeira.[22] The wines of Collares, Bucellas,
and Carcavellos have a great reputation in Portugal, as also those of
Ribatejo, the _Moscatel_ of Setubal, and the light _vinhos verdes_ of
Minho (Amarante, Basto, Monsão). The famous treaty of Methuen in 1703,
which stipulated that Portuguese wines should be exported to England
at a reduced tariff (see pages 126 and 225) has been blamed by some
Portuguese for the fall of the price of wines in Portugal. That is,
they blame England because the Portuguese after the treaty, in their
eagerness to benefit by it, devoted themselves to vine-growing to the
exclusion of other branches of agriculture. The Portuguese vine-growers
have had to contend against this over-production, against the ravages of
phylloxera, which a quarter of a century ago destroyed nearly two hundred
thousand acres (since for the most part replanted), against foreign
falsifications, against the competition of France, Italy, and Spain.[23]
Recently the export of common red wines of Portugal to Brazil has greatly
increased, Brazil being now the country to which, after England, Portugal
exports most wine—as also the export of generous wines to Germany since
the German-Portuguese commercial treaty of 1908. Against these advantages
must be set the closure of French markets and the decreasing popularity
of port wine in England. The districts of Portugal which produce most
wine are those of Lisbon (about 160,000 acres of vineyards), Braga (about
75,000 acres), Vizeu (about 72,000 acres), Santarem (about 65,000),
Oporto (about 62,000).

[Sidenote: Olive Oil.]

The total cultivated area in Portugal exceeds twelve million acres, and
of this area olives occupy about a fifteenth, or 329,000 _hectares_ (in
1906), vines 313,000 _hectares_, and fruit trees (chiefly the fig, almond
and carob, which need little rain and flourish in Algarve) about 630,000
acres. Olives are grown principally in the districts of Santarem (75,000
_hectares_), Leiria (35,000), Castello Branco (33,000), Beja, Bragança,
and Coimbra (some 25,000 _hectares_ each), and Faro (20,000). The annual
export of olive oil is considerable, but it cannot compare for excellence
with the oil of Italy: it is in fact from Italy that oil comes for the
tinning of fish in Portugal.

[Illustration: THE VINTAGE, DOURO]

[Sidenote: Strange Imports.]

But the most remarkable imports into Portugal are those of wheat, maize
and rice, in which, as in garden produce and cattle, Portugal should
be able to become almost, if not quite, self-supporting. While whole
regions remain untilled and emigrants are counted by the thousand
monthly, immense sums are spent every year in importing wheat and maize:
in 1913 the Treasury received about £600,000 merely from the duty on
these imports. Maize is grown chiefly in the north, where in summer it
gives a cool peaceful look to the province of Minho, wheat in Alemtejo,
and rye in Traz os Montes. Official statistics for 1911 give the number
of _hectares_ sown with corn as follows in the various districts: Beja
117,324 (11·44 per cent. of the entire area of the district), Castello
Branco 68,299 (10·21 per cent.), Evora 65,290 (8·82), Lisbon 54,810
(6·90), Portalegre 47,608 (7·64), Santarem 29,252 (4·41), Faro 19,648
(3·91), Bragança 18,563 (2·85), Guarda 8,996 (1·64), Coimbra 5,754
(1·47), Vizeu 2,776 (·55), Villa Real 2,691 (·60), Porto 2,064 (·89),
Braga 1,492 (·55), Aveiro 1,004 (·56), Vianna 996 (·44). Alemtejo,
besides corn, provides wide pasture lands, and live stock forms one of
Portugal’s principal exports (chiefly to England and Spain), while, on
the other hand, large quantities of meat are imported from South America.
Mules and pigs are most numerous in the province of Alemtejo, horses and
donkeys in Estremadura, sheep and goats in Traz os Montes, and oxen in
Minho.

[Sidenote: Exports and Imports.]

Portugal’s chief exports, besides wine and cork, are cattle, fish,
fruits, minerals, wood, olive oil. There is no reason why all of these,
with the exception perhaps of wine, should not show a gradual increase
as fresh markets are obtained, and better methods (especially in the
preparation of olive oil) and quicker communications, which will
enable Portuguese fruits and flowers to be exported in ever-growing
quantities.[24] The principal imports, apart from machinery and articles
of luxury, are wheat, maize, sugar, cod, rice. A large number of Dutch
cheeses is imported every year, although the curious little soft white
cheeses, about the size of half a crown, are very common in Portugal,
and are a favourite food of the peasants. Indolence, ignorance, mistaken
finance and lack of capital have hitherto fettered agriculture in
Portugal, neglect on the part of the State and of private landowners
going hand in hand with illiteracy and distrust on the part of the
peasants. But it can hardly be doubted that Portuguese agriculture has
a prosperous future and that the miserable lot of the peasant will be
improved. Portugal should be able to become a land of enlightened and
cultured farmers, such as are sometimes found in the north of Europe (for
instance, in Denmark), as it were a land of little Herculanos, combining
farming with scholarship.

CHAPTER III

LIFE IN TOWN AND COUNTRY

[Sidenote: The “Chiado.”]

For many, too many, Portuguese, Lisbon is Portugal. They will put up
with much misery in the provinces so long as Lisbon has fine shops and
streets and squares. The ambition of the peasant is to see Lisbon, and
many prefer to live, however wretchedly, as citizens of that great city
than quietly at their ease in the country. The rich inhabitants inhabit
Paris, or else, as in the days of Garrett, “spend their lives between the
_Chiado_ and the _Rua do Oiro_,” although the motor-car now lures many
from the clubs of the _Rua Garrett_ and the _cafés_ of the Rocio at least
as far afield as Cintra or the Estoris. _Rua Garrett_ is now the official
name (after the poet Almeida-Garrett, 1799-1854), but it remains the
_Chiado_ in common speech. Its name derived probably from the name, or
rather from the nickname, of another poet, Antonio Ribeiro, _o Chiado_.
He was a popular sixteenth-century Lisbon poet, and lived in a house
just off this street: it is thought that the frequent phrase “_Vámos ao
Chiado_” (“Let us go and see Chiado”) led to the name being given to the
street, hitherto called _Rua direita das Portas de Santa Catharina_. The
quaint lift which suspends people like the mediaeval Virgil in a basket
over the city, and, like some of the other eight _ascensores_, gives
a splendid view, still has the words written up at its _Largo de São
Julião_ entrance: “AO CHIADO.”

[Sidenote: The “Baixa.”]

Lisbon, on its seven hills, has so few level spaces that people naturally
congregate, as water runs down from a mountain-side, in the district
between the Rocio and the river, appropriately called the _Baixa_, the
Low Quarter, and meeting between acquaintances is more frequent than in
any other capital city. The splendid _Avenida da Liberdade_ has never
become popular, and is apt to be deserted except on special occasions,
a great review or some Republican anniversary. It seems to be too far
from the centres of gossip: before you had walked from the _Praça dos
Restauradores_ (_i.e._, the liberators of Portugal from Spain in 1640) to
the _Praça do Marquez de Pombal_ and back a ministry might have fallen.
Best keep on the safe side and miss nothing of the human comedy which in
Lisbon has centred in the _Rocio_ throughout the centuries. Here there
is continual movement by day and night. Lisbon sits up late and is an
extremely late riser. Three o’clock on a June morning sees the last
revellers in the streets, and, later, at an hour when other cities have
put on their best clothes, dust-bins still line the pavements, and the
rag-pickers are at their work.

[Sidenote: Singed Pigs.]

Lisbon’s streets, spick and span, at least all those that the passing
tourist will see, give no idea of the accounts of all writers a century
ago, who in prose and verse agreed about the dirt and nastiness of the
town. Indeed, so late as 1835 the suggestions of a Portuguese writer
for the improvement of the city give some idea of its condition. It
will be forbidden, said he, to break in horses in the streets. It will
be forbidden to kill or singe pigs in the streets, or keep them alive
in the streets, or tied to the doors, “for all these things annoy the
inhabitants.” Dead animals were not to be left lying in the streets.
He noted, too, the number of stray dogs, the beggars at every step,
the filthiness of the outer staircases of the houses.[25] Some of the
staircases had deep wells beneath them—there was one at No. 17 rua da
Prata, 19 _palmos_ deep.[26] The great houses had several, as also the
convents; indeed, there is a doleful history of how the Prioress fell
into one of these on a moonless night; however, she was fished out
next morning, and it was regarded as a miracle that her clothes were
perfectly dry, not even the _sabots_ which she was wearing showing any
sign of water.

[Illustration: TERREIRO DO PAÇO, LISBON]

[Sidenote: The “Aguadeiros.”]

But the wisest inhabitants of Lisbon sent and send their servants and
negro slaves to the public fountains or buy the water brought thence by
the _aguadeiros_ who may be seen barrel on shoulder in all the narrow
streets of the high-lying districts. The water of many of these fountains
is reputed to have special virtues, as formerly the “fountain of the
horses of New Street,” taken before sunrise, miraculously healed diseases
of the eyes, and the same water “has the secret property of speedily
fattening the horses that drink of it, and it would do the same to men
if they went to drink of it at the fountain.” Carrying heavy _bilhas_ of
water up Lisbon’s steep and narrow streets is so arduous a business that
the poorest inhabitants prefer to pay a tiny sum to the _aguadeiro_, and
in a country where wine is often almost as common as water the qualities
of the various waters are discussed with perhaps greater keenness than
those of wines. In the sixteenth century the number of water-sellers is
given as twenty-six.

[Sidenote: Lisbon Streets and Houses.]

Many houses, chiefly in the newer parts of the city, are entirely covered
outside with _azulejos_, mostly green or blue, which give them a cool
and cleanly appearance. The rooms inside, too, often have a pattern of
_azulejos_ several feet high round the walls, and their use should be
more common in all hot countries. The low-lying part of Lisbon between
the _Rocio_ (sometimes called Rolling Motion Square or Turkey Square) and
the _Terreiro do Paço_ or _Praça do Commercio_ (Black Horse Square) was
rebuilt in parallel straight streets after the earthquake of 1755. These
streets seem narrow enough now, and the united breadth of them would
fit into the _Avenida da Liberdade_, but for the days of the Marquez de
Pombal their plan had a certain grandeur. They still keep in some measure
their distinctive characters, the _Rua da Prata_ abounding in the shops
of silversmiths, the _Rua Augusta_ in tailors and linendrapers. From the
_Rocio_, besides these links with Black Horse Square, goes the steep _Rua
do Carmo_, with more fashionable shops, leading to the _Chiado_, and on
the opposite side is the great market-place of the _Praça da Figueira_.

[Sidenote: The Market.]

Thither through the night carts drawn by single oxen rumble slowly in,
laden with vegetables from the country, the white hanging street-lamps
lighting up the lordly pyramids of cabbages or turnips or tomatoes while
_regateiras_ (market women, also called _collarejas_, from Collares)
carry in great baskets on their heads, and may be seen resting at dawn
on the pavement outside the market. Indeed, it is one of the charms of
Lisbon that beneath all its cosmopolitanism it has succeeded in retaining
a certain rustic air. The servant-girl in one of M. Anatole France’s
books, who came back well pleased with her first day in Paris: _elle
avait vu de beaux navets_, would be enchanted with Lisbon. There the flat
open baskets of vegetables balanced by men on their shoulders at either
end of a thick pole—a truly tremendous burden, but perhaps they are
_gallegos_, the porters of Lisbon, who stand cord over shoulder at the
street corners—and the brimming panniers of donkeys give a freshness to
the streets.

[Sidenote: Pregões.]

Morning and evening the milkman drives his cows through the streets with
the most melodious and delightful of chants. Or the seller of maize bread
cries his _broinhas de milho quentinhas_. In May come the strawberries:
_morangos de Cintra_, followed through the summer months by a legion
of melon-sellers, criers of grapes and all manner of fruit as the heat
increases. Some kind of fruit is ever to be had in plenty: in winter
handcarts of oranges and pineapples; or a man carries a rosary of great
pineapples hanging from a pole. And year in, year out, go the _varinas_,
the women of Ovar, bare-footed, with their gold ornaments and stiffly
falling skirts, crying their fish; the sellers of newspapers; and the
lotteryman (_cauteleiro_) with his perpetual litany of figures and his
warning that “to-morrow the wheel goes round: _Amanhã anda a roda_.”
The cries are nearly always soft and musical, very different from the
piercing street-cries of Madrid or Barcelona.

[Sidenote: Lisbon in the Dead Season.]

There comes a time, about the end of July, when Lisbon is like Oxford in
vacation. The glory is departed, and here there is no secondary reflected
splendour of besundayed scouts to take its place. The smart carriages and
motor-cars are few and far between, the steady flow of the well-dressed
and fashionable passing up and down the _Rua do Carmo_, the _Chiado_, the
_Rua Nova de Almada_, the _Rua de S. Nicolau_, and the _Rua do Oiro_,
dries up like the summer streams. Then lemons and dark red _bilhas_ of
water are carried about the streets, here a woman bears on her head over
a kerchief of deepest blue flowing to her waist a flat basket of long
light green water-melons, or a great mound of white and purple grapes.
Or perhaps in the sultry evening from some doorway sounds the sluggish
and persistent _Quem da mais, mais, mais_, of the auctioneer at a long
drawn-out _leilão_, as if the whole world were ending in a slow desolate
agony. It is a cry so different from, yet as melancholy as, the _Ho
vitrier_ of the itinerant glazier in some village of the French Alps in
autumn before the first heavy snows cut off its communications with the
plain.

[Sidenote: Chestnuts.]

But with the autumn in Lisbon cheerfulness returns. From Bussaco and
Cascaes and Cintra, the Estoris and Buarcos and Caldas da Rainha, from
Paris and foreign and Portuguese watering-places, come the sun-browned
_veraneantes_. There is a fresh vigour in the streets, the first autumn
violets are sold, the chestnut-seller with his smoking baskets chants
his _Castanhas quentes e boas_. Donkeys are driven through the streets
with panniers of olives fresh from the country, and a little later
droves of turkeys stalk through the Rocio undeterred from their leisured
dignity by all the embarrassing trams and taxis. The inner meaning of
_castanha_ in Portuguese is “restoration”; violets were the emblems of
Napoleon’s return from Elba: so that everything points to the coming of
King Sebastian on one of those quiet autumn mornings when the hot sun
does not pierce till midday through the thick mists enveloping the Tagus,
and the fishing boats pass down-stream silent and invisible. The author
of _Costume of Portugal_[27] refers to Lisbon’s chestnut-roasters: “women
who are seen at the corner of almost every street in Lisbon. While the
chestnuts are roasting a few grains of salt are thrown over them, which
gives them a down similar to the bloom on a plumb fresh gathered.” We may
take the bloom of the plumb with a grain of their salt, but still in the
winter months women are to be seen sitting in nearly every doorway of the
humbler streets fanning their glowing earthenware pots of shape exactly
the same as that used in illustration of the letter F (_Fogareiro_) in
João de Barros’ alphabet (1539).

[Sidenote: Modern Lisbon.]

If stress is here laid on these rustic traits as one of Lisbon’s great
attractions to the foreigner, it must not of course be thought that
it is not endowed with all the luxuries and refinements of a great
modern city. There they all are, the good hôtels, streets neatly paved
and scrupulously clean, the comfortable motor-cars and carriages, the
tempting shop-windows, and a good service of electric tramcars, in
an endless rosary of white and yellow. The service of motor-cars can
scarcely be called good. Most of the cars are comfortable, and some of
the drivers efficient, but the drivers of others sprawl lazily in the
_Rocio_, only waking up to charge an excessive fare, which frightens
away most people. Even if they have a taximeter, it starts at a shilling
(250 _réis_) and reaches 1,000 _réis_ with a strange rapidity. And if
they have inveigled some unwary person into becoming their fare and
prey—they, of course, consider all foreigners fair prey—he will find
himself being conveyed at breakneck pace in a totally wrong direction.
Indeed, the foreigner driven furiously in a Lisbon taxi may think that
the _lisboeta_ sets more value on time than on life, but in fact their
attitude to time is rather that of the _madrileño_ driver who, if asked
to drive faster, will gradually slow down, stop, get down, open the
door, take off his hat, and ask if you wished for anything. He will keep
his politeness, even if you miss your train. All the sadder is it that
in Lisbon the inroad of foreign customs tends to interfere with the
pleasant dilatory habits of the native. Few shops, for instance—one or
two chemists or booksellers at the most—have a little circle of chairs
for their clients (_freguezes_) to pass the time in leisurely _cavaco_.
But centuries of progress have failed to make Lisbon uninteresting, so
various are the ingredients of its motley population, men of all nations,
classes and religions. _Saloios_, _i.e._, peasants from the neighbourhood
of Lisbon, are noticeable in the streets for their short “Eton jackets”
and close-fitting trousers spreading out over the foot, and peasants from
further afield, beyond the Tagus for their immensely wide (_desabado_)
hats and their sackcloth coloured cloaks reaching in a succession of
capes to the feet. And emigrants with their many-coloured patchwork
_alforges_ and their coffin-shaped trunks haunt the quays.

[Sidenote: Glimpses of Lisbon.]

Along the Tagus are more markets of fruits and vegetables and fish,
and vessels of every description, from the fishing-boat to the great
Atlantic liner, are continually loading and unloading. Above and between
the masts of the boats show the many-coloured dresses of fishwives and
peasants, while a multitude of snow-white seagulls rise and fall, rise
and fall against the turquoise blue of the river. Beyond lies Barreiro,
with its cork factories, the banks of the Tagus rise abruptly, and on a
clear day lordly Palmella (from which the _palmellão_ wind blows across
the Tagus), perched on its lofty crag, gleams from the dark _serra_.
The passing traveller has, even without landing, a magnificent view
of city and harbour. But Lisbon has many more intimate beauties which
demand a longer study, and would provide an artist with work for months
and years. Especially in winter the colouring is often very exquisite,
with tints subdued and delicate, as, for instance, on a stormy day the
grey irregular roofs with their crops of fresh green grass seen in some
steep _travessa_ against the dark indigo of the river or hills beyond;
or some glimpse of ruined Carmo or crumbling Alfama set in relief by a
sky of limitless clear blue. The old tiled roofs, warped and curving,
are a perpetual delight. Sometimes they have grass in straight furrows
between the rows of tiles like springing corn, or they are covered by
a more continuous carpet of mosses, or even are gay with the flower
of hawksweed. It depends largely on the rain. Two or three months of
continuous rain in winter brings them to a high perfection. Summer is
the great weeder in Portugal: it robs both roofs and cobbled squares
of their pleasant green. Alfama from a distance has the look of a
tumble-down fishing-village above the Tagus. At close quarters it is
found to be an intricate maze of streets so narrow that they never let in
the sun, and a man’s stretched-out arms touch either wall, and so steep
that they are built often in the form of stairs. Equally picturesque
is the district of Santa Catharina, on the other side of the city. The
marvellously steep streets and stairways going down from the _Calçada
do Combro_ to the river are full of quaint surprises worthy of the
wynds of Edinburgh. Narrow stone staircases lead round and down and
down, apparently nowhither, small yards and terraces struggle manfully
to keep their balance as level spaces, here and there a palm or a vine
or an orange-tree gives a touch of green. The principal descending
streets are several yards in width. Rows of bright-coloured clothes
perpetually a-drying are projected on poles from either side, and beneath
these motley banners is a succession of tiny stifling black shops. The
steps are strewn with rubbish and with cats and children innumerable.
Sometimes from a doorway comes a smell of burnt rosemary or other scented
brushwood used to light the kitchen fire, and bringing with it _saudade_
of the life in Portuguese villages. The names of the streets are often
as quaint as the streets themselves, or were, for they disappear and
change with a dreadful frequency. One may tremble for the _Travessa da
Larangeira_ (of the Orange Tree) or for the _Travessa dos Fieis de Deus_
(of the Faithful of God). How soon will these be called the Passage of
Progress and the Street of Civilisation? But perhaps those in authority
are beginning to realise that these changes often rob the city of what is
more precious than much fine gold and can never be replaced.

[Sidenote: Village Life.]

One need not go many leagues from Lisbon to find a look of immemorial
age about the life of the peasantry. One might be in pre-Roman times.
The peasant in black peaked woollen cap, black shirt or blouse and
knee-breeches and woollen leggings, walks slowly, goad in hand, in front
of his ox-cart with its spokeless wheels of solid wood, or is jolted
along as he stands against the tall crooked stakes that form the sides of
the cart. The life is often very primitive. The village will have some
kind of a dark _taverna_, where men may drink and play cards, and the
shop of the grocer who is the little god and gombeen man of the village.
His shop sells everything from hats and shoes and brooms to cheeses and
candles and wine and bread and melons and grapes. He gives himself no
airs and is always ready to serve his customers behind the counter, but
he is a power in the land, often makes a considerable sum of money, and
becomes an usurer, or even helps to turn the scale at an election.

[Sidenote: Prisons.]

The village will also, though it may not have a church, almost certainly
have a prison, through the bars of which the prisoners converse with
their friends or with any passer-by, as is, indeed, the case in the
famous _Limoeiro_ prison in Lisbon. The Portuguese are unfortunately
notorious for their neglect of the prisons and for the astonishing way in
which children and hardened criminals, political and common offenders,
are herded together. And the eagerness to arrest is only equalled by
the reluctance to provide food for the arrested. In fact, to give a meal
to prisoners is a recognised form of private charity, and stands between
them and actual starvation.

[Sidenote: “Festas.”]

The villages themselves, their streets and houses, are often miserable
enough, but they are enlivened by a large number of _festas_ through
the year. The pilgrimage or _romaria_ is usually to some shrine in the
hills or by the sea, and combines the character of a profane picnic with
a religious motive. The most famous shrine is that of the _Bom Jesus_,
near Braga, but every village has its small church or hermitage to which
a yearly procession is organised. In some parts of the country the year
begins with the _janeiras_, when groups of men go from house to house
with songs special to the occasion, after the fashion of the waits in
England. This may be on New Year’s Day or five days later on the Day of
Kings. It ends, of course, with the festivities of Christmas, which in
Portugal, where the ties of family life are strong, is observed with a
peculiar devotion, and all the rites of the yule log and other ancient
customs, as the _consoada_ or odd meal to pass the time while waiting
for the midnight mass, called _a missa do gallo_. In the towns at
Christmas and at Easter the postman, the porter, the newspaper-seller,
the tradesman will send you their visiting-cards (!) with their name and,
printed beneath it the words, “_Deseja boas festas a V. Exa. e sua Exma.
familia_” (“Wishes a happy _fête_ to Your Excellency and to your most
excellent family”). In return for this you are expected at Christmas to
_dar as broas_ (lit., give maize-breads—the _broas_ eaten at Christmas
in the towns are yellow cakes, in which honey, egg, almond, and orange
peel predominate, and are very different from the excellent maize bread
of Minho), and at Easter _dar as amendoas_ (almonds). Between the Day
of Kings and Christmas comes a long series of feast-days and pleasant
customs, such as in autumn (on All Saints’ Day) the _magusto_, that is, a
kind of picnic in which the principal feature is the roasting and eating
of chestnuts not unaccompanied by wine.

[Illustration: BOM JESUS DO MONTE, BRAGA]

[Sidenote: St. John’s Day.]

But, above all, June is the month of rustic merriment, with the _fêtes_
of St. Antony, St. John the Baptist, and St. Peter. Happily no attempts
to dislodge these saints from their pre-eminence in the mind of the
people have hitherto succeeded. The eve of St. John continues to be
celebrated with festivities far more joyous and interesting than the
_bourgeois fête_ of Carnival, in which the real people takes little part.
(At Lisbon the Carnival lasts not one day but many, and is marked by a
good deal of vulgarity and absence of originality. Indeed, it would be
utterly tedious but for the striking miniature peasant costumes in which
it is the custom to dress up small children.) St. John the Baptist is
the true popular patron saint of Portugal, and around St. John’s Eve the
popular fancy has woven a rich fairy web of legend and superstition. In
all the world, says a _cantiga_, this day is celebrated—

São João não ha no mundo
Quem não queira festejar:
Este dia é mui sob’rano,
Esta noite é singular.

The very Moors observe it in Moordom—

Até os Mouros da Mourama
Festejão o São João.

He is set above all the other saints: there is none like him, none—

São João é festejado
Por todo o mundo em geral,
Entre todos os mais santos
Não ha quem lhe seja igual.

São Pedro é homem honrado,
Companheiro do Senhor,
Mas para’s noites divertidas
São João tem mais valor.

(St. Peter is an honest man,
Companion of Our Lord,
But for a night of sheer delight
St. John must be preferred.)

On the hills and at cross-roads and in the villages the fires of St. John
glow late into the night. The saint himself comes to light them. He comes
from the flowered _mattos_ and _charnecas_, bringing with him a scent of
rosemary—

Donde vindes, ó Baptista,
Que cheirais a alecrim?

(Rosemary is spoken of as the king of herbs—

O alecrim, rei das hervas

or,

Das floras que ha no monte
O rosmaninho é rei;)

or he descends straight from heaven, where he has been engaged in leaping
over the fires lit in his honour in the sky.

Donde vindes, ó Baptista,
Pela calma sem chapeo?
—Vim de pular as fogueiras
Que me fazem lá no ceo.

(Whence come you, St. John the Baptist,
Hatless in the heat of the day?
—From leaping over my fires in the sky
Am I come away.)

Or he even comes all drenched from watering beds of onions—

Donde vindes, São João,
Que vindes tão molhadinho?
—Venho d’entre aquellas hortas
De regar o cebolinho.

[Sidenote: St. John as “Picaro.”]

He is a rogue, a _picaro_, up to all kinds of fun in the popular fancy,
which treats him with the utmost familiarity. He stands as godfather, he
eats the grapes in the vineyards, he courts the girls as they go to fill
their pitchers at the fountain, and they in turn crown him with flowers—

O meu rico São João
Quem vos metteu entre as flores?
—Foram as donzellinhas
Que não têm outros amores.

He is expected to win the hearts of the village maidens for his votaries,
and smooth the course of true love, and if he fails in these duties he is
treated with scant respect and even well beaten—

Em as moças não me querendo
Dou pancadas no santinho.

He is expected himself to help in building up the fire—

Para fazer as fogueiras
Na noite de sua festa,
São João traz lá do monte
Um braçado de giesta.

(With a handful of broom
For his festal night,
St. John now is come
His fires to light.)

He even jumps over it—on a donkey—

S. João comprou um burro
Para pular as fogueiras
E depois de as pular todas
Deu-o de presente ás freiras.

(St. John bought a donkey to leap over the fires, and when he had leapt
over them all he gave it as a present to the nuns.) Possibly the donkey
enables him to go from one fire to the other, from hill to hill, and
village to village.

[Sidenote: St. John Superstitions.]

In Beira[28] a pine tree is pulled up, a procession going out to the
woods with drums and pipes. Then the smaller branches are lopped off, and
as a _galheiro_ it is decked with ferns and rosemary and other scented
shrubs and so burnt. When the fire has burnt down to a heap of glowing
logs and faggots children and grown persons jump over it, chanting
various rhymes to bring them health and good luck through the year till
next fire-tide. It does not seem to be the custom to roll a stone on to
the ashes, as in the South of France, where the beard of St. John is
found next morning under the stones. But, although St. John’s Eve is in
Portugal recognised as essentially the night of song and love—

Cantão moças, cantão velhas
Na noite de São João.

(Young maidens and old women sing
Alike on St. John’s Eve).

Esta noite é de segredos
Noite de amores e ciumes:
Quantos nacem, quantos morrem
Hoje a volta destes lumes!

Na noite de São João
É que é tomar amores,
Que estão os trigos nos campos
Todos com as suas flores.

(St. John’s night yields
Love’s fairest hour,
For the corn in the fields
Is all aflower.)

many superstitious beliefs are also connected with this night. Its hours
between midnight and dawn are among the most precious of all the year,
and no witch who has the least inkling of her business will waste a
single instant of them. The dews (_orvalhadas_) then gathered have a
special virtue, as also rosemary and other herbs and water brought from
the mountains and streams. By the fountains appear enchanted Moorish
maidens combing their hair with combs of gold, and many other spirits are
abroad. It is the night, too, of the great blue thistles or Jerusalem
artichokes (_alcachofras_) and other auguries of love. Next morning, on
St. John’s Day, the sun dances at its rising. So a Galician _romance_
begins with these lines—

Madrugada de San Joan,
Madrugada a mais garrida,
Que baila o sol cando nace
E ri cando morre o dia.

(The morning of St. John,
Fairest of all the year,
For the sun at its rising dances
And laughs when the day dies.)

Even at Lisbon St. John’s night is celebrated with genuine enthusiasm,
and the dark blue flower of the artichoke abounds in the markets.

[Sidenote: The Bull-fight.]

Such a _fête_ is far more popular than the bull-fight, about which in
Portugal there seems to be something a little artificial, with none of
the fierce passion that it evokes in Spain. As a spectacular display
the Portuguese _touradas_ can be very fine, and there is no horror of
killed horses, though the _toreador_ himself has been killed before
now, despite the bull’s blunted horns. The death of the well-known
Portuguese bull-fighter Fernando d’Oliveira, in Lisbon’s bull-ring at the
_Campo Pequeno_ on the 12th of May, 1904, caused an immense impression.
A special feature in Portugal are the _touradas nocturnas_ (first
introduced in 1880), carried on by artificial light. The more spirited
among the young men looking on are keen to show their own skill and
valour in the arena, and on special occasions the _toreadores_ are of
noble birth.

[Sidenote: Sports.]

Perhaps the greatest surprise of the Englishman visiting Portugal,
especially if he comes from Spain, where he may have imbibed the false
notion that the Portuguese are an enervated and decadent people, is to
find that a considerable and ever-growing number of Portuguese take part
and interest in sports and games—horse-racing, regattas, lawn-tennis,
football, motoring, riding, fencing, swimming. Football and lawn-tennis
are fairly common, cricket is played at Oporto, and in spite of a vague
belief that golf is played by the mad Englishman on horseback, his object
being to hit the ball and arrive on the green before it, a golf-links is
to be laid down in the grounds of the new thermal establishment, hôtel
and casino at Estoril.

[Sidenote: “Brazileiros.”]

In Portugal there is a small and narrowing circle of old nobility,
haughty and aloof, naturally growing more aloof as they have seen in
recent years titles showered or money made the sole measure of respect.
Lisbon, certainly, materialistic as a South American city, is at the feet
of the first _brazileiro_ who returns rich to his native land.

[Sidenote: Oporto.]

At Oporto, too, although the atmosphere is totally different from that of
Lisbon, the enriched _brazileiro_ plays a great part. It is, of course,
principally a business city, and has something grim and forbidding, a
reserve foreign to Lisbon. The large number of English wine merchants
and its communications by sea prevent it, however, from being a typical
Portuguese city.

[Sidenote: Braga.]

This is reserved for Braga in the north, which retains a peculiar
old-world flavour, and where probably there are not more than
half-a-dozen foreigners. As most towns in Portugal, it is a steep city
on a hill, its streets of houses of many-coloured _azulejos_, tiles,
and washes, going up precipitously to the splendid old cathedral. The
inhabitants are conservative as mountaineers, and it has the reputation
of being a stronghold of the reactionaries.

[Sidenote: North and South.]

The outlook on life in the North and in the South of Portugal seems
often, indeed, poles asunder, the North conservative, reserved, slow;
the South more expansive, liberal, and socialist, and the inhabitants
of Minho will look upon the inhabitant of Algarve as little less of a
stranger than the Frenchman or the Spaniard, indeed more of a stranger
than his northern neighbour of Galicia. The inhabitants of the North
are certainly more independent: in the South, and especially in all
the district round Lisbon, political intrigue and office-hunting, and
invasion of foreigners, have had a bad influence on character.

[Sidenote: Begging.]

Perhaps in no region on earth is begging more general. It is not only
the _lamuria_, the woeful _ladainhas_ of the beggars in the streets and
on the roads, with their strange tales or worn pieces of paper telling
of “disastrous chances” and “moving accidents,” in spelling still more
disastrous. You may say that you have no money to give or that you
will not give it, but that will not move them. The shibboleth to get
rid of them is _Tenha paciencia_ (Have patience: the very last thing
they require), which corresponds in effectiveness to the _Perdone Vd.
por Dios_, the pardon asked in the name of God of Spanish beggars for
giving them nothing. It means presumably that you have a hardened and
obdurate heart, that you have heard it all before, and are up to all
their tricks and devices: at least they immediately depart with gently
muttered imprecations. These unfortunate persons are from time to time
swept up promiscuously, the knaves and the deserving, by the police, and
shut up in the worst cells of the Lisbon prisons till they can be shipped
overseas with far less care or concern than a cargo of frozen meat.
Meanwhile their _confrères_ in higher grades of society continue in their
no less degrading mendicity: for an official post, a trade concession,
a favourable verdict in the law-courts, a this, a that, sinecures and
trifles, in an endless intrigue to _arranjar_ whatever necessity or
ambition demands at the hands of friends, Government officials, deputies,
politicians.

[Sidenote: Officials.]

And the number of Government officials is enormous and increases. It
is the object of all to attain this dignity. For the higher posts a
University degree is a help, and many go to Coimbra solely with this
object in view. (In the seventeenth century, according to the _Arte de
Furtar_ (1652), over a hundred “students” yearly succeeded in taking
their degree at Coimbra in order to obtain government employment without
ever having been in Coimbra.) But even the _cantoneiro_, who receives
something under a shilling from the State to mend or omit to mend the
roads of Portugal, thereby rises a step in the social scale and, if he
starves, starves with authority. It is the duty of a political leader
to provide places high and low for as large a number of followers as
possible: herein will be gauged the measure of his success. There is
thus continually a great moral (or immoral) force persistently at work
to overthrow the existing Government, which is like a solitary batsman
with not only the bowler—the legitimate Opposition—against him, but the
whole field and all the spectators (hostile or indifferent). For the
Portuguese are like the frogs, never content until King Log has been
replaced by King Stork, and not very content then. For them the bird
in the hand is never half so fine as the two in the bush, and they go
on intriguing, insinuating, imagining _novidades_ and betterment, both
in private and public life, forgetful of their own proverb, _Do mal o
menos_ (Let sleeping dogs lie). Politics sometimes causes disturbances at
Coimbra. The University, formerly Liberal, has now become Conservative,
“reactionary” in its dislike of the methods of the “White Ants.”

[Sidenote: Coimbra University.]

This, the only Portuguese University, answering to Oxford and Cambridge,
and old as they, is built on a hill in a delightful position above the
Mondego, perhaps the most beautiful of Portugal’s many beautiful rivers,
flowing through a country lovely in itself and endeared to all Portuguese
by its traditions of history and legend, of which a great book might
be filled. The teaching at Coimbra is apt to be too theoretical and to
embrace too many fields, to the loss of exact scholarship. Many attend
the lectures and rarely open a book. Literary discussions are frequent
unless momentarily submerged by politics, and of course much ingenuity
is always expended on skit and _troça_ and epigram. Actual book-learning
and accurate study of texts are less in favour (especially among the
_cabulas_ or _calaceiros_, _i.e._, students whose mission in life is to
take the key of the fields). Rows between town (_futricas_) and gown are
not unknown. The undergraduates are divided into _caloiros_ (_becjaune_,
fledgling, fresher), _novatos_ and _veteranos_, and live in considerable
freedom, in lodgings or hôtels, or clubbing together in _republicas_
composed of a few students often from the same province, _algarvios_,
_minhotos_, _beirões_.

[Sidenote: Regional Variety.]

Thus even here are maintained those distinctions between region and
region, which form no little part of the attraction of Portugal for
the traveller. Scarcely for the traveller in trains: if anyone wishes
to write a valuable and delightful book on Spain and Portugal, let his
travels be with a donkey, or on foot, selling, say, saffron or images of
saints, and he will be amply rewarded for whatever little discomforts he
may have to endure. The dress and gold ornaments of the peasant women of
the North have been often described, and if Minho deserved visiting for
nothing else it would be worth while to go there in order to see some
out-of-the-way village _praça_ (consisting often of the high road) on a
market day gleaming with gold, if not purple, more than all the cohorts
of Sennacherib. Some of the women are entirely covered with necklaces
from neck almost to the waist, and wear one or more pairs of earrings
often several inches in length. But even the _boeirinha_, the little
ox-girl who goes dressed in scarlet and gold with her huge goad in front
of the oxen, will have her gold ornament. It is in the North that the
oxen wear on their heads those strange erections, often beautifully
carved, called _cangas_. In Minho, too, chiefly survives the use of the
cloak of reeds—_coroça_—which, according to the author of _Costume of
Portugal_, was adopted by certain English officers who had seen it in
Portugal nearly a century ago, and admired its convenience and capacity
for keeping out the rain, which runs off it as water from a duck’s back:
a useful property in a country like Portugal, where the autumn, winter,
and spring rains are often heavy and sometimes continuous. For the
Portuguese, except for some districts of Traz os Montes and Beira, winter
consists of rain, not cold, and the rain at most develops a suspicion of
sleet (_chuva branca_). But as a rule that good sun of Portugal, which
has the property of warming without burning, is ever lurking round the
corner, ready to appear on the first pretext.

[Sidenote: Shepherds.]

A familiar sight in Alemtejo and the _Serra da Estrella_ are the
shepherds, the _rabadãos_ and _zagaes_, dressed in brown fleeces, with
their huge umbrellas of faded blue slung across their shoulders. The late
Conde de Ficalho, in the first volume of _A Tradição_ (1899), described
in an interesting paper the shepherds of Alemtejo, living a nomad life
from pasture to pasture, after the fashion of the Arabs, transferring
their clothes and food and implements on donkeys, as in Gil Vicente.
Many of the words they use are of Arabic origin, as _alfeire_ (a flock
of young lambs) or the _alfirme_ used to tie the sheep’s legs for the
shearing. They wear a _pellico_, _i.e._, a great jacket of fleeces
sewn together with _corriol_ (strips of leather) or a _çamarro_, which
consists merely of two fleeces without sleeves. The shepherd earns a
small salary (_soldada_) and his food (_comedia_), and has certain sheep
of his own (his _pegulhal_). The shepherds of the _Serra da Estrella_
are more stationary. Sun and wind have fanned and tanned them till they
sometimes resemble nothing so much as an old dead tree-trunk scarred
by lightning, and they may be seen standing motionless as a tree hour
after hour in the bare _Serra_. They are as remote from the twentieth
century as are the days of Romulus and Remus, and their customs and
those of the quaint villages set in the deep ravines of the _Serra_ are
worth a careful study, belonging as they do to an age long past, before
civilisation sweeps them away. Read or write the inhabitants cannot,
books and newspapers are unknown; but they maintain an old-world courtesy
and dignity of bearing which are attractive. They constitute one of the
most characteristic parts of the Portuguese people, one of the most
interesting elements in the infinite variety of Portuguese life.

[Illustration: A SHEPHERD]

CHAPTER IV

RELIGION AND EDUCATION

[Sidenote: Anti-clericalism.]

“To persecute is to propagate,” said one of the greatest modern
Portuguese, Alexandre Herculano, and a Lisbon newspaper, _O Diario
de Noticias_ (22nd March, 1901), could declare that “toleration in
matters of religion has with us been almost unbroken.” The anti-clerical
agitation in Portugal in the year 1901 was for the most part an
artificial echo of the agitation in Spain (the year of Pérez Galdós’
_Electra_), encouraged for political purposes. Popular demonstrations
were organised and cheers raised for Liberty, Democracy, and Snr. Manoel
da Arriaga (subsequently the first President of the Republic). On the
10th of March the Civil Governors were ordered to inquire whether any
religious houses existed under illegal conditions, that is, contrary to
the _Concordat_ between Portugal and the Vatican. Properly, in view of
the law of May, 1834, only the religious orders concerned with education,
charity, nursing, and foreign missions had the right to exist. On the
11th of March fresh disturbances occurred, and on the 13th a decree was
published ordering the inspection of those religious houses which could
show their title to exist and the closure of all others. But there was
in reality no “religious question” in Portugal, no comparison with the
situation in France and Spain.

[Sidenote: The Religious Orders.]

The religious congregations took no part in industry nor did they evade
the taxes (these are the two chief popular charges against them in
Spain). On the other hand, they did much good work among the poor, and
performed useful service in education. To many their sudden expulsion
may seem a foolish and brutal measure. But France had banished the
congregations, and those Portuguese politicians who model their actions
on those of France must follow suit without inquiring whether the action
of France in this respect had been wise or its results beneficial, or
whether the conditions in France and Portugal were identical. Henry
VIII of England abolished the monasteries because they were rich, and
the fabulous wealth attributed to the religious houses no doubt largely
inspired the modern cry of anti-clericalism. What must have been the
disappointment when the wealth of some of the Portuguese congregations
was found to consist of nothing but a few musty and worm-eaten volumes.
Had the same arbitrary measures been adopted against a literary or
industrial association, there would have been an outcry throughout the
world at the tyranny or injustice: but these were only poor religious,
men and women who had deliberately chosen to lead that kind of life, in
many ways an ideal life in Portugal. Why happiness thus attained by a few
should be so obnoxious to the modern politician is one of the mysteries
of progress.

Soll ich vielleicht in tausend Büchern lesen
Dass überall die Menschen sich gequält
Dass hie und da ein Glücklicher gewesen?

But the religious orders will return to Portugal, and those beautifully
situated and beautifully built convents once more fulfil their proper
purpose. Or, if they do not return, almost certainly in the course of
time groups of men and women will separate themselves from society and
live a philosophical life apart—religious orders under another name.
If they can combine philosophy, literature, and art with manual labour
the expulsion of the original orders will not have been in vain. We
shall have the Order of Carpenters and Musicians at Belem, of Cobblers
and Sculptors at Alcobaça, of Philosophers and Tailors at Batalha, of
Painters and Ploughmen at Thomar, of Poets and Foresters at Bussaco, and
so on. It was easy for demagogues to persuade the people, in whose eyes
_omne ignotum pro—malefico_, that dreadful crimes were committed behind
convent walls, just as the uneducated Russian believes that the Jews
sacrifice Christian children, and the expulsion of the religious orders
figured as the most prominent item on the programme of the Republicans,
and was put into practice immediately after the Revolution of 1910.

[Sidenote: The Jesuits.]

Considering the great services of monks and nuns in education, in
nursing, and in the Portuguese possessions overseas, the only fair
course in Portugal would have been at the most to banish the Jesuits,
if their action was thought to be political, and any congregations that
had emigrated to Portugal after their expulsion from France. For the
rest, they could be undermined slowly by education: obviously if no new
members were found willing to profess they would come to an end of their
own accord. The Jesuits, whom half-educated Republicans, knowing very
little about them, believe to be peculiarly maleficent and satanic, were
not very numerous in Portugal. In the beginning of 1909 there were only
355 as compared with 3,002 in Spain. In the beginning of 1910 there were
in Portugal 387 (161 priests, 123 coadjutors, and 103 students). It may
or may not have been expedient to expel them, but in any case they stood
upon a different footing from that of the other religious houses, whose
sudden expulsion brought consternation and misery to many a village. But
the action of the reformers did not stop here: it was extended to the
secular clergy, and seemed to be directed against the very existence of
religion. The precept of _O Seculo_ a few years earlier (11th March,
1901) was forgotten: “It is necessary not to confuse the religion of the
State with Jesuitism, our regular clergy with the Jesuits.”

[Sidenote: Clergy and People.]

Portugal had been fortunate in possessing an enlightened clergy. Many
priests were liberal in politics, and only a few of them—in some
remote parts of the country—were fanatics. The mass of the people is
equally unfanatic. But only a section of the population of a single
city—Lisbon—is non-Catholic. Indeed, according to one computation,
there are only six thousand non-Catholics in Portugal, or one in every
thousand inhabitants. To the mass of the people religion is a pleasant
show, and a refuge from the grinding reality of their lives, the Church
ceremonies, the processions and pilgrimages are the notes of holiday
and gaiety in the villages.[29] To the educated it was part of the
glorious traditions of Portugal’s past, ever intimately connected with
religion (_fé e imperio._ Camões, _Lusiads_, I, 2), so that the extreme
anti-clerical who carries his creed to the length of striking at the
root and existence of religion will, if he is logical, look askance at
those Portuguese heroes who fought in Portugal and in India in the name
of Santiago, and at the most magnificent old buildings in Portugal. The
cry of anti-clericalism in Portugal has proved itself in the Spanish
phrase a _necedad de siete capas_—seven times foolishness. It is not in
any sense national, but has been imported bodily from abroad. Senhor
Teixeira de Sousa, the last Premier of the Monarchy, said in an interview
to a correspondent of _Le Matin_: “La question cléricale ne se pose pas
ici comme en Espagne, car le peuple portugais n’est pas clérical.” So
the Republican _Intransigente_ could say later (31st December, 1911):
“There was no religious question in the country, and now the religious
question, provoked by certain measures of a secondary character and by
the so-called Law of Separation between Church and State, rises over the
country like a menace of civil war.” And the anti-clerical _Mundo_ itself
admitted (9th March, 1914) that the religious question in Portugal “has
never had the serious aspect which it has had in other nations.... If
recently the religious question has begun to make itself felt that is
due to the deference of certain persons who call themselves Republicans
to clerical pretensions.” Thus the religious question, having been
provoked by anti-clericalism, was to receive a homoeopathic remedy—more
anti-clericalism. Gambetta had exclaimed, “_Le Cléricalisme, voilà
l’ennemi_,” and Portuguese politicians had adopted this cry from Paris.
In the public schools religion has been forbidden by law, in the private
it has only been given at the expense of denunciation and persecution.
When it is remembered that in many parishes the priests have been
deprived of all authority, it will be seen how little chance there is of
the children receiving any religious instruction. Portuguese Democrats
if they have ever heard of Cecil Rhodes probably know that he was no
reactionary. It is worth quoting his words: “Their school years are the
years in which to tell the children that there is one thing better than
material instruction, and that is religious belief.” But in Portugal
now thousands of children are being brought up to regard material
prosperity as the only good. There is no God but Gold, and the Republic
is its prophet. The new narrow system of education may turn out shrewd,
materialistic, tram-and-asphalt citizens, but in a larger sense and in
the long run Portugal is likely to suffer. It may be found when it is too
late that the _cera branda_ has been moulded to ill purpose.

[Sidenote: The Law of Separation (1911).]

The Law of Separation between Church and State was drawn up by Dr.
Affonso Costa as Minister of Justice (20th April, 1911). It is a long
document of 196 clauses, closely following French models or modifying
them in a still more anti-clerical direction. Yet there were many
considerations which should have given extreme anti-clericalism pause
in Portugal. With a clergy not in principle opposed to the Republic, it
might have been possible to come to an excellent working compromise. Many
of the priests even acquiesce in the principle of separation between
Church and State, but Dr. Costa’s law, they complain, while pretending
to separate Church from State, in reality subjugates the Church to a
hostile State. And it is not the priests only who say it. “The decree of
20th April, 1911,” says _A Republica_ (13th March, 1914), “affected to
separate the Churches from the State, but did nothing but subject the
Catholic Church to the intervention of the Republic.” These are the words
of an extremely Republican paper. The priests by this Law must either
receive State pensions or starve; their authority has been replaced by
that of the public worship associations, often organised by persons
hostile to religion. They are deprived of the possession of the churches,
and even of the bishops’ and priests’ houses, even of the libraries
carefully added to by successive bishops. They are not allowed to wear
clerical dress. The authority of the higher ecclesiastics is carefully
undermined, and the bishops are not permitted even to issue a pastoral
letter without previous censorship of the Government.

[Sidenote: Processions.]

These and other real grievances as well as many petty restrictions, such
as the prohibition of processions, of services and ringing of bells
between sunrise and sunset, mark a narrow spirit which has made it
impossible for the whole of the North of Portugal to sympathise with the
Republic. Dr. Costa has been the Royalists’ great asset. “Oh, but there
is no such prohibition,” say the Democrats; “the law does not forbid
processions.” It contents itself with rendering them impossible. Clause
57 runs: “Ceremonies, processions, and other external manifestations
of religion will only be permitted where and in so far as they are an
inveterate custom of the majority of the citizens of a district, and must
be immediately and definitely forbidden in places where the faithful or
other persons without a protest on their part make the processions an
occasion for provoking tumults and disturbances of public order.” Thus
the procedure is simple. You have only to throw a stone at a priest or
other person in a procession. If the faithful protest there is a tumult,
if they fail to protest there has been a disturbance of public order.
The procession is henceforth forbidden. Yet to deprive the people of
these simple pleasures is a kind of sacrilege. In the remote villages
they have few others. Those who know to what an extent in Latin countries
these ceremonies partake of a secular as well as a religious character
realise the sadness which descends upon a village when docked of its
processions. They are the villager’s theatre as well as his prayer book.
The men, it is true, can substitute the tavern, and the women do not
count. Let them stay in their black kitchens, often as dirty and airless
as the taverns, and mind their pots and their pans.

[Sidenote: A Religious Revival.]

That the Republic could be so blind to its own interests as to adopt
these Jacobin courses would be strange indeed, were it not that evidently
the interests of a party had been preferred to those of the Republic.
Recently (_i.e._, before 14th May, 1915) a far more moderate attitude
and methods more conciliatory have been adopted, but in the question of
religion fresh legislation, as well as a new spirit, will be required.
All men of sense, from the President, Dr. Arriaga, downwards, recognise
that the Law of Separation will have to be altered in a more moderate
direction. In this connection _A Republica_ (6th March, 1914) used the
following words, in connection with the Amnesty of 1914: “To grant an
amnesty to priests who have acted illegally because their religious
conscience bade them oppose certain clauses in the Law of Separation is
merely to say to these priests, ‘You leave prison to-day in order to come
back to it to-morrow.’” When Dr. Affonso Costa became Prime Minister in
1913 revision of this law was promised, but during his year of office it
was not revised. Under his successor, Dr. Bernardino Machado, discussion
of the Law began, but still it was not revised. Its revision would,
however, be assured, were it realised that the Republic by violent
anti-clericalism is defeating its own objects. For—not to mention the
wholesome discipline of the Roman Catholic Church and its democratic
tendency—such anti-clericalism is in danger of driving moderate Roman
Catholics into something like fanaticism and of creating a religious
revival.

[Sidenote: Illiterates.]

The census of 1911 gives the number of illiterates in Portugal as 75·1
per cent. of the entire population (men, 68·4 per cent.; women, 81·2),
and this at least is not the fault of the priests, since religion was
taken out of their hands in 1834. This extraordinary figure of 75·1
includes small children; excluding children under seven the figures are
69·7 (men, 60·8; women, 77·4). The progress has been slow in the last
twenty years. In 1890 the total percentage of illiterates was 79·2 per
cent. (1,762,842 men and 2,238,115 women). In 1900 it was 78·6 (1,855,091
men and 2,406,245 women). In 1911 the number of men who cannot read or
write was 1,936,131, and of women 2,541,947; or, excluding children under
seven, 1,370,571 men, 1,989,906 women. The Republic was ushered in with
pompous phrases concerning education. In a few years there were to be no
more illiterates, in a few years there was to be a school to every two
_kilomètres_ throughout the country. But there has been danger of more
attention being given to the show than to the substance of reform, and
of education becoming more and more a whited sepulchre. Yet apart from
mistakes made and hollow promises put forward for foreign consumption,
but quite meaningless in Portugal, one must admit that the Republicans
realise the importance of education and have a sincere desire to diminish
the number of illiterates (as though that in itself were a great gain!),
and may hope that their efforts in the matter of education will be more
successful in future than they have been in the past. The institution
of night schools and itinerant masters is no doubt a step in the right
direction.

[Sidenote: Primary Schools.]

The method adopted has been to draw up ideally excellent decrees, and the
hope is presumably that they will gradually work down into touch with
the facts of Portuguese life. Meanwhile they tend to remain mere pieces
of paper. The decree of 29th March, 1911, reforming primary education
is little more. Primary education was transferred from the control of
the State to that of the local authorities, which tend to neglect it
altogether. The failure of the _municipios_ to pay the schoolmasters had
been already manifest when primary instruction was entrusted to them in
1881, and they were empowered to levy a special tax for the purpose.
The law of 1911 made education compulsory and neutral in the matter of
religion. It had been compulsory since 1878, with the results already
described. The Republicans boast that they have created a large number of
schools, over 900 primary schools in three years, but in reality it would
have been better to see to an improvement in the condition of the 6,000
existing schools, and to the payment of the schoolmasters’ salaries.
The foundation of a school in Portugal is a very simple affair, almost
as simple as the issuing of a decree. It consists in fixing on a room
or a house in a village which might be used for that purpose and—there
the matter generally ends. Neither books nor furniture nor masters are
provided, and that not from any carelessness or indifference but because
there is no money to pay for them. Thus, Snr. Antonio Macieira, Minister
for Foreign Affairs in Dr. Costa’s Government, declared in a speech made
on 28th March, 1913, that to replace the 115 schools of the expelled
religious congregations the Republic had created 991 new schools. Of
these 991, he continued blandly to state, 556 were non-existent. The
Monarchy had not neglected education, even though it cannot claim to have
founded schools at the rate of half-a-dozen a week. In 1772 the number
of primary schools was 526, and rose to 720 fifty years later. Between
1839 and 1868 new schools were created to the number of 1,422, and in the
next thirteen years 965, so that in 1881 the total stood at 4,472, with
some 200,000 school-children.[30] In 1900 the schools were 4,520; at the
end of 1906 there were 5,226, or about one per thousand inhabitants. The
pity was that they were for the most part in hired unhealthy buildings,
and that the ill-paid or unpaid schoolmasters taught as badly as they
were paid. Other decrees concerning education were more practical, as
that of 1905 insisting on physical drill in the schools, or that of 1907
assigning a hundred _contos_ a year to send students abroad. As to the
condition of the school-buildings, even in Lisbon, says a Republican
paper (_A Republica_, 17th April, 1914), “there are State schools in
small flats in the midst of the deafening noise of the street, without
light, without air, without hygiene, without anything to attract the
miserable children who attend them.”

[Sidenote: Minister of Education.]

The Republic has founded a Department of Public Instruction with a new
Minister and all the subordinate officials. Dr. Theophilo Braga at the
time gave it as his opinion that it would only serve to provide posts
for half-a-dozen political friends of the Government—_anichar meia duzia
de amigos politicos_. The department existed in 1870 and again in 1890.
In both cases it proved expensive and unsatisfactory, and was chiefly
notable for giving further scope to _empregomania_ and bureaucracy, more
than 600 candidates applying for posts in 1890.[31] Snr. Machado notes
the _despesas de installação_ of the new department and its _esperança a
toda a gente_, _i.e._, it spread hope far and wide not of an improvement
in education but of a new chance of becoming a Government official.[32]
It is true that in the past sums contributed by local administrative
bodies to the State for the purpose of education, sent by them to the
Department of the Interior which embraced that of Education, were not
infrequently diverted to the more pressing needs of the Government and
spent on something quite unconnected with education. In future, at least,
they will be spent on maintaining the new Department of Education.

[Sidenote: Attitude of the People.]

Education in Portugal is of three kinds: primary, secondary (in _lycées_,
in the capital of each district, with two at Oporto and three at Lisbon),
and the University education of Coimbra. Primary education has been
compulsory for the last generation, yet four and a half million out of
six million inhabitants cannot write or read. There is indeed little
inducement for the peasants to send their children to school, and
considerable inducement to keep them at home where they can be useful
in the fields. In a land of few industries, where a large majority of
the inhabitants live by agriculture and fishing, there is but little
need of book-learning, nor is there any universal book to be found
in peasants’ houses, as the Bible in England. Moreover, the peasants
distrust education, and distrust it the more the more it is mixed
up with politics and questions of religion. And if illiterates are
disfranchised they look upon that rather as a blessing than a penalty,
being desirous to have as little to do with politics as may be. Some of
the children are quite keen to learn, and after being kept at work all
day willingly attend night classes; but there is many a family in which
the parents not only do not encourage their children to learn to write
and read, but deliberately forbid it, considering that the drawbacks
of education exceed its advantages. The Republic is credited with the
project of providing all the children at the primary schools with food
and clothes. It may be wondered what the ill-paid schoolmasters would say
to this—probably they would go on strike until they were given clothes
and food too—but the children would certainly flock to school, as indeed
they often do now, without therefore necessarily learning to write or
read. _Para que serve saber ler?_ What use is it? That is the question
which the peasant children learn from their parents, who, it is to be
feared, do not pay all the respect that were to be desired to Lisbon’s
crowding politicians. Perhaps, too, in their native good sense, they
consider the pale and sickly Lisbon school children who on the shortest
provocation will rattle you off a fable of La Fontaine in French or talk
of the eclipses or the equinox, or the scientific reason for the colour
of sunsets, or other high matters of which you know nothing and which to
them are mere abstractions, while they do not know the difference between
an ash and an oak. Of Portuguese as it should be spoken, of Portuguese
literature, history and geography they are more ignorant. Yet before
learning French or English they should surely be taught Portuguese—the
direct and forcible Portuguese of the early prose-writers.

[Sidenote: Aged Children.]

In Portugal, and especially in the towns, the children are for the most
part too serious and precocious and sad. This seems to be encouraged;
they are willingly taken to funerals or marshalled in thousands to attend
political demonstrations. It was even proposed recently, on the occasion
of the death-sentence in the English law-courts of a Portuguese who had
murdered his wife, that all the school-children, pompously lectured on
the duties of humanity, should sign a petition to the King of England
on his behalf. Thus they are doctors at ten—_docteurs à dix [ans]_—in
Montaigne’s phrase and die of old age before they are twenty.

[Sidenote: The Lycées.]

The theoretical character of the education provided is especially
noticeable in the _lycées_. This _ensino secundario_ is described by a
master in July, 1913, as consisting of “immense disconnected programmes.”
It overloads the pupil’s mind, and stuffs him with abstractions. Far
from diminishing, it increases his natural vagueness and teaches him
to approach Portugal by way of China or Japan and mankind through that
wicked abstraction, Humanity. Freedom and Happiness, too, fade away into
abstract ideals to be intrigued and fought for, perhaps, but scarcely to
be enjoyed in common life. Yet it is as true now as when Blake wrote the
words that “Those who want Happiness must stoop [not soar] to find it: it
is a flower that grows in every vale.” It is as true now, in spite of all
the changed conditions, as when Goethe said it, that “If a man has enough
Freedom to live a healthy life and carry on his work, it should suffice
him, and so much freedom anyone can easily attain.” The number of those
who matriculated at the _lycées_ throughout the country is given for
1907-8 as 6,947, including 1,845 at the three Lisbon _lycées_, 802 at
the two Oporto _lycées_, 630 at Coimbra, 343 at Braga, 310 at Vizeu, 181
at Evora.[33]

[Sidenote: University Degrees.]

The University of Coimbra has the advantage of attracting scholars from
all Portugal and of thus being Portugal’s factory of ideas and future
politicians. The practical object of the undergraduates is to become
lawyers, journalists, politicians, Government officials. To be addressed
for the rest of their lives as _Senhor Doutor_ (_bacharel_, _licenciado_,
_doutor_) appeals to their vanity.

[Sidenote: The Liberal Profession.]

The result is that all these liberal professions are overcrowded and so
unremunerative that it is necessary for one person to combine two or
three professions; to be for instance, journalist, advocate, and leader
of a party, or journalist, doctor, and Minister of Finance. The number of
applicants for every post makes it possible, moreover, for the Government
to leave the officials unpaid: others will be only too willing to succeed
them should they rebel. Every Government department, and indeed every
liberal profession, is overstaffed. “In nearly every service there is an
army of supernumeraries, many of whom merely receive a salary without
doing any work, the public department to which they belong not even
knowing their address. Yet when a post becomes vacant a new official is
appointed, the supernumeraries continuing as before” (_O Seculo_, 7th
December, 1912). The first years after a revolution were unlikely to
bring any change: “Republican Ministers seem to have considered matters
of administration too insignificant to notice.... New expenses have been
created, the action of the public departments extended with lamentable
rapidity, and no check has been set, as was urgently required, on the
system of promotions and the growth of the bureaucracy” (_O Seculo_, 3rd
December, 1912).

The Department of Public Works has an army of architects and other
officials, but when some public work crops up a foreign engineer is
usually called in. The Department resembles a river which dries up before
reaching the region that required irrigation or that army sent by Philip
XII of France against Spain, which had dwindled away before crossing
the Bidasoa. In the same way it was complained in Portugal a few years
ago that there were “too many canons” (_O Diario de Noticias_, January,
1902). In the same way it is complained to-day that there are too many
officers. The sum of 1,535 contos, over a sixth of the whole military
estimates, was devoted to the retired list in the Budget of 1913-4. The
average of officers is, roughly, one to nine men. “Our officers would
suffice for an army as large as that of Germany” (_O Diario de Noticias_,
11th February, 1902). (In the Engineers there are 145 officers to 1,075
men, in the Artillery 368 to 2,610 men, in the Cavalry 263 to 1,837, in
the Infantry 1,291 to 12,289 men.) (_A Republica_, 26th March, 1913). It
has been suggested that a thousand officers would be sufficient, and that
the other thousand should be employed as mayors, a course also proposed
in 1893. And in the same way there are too many journalists, too many
politicians. Some attempts have been made to get back to reality, and
several technical schools, for instance, are in existence.

[Sidenote: “Francezismo.”]

The same lack of funds which fetters the schools prevents the libraries
of Lisbon, Oporto, Coimbra, Evora, and Braga from being kept up to
date. But for these difficulties, the material to the teacher’s hand is
promising enough, for the people, if it can be persuaded that it is to
its advantage, is quick and eager to learn. The attempts, however, to
dissociate the teaching from all the traditions of Portugal is bound to
be a failure. The trouble already is that the Portuguese are too much
inclined to be cosmopolitan, and what is required is a development of
that part of the Portuguese people still untainted with _francezismo_
along strictly national lines. The lament of the novelist Eça de
Queiroz is well known. Accused of Gallicism in his work, he retorted:
“Scarcely was I born when I began to breathe a French atmosphere.
France was all around me.” The atmosphere of his home was continued in
French text-books, at Coimbra. At Lisbon, “in theatres and shops and
cookery there was nothing left of Portugal: there was nothing but cheap
imitations of France.” And especially was this true in politics: a small
group of Frenchified persons ruled Portugal.[34] In the last half-century
this Frenchification has only increased in Portugal. “Portugal is a
country translated from the French into slang,” said Eça de Queiroz on
the same occasion, in an essay published after his death. Fortunately
this is an exaggeration, and a symptom of the disease that a Portuguese
should thus mistake Coimbra and Lisbon for Portugal. “Outside Lisbon,”
he declared, “there is neither intellectual nor social life,” and this
may be deplorable but it is of good augury for the future. Not Portugal
but Lisbon is “translated from the French.” The _francezismo_ has not yet
extended to the mass of the people, and it is therefore of the utmost
importance that it should not be denationalized by French text-books,
French laws, French customs. At the root of this _francezismo_ lies the
love of progress which has always characterised the Portuguese, but
the truest progress at present will surely consist in going back to
Portugal’s past, to the study of the land of Portugal, of her history, as
rich as that of any other country in striking episodes and personalities,
and of her literature, in which the glories of that history are
reflected.

CHAPTER V

A LAND OF FLOWERS

[Sidenote: Estoril and Cintra.]

It is a land of roses flowering in December, a land where, in the words
of Garrett, “oranges glow in the orchards and myrtle blooms on the moors:
_Onde a laranjeira cresce na horta e o matto é de murta_” (_Viajens na
minha terra_, 1846). The foreigner who spends a few days in Portugal
and sees perhaps Cintra and Estoril may think that he has been offered
a few show pieces, yet everywhere in this wonderful climate, a warmer
South-west of Ireland, given water and shelter either from the sea or
from the subtle Spanish wind, plants thrive and grow as swiftly almost
as the fabled bean-stalk, and flowers cover the ground like mushrooms in
the twinkling of a fairy’s eye. A desolate strip of coast near Lisbon,
apparently grey and barren, mere sunburnt and spray-beaten rock, was
found on closer acquaintance to have at various seasons of the year,
among other flowers, whin and cistus, yellow jonquil, white clustered
jonquil, celandine, crocus, light blue dwarf iris, large dark-blue iris,
mint and sea-lavender. And Cintra possesses many lovely places unknown
to tourists, the whole region deserving not the stay of a few hours
but a quiet sojourn in one of its houses or hôtels. The slopes of the
_Serra_ looking towards Cascaes, though rarely visited, are scarcely less
beautiful than those above the village of Cintra, and are crowded with
all kinds of trees and flowers. You may walk across from Estoril. The
path goes haphazard through the uncultivated _matto_ and then a road,
also through _matto_ moorland, passing an occasional village with low
one-storeyed houses and lanes between walls of loose stones covered with
brambles, sarsaparilla, and eglantine. Here a woman in white blouse,
yellow skirt, and plum-coloured kerchief is at work in a small plot of
vines; there a boy keeping donkeys and black-and-white cows is dressed
all in light faded greys and blues like one of the wayside thistles. The
country has a look of Dartmoor—only that there is no water, no patches
of vivid treacherous green—and in front rise the twenty odd tors of the
_Serra_.

[Sidenote: Ribeira de Pena Longa.]

At the foot of the _Serra_ is Ribeira de Pena Longa, a little tumble-down
village in olives and fruit-trees, with a few clumps of mighty planes.
The village street is mainly of rock with loose stones, evidently a
torrent in winter, and the forlorn and poverty-stricken look of the whole
village will amaze the Englishman accustomed to see the flourishing
condition of villages near or on some great estate in England. There are
a few iron balconies with tins of carnations, and grey ruined walls of
houses with olives and vines growing between them seem to tell of a more
prosperous past, perhaps when the neighbouring Convent of Pena Longa was
wont to receive the visits of King João III. From the village a wide gate
leads into a kind of mysterious fairyland: out of the glowing sunshine
the road passes to a cool shaded avenue of arched trees, where the
songs of birds are heard in number and variety rare in Latin countries.
A rapid stream runs by the road, and on this side and on that are a
multitude of fruit trees and great myrtle hedges, twenty-feet high cactus
with their large deep-orange-coloured flowers, giant-leaved bananas,
vine-trellises, groves of lemons, plots gay with garden flowers. It is
an enchanted country, and presently you will come to many peacocks and
the low rambling house of the Viscondes de Pena Longa. At the other
end the estate is bounded by the _serra_ of pines and eucalyptus. A
little further on a small lake is fringed with great pines, and here is
a marvellous solemn silence scarcely broken by the distant cooing of
doves or the sound of running water. Among the pines grows bracken and
heather, myrtles in massed snow-white flower, and thick tufts of the
dark purple lavender. Thence with some difficulty you may climb through
a dense wood of every variety of tree and labyrinthine paths up to the
palace of Pena. Fuchsias and bays and many a scented shrub and flowering
tree will recompense you for the pains of the ascent, and goodly views
of the Tagus, and of the _Serra d’Ossa_ in Alemtejo. There are masses of
periwinkles, and many an old wall a-crumble fretted with maidenhair and
that variety of daisy which loves old mellow stonework, be it that of an
Oxford college or of the Basque church of Urrugne.

[Sidenote: The Coast.]

Or you may attack Cintra by way of Cascaes and Collares, since the
accepted approach is rarely the best way of seeing a place for the first
time. There is a road for part of the way from Cascaes along the coast
with sand-dunes, and hollows of scented cistus and many a delightful
cove or broader sandy bays, which are now without a house, but might
at the whim of fashion—_absit omen_—become favourite and crowded
watering-places. Some miles from Cascaes the Mountains of the Moon
descend into the sea, ending in the famous _Cabo da Roca_, the “Rock of
Lisbon.” A little further on lies Collares in its celebrated vineyards,
and taking the road from here to Cintra one has a view of the _Serra_
above Cintra in a rugged, almost Alpine, grandeur of grey rocks and
trees, and may understand how Fielding could call it a high mountain. To
the right the last slopes are covered with groves of arbutus trees, which
hang their berries in clustered lanterns of glowing yellow and orange,
white and green and red. Thick layers of mist hide them on an autumn
morning, through which the sun lights up the ravines in weird spears and
shafts of light. To the left extends that fertile plain which produces
nearly all the fruits of the earth and has for centuries provided
Lisbon’s markets with their most treasured wares. Even in summer when
all the surrounding country is in a cloudless blue the whole _Serra_ of
Cintra from crown to base is often blotted out in thick white mist which
folds over peak and ravine, taking the shape of each in a more rounded
softness of snowfields. Then when a slight wind drives it off in a bank
along the horizon seaward the _Serra_ appears a metallic blue, as if
it had been poured molten into the mould and was just hardening to its
definite shape.

[Sidenote: An Infinite Variety.]

The variety of Cintra is but a sample of that rich profusion of natural
beauties in the most diverse kinds throughout the country. With an area
little over a quarter of that of Great Britain and about three times
that of Belgium, Portugal presents perhaps greater variety of scenery
and products than any other country of Europe. Rich in trees and fruits
(especially figs and oranges), rice (it was one of the projects of the
last Ministry of the Monarchy to encourage rice-growing in Portugal),
wine, oil, maize, wheat, rye, cork, salt from the _marinhas_ of Aveiro
and Algarve, honey from Alemtejo, Portugal could also, but for State
prohibitions, produce tobacco, cotton, and the sugar-cane. The gardens
on the banks of the Tagus, the orchards of Setubal and Santarem, the
fruit-gardens round Caldas da Rainha and Alcobaça, the wide corn-lands on
the alluvial _lezirias_ of the rivers Tagus and Sado, the sub-tropical
vegetation of the southern slope of the _Serra de Arrabida_ and of Cintra
and of the neighbourhood of Faro and Villa Real de S. Antonio in Algarve,
prove that potentially at least Portugal is indeed the “garden of Europe
planted by the sea.”

[Sidenote: The Rivers.]

The salmon in the transparent rivers of Minho are less plentiful than
they were, owing to the poaching and wholesale destruction dating from
1498, when King Manoel deprived the nobility of hunting and fishing
privileges in their _coutadas_. The Vez, a tributary of the Lima, is
said to be still a good trout-stream, and some trout are to be caught
in the Leça. In the Cavado, Mondego and Zezere trout are now rare.
Salmon are caught only or chiefly in the river Minho. But the sea along
Portugal’s coasts provides her with an unfailing abundance of fish, and
the fish-markets of Lisbon and Faro are renowned for their richness and
variety all the year round. To the south, especially, sardines are
plentiful in winter as well as in summer. The Portuguese coast is in
great part rocky and dangerous, but these bare inhospitable cliffs are
broken by little sand coves and bays, and varied with immense bare or
pine-covered sand-dunes.

[Sidenote: Climate.]

The climate varies considerably. In the south (Algarve) and especially
in Eastern Alemtejo (where the summer temperature can rise to 120
Fahrenheit) and Traz os Montes (where the climate is indeed rather
Spanish than Portuguese) the heat can be insufferable, and the winter
cold of the north-east is severe. But in the centre, and especially
along the coast of Estremadura, the climate may be described without
exaggeration as the best in Europe. The warm winters lead one to expect
tropical summers, but this expectation is not fulfilled, and the sea and
the north summer wind here moderate the heat which can be so oppressive
in the interior. The following statistics from an article by Snr. Antonio
Arroyo, in _Notas sobre Portugal_, give the average temperatures during
the years 1856-1900 at (1) Lisbon, (2) Biarritz, (3) Nice—

_Yearly _Winter _Spring._ _Summer._ _Autumn._
Average._ Average._

(1) 15·63 10·63 14·38 20·69 16·69
(2) 13·80 7·79 12·39 19·67 15·25
(3) 14·75 7·91 13·27 21·94 15·79

Thus, while the Lisbon winters are nearly three degrees warmer, the
summers are barely one degree warmer. The figures are Centigrade. To
convert into Fahrenheit divide by five, multiply by 9, and add 32. A
scientific book has recently been published on the climate round Lisbon:
_The Climate of Lisbon and of the two health resorts in its immediate
neighbourhood, Mont’ Estoril, on the Riviera of Portugal, and Cintra_. By
Dr. A. G. Delgado. Lisbon, 1914.

[Sidenote: Estoril.]

At Estoril a thermal station, with casino, gardens, golf-links, etc.,
is in process of construction. The Estoril climate even excels that of
Lisbon, being slightly warmer in winter and cooler in summer. It is
a little surprising that more foreigners do not settle temporarily or
permanently in this region, which is so easy of access and has so many
advantages. The considerable number of Englishmen now living in Portugal
are with few exceptions engaged in business. Possibly foreigners are
afraid of revolutions, but revolutions in Portugal do not as a rule
affect the foreigner in the slightest degree. Gambling, on a large
scale, and great luxury, it is true, he will not find, but cleanliness
and ordinary comfort are to be had at the existing hôtels, and any other
deficiencies are amply compensated for by the excellent climate and the
charms and interest of the surrounding country, and by the courtesy and
helpfulness of its inhabitants. It is not often that travellers can live
in a comfortable hôtel, have English newspapers, English books (from the
Lisbon International Library), English tinned foods and tobacco, all the
delights and none of the drawbacks of a southern climate, and at the same
time such scenery to their hand as that of Cintra, and such architecture
as is to be had on all sides in a day’s motor drive, besides lawn-tennis
and golf, and the historical associations of the Peninsular War.

[Sidenote: Backwardness of the Country.]

Rarely does the country appear to be fully developed, yet even so it
produces such a wealth of fruits and flowers that evidently with greater
care, better methods, and a more widely extended system of irrigation, it
might be a perfect paradise. It would be unfair to attribute the neglect
and backwardness and misery prevailing throughout this lovely country
entirely to the character of the inhabitants. The accumulated misfortunes
of their history for the last three centuries would be enough to explain
it; but they certainly have been inclined to neglect their own native
soil for alien enterprises, and are only now beginning to realise that
the future of Portugal lies in Portugal. In time, no doubt, Algarve,
Estremadura, and Minho will be fringed with prosperous watering-places
and with busy seaports, to which railways from the interior will carry
many minerals, wood from existing forests and from land still awaiting
afforestation, as well as the most varied vegetables, fruits and flowers.
(Foreign countries will find it profitable also to import on a large
scale earthenware manufactures, _azulejos_, and the majolica wares of
Caldas da Rainha.) Irrigation will have transformed much _matto_ country
into flourishing gardens and orchards, and Alemtejo will become in fact
as well as in name the granary of Portugal. It is quite possible for
Portugal to become one continuous garden city, through which flawless
roads will whirl the traveller in a few hours from Valença to Faro, and
from Elvas to Cintra. This is the object at which those who care more for
Portugal than for party politics must aim.

[Sidenote: Travelling in Portugal.]

But the charm will have departed, and present-day travellers may
congratulate themselves that the change is not in their day. For now
parts of the country are not to be seen without considerable effort,
and have the added fascination of things difficult of attainment. The
Portuguese rarely journey for enjoyment south of the Tagus, to the land
_alemtejo_, yet both the Alemtejo and Algarve are delightful districts,
and fully repay any little discomforts which a visit to them may entail,
and the impression left is of a great region of wild flowers and garden
fruits lying in a semi-tropical sunshine, round a few villages and
ancient towns. Indeed, those who have seen not only Minho and the massed
rhododendrons in flower on the _Serra do Gerez_, and the smooth mountains
of the _Serra da Estrella_, apparently bare and desolate, covered with
cistus, lavender, and a thousand other varieties of wild flowers, but
also the rare flowers and rhododendrons of the _Serra de Monchique_ in
Algarve, and the giant patchwork of all kinds and colours of flowers
which make beautiful the pastures and wastelands of Alemtejo, from the
tall branching asphodels, like chandeliers of chalcedony, to the serried
fields of thistle or hawksweed, will readily extend to the whole of
Portugal the name of “Switzerland of Spain,” which has been bestowed on
Galicia. (The word “Spain,” meaning the whole Peninsula, once common, is
still in use occasionally, as in the title of the Archbishop of Braga,
who is “Primate of the Spains.”) The roads of Portugal are a delight by
reason of their wayside springs and streams and groves, and the hedges
which in height and thickness rival those of Devonshire, and have all the
luxuriant growth of the south. Or, when the road cuts through _matto_,
thick masses of cistus often invade it on either side, and the air is
heavy with its scent. (Both in leaf and scent it strongly resembles
escalonia.) A walking tour is more often a hardship than a pleasure, or
rather its pleasure is of recollections, especially where, as in Spain,
inns are rare and food in an inn rarer. But Portugal, that is in the
northern provinces—for the sun tyrannises south of the Tagus and shade is
rarer—is an ideal country for such a tour.

[Sidenote: Inns.]

The witty Nicolaus Clenardus, in the sixteenth century, after complaining
that at an inn in Spain his horses had well fasted, and he himself had
had but half an ounce of meat in an _olla_, and departed as he came,
_latrante stomacho_, admitted that in Portugal things were better: _omnia
mitescere visa sunt_. It is true that the author of the _Arte de Furtar_,
writing a few generations later, gives us a melancholy initiation into
the ways of the inn-hostess of Beja. “I saw her,” he says, “buy two
cabbages for a halfpenny. She cast them into a caldron with two large
_pimentos_ well crushed and another halfpenny-worth of oil. She boiled
them twice, and without ever rising from her stool, she made thirty
plates full at a penny each, with which she feasted guests and carters
alike, and they professed themselves satisfied.” There is something
sinister about this stationary woman. _Sedet aeternumque sedebit._
Probably if an old shoe had been to hand, instead of the _pimentões_,
in it would have gone. But, however far afield the twentieth century
traveller wanders, Heaven will probably keep him from such a hostess
in Portugal—in Spain she is still common—and everywhere he will find
great willingness to attend to his requirements, such readiness in fact
that he will probably expect to be asked for several shillings and be
surprised to be charged only in _vintens_. Of course, in a sense the more
poorly he goes clad the better he will fare in the out-of-the-way parts,
the poor reserving a wealth of kindliness and ready service exclusively
for the poor. The _hospedarias_ are bare and clean, the _estalagens_ are
not much less comfortable than the _hospedarias_, and sometimes as clean.
The _estalagem_ is where any passing wayfarer—carriers, _almocreves_,
etc., put up; the _hospedarias_ are rather for more permanent guests,
officers quartered in the town, and so on. But even the wayside _venda_,
perhaps consisting of a single room, roofed over with branches and with
the trodden ground for floor, will be able to provide a meal of eggs,
coffee, and bread.

[Sidenote: Walking in Portugal.]

The water difficulty is not present as in Spain. Springs and rivulets of
most excellent transparent water, flowing cleanly over granite, are ever
to the hand of the thirsty, icy cold even in the dog days, and the great
flowered hedges will yield him a plot of shade for a rest even if he does
not hit on some pleasant grove of trees and flowers. It is to be hoped
that the _Sociedade de Propaganda de Portugal_, which watches over the
interests of the more respectable tourist, will not forget to attend to
the needs of the humble pedestrian, and indeed of the motorist, by seeing
to it that sign-posts and milestones be set on all the roads. These can
be of such a character as not in the least to obtrude upon the rustic
character of these delightful roads. In Portugal the pedestrian has the
great advantage over the motorist that he is able to digest what he sees,
and even he will have to advance in very leisurely fashion in order to
do that. It is the charm of Alcobaça and Batalha—those two marvellous
buildings—that they have no railway. You may drive or walk, but even
if you walk it is but a few miles from the one to the other, through a
tempting country of dense pinewoods and heather, with the village of
Aljubarrota and the famous battlefield thrown in. To see in one day the
multifarious splendours of Batalha and Alcobaça, not to speak of Leiria,
is more than is good for the ordinary person.

[Sidenote: Leiria.]

Leiria is little more than a village, a delightful village set in trees
and flowers, orchards and vineyards, with the sound of the rushing river
Lis ever present. On a sheer hill above it stands crumbling in flowers
the ruins of King Diniz’ Castle.

[Sidenote: Luso and Bussaco.]

The village of Luso, too, beneath Bussaco, is embedded in flowers and
creepers, and Bussaco itself, of course, consists of nothing but the
remnants of a convent and a single modern hôtel, all the rest being
a vast enclosure of trees, creepers, brushwood, shrubs and ferns and
flowers probably unequalled in Europe.

[Sidenote: Villages.]

And countless villages throughout Portugal are literally set in and
scented with flowers. A writer of the seventeenth century describes one
of them thus: “Each house has its garden with various trees, oranges,
and lemons, which fill the whole town with the sweetest scent and with
their gay flowers.”[35] For fuel all kinds of scented brushwood are
burnt—cistus, rosemary, myrtle—the thin blue smoke of which is a sweet
incense.

[Sidenote: Cascaes and the Estoris.]

Even on the rocky coast, at Cascaes near Lisbon, many flowers are to be
found. Where there is any moisture periwinkles star the ground, and in
the strip immediately along the coast burnt by the winter spray, flower
dwarf irises in crowds. They know that the sea-winds blow chiefly in
winter, and cunningly wait till they have little to fear from the spray,
springing into flower at the end of April or beginning of May. It is,
however, the land wind (the _nortadas_ that begin slightly in spring
and prevail in July and August) which blackens and bruises creepers and
flowers. This wind has something of the subtle winds of Spain, whence it
comes, and is disliked by some persons, but by those who shun intense
heat it is welcomed in the summer months. It brings cloudless skies
without great heat. It transforms all things to a clearer outline and
darkens the sea to a deep sapphire, flecked with white horses. Under the
cliffs the water in such weather—which may continue for ten days or a
fortnight—is calm and transparent, and the sunshine ripples and plays in
wrinkles of amber on the deep-sunken rocks, transmuted for the time into
great slabs of beryl, jasper and emerald. In summer a whole population
lives for weeks together fishing in these waters. Almost everything that
will float is put into requisition, and the queerest craft make their
appearance, long crescent-shaped boats that seem scarcely to touch the
water, old boats with a single square black or tawny sail, boats with
sails cherry-red, white, and brown.

[Sidenote: Wealth of Flowers.]

At Estoril, which almost joins Cascaes, live many of the foreigners
settled in Lisbon, and here the houses, mostly well sheltered by a
pine-covered hill, have gardens brimming with flowers, winter and summer.
Still more sheltered is Cintra, on the other side of the _Serra_,
where the work of the gardener consists rather in cutting away than
in encouraging growth. The road from Cintra to Collares is hemmed by
wonderful gardens and orchards, although there is still plenty of ground
waiting to be enclosed and turned into a little Monserrate. Some of these
orchards are half neglected, and one may wander gradually from woodland
into weedy garden paths where orange trees, crowded with glowing fruit,
grow apparently at random. (And the oranges of Cintra vie with those
of Setubal, at the mouth of the Sado.) It is from Collares in great
part that Lisbon fills its markets daily with an abundance of fruits
and flowers. “He who goes to the Church of the Misericordia will find
daily from fifteen to twenty girls selling flowers, loose or in wreaths
and bunches.”[36] The author, Frey Nicolas d’Oliveyra, adds that on
the 4th of August, 1620, for one _fête_ in four Lisbon churches three
thousand wreaths and two thousand bunches of flowers were used. If less
flowers now adorn Lisbon’s churches their number has not diminished, and
exportation of flowers and fruits on a vast scale only awaits quicker
means of transport and intelligent markets in foreign countries. For the
flowers fill the great uncultivated tracts of the country with scent and
colour, and wherever some minor Beckford has enclosed a plot of ground he
is rewarded by a true garden of Eden.

CHAPTER VI

CONVENTS AND PALACES

[Sidenote: Belem.]

In palaces and convents, churches, castles, towers, crumbling Roman
ruins, fine country houses, Portugal is as rich as any land. The chief
attraction of the Palacio das Necessidades at Lisbon is its splendid
grounds, now open to the public. From the Tagus the most imposing
building is the great mass of the Church of S. Vicente, which the morbid
visit to see the Princes and Kings of Portugal in their glass-covered
coffins. Of Lisbon’s ancient buildings that which most forcibly
appeals to eye and imagination is the ruined Carmo, now serving as an
archaeological museum, standing so nobly over the city and carrying
the mind back to the days of Nun’ Alvares Pereira, one of the greatest
figures of all time. But the finest building of Lisbon—since a street
now connects with the capital what was formerly a separate village, is
the Church and Convent of Belem. The village still, however, maintains a
certain individuality, with its wide common surrounded by low pink-washed
houses and primitive arcades, and its statue of Affonso d’Albuquerque
perched, like St. Simeon Stylites, on a high pillar, and looking out
across the Tagus to the Atlantic, its peculiar square Tower of Belem
jutting out into the river and, above all, the church of the Convent,
which in its perfect proportions and ancient grey colouring is one of
the most beautiful of the world’s buildings. To realise its beauty, the
church must not be seen too near, since the famous doorway will seem to
many excessively ornamented in its wealth of detail. But from the river
seen in spring above the flowering Judas trees, or above the yellowing
leaves in autumn, it might be some old Oxford college. And the interior
is worthy of such beauty, in spite of the Manoeline style, which does its
best to spoil the noble Gothic, in relation to which it stands as ivy to
the trunk of a tree. The pillars go straight up without a break to a
height of nearly a hundred feet, and about the whole place is a sense of
spaciousness and fine proportion which the Manoeline decoration cannot
mar. In little chapels round the church are the tombs of King Manoel I
(who built the Convent to celebrate the voyage of Vasco da Gama, the
buildings thus corresponding in stone to the Lusiads of Camões: _ceci n’a
pas tué cela_); of his son King João III, variously judged by historians
as a saint or a simpleton (it is not for nothing that the Spanish word
for “blessed,” _bendito_, means also a fool: _cf._ the English “silly,”
derived from the German _selig_); of Camões and of Vasco da Gama (the
tomb is his, but there was a mistake in the bones when they were
transferred thither from Vidigueira in 1880).

[Illustration: CONVENTO DE JERONYMOS, BELEM]

[Sidenote: Cintra.]

From Lisbon to Cintra is but a step, and it is equally pleasant to walk
or drive or ride, but the train will take you there in little over
half-an-hour. What strikes everyone on arriving at the village is the
curious prominence of the two uncouth gigantic chimneys of the palace.
This palace is now an archaeological museum, but the interest still
centres in the legends and history and natural beauty of its walls, for
the most part lined with fine old _azulejos_. The magpies of the ceiling
in the Sala das Pegas have not been whitewashed away, the Sala dos Cisnes
still keeps its swans, and the coats of arms cover the walls of the Sala
dos Cervos, a stag in each case supporting the arms of the old families
of Portugal—

Pois com esforços e leaes
Serviços foram ganhados:
Com estes e outros taes
Devem de ser conservados.

(Loyal services and deeds
Were yours to gain them:
By such services and deeds
Shall you maintain them.)

Cf. Marvell’s

The same arts that did gain
A power must it maintain.

A path or no path leads to the grey ruined walls of the Castello dos
Mouros above the village. Here legend would have it that the hapless
poet, Bernardim Ribeiro, came to sigh for his royal mistress, King Manoel
I’s daughter, who, however, probably left Lisbon and Cintra for Savoy
some weeks before Ribeiro came to Lisbon from Alemtejo.

[Illustration: CASTELLO DA PENA, CINTRA]

[Sidenote: Castello da Pena.]

Far above on its peak, conspicuous far out to sea on both sides of the
Serra, but in shape so different, as seen from Mafra or Collares and
from the Estoril side, that one scarcely realises that it is the same
building, stands the Castello da Pena, over 1,700 feet above sea-level.
Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg, husband of Queen Maria II of Portugal,
bought the place towards the middle of the nineteenth century for a few
hundred pounds. It was then merely a ruin of the convent built there by
King Manoel I. The surrounding woods and gardens and the magnificent
views from every window make this palace one of the most wonderful houses
in Europe, wonderful, too, in the wealth of designs on pillar and archway
(in imitation of the style Manoeline), and in many incidental beauties,
especially the altar of alabaster and grey marble in the chapel. Below,
set in luxuriant growth of azaleas and camellias, are the flower-gardens
and the Fonte dos Passarinhos or das Andorinhas, with its white marble
swallows drinking. In the palace private photographs and weapons
belonging to the Portuguese Royal Family still hang from the walls, and
the tables are covered with magazines and newspapers, dated October,
1910, precisely as on that autumn day on which Queen Amélie heard here
the faint booming of the guns from Lisbon in revolution. Those who are
not content with the exquisite partial view from the terrace of the
dining-room climb by a little outer staircase to the wind-swept cupola.
Winter and summer every wind that blows seems to redouble its force just
here. For the sake of the view a north-east wind is to be preferred,
but the view is always magnificent and extensive, in spite of the fact
that it is bounded on two sides by the Atlantic. White sands mark the
entrance of the Tagus with the Serra d’Ossa and Alemtejo beyond, and the
long headland which begins in beautiful sand-dunes—beautiful in certain
lights and days—and runs out to Cape Espichel. On afternoons of a clear
land wind the cape is lit up by the sun in every crevice of its sheer
white cliffs and stands out like an island in mid-ocean—with a strong
resemblance to the southern cliffs of England. Immediately beneath the
palace walls are the famous woods of the grounds down the sides of the
Serra. The Serra itself extends on one side to the small villages of
Charneca (Moor) and Areias (Sands), and on the other to Collares and
the Praia das Maçãs (Shore of Apples). All this country is really a
promontory some twenty miles across, between the Atlantic and the vast
estuary of the Tagus. To the east the view includes such fragments of
Lisbon as are not concealed by hills, while on the north a great black
patch in the level plain is the Convent of Mafra.

[Sidenote: Mafra.]

The Convent of Mafra is eighteenth century, and would be uninteresting
were it not for its sheer hugeness, which seems to defy you to criticise.
It bullies you into accepting its ugliness, and stuns you with figures.
Thus, you have scarcely recovered from the gigantic proportions of its
towers and the steps hundreds of feet long in front of them when you are
told that it was nearly thirty years a-building, and employed at times
nearly 50,000 builders, that the tale of its doors is 5,200, of its
windows 2,500. If you are incredulous, count them. The whole building
measures some 275 by 240 yards, nearly a sixth of a mile long. The church
is a glory of pink and white marble, magnificent but not beautiful. Yet
it is worth going through Mafra to see the front of Mafra’s Convent,
even if one does not stop to enter the building. The railway station is
ten kilomètres from the village, so that most people drive there, but if
anyone likes to take train to Mafra’s station, walk thence to Mafra, and
then straight across to Cintra, he will be rewarded by a splendid view
of the Serra to shorten his way. Seen from here, it is a gigantic wing
folded over the village of Cintra, grey crags and dark wooded ravines,
with the Cruz Alta, the Castle of Pena, and the Castle of the Moors to
mark the heights. Mafra is about thirty-five _kilomètres_ north-west
of Lisbon, and another hundred _kilomètres_ intervene between Mafra
and Vallado—no unpleasant three days’ walk. Vallado is at about equal
distance from Nazareth and the sea on one side and Alcobaça on the other.

[Illustration: CLOISTER OF D. DINIZ, ALCOBAÇA.]

[Sidenote: Alcobaça.]

To whatever pains the traveller may be put before reaching Alcobaça
he will think nothing thereof when he sees the interior of this old
Cistercian abbey, and to many the very remoteness of Alcobaça and
Batalha, lying fortunately miles from any railway station, is no mean
attraction. This Convent, like that of Mafra, is now used partly as
barracks and partly as prison—the mixed company of prisoners may be seen
white and hungry, stretching out their hands through the bars to the
village street. But, whereas Mafra as a barracks seems to be usefully
fulfilling its proper purpose, to quarter a regiment in Alcobaça’s
monastery savours of desecration. However, the principal cloisters, the
Cloisters of Dom Diniz, are still and peaceful, surrounding with their
beautiful arches plots gay with flowers, as when the monks sought or
sheltered from the sun here and were buried beneath the flagstones. Here
is an old well with its ferns and crumbling Gothic architecture, and the
whole place may give many an intense desire to have the good monks back
there to enjoy it instead of half-a-dozen flurried and unappreciative
tourists. The climate of Portugal makes it an ideal country for all whose
sole vocation is endless contemplation, and where better fulfil that
vocation than in these lovely convents! In winter the building provides
a hundred corners of hot sun, and in hot weather the cold stone and
the sound of running water recall some Seville _patio_. The guide-books
for every two or three pages given to Batalha, will devote but one to
Alcobaça. Yet for those who care for pure Gothic the latter is perhaps
even the more attractive of the two. The narrow aisles, plain majestic
pillars, and nobly sculptured capitals, make of its early Gothic church
a severe and lovely building, and historically, of course, the interest
of the place is very great. In the Sala dos Reis are statues of the early
kings of Portugal, and _azulejo_ scenes of the events which led to the
foundation of the convent. As is well known, it was Affonso Henriques
(that is, son of Count Henry of Burgundy), who began it, owing to an
oath he had made to build a convent in the event of taking Santarem from
the Moors. The capture of Santarem (1147 A.D.) was but one of the many
successes of that great warrior king, the first king and the real founder
of Portugal as a separate nation. Compared with so early a date, the
giant caldron taken from the Spaniards after the battle of Aljubarrota
(1385) is almost modern. It also stands in the Sala dos Reis, and it is
well that one memorial of the deeds of the great Constable should be
here, for the hero of Aljubarrota, Nun’ Alvares, and Affonso I had much
in common. Both won many victories, and founded churches and convents,
and both were inspired by a passionate love of the independence of their
country. If Nun’ Alvares was the more chivalrous of the two this must
be attributed to the intervening centuries. But it is not of Affonso
Henriques that most visitors think when they are at Alcobaça, but of a
time one generation earlier than that of Nun’ Alvares, who was but seven
when King Pedro I (1357-67) died.

[Sidenote: Inés de Castro.]

In one of the chapels of Alcobaça’s church are the tombs of King Pedro
and of Inés de Castro. Legend would have it that they were buried feet to
feet, in order that when the trumpet of the Day of Judgment sounded their
eyes might meet at once as they rose from the dead. In the striking lines
of the modern Portuguese poet, Snr. Affonso Lopes Vieira—striking by
reason of their fine sound and volume—

Hão de accordar sorrindo eternamente,
Os olhos um no outro emfim pousando.

(They will awake and smile henceforth for ever,
As their eyes meet at length in fond embrace.)

Such subtleties were scarcely of that age, but the tombs (and their
recumbent figures) certainly face one another, minutely and delightfully
carved in stone. The rivers Alcoa and Baça meet at Alcobaça, and a
tributary of the Alcoa, a tiny stream, runs beneath the convent. Some of
the tombs in this Capella dos Tumulos are green with damp and run a fair
chance of permanent injury. King Diniz’ mother as well as the children
of Pedro and Inés are buried in the same chapel. Round the cruel fate
of lovely Inés a whole literature has grown up in prose and verse, from
the fine verses of the courtier poet Garcia de Resende—far the best
that he wrote—in the reign of King Manoel I to the poem _Costança_ by
Snr. Eugenio de Castro, and the sonnet which the two lines quoted above
close. There is scarcely an educated Portuguese who does not try his hand
at poetry, and scarcely a Portuguese poet who escapes the temptation
to renew in verse the tragic tale of Inés de Castro. The temptation is
the greater in that she lived and died a stone’s throw from the halls
of Coimbra, in which most Portuguese receive their education, and
represents in her romantic story and sorrowful ending all that is most
_meigo_ and _saudoso_ in Portuguese _saudade_. From the fifteenth to the
twentieth century the Inés legend runs like a connecting link through
Portuguese literature, and if it has never yet been treated with more
than a pretty lyric wistfulness in minor poems beautiful but subjective,
perhaps these are the basis and preparation for the great poet who will
record it in a spirit of true and high Tragedy worthy of the subject and
of these Alcobaça sculptures. Pedro and Inés do not even meet in the
celebrated drama, _Inés de Castro_, by Antonio Ferreira (1528-69). He
discreetly left that for the Day of Judgment, rightly feeling, no doubt,
that his own powers of description and psychology would be inadequate
to the occasion. So they still lie waiting separated by these barriers
of incomparable sculpture in the gloomy damp Chapel of the Tombs. With
relief the visitor emerges to the sunny cloisters, a part of which
really dates from the days of stout-hearted King Diniz and escaped the
far-spread destruction of the Peninsular War.

[Illustration: TOMB OF D. INÉS DE CASTRO, ALCOBAÇA]

[Sidenote: Batalha.]

Portugal’s Battle Abbey, the Mosteiro da Batalha or de Santa Maria da
Vitoria commemorates a victory not over the Moors, but over the invading
Spaniard in the battle of Aljubarrota, King João I against King Juan I.
The military genius and enthusiasm of Nun’ Alvares won the day. King
João two years later married an English wife. Their children were given
an English education, and became Prince Henry the Navigator, King Edward
the Eloquent, one of the masters of early Portuguese prose, the Infante
Pedro, also author and statesman, and the Infante Fernando, who died
loyally in Africa, a happier death than that which awaited his brother
Pedro, killed in a civil feud in the reign of his nephew Affonso V.
English was all the order of the day, the story of King Arthur penetrated
deep into Portuguese Court life and literature, the knightly Galahad
was Nun’ Alvares’ model and hero. And under English influence, perhaps
English workmen, was begun the great monastery which stands so nobly
apart, grey traceries and pinnacles in a hollow of dark pine-covered
hills. It must ever continue to be one of the chief attractions to those
who visit Portugal, and it is to be hoped that it will ever retain its
rustic situation, far from trains, hôtels and all those appurtenances
of civilisation which usually dog the tourist’s footsteps. Indeed, this
sequestered region between Leiria and Alcobaça will to many, whether they
drive or walk, but especially if they walk, remain the principal among
their many delightful memories of Portugal. The church of Batalha is
more magnificent than that of Alcobaça, yet in some respects as severely
beautiful. These lordly pillars have none of the false ornament which
defaces the pillars of Belem, and the arches are of unrivalled boldness
and beauty of proportion. Some of the windows have kept pieces of fine
old stained glass among much modern stuff. In the Chapel of the Founders
are the tombs of the Master of Aviz, João I, of his wife Philippa of
Lancaster, and of their sons, Pedro, Enrique, João, and Fernando (the
Infante Santo), whose untimely fate probably hastened the death of his
brother, King Duarte, whose tomb is in another chapel of this church.
The king was equally unwilling to give up Ceuta, for the surrender of
which Prince Fernando had remained hostage, or to be responsible for
his brother’s death. It was only two years after King Duarte’s death at
Thomar in 1438 that the Infante’s sufferings in a Moorish dungeon ended.
They were borne with a patience and intrepidity which made of him a
true _principe constante_. His story is told in the _Cronica do Infante
Santo D. Fernando_, by Frei João Alvarez. It is poetic justice that this
splendid building should unite in death these five brothers who were as
talented and as mutually affectionate as they were ill-fated—if fortunate
implies long life rather than fine character or high deeds accomplished.
Alcobaça for the most part scorns the Manoeline style and the church
of Batalha is as purely Gothic. Its cloisters, however, and Unfinished
Chapels (Capellas Imperfeitas) are the very flower of Manoeline. This
strange style, typical of Portuguese restlessness and longing for new
things, was introduced in the age of Portugal’s great discoveries and
partly under Oriental influence. However inartistic its general effect,
in details it is often beautiful, and always interesting as commemorating
Portugal’s naval glories and the new animals, plants, shells, etc., found
beyond the seas. The many minute designs, as well as the cryptic “Greek”
inscriptions (really French: _Tant que seray lealte faray_) of these
arches in the Unfinished Chapels are full of interest. The first view of
Batalha gives an impression of greyness; but, nearer, the lower part is
found to be built of stone originally snow-white, which changes to the
most varied hues of yellow and grey as time and weather mould and stain
it. With keen regret must travellers leave Batalha to take their way
along the white road between pines to Alcobaça or Leiria.

[Sidenote: Thomar.]

A longer tramp or drive going East from Leiria takes one to Thomar in
the very heart of Portugal, unless one goes by train to Payalvo, a few
_kilomètres_ from Thomar on the other side. The town and its river
may have exchanged names since the ancient Nabantia apparently had a
river called Thomar, whereas the river’s name is now Nabão. The site of
Nabantia is supposed to be occupied now by the Church of Santa Maria do
Olival, the oldest church of the Templars in Portugal, built by Gualdim
Paes, one of the heroes of legendary feats of arms in the reign of the
first King of Portugal. If in parts of the interior of Batalha the
Manoeline style is seen in all its glory, in the Convent of Thomar it is
the outside walls that display it in a way so bold and magnificent as to
silence the carpers. It may be said that it is magnificent, but that it
is not art: yet it was well that in at least one great building the outer
walls should bear silent witness through the centuries to Portugal’s
great achievement. Chain and grummet and rope, coral from distant seas,
flowers and plants and birds from tropical lands, anchors and even—a
conception as strange as its execution was happy—great bellying sails in
stone, represent the story of those ships (ships of a few score tons)

Que foram descobrir mundos e mares.

The Convent contains a succession of cloisters and architecture of many
centuries, the original Church of the Templars being of the twelfth
century, when Affonso I relied on their strong right arms to force back
the Moors mile by mile to the south. Indeed, the building is a perfect
wilderness of courts and corridors. Gualdim Paes is not the only hero of
these now deserted halls, for Prince Henry the Navigator was Grand Master
of Thomar for over forty years, till his death in 1460, and devoted the
greater part of the revenues of the Templars to further the cause he had
most at heart—the extension of Christianity into lands and seas unknown.
The view from the terrace is of surpassing beauty, and it seems a pity
that there is no one living here permanently to enjoy it. The gently
sloping hills are covered with every variety of green, from the grey
of olives to the dark leaves of orange-trees. On the other side there
is a view of Thomar beneath the Convent, a most curious town, of bare
discomfortable look by reason of its angular buildings, steep towers and
spires, severe mediaeval churches and clean streets of cobbles without
side pavement. Its paper mills flourish, so that it does not stand aloof
from modern industry and progress, but its inhabitants maintain an
old-fashioned pride in themselves and their town.

[Sidenote: Coimbra.]

Coimbra lies some sixty miles due north of Thomar, on the other side of
the _Serra de Louzã_, westernmost offshoot of the _Serra da Estrella_.
Its look is far less grey and stern than that of Thomar. Most of its
buildings are whitewashed, and a few washed in pink or yellow, so that
the old cathedral stands out like a great mass of rock from among the
tier after tier of houses that cover the steep hill above the Mondego.
Indeed, it is the exterior of the Sé Velha that is chiefly remarkable,
in its massive and imposing grandeur. Coimbra has many other fine old
buildings set among its serried houses. The University or Schools (_Paços
das Escholas_) stands at the very top of the town, its clock-tower
pointing skyward. Students in their long black coats, white ties, and
flowing gowns (_capas_), bareheaded even in July, when the summer term
ends, are to be seen everywhere in the narrow streets or along the
river and famous walk under the poplars (the _Choupal_). The Faculty of
Theology is now abolished, but they may study mathematics, philosophy,
philology, medicine, and especially they study law as a preliminary to a
political career. They enter the University younger than is usual at an
English University and remain longer—about eight years. The University
with its spacious quadrangles, fine halls, and library, is surrounded by
a view of valleys, hills and river such as surely no other University in
the world can boast. The Mondego is one of the most beautiful rivers of
Northern Portugal, the land of transparent rivers and streams flowing
over granite and tinged by no taint of soil. Close to the Mondego across
the bridge is the remnant of the old convent of Santa Clara. It is now
a farmhouse and the fine capitals of its pillars between which the oxen
have their stalls are now but a few feet from the ground, so great is
the volume of sand carried down by the _cheias_ of the river. It flows
so _mansamente_, clear and gentle, but owing to the rockiness of its
bed has no elasticity, and a few hours of heavy rain suffice to turn it
into a huge rushing torrent. The new Mosteiro de Santa Clara is built
high above the level of the river, and the Quinta das Lagrimas stands
some way from its banks. Here the Fonte dos Amores flows from a rock of
ferns and flowers through a rough cross-shaped channel of stone, the
iron-red stains of which are supposed to mark the place where Inés de
Castro was murdered in 1355, a date hardly less celebrated in Portugal
than that other fifty-five of the great Lisbon earthquake four centuries
later. All these buildings are on the left bank of the river among a
lovely orchard-country of orange, cherry, and pomegranate. The principal
building in Coimbra itself after the Sé Velha is the Mosteiro de Santa
Cruz, which was built in the twelfth century, and contains the tombs of
Affonso and Sancho, the first two Kings of Portugal. Its church is much
later, built by Marcos Pires in the sixteenth century. He was also the
architect of the Convent’s Manoeline “Cloisters of Silence.” But Coimbra
as a whole seen from the green Mondego or from the Mosteiro de Santa
Clara beyond it, is a work of art, and both the town and surrounding
country deserve a far more prolonged study than they usually receive.

[Sidenote: Striking Positions.]

It is in the strip of country between Tagus and Mondego that Portugal has
massed her most famous and beautiful buildings, and the hurried traveller
can thus within a space of about a hundred miles see Belem and Cintra
and Mafra, Alcobaça, Batalha, and Thomar, Santarem, Leiria and Coimbra.
But Portugal possesses a hundred other towns and towers so splendidly
situated as to need little art for their beauty’s heightening. What can
be finer, for instances at random, than the position of Palmella or of
Covilhã, or high-perched Guarda, or Louzã, or the castle of Melgaço, or
the ruins of the monastery of Crato, the early home of Nun’ Alvares, or
of the castle of Almourol on its Tagus islet, the site chosen by the
Romans and the castle famous in the adventures of Palmeirim of England.

[Sidenote: Minho.]

The provinces of Minho and Traz os Montes, which limit Portugal to the
north, have few great buildings. Minho is celebrated rather for its woods
and hills and streams, its cheerful _quintas_ in pleasant surroundings of
maize and granite, than for its ancient buildings. It is not a country
of large towns. Several unpretentious small towns it has along its sand
and pine coast, Villa do Conde. Povoa de Varzim and Vianna do Castello,
the latter beautiful in its sheltered position at the mouth of the river
Lima. It is worth following up this river, which inspired the poet Diogo
Bernardes with his tenderest verses, and to which his thoughts turned
longingly when a captive in Africa after the battle of Alcacer Kebir, for
it really is beautiful, and the _quintas_ and villages most interesting.
The capital of Minho, Braga, has few old buildings besides the Cathedral,
which is said to date from the first years of Portugal’s existence, and
preserves the tomb of Count Henry of Burgundy, father of Portugal’s first
King.

[Sidenote: Traz os Montes.]

Traz os Montes, the neighbouring province to the east, has even fewer
towns. Its villages lie like those of Castille in a bleak and shadeless
country. The only two with pretensions to the name of town are Villa
Real, the capital, and Bragança. Both of these towns are most curious.
They have rather many interesting scraps of carved wood and stone than
any great buildings, but the Castle of the Braganzas is one of the
finest of the many noble castles that crown the hills of Portugal. It
is surrounded by a wall within which is a little village of streets and
shops of its own, so that it forms a miniature town above Bragança.
The wall hides these low houses, tiny shops and narrow streets from
sight, and the town of Bragança itself is in a hollow, so that from some
distance one sees only the great castle standing out among the bare
treeless hills.

[Sidenote: Oporto.]

Oporto, too, has succeeded in retaining its individuality. The towns of
Portugal have to thank their position on steep hills, strong sites chosen
against attack of Moor or Christian, for having kept in some at least
of their quarters a peculiar character of mediaeval charm. So steep are
many of Oporto’s streets that a strike of tramcars—which in Portugal
ascend streets truly perpendicular—leaves the citizens in a comical
helplessness, infants without arms. Oporto covers several hills on the
right bank of the Douro. The river is here so narrow, the granite banks
so steep that from some points of the city one may look across from one
bank to the other without realising that there is any break or that a
river flows between. Oporto is the only city of Portugal besides Lisbon.
The latest returns give a population of 194,000. The total number of
foreigners is 7,210, of which 3,110 are Brazilians, 2,764 Spaniards,
289 French, 229 Germans, and 579 English (census of 1911). It is a busy
industrial city, and has no parades of idleness like Lisbon, where the
busy workers are crushed away into side streets and quays, for fear the
foreigner should see such undignified behaviour. The true _Lisboeta’s_
ambition is to do nothing, and to do it elegantly. On the other hand,
the inhabitant of Oporto is proud of his business. He is more vigorous
and active, and has a sterner and more independent outlook on life. And
the two cities are rivals, sometimes almost bitterly hostile. It is the
steep right bank of the Douro which has provided Oporto with its most
curious and conservative quarters. There is here little scope for change.
The narrow streets descend so sheerly that they have become in places
mere flights of stone steps, and the coal smoke of Oporto gives them
a coat of blackness. It is the most northern in look of all southern
cities. If you were to transport a part of the City or some town of the
North of England to the radiant sunshine and crushing heat of Portugal,
you might have a like effect. Not that Oporto has not plenty of colour in
detail, but the first impression is one of iron-grey and gloom. The fine
old Cathedral stands immediately above these steep descents to the river.
One says “old” naturally, although it retains nothing of the twelfth
century, when it was founded, and much of it is quite modern: for the
granite of which it is built has a look of age even in its first youth.
The cloisters are five centuries old, the oldest part of the building.
In the sordid surroundings and in the summer heat, which can be more
oppressive at Oporto than at Lisbon, the Cathedral is a cool refuge to
which, however, few of the citizens have apparently the leisure to go;
or the energy, unless they live in some little black court or smothered
alley in its neighbourhood. More central is the eighteenth-century
Priests’ Tower—Torre dos Clerigos—nearly a twentieth of a mile high,
from which all Oporto and the surrounding country can be seen. Oporto
has older buildings, as the Church of São Martinho de Cedofeita, of the
twelfth century, but the real pride of its citizens is in the Jardim da
Cordoaria, planted fifty years ago, in the Palacio de Crystal, of the
same date, built in imitation of the Crystal Palace, in the statue of
Prince Henry the Navigator (1900); the “Avenue of Fountains” above the
Douro and the 200 ft. high bridge of Dom Luiz I across it. On top of the
left bank in rocky prominence is the old Convent of the Augustinians,
Nossa Senhora da Serra do Pilar, famous in the Peninsular War, and
beneath are the gaily washed cellars and _armazens_ of the port-wine
merchants in the most ancient town of Gaia.

[Illustration: GENERAL VIEW, OPORTO]

[Sidenote: Alemtejo and Algarve.]

Rarely does the foreign traveller in Portugal, rarely the Portuguese
traveller on pleasure bent, cross the Tagus. Alemtejo and Algarve are
relegated for the most part to the glare of the sun and to farmers,
engineers and commercial travellers. Only a few cunning persons know
that a whole new kingdom of pleasure and interest here awaits the
enterprising. But it must be confessed that the travelling is not easy,
and that the train which saunters along the single railway, zigzagging
towards Algarve, takes a whole day to reach Faro from Lisbon. The
foreigner coming from Badajoz sees the delightful town of Elvas, sees
perhaps Estremoz or Portalegre. But many other towns and villages deserve
his attention, Setubal for its position and groves of oranges, Santarem
for its splendid view of the Tagus valley, Vianna do Alemtejo, a white
village above wide charnecas, Monchique, high in the southernmost _serra_
of Portugal, the ancient Silves, once a flourishing city of the Moors,
Sines and Sagres for their more modern historical associations, Lagos in
its beautiful sheltered bay calling to all those who like hot winters,
Portimão with its no less beautiful Praia da Rocha.

[Sidenote: Beja.]

Beja, in the heart of Alemtejo, rightly has an ox in its city arms, a
strong frontier town transformed into a centre of agriculture since
the days of King Diniz. It is seen from far across the level plain, a
beautiful old town on a hill, its outline of crumbling walls and towers
clear against the sky. Its castle, with the magnificent Torre de Menagem,
was built, as so many other Portuguese castles, by King Diniz, who
clearly saw the importance of Beja as a centre for his “nerves of the
republic,” the peasants of the soil. The whole town is extraordinarily
picturesque, with no lack of colour in its narrow lanes and streets.
The water-carriers wheel their handcarts with holes for twenty-four
or a dozen jars from far outside the town, and the peasants go out in
troops to till the soil or gather the harvest, returning at nightfall to
Beja’s sheltering walls, as if some sudden attack of the Moors were to
be feared. This daedal of steep streets enshrines beautiful churches, as
that of Nossa Senhora da Conceição, but it is the streets themselves and
the lovely ruins of Beja that are its chief attraction. Both the Kings
Manoel bore the title of Duke of Beja before coming to the throne, which
is to say, that neither of them was the heir apparent, this being the
title borne by the King’s second son.

[Sidenote: Evora.]

The capital of Alemtejo is Evora, which thus keeps something of the
importance that formerly made it the second city of Portugal. It has
now sunk to a provincial life, although in the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries it figured largely in Portuguese history as a favourite
residence of the Court. It remains, however, the paradise of the
archaeologist and student of architecture, as it was in the time of André
de Resende. Even before entering the town the old church of São Braz, of
curious and forbidding exterior, arrests the attention. It is more like
a turreted fortification than a church. Within the walls of the town one
comes at every step on some fine old building or ruin, or rather within
what remains of these magnificent walls. It was at the entrance of the
town that Trancoso in the sixteenth century placed an incident in one
of the most entertaining of his “profitable histories.” The poor man of
his tale, reduced to the extreme of misery, persecuted by all, and made
desperate by such injustice, threw himself over the battlement. Now it
happened that an old paralysed man was seated taking the sun beneath the
wall, and the poor man fell on top of him. He himself escaped unhurt,
but he killed the old man. Here was another charge against him, and the
old man’s son demanded a life for a life. The judge was the father of
Sancho, of the island of Barataria. He decreed that the poor man should
sit in the chair of the paralysed and take the sun beneath the wall of
Evora, and that the dead man’s son should throw himself from the wall on
top of him and so kill him. The whole town of Evora has been described
as an archaeological museum, and the narrow streets sometimes ascending
steeply with quaint wooden arcades on either side, the houses of massive
stone and ironwork and green shutters, the squares and _chafarizes_
(fountains), the hanging gardens of private houses, and the public
gardens brimming with flowers, the tiny shops, dark beneath arcades,
the fairs and markets, all make of Evora one of the most peculiar and
interesting of cities. And there is the fine imposing sixteenth-century
church of São Francisco, with its massive exterior walls and pillars,
and, inside the famous chapel, the Room of Bones (_Casa dos Ossos_)—

Nós ossos
Que aqui estamos
Pelos vossos
Esperamos.

(We bones that lie here wait for yours to appear.)

The early Gothic cathedral was originally finished in 1204, but is,
of course, as it stands, largely of later date. Its interior contains
much fine work of both the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries. Almost
touching it is one of the finest Roman ruins in existence, the “Temple of
Diana,” nearly 2,000 years old, its magnificent Corinthian columns still
supporting massive blocks of granite. It stands at the top of the town,
having thus little to fear from the encroachment of modern buildings, and
is outlined proudly against the sky. One may hope, since so many pillars
have escaped as by a miracle from the peril of earthquake, that it may
stand there during another score of centuries and escape destruction and
mutilation at the hands of man, though indeed to the materialist it is as
valueless as a flower, a crimson sunset, or a Cathedral evensong.

[Sidenote: Faro.]

Faro is nearly two hundred miles due south of Evora, and between the two
towns is all the difference between serious solid conservative Alemtejo
and gay epicurean Algarve. Faro cannot vie with Evora in the matter of
buildings, it has no palaces or convents, though it has an interesting
little cathedral. Of the Convent of São Bento only the cloisters survive.
But in its position on the sea, its lines of low houses washed in many
light hues, its inner harbour, like some still sky-reflecting lagoon, its
markets and the shifting scenes that enliven its streets and _praças_, it
is one of the most charming of Portugal’s towns, and gives the traveller
one of those lively impressions of contrast in which the whole land of
Portugal abounds. Surely no other combines in so small a space so many
varieties of natural scenery and of architecture.

CHAPTER VII

HISTORICAL SURVEY

[Sidenote: Count Henry.]

The early, the first five, centuries, of Portugal’s history read like
some enchanting romance of chivalry, a long chain of heroic deeds by
a few great men in an age when the individual counted for everything.
In Roman history, Viriathus, the chieftain of the _Serra da Estrella_,
and the Lusitanians under Sertorius had signalized themselves for their
courage and powers of resistance. But Portugal was but a part of a
Roman province—modern Portugal corresponds only in part to the ancient
Lusitania—nor was it in existence as a separate region when Count
Henry of Burgundy became Count of Portugal in 1095. The Moors, who had
conquered Lisbon three centuries after the Roman rule in Lusitania came
to an end in A.D. 409, were still in possession, although temporarily
ousted by Alfonso VI, King of León, in 1093. Thus the province which
separated itself from Galicia consisted of a narrow tract with wavering
borders between the Minho and the Tagus.

[Sidenote: Affonso I.]

Count Henry had extended its southern frontier before he died in 1112,
but it was his son Affonso Henriques, who, by his mighty deeds of war,
really established the kingdom. Santarem was taken in 1147, and in the
same year, with the help of English and other Crusaders, Lisbon. His
mother, the Countess Theresa, was Regent from 1112 to 1128, but in the
latter year he took over the reins of power. For the first year of
his rule he was at war with Castille, but soon all his energies were
directed against the Moors, and the battle of Ourique, before which
Christ was supposed to have appeared to the Infante, promising him
victory, definitely turned the scales in favour of the Christians
(1139). Henceforth he was known as King of Portugal, a title conferred
perhaps on the battlefield of Ourique and confirmed at the Cortes of
Lamego (1143). The King’s untiring energy had the great incentive that
whatever territory he won from the Moors he held in his own right, and
if this territory became greater than that originally held in fealty to
León, Portugal would almost naturally become independent. His prudence
seems to have matched his valour, and he parried the claims of León by
making Portugal tributary to the Pope. In 1184, after nearly sixty years
of warfare, begun in 1128 against his own mother in order to obtain his
kingdom, the old King was once more in arms, with the object of relieving
his son, besieged in Santarem by the Moors. He died in the following
year, in great honour and glory. The King had made the nation.

[Sidenote: Sancho I.]

His son, Sancho I, second King of Portugal (1185-1211), and perhaps
also her first poet (in a poem addressed to the fair Maria Paes), had
proved himself in his youth worthy of his father’s great reputation. The
conquest of the south of the Peninsula from the Moors continued. Silves
was taken in 1189, retaken by the Moors in 1191. But Sancho did not
confine himself to war: he founded towns and encouraged agriculture to
such an extent that he became known as the _Lavrador_ or the _Poblador_.
In his reign occurred the first disagreement between Church and State,
which was soon to grow to so serious a conflict. The religious orders for
their past and prospective services against the Moors had received huge
grants of land from his father and from King Sancho himself. Often an
Order would be given the whole of a vast tract of land still unconquered
from the Moors. It seemed a little thing at the time, but when conquered
and cultivated, made the possessors as powerful as the King or more so.
King Sancho, however, left a prosperous kingdom at his death. By his will
he bequeathed certain important towns to his daughters absolutely.

[Sidenote: Affonso II.]

Their brother, King Affonso II, refused to waive his right to these
towns, and the first years of his reign were occupied with civil war,
while it ended in a first serious disagreement with the Clergy and Rome.
The most welcome event of his reign was the capture of the strongly
fortified town of Alcacer do Sal from the Moors in 1217, with the help of
Crusaders who had sheltered in the Tagus and sailed up the Sado to the
attack.

[Sidenote: Sancho II.]

In the reign of his son, Sancho II (1223-46), the strife with the Clergy
developed and the powerful nobility took part against the King, the
dissatisfaction being fanned apparently by the report that the King
intended to marry his distant cousin, Mecia Lopes de Haro, daughter of
the Lord of Biscay. The King, who had continued the conquest of Algarve,
and won the important town of Tavira, was powerless to withstand the
forces united against him. A deputation of Portuguese prelates and nobles
waited on the Pope at Lyon, and persuaded him to depose King Sancho,
or rather to appoint his brother Affonso as Regent. The cynical and
ambitious Affonso had been long resident in France, and he now accepted
the offer with some alacrity, taking whatever oaths were required of him
before he set out for Portugal. The King fled at his approach, and died
two years later an exile at Toledo (1248).

[Sidenote: Affonso III.]

As he was childless, Affonso was his natural successor. His ambitions
realised, he made a good king—he seems to have had great personal
attractions—and continued successful in all his undertakings. The
conquest of Algarve was completed, Faro, facing out towards Africa,
falling to the King in 1249. A dispute between Affonso III and Alfonso
X, the Learned, of Castille, arose out of these Portuguese victories in
Algarve. The Guadiana was not yet a boundary between Spain and Portugal,
and it seemed as if the victorious Portuguese might eventually deprive
Castille of the potential possession of the whole southern strip of the
Peninsula, even to Almería. A treaty settled their differences in 1253.
By this treaty Affonso III was to marry Brites, illegitimate daughter
of Alfonso X. The wedding, as well as the bride, was illegitimate, for
the Portuguese King was already married to the French Countess Mathilde.
The dowry now offered was a glittering temptation, and the Pope, who
excommunicated Affonso III for bigamy, should have included in his ban
the Castilian monarch, fellow-conspirator with Affonso in this wickedness.

[Sidenote: Diniz.]

When Affonso died his eldest son, Diniz or Denis (1279-1325) was in his
eighteenth year. Owing to the illness of his father—bedridden for years
before his death—he had early taken a part in affairs. Indeed, at the age
of six, we find him a full-blown diplomatist, sent on a mission—connected
with the independence of Algarve—to his grandfather, King Alfonso the
Learned, at Seville. As King, his activities were many-sided, and in all
of them he showed the same strong will and good sense, always directed
towards the strengthening of Portugal, and making the interests of throne
and people one. The quarrel between the State and the Church in Portugal,
backed by the Vatican, which had caused his father to die excommunicate,
continued, but by an attitude of equal firmness and justice. King Diniz
contrived to bring about a settlement, and to check the acquisition of
real property by the religious orders. The same firm hand dealt with
the overweening nobility. Some discontent was felt among the nobles,
and Diniz’ real popularity was with the workmen, peasants, and small
farmers, whose interests he so unflaggingly protected. Throughout the
country he built and rebuilt walls and towns and towers, and encouraged
the cultivators of the soil as “the nerves of the republic.” He founded
in 1290 at Lisbon the University, which after several removals from
Lisbon to Coimbra and from Coimbra to Lisbon, is now definitely fixed at
Coimbra. And, as if he foresaw all Portugal’s destined task and glory,
he encouraged ship-building, imported an admiral for his fleet from
Genoa, and planted the country about Leiria with pines. As a poet he has
left us a greater number of lyrics than any other early king, with the
exception, perhaps, of his grandfather of Castille. And he wrote them
not only in the Provençal manner, but characteristically encouraged the
indigenous poetry derived from the soil of Galicia. He was a thorough
Portuguese, and ruled over a clearly defined region with the boundaries
of modern Portugal. The first years of his reign were clouded by civil
strife with his brother, who based a claim to the Crown on the fact that
Diniz was born before the Countess Mathilde died, and his last years were
saddened by disagreement with his eldest son. This only did not come
to battles even more serious than those actually fought owing to the
untiring mediation of King Diniz’ wife, the Queen Saint Elizabeth.

[Sidenote: Affonso IV.]

King Diniz, the _Lavrador_, was reconciled to and succeeded by this son,
Affonso IV. Under Affonso the relations with Castille became more and
more frequent, and in 1340 the Portuguese King and the flower of the
Portuguese chivalry helped to win the great battle of Salado against the
Moors. Affonso IV, who had embittered his father’s last years, suffered
in turn at the hands of his son. It must be allowed that Pedro had some
excuse, for the King had sanctioned the murder, during his son’s absence,
of the mother of Pedro’s three children, the lovely Inés de Castro.
Maddened with grief, Pedro harassed his father’s realm with fire and
sword.

[Sidenote: Pedro I.]

This sorrow seems to have increased the eccentricity of his character, so
that at times there seemed a streak of madness. It was he who thrashed
the Bishop of Porto, it was he who condemned a stonecutter who had
killed a man to the same sentence as a priest who had killed a man:
after ascertaining that the priest had been forbidden to say mass as
punishment, he sternly forbade the stonecutter to cut any more stones.
There was grim humour in many of the sentences of this _Rei Justiceiro_,
and they were always directed against the powerful, the nobility, the
clergy, the King’s officials in favour of the weak and unprotected, so
that the people sang his praises. He seems to have had something of his
grandfather, King Diniz’, art of popularity without his high sense of
dignity. Pedro’s passion was for the dance and to the blowing of his long
silver trumpets he would dance through the streets of Lisbon by night or
day.

[Sidenote: Fernando I.]

After a reign of ten years (1357-67) he was succeeded by the reckless
and irresponsible Fernando, who contrived during his reign of sixteen
years to squander the great wealth built up by the Kings of Portugal
since Affonso III. He must needs lay claim to the Crown of Castille,
and in a series of unnecessary wars brought his kingdom to the verge of
ruin. Lisbon was besieged by land and sea by the Castilians in 1373.
The King’s unpopularity was increased by his marriage with the wily
and unscrupulous Leonor Telles. It was in this reign that occurred the
murder of the beautiful and innocent Maria Telles, at the hands of her
own husband, brother of the King and son of murdered Inés, by instigation
of her sister Leonor. Her fate has been less celebrated than that of
Inés, but had no less of tragedy and pathos. During the whole of the
fourteenth century a succession of double marriages between the royal
families of Castille and Portugal increased the mutual familiarity, if
not friendliness, of the two countries. Finally, to crown the impolicy
of his whole reign, Fernando married his daughter Beatrice to King Juan
I of Castille in the year 1383, thereby almost irretrievably assuring
Portugal’s union with or rather subjection to Castille. He had previously
settled to marry her to nearly every prince in Europe, but did not
consider himself bound by treaties. To him they were mere scraps of
paper. The old-fashioned German historian, Heinrich Schäfer, writing in
1835, says that “neither duty nor honour could bind him” to respect them.

[Sidenote: João I.]

His widow, Queen Leonor, stood for the cause of Castille, wishing the
Portuguese throne for her daughter and son-in-law. After her favourite,
João Fernandes Andeiro, Count of Ourem, had been murdered almost before
her eyes in the palace, and popular excesses at Lisbon, Evora and other
towns had fully showed the danger of her position, she retired from
Lisbon and joined the Spanish invader. Early in 1384 King Juan I was
at Santarem, styling himself King of Castille, León and Portugal. Thus
Portugal was ruled at one and the same time by two Kings John I, for
the Infante João, Master of Aviz, illegitimate son of King Pedro, and
intensely popular, especially at Lisbon, was now king in all but name.
Many of the Portuguese nobility favoured the cause of Castille, and King
Juan I appeared to have good chance of ultimate victory. Queen Leonor
soon found that she had exchanged one difficult position for another. She
was virtually a prisoner in the King’s hands, and was finally relegated
to the Convent of Tordesillas. The Castilians besieged Lisbon closely by
land and sea, and only the plague in their ranks brought relief to the
starving city. On the 6th of April, 1385, the Infante João was formally
chosen King of Portugal. His chief supporter was, like Napoleon, worth a
whole army. Others might waver, but in Nun’ Alvares’ straight and clear
mind loyalty to Queen Leonor, who was held to have forfeited loyalty,
could not weigh for an instant against his love of an independent
Portugal. To secure that, he said, he would fight against his own father.
Against his brother he did fight, and no suspicion of the loyalty of the
Constable, not long out of his teens, could be instilled into the mind of
his friend João I, who rewarded him for his victories with well-nigh half
his kingdom. The first great Portuguese victory was at Trancoso in July,
1385, followed on the 15th of August by the battle near Aljubarrota,
in which the flower of the Spanish nobility, and of Portuguese nobles
fighting on the side of Castille, fell. It was a victory of King and
people over the nobility. King Juan fled in haste to Santarem, and
thence to Spain. Nun’ Alvares in October won another great victory at
Valverde, and after that there was little more fear of serious Spanish
invasion. Fighting, however, went on at intervals, till a truce in 1389
was followed by a more permanent truce in 1400, and by a treaty of peace
in 1411, after the death of King Juan’s successor, Henrique III. The last
great achievement of King João I’s great reign was the conquest of Ceuta.
The expedition was saddened at its outset by the death of the Queen, of
plague, a few days before the King and his three older sons, Duarte,
Pedro, Henrique, sailed on their crusade against the Moors (1415). The
expedition was completely successful. Ceuta was taken immediately owing
to the eager heroism of the Princes and their Portuguese followers. This
was the first of Portugal’s great deeds beyond the seas. The last years
of King João I’s reign were peaceful, and when he died in 1433, two years
after the death of his life-long friend, Nun’ Alvares, Portugal was as
independent as Spain or any other country, and her alliance with England
already ancient and secure.

[Sidenote: Duarte.]

King Duarte (1433-8) himself married an Aragonese princess, another
Leonor. In spite of his good sense and great qualities, in spite of
his personal courage amply shown in the expedition against Ceuta, his
combination of king and philosopher was not entirely successful. He
had the weakness to yield to the fiery determination of his brother,
Infante Henrique, to send a force against Tangiers. The expedition ended
disastrously (had it been a success there would, of course, be no talk
of King Duarte’s weakness). After thirty-seven days of heroic fighting
against vast numbers of Moors, the Portuguese were forced to surrender.
In return for permission to sail back without their arms, to Portugal,
they agreed to give up Ceuta, and the Infante Fernando remained as
hostage and died a prisoner after many months of fearful ill-treatment.
His brother, King Duarte, had died before him, leaving his wife, Queen
Leonor, Regent for the infant King.

[Sidenote: Affonso V.]

Another of his brothers, the Infante Pedro, soon became Regent, while
another, the Infante Henrique, now known as the Navigator, was preparing
Portugal’s future glory with a faith and persistency rarely surpassed. At
his bidding and under his direction, Portuguese mariners crept down the
west coast of Africa, and at his death in 1460 he had cause to feel that
his labours had not been in vain, and that a rich field for the merchant
and the missionary would yearly extend. The discovery of the Cape of Good
Hope followed, and in 1497-9, when Vasco da Gama, rounding the Cape,
crossed from East Africa to India, and returned in triumph to Lisbon,
this successful enterprise was felt to be, and indeed was, the crown and
natural outcome of Prince Henry’s life-work. He was the last of that
noble galaxy of brothers. When the Infante Pedro, answering to the wishes
of a great part of the kingdom, and especially of the people of Lisbon,
assumed the Regency, he ruled firmly and wisely (1438-47), and did not,
therefore, make the fewer enemies. Queen Leonor died in 1445, and two
years later the young King took power into his own hands. No sooner had
Pedro ceased to be Regent than his enemies combined for his ruin, and
the King, his nephew, and son-in-law, an amiable but weak young man, was
induced to listen to their accusations. The Infante Pedro was banished
from the Court, and was given no opportunity of defending himself. The
matter finally came to open war, and the King’s large army met the
Infante Pedro’s small force at Alfarrobeira in May, 1449. The Infante
was killed in a preliminary skirmish. Affonso V (1438-81), gifted with a
noble and generous character, as king proved at once weak and obstinate.
An extant letter from him to the historian Azurara shows him in a very
pleasant light. In his external policy he had two chief aims, to conquer
North-West Africa, and to make good his claim to the Crown of Castille.
As to the first he obtained some measure of success, so that flatterers
called him the “African.” Alcacer was taken in 1458, Tangiers thirteen
years later. But the last ten years of his reign had no victories to
show. He espoused the cause of Juana, daughter of Henry IV, King of
Castille, making it his own by betrothing himself to her (_a excellente
Senhora_). War with Castille followed, and he was defeated at the battle
of Toro (1476). He was not more successful in his attempt to obtain the
support of France. In his visit to the French Court he was a puppet in
the hands of the astute Louis XI, and when he returned to Portugal it
was felt that he had failed doubly. Indeed, he had renounced the throne
and decided to retire to a convent, but he now reassumed his position as
king, although the real power and direction of affairs remained in the
vigorous and able hands of his son João. Before Affonso V died, João had
effected a peace with Castille (1479), by which the hapless Juana was
shut up in a convent, at Santarem.

[Sidenote: João II.]

Affonso V had always been man first and king by an after-thought, his
son João II was always king first. In his reign (1481-95) the royal
power was strengthened and made supreme in Portugal. This was indeed the
outstanding feature of the rule of the “Perfect Prince,” in whose strong
hands Portugal reached the height of her strength, though not of her
glory. The most powerful Portuguese subject was the Duke of Braganza,
who owned a third of Portugal, or more. The founder of this house was
an illegitimate son of João I, married to the daughter of Nun’ Alvares,
who had received from the King a large proportion of the towns and
territories conquered by his skill and energy in battle. The Duke of
Braganza was now arrested by João II and executed at Evora as a friend of
Castille, but essentially as a too powerful vassal of Portugal. Part of
the nobility, disaffected owing to the King’s strenuous proceedings, and
the Bishop of Evora involved the Duke of Vizeu in a plot to dethrone his
brother-in-law, although, as it proved, he would have become king in the
natural course of events a few years later. King João II’s son, Prince
Affonso, married in 1490 to Isabel, daughter of the Catholic Kings, died
in the following year at the age of sixteen. The Duke of Vizeu’s plot
was betrayed to the King, who acted with his usual energy and decision.
His brother-in-law he stabbed to death with his own hand. The other
principal conspirators were sentenced to imprisonment or death. The title
of the Duke of Vizeu was extinguished, but his younger brother, Manoel,
became heir to the throne with the title of Duke of Beja.

[Sidenote: Manoel I.]

As King Manoel, the Fortunate, he ruled over Portugal for twenty-six
years (1495-1521), a period which will always be considered the greatest
of Portugal’s prosperity and glory, as well as the golden age of her
literature (although her greatest poet, Camões, was unborn when King
Manoel died). The fruits of the labours of the Infante Henrique, of King
João II, of a long line of glorious or obscure heroes and adventurers
and administrators from the time of King Diniz now fell into the mouth
of King Manoel. Compared with his predecessor on the throne, he has been
aptly described as an orange-tree succeeding an oak. But it must not be
supposed that he was without energy, witness the speed with which he
prepared to rescue Arzilla in 1508, and the fact that he would be up
and at work when most of his subjects were still asleep in their beds.
But what astonishes and must ever astonish the world is the mighty
achievement of this tiny kingdom. The series of wars with Castille, of
adventures along the west coast of Africa, of battles in Morocco, of
internal troubles, might seem to justify and explain a period of complete
inactivity. Yet in the years that followed the Portuguese conquered not
one country or one province, but a whole world.

[Sidenote: Portugal’s World-Empire.]

To tell the wonderful story of the Portuguese discoveries, culminating in
the rounding of the Cape of Good Hope by Bartolomeu Diaz and the voyage
of a handful of Portuguese under Vasco da Gama, and how the Portuguese
Empire in the East was defended by such heroes as Duarte Pacheco Pereira,
and strengthened and extended by the indomitable Affonso d’Albuquerque,
would fill volumes. The tiny Portuguese nation provided men to do these
deeds, and also historians to record them worthily. Sometimes the hero
was himself author, and wrote with a directness and vigour of style
scarcely ever attained by Portuguese writers of to-day. Only half a
century elapsed between the voyage of Vasco da Gama and the death of
D. João de Castro in India in 1548, and into this brief period is
crowded a bewildering array of fighters, writers, poets, historians,
administrators, men of science, to such an extent that no brief summary
of Portuguese history can even record their names. But large tracts of
Asia and Africa now acknowledged Portugal’s sway, and all the kings of
the East sent costly presents, gold and spices and precious stones, to
their suzerain in the West. The name and fame of the Portuguese extended
throughout all lands in mixed fear and admiration. Foreign adventurers
and merchants and men of curiosity and learning flocked to Lisbon, which
for a brief space appeared as the true centre of the universe. The Pope
and Cardinals in Rome gazed in wonder at the unprecedented gifts from
the East sent by the King of Portugal. But not in the East only were
great deeds performed at this time by the Portuguese, for in North-West
Africa D. João de Menezes won undying glory by his brilliant military
achievements, taking Larache, Azamor (1519), and other towns. When we
read that in a single day—in the defence of a fortress they were building
in North Africa—1,200 Portuguese are said to have fallen, and know that
this was a comparatively unimportant link in the huge chain of empire
which Affonso d’Albuquerque (the fear of whose name penetrated far into
China) was even then (1515) forging in India, we are not surprised that
agriculture in Portugal was neglected and that two generations later King
Sebastian could only collect a force of 9,000 Portuguese to accompany
him to Africa. Rather we marvel how Portugal could continue so long to
sustain efforts so many and so various. For a skilful historian the story
of Portugal in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries affords an epic
subject more wonderful than perhaps any in history—except that of the
events exactly four centuries later which welded together another empire
and again saw all the Princes of India sending gifts to the West. And the
materials to the hand of such an historian are fascinating and abundant,
both published and manuscript. Unfortunately the age of King Manoel
did not provide a fresh crop of heroes equal to those who had grown to
manhood under King João II, and when he died in 1521 the disquieting
symptoms were many. In Portugal the real prosperity had been replaced by
a garish and deceptive luxury, and the old simple pleasures and jollity
had vanished with the old austerity of life. In the East the mighty
compelling arm of Affonso d’Albuquerque had sunk to rest in 1515. King
Manoel had married as his first wife Isabel, daughter of Ferdinand and
Isabella. She died in childbirth, and their son Miguel died two years
later in 1500. Had he lived he would have succeeded not only to the
throne and mighty empire of his father, King Manoel, but to the throne
and mighty empire of the Catholic Kings. Such a load of empire would
seem too great for the shoulders of one ruler to bear, and in the very
year of the infant prince’s death the Portuguese Pedro Alvares Cabral’s
discovery, or rediscovery, of Brazil added another huge item to the
burden and the glory.

[Sidenote: João III.]

King Manoel was succeeded by his son, João III (1521-57), born in 1502.
To the oak and the orange succeeded the cypress. But the gloom of his
reign has been much exaggerated, and the King’s character wilfully
distorted by the historians, who have described him as a bigot and a
witless idiot. King João was no fool, and had an intelligent love of
letters, and, if the Court was now less given up to pleasure than in the
reign of his predecessor, we still read of _serões_ continuing at the
palace during several nights. But the power of Rome in Portugal certainly
grew in his reign, and a succession of personal sorrows increased his
devotion to religion. About fifteen years after his accession many of
his nearest relations died, and, although a son and heir to his throne
survived till 1554, his death in that year came to crown the many griefs
of this reign. This precocious boy, the Infante João, had already won
some fame as a patron of letters, and was married when he died at the age
of sixteen. His death was one of the greatest misfortunes of Portuguese
history, from which indeed the goddess of Good Fortune seems to have
departed in the first half of the sixteenth century, leaving in her place
a poor Mofina Mendes, personification of ill luck. King João III and his
brother Henrique had worked persistently to introduce the Inquisition
into Portugal, and the Company of Jesuits, destined to do excellent work
in education at home and in the colonies overseas, also came to Portugal
during his reign.

[Sidenote: Sebastian.]

Prince João’s infant son, Sebastian, born in 1554, was educated by
priests and Jesuits, and in 1562 his grand-uncle Henrique, priest first
and prince afterwards, succeeded Queen Catharina as Regent, and continued
to rule till the King came of age (14) in 1568. King Sebastian reigned
in person for ten years. His character and capacities have been much
discussed. To a love of sport and all dangerous enterprises, he united a
deep religiousness, instilled into him by his education, and a consuming
desire to extend the Christian faith and win personal glory by a victory
over the Moors in Africa. To this end the ten years of his reign were
directed, and in 1578 he sailed from Lisbon (25th June), with a force of
about 14,000, Portuguese and foreigners, including members of all the
noblest families in Portugal. Surrounded by a vastly superior number of
Moors in the battle of Alcacer Kebir (4th August, 1578), the majority of
the Portuguese were slain or taken prisoners. The King himself, a Don
Quixote before Don Quixote was born, died fighting valiantly. His body
was recovered later and sent to Spain and thence to Portugal, where it
was buried in the convent of Belem, built by his great-grandfather, King
Manoel. Yet in the confusion of that battle many rumours arose and the
people in Portugal never believed in his death, a fact which occasioned
various episodes in the following year, and was the basis of a kind of
religious faith which lasted on into the nineteenth century. Not quite
two centuries had passed since the battle of Aljubarrota, and into that
period the Portuguese had crowded a history more brilliant than that of
any other country. Now it seemed as if the ship had gone by, leaving only
a wake of troubled water.

[Sidenote: Henrique.]

Sebastião was succeeded by his great-uncle Henrique, Cardinal at 33, and
King at 66, who, however, only survived him for a few months, dying in
1580. His last days were embittered by the question of the succession.
Seven pretenders claimed the Crown of Portugal, and chiefly the Duke
of Braganza, in his wife’s right, Antonio, Prior of Crato, the Lisbon
people’s favourite, and King Philip II of Spain.

[Sidenote: Philip II of Spain.]

The right seems to have been doubtful, but the might was on the side of
King Philip, who made no secret of his resolution to win the kingdom
by force if it were not given to him willingly. Many of the Portuguese
nobility were on his side, and the King Cardinal was finally induced
to recognise his claim. But the people strongly resented the intrusion
of the Spaniard, and the Prior of Crato found no difficulty in having
himself proclaimed King at Santarem. When, however, King Philip’s army,
under the Duke of Alba, arrived at Setubal, and after taking Cascaes,
advanced on Lisbon, Antonio’s forces, encamped outside the capital,
melted away—they consisted of untrained citizens for the most part—and
Antonio himself fled into Lisbon and thence to Oporto and Vianna in the
North. From Vianna do Castello he escaped in disguise by sea, accompanied
by the Bishop of Guarda and the Conde do Vimioso (October, 1580). He did
not, however, yet leave Portugal, remaining disguised there and even at
times at Lisbon till June, 1581, when he retired to France. Philip II
had entered Portugal by Elvas, and was received as king without further
resistance, making a solemn entry into Lisbon, the fourth king of
Portugal in the last three years. A French fleet was sent to the Azores
in favour of Antonio, but was defeated. He made a last fruitless effort
in 1589 in combination with Drake, who took the town of Cascaes. There
was no support forthcoming in Portugal, and the Prior de Crato returned
to France, and died there a few years later. If Philip II expected now
to rule over Portugal in peace he had mistaken the character of his new
subjects. Antonio was dead, King Sebastian dead and buried at Belem,
but in the wishes and thoughts of the people King Sebastian was alive
and might be expected to return from one day to another. Pretenders
accordingly abounded and gave considerable trouble; one, especially,
who appeared in Italy, bore so striking a resemblance to Sebastian, and
displayed knowledge of matters which only Sebastian could, apparently,
have known, that to this day some believe him to have been the real king.

[Sidenote: Spanish Domination (Philip II-IV 1580-1640).]

But Portugal was now definitely wedded to Castille for the next sixty
years. Spain’s enemies became her enemies, and her great colonial empire
lay at their mercy. Before the end of the century the Dutch were in
the East, and like rats in cheese, battened on the possessions of the
Portuguese. A few years later the English followed. All the old daring
and enterprise of the Portuguese mariners of the fifteenth and sixteenth
centuries seemed to have fallen from them like the cloak of Elijah. Their
ships were used in the service of Spain, and their own overseas dominions
left unprotected. Lisbon, accustomed to see the fleets depart and come
in traffics and discoveries from the East, now watched the building of
the invincible Armada against her old ally England. But Philip II’s hand
was a strong hand, and not lightly to be shaken off by an exhausted
people. Under the rule of his successors it was otherwise. Hollow pomp
took the place of real power, and the concentration of affairs in
the King’s hands, or in those of his minister, required men of more
insight and astuteness than Philip IV (Philip III of Portugal) or the
Count-Duke Olivares possessed. In Portugal discontent was widespread.
The people had never willingly accepted Spanish rule, and the increased
burden of taxation did not lessen their dislike. The nobles, even if
they were not fired by the misfortunes of their country, were enraged by
slights inflicted upon themselves. Margaret, Duchess of Mantua, had been
appointed Regent of Portugal in 1634. The real power was in the hands of
Miguel de Vasconcellos, who concentrated in his own person all the hatred
of the Portuguese for the Spaniard.

[Sidenote: The Restoration.]

In 1640, forty nobles, sure of the support of the people, and encouraged
by the enthusiastic approbation of the Archbishop of Lisbon, decided that
the hour had come to throw off the hated yoke. The Duke of Braganza’s
agent, João Pinto Ribeiro, was the heart and soul of the conspiracy.
The secret was well kept. _Fu cosa meravigliosa il concerto_, says an
Italian historian. The Countess of Atouguia, Filippa de Vilhena, who had
knowledge of the plot, herself armed her two young sons to take part
in it on the 1st of December. As nine o’clock struck that morning the
conspirator nobles forced their way into the palace and proclaimed the
King, João IV, Duke of Braganza.

[Sidenote: João IV.]

He was the grandson of the Duchess Catharina, one of the claimants to the
Portuguese throne on the death of the Cardinal King. Spain, with burdens
not less great than her vast resources, and the revolt of Catalonia on
her hands, was unable to do more for the moment than encourage plots in
Portugal against the new King. The most serious of them was a conspiracy
to kill the King, of which the Archbishop of Braga was the organiser
in 1641. The Vatican gave its support to Spain and connived at this
conspiracy. King João IV was too deeply religious to take the opportunity
to free the Church—and State—in Portugal from the supremacy of Rome,
and his foreign policy generally was not marked by the strength which
the circumstances required. His foreign ministers had extraordinarily
difficult tasks. In the year after the Restoration, treaties were made
with France and Holland, and the alliance with England was renewed. But
the custom to plunder Portugal’s overseas territories was now inveterate,
and she derived little profit from her new allies, although a common
cause united them against Spain. The Dutch gave the Portuguese fair words
in Europe and hard blows in her colonies, and Portugal was powerless to
do more than protest with words against such double dealing. Actual war
between Spain and Portugal began in 1643, and continued desultorily till
1646, when it was broken off till the death of King John IV in 1656. King
João’s brother, the Infante Duarte, had been arrested by order of Philip
II as soon as news came of the Restoration in 1640, and was subjected to
a process of slow murder till he died in prison in 1649, a second Infante
Fernando, only that his gaoler was no prince of Fez but the Catholic King.

[Sidenote: Affonso VI.]

King João’s eldest son, Theodosio, who had shown great promise, also
died before him, aged nineteen and the second son, Affonso, succeeded
at the age of thirteen. Although completely uneducated and incapable of
affairs, he wrested the power out of his mother’s hands six years later.
Affonso VI is said to have been more at home in the company of grooms
than in that of statesmen, but fortunately at the beginning of his reign
he had an affection for a statesman of strong and wise views, the Conde
de Castello Melhor, and allowed himself to be guided by his counsels.
There seems no reason to think that he would not have continued to rely
on ministers as excellent, and in that case his reign might have ended
as prosperously as it began. But dissensions at Court deprived him first
of Castello Melhor, then of his capable successor, Antonio Sousa de
Macedo, and without them he was helpless. The Queen, a daughter of the
Duc de Nemours, insisted on taking part, and no minor part, in affairs,
was determined, in fact, to govern Portugal in the interests of Louis
XIV. The strife between her and Castello Melhor was open and continuous
till the Secretary of State fell. The King’s brother, the Infante Pedro,
who must have known better than most how the country would gain if King
Affonso had a wise minister at his elbow, supported the cause of the
Queen. He forced Sousa de Macedo to flee from the palace to save his
life, and when the King was thus left defenceless, obliged him to resign
(November, 1667) and proceeded to marry the Queen.

[Sidenote: Pedro II.]

He did not himself assume the title of King but used that of “Governor”
until the death of the King, who had been sent to the island of Terceira
and then brought to Cintra, where he died in 1683. (The Queen, his former
wife, died in the same year.) During these internal affairs events had
happened which were of vast importance for Portugal. The war with Spain
had at first been favourable to Spain, but three years after Affonso VI
came to the throne the Spanish were decisively defeated at Elvas, and
four years later, in 1663, the Portuguese under the leadership of the
Count of Schomberg, achieved the victory of Ameixial, by which Portugal
really established her independence. The capture of Elvas and the victory
of Montes Claros followed. These were good answers to the exclusion
of Portugal from the peace between Louis XIV and Spain in 1659. The
Restoration of Charles II brought about renewed relations of friendliness
between England and Portugal. A fresh treaty was signed between the two
countries in May, 1661, and Englishmen (as well as Frenchmen) fought
at Ameixial. Negotiations for peace with Holland began in the same
year, and were brought to a successful issue in 1662, although, owing
to new conflicts in India, the Portuguese and Dutch were not really at
peace till 1669. Finally, in 1666, negotiations for peace were carried
on between Spain and Portugal. They were, however, broken off, and in
1667 a treaty was signed, not between Portugal and Spain, but between
Portugal and France. However, in 1668, the war with Spain, which had
lasted for over a quarter of a century, ended, and peace was concluded
between the two countries. Ceuta remained in the hands of the Spanish.
This was unhappily the fate of many of Portugal’s overseas possessions.
She lost or pawned one jewel after another till her splendid heirlooms
were reduced, not indeed to insignificance, but to insignificance
in comparison with their former worth. She did at least succeed in
recovering Brazil from the Dutch. Pedro II, who ruled as Regent from 1656
to 1683, and as King from 1683 to 1706, was little better educated than
his unfortunate brother, but he proved a wise and capable statesman with
the good of his country constantly at heart. If personal ambition seemed
to mark the first events of his public life, he redeemed these faults
by a real devotion to Portuguese interests, and under his rule Portugal
again attained a degree of importance which was clearly shown at the
beginning of the War of the Spanish Succession, when all the European
Powers eagerly sought her assistance. Portugal at first maintained her
neutrality, and, not for the last time in her history, bobbed and wavered
like a cork between conflicting waves. But before Pedro II died he had
set the seal on his wisdom by openly throwing in his lot with England and
her Allies (May, 1703). As events proved, the other course would have
meant Portugal’s ruin. The same year, 1703, witnessed the signing of an
important and much discussed commercial treaty between Great Britain
and Portugal, known as the Methuen Treaty (27th December). It provided
that Portuguese wines should be admitted to Great Britain at reduced
rates (a third less than those upon French wines), and that as regards
the prohibition of the importation of manufactured woollen goods into
Portugal an exception should be made in the case of Great Britain.

[Sidenote: João V.]

João V was but seventeen when he began his reign of forty-four years in
1706. His noble qualities and lofty aims were marred by the grandiose
taste of the time and by an unwise imitation of the _Roi Soleil_. He
wished to be the Portuguese Louis XIV. He lavishly encouraged art and
science, and took personal and intelligent interest in their progress. He
acted generally with a magnificence befitting a lord of all Europe, or at
least of all the possessions in the East that had once been Portugal’s,
whereas his treasury was supplied mainly by gold from Brazil. In the
matter of buildings, especially, his extravagance was unbridled, and two
of them, the Convent of Mafra and the Alcantara Aqueduct, still excite
wonder and admiration. It was all very splendid, and very unwise when
agriculture at home and the development of the colonies abroad as well as
a fleet to maintain them required every available penny. The principal
event of his reign in foreign affairs was the peace of Utrecht, signed
between France, Spain, and Portugal in 1713.

[Sidenote: Joseph I.]

His successor, Joseph I (1750-77) might perhaps have reigned in Portugal
as a Philip IV of Spain, and been known chiefly for his love of the
theatre had he not possessed a minister far wiser and abler than
Olivares. This minister, Sebastião José de Carvalho e Mello, Marquez de
Pombal, born in 1699, had been Ambassador in London (1739-45), and then
at Vienna before becoming Joseph I’s Secretary of State. A terrible event
on the 1st of November, 1755, proved his decision, calmness, and energy.
At 9 a.m. on the morning of that day an earthquake of unparalleled
severity set Lisbon in ruins in the space of a quarter of an hour.
Slighter shocks continued to terrify the inhabitants—the survivors
(between 25,000 and 30,000 had perished) during the next two months. That
the consequences were not even more disastrous and that the population
did not get wholly out of hand was due to one man—Pombal. His plan for
rebuilding the city was not carried to completion, but the regular
streets and squares of the lower part of Lisbon, the _Baixa_, still
attest his energy and foresight. The other event with which his name is
chiefly associated is the expulsion of the Jesuits whose power had been
steadily growing in Portugal and her colonies for the last two centuries.

[Sidenote: Pombal.]

To this end Pombal’s great energies were for years directed, although
he found time in some measure to give attention to the more important
objects of agriculture, education, etc. An attempt on the King’s life on
the 3rd of September, 1758, in which the King was wounded in the arm,
gave Pombal his opportunity against the Jesuits, who were accused of
being the promoters (_impulsores_) of the plot. First the Duke of Aveiro,
as the chief conspirator, was executed with horrible cruelty, worthy of
the twentieth century, at Belem. The Count of Atouguia and the family
of Tavora, the Marquez de Tavora, who had recently returned from ruling
Portuguese India as Viceroy, his noble and witty wife and their two sons,
were executed with him. They were probably all innocent. Their ashes
were thrown into the Tagus, their arms crossed out from among the noble
families of Portugal. Then, exactly a year after the attempt, the Jesuits
were banished from Portugal and her colonies (3rd September, 1759), and
their goods confiscated (25th February, 1761). Relations between Portugal
and the Vatican were broken off and were not resumed until 1770 after
prolonged negotiations and the death of Pope Clement XIII. His successor,
Clement XIV, extinguished the Society of Jesus (August, 1773). Soon after
King José’s death the Marquez de Pombal retired to the village of Pombal,
and died there five years later in 1782, in his 83rd year. Ambitious to
obtain power and merciless in its use, he was, undoubtedly, a man of
strong will and enlightened views (he condemned slavery and protected
the Jews), but he was unattractive and often unjust in his methods. He
is sometimes spoken of as if he were the only enlightened ruler of the
eighteenth century in Portugal, whereas both the preceding and succeeding
reigns were marked by a steady progress and culture. King João V gave
a strong impulsion to literature and science: and in the reign of King
José’s daughter, Queen Maria I, the first roads worthy of the name
were built. In Pombal’s methods we may perhaps see the germ of that
embitterment in Portugal which has manifested itself in open or latent
civil war almost ever since.

[Illustration: THE CONVENT, MAFRA

[_See p. 91_]

[Sidenote: Maria I.]

At the end of the century Portugal’s prosperity stood high. In 1792,
owing to the Queen’s failing reason, her son João took over the reins of
government. The Queen lived till 1816, and the Regent then became King
João VI till his death ten years later. The greater part of his rule,
as Regent and King, was fraught with a series of disasters which from
prosperity dashed Portugal into distress and despair, and threatened her
very existence as a nation. The two causes which contributed most to her
ruin were the invasion of Portugal by the French armies of Napoleon, and
the declaration of the independence of Brazil, with which Portugal had
hitherto had a monopoly of trade. Portugal, as England’s ally, and the
possessor of excellent seaports, could not hope to escape Napoleon’s
attention. In vain she attempted to maintain her neutrality, even to
the extent of wishing to close her harbours against and yet remain the
ally of Great Britain. But the treaty of Fontainebleau in October, 1807,
between Napoleon and Godoy, made it clear that whatever hope there was
for Portugal consisted in her old alliance. By this treaty Portugal
was to be divided into three parts, and to cease to be an independent
country. Junot advanced rapidly upon Lisbon, and the Regent and Royal
Family set sail for Brazil, accompanied by many of the noble and wealthy
families of Portugal. The land of Portugal itself remained for years the
scene of warfare, for, although the convention of Cintra in 1808 freed it
from its immediate invaders, other armies followed and were only slowly
forced northwards by the genius and persistency of Wellington.

[Sidenote: João VI.]

Wellington himself was not unpopular in Portugal, but with Beresford,
who was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the Portuguese army under the
regency which governed Portugal during the King’s absence in Brazil, it
was otherwise. His punctual discipline was hated, and a growing number
of Portuguese, filled with the ideas of the French Revolution, nourished
a hope of freeing their country from what they considered the undue
interference of the foreigner, and the dominion of what appeared to be
obsolete and reactionary methods. In 1817 a plot of General Gomes Freire
de Andrade against Beresford proclaimed to all the world how necessary
discipline was for Portugal. The plot was discovered, and Gomes Freire
was executed. But three years later a revolution broke out. Beresford,
who had been absent in Brazil, was refused a landing on his return, the
Regency was overthrown, and a new Constitution drawn up. King João VI
returned in the following year from Brazil. In 1822 Brazil pronounced
itself independent and chose the King’s popular and liberal-minded son,
Pedro, to be its ruler. King João was disposed to accept some kind of
constitution, and entrusted the Conde de Palmella with the drawing up of
a constitution less radical than that of 1820. He had, however, counted
without the Queen Carlotta and his son, Dom Miguel. They succeeded in
overthrowing the constitutional party, and King João VI was obliged to
take refuge from his own son on an English man-of-war in 1823. In the
following year, with the help of the Powers, he succeeded in restoring
his authority, and Dom Miguel was banished. King João died two years
later.

[Illustration: THE CHURCH, BATALHA

[_See p. 95_]

[Sidenote: Maria II da Gloria.]

His eldest son, Pedro, as Emperor of Brazil, renounced the throne of
Portugal in favour of his daughter, Maria II da Gloria, then a small
child. In the hope of healing the strife which bade fair to be the
irremediable ruin of Portugal, he decided that his brother Miguel
should act as Regent and marry his niece, under condition of swearing
to accept the Constitution. Dom Miguel came to Portugal—_o rei chegou,
o rei chegou_—and under cover of accepting the Constitution had himself
proclaimed King (in June, 1828), while his niece and betrothed wife
was being educated in Paris. A vigorous persecution of Liberals and
Constitutionalists followed. Thousands of them left the country as
exiles, others suffered cruel torments in prison, and others were
executed: and more seeds of that mutual hatred and vindictiveness were
sown between Portuguese and Portuguese which a century was unable to root
out. Pedro returned from Brazil to fight for his daughter’s throne, and
reached the Azores in the spring of 1832. Two years later Miguel, who in
spite of all his faults possessed many good qualities, and was beloved by
the Portuguese people, was finally defeated at Thomar and by the treaty
of Evora renounced the throne. King Pedro himself died in the same year.
In 1836 Queen Maria was married to Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.
Her reign was embittered by military _pronunciamentos_ in favour of
a more radical or more moderate constitution, and, in 1852, a year
before the Queen’s death, the Duke of Saldanha succeeded in imposing a
constitution which remained in force for some years. He himself continued
to be the make-weight in Portuguese politics until 1871, when after a
brief term of office he was overthrown in turn by the Conservatives and
sent as Ambassador to London, where he died in 1876.

[Sidenote: Pedro V.]

After Queen Maria’s death, the enlightened and art-loving King Consort
Ferdinand ruled on behalf of his son, Pedro V, until he was pronounced to
be of age in 1855. The new King died in 1861, and was succeeded by Luiz I
(1861-89), during whose reign the unpatriotic strife between Liberal and
Conservative politicians, _Progressistas_ and _Regeneradores_, went on
unabated.

[Sidenote: Luiz I.]

It is not pleasant to dwell on the fate of a country, once as glorious as
any in Europe, now torn and harassed by party feuds, personal ambitions,
false ideas of liberty, artificial and purely formal conceptions of
Constitutionalism, misgovernment and corruption, neglect, indifference,
despair.

[Sidenote: Carlos I.]

Luiz I was succeeded in 1889 by his son, Carlos I, whose reign began as
it ended, disastrously for Portugal. In the very year of his accession,
the house of Braganza was driven from Brazil, which declared itself a
Republic. In the following year a colonial question between Great Britain
and Portugal led to the presentation of an ultimatum by Great Britain,
and what was ignorantly regarded as the King’s weakness inspired an
abortive republican rising at Oporto in 1891. In the following year
Portugal’s credit was laid in the dust by a formal declaration of
bankruptcy. The events of these four years were sufficient to disgust
anyone with the business of king. The King, under the Constitution, had
really little power to interfere. The Queen, Marie Amélie, daughter
of the Comte de Paris, was looked upon askance as a friend of the
religious orders, and her courage and charity awakened no response of
chivalry in the hearts of the Portuguese. The position came to be this:
that every kind of support was refused to the Monarchy, which was then
bitterly criticised and attacked by those who, had they supported it
loyally, might have made it a success. It was “a Monarchy without any
monarchists,” said King Carlos.

CHAPTER VIII

LITERATURE

[Sidenote: Theophilo Braga, and Carolina Michaëlis de Vasconcellos.]

The Portuguese have reason to be proud of their literature, which,
though it does not abound in masterpieces of the first order, possesses
a very large number of works, in verse and prose, of conspicuous merit
and deserving to be far better known, both in Portugal and abroad. The
Portuguese have aroused themselves from their indifference in this
respect. Dr. Theophilo Braga has produced an immense work of discovery
and criticism. Dona Carolina Michaëlis de Vasconcellos, a far more
scholarly critic, has, during the last forty years, carried through a
work no less immense and far more valuable and abiding. Her genius is
like an electric torch shedding powerful light as it rests in turn on
each of the great Portuguese writers, and illuminating by the way all
the nooks and crannies. The difference between these, the two great
authorities on Portuguese literature, is that the works of the former
satisfy no one but himself, those of the latter everyone but herself. And
there are many younger workers now in the same field eager to discover,
decipher, print and re-edit the old monuments of Portuguese literature.

[Sidenote: Lost Treasures.]

In the past the carelessness has been such that several famous works
which were in all probability originally Portuguese, have been allowed
to perish utterly or to survive only in Spanish translations. _Amadis of
Gaul_ is probably one of these, and another masterpiece claimed wrongly
by Spain is _Palmeirim of England_, by Francisco de Moraes Cabral, in the
first half of the sixteenth century, and held by Cervantes worthy to be
preserved as carefully as the poems of Homer. In the sixteenth century
Garcia de Resende regretted the loss of many poems, and Damião de Goes
lamented the number of valuable manuscripts that had perished because
they had not been placed in the _Torre do Tombo_. Even as recently as the
nineteenth century (in the eighteenth the earthquake and the fire that
followed it swallowed up hundreds of precious books and manuscripts),
the archives of the family of Niza were sold by a servant of the family
as waste-paper, like the original manuscripts of the Polyglot Bible of
Alcalá some thirty years earlier. The Niza papers had been placed for
safety in a cellar during the Peninsular War, and were sold by the kilo.
(The first Marquis of Niza was the great-great-grandson of Vasco da Gama.
The last Marquis was the grandfather of Dona Constança Telles da Gama,
whose imprisonment for eight months under the Republic caused so great
a sensation.) But although by this and similar mischances a vast number
of invaluable documents have been lost, a large store remains, and a
considerable number have been published of late years, the Lisbon Academy
of Sciences doing excellent work in this respect.

[Sidenote: Earliest Poetry.]

It was in verse that the Portuguese first distinguished themselves. In
the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries they attained such proficiency
in imitations of Provençal song that it became the fashion for lyrics
throughout Spain to be composed in Galician or Portuguese, and a large
collection of lyrics in praise of the Virgin was compiled and in part
written by King Alfonso X of Castille in the Galician tongue.

The first Portuguese poem was probably not prior to the beginning of the
thirteenth century, or prior by a very few years only, but unwritten
songs of the people had been composed, especially by the women, probably
without a break since the days of Rome. The Portuguese Court poets of the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries were not cut off from the life of the
people. How simple were the Courts of those days may be realised from the
rules drawn up for the King’s children by Alfonso the Learned, whose
daughter Isabel was mother of King Diniz of Portugal. The King’s sons
must wash their hands before and after meals, and not wipe them on their
clothes. They must not sing at meals lest they seem to be merry with
wine, nor bend over the dish as if they wanted all the food. And thus
among the more servile imitations of Provençal poetry crept in the Court
versions of the _Cantares de amigo_, sung by the people in Galicia and
Portugal, which still delight by their freshness and savour of the soil.
With the death of King Diniz (1325), of whose own poems over a hundred
survive, the Provençal Portuguese school of poetry ended. If Spain
borrowed from Portugal in the composition of the early lyrics, she repaid
the debt later with the _romances_, those lovely fifteenth and sixteenth
century crystallisations of the longer early heroic poems and chronicles
of Spain. So few _romances_ originally belonged to Portugal that
Spanish came to be regarded as the appropriate language for them, and a
Portuguese poet composing a _romance_ would do so in Castilian as in the
thirteenth century a Spanish poet would compose his lyrics in Portuguese.
Gil Vicente wrote his ballad of Duardos and Flérida in Spanish, and it
was only three centuries later that it was translated into Portuguese,
probably by Almeida Garrett. It was the Breton cycle which in its vague
romance especially appealed to Portuguese taste, and its episodes have
been, with the death of Inés de Castro, the prominent theme in Portuguese
literature. In history, too, in the fourteenth century, Nun’ Alvares
took Sir Galahad for ideal, and in the sixteenth King Sebastian became a
Portuguese King Arthur, his return long looked for in Portugal. There is
a gap in Portuguese literature in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries,
similar to that in the seventeenth and eighteenth, so far as poetry is
concerned, and the sixteenth, during which Portuguese poetry revived and
reached its highest expression, began with dull and uninspired Court
poems—of a Court now more artificial than that of King Diniz—such as the
majority of those in Garcia de Resende’s _Cancioneiro_, containing poems
of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and published in 1516.

[Sidenote: First Prose.]

In prose, however, the fifteenth century was remarkable. Portuguese prose
began with brief jejune chronicles, and with _nobiliarios_ or _livros
de linhagens_ (thirteenth and fourteenth centuries). A famous _Livro
de linhagens_, or book of descents, was that compiled by Pedro, son
of King Diniz, in prose which already possesses considerable literary
pretensions, although it cannot compare for clearness, grace, and
concision with the admirable work of King Duarte, _O Leal Conselheiro_
(_circa_ 1430).

[Sidenote: Chronicles.]

To the fifteenth century also belong the first important chronicles.
Fernão Lopes, who died in the middle of the century, and wrote chronicles
which have been set side by side with or even above those of Froissart,
was Keeper of the Royal Archives, and _Chronista môr_. As such he was
charged to “set forth in chronicles the histories of the kings—_poer
em coronycas as estorias dos reis_.” He wrote that of King João I, and
probably that of all the other Kings of Portugal to his own day. Lopes
is described as “a notable person” by his successor, Gomes Eannes de
Azurara, who died in 1474, and who completed the chronicle of João I,
and wrote among other works the _Chronica do descobrimento e conquista
da Guiné_ (published at Paris, 1841; translated into English, with an
important study, by Mr. Edgar Prestage). Ruy de Pina became _Chronista
môr_ in 1497, and wrote or re-wrote the chronicles of the Kings of
Portugal from Sancho I to João II in a somewhat more affected and
artificial style than that of his predecessors.

[Sidenote: Damião de Goes.]

The sixteenth century, famous for its poets in Portugal as in other
countries, was also exceedingly rich in Portuguese prose of the most
varied kinds. Damião de Goes (1502-74) took up the work of the early
chronicles, and wrote during the years 1557-66 his famous _Chronica de
Dom Manoel_, a clear and careful account of the discovery and conquest
of India and of events at home. Damião de Goes’ life and character are
even more interesting than his works, and although his travels did not
extend beyond Europe they were as arresting in their way as are the
_Peregrinações_ of Fernão Mendes Pinto (1509-80) in theirs.

[Sidenote: Fernão Mendes Pinto.]

During twenty-one years the life of the latter was a series of “great
hardships and misfortunes and dangers.” He was thirteen times taken
captive, and twenty-one times (in another passage he says sixteen times)
sold as a slave during his adventurous career in the East, and he has
left us the most vivid and delightful memoirs. They read like a modern
novel, but, except for some obvious mistakes in facts and figures, bear
the stamp of truth.

[Sidenote: History.]

The glorious enterprises and discoveries of King Manoel’s reign naturally
found many chroniclers. Fernão Lopes de Castanheda spent more than
twenty years over his “History of the Discovery and Conquest of India
by the Portuguese” (1554), scrupulously visiting the places and many of
the persons concerned. The knowledge thus acquired was all the wealth
he brought back with him from India, and he was reduced to accept the
office of beadle of the Faculty of Arts at Coimbra University. The style
of his history is plain and unadorned, sentence after sentence beginning
with “And”; the narrative is simple and outspoken, and has an ingenuous
freshness suitable to the account of the “seas ne’er traversed before.”
Some of his pages, as the description of the natives of Malabar, might
have come straight out of Herodotus. João de Barros, of Vizeu (1496-1570)
began the famous _Decadas_, describing the Portuguese conquests in
the East, and wrote a romance of chivalry and a Portuguese grammar.
His _Decadas_ were continued by Diogo de Couto (1544-1616), who was
able to bring to their composition the knowledge from fifty years of
personal experience in India. Gaspar Correa, born in 1495, wrote the
_Lendas da India_, and was killed in a quarrel, or perhaps deliberately
murdered at Malaca in 1564. Bras d’Albuquerque (1500-1580) composed
the _Commentarios_ of his father, the great Affonso d’Albuquerque,
from original letters written by the latter in India to King Manoel, a
straightforward account marked by much restraint and regard for truth,
and enlivened by vivid scenes here and there. Many of those who went to
India, missionaries, adventurers, soldiers, officials, wrote narratives
of their experiences. The _Roteiros_ of Vasco da Gama and João de Castro
are of remarkable interest both for their contents and their style. There
are few more stirring and pathetic narratives than those of the tragedies
of the sea, the _Historia Tragico-Maritima_ (Lisbon, 2 vols., 1735-6),
tales of shipwreck which made the greatest impression on those who read
and listened to them. One suspects that Mendes Pinto wrote some of his
wonderfully vivid shipwreck scenes under the recollection of those longer
narratives, to the most famous of which, the Shipwreck of Sepulveda, he
refers in his memoirs. Antonio Tenreiro wrote an _Itinerario_ of his
journey by land from India to Europe, combining with this an account of
other travels. His principal journey was from Ormuz to Tripoli by camel
with a single Arab (_Mouro alarve_) attendant, taking twenty-two days to
cross the desert. From Tripoli he proceeded to Cyprus, Crete, Ferrara,
Genoa, thence “with much fear of the Turks,” by sea to the coast of
Valencia, and on to Toledo and Lisbon. He observes minutely and raps out
his information in concise disconnected sentences. Pantaleão de Aveiro
wrote an Itinerary of the Holy Land, Frei Gaspar Fructuoso the _Saudades
da Terra_, Frei Gaspar da Cruz a _Tratado das Cousas da China e de Ormuz_.

[Sidenote: Great Prose Works.]

Apart from these profane writings, there were several notable preachers
in this century, as the celebrated Archbishop of Braga, Frei Bartholomeu
dos Martyres (1514-90), Frei Miguel dos Santos (d. 1595), only one of
whose sermons, on the death of King Sebastian, remains. Of Diogo de Paiva
de Andrade (1528-75) 181 survive (3 vols., 1603, 4, 15), and there are
three volumes (1611, 3, 6) of those of Frei Francisco Fernandes Galvão
(1554-1610). Heitor Pinto (d. 1584), Professor of Scripture at Coimbra
University, wrote eleven dialogues: _Imagem da vida christã_ (Coimbra,
2 vols., 1563, 72). The _Trabalhos de Jesus_ by Frei Thomé de Jesus
did not appear till 1620 and 1629 (Lisbon, 2 pts.). Gonçalo Fernandes
Trancoso is remembered by his _Contos e historias de proveito e exemplo_,
twenty-nine of which first appeared in 1585. João de Lucena wrote the
life of St. Francis Xavier: _Historia da Vida do Padre Francisco Xavier_.
Samuel Usque, a Portuguese Jew of Lisbon, composed a _Consolaçam ás
tribulações de Israel_ (Ferrara, 1552), much needed in that period of
massacres of “new Christians.” It is written in a coloured and exuberant
style, recalling at times that of the Spanish writer Luis de León. All
these works and many more, though unequal in merit, are worth recording
and reading partly from the interest of the facts and descriptions
they contain, and partly because after them good Portuguese prose only
occasionally revisited the earth.

[Sidenote: Gil Vicente.]

But, of course, the sixteenth century, for all the excellence of its
prose, was also the golden age of Portuguese poetry. Gil Vicente (about
1470-1540), although he inaugurated the Portuguese drama in 1502, was
essentially a lyric poet. In his work the true spirit of old Portugal
survives, a spirit of simple mirth with dance and song, and a note of
gaiety so rare in Portuguese literature. His plays are of extreme value
to students of Portugal in the sixteenth century, the _cantigas_ and
_romances_, etc., which they contain are for all time.

[Sidenote: Miranda.]

Francisco de Sá de Miranda (_c._ 1490-1558) brought back from his
travels in Italy the fixed resolve to introduce the Italian metres
into Portuguese poetry, and, retiring some years later from the Court,
devoted the rest of his life to poetry, gardening, and the chase in the
beautiful province of Minho. A man of austere and noble character,
he was less generous to himself than to his friends, wrote an early
biographer. Friends he had many, among the peasants and shepherds of
the Minho hills, the neighbouring nobles and poets from all parts of
Portugal. He imprinted his individuality on his poems written in the new
style, and especially on his eclogues composed in the old octosyllabic
_redondilhas_. Among his friends were Diogo Bernardes, some thirty years
his junior, who celebrated his beloved river Lima, on whose banks was
his birthplace, with a softness and fluency in the new metres not given
to Sá de Miranda, and whose sonnets rivalled those with which Camões
soothed an exile’s grief; Antonio Ferreira (1528-1569), who was the first
to write a classical drama, _Inés de Castro_, and who remained faithful
to Portuguese when most of his contemporaries wrote indifferently in
Portuguese or Spanish; Dom Manoel de Portugal (1520-1606), the first
poet to follow Sá de Miranda in adopting the Italian measures; Pedro de
Andrade Caminha (_c._ 1520-89), highly praised by his contemporaries,
but whose verse has a certain wooden quality foreign to theirs. To name
all the poets whose verse was inspired by the genius of those spacious
times were an endless task. Frei Agostinho da Cruz (_c._ 1540-1619) wrote
verses, like his brother Diogo Bernardes—

Na ribeira do Lima em tenra idade.

Of Francisco de Sá de Meneses, Conde de Mattosinhos (he was created Count
of Mattosinhos in 1580 and died there in 1584) much of the poetry has
been lost, but what survives is of high excellence. His delightful verses
to the river Leça were not rediscovered till the nineteenth century, by
Dr. Sousa Viterbo in the Torre do Tombo.

[Sidenote: Bernardim Ribeiro.]

About the lives of the two poets of _Saudade_, Bernardim Ribeiro and
Christovam Falcão, little is known, but their eclogues are notable for
their perfection of form and that passionate melancholy peculiar to
Portuguese literature. Elaborate efforts have been made to construct
their biographies out of their poems, a risky proceeding with poets who
so evidently delighted in dismal incidents for their own sake.

[Illustration: THE CATHEDRAL, BRAGA

[_See p. 56_]

[Sidenote: Camões.]

Luis de Camões, the greatest of all these poets, was a few years
younger than most of them. To him at least grief and disappointment
came in flowing measure, and he lived to die with his country in 1580,
probably at the age of 56. Out of his sorrows he built a fairy edifice
of verse, which has delighted and sustained his countrymen ever since.
With him Portuguese poetry reached a level only dimly heralded by his
predecessors: to judge from their poetry only, it would be difficult to
believe that the lives of Vicente, Miranda and Camões overlapped.

[Sidenote: Dom Francisco Manuel.]

The most notable literary figure of the seventeenth century in Portugal
is Dom Francisco Manuel de Mello (1608-66). Those who read of his
manifold adventures in Mr. Prestage’s biography will perhaps wonder
that he should have found time or temper to write at all, and his works
are many and various, from the “History of the War in Catalonia” to the
_Carta de Guia de Casados_ and _Cartas Familiares_, admirably clear and
direct in style.

[Sidenote: Seventeenth-Century Prose.]

Most of his contemporaries were infected with _gongorismo_ from Spain,
and their writings defaced by conceits and hyperbole. Jacyntho Freire
d’Andrade (1597-1657) wrote the biography of Dom João de Castro in an
artificial style closely modelled on that of Tacitus. Frei Bernardo de
Brito (1569-1617) composed _A Monarchia Lusitana_ (parts 1 and 2), of
which it has been said that it ends where it should have begun—with
the history of Portugal,[37] but which was written in good Portuguese
prose. Frei Luis de Sousa (1555-1632) wrote among other works the life
of Bartholomeu dos Martyres, Archbishop of Braga. As Manoel de Sousa
Coutinho, he returned from the disastrous Alcacer Kebir expedition after
a year’s captivity, and married the widow of Dom João de Portugal, who
was killed at Alcacer Kebir. He retired to a convent, as did also his
wife, after their daughter’s death. The legend of the return of Dona
Magdalena’s first husband inspired Garrett with his celebrated play,
_Frei Luis de Sousa_. There were a considerable number of miscellaneous
prose works of merit, as the _Discursos varios_ of Manoel Severim de
Faria (1583-1655) and the _Itinerario da India por terra até a ilha
de Chipre_ by Frei Gaspar de S. Bernardino. The works of the Jesuit
Antonio Vieira (1608-1697) fill twenty-six volumes (with 200 sermons, 500
letters), those of Manoel Bernardes (1644-1710) nineteen volumes (sermons
and moral treatises). In both Portuguese prose is seen at its best.

[Sidenote: The Love Letters.]

In 1669 appeared in French five love letters purporting to be written by
Marianna de Alcoforado, a Portuguese nun born in 1640, from her convent
to a French officer, afterwards the Marquis de Chamilly. They were
translated, or retranslated into Portuguese and are reckoned among the
masterpieces of Portuguese prose. Portugal was known for its sentimental
fervour, and the wholly untenable suspicion arises that a French writer
may have composed these letters (basing them on a foundation of fact),
and attributed them to the Portuguese nun as later Elizabeth Barrett
Browning called her love sonnets “Sonnets from the Portuguese.”

[Sidenote: The Eighteenth Century.]

In the eighteenth century, when lyrical poetry seemed to have died out
of Europe, it became more than ever evident how much the excellence of
Portuguese literature depends on the lyric. None of the Portuguese poets
of this any more than of the preceding century attained prominence,
while in the eighteenth there was no compensating excellence in prose.
Some letters and sermons and treatises on the Portuguese language there
were, and Barbosa Machado (1682-1772) composed his valuable _Bibliotheca
Lusitana_. It was the age of academies and _arcadias_. The _Academia Real
da Historia_ was founded in 1720, the _Academia Real das Sciencias_,
which has done and continues to do such good service to Portuguese
literature, first met in 1780.

[Sidenote: Eighteenth-Century Poets.]

Of the poets, many of whom met with a tragic fate, José Agostinho de
Macedo (1761-1831) was a dull and copious versifier, who apparently
reserved all his fire for attacks upon dead or contemporary writers.
He made bold to supersede the _Lusiads_ with his poem _Gama_ (1811),
subsequently revised and entitled _Oriente_ (1814). Corrêa Garção
(1724-72) was imprisoned by order of the powerful Minister, the Marquez
de Pombal, in 1772, and is stated to have died in prison on the very day
on which his release was ordered. His complete works were published at
Rome in 1888. Domingos dos Reis Quita (1728-70), a Lisbon hairdresser,
wrote odes, idyls, tragedies, a pastoral drama, but his poetry is
second-rate except when it closely imitates Camões. Antonio José da Silva
was born in Brazil in 1705. He belonged to a family of “new Christians,”
and by the people of Lisbon, which enjoyed his comedies, he was known as
“the Jew.” He perished, strangled and then burnt, in the _auto da fé_
of 18th October, 1739. Francisco Manuel do Nascimento (Filinto Elysio),
more fortunate, escaped from the Inquisition and lived and died in
Paris. He earned a living by translation, and his copious poetry had a
great vogue in his day but now has few readers. The most talented of all
the Portuguese eighteenth-century poets was another Arcadian, Manuel
Maria Barbosa de Bocage,[38] whose Arcadian name was Elmano Sadino.
Born at Setubal in 1765, he deserted from military service in India,
and returned to Lisbon in 1790, where he led a dissipated life and was
in 1797 imprisoned during three months in the _Limoeiro_ for having
published a poem entitled _A pavorosa illusão da Eternidade_. After the
_Limoeiro_ he was a prisoner of the Inquisition for four months, and was
then relegated to a monastery. He died, worn out by his own excesses,
at the age of 40, in 1805. With a fund of satire and gift of facile
improvisation, he rose occasionally to real poetry, as in some of his
sonnets.

[Sidenote: The Romantics.]

In the nineteenth century lyric poetry revived in Portugal as elsewhere,
although the influence of Byron did not there inspire any genius such as
Espronceda in Spain. The romanticism of Antonio Feliciano de Castilho
(1800-75) was of a gentler kind. Blind from the age of six, his literary
activity was nevertheless untiring. Besides writing a large number
of books of verse, he translated Ovid, Anacreon, Virgil, Molière,
Shakespeare, Goethe’s _Faust_. Other romantic poets were Soares de Passos
(1826-60); João de Lemos (1819-89), who in _A Lua de Londres_ regrets
Portugal and his native Douro; Mendes Leal (1818-86), who won a great
reputation with his heroic odes (especially _Ave Cesar_, _O Pavilhão_,
and _Napoleão no Kremlin_); José Simões Dias (1844-99), who, besides his
poems (_Peninsulares_), wrote a history of Portuguese literature, and
Gomes d’Amorim (1827-92).

[Sidenote: The Reaction.]

In 1865 appeared the _Poema da Mocidade_, by Pinheiro Chagas, with
a letter by Castilho, which gave rise to Quental’s _Bom senso e bom
gosto_ and the beginning of a new school of poets. Foremost among
these were Anthero de Quental (1842-91) himself, and João de Deus
Ramos (1830-96). Their poetry has nothing in common, but they are both
equally far removed from the traditional romantic school. The sonnets of
Anthero (many of which have been translated into English by Mr. Edgar
Prestage) have nothing to fear from comparison with those of any other
nineteenth-century poet. Portuguese in his hands became adamantine and
sonorous, and the sonnet a trumpet-call. João de Deus, on the other hand,
wrote feathery light lyrics with great naturalness and charm, and in his
easy flow of improvisation is far the more characteristically Portuguese
of the two. Thomaz Ribeiro (1831-1901) belonged to the romantic school,
and is the author of the celebrated ode _A Portugal_. Gonçalves Crespo
(1846-83) published only two small volumes of poems, _Miniaturas_ (1870)
and _Nocturnos_ (1882), which contain one or two little masterpieces,
such as the sonnet _Mater dolorosa_.

[Sidenote: Living Poets.]

Of living poets the most widely known is Senhor Abilio Guerra Junqueiro
(born in 1850), who now, however, rarely publishes any verse. He is a
true poet, and _Finis Patriae_, and, above all, _Os Simples_ (1892, sixth
edition, 1913), contain the best poems in the Portuguese language of the
last twenty years. In other works his poetry has often suffered from
an invasion of rhetoric, but it always displays vigour and courageous
patriotism. There are many schools, the Cloud Treaders (_Nephelibatas_),
of whom Snr. Eugenio de Castro is the head; the Parnassians, as Colonel
Christovam Ayres, Snr. Antonio Feijó, João Diniz, Joaquim de Araujo,
aiming at and sometimes achieving that perfection of form which marked
the work of Gonçalves Crespo, João Penha, Antonio Nobre; the pantheistic
school of the _Renascença_, of which the principal poets are Snr.
Teixeira de Pascoaes, and Snr. Mario Beirão. Two notable living poets are
Snr. Affonso Lopes Vieira and Snr. Antonio Correa d’Oliveira, whose works
are always read with eagerness, the latter especially having caught some
of the sixteenth-century lyrical vein. The living poets of Portugal are,
however, so numerous that it is impossible even to give the names of all
of them. A French critic, who names some sixty, says modestly: “On ne
peut tout citer.”[39]

[Sidenote: Almeida Garrett.]

It is preferable to leave them on one side (although an anthology of some
merit might easily be formed from their works) and to go back to that
strange figure and very real poet of the first half of the nineteenth
century, the Visconde de Almeida Garrett (1799-1854). He was master of
a peculiar and fascinating style of Portuguese prose, he revived the
Portuguese drama, he wrote long romantic poems and exquisitely finished
short lyrics, and he collected old Portuguese romances, which, however,
he could not refrain from retouching and adorning. It is impossible to
over-estimate his services to Portuguese literature, although the works
written by him that will be read a hundred years hence will probably fit
into a very small volume.

[Sidenote: Herculano.]

In prose the other great figure of the nineteenth century in Portugal was
Alexandre Herculano (1810-77), historian, poet and historical novelist
(_Historia de Portugal_; _Lendas e Narrativas_; _Eurico_, _etc_). His
works are of permanent value, and his prose bears the impress of his
strong exceptional character. Other historical writers were Pinheiro
Chagas (1842-95), Latino Coelho (1825-91), Rebello da Silva (1821-72),
and Oliveira Martins (1845-94).

[Sidenote: Oliveira Martins.]

The latter’s first work was a historical novel, and his work remained
romantic throughout, but he had the power of reconstituting historical
scenes in their picturesqueness and colour, and making the dry bones
live. His most celebrated works are his _Historia de Portugal_, _Portugal
Contemporaneo_, _A Vida de Nun’ Alvares_, and the _Filhos de João I_. He
did not, however, confine himself in his historical writings to Portugal,
but embraced the histories of Greece, Rome, and Iberian civilisation.
When one remembers that he was also an active politician and Minister of
Finance in 1892, it is not surprising that he had worn himself out before
reaching the age of 50.

[Sidenote: Camillo.]

The novel in Portugal since the middle of the nineteenth century has
embraced the most varied kinds and sometimes attained a high degree of
merit. Camillo Castello Branco (1826-1890), most Portuguese of writers
in theme and style, wrote over a hundred novels. He was gifted with a
temperament that could not fail to make his life restless and unhappy
and is reflected in the sentimental tragedies and nervous pessimism and
vitriolic satire of his books. By his countrymen his novels, especially
_Amor de perdição_, are still read with enthusiasm; for foreigners they
are redeemed by the pure Portuguese of their style and by the occasional
insight to be won from them into the Portuguese life of the second half
of the nineteenth century. But probably it is necessary to be born a
Portuguese in order to do them full justice. For those who wish to learn
Portuguese untainted with Gallicisms they are invaluable.

[Illustration: GENERAL VIEW, COIMBRA

[_See p. 56_]

[Sidenote: Eça de Queiroz.]

Eça de Queiroz (1846-1900), the other great Portuguese novelist of
the century, is, on the contrary, almost as much French as Portuguese
in style, and is probably the best known of modern Portuguese writers
outside Portugal. His work contains many arresting pages, especially
those which describe country or provincial life in Portugal (in _O Crime
do Padre Amaro_, 1875; _A Correspondencia de Fradique Mendes_, 1891; _A
Illustre Casa de Ramires_, 1897; _A Cidade e as Serras_, 1901). Life in
Lisbon is described, or perhaps one should say distorted, caricatured in
_O Primo Basilio_ (1878), _Os Maias_ (1880), and in part of _A Reliquia_
(1887). Eça de Queiroz went from strength to strength, or rather from
weakness to strength. His later work is more original and above all more
Portuguese. It is in parts very striking indeed, and through all his
novels runs that peculiar flavour of irony and sarcasm which prevents him
from ever being merged entirely in the French realistic or naturalistic
school.

[Sidenote: Julio Diniz.]

A writer of less vigorous talent was “Julio Diniz” (Joaquim Guilherme
Gomes Coelho) (1839-71), whose novels, _Uma Familia Inglesa_ (1862), _As
Pupillas do Sr. Reitor_ (1867), _A Morgadinha dos Cannaviaes_ (1868),
_Os Fidalgos da Casa Morisca_ (1871) treat of country themes with a
quiet charm and no little psychological interest. Some of his pages
recall those of the Spanish novelist Fernán Caballero in their delicate
observation and gentle optimism.

[Sidenote: Living Novelists.]

Of living novelists, Snr. Teixeira de Queiroz (born in 1848) also
occasionally recalls Fernán Caballero in a certain naïve and delightful
power of description, preferably of country scenes and peasants.
His best work is contained in the short stories of his _Comedia do
Campo_—_Contos_, _Amor Divino_, _Antonio Fogueira_, _Novos Contos_,
_Amores, Amores_, _A Nossa Gente_, _A Cantadeira_ (1913). Sr. Luiz de
Magalhães, born in 1859, who was Minister of Foreign Affairs in Senhor
João Franco’s Ministry, wrote in 1886 a novel entitled _O Brazileiro
Soares_, a careful study of a “Brazilian” (that is, a Portuguese
returning enriched from Brazil), which placed him in the front rank of
contemporary Portuguese novelists. Senhor Magalhães Lima, born in 1857,
did not publish his first novel, _O Transviado_, till 1899. Other novels
by the same author are _A Paz do Senhor_ (1903) and _O Reino da Saudade_
(1904). Senhor Abel Botelho, born in 1854, and appointed Minister at
Buenos Aires by the Republic, has a great reputation as a novelist.
His novels are professedly “pathological.” A Portuguese critic remarks
that his books sometimes “cause more moral indignation than aesthetic
enjoyment.”[40] Younger contemporary novelists, as contemporary poets,
are very numerous.

[Sidenote: The “Conto.”]

[Sidenote: Dona Maria Amalia Vaz de Carvalho.]

The short story, or _conto_, has been written with success by so many
authors that it has almost become a special feature of modern Portuguese
literature: Eça de Queiroz, Snr. Teixeira de Queiroz, Affonso Botelho,
Fialho d’Almeida (1857-1911)—stories of Alemtejo in _O Paiz das Uvas_
and other works—the Conde de Ficalho, the Conde de Sabugosa, Julio Cesar
Machado, the Visconde de Villa Moura (_Os Humildes_, _Bohemios_, etc.),
and above all, Trindade Coelho, whose _Os Meus Amores_ are stories
deliberately ingenuous, remarkable for their style. Dona Maria Amalia
Vaz de Carvalho, whose husband was the poet Gonçalves Crespo, has also
written _contos_ and poems. But her chief work consists in historical
studies and in critical essays. Her works comprise over twenty volumes,
and especially she has won English gratitude by introducing some part of
modern English literature to Portuguese and Brazilian readers.

[Sidenote: The Drama.]

“_Em Portugal nunca chegou a haver theatro_—a Portuguese drama has never
existed,” said Garrett (life to a Portuguese is perhaps not dull enough
to drive him to the theatre), and his own plays for long continued to
be an isolated achievement. Recently, however, a number of playwrights
by no means to be despised have arisen in Portugal. Foremost among them
are Snr. Julio Dantas, Dom João da Camara (1852-1912), Antonio Ennes
(1848-1901), Snr. Marcellino de Mesquita, Snr. Henrique Lopes de Mendonça
and Snr. Abel Botelho, the novelist. It would almost seem as if there
were two writers to every reader in Portugal. “Every passing season
inundates the bookshops with a flood of _brochures_ in verse and prose,
the proof of an exaggerated output of books. It seems as if even the
illiterates must be authors” (_Diario de Noticias_, 6th April, 1914).
What most amazes the foreigner is to see the Lisbon bookshops parade a
crowd of foreign books, while those in Portuguese are often tucked away
in some obscure corner. Modern Portuguese literature is, unhappily, like
finance and politics, largely of artificial growth, imported from abroad.
There is plenty of writers but no critical reading public.

[Sidenote: The Critics.]

The excessive number of writers is no doubt due in part to the defects
of a criticism which appears not to realise its power of regulating
this stream of production. A little sincere condemnation may serve to
prevent a whole series of inferior works of fiction or poetry, especially
as Portuguese writers are very sensitive to criticism. Fortunately
contemporary Portuguese literature now has a promising young critic in
Senhor Fidelino de Figueiredo, who combines sympathy with sincerity and
may do something to check copious, slovenly, and slavishly imitative
writing, and inaugurate a school of concrete criticism. Senhor Theophile
Braga does not deal with contemporary literature, but is still piling
Ossa on Pelion in the wide range of his works. His long poem, _A Visão
dos Tempos_, was published in 1864, and his _Historia da Litteratura
Portugueza_ continues to receive valuable additions from time to time.
There is plenty of literary talent in Portugal, but it needs direction:
it would be a thousand pities were it all to be frittered away from an
inability to select and concentrate.

[Sidenote: Art.]

In art the Portuguese have never occupied a very high position. Perhaps
they are too vague and romantic. Yet in early times they would seem to
have excelled rather in realistic representation on a small scale than
in large romantic pictures, as may be seen in the admirable, minute
sculpture on the tombs at Alcobaça and in the illustrations of old
manuscripts—for instance, the wonderfully life-like portrait of Prince
Henry the Navigator in the Chronicle of Gomes Eannes de Azurara, a
masterpiece attributed to Nuno Gonçalves, who painted the exceedingly
fine triptychs now in the Lisbon Museum. What treasures of art are or
were (being now transferred to museums) contained in Portugal’s churches
and convents is amply shown by an excellent magazine of art now being
published by Snr. Joaquim de Vasconcellos, whose researches in connection
with Damião de Goes, Francisco de Hollanda, and other Portuguese
classics have earned him the gratitude of all who interest themselves in
Portuguese literature. This _Arte Religiosa de Portugal_, begun in 1914,
is published monthly, each part containing eight beautifully reproduced
plates, and costing 500 _réis_ (about two shillings). No one who cares
for art will regret subscribing for it, and certainly after seeing these
plates they will never think of Portugal as a country without art. Nor
is talent lacking in painting and in sculpture at the present day in
Portugal. Witness the painters Sr. Bordallo Pinheiro, Sr. Carlos Reis,
Sr. José Malhoa and others, and the sculptors, Sr. Soares dos Reis and
Sr. Teixeira Lopes, whose Eça de Queiroz statue and other works have won
him universal admiration. In art, as in literature, caricature usually
flourishes in Portugal, and it is perhaps a useful corrective of the
tendency to copiousness and vagueness of outline, and, in the hands of
clever draughtsmen, has given ample proof that it need not degenerate
into vulgarity. The fervent activity in many fields gives good hope, at
any rate, of a twentieth-century crop of writers and artists who may
maintain or surpass the achievement of the nineteenth.

[Sidenote: The Language.]

The restoration of the Portuguese language to its original purity
is an essential condition, since it is vain to hope to gather figs
from thistles. The late Gonçalves Vianna, Julio Moreira, and others
watched over Portuguese with loving care, and it is now under the
protection of the celebrated philologist and folk-lorist, Dr. José
Leite de Vasconcellos. But all may do their share by forswearing and
rooting out Gallicisms to the best of their knowledge (Snr. Candido
de Figueiredo does excellent service here), and when the ground has
been cleared of these noxious weeds—Gallicisms, abstractions, trailing
circumlocutions—Portuguese literature is likely to thrive as it has not
thriven for the last three hundred years.

CHAPTER IX

PLAYS—GIL VICENTE

[Sidenote: Portuguese Drama.]

Portuguese writers have never shown a marked genius for dramatic action
in their works, and although several hundreds of _autos_ were written
in the sixteenth century, and Antonio Ferreira (1528-69) introduced the
classical drama into Portugal, yet drama might almost be said not to
exist in Portugal were it not for two great writers: Gil Vicente, of
the sixteenth century, and Almeida Garrett, of the nineteenth. Living
Portuguese writers include some dramatic authors of remarkable merit, and
the theatre has its devoted followers in Lisbon. But the opera and the
cinematograph are the great favourites, and plays often owe their success
to the scenic effects rather than to the drama in itself. Gil Vicente’s
plays in the sixteenth century were, we know, accompanied by lavish
scenic display, but their dialogue is so spirited, life-like and natural
that they scarcely require alien adornments. Several of these plays have
been recently revived, adapted or translated (from Spanish to Portuguese)
by the poet Snr. Affonso Lopes Vieira, and favourably received at Lisbon.

[Sidenote: Frei Luiz de Sousa.]

As, together with the totally different plays of Garrett, with the
principal of which, _Frei Luiz de Sousa_, English readers are familiar
in the translation by Mr. Edgar Prestage (Elkin Mathews, 1909), these
plays of Gil Vicente, lyric poet, satirist, goldsmith, playwright and
actor, form the chief dramatic baggage of the Portuguese, it will not
be amiss to give a few extracts from them. But, of course, to be fully
appreciated, they must be read whole, and a forthcoming critical edition
will make this less difficult for the ordinary reader than it has
hitherto been.

_THE BITER BIT_

_Servant Girl._ Sir, an honest lady is here and would speak with you.

_Merchant._ Let her come in, if she will, for I am free at present.

_Widow._ Look here, my young gossip, do not you betray me.

_S.G._ Not I, by my life.

_W._ For you are the greatest chatterer I saw in all my life.

_S.G._ Oh, what fun! And should I tell that you are a poor gentleman
without a horse and without a shilling, dressed up as a woman to deceive
a thief!...

_W._ Good-day, Sir.

_M._ Good-day, _senhora_. What is it you would have?

_W._ I will tell you anon. Ah me, how tired I am, how tired and worried.

_M._ Take one of these chairs.

_W._ Oh, that is nothing: believe me, distress knows little rest.

_M._ By my life you say true, and I agree with you entirely.

_W._ I say, sir, that the Lord Treasurer of the noble King Telebano owes
me last year’s pension won in the sweat of my brow.

_S.G._ (aside): Yes, a fine pension of your imagination.

_M._ How much is it?

_W._ This note will tell you.

_M._ Let me have a look at it. I congratulate you: it is 40,000 _réis_.

_W._ Sir, I am in despair, and unless you buy it of me, they will
distrain upon my goods to-morrow.

_M._ No more of that; I shall certainly do nothing of the kind.

_W._ That is not a good answer.

_M._ And what of the penalty imposed by law?

_W._ Our agreement will be secret.

_M._ Impossible.

_W._ Who is to know of it?

_M._ When I go to change this note.

_W._ Do not reduce me to despair. You will know how to manage it.

_M._ Well, well, I will be an arrant fool, simply in order to help you.
What will you sell for?

_W._ I leave that to your conscience.

_M._ I will tell you: 10,000 _réis_ will I give you, cash down.

_W._ _Ai Jesu!_ Ho, there! help!

_M._ I will not give more, there’s no use in further discussion.

_W._ Would you be so cruel to a poor widow woman? O, what a sad thing is
poverty, abandoned by all!

_M._ No more, _senhora_.

_W._ Will you not be content now with 20,000, one half?

_M._ No, nor 25,000, I may tell you.

_W._ Well, let me have them, plague upon it.

_Moça_

Senhor, uma dona honrada
’Stá aqui pera vos fallar.

_Mercador_

Entre ca, s’ella mandar,
Que eu não faço agora nada.

_Viuva_

Olha ca, mexeriqueirinha,
Não me descubras tu a mi.

_Moça_

Não farei por vida minha.

_Viuva_

Porque es a môr palreirinha
Que eu em minha vida vi.

_Moça_

Que prazer!
E eu havia de dizer
Que ereis pobre escudeirão
Sem cavallo e sem tostão
E em trajos de molher
Que is enganar um ladrão!...

_Viuva_

Senhor, embora estejais.

_Mercador_

Embora estejais, senhora.
Que é o que demandais?

_V._

Eu o direi ora.
Ai coitada
Que venho ora tão cansada
Do corpo e d’outras canseiras.

_M._

Sentae-vos nessas cadeiras.

_V._

Esse descanso não é nada:
Crede que a necessidade
Mui pouco descanso tem.

_M._

Assi viva eu que é verdade
E fallastes muito bem,
Muito á minha vontade.

_V._

Digo, senhor,
Que o thesoureiro môr
Do nobre Rei Dom Telebano
Me deve já do outro anno
As tenças do meu suor.

_Moça_ (_áparte_)

Tens tu lá tenças de vento!

_M._

O dinheiro quanto é?

_V._

Este papel dará fé
Que é o seu conhecimento.

_M._

Mostrae ca, verei que é.
Bem estais:
São quarenta mil reaes.[41]

_V._

Senhor eu ’stou enforcada
E se vos não m’os comprais
Amanhã sou penhorada.

_M._

Não me falleis nisso mais;
Não farei eutal por certo.

_V._

Não é essa boa resposta.

_M._

E a pena que está posta?

_V._

Será secreto o concerto.

_M._

Não pode ser.

_V._

Quem ha isso de saber?

_M._

Quando os for arrecadar.

_N._

Não me queirais desconsolar;
Vos o sabereis fazer.

_M._

Ora emfim, quero ser tolo sandeu
E só por vos soccorrer.
Quanto m’os quereis vender?

_V._

Em vossa alma o deixo eu.

_M._

Eu vos direi:
Dez mil reaes vos darei,
Estes logo em bons tostões.

_V._

Ai Jesu! aquidelrei!

_M._

Eu d’aqui não passarei,
Nem passemos mais rezões.

_V._

A uma viuva amara
Fazeis tamanha crueza?
Oh coitada da pobreza
Que tudo o desempara!

_M._

No mais, senhora.

_V._

Não vos contentareis ora
Com vinte mil, que é metade?

_M._

Nem com mais cinco, em verdade.
Dae-m’os já com a ma ora.[42]

Of the scenes which follow only the English version is here given—

_PEASANTS GOING TO THE FAIR_

_Amancio Vaz._ Are you going to the fair, _compadre_?

_Deniz Lourenço._ To the fair, _compadre_.

_A._ So. Let us go together, you and me, along this stream.

_D._ Let us go, in sooth.

_A._ I am very glad to find you here.

_D._ Are you going to see some one or do you mean to buy?

_A._ I will tell you, and we will talk as we go, and have a look at the
village girls. _Compadre_, my wife has a very difficult temper, and now,
God willing, I am thinking of selling her, and will give her for next to
nothing.

_D._ Your wife is good enough, I don’t know what is the matter with, you,
my friend.

_A._ If she had married you, you would complain just as I do now.

_D._ Well, as to mine, _compadre_, she is so slack and clumsy that she
can never knead bread without knocking over the flour....

(_Later enter Branca Annes, wife of A., and Marta Dias, wife of D._)

_B.A._ Since in so ill an hour I married, cousin, and such a husband,
I will buy a tub here and keep him under it, and a great stone on top.
For he goes to the fig-trees and eats ripe and unripe, and all my hung
grapes he devours till he seems a very rubbish heap. He goes for the
plums before they are ripe, he breaks down the cherry trees, and as to
the grapes of the vines I don’t know what he does with them. He eats all
day, sleeps all night, never does anything, and is always telling me that
he is hungry.

_M._ To me he seems a good husband.[43]

_THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE_

_Joanne._ Have you seen my brown smock? When you do you will lose your
wits, it looks so well, so well. What in the world is this, you will say.

_Catalina._ O, what a simpleton! Do not open your mouth if anyone is at
hand.

_J._ O, to the devil with such a life as mine! Catalina, if I take it
into my head, I will go as soon as anything. Is not there India? What
good am I doing here? Better to go.

_C._ And what is that to me? There comes Fernando. Good-day, Fernando. I
waited for you at the pass.

_Fernando._ Is Madanella here?

_C._ And why are you looking for her? Have you taken a dislike to me?

_J._ Really, Catalina?

_C._ No more, consider that you have left me.

_J._ Really, Catalina?

_F._ You don’t say where Madanella is gone.

_C._ Why do you ask for her?

_F._ Because so fortune wills.

_C._ A plague upon you.

_J._ Really, Catalina? Well, if I had known this, I wouldn’t have given
you the distaff that I brought from Santarem.[43]

_THE DISCONTENTED PEASANT_

_Frei Paço._ What are you grumbling at, peasant?

_Peasant._ At God, who clearly has a great spite against me.

_F.P._ But what do you complain of?

_P._ He drives me to despair.

_F.P._ But how?

_P._ He sends rain when I don’t want it, and when I would have some rain
the very stars glow like the sun. Now He swamps the newly sown fields or
parches everything, or sends a cruel wind or snow to kill the flocks, and
little He cares. And if I would sue Him for damage done by lightning and
thunder, hail and frost, who is to find out His dwelling and summon Him!
He cares for no one, and will do as He likes. He might do me good and no
one a penny the worse, but not a bit of it. And so I say He has a grudge
against me, and if you doubt it you have but to look at my year’s harvest.

_F.P._ Do you think, then, God lives with you?

_P._ Look you, _padre_, what I say is, let Him temper the winter’s rages,
and let the corn ripen, but He in his spite without gaining a farthing
by it, sends rain in January and frost in April, and summer heat in
February, mists in the month of May, and hail in mid-July. I toil till I
drop, and He in whose care I am makes it ever worse for me.

_F.P._ Consider if you duly pay Him what is His.

_P._ I would pay my tithes willingly enough if He in sheer malice did not
damage what is His and mine.

_F.P._ And do you ever pray to Him to free you from these troubles?

_P._ Much store He sets on my prayers. I pray quite enough. I don’t know
how it is, but everything is done at His good pleasure. He killed my
father and my master, and then my wife. Ask yourself why He should kill
my aunt with all her charities, and leave the tax-gatherers, who plague
me daily.

_F.P._ They say there is no better gift than good advice. Do then as I
bid you: conform yourself with the will of God, and make good sense your
mirror.

_P._ Let Him conform Himself with me. I am poor as a dog, and tell Him
so daily, and He, it may be, rejoices. Offering and prayer avail me not
a whit: now He gives but straw without grain, and now neither grain nor
straw, but only infinite oppression. Therefore, I would have this boy of
mine enter the Church, not that he is especially inclined that way, but
that he may live a life of greater ease. If you, _padre_, will teach him,
all I have will be yours.

_F.P._ Yes, if he is so minded.

_P._ He has intelligence for anything, and a good singing voice.

_F.P._ Here, take this paper, and read those verses.

_Sebastian._ Is this for cummin or must I go for saffron?

_F.P._ You know nothing at all.

_S._ I know where the village shop is.

_P._ He is as sharp as a sword, there isn’t a goat in the herd that he
doesn’t know.

_F.P._ Come now, without more ado, say the A B C D E.

_S._ ’A be seedy.

_F.P._ Say A X.

_S._ Aex was a tailor who lived by the Cathedral.

_P._ If your life is spared, Sebastian, you will make a fine scholar.

_S._ It looks as if the plough had been at work among these letters.

_F.P._ You need much examining. And now, as to Latin: say _Beatus vir_.

_S._ O, that is easy enough: _Bi ora tres ratos vir_ (I saw three mice).

_P._ See what learning![44]

_THE COURTIER PRIEST_

_Frey Paço enters in cassock and cape, with velvet cap and gloves and
gilt sword, mincing like a very sweet courtier, and says_:

He who sees me enter with such antics will think I am gone mad till he
knows that I am Frey Paço. _Glory be to God_ and _For ever and ever_ are
not for me, but a gilt sword, since it looks well to wear a sword at
court. So refined am I; and that there should be no doubt of it, I had
an excellent idea: I never let them shave my tonsure. So do not expect
me to address you with _Glory to God_ or _Praised be Jesus Christ_, for
all my priest’s frock. And I am so finished a courtier that I may well
say that the psalms I recite are—envy and gossip. My speech is gentle and
courteous with great store of compliments. Expect no deeds from me but
be content with words borne away by the wind. Favour and disaffection am
I, the protector of lovers; I disillusion those who trust me and am the
very temple of the god of love and the hell of the love-lorn. But since
the law of love is changed, and everything grows cold, I love now by
agreement and sigh to order.[45]

_FREI PAÇO GIVES A LESSON IN COURT MANNERS_

_Frei Paço._ My friend, a noble lady must be rich and fair, sensitive,
serene, courteous, gentle, charming.

_Apariço._ Giralda is all that.

_F.P._ Let us see how this head-dress suits her.

_A._ Away, away with it, it is not fit for anyone to wear.

_F.P._ You mean, peasant, that it is not for harvesters but for the Court.

_A._ It is a magpie’s tail, and not for a woman to wear; so thinks
Apariço.

_F.P._ Yet it didn’t suit her ill.

_A._ Who ever saw a sparrow with its tail at the back of its head!

_F.P._ I’m afraid she will not suit.

_A._ Why?

_F.P._ Well, she has not the air.

_A._ She has been treading grapes in the wine-press and is all stained,
but she will go and have a wash....

_F.P._ Drop me a curtsey now. Let us see how she does it.

_G._ This side or that?

_F.P._ See what a manner for the Court! My fine lady keeper of goats, you
must do thus. Did you mark me? And make the steps so. Do you understand?
And you will look thus, with lofty mien, your body very straight,
laughing little and subtly, with a spice of honest deceit. To speak only
occasionally is excellent. You must not be in love nor give love over,
and to show that you are fancy-free be careful not to sigh.[46]

_MOFINA MENDES_

_Payo._ Since it is the will of God that I should pay so harmful a
shepherdess, in reward for your trouble, take this pot of oil and go and
sell it at the fair, and perhaps you will prosper, since I cannot with
you in my service.

_Mofina._ Straightway in God’s name to the fair of Trancoso will I go,
and will make much money. With the money of the oil I will buy ducks’
eggs, which is the cheapest thing I can get there, and each egg hatched
will give me a duck and every duck a shilling. At a low price they will
yield over a million and a half (_réis?_). These ducks’ eggs will bring
me a rich and honourable marriage, and on the day of my wedding I will
go dressed in a robe of scarlet, and before me the bridegroom will go
courting me. I will come from within dancing a dance like this and
singing this song.

(_So speaks Mofina Mendes with the pot of oil on her head, and as she
gives her mind ever more to the dancing, it falls off._)[47]

_VANITY OF VANITIES_

_Nigger._ All the world is weariness,
To be a great lord, weariness;
Or a poor man, weariness;
A lovely woman, weariness;
An ugly woman, weariness;
A negro slave, weariness;
Or the slave’s master, weariness;
To go to Mass, weariness;
And a long sermon, weariness;
A priest without a wife, weariness;
A priest with a wife, weariness,
Great weariness;
An unmarried nobleman, weariness;
Much rain, weariness;
Or no rain, weariness;
To have many children, weariness;
Or to have none at all, weariness;
To be the Pope in Rome, weariness;
Or that peasant there, weariness;
Not to go to Paradise, great weariness;
All, all the world is but weariness.[48]

_THE POOR GENTLEMAN_

_Ordonho._ Who is your master, brother, say?

_Apariço._ O, it is the devil himself. Year in, year out, we are both
dead of hunger and misery.

_O._ Who does he pass the time with?

_A._ What do I know! He goes about like a scalded dog.

_O._ And what is his occupation?

_A._ That of a fool. Combing his hair and fasting, all day without food,
singing and playing on the guitar, sighing and yawning. He is ever
talking to himself, and the verses he makes are so cold and insipid and
senseless that they make one pity him. And the airs he gives himself!
That is what enrages me. I have been in his service three years and have
never seen him with half a crown, but in our expenditure a shilling lasts
a month.

_O._ Mercy on us, what do you eat?

_A._ Not even of bread do we eat our fill.

_O._ And his horse?

_A._ Skin and bones, the bones piercing the skin. I and the horse and he
eat scarcely anything. Yet you should see him boasting and pretending to
be a valiant knight, and singing his own praises the whole live-long day.
But the other day, in an alley there, they gave him a fine thrashing. O,
such a thrashing!

_O._ What with?

_A._ With an old stick.

_O._ Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!

_A._ It gave me such pleasure.

_O._ And he said nothing?

_A._ Took it without a word, blow on blow. He comes home late at night,
being shut in the house all day since he dare not show himself on account
of his clothes. And he calls out gaily, “To supper,” as if he had supper
ready. And I have nothing for him, and he has nothing for me to give him.
And he takes a crust of bread and a shrivelled turnip and fastens his
teeth in it like a dog. I don’t know how he keeps up his strength.[49]

_THE MOÇO’S COMPLAINT_

Do they call a chest a bed here or is there no meaning in words! All
my nights in his house were nights spent in an open boat at sea, not
to speak of other evils. Senhor Judge, I have been six years in this
gentleman’s service, and might have been a barber by now but for his
false promises. When I entered his service he was in better plight, but
now, good lack, it is all up with him, and his guitar, and his horse, and
his bed, and his clothes, and my service, and all the rest. This last
night, as I lay ill at ease on a chest with my feet hanging over, he woke
me up at one o’clock, and: “O, if you knew, Fernando, what verses I have
just made.” He bids me light the lamp and hold the inkstand for him, and
there was his dog howling and I standing there cursing because in my
first sleep my master must needs make verses.[50]

_THE NOBLEMAN’S CHAPLAIN_

_Chaplain._ _Senhor_, it seems time....

_Nobleman._ Say on, _padre_, say on.

_C._ I say that it is close on three years that I have been your chaplain.

_N._ Most true. Say on.

_C._ And I might have been the Prince’s or even the King’s.

_N._ In good sooth, I don’t know about that, _padre_.

_C._ Yes, indeed, I might, though I am in your service. Consider then,
sir, what you will give me, for, besides serving at the altar, I was
employed to buy provisions.

_N._ I won’t deny it. Draw me up a petition of all your claims.

_C._ _Senhor_, do not put me off, for the matter has no ending, as
perhaps you wish, for indeed I am become for you both clergyman and man
of business.

_N._ And I have given you favours, yes, so far as my poor means allowed,
have done more for you than others do. For what more does a clergyman
want in wages or income than that he should be given his food—a good
penny a day—and allowed to live as he wills. And think of the honour! “He
is chaplain of So-and-So.”

_C._ Yes, and what about clothes, and meals snatched anyhow, and sleeping
so ill at ease that my head lies on the floor without a pillow, and
always at one o’clock in the morning Mass before the chase? And to
please you, moreover, I served you out of doors, even buying fish in the
market-place. And other errands too, ill befitting my dignity. Indeed,
indeed, sir, I was your carrier on the high road, driven this way and
that; and I had charge of the cats and of the negroes in the kitchen, and
I used to clean your boots for you, and do many another thing besides.

_N._ Yes, I trusted you with all my alms-giving, and you gave for the
love of God, and I never asked you for accounts.

_C._ For the three years to which I’m referring I can give them now
without more ado. You once bade me give twopence to a blind man in
charity.

_N._ I’m not denying it.[51]

_THE POOR NOBLEMAN_

_Page._ Sir, the goldsmith is here.

_Nobleman._ Show him in. He will be wanting money. Good-day to you, sir.
Put your hat on, please. You have a great friend in me, and one who
sings your merits. I was praising you only yesterday to the King with all
my might, and I know he will employ you, and I will help you in this as
often as I can. For sometimes such help is better than a pension, and you
know well the value of your reputation and other such things.

_Goldsmith._ Sir, I will serve him with all my heart.

_N._ Do you know what I like about you—I said so to the King, and it is
greatly to your credit: you do not mind if you are paid or left unpaid. I
never saw such patience, such superiority, such a will to please.

_G._ Our account is so small and so long overdue that it is dying of hope
deferred, and to present it fills me with presentiment.

_N._ O, how skilfully you limn your speech. Glad indeed am I not to have
paid you so as to hear you hammer out your words so well.

_G._ Sir, I kiss your hands, but would gladly see what is mine in mine.

_N._ Another courtier’s phrase! “Sir, I kiss your hands, but would gladly
see what is mine in mine!” O, what fine flowers of speech![52]

CHAPTER X

POLITICS AND THE PRESS

[Sidenote: The Political Press.]

It is the misfortune of existing Portuguese politics and of the
Portuguese Press that the party-leader is often a newspaper-editor.
If we imagine Mr. Balfour as Leader of the Conservatives and editor
and leader-writer of the _Morning Post_, Mr. Asquith as Leader of the
Liberals and editor of the _Westminster Gazette_, Mr. Lloyd George at
the _Daily Chronicle_, Mr. Ramsay Macdonald at a paper of his own, we
have some idea on a large scale of the state of affairs in Portugal. “Men
are rarely good judges in their own interests,” one of the characters in
Francisco de Sá de Miranda’s play, _Os Vilhalpandos_, informs us. The
Latin temperament, with its many merits and excellences, its logical and
intelligent outlook, rarely has the quality of objective justice. It is
too fervent and impassioned, loves and hates too ardently to pause to
consider coldly the fairness of a matter. All the more welcome would be
some independent organs in the Lisbon Press, some steadying element, some
kind of Portuguese _Spectator_. As to partisan newspapers, there are far
too many of them.

[Sidenote: Journalism.]

At Lisbon alone—if we include all kinds and descriptions of periodical
publications—there are upwards of a hundred, and the majority of these
are political. There are too many writers, who drift from a Coimbra
degree into journalism at Lisbon, and who consider it far less important
to write good Portuguese than to drag in some French or Latin quotation
in and out of season, and most often misspelt.

[Illustration: THE WASHING PLACE, COIMBRA

[_See p. 99_]

[Sidenote: Portuguese and Portugibberish.]

It is worth while to consider the sad case of the Portuguese language,
since it is or might be one of the finest languages in Europe. It is
to be hoped that the Bible Society will distribute far and wide the
Portuguese translation of the Bible by João Ferreira d’Almeida among
all, peasants and others, who can read. It may not convert them to
Protestantism, but will lay the basis for a revival of the Portuguese
language, murdered daily in the Press. It is not only the Latin tags
that are misspelt; in spite of the intricate official rules drawn up
for Portuguese spelling, it remains unfixed, and words are sometimes
transformed almost out of recognition. _E_, being often pronounced as
_i_, becomes so written, _s_ takes the place of _c_, and when these and
other errors combine the result is remarkable; for instance, “scepticism”
becomes _siticismo_, “miscellany” _mecellanea_, and so forth. The
most minute rules of Portuguese orthography were drawn up after the
Revolution. They went so far as to forbid you to write Sarah, while
permitting _ah_ and _oh_, with final H(_aga_). The confusion has only
become worse confounded.

[Sidenote: Polysyllables.]

The Portuguese language as spoken in the provinces and by the peasants
is far clearer and more attractive than as it is often spoken at Lisbon.
As to the written language, it is too often debased by Gallicisms and
by sesquipedalian words. It appears to shun directness like the plague.
A “large crowd” becomes an “innumerable multitude,” a “fine view” is
an “admirable panorama,” a horse is a solipede, a dog is _um exemplar
canino_ (_O Seculo_, 21st June, 1915). The terse phrase, “Wait and see,”
translated into modern Portuguese, would become “Will you have the
goodness to adopt an attitude of expectation and devote yourself to a
consideration of the progress of events.” A sentence is often a great
wave of abstract terms which leaves the reader stunned and breathless.
Take the following from the _Parnasso Portuguez Moderno_ (Lisbon, 1877):
“A par das grandes descobertas scientificas do nosso seculo que pela via
inductiva conduziram á demonstração integral dos phenomenos cosmicos pelo
movimento etherodynamico.” All that this really means is “Beside the
great discoveries made by science in our time in cosmic phenomena.” Or
attempt to extract the character of the unfortunate Luis de Camões from
this: “A forma da genialidade de Camões não foi a de uma sobrexcitação
da sensibilidade mantendo em estado morbido os elementos nervosos; a
boa cultura synthetica, completandose pela synessia da sua vida em
diversissimos meios teve um objectivo para onde convergiram todas as
assimilisações mentaes e adaptações praticas.” In a single page of one
recent novel occur no less than fourteen abstract words ending in _-ade_.

[Sidenote: True Portuguese.]

Yet there is ample evidence to show that Portuguese at its best is
well qualified to rival or even excel Castilian. It has by nature that
softness and pliancy which the Castilian only attains exceptionally,
at the hands of genius, and in Portuguese it is for the master hand to
give this language that force and concision which comes naturally to the
Castilian, and which was once a characteristic of Portuguese also. The
saying, “Fortune usually kicks a man when he’s down,” is expressed in
Portuguese in three words, “_Sobre queda coices_”—“after fall kicks,”
and innumerable words are in Portuguese reduced to half the length they
have in Latin and in other modern Romance languages. _Solus_, alone,
becomes _só_; _dolor_, grief, _dôr_, _major môr_. As to its softness,
delightful words such as _chuva_, rain, and all those words expressive of
bittersweet regret and similar feelings—_saudade_, _saudoso_, _meigo_,
_mavioso_—occur continually. But the tendency has been always to praise
and exaggerate this softness, whereas it needs a corrective of terseness
if it is not to become excessive. Even occasional harshnesses of
construction are not amiss. The uglinesses and thicknesses of Portuguese
pronunciation and spelling are of comparatively modern growth. Open some
folio of the sixteenth century, and you will find not the nasal _ão_, but
the straightforward _am_, not _prompto_ but _pronto_, not _lucta_ but
_luta_, not _tracto_ but _trato_—everything clearer and more direct. And
as the scholar goes to his books the politician must turn to the people,
not the people to which the Lisbon political press addresses itself, but
the inhabitants of the remote provinces which have remained as stationary
as old folios in a convent library, and preserve many uncorrupted
excellences of language and custom. And indeed this is no matter of vain
pedantry: for unless the language, and the citizens too, hark back to the
sixteenth century, they are doomed to perish. No great literature can
come of Portuguese as it is at present too often spoken and written, and
without a literature a nation dwindles and dies. (Witness the Basques,
who have the vigour of six ordinary nations, and are losing their
language and nationality because they have never given much attention to
the written word, content with their splendid old games and customs.)
It is a pity that the passion for politics in Portugal has not inspired
its devotees with nobler prose; though there are some journalists who
are also men of letters, the majority of articles published are scarcely
written in anything worthy of the name of prose, and this is the more
regrettable as politics in Portugal stretches its net so wide, and
thousands read the newspaper who have never opened a book.

[Sidenote: The Political Octopus.]

Nearly a century ago, that is at about the time of the introduction into
Portugal of constitutional government, a Portuguese writer proposed that
the vanity of his countrymen should be turned to account by bestowing
such titles as Viscount and Baron on rich persons according as they
built a large or small number of houses, a large or small village in
the more deserted parts of the country. Succeeding governments seemed
to adopt the suggestion, only the titles were given systematically to
those rich _brazileiros_ and others who paid in so many _contos_ to
the public exchequer or who helped by their local influence to win an
election. Thus, politics became more and more a dreadful octopus, its
tentacles closing round and crushing the life out of the nation. Even
those who do not know a ballot-box from a sheep-trough or a Minister from
a counter-jumper, find themselves compelled to take part in politics.
They may gain nothing from it, but they cannot escape it. And if a man
wishes to get anything done, if he desires a road mended, a church built,
a son placed, a title conferred, an opponent imprisoned, it is possible
to arrange the matter, by means of politics. As to Lisbon, of course, it
would not be Lisbon were it not for politics. Alas for the clubs of the
Chiado, the _cafés_ of the Rocio, the arcades of Black House Square, and
even the shops, the streets, the _praças_, where men do gather together
and gossip, were there not a new government to discuss every three or
four months. The country may be driven to the dogs by these continual
changes, but the politicians, amateur and professional, are in clover.
And indeed this soft air and warm sun needs a spice of _maledicencia_
and criticism of politicians. In England the climate affords an abundant
topic, in Portugal the days are often monotonously beautiful, sometimes
monotonously rainy, so that whereas people in England discuss a late fall
of snow or an early frost, in Portugal they pass the time over the fall
of the Government or a partial ministerial crisis. A wonderful amount
of excellent wit and intelligence is expended over the subject, and it
is extraordinary how every shopkeeper even, every newspaper-boy almost,
has his political views, his favourite politician. Men whose education
consists in being able to spell out the newspaper of their predilection
will discuss the political situation with considerable eloquence and
knowledge. Each political group counts as many real adherents as may fit
into a not very large hall, and each politician who takes office is the
target at which all the other political groups aim the shafts of their
ridicule.

[Sidenote: Political Groups.]

Nowhere have political parties been more numerous and more picturesque
in their names and their theories than in Spain and Portugal. In Spain
at a recent general election members of nearly a dozen political
parties were returned to Parliament, and in Portugal since the
introduction of constitutional government there have been _Cartistas_
and _Septembristas_, _Regeneradores_, _Dissidentes_, _Reformistas_,
_Nacionalistas_, _Progressistas_, and since the Revolution of 1910,
_Evolucionistas_, _Independentes_, _Reformistas_, _Integralistas_,
_Unionistas_, and _Democratas_. These are but a few of the many
parties which have misinterpreted and abused the Parliamentary system
in Portugal, some of them with names and actions as vague as Emilio
Castelar’s celebrated _Posibilistas_. To take the present time there
are the “Democrats” under the leadership of Dr. Affonso Augusto da
Costa (their chief newspaper organs are _O Mundo_, _A Montanha_ and _A
Patria_), the “Evolutionists” under the leadership of Dr. José Antonio de
Almeida (organ, _A Republica_), the “Unionists,” led by Dr. Manuel Brito
Camacho (_A Lucta_), the “Independents” or _Reformistas_ under Senhor
Machado Santos (_O Intransigente_). The Democrats consider themselves the
direct continuation of the original Republican party, and thus in a sense
the only legitimate party, the others having branched off from it since
the Revolution. These four are the definitely constituted Republican
parties, besides which there are the more advanced Radical Republicans,
the Syndicalists (_O Sindicalista_), Socialists (_O Socialista_), etc.
There are also the Miguelists (_A Nação_), Manuelists (_O Dia_), and
a Royalist party which may be called Sebastianist, and which vaguely
desires the return of former conditions without having any very definite
political creed. It must be remembered that there are but a million
and a half Portuguese who can read and write, and that the Republic
has disfranchised the remaining 4,500,000. But even of the 1,500,000
the majority take no active part in politics. The parties are in fact
small personal groups collecting round any politician of intelligence
or energy, or who knows the political ropes and the art of placing or
promising to place his friends, and as a consequence they are too much
inclined to give prominence to small personal questions and storms in
the Lisbon teacup. The followers of the various parties are also known
as _Affonsistas_, _Almeidistas_, _Camachistas_, as before the Revolution
there were _Franquistas_, _Henriquistas_, _Teixeiristas_, etc.

[Sidenote: Ministries and Elections.]

These groups bicker with all the venom of personal hatred amid the most
profound indifference of the country. The formation of a new party or a
new ministry has nothing to do with the country. Even were elections in
Portugal to be regarded as a sign of the people’s will, there had been
but one general election since the Revolution at a time when the number
of governments had to be counted on the fingers of both hands, and the
Ministers of Finance on fingers and toes. So a new party will spring
up in Lisbon and have little root in the country outside Lisbon. The
attitude of the people towards all these politicians is one of profound
distrust. They give them credit for sufficient intelligence to understand
their own interests, but not sufficient to understand the interests of
the country. A peasant in one of Eça de Queiroz’ novels is of opinion
that _quem manda lucra_, and this melancholy sentiment (that he who has
charge of affairs feathers his nest) may be heard at the present day.
It is not said in anger, but as the expression of a very natural fact.
They would be surprised if it were otherwise. While the unfortunate
Minister of Finance is gazing at an empty exchequer, they imagine him
plunging both hands in a rich store for himself and his friends. And in
a sense they are right. It is expected of ministers in office to help
their friends, in their business affairs, and to find places for their
political followers somewhere in that huge bureaucracy which has been the
bane of Portugal since the sixteenth century. And, of course, each new
government appoints new civil governors and new mayors and usually many
other officials in the provinces.

[Illustration: CASTLE OF ALMOUROL

[_See p. 100_]

[Sidenote: Brief Ministries.]

When it is remembered that Portugal has had some twenty governments
during the life of a single government in England, it will be readily
understood what disastrous confusion, what expense and waste, result,
not to speak of personal ambitions kept continually at fever heat, on
the watch and intriguing for some official post, and the large army of
ex-officials disinclined or unable to find other employment. The list
of Governments in the seven years 1908-15 is—save omissions—as follows:
(1) João Franco, (2) Amaral, (3) Henriques, (4) Telles, (5) Lima, (6)
Beirão, (7) Teixeira de Sousa, (8) Provisional Government, (9) João
Chagas, (10) Vasconcellos, (11), Duarte Leite, (12) Costa, (13) Machado,
(14) Azevedo, (15) Pimenta de Castro, (16) Revolutionary Government (João
Chagas), (17) José de Castro, (18) José de Castro with new ministry. The
first regular Republican Parliament (1911-14) saw the rise and fall of
seven governments, and the rise and fall of each of them made as little
commotion in the country (apart from the habitual discussions of the
_cafés_ and political clubs in the towns) as a pebble thrown into the
Atlantic.

[Sidenote: Making the Elections.]

How can this be so, it may be asked, with the deputies of the nation
sitting in Parliament? The answer is that elections in Portugal are
a peculiar practice. The phrase “The Government makes the elections”
obtains in Portugal as in Spain, and of itself speaks volumes. The
Government is first appointed by some personal intrigue in Lisbon, with
or without reference, or with a purely formal reference to the strength
of the various parties in Parliament. It then proceeds to remodel the
political framework throughout the country by appointing civil governors,
mayors, etc., of its own political views. Then, when it is well seated in
the saddle, it holds the elections. It is an unknown thing for a majority
to be returned other than of the supporters of the Government. This
would be discouraging to the electors (and also it would be impossible)
if they took any interest in the results, but the results are always a
foregone conclusion except in matters of detail. Senhor Affonso Costa
after he had as Premier obtained thirty-four out of thirty-seven seats
in a partial election, remarked in a speech to his party, the Democrats:
“The country will give us more next time.” That is, the Democrat
Government which had made the election was scarcely content to have
obtained all except two or three seats, but better luck next time: one
must not ask too much. “For the first time,” said Senhor Bernardino
Machado after the Revolution, “there is going to be in this country an
election without the intervention of the Government.” “The whole country
must be fully convinced that it is not the Government that makes the
Constituent Assembly” (from a speech delivered in December, 1910). Of
course the thing was impossible, the country had not been brought up to
use its own discretion at an election. At a meeting of the Provisional
Government and the Directory of the Republican Party held in the very
month in which these words were spoken and attended by Senhor Bernardino
Machado who had spoken them, it was resolved to “bring to bear all the
forces of the party without exception in their official organisation in
order thus to prevent the adversaries of the Republic from introducing
themselves disguisedly into the politics of the nation to disturb it.”
Openly, of course, no Royalist would dare to present himself after such
an invitation or warning. Yet the question has sometimes been put with a
spider-and-fly blandness of hypocrisy: “Why do the Royalists not present
themselves for election instead of conspiring?” although, with organised
groups employed for “the defence of the Republic,” the Royalists who did
so would have been more likely to see the inside of the _Penitenciaria_
than of the House of Parliament. Sincere Republicans admit that the
first Republican Parliament was artificially fabricated in Lisbon, and
it is difficult to see how it could be otherwise: generations must pass
before a really representative assembly can exist in Portugal. Meanwhile,
_fit, non nascitur_. A candid member of the majority in the Chamber of
Deputies addressed the little shrivelled minority in 1911 with the words:
“Vocês, se vieram á Camara, foi porque nós quizemos” (“You are only
here on sufferance”). In 1907 Senhor João Chagas was exclaiming against
the fictions, lies, fraud, mockery of the elections: “In Portugal the
Government makes the elections.... In our country it is not the people
that elects its representatives: it is the Civil Governors and the
Mayors.”

[Sidenote: Centralisation.]

His words are still applicable, and recent years have fastened even more
closely upon the country that political centralisation originally derived
from Napoleon’s system, and which gives excellent results only so long
as an administrative genius is at the head of affairs. The country is
more and more a motionless and paralysed victim in the strait-waistcoat
of an administration which is little but politics, and the cost of which
exceeds, relatively, even that of France. The Revolution brought the
charge of even greater interference of politics, otherwise the political
system has remained much as before. _Leges non animam mutant._ The new
electoral law has been described even by Republicans as being drawn up on
the lines of the old.

[Sidenote: Rotativism.]

_O Seculo_ in a leading article said (5th November, 1911): “We must
confess that the transformation of the old methods has not attained the
required extent. There seems to be a wish to continue a life of personal
politics.” The famous rotativism of the Monarchy, by which parties
succeeded one another to power without any reference to the country, and
with but little reference to its nominal representatives in Parliament,
did not cease with the Revolution. “Nefarious rotativism is still with
us,” said _O Seculo_ a year later.

[Sidenote: Sincere Republicans.]

_A Republica_, a year later again (18th October, 1912) remarked in
a leading article: “The truth is that, in two years of Republic,
political cabals, persecutions, the boldness of the incompetent, the
unscrupulousness of the ambitious, the indiscipline of nearly everyone,
and the cowardice of the greater number, have prevented the Republic
from entering frankly upon a system of careful administration.... We are
continuing the system of mere words which was our glory in opposition but
is our disgrace in power.” And a little later (24th March, 1913): “The
country is tired. It is tired especially of the enormous lie that we have
given it, as it looks upon a Republic which taxes arbitrarily, arrests
and persecutes arbitrarily, governs and administers arbitrarily.” “We are
living in anarchy as regards administration,” said Dr. Brito Canacho in
_A Lucta_ a month later. And Senhor Machado Santos, one of the founders
of the Republic, soon found that the Republic did not answer to his
dreams, and was not slow to say so in his newspaper, _O Intransigente_:
“The Republic is very different from what the people had imagined, and
as a result the majority has relapsed into indifference, while others,
passing the limits of all reason, beat the record of petty and passionate
politics” (3rd November, 1911). “Politics under the Monarchy brought
the Portuguese nation to ruin, and politics under the Republic instead
of being completely different, has adopted the old methods,” and “in
fourteen months has done more harm than fourteen years of politics during
the Monarchy” (13th December, 1911).

[Sidenote: Disillusion.]

The peasants had remained indifferent from the first, where they were
not secretly hostile to the Republic, but the workmen of the towns, or
more accurately, of Lisbon, were bitterly disappointed. They noted “the
enormous difference” between the words and deeds of the Republicans
and that “everything is now sacrificed to the creeping politics of the
_bourgeois_, who above the interests of the country set the ambitions
of their politicians” (_A Voz do Operario_, 1st December, 1912). The
Socialists reserved for themselves the right to “adopt the revolutionary
methods so freely advocated formerly by the Republicans.”

[Illustration: GENERAL VIEW, VILLA REAL

[_See p. 101_]

[Sidenote: Remedies.]

It will be seen from the above quotations that Republicans have
acknowledged that politics before the Revolution and politics after
the Revolution were as much alike as the names of Muppim and Huppim,
those sons of Benjamin. Sincere Republicans admit it; it is more
difficult to find a remedy. When education has done its work these
party groups may possibly, no doubt, broaden out into political parties
with real root in the country, but it will be a process of centuries.
And meanwhile, unfortunately, the Republicans, dissatisfied with the
results of the Revolution, have recourse to a different remedy—more
revolution—and try to cure themselves with a hair of the dog that has
bitten them. Decentralisation, of course, is incompatible with the
government by personal groups at Lisbon in the name of the nation. The
new administrative code, if it is willing to take power from the mayors,
is not willing to give it to the municipal bodies. Whatever authority is
taken from the mayors is given not to locally elected corporations, but
to other officials, mere instruments and offshoots of the central power.
And indeed Portugal is scarcely ready yet for local autonomy. It is not
ready for the parliamentary system, and the scrupulous care with which it
and all constitutional forms are observed sometimes increases instead of
diminishes the difficulty of a situation. The hope is that by maintaining
the forms strictly, they will gradually become a living system instead
of an empty framework, but that hope is indefinitely deferred owing
to the number of political groups and the virulence of their personal
animosities and ambitions.

[Sidenote: Party Politics.]

Two great parties, instead of a number of personal groups, might yet
succeed in extending their influence in the country, were they to adopt
simple, practical programmes. But it is hopeless to expect that a
programme, however simple, will be carried out so long as there are three
or four Ministries to the year. Six or seven years should be the average
length of a government, and the elections should be held at the end of
that time, not at the beginning of its career: that is, the Government
should ask the country to keep it in office if satisfied with what it has
achieved, not merely inform the country that it has achieved its object
of establishing itself in power. It was a brave and excellent precept of
the late Spanish Premier, Señor Canalejas, whose assassination was so
heavy a loss to Spanish politics, when he said: “I mean to remain in
office a long time” (_Yo me propongo seguir mucho tiempo en mi puesto_),
and the most praiseworthy achievement of Dr. Affonso Costa as Premier was
that he did in the face of attacks from all sides and every criticism,
succeed in remaining in office without a single change of Minister (one
does not trouble to knock down puppets) for a whole year. Perhaps some
more conciliatory Premier, who is not a mere party politician, with power
based precariously in demagogy, may yet continue in office for five.
It would make politics duller, but the country would gain undoubtedly.
A Liberal and a Conservative Government succeeding one another at long
intervals, and really making some effort to interest the people and base
their authority in the will of the people, must be the aim of Portuguese
politics for the present. Then in a century or two, when education has
become general and communications have improved, it will be discovered
that Portugal is an excellent country for government by referendum.

[Sidenote: Prominent Party Politicians.]

But for the present the Lisbon politicians continue to pipe to the
country, and the country refuses to dance to their piping. The
Provisional Government, formed immediately after the Revolution under
the presidency of Dr. Theophilo Braga,[53] comprised Dr. Antonio José
de Almeida[54] as Minister of the Interior, Dr. Bernardino Machado[55]
as Minister for Foreign Affairs, Dr. Brito Camacho[56] as Minister of
Public Works, and Dr. Affonso Costa[57] as Minister of Justice. So far
only one party existed, called the _Partido Republicano_, but after
the Provisional Government had come to an end Dr. Almeida dissociated
himself from it to form what he called the Evolutionist Republican party,
while a third party, the Unionist (_União Nacional Republicano_), was
constituted under the leadership of Dr. Brito Camacho. Both these parties
were slightly more Conservative in character, and in the Evolutionists
especially this tendency was subsequently accentuated. Yet the _Partido
Republicano_, under the leadership of Dr. Costa, continued to regard
itself as the only Republican party. In a sense this was true, since
the Republicans, in the words of Senhor Guerra Junqueiro, at the end of
last century, are a party of “demolition rather than reconstruction.”
Dr. Costa and his party have been excellent demolishers. Senhor Machado
Santos,[58] who had led the Republican troops in October, 1910, in
Lisbon, and is sometimes called the Founder of the Republic, constituted
himself the candid critic of Republican political tendencies, and
gathered round him a small group of Independents. But none of these
dissenting leaders have had the strength to form a Ministry of their own,
and the Conservative side of Republican politics has existed rather in
theory than in action.

[Sidenote: Dr. Affonso Costa.]

Of the Republican politicians, the most forcible, persistent, and
unscrupulous, has been Dr. Affonso Costa. Dr. Brito Camacho has beside
him the air of a retired thinker and student, while Dr. Antonio José
d’Almeida has the reputation of being more of an idealist than a
practical politician. Dr. Costa was described once in _Le Temps_ as
being likely to play “un rôle en évidence dans les manifestations de la
rue.” He is a clever lawyer, quick to see his advantage and follow it
up, but lacking far-sightedness and breadth of view. He has the strength
of his narrowness, and may be called an inverted João Franco. But he is
essentially a party politician, not a statesman. In all opposition, in
every _contretemps_, he sees the hand of clericalism and the Jesuits,
using anti-clericalism as a cement to keep his party together. His
power has been built up and based on the art of the demagogue, and by
controlling the mob and organised groups of Carbonarios he was able to
control the destinies of the Republic during times of disorder, and to
upset any government with which he disagreed. But if his hold on the mob
has made him arbiter of the Republic he has also suffered at the hands of
his supporters, and might well pray to be delivered from his friends.

[Illustration: TOWER OF CASTLE, BEJA

[_See p. 104_]

[Sidenote: The Puff Politician.]

The strange paeans of praise in _O Mundo_, poems to his _vulto imortal_,
the resolve of an admirer to order a life-like silver statue of him,
the arrest of persons for speaking ill of him, the arrest of others
accused of wishing to assassinate him, as well as his own extraordinary
speeches in Parliament and out of Parliament, showing an ignorance of
the conditions of life in Portugal almost as profound as his ignorance
of the conditions in foreign countries, might well have crushed him
beneath a load of ridicule, but have merely served to keep him in the
public eye. As to the attempts at assassinating him, these puffs of
his political admirers are now quite discredited. One of the supposed
murderers arrested at Santarem was found to be armed with nothing more
deadly than a small pocket-knife, others arrested at the _Praia das
Maçãs_, in the summer of 1913, were released as innocent after a year
and a half’s imprisonment; another, this time a schoolboy, had a pistol
put into his hand by Dr. Costa’s puffers, but fired so badly that he
did not even succeed in hitting the railway carriage in which Dr. Costa
was going to travel. His opponents must be fools indeed if they do not
realise how greatly his party would gain were a real attempt made to
assassinate him. He would be at once converted from a pleasant nonentity
to a martyr, a kind of Portuguese Ferrer. Certainly Dr. Affonso Costa
has been the politician most in evidence since the Revolution. It is
rumoured that he keeps a large number of dogs and cuts off the tail of
one of them Alcibiades-fashion as occasion offers, but this is almost
certainly a calumnious invention, cruelty to animals being quite foreign
to his nature. But it was almost pathetic to see how, at the advent of
a statesman, he withered away politically as if he had met the Snark,
and turned to conspiracy and revolution in order to overthrow him. For
General Pimenta de Castro,[59] though not a party politician, showed
truer statesmanship than all the party-leaders.

[Sidenote: The Democrats.]

A return of the Democrats to power must be disastrous for many reasons,
and the way the country would be thrown into fresh unrest and the prisons
filled may be gauged from the fact that the Democrats are wonderfully
vindictive, and are already marking out names of persons for arrest and
of buildings (of Royalist newspapers, Conservative clubs, etc.) for
attack. Vindictiveness in Portugal, especially in political questions,
is carried to extraordinary lengths, and the man marked down for
political persecution has to be continually on his guard. Perhaps years
are allowed to pass, and the victim is given no inkling of hostility;
perhaps he had left the country and returns to live peacefully and
obscurely; then when he least expects it he will find himself in gaol
or stabbed or shot. A foreigner will give far less offence if he adopts
a detached, amused, supercilious attitude than if he studies Portuguese
politics sincerely from a Portuguese point of view, and considers what is
the best remedy for the country. But all who prefer to breathe the sweet
air of Heaven rather than that of the prisons of Portugal, would do well
to club together, and keep the “Democrats” out of office until they have
moderated their inquisitorial ardour.

[Sidenote: The Carbonaria.]

As to the Carbonarios, it is hoped that if the Royalists refrain from
any violent demonstrations these devoted defenders of the Republic in
and out of season will gradually disappear. The society was founded as
early as 1823 in imitation, or rather in desecration, of the Italians
who conspired against the yoke of Austria, and was reorganised in
1848. It was, however, chiefly after the abortive Republican rising of
the 31st of January, 1891, that the _Carbonarios_ gained in strength
and, organised in small separate groups, in _choças_, _barracas_, and
_vendas_, became the most powerful political force in the country. Their
numbers in October, 1910, have been variously estimated at 40,000,
32,000, or a much lower figure. It is impossible to say, but it is
certain that since the Revolution, while the old Carbonarios were not
disbanded, new sets sprang up, organised by the Republican parties “for
the defence of the Republic.” The Democrats especially advanced hand in
hand with the Carbonarios, forming an army of Carbonario spies in their
service, till in 1913 they came into office together. These new bodies
of “insolent neo-Carbonarios,” as a Republican newspaper described them,
spread distrust and unrest through the country, spying, insulting,
arresting. “They allow us not a moment of tranquillity” (_A Republica_,
12th December, 1912). “There is no corner of the country now without
a nest of Carbonarios,” wrote Senhor Machado Santos a year after the
Revolution in _O Intransigente_, 3rd November, 1911. And these nests were
not composed, principally, of the old Carbonarios. Thus, it was possible
for Dr. Affonso Costa, when Premier, to say in the Chamber of Deputies
that he considered the _Carbonarios_ should have been disbanded after the
Revolution, referring to the old _Carbonarios_.

[Sidenote: White Antics.]

The words naturally did not apply to the post-revolution brands, such as
that of the “White Ants,” which at the very time that Dr. Costa spoke
thus were being actively organised by his Government. According to the
statements made in Parliament by Senhor Alberto Silveira, who during
three years after the Revolution of 1910 was head of the Lisbon police,
these White Ants (often suitably dressed in antique black, with flowing
black ties), organised during Dr. Costa’s Premiership, included “some
who gave their services with a view to future employment, others who
contented themselves with payment in money.” Some “belonged to Carbonario
associations created since the Revolution by individuals of low social
and moral status.” “Others came from revolutionary clubs, such as the
‘Radical Club’; some were anarchists openly hostile to the existing
_régime_.” Some used cards with _G. Civil_ printed on them, standing
for _Grupo Civil_, but intended to convey to their victims the official
authority of the _Governo Civil_. Groups (_nucleos de vigilancia_) had
been formed for the defence of the Republic, said Dr. Costa on another
occasion, at the meeting of the Republican (Democrat) Party at Aveiro in
April, 1913, and had been such a success that they would be continued.
But officially, of course, the _Carbonaria_ does not exist, the
Government knows nothing about it, and if you ask a _Carbonario_ he will
answer that there is no such thing in Portugal.

[Sidenote: Delenda est Carbonaria.]

There should be no such society in Portugal. It is not needed and only
serves to spread a feeling of distrust and discomfort in daily life,
which can only be paralleled by the state of suspicion and disquiet under
some of the Roman Emperors or in the heyday of the Spanish Inquisition.
Or if it is needed to prop up the Republic, the Republic by that very
fact stands condemned. But the Carbonarios should understand that their
services are no longer required, and take a well-earned rest. If they
do not and, encouraged by a certain section of the Republican Press,
commit fresh outrages, they will signally help the Royalist cause and
hasten the Restoration. Almost the worst feature of the last few years
has been the encouragement given by the Democrat Press to attack the
life and property of priests, Roman Catholics, and Royalists. Such a
journalist as the editor of _O Mundo_ was indirectly responsible for
the death of Lieutenant Soares and other murders and should have been
punished accordingly. The liberty of the Press cannot be held to include
toleration of direct incitements to kill political opponents. The _Mundo_
is all the more dangerous in that it is not read by the educated, but by
ignorant persons, who have no means of knowing how false and insidious
are many of its contents.

[Illustration: RUINED CASTLE, LEIRIA

[_See p. 85_]

CHAPTER XI

FROM MONARCHY TO REPUBLIC

[Sidenote: Last Years of Dom Carlos’ Reign.]

At the opening of the twentieth century, Dom Carlos was in the twelfth
year of his reign, and Senhor Hintze Ribeiro (d. 1st August, 1907) was
his Prime Minister. The Parliamentary system copied from England was in
use, with the difference that whereas in England the political views
of the Government depend on the result of the elections, in Portugal
the result of the elections depended on the political views of the
Government which “made” them, after the Government itself had been made
for personal or party reasons at Lisbon. The two principal parties,
were the _Regenerador_ or Conservative, under the leadership of Senhor
Hintze Ribeiro, and the _Progressista_ or Liberal, under the leadership
of Senhor José Luciano de Castro (d. 9th March, 1914). These continued
to alternate in power by a system of connivance and compromise known as
Rotativism. The _Regenerador_ Ministry of Senhor Hintze Ribeiro lasted
from 25th June, 1900, till 1904. In an earlier _Regenerador_ Ministry
under Senhor Hintze Ribeiro the Minister of the Interior had been Senhor
João Franco, who in 1901 separated himself from the _Regenerador_ party.
In 1903 he formed a new party entitled _Regenerador Liberal_. With the
resignation of Senhor Hintze Ribeiro in 1904, Senhor José Luciano de
Castro came into office, and held the elections in the following year.
In March, 1906, Senhor Hintze Ribeiro was again Premier, but only for a
few weeks, during which he held another general election. The election
as a Republican deputy of Senhor Bernardino Machado gave the populace of
Lisbon an opportunity to show its Republican leanings, and the severe
repression of the demonstration made on his arrival at Lisbon led
indirectly to the fall of the Government. Both the great parties had now
met with such resistance in Parliament or in public opinion that they
found it impossible to govern.

[Sidenote: João Franco.]

On the 18th of May, King Carlos, breaking through the Rotativism which
has been so frequently attacked, turned to the _Regenerador Liberal_
party, and its leader, Senhor João Franco, became Premier. The King
considered that he had found the “man of character” to put the political
house in order, and he openly said so, thereby giving great offence to
all the other politicians who amazingly fitted on the cap, and said: “He
accuses us of political corruption.” Senhor Franco had come into office
with the support of the _Progressistas_, under Senhor José Luciano de
Castro, without which, indeed, it would have been impossible for him
to control the Parliamentary situation. In the new Parliament, elected
in August, four Republicans were elected, including Dr. Antonio José
de Almeida and Dr. Affonso Costa; Senhor Hintze Ribeiro’s party (the
_Regenerador_) was represented by thirty deputies, Senhor Castro’s by
over forty, while the Government secured for itself only seventy. So
long as the new Premier could count on the votes of the forty-three
_Progressista_ deputies, he was able to face the noisy scenes of the
Chamber, but when that support was withdrawn a few months later it only
remained for him to resign or to dissolve Parliament. Since the leaders
of the _Regeneradores_ and of the _Progressistas_ had both within the
last few months come to a similar dilemma, and there was no likelihood of
finding a statesman of stronger character and greater ability than Senhor
Franco, the King accepted the latter alternative and on 10th May, 1907,
Parliament was dissolved.

[Sidenote: The Republicans.]

Henceforth Senhor Franco stood alone, the best-hated and most calumniated
man in Lisbon. It was in Lisbon that the Republicans had principally
spread their doctrines, by gossip, pamphlets, and newspapers among the
half-educated classes, who received with scandalised anger whatever
accounts of Royal extravagance and of the wickedness of the Jesuits were
furnished to them. If Senhor Franco was hated in Lisbon, the King was not
much more popular. He himself had summed up the situation as “a Monarchy
without Monarchists,” and the last Premier of the Monarchy, Senhor
Teixeira de Sousa, declared that the Monarchy fell because it had against
it the passion of many and the indifference of the majority. “There are
no Royalists in Portugal,” said Senhor João Chagas, a good instance of
the bad habit of calling Lisbon Portugal. The passions were concentrated
in Lisbon, and the indifference in the provinces only served to throw the
lurid politics of the capital into stronger relief.

[Sidenote: The Civil List.]

The _adeantamentos_, that is, sums advanced by the Treasury for the
King’s expenses, were a favourite catchword of the Republicans, and a
frequent motive of calumny. But when Senhor Franco proposed to increase
the Civil List, which had remained stationary for the last three-quarters
of a century at a _conto_ (about £200) a day, and do away with the
_adeantamentos_, the storm of opposition and abuse only increased.

[Sidenote: Stormy Opposition.]

Here was a firm and able statesman, anxious to carry through financial,
political and social reforms, and it might have been expected that he
would have received some support from those who had the interests of the
country at heart. Perhaps the Republicans considered the reforms too
late, or rather a little too early, since for them the first, the chief,
reform was now a change of _régime_: reforms did not please them unless
they could be carried out by themselves. But it was not the Republicans
alone who were to blame for the loss of this great opportunity of
restoring order and stable government in Portugal. If the Republicans
shrieked, the Royalist parties were no less clamorous against Senhor
Franco. All those whose interests were menaced by the proposed reforms,
all the comfortable rotativists and political hypocrites, all those who
wished to gain credit by themselves initiating the reforms, and hated
them when coming from another, were united against Senhor Franco. Senhor
Franco, however, did not lose his head but continued his work with
calmness and courage. He succeeded in decreasing the deficit and giving
some hope of gradually abolishing it altogether. But as the opposition
increased he was obliged to increase the rigour of his dictatorship.
Various newspapers were suspended and the censorship became very strict.
The fact that the suspended newspapers included _O Dia_, then the organ
of the _Alpoimistas_ (that is, the _Progressistas Dissidentes_, under
the leadership of Snr. José Alpoim), _O Mundo_, a Republican newspaper
then in its eighth year, the Progressista _Correio da Noite_ and the
Regenerador _Populo_ suffices to show the force of the opposition with
which the hated “Dictator” had to contend, and also how impartial he
was in his efforts to effect reforms which most disinterested persons
acknowledged to be excellent and necessary. He had not begun by employing
arbitrary methods. “The Republican party,” wrote a Portuguese journalist,
“asked above all for liberty, and the first thing the Government of João
Franco did was to give it liberty. He gave it liberty of the Press and of
association; he allowed it to demonstrate noisily in streets and squares.
What was the result? The Republicans declared in the newspapers that they
did not want the liberty given them by the Government, and one newspaper
even wrote: ‘The more liberty they give us the more we will require; we
must force them to compromising violence or disgraceful compromise.’”

[Sidenote: Party Passions.]

Never have party passions so blinded all the politicians of a country
to that country’s interests as in the violent and, one may well add,
cowardly attacks on Senhor Franco. There was even a plot to kidnap him,
and place him on a man-of-war in the Tagus. It is scarcely surprising
that Senhor Franco should have been obliged to resort to methods more
arbitrary, which of course drew scandalised cries of rage from those who
had made them necessary. In Lisbon the lowest interpretation was placed
on all his actions. Senhor Franco had no delight in violence, but he
considered that it was the duty of a Government to govern, and that if
this was rendered impossible for it by constitutional means it must
govern as best it might. The dictatorship was only temporary, in fact the
elections were fixed for April of the following year (1908). But with the
extraordinary respect for convention and nice superficial scruples about
formalities that characterises Portuguese politics (which sometimes seems
to be a game to see who has the skill to govern most constitutionally
and worst), a certain number of Royalists preferred to go over to the
Republic than to acquiesce in anything so unconstitutional (and opposed
to their interests) as the dictatorship.

[Sidenote: Arrest of the Conspirators.]

Could Senhor Franco have counted on the support of public opinion outside
Lisbon he might have mastered the situation, but the mass of the people
continued as usual remote and apathetic, and it only remained for him
to order the arrest of those whose avowed object was to make government
impossible. Never under the Monarchy was a Republican arrested because
he was a Republican. Republicans were allowed to retain high office in
the army and in the civil service. But the men now arrested were known to
have entered into a definite conspiracy to overthrow the Government and
to seize the person of the Premier, if not to kill him. In January, not
for the first time, a turbulent Republican journalist, Snr. João Chagas,
was arrested, as also a more dangerous because more underhand Republican,
Snr. França Borges, of the _Mundo_. The arrest of the Republican deputy,
Snr. Affonso Costa and of the Visconde de Ribeira Brava, followed a
week later (28th January, 1908). Dr. Antonio José de Almeida had been
arrested a few days before. These were the darlings of a certain and
not the most orderly section of the Lisbon people, and on their arrest
disturbances occurred which were suppressed by the Civil Guard. And here
it may be remarked that while Snr. Franco held the perfectly legitimate
view that order must be maintained at all costs, he could scarcely be
held responsible for the way in which his orders were carried out in
detail. The methods of the Lisbon police and soldiers of the Guard are
strange and ill calculated to lessen the anger of a crowd. Even under
the Republic mounted soldiers of the Guard have been known to slash
with their naked swords at innocent persons standing on the pavement
who did not amount in all to a dozen, and were not dreaming of revolt
or rebellion, being armed only with the not very warlike weapons known
as umbrellas. The suppression of riots in January, 1908, was no doubt
characterised by the same methods. A decree of January 31st (anniversary
of the rising at Oporto in 1891, from which the Republican movement
really dates) came to set a fine edge on the indignation of the Lisbon
Republicans, who had been schooled to believe the worst of Snr. Franco
and the King. By a decree of the preceding November political crimes were
to come before three judges, the _Juge d’Instruction Criminelle_ and two
coadjutors, their verdict to be without appeal. The new decree allowed
the Government to interfere and banish the accused. (Not for a moment
was there any idea of imprisoning these confessed conspirators in the
_Penitenciaria_.)

[Sidenote: Murder of the King and of the Crown Prince.]

Like lightning the news spread through Lisbon, exaggerated into the
announcement that all the Republican leaders were to be deported to
Africa. King Carlos was, with the Queen and the Crown Prince, at Villa
Viçosa, to the south of the Tagus, but was returning to Lisbon on the
following day. The report was diligently circulated that he was coming
in order to sign a decree deporting Snr. Affonso Costa and the other
leaders. The King was met at the quay of the _Terreiro do Paço_, or
“Black Horse Square,” by Prince Manoel, and the Premier, Snr. Franco,
and entered an open carriage with Queen Amélie, the Crown Prince, and
Prince Manoel. The carriage was about to leave the spacious _Terreiro do
Paço_ when several men sprang towards it, and in an instant Dom Carlos
and the Crown Prince fell back mortally wounded by several bullets. The
Queen was seen standing up in the carriage waving her bouquet of flowers
in order to deflect the aim of the assassins. The Infante Manoel was
slightly wounded in the arm. The first words spoken by Queen Amélie and
Queen Maria Pia, mother of Dom Carlos, when they met, have been thus
recorded: “They have killed my son”—“And mine.” The murder was followed
in Lisbon by no wave of generous feeling, and if sadness was felt by many
it was in the words of Camões, an _apagada e vil tristeza_.

[Sidenote: Republican Heroes.]

Was this peculiarly hideous and dastardly crime the work of the
Republicans? They denied it at first for the sake of foreign opinion,
but subsequently they have accepted it as one of the glorious deeds of
Portuguese history. Thousands of Republicans defiled past the graves of
the murderers, Buiça and Costa, who had been cut down by the police, and
the procession to their graves has been continued on each anniversary of
this cowardly deed. The Democrats have now erected a costly mausoleum in
honour of its authors. On the first anniversary of the Republic their
names appeared written up in one of the principal streets of Lisbon among
the heroes of the nation. Even while King Manoel was still on the throne
Snr. João Chagas addressed one of his _Cartas politicas_ to the shade
of Manoel Buiça: “You did something great,” he says, “very great. You
rehabilitated, you dignified the people.” Yet a people so “rehabilitated”
could only be a despicable rabble. It will be seen that the Republicans,
or at least the Democrats, have accepted and glory in this crime as their
own. If at the time they repudiated it for the sake of appearances (since
it was evident that a Republic ostensibly based on a deed of the kind
could have little chance of winning the sympathy of foreign nations),
in fact the Republican leaders and the Lisbon shopkeepers who supported
them gave it their hearty approval, with that strange callousness which
appears more repulsive when combined with sentimentalism and vague
humanity. The more enlightened Republicans knew, of course, that the
King was not responsible for the dishonesty or incapacity prevailing in
Portuguese politics, and that his interference in politics was strictly
defined and limited by the Constitution. There was no reason why honest
and able men should not rise to a prominent place in politics, and if the
Republicans held a monopoly of such men they would have been well advised
to reform the Monarchy from within, by pocketing their Republicanism and
rising to high office under the Monarchy. The very fact that the King
chose and stuck to Snr. Franco in the face of all opposition shows that
he was far from being anxious to encourage corruption and incompetence.

[Sidenote: King Manoel’s Reign.]

No sensible critic has accused Snr. Franco of either incompetence or
corruption. But the King’s death naturally caused the fall of Snr.
Franco, and the Monarchy was left to attempt to carry out reforms, but
without the only politician disinterested enough or of firm enough
character to make the attempt successful. The situation in the new reign,
especially during its last Ministry, with its sincere programme of
reform, was similar to that under Snr. Franco’s dictatorship, except that
the strong will had departed. The weakness and lenience displayed towards
the Republicans did not for a moment disarm them; the reforms proposed
only served to infuriate them. It was considered that the strong hand had
been tried and failed, and an opposite policy was adopted. Almost the new
king might have been expected to go and lay a wreath on the tombs of the
assassins, so conciliatory was the Government. The Republican leaders
were released, the basest insults and calumnies and active conspiracies
were allowed to go on unchecked. “Conspiracy proceeded on all sides”
(“_Conspiravase por toda a parte_”), says Snr. João Chagas, and he ought
to know. The Republicans looked forward to a Portugal so different from
that of the Monarchy that it would scarcely be recognised. They had no
reforms to offer other than those advocated by the Royalists and they
were finally reduced to saying that what they wanted was—a revolution.
“Only a revolution could satisfy the thirst for justice of Portuguese
society: a revolution to punish the crimes of the dictatorship and
definitely expel the old politicians from power.”[60] But it was not
yet too late for the _velhos politicos_ to stave off the revolution.
Unhappily, however, after the death of Dom Carlos they appeared in all
their worst faults, with no strong directing hand to restrain them. Dom
Manoel, thus at the age of eighteen suddenly raised to the throne beyond
all expectation, was in an extraordinarily difficult position. His tastes
inclined rather to letters and music than to the art of government. He
soon found, moreover, that the party leaders were thinking not of his
interests, or the interests of Portugal, but of their own.

[Sidenote: Rotativism in Action.]

The Ministers rose and fell at intervals of a few weeks. At first Admiral
Ferreira do Amaral formed a coalition ministry, which naturally pleased
nobody, while its weakness towards the Republicans excited criticism.
Had the Republicans been as unconnected with the murder of the King as
for the sake of appearances they at the time pretended, they would have
been the first to demand an instant and searching inquiry; as it was,
the government, in order to conciliate the Republicans, allowed the
investigations to be rather a matter of form than anything else, and the
exact truth will now never be established, although the inference is
clear. Admiral Ferreira do Amaral was succeeded by Snr. Campos Henriques,
who, however, had the support of neither the _Vilhenistas_ (Snr. Julio
de Vilhena had succeeded to the leadership of the _Regenerador_ party
on the death of Snr. Hintze Ribeiro), nor of the _Progressistas_. Snr.
José Luciano de Castro, although himself in retirement, continued to
command the situation and pull the political wires, occupying much
the same _rôle_ of Cabinet-maker as Señor Montero Rios in Spain. Snr.
Campos Henriques was speedily succeeded in the Premiership by his War
Minister, Snr. Sebastião Telles, whose ministry did not last a month,
and who was in turn succeeded by the Minister for Foreign Affairs of
the preceding Cabinet, Snr. Wenceslao de Lima. Snr. Wenceslao de Lima
occupied a somewhat similar position to that of a Republican Premier, Dr.
Bernardino Machado, four years later. His Ministry was formed with the
support of the _Regeneradores_ or _Vilhenistas_ and the _Progressistas
dissidentes_ or _Alpoimistas_ (whose leader, Dr. José d’Alpoim, was
the personal enemy of the veteran Snr. José Luciano de Castro). But he
wished to please also Snr. Castro’s _Progressistas_ by maintaining the
Civil Governors and Mayors appointed by them. This is, of course, an
all-important matter after the constitution of a Portuguese Ministry, for
as these officials will make the elections it is a bone of contention to
which party they shall belong. The difficulty of a non-party Ministry of
Concentration or Coalition is to find a sufficient number of non-party
persons to fill these posts. In 1914 Snr. Bernardino Machado was accused
of favouring the officials of Dr. Affonso Costa as in 1909 Snr. Wenceslao
de Lima was accused of favouring those of Snr. Castro. And, like the
_Almeidistas_ and _Camachistas_ of the later day, the _Alpoimistas_ and
_Vilhenistas_ combined to overthrow the Government. On 21st December
(1909) a new Cabinet was formed under Snr. Francisco Beirão. It lasted
for six months. It was a _Progressista_ Ministry, and had to face the
unflagging opposition of both _Alpoimistas_ and _Vilhenistas_, and of the
Republicans. No stone was left unturned to discredit the Government. The
sugar monopoly “scandal” was exploited to the utmost, and Dr. Affonso
Costa sought to implicate persons of the Court in it. It seemed indeed
that honesty was only dear to Portuguese politicians when they were able
to unearth something damaging to their opponents. The Ministry fell on
the 19th of June, and after a crisis lasting a fortnight Snr. Teixeira de
Sousa agreed to form a _Regenerador_ Ministry.

[Sidenote: The Last Ministry of the Monarchy.]

In the new Cabinet Snr. Anselmo de Andrade was Minister of Finance and
Dr. José de Azevedo Castello Branco Minister for Foreign Affairs. It was
this _Regenerador_, or nominally Conservative, Government which proposed
reforms that should have satisfied the most ardent reformers. They
included the alteration of certain clauses in the _Carta Constitucional_,
the reorganisation of the House of Peers, the reform of the electoral
law (allowing proportional representation to Lisbon and Oporto) of
the administrative code (re-establishing the _juntas geraes_ and so
diminishing centralisation),[61] of education, of justice. It was
proposed to make civil registration compulsory. The contract between
the State and the Bank of Portugal was to be revised. Customs duties
were to be paid in gold.[62] Roads and irrigation were to receive
especial attention. Other measures were to affect the Army, the Navy,
the colonies. These are some of the reforms sketched in the speech from
the Throne read by King Manoel at the opening of Parliament on the 23rd
of September, 1910. Mere words? But it only depended on the opponents
of the Government to translate some of them at least into reality. The
Government was only too willing but, apart from the opposition of the
Monarchical parties, the Republicans did not want reform—they wanted a
revolution. Had angels from Heaven drawn up a programme of reforms the
Republicans would still have cried for a revolution. They did not allow
Snr. Teixeira de Sousa a breathing space to carry out some of these
reforms any more than they had allowed it to Snr. João Franco.

[Sidenote: Republican Lisbon.]

The elections had been held on 28th August, and resulted in the return
of 89 Ministerialists, 41 opposition _Bloquistas_, and 14 Republicans.
Ten of the latter were returned by Lisbon (where the voting was
proportional). With 10,000 votes apiece, the Eastern section of the
capital returned Dr. Bernardino Machado, Dr. Antonio José de Almeida,
Dr. Affonso Costa, Dr. Alfredo de Magalhães and Dr. Miguel Bombarda,
and the Western section Snr. João de Menezes, Admiral Candido dos Reis,
Dr. Theophilo Braga, Snr. Alexandre Braga and Snr. Antonio Luis Gomes.
The Government was in the seven thousands in both districts, while the
candidates of the Monarchical Opposition _Bloco_ received 5,000 votes
apiece in the _Circulo Occidental_ and 2,000 in the _Circulo Oriental_.
The King, in obedience to the natural wishes of Queen Amélie, had not
left the Palace for some months after the assassination of the 1st of
February, 1908, but in the spring of that year he opened Parliament in
State, and read the Speech from the Throne. In 1910 he was present at
King Edward’s funeral, and in the same year made a journey through the
North of Portugal, which in some districts became a triumphal progress,
the peasants pressing eagerly to welcome their King.

[Sidenote: The Revolution of 1910.]

After the opening of Parliament (which was then adjourned till the end of
the year), the King proceeded to Bussaco to celebrate the anniversary of
the battle in which, on the 27th of September, 1810, Wellington checked
the advance of Masséna. The Duke of Wellington was present (as also,
according to _O Seculo_, “Sir Olman, the historian”). The King held a
great military review. It is reported that the sentiments of the Army
towards the King were expressed in the words: “They killed the other [Dom
Carlos], but if they touch this one they will have us to deal with.” A
week later the Republic had been proclaimed. On the 3rd of October, _O
Seculo_ in its weekly summary of events could write, “_Correu serena
a semana_—without anything worthy of mention.” On that very day the
Revolution was hastened by the act of a madman, who shot one of the
Republican deputies, Dr. Miguel Bombarda. The crime was, of course,
attributed to the Royalists, but the Republicans have not shown that
clemency towards opponents which hushed up the details of King Carlos’
murder, and had the death of Dr. Bombarda been due to something more than
the act of a single individual, the world would have heard of it. Dr.
Bombarda had earlier sat in Parliament as a Royalist, but he had recently
joined the Republican party. On the 8th of August he had been the chief
organiser of an anti-clerical demonstration described as “the greatest
demonstration ever held in Lisbon,” and on the 28th of August was elected
one of the ten Republican deputies for Lisbon. The _Carbonarios_ had been
carefully organised, and had done their work well, so that everything
was prepared for a revolutionary movement now or later. Mutinies had
already occurred on men-of-war, the marines having been won over to very
advanced views, and the loyalty of the First Artillery and Sixteenth
Infantry Regiments had been undermined. These regiments, and marines
from men-of-war in the Tagus, under the command first of Admiral Candido
dos Reis (who, under the impression, it is said, that the movement was
a failure, committed suicide during the night of the 3rd), and then of
the _Carbonario_ Lieutenant Machado Santos, were able in a few hours
to bring the Revolution to a successful conclusion, in the face of the
greater part of the Army, which was loyal to the King: a signal example
of the slowness and apathy which have always permitted a handful of
men of energetic action to impose themselves temporarily in Portugal.
According to the Lisbon Press, the total casualties of the Revolution
were a little over 100 killed and 500 wounded. At eleven o’clock on the
morning of the 5th of October the Republic was formally proclaimed at
Lisbon, and Dr. Theophilo Braga installed as President of the Provisional
Government. The provinces followed suit without a murmur. “If Lisbon
turns Turk to-morrow,” Eça de Queiroz had written, “all Portugal will
wear the turban.” Lisbon had now turned Turk, and the three other towns
of Portugal, Oporto, almost exclusively Royalist, conservative Coimbra
and clerical Braga, proceeded to don the turban. The rest of the country
docilely did as it was bidden, and in its ignorance was as much affected
by the recent change from Monarchy to Republic as it has been by recent
changes of Ministry. The King had been entertaining the President-Elect
of the Brazilian Republic, Marshal Hermes de Fonseca at dinner in the
Necessidades Palace, on the evening of the 3rd. During the night the
fire from two men-of-war in the river below was directed against the
palace. Early on the morning of the 4th the King, accompanied by a small
escort, left the palace, and subsequently embarked on the Royal yacht at
the little fishing village of Ericeira, to the north of Cintra (the same
which in the sixteenth century gave its name, “King of Ericeira,” to one
of the Sebastianist impostors), with Queen Amélie, Queen Maria Pia, and
his uncle, the Duke of Oporto.

[Sidenote: Professionals and Professors.]

The field lay open to the Republicans—professors who dreamed that they
would soon see their doctrines become realities, professional politicians
who had waited long for their turn, _Carbonarios_ who had been skilfully
trained as spies. The _doctrinaires_ were rapidly disillusioned, and soon
retired from active politics, leaving the more practical politicians
to go hand in hand with the _Carbonarios_ if they wished to maintain
themselves in office. For the moment, amid the Utopian dreams of a new
Portugal, moderation prevailed.

[Sidenote: Rhetoric.]

On the 5th a proclamation was issued to the Portuguese people, marked
by that abstract and bombastic style which disfigures the literary work
of the President of the Provisional Government: “The maleficent dynasty
of Bragança, wilful disturber of social peace, has now been proscribed
for ever.... Now at length terminates the slavery of our country, and,
luminous in its virginal essence, rises the beneficent aspiration of a
_régime_ of liberty.” The good _bourgeois_ of Lisbon were delighted.
They felt that now at last they had a head of the State who knew how to
speak. A more practical proclamation was that of the 7th to the effect
that, “Since to-day there can be no foolish attempts or hopes on the part
of a _régime_ which has shamefully ended in a moral overthrow that adds
greater humiliation to the tremendous lesson taught it by the Republican
arms ... there is no reason for citizens to keep in their possession the
arms of which they made such heroic use.” Throughout the country was
posted up the decree declaring the family of Bragança proscribed for
ever, and the orders of nobility extinct—bringing to many a village the
first inkling that such a thing as a revolution had occurred. In Lisbon
the Republicans had triumphed by sounding persistently two notes, that
of the _adeantamentos_, to prove that the fall of the Monarchy would
fill the Exchequer, that of anti-clericalism, to show that the religious
orders were withholding the wealth of the nation.

[Sidenote: Republican Promises.]

Thus, apart from the dreams of the _doctrinaires_, the movement was
essentially materialistic, and what support the Republicans had won in
the country was obtained by promises of cheaper food and cheaper houses.
Had the revolution been a proof that the Portuguese nation was alive, it
might have been welcomed at whatever cost; but unfortunately it was the
outcome of the nation’s apathy, which gave a free hand to a comparatively
small body of politicians imbued with foreign ideas. And had the
Republicans been as practical as they were materialistic, the Revolution
might, again, have been welcomed; but they looked rather to abstract
principles—positivism, liberty, humanity—than to the actual conditions
in Portugal. How materialistic was the creed of the Republicans may be
gathered from the following quotation from _O Seculo_ a few days after
the Revolution: “The Court is not wanted because with the exception
of two or three noble houses of large fortune, it consisted of persons
without money.... The _bourgeoisie_ is the safe of the nation, and it is
nearly all on the side of the Republic.” Rarely has franker expression
been given to the unmannerly creed that families in which civilisation
is a tradition of centuries, and which have often done signal service to
their country, should be cast aside if they happen to be poor. How _naïf_
was the Republican idea of Monarchy is shown by the remark in the same
leading article of the same newspaper: “The man who presides over the
destinies of the nation is now no longer a man in high boots and flowing
robe with a little stick in his right hand; he is a man dressed like any
other.”

[Sidenote: Humiliating Monarchy.]

And the new President, Dr. Theophilo Braga, declared on the 15th of
October that “Science tells us that monarchies have no _raison d’être_
because they humiliate the men who accept them.” Thus in a brief sentence
all the nations of the North of Europe are dismissed humiliated. It was
a moment of pardonable excitement, and some sincere Republicans believed
that a new era of peace and prosperity had dawned for Portugal.

CHAPTER XII

RECENT EVENTS

[Sidenote: A Minority in Power.]

It may have been hoped by many both in Portugal and abroad that a new
period of well-being for Portugal had begun. It was known that the change
had been effected by a small section of Portuguese at Lisbon, but there
was apparently some expectation that this small section would gradually
extend its influence until the Portuguese Republic and the Portuguese
people had indeed become one. It was believed, especially outside of
Portugal, that the corrupt and inefficient interplay of party cliques at
Lisbon was for ever at an end, and it was also believed, especially in
Portugal, that the magic of the name Republic would restore prosperity
to the national finances. Better administration, the development of
Portugal’s resources, decentralisation, the improvement of conditions in
the colonies, these were some of the problems by which the Republicans
were confronted. Foreign opinion was prepared to support a _régime_ which
should encourage all that was best in the country, peasant and nobleman
alike, to co-operate in this huge effort of regeneration. A small
minority, of course, refused to co-operate, and the mass of the people
relapsed into indifference as it became apparent that the Republicans,
far from attracting waverers and conciliating their opponents, intended
to rule as one clique more rather than as representatives of the
Portuguese nation. The first Parliament of the Republicans, packed with
their supporters, the municipal authorities appointed from Lisbon, the
electoral law delayed from session to session, the “invention” of the
clerical question, were so many indications of the gulf existing between
the Republic and the country, and that the Republicans were aware of
their isolation.

[Sidenote: “Ordem e Trabalho.”]

“_Ordem e Trabalho_”—“Order and Work” was the motto chosen by the
Republic, but with that Portuguese love of words for their own sake or
for the sake of appearances, the legend was far removed from the reality.
On the very day after the citizens of Lisbon had been requested to give
up their arms an assault was organised on the Convent of Quelhas. From
the windows or roof of the convent Jesuits were said to have fired
repeatedly on the mob, and to reconcile this assertion with the fact that
the convent when entered was found to be empty, underground passages
were devised for their escape, although in reality such passages did
not exist. A few days later more firing was reported from the Jesuit
convent at Campolide, described by the Republican Press as a “fortress
of murderers and brigands.” In the next few months all the offices of
Royalist newspapers were attacked and wrecked, both at Lisbon and in the
provinces. At Coimbra and elsewhere the Royalist and the Catholic Clubs
were assaulted and plundered.

[Sidenote: Decrees.]

Apart from the activity of the _Carbonarios_, the first months of the
Republic were marked by an almost equal number of decrees and strikes.
Every day the _Diario do Governo_ came out bursting with new decrees, the
Provisional Government being determined to make hay before the slower
procedure of Parliamentary forms came to check progress.

[Sidenote: Strikes.]

And nearly every day one or several classes of workmen, taking advantage
of the new permission to strike, struck. The strikes were the reality,
the decrees were too often theoretical,[63] although some of them, such
as that of agricultural credit, 2nd February, 1911, were excellent in
principle. _O Seculo_ might speak with complacency of “the evident
identification of the people with the Government,” of “the close union
between the people and the Government,” but all these decrees and the new
Constitution provided by the Constituent Assembly left the people cold.
The salaries voted to themselves by its representatives in Parliament did
not fill it with enthusiasm: it would have preferred cheaper _bacalhau_.
The _octroi_ duty on certain articles was remitted, but it was soon
discovered that while the State lost several hundred _contos_ the price
of the articles did not diminish.

[Sidenote: The Constitution.]

The people found but small compensation in the clauses of the
Constitution which declared that “The sovereignty belongs essentially
to the nation,” or “Members of the Congress are representatives of the
nation and not of the clubs which elect them.” Each Parliament was to
last three years, and each year was to have one session of four months,
from 2nd December to 2nd April. Parliament cannot be dissolved before
the end of three years (the result being that the frequent changes
of government are not even in appearance connected with the people).
Senators are elected for six years, half their number being renewed at
the elections to the Chamber of Deputies every three years.

[Sidenote: President Arriaga.]

The President of the Republic must be of Portuguese nationality and over
thirty-five years of age. He is elected for four years, and cannot be
President twice in succession.[64] For the first term of the Presidency
(August, 1911, to August, 1915) Dr. Manoel de Arriaga was elected.[65]
Ten days after the election of the President, Snr. João Chagas, since
the Revolution Portuguese Minister in Paris, formed the first regular
Government of the Republic (3rd September, 1911).

[Sidenote: First Royalist Incursion.]

It did not last ten weeks; a period which included the first Royalist
incursion under Captain Paiva Conceiro. The expedition was not of great
importance. The danger to the Republic lay in the possibility of the
whole of the North of Portugal rising in favour of the Monarchy; but,
although there were many isolated disturbances they just failed to break
into a general conflagration. The organisation of _Carbonario_ spies
throughout the country and the municipal authorities appointed by the
Republicans undoubtedly acted as a powerful check on the inhabitants.

[Sidenote: Snr. Chagas’ Ministerial Statement.]

On the 4th of September Snr. Chagas had read his ministerial statement to
Parliament. His principal object, he said, was to carry on the work begun
by the patriotic and disinterested members of the Provisional Government,
and his principal care to reconcile the work initiated by them with the
situation of the Republic’s finances. The Republic was to be a _régime_
of conciliation for all Portuguese. Some days later the Premier addressed
a large crowd from a window of the Ministerio of the Interior. That day,
he said, was the last of the revolutionary period, and began a period
of order, peace and work. Unfortunately it did nothing of the kind, and
Snr. Chagas was glad to get back to Paris.[66] Snr. Chagas’ promises
had been too moderate to satisfy the extremists. Reconciliation of all
Portuguese was a large order for the Democrats who were never tired of
demonstrating that a Portuguese Royalist was far worse than an assassin.

[Sidenote: Dr. Augusto de Vasconcellos.]

The new Ministry under the Premiership of Dr. Augusto de Vasconcellos was
presented to Parliament on the 16th of November, 1911. Dr. Vasconcellos
declared that the Government would be decidedly anti-clerical. He spoke
of the urgent need of adapting administration to the actual political
condition of the country, and of creating “an atmosphere of tranquillity,
peace, and confidence.” The Government received the support of the
leaders of the various tendencies of Republican politics which had now
crystallised into separate parties. Dr. Affonso Costa, Dr. Antonio José
de Almeida, and Dr. Brito Camacho.[67] Yet all was not plain sailing for
the Government. Snr. Machado Santos even declared (_O Intransigente_, 8th
December, 1911) that every day that passed discontent increased. And the
_Seculo_, four days later, said: “Unless Portuguese politicians leave
little party questions on one side, and devote themselves seriously to
the economic development of the country, the country is doomed.” “The
Parliamentary system has only served to embarrass for the most part the
normal life of the nation” (_O Seculo_, 12th December, 1911). The Budget,
according to the same newspaper (28th December, 1911) was “but a very
close copy of those of the Monarchy.” And while it was found impossible
to allow sufficient money for the most urgent expenses of schools and
roads, the Minister of Marine presented a project to construct three
20,000 ton cruisers, twelve torpedo destroyers, etc., at a total expense
of 45,000 _contos_.

[Sidenote: Fresh Disturbances.]

At the end of January, 1912, a revolutionary strike at Lisbon, coinciding
with a widely extended strike movement in Alemtejo, was met by the
Government with the declaration of martial law, and the arrest of
over a thousand suspected Syndicalists and workmen. It was during the
weakness of this and the following Government that the _Carbonarios_
were allowed to commit some of their worst outrages with impunity.
The “laws of defence” voted by Parliament at the beginning of July on
the occasion of the second Royalist incursion were opposed even by _O
Seculo_, which remarked in a leading article (6th July, 1912): “It is
certain that we are thus entering upon a purely arbitrary _régime_
which will no doubt be temporary but which nevertheless is a detestable
instance of the Parliament abdicating in favour of the Government, of
this and succeeding Governments.... The laws to which we are referring
are so vague and indefinite that they favour any desire of persecution or
vengeance.” Since the Royalist “army” was as negligible as in the autumn
of the preceding year the excitement was deliberately fanned by the
_Carbonarios_.

[Sidenote: Dom João d’Almeida.]

It was during the second Royalist incursion in the summer of 1912 that
Dom João d’Almeida, a Portuguese of noble family, serving as an officer
in the Austrian army, was taken prisoner. His sentence of six years’
confinement in a solitary cell in the _Penitenciaria_, to be followed by
ten years of deportation to a penal settlement, was severe, but under the
circumstances, naturally so. Unfortunately, however, for its credit, the
Republic neglected to treat him as an officer and a gentleman.

[Sidenote: Carbonario Outrages.]

Persons known to be Royalist were set upon in the street, beaten,
wounded, and then arrested as conspirators. But the worst feature was
the encouragement given by the Democrat Press to the perpetrators of
these outrages. The murder of Lieutenant Soares elicited no protest from
the Republican Press. It was not till September that _A Republica_,
organ of the moderate Republicans, found its voice to protest generally
against the abuses: “The number of those who dislike or distrust the
Republic or have retired from politics is enormous, owing to the narrow
persecutions of the demagogues, headed by Dr. Affonso Costa.”[68] On the
16th of June Snr. Duarte Leite constituted another coalition government
(Democrats, Evolutionists, Unionists, Independents) in succession to
that of Dr. Augusto de Vasconcellos, who remained in office as Minister
for Foreign Affairs. Parliament met a little before the date fixed by
the Constitution, and the Government was soon in crisis. Discontent
was fairly general. An attempted _coup d’état_ by advanced Republicans
had occurred at Oporto. No municipal elections had been held since the
Revolution.

[Sidenote: The Financial Situation.]

The statement made to Parliament by the new Finance Minister, Snr.
Antonio Vicente Ferreira in November, concerning the financial situation
did not mend matters. He admitted that the finances were in a most
serious state, and that the deficit would be enormous. “As there can be
no doubt,” said _O Seculo_ (4th December, 1912), “that waste is going
on, and indeed increasing precisely when it seemed that it should have
disappeared, the logical and irrefutable conclusion is: The politicians
of the Republic are personally as honest as may be, but as administrators
of the public finances they rank with what was bad in the administration
under the Monarchy. Is this due to discreditable concessions? to weakness
or cowardice? We do not know.”

[Sidenote: Dr. Costa in Power.]

The Government was _demissionario_ before the end of the year, and
after a fortnight of attempts to constitute a moderate Government, Dr.
Affonso Costa was sent for by the President and on the 9th of January
formed, with a ministry of nonentities, the fifth government of the
Republic.[69] This Democrat Ministry maintained itself in office for a
little over a year, and during that time some of the worst elements of
the Republic were in clover. _O Mundo_, under the editorship of Snr.
França Borges, now became an official organ, and made full use of its
new opportunities. In its inquisitorial ardour it spared not even the
impartial and moderate _Diario de Noticias_ nor the distinguished poet
who was serving the Republic as its Minister in Berne, Snr. Guerra
Junqueiro, nor the President of the Republic, nor any moderate person.
The _Carbonarios_, moreover, knew that whatever they did would be
supported by the Government, and the Government, by organising new groups
of _Carbonarios_ in its special service, saw to it that whatever they did
should benefit the Democrat party. The Democrats, the _Carbonarios_ and
the _Mundo_ formed a trinity which came very near to being as disastrous
to the Republic as, according to the Democrats, the “august trinity of
Braganças, Jesuits and English” had been disastrous to Portugal. Dr.
Costa, when Premier, declared that he agreed with every word written in
_O Mundo_. It is the creed of the Democrats that outside the Republic
there are no Portuguese, and outside the Democrat party there are
no Republicans. Those who do not belong to the Democrat party can,
therefore, scarcely be good Republicans.

[Sidenote: Bombs and Risings.]

Yet it became impossible in 1913 to continue to ascribe all disturbances
to the Royalists. The movements of April and July of that year and the
bomb thrown at the procession in honour of Camões on the 10th of June,
killing and wounding several persons, were the work of Anarchist and
Radical Republican elements. Yellow badges inscribed with the letters
R.R. (_Republica Radical_) were freely distributed, and the number of
bombs manufactured in Lisbon was so great that even the Republicans who
had exalted the bomb as the instrument of liberty, began to like it less
when it was directed against themselves. Well-intentioned Republicans
were exhorted to give up the bombs in their possession, and after July
hundreds of bombs were thus daily delivered voluntarily or discovered
by the police in Lisbon. The _Mundo_, which continued to harp on the
time-honoured theme that the bomb-throwers were Jesuits, must have failed
to convince even the most enthusiastic of its readers. Obviously from the
point of view of the Republic, Royalist conspiracies were far preferable
to these plots and disturbances within the very bosom of the Republic.

[Sidenote: Crowded Prisons.]

As early as February, 1913, on the day after Snr. Machado Santos’
Amnesty Bill had been discussed in Parliament, the _Alta Venda_ of the
_Carbonarios_ had posted up a notice in the streets of Lisbon, warning
citizens that the Royalists were actively conspiring. Rigorous vigilance,
said the notice, is needed; all Portuguese worthy of the name must be
at their posts to destroy the miserable plots of the reactionaries.
The warning, subsequently explained Snr. Luz Almeida, head of the
_Carbonarios_, was dictated by fear of “the wave of false generosity
which was invading the spirit of sincere Republicans.” In other words,
there had been serious talk of an amnesty for the political prisoners
with which the prisons throughout the country had been crowded since the
proclamation of the Republic. In December, 1912, the President addressed
a letter to the Government in favour of an amnesty for the prisoners and
the recall of the bishops. The Government did not see its way to grant
either, but in the following October, on the third anniversary of the
Republic, a pardon (_indulto_) was given to some three hundred among
the uneducated prisoners of the _Penitenciarias_, who sought it as a
favour. The injustice was manifest, especially as it was not among the
uneducated classes that persons were most likely to have been arrested
and imprisoned merely for their Royalist opinions. The “defenders of the
Republic” did not intend the cells thus vacant in the _Penitenciarias_ to
be left long unoccupied, and they were to be filled by persons of higher
social importance than the released peasants.

[Sidenote: Movement of October, 1913.]

The “Royalist movement” of October, 1913, was prepared by means of
_agents provocateurs_, with the object of making a clean sweep of all
those suspected of being unfriendly to the Republic who were not yet
in prison. The most celebrated of these agents, Homero de Lencastre,
succeeded in securing the arrest of the Conde de Mangualde and other
Royalists, and the movement thus organised became a pretext for arresting
Royalists by the score. The proof of the existence of the Royalist
movement consisted chiefly in these arrests. The first and last items
on the programme of the “White Ants” and _Carbonarios_ were—arrests.
The Lisbon police had not been taken into the confidence of these
unofficial defenders of the Republic. In the words of the head of the
Lisbon police himself: “Neither the Minister of the Interior nor the
Civil Governor ever gave the Lisbon police any definite information
concerning the ‘conspiracy,’ with which the Oporto police, it was
said, was acquainted in all its details. Only vague words: ‘A great
affair,’ ‘we are on a volcano,’ ‘the men are working bravely,’ and so
forth. Certain indications were received from the police at Oporto, but
these indications were very vague: ‘Many people compromised,’ ‘over
four hundred officers have signed documents with their own blood,’ and
so forth.” _Muita gente compromettida_: there in three words is the
_raison d’être_ of the October “Royalist conspiracy” which succeeded
in overcrowding the prisons throughout the country till the Amnesty
Bill was passed in the following February. Snr. Azevedo Coutinho almost
alone succeeded in escaping, on board an English boat, to the extreme
mortification of the _Carbonarios_.

[Sidenote: Partial Elections.]

The partial election of members of the Chamber of Deputies, rendered
necessary by the vacancies due to deaths, resignations, and diplomatic
and other appointments, were held on the 16th of November, and resulted,
as had been foreseen, in the return of Democrats for all but two
constituencies. Dr. Affonso Costa thus had a good working majority in
the Lower House, which enabled him to dispense with the support of the
Unionists, by which he had been kept in office during the earlier part
of the year.

[Illustration: DOORWAY OF THE UNFINISHED CHAPELS, BATALHA

[_See p. 96_]

[Sidenote: Parliamentary Deadlock.]

The majority in the Senate was, however, anti-Democrat. Thus a difficult
situation arose which in the beginning of the following year led to a
deadlock between the Government and Parliament. A senator, Snr. João
de Freitas, had made certain accusations against the Premier, Dr.
Affonso Costa, and the Premier, instead of attending in the Senate to
refute the charges, answered by a letter which the acting President of
the Senate considered lacking in respect to that House, and therefore
refused to read. The Government thereupon in its turn refused to have
anything to do with the sittings of the Senate, and it therefore became
impossible to carry through certain necessary business such as the
passing of the Budget. At the same time the Government was threatened
with another general strike, and to avert this it adopted the old method
of surrounding the building in which the strikers held their meetings and
arresting hundreds of workmen. This did not add to the popularity of the
Government, which was already hated owing to the arrest of hundreds of
Republicans after the April and July disturbances. The prisoners had been
sent partly to Elvas and partly to Angra do Heroisno, since the prisons
of the capital were insufficient. The Lisbon Republican Press, which had
kept silence concerning the sufferings and ill-treatment of the Royalist
prisoners and the condition of the prisons, now told of the sufferings
and ill-treatment of the Republican prisoners, of the insanitary
state of the prisons, and the badness and insufficiency of the food.
A demonstration was actually held in Lisbon against the Government of
Dr. Affonso Costa, and a large crowd, organised by Snr. Machado Santos,
proceeded to the palace of Belem, where the President of the Republic
lives, to show their wish for an amnesty, which the Democrat Government
had declared unnecessary and inopportune.

[Sidenote: President Arriaga’s Letter.]

It was evident that Dr. Costa’s days as Premier were numbered, and when
the President addressed to him a letter proposing that a government of
concentration should be formed in order to grant an amnesty, revise in
a more moderate sense the Law of Separation between Church and State,
pass the Budget and hold the General Election, the Government resigned
(25th January, 1914). A crisis of over a fortnight ensued. The Democrat
Government had fallen because it was in opposition to the President of
the Republic, to the majority in the Senate, and to public opinion. The
President had been on the point of resigning more than once during the
last two years as he saw his moderate policy ruthlessly cast aside by the
extremists. His definite resolution to resign unless his conciliatory
policy were now adopted, produced its effect. But the Democrats still had
a strong majority in the Chamber of Deputies, which made it impossible
for the Evolutionists or Unionists to form a Ministry. The attempt
to constitute a non-party Government also failed. One of the most
significant features of the crisis was the extreme unwillingness of the
abler Republican politicians to take office. It was not till the 9th of
February that Snr. Bernardino Machado was able to constitute a Cabinet,
all the new Ministers, with the exception of the Premier, holding office
for the first time. The Premier took the portfolio of Foreign Affairs,
as in 1910-11, and retained it during three months, until Snr. Freire de
Andrade was appointed.

[Sidenote: The Amnesty.]

The Ministry came into power with the solemn obligation of immediately
introducing an amnesty to Parliament. Ten days later (19th February) it
redeemed this promise, and after an all-night sitting the Amnesty Bill
was passed in the Chamber of Deputies. The amendments made by the Senate
were rejected by the Lower House, and the Bill as voted by the Chamber of
Deputies became law on the 21st of February. The terms of the Bill were
unsatisfactory and gave rise to much criticism, but its actual results
were all that could be desired. All the political prisoners without
exception were released, and only eleven “leaders” or “instigators,”
among the thousands of prisoners and _émigrés_, were banished, for a
space of ten years. A less creditable clause was that by which all abuses
of authority were included in the amnesty. The clause by which all the
untried prisoners were to be tried subsequently to their release received
widespread criticism, and was often misinterpreted, as was but natural
considering its strange and apparently contradictory character. For the
law expressly said that these persons even if sentenced to imprisonment
could not be imprisoned. Then why try them? it was said. The reason
apparently was to have an opportunity to distinguish who were leaders or
instigators, and also to show that these persons had not been arrested
unjustifiably. Another point more justly criticised was the indefinite
power conferred by the law to banish leaders and instigators. Only eleven
persons, however, were regarded as leaders, and not allowed to return to
Portugal, whereas it was calculated that the amnesty would include some
3,000 persons, of whom 572 were untried prisoners and 1,700 _émigrés_.
The new Government was obliged to walk circumspectly, for although it
leaned towards the Democrats and consulted the wishes of Dr. Affonso
Costa, it did not content the extremists of that party, and it contented
scarcely anyone else. It did not profess to look upon itself as more
than a stop-gap ministry, temporarily pouring oil on the troubled waters
between a storm and a storm.

[Sidenote: Seventh Republican Government.]

It was succeeded by a Democrat ministry, presided over by Snr. Victor
Hugo d’Azevedo, Democrat President of the Chamber of Deputies. Regardless
of the fact that a great World War was now raging, the thoughts of
political parties were bent almost exclusively upon the forthcoming
elections. The real reason for the fall of Dr. Bernardino Machado’s
Government was that the Democrats were determined to run no risks and
to make the elections themselves. For this it was essential to have a
Democrat at the Ministry of the Interior, and Dr. Alexandre Braga,
considered to have much skill in the political intrigues required, was
accordingly appointed Minister of the Interior. Everything seemed to
point to an overwhelming return of Democrats at the election. Press,
Opposition, public opinion were gagged, telegrams to the foreign Press
suppressed. “Ministerial oppression,” said General Pimenta de Castro,
“reached such a point that even liberty of thought was strangled.” A
packed Democrat Parliament seemed assured. But there were two elements
which proved too vigorous to be gagged and bound. One of these was the
bitter discontent of the other political parties who saw the elections
escaping them; the other was discontent in the Army. When the Democrat
Government proceeded to interfere with the Army and, moreover, attempted
to hamper the President of the Republic’s action, and to force him
into declaring martial law, the cup brimmed over, and a military
_pronunciamento_ led to the fall of the Ministry and to the appointment
of General Pimenta de Castro.

[Sidenote: Pimenta de Castro.]

The Democrats still had a majority in the Chamber of Deputies, but,
when they attempted to meet and “confer of their miserable fall,” like
Satan and his angels on the burning lake, they found the entrance of
the Congresso guarded against them. The country had had enough of their
constitutional hypocrisies. From thenceforward General Pimenta de
Castro’s Government, welcome to the country, went serenely on its way,
although bitterly attacked by the Democrat opposition which even went to
the length of spreading abroad in their Press that the Government was
responsible for the rise in prices, although it was well known—to all
but the ignorant readers of such newspapers—that the pinch of the war
would be felt in the Spring. The President of the Republic also came in
for his share of foul abuse, owing to the fact that by the firmness and
strength of character displayed by him the election hopes of the Democrat
party had been ruined. It may well be argued that his action also saved
the Republic, since it is difficult to believe that the Republic could
have lasted many months longer in the rarefied atmosphere produced by the
Democrats in power. There was a general breath of relief throughout the
country, and by an odd paradox this new Government born of a military
movement, this “dictatorship,” this “tyranny,” proved the most moderate
Government that Portugal had seen since the Revolution of 1910. With
equal moderation and firmness one measure after another was enacted in
order to bring about the long-dreamt reconciliation of all Portuguese.
Churches were restored to the use of the faithful, officials arbitrarily
dismissed were restored to their posts, the “White Ants” were sent about
their business, their so-called “Committee of Public Safety” abolished,
and finally in April (1915) a general amnesty emptied the prisons and
allowed the eleven exiles of the 1914 amnesty to return to Portugal.

[Sidenote: Moderate Dictator and Constitutional Tyrants.]

O but, say the Democrats, it was all so unconstitutional! Such a
dictatorship! _Of course_ it was unconstitutional. The Constitution
has been so ordered that the Democrats having installed themselves
in power—and they had been in power in fact if not in name since the
Revolution—could never be dislodged by constitutional means. Their
majority in the Chamber of Deputies was secure, their majorities in the
town councils throughout the country, and in the officials responsible
for returning the new deputies equally secure. It became necessary
to dissolve these bodies, by force if they would not go willingly.
But the country which had suffered from four years of constitutional
tyranny was delighted to have a little unconstitutional moderation. In
vain the Democrats cried out that it was a dictatorship worse than the
dictatorship of Snr. João Franco. If, answered common-sense opinion,
the Government which empties the prisons, maintains order and acts in
every respect so fairly and moderately, is a dictatorship, then may all
succeeding Governments be tarred with the dictatorial brush. Only so
will the future of the Republic and of Portugal be secure. It is quite
true that the situation in some respects resembled that of Snr. João
Franco’s Government, and it is a striking and bitter comment on the seven
intervening years that to find a government as good as that of General
Pimenta de Castro one has to go back to that of Snr. João Franco. They
are like two rocks, and the seven years between a sea of slush and molten
fire.

[Illustration: INTERIOR OF THE CHURCH, BATALHA

[_See p. 96_]

[Sidenote: Revolution of May, 1915.]

Scarcely had these words been written when the guns of the fleet
early on the 14th of May announced the determination of Democrats and
_Carbonarios_, having found no support in public opinion, to overthrow
by force the Government of General Pimenta de Castro. For two days
Lisbon was cut off from the outside world and bombarded from the river.
Scores of persons lost their lives, hundreds were wounded. The rebels
triumphed. General Pimenta de Castro was arrested. The Democrat Press
had done its work well. The sergeants in the army had been encouraged to
mutiny against their superior officers, and the officers who resisted
the mutiny of the sailors were arrested or killed. The commander of
the _Vasco da Gama_ was shot dead, the commander of the _Almirante
Reis_ died some days later of his wound. The Democrat revolutionary
committee nominated a new government with Snr. João Chagas as Premier.
The new Premier was, however, shot by the Senator João de Freitas when
on his way to Lisbon, and, although not mortally wounded, resigned the
premiership some days later. This was the only _contretemps_ in the
Democrats’ plans. Otherwise their victory was complete, and they at
once set about making the elections. In certain States of South America
one has heard of such proceedings, of a party winning its way to power
by means of civil war. (The peaceful and exceptionally well-governed
country of Chile, ignorantly confused with the pungent red Chili pepper
of the Portuguese Republic, naturally resented any such comparison.) But
even over those States the World War had thrown a steadying influence.
That a party in Portugal should take this opportunity to copy Mexico
stamps that party more effectively than would reams of comment. It
suffices to state the fact, and the Democrat party will always be known
as the party which, under cover of the World War, raised itself to
power over the dead bodies of its fellow-countrymen. The object of the
Revolution of the 14th of May, say the Democrats, was to restore the
Constitution. The falseness of this argument will be obvious to any but
the wilfully obtuse when it is remembered that the general election
was fixed for the 6th of June, and that they would therefore in twenty
days have had constitution to their hearts’ content. As a result of
their proceedings, Dr. Arriaga, the moderate President of the Republic,
resigned, accompanying his resignation with a very dignified protest
addressed to Parliament. The Democrat members of Parliament thereupon
chose the Democrat, Dr. Theophilo Braga, to succeed him (29th May, 1915).
General Pimenta de Castro was deported to the Azores and dismissed from
the Army. Were not the injustice of it a bitter shame and humiliation to
all true Portuguese, this persecution as dictators and tyrants of two
old men who have been Liberals and Republicans for over a generation,
and have done and suffered so much for the Republic (but not for the
_Carbonario_-Democrat clique) would be highly diverting.

CHAPTER XIII

GREAT BRITAIN AND PORTUGAL

[Sidenote: Ancient Allies.]

The case of Great Britain and Portugal is the only instance in
history of an alliance extending over seven centuries. With two
peoples so fundamentally different such an alliance could not prevent
misunderstandings, but it has nevertheless been a real bond. It is
characteristic of Portugal’s whole history that England, separated from
her by a great expanse of sea, should have been a nearer neighbour than
Spain, and although it has sometimes become the custom in Portugal for
writers and speakers to belittle England on every possible occasion,
there has never been any real or at least immediate thought of giving up
the ancient alliance.

[Illustration: CONVENTO DE CHRISTO, THOMAR

[_See p. 97_]

[Sidenote: Spain and Portugal.]

The modern Portuguese are full of suspicions with regard to foreign
politics, and are unwise enough to give these suspicions expression in
words. Recently the well-known Madrid newspaper, _La Epoca_, officially
denied that these _suspicacias portuguesas_ had any foundation in fact:
“For some time past there has been talk in Portugal of the so-called
‘Spanish danger,’ and the Press of that country of various political
shades frequently declares that intervention in Portugal meets with
widespread favour in Spain.... In Spain no thought has ever been given
to the political form of the Portuguese Government further than the
wish for order and tranquillity in the neighbouring nation, since these
constitute the sure basis of prosperity. This we sincerely desire, as it
is desired by all the powers that have relations of real friendship with
Portugal.... Whatever the form of Government in Portugal we repeat that
the Press and public opinion in Spain unfortunately give but slight and
disconnected attention to the affairs of that country, and that there is
no reason whatever for these suspicions, since we only occupy ourselves
with Portugal in order to wish her every kind of happiness.” A _démenti_
somewhat crushing in its kindness, invoked by the mania of the Portuguese
to ascribe motives that do not exist. The expression of such suspicions
can be of no possible advantage to Portugal. The weakness of Portugal’s
army and of her defences, and the practical non-existence of her navy
are perfectly well known, and Spain could easily conquer Portugal were
she so minded. The difficulty would be to retain her conquest. All the
Portuguese in their hatred of the Spaniard and their love of independence
would unite to throw off the yoke of Spain, even though they have not the
sense to unite to build up Portugal’s prosperity and to make a second
imposition of the Spanish yoke impossible. Spain would thus be confronted
with that which defeated Napoleon—the resistance of a people, and might
come out of the conflict shorn of Catalonia as well as of their new
Lusitanian province. The country that would benefit would be Portugal,
since the Portuguese would at last pull themselves together and pull
together. But indeed the idea of Spain permanently conquering Portugal
is as far removed from practical politics as the idea cherished by not
a few Portuguese—of Portugal conquering Spain. Iberian unity may be a
pleasant dream, but when a country has won for itself so definite and
distinguished a position as Portugal in history, literature and language,
it is too late for it to coalesce with another nation, unless as one of
a federation of free States, the Basque Provinces and Asturias, Portugal
and Galicia, Catalonia, Aragon, Valencia, Andalucía, Castille. Nor
can one think of Lisbon as a provincial capital. Portugal, modern and
progressive, considers Spain very backward and narrow, and rarely seeks
to pierce the rough shell to the very excellent kernel beneath it. The
Portuguese Press, which gives to foreign news infinitely greater and more
enlightened attention than does the Press of Spain, scarcely extends its
interest to Spain. And unfortunately what _La Epoca_ said is true: Spain
gives Portugal but a passing thought. Both countries would be the gainers
by closer relations and a better understanding. Portugal is far more
nearly allied in thought with France than with Spain, and the Portuguese
who takes the _Sud-Express_ from Lisbon to Paris journeys through an
unknown country till he reaches the French frontier.

[Sidenote: Republicans and the British Alliance.]

Formal ally Portugal possesses but one in Europe: Great Britain. The
Portuguese, especially the Portuguese Republicans, have attacked this
alliance vigorously; indeed, the Republican party increased and prospered
largely as a protest against Lord Salisbury’s ultimatum. Even as late
as 1910 a book appeared,[70] which accused the English of being in
their relations to Portugal hypocritical, voracious and untrustworthy.
Snr. João Chagas in one of his pamphlets had charged the Kings of the
Braganza dynasty with being “vassals of England,” and this book was the
“arraignment of the Monarchy in Portugal.” The British Alliance, it said,
was essentially an alliance between dynasties, and to this character owed
its unbroken continuity “in spite of all the incidents that have arisen
between the two countries and of the unequivocal feeling of repulsion
which separates the two peoples.” England has “exploited and insulted
us.” But, asks the writer, “does the protection of England at least
shelter us from other countries?” and his answer is “Only if it suits
her interests. The decadence and degradation of Portugal are due to the
august trinity of the Braganças, the Jesuits and the English.” British
policy towards Portugal has “always been inspired by a spirit of rapine.”
The British alliance has been constantly characterised by its want of
sincerity and “a spirit absolutely foreign to the general interests of
the Portuguese nation.” And after heaping abuse and insult the author
concludes that, much as Portugal may dislike the British alliance, “it
is that which suits Portugal more than any other,” since Great Britain
is the only power which can effectively support Portugal against the
encroachment of Germany and the Congo Free State. They cannot have their
cake and eat their cake, and if they wished the British alliance to
continue why express their hatred and abhorrence of it? This book was the
true expression of the attitude of the Portuguese Republicans towards
England, although Dr. Bernardino Machado, first Republican Minister for
Foreign Affairs and fifth Republican Premier, who supplied it with an
introduction and with a prefatory letter, dated 20th May, 1910, held no
official position when he expressed cordial approval of its contents.

[Sidenote: Germany’s Peaceful Penetration.]

The Republicans after the Revolution were obliged to modify their
attitude, but it would have been wiser had they frankly accepted the
British Alliance, frankly without _arrière-pensée_, instead of exerting
themselves to stand well with Great Britain officially while at the same
time indulging in petty slights and insinuations, and doing their utmost
to encourage German at the expense of British trade in Portugal. German
exports to Portugal before the War, although they had not yet equalled
the British, were gaining ground very rapidly (_avance à pas de géants_,
said M. Marvaud). Intellectually France held the field, materially it
might soon be Germany. The British Chamber of Commerce in Portugal,
founded in 1911, does good service in the interests of British trade.
The threatened increase of the already exorbitant Customs duties has had
at least the good effect of bringing about several commercial treaties:
between Portugal and Germany (1908), Portugal and Great Britain (1914),
and others, _e.g._, with Spain, are in contemplation. It was certainly
significant and, partly, the natural outcome of the commercial treaty of
1908, that the Lisbon shopkeepers, the most devoted of the Republic’s
supporters, filled their shops as never before with German wares. Germany
methodically set herself to undermine the British Alliance by peaceful
penetration. She offered Portuguese tradesmen cheaper (if less lasting)
goods than did Great Britain, and made great reductions for large
orders, and generally studied and consulted the needs and the character
of her Portuguese customers. Her advances were so well received as to
give a misleading impression. A German observer, Dr. Gustav Diercks,
for instance, writing in 1911, guilelessly remarked that Germans were
perhaps of all foreigners, the most agreeable to the Portuguese at the
present time, “because they have nothing to fear from them, and have
learnt to know them merely as pleasant business men, whose aim is not
the systematic exploitation of Portugal.” For the great majority of
Portuguese, of course, tradition counts for less than nothing; and the
old Portuguese families, with which tradition counts for much, often have
old ties of family or religion connecting them with Germany or Austria.

[Sidenote: Suspicion and Distrust.]

The chief evil in Portugal has been the imagination of evil, the fear of
disease doing much to encourage or aggravate the disease. The suspicions
of conspiracy were more serious than the actual conspiracies, the
continual charges of political corruption are a powerful incentive to
political corruption. The nagging accusations against Spain at the time
of the Royalist incursions might have tempted that country to help the
Royalists in earnest. The ridicule and abuse heaped in an underhand way
on Great Britain might have induced a Power without scruples and without
a sense of honour to make serious use of its brute force. It would, of
course, be quite as easy for Great Britain to pocket the entire colonial
empire of Portugal as it was for Germany to invade Belgium. But even the
most suspicious and cantankerous Portuguese trusts Great Britain’s honour
and moderation; and if the Republicans have sometimes affected to regard
Great Britain as a gorged beast of prey, they trust and love Germany much
as one may love and trust a tiger ready to spring.

[Sidenote: English and Portuguese in the Twelfth Century.]

For those to whom history and tradition have any meaning, the ancient
alliance between Great Britain and Portugal and the fact that under many
diverse conditions Englishmen and Portuguese have fought side by side,
will always establish at least a basis of friendliness between the two
countries. Before Portugal was Portugal, Portuguese and English fought in
a common undertaking, the conquest of Lisbon from the Moors in 1147. In
this difficult enterprise English crusaders played a very important part,
and an account of it was written, in Latin, by an Englishman. A treaty
between Portugal and England, or at least between Portuguese and English
merchants, followed not long afterwards, for in 1308 when the treaty was
formally renewed by the Kings of England and Portugal, King Edward wrote
to King Diniz of “the treaty of love and union that has hitherto existed
between your merchants (_mercatores_) and ours.”

[Sidenote: At Aljubarrota.]

It was, however, in the fourteenth century that the old treaty between
the countries became a definite and strong alliance. Portugal was in
need of a foreign ally against her neighbour Castille, and when old
John of Gaunt, time-honoured Lancaster, laid claim to the throne of
Castille, a further tightening of the relations between England and
Portugal indicated itself as the obvious policy. A treaty between John
of Gaunt and King Ferdinand of Portugal was drawn up at Braga in 1372.
It is true that eight months later Ferdinand signed a treaty of peace
with King Henry II of Castille against the Duke of Lancaster and the King
of England, but England continued to have many friends and partisans at
the Portuguese Court, and eight years later, when Portugal was again at
war with Spain, an English fleet with three thousand soldiers commanded
by the Earl of Cambridge (_Cambris_ and _Cãbrix_ in the old Portuguese
chronicles) appeared in the Tagus to the assistance of Portugal.
Unhappily the English soldiers incurred the hatred of the inhabitants
by their pillaging and lawless behaviour, as if they were in a hostile
country. They remained in Portugal till 1383 when a fresh treaty between
the Kings of Castille and Portugal turned the tables on them, and the
King of Castille blandly provided ships to convey them back to England.
However that might be, King Ferdinand’s successor, the Infante João,
Master of Aviz, when he laid claim to the crown of Portugal, was glad
enough to be able to count on the support of England, and the prosperity
of his reign certainly owed something to English influence. English
soldiers fought side by side with the Portuguese in the victory of
Aljubarrota in 1385, and the great Nun’ Alvares evidently learnt from
English soldiers the best way of making his infantry effective against
cavalry. At Aljubarrota, as at Crécy and Agincourt, the infantry stood
firm in close formation against vastly superior numbers, and all the
efforts of the cavalry were as powerless to break them as were the
French charges at Waterloo. The influence of the Earl of Cambridge and
the other English commanders was great in Portugal, and when João I
married an English princess in 1387, English ascendancy became supreme
at the Portuguese Court. There are many indications to show how wide
that influence extended. The dignity of Constable and Marshal were
introduced directly from England; Nun’ Alvares, the first Constable, was
deliberately a second Galahad; the chivalry of the Round Table became the
incentive and fashion of the Portuguese courtiers and nobles; the royal
princes were given an English education by their English mother.

[Sidenote: Queen Philippa.]

To her Portugal owes a great debt. The Portuguese chronicles admit that
her children received a more careful education than was habitual at the
Courts of the Peninsula, and one of these children was Prince Henry
the Navigator, real founder of Portugal’s glory in the fifteenth and
sixteenth centuries. The treaty of 1308 between Portugal and England had
been constantly renewed: in 1353, 1372, and 1380. After King João I’s
accession it was confirmed in 1386 and 1404. The fishermen and traders
of Portugal, as indeed of the whole coast as far as Bayonne, had much
in common both in character and interests with the English, and even
if close relations had not existed between the Courts of Portugal and
England it is probable that some such treaty would have been formed as
existed between Basque fishermen and King Edward II of England.

[Sidenote: Alliance Broken Off and Renewed.]

In 1470 these friendly relations were disturbed. Portuguese ships were
plundered by English pirates. But actual war was avoided, and the treaty
signed in 1472 lasted unbroken between Portugal and England for the
next hundred years. In 1580, when Portugal came under Spanish sway, her
alliance with England naturally fell to the ground, and it was actually
in the harbour of the Tagus that was equipped the greater part of the
Invincible Armada of 1588. Portugal, which had sometimes found England’s
friendship unpleasant, when English soldiers were quartered for long
periods in Portugal, and, as says an old chronicle, would kill an ox in
order to eat its tongue, now experienced the very much more unpleasant
consequences of the cessation of that friendship. All her coasts and all
her colonies were at the mercy of her former ally’s attacks. As soon as
the yoke of Spain was thrown off the Duke of Bragança as João IV sent
ambassadors to England to conclude peace. A treaty was signed in January,
1643, by which many mutual privileges, both of trade and individuals,
were recognised. Among other privileges of British subjects in Portugal,
it was agreed that British Consuls need not belong to the Roman Catholic
religion. Generally the treaty increased in a high degree the facilities
of trade and commerce between the two countries. But when Cromwell came
to the throne the relations between England and Portugal were not easy,
in spite of the fact that they had the same enemies. In 1650, Prince
Rupert and his brother Maurice took refuge in Portugal, and King João IV
refused to accede to Cromwell’s demand that they should be surrendered.
Two years later, however, when both Portugal and England were at war
with the Dutch, the old friendship was resumed. The Conde de Penaguião
was sent on a special mission to England, and in July, 1654, the treaty
of 1642 was revised and renewed. Among other articles it stipulated that
the English should have certain rights of trading with the Portuguese
possessions in the East, and that in Portugal no British subject might be
arrested without a special warrant.

[Sidenote: At Ameixial.]

The Restoration in England and the marriage of Charles II with Catharina,
daughter of King João IV, drew the bond between Portugal and England
still closer. In 1662 an English force was sent to Portugal to assist
her in her war against Spain, and in the following year took part in
the victory over Don John of Austria at Ameixial. The Spanish losses in
dead, wounded, and prisoners are said to have numbered 10,000 out of
a total army of 16,000. The Portuguese losses are given as 1,500 dead
and wounded, and those of their allies, the French and the English,
as 300 and 50 respectively. Once more, as at Aljubarrota and so many
other fights, the English had contributed in some measure to secure
Portugal’s independence. Charles II also helped to bring about the peace
between Spain and Portugal, which was signed after many negotiations and
difficulties in 1668. The English ambassadors both at Madrid and Lisbon
worked persistently for peace, and the two neighbouring countries, which
should never have been at war, were finally induced to accept it.

[Sidenote: Queen Catharine’s Dowry.]

A new treaty between England and Portugal had been signed seven years
earlier in 1661, by which all the older treaties were confirmed. Portugal
ceded Tangiers to Great Britain, as well as Bombay, and two million
_cruzados_ as dowry of the Princess Catharine. Great Britain promised
to protect Portugal by land and sea, with cavalry, infantry, and ten of
her best warships whenever Portugal might be attacked. Great Britain,
moreover, undertook never to form a treaty with Spain which might be in
any way prejudicial to Portuguese interests, never to give back Dunkirk
or Jamaica to Spain, and to support the Portuguese in India against the
Dutch unless the latter made peace with Portugal. At first sight the
actual advantages of this treaty are all on the side of Great Britain,
those of Portugal being chiefly hypothetical, but Portugal had received
in the past proofs of support from England so solid that the promise of
British support in the future was considered as anything but nugatory.
After the Revolution in England William of Orange informed the King
of Portugal of his intention to abide by the existing treaties, and
accordingly King Pedro II gave no help to the exiled Stuarts, however
much they might have his sympathy.

[Sidenote: War of the Spanish Succession.]

In the war of the Spanish Succession Portugal at first maintained
neutrality in spite of the offer of ships and men made to her by the
Allies if she declared war against Spain, and the promise that whatever
territory she won from Spain should be guaranteed to her after the war
ended. Although Portugal’s duty and interests alike seemed to require
that she should join the alliance against Spain without hesitation, it
was not till May, 1703, that she finally threw in her lot with them. The
alliance between Great Britain and Portugal has more than once shown a
strange capacity to simmer down into neutrality at the very moment when
it might have been expected to be most active. Yet war between Great
Britain and another Power was not so remote a contingency that Portugal’s
attitude and obligations might not have been clearly defined beforehand.
Of the force of 28,000 men which Portugal now engaged to bring into the
field, nearly a half, 13,000, were to be maintained by the Allies.

[Sidenote: The Methuen Treaty.]

The Methuen commercial treaty between Great Britain and Portugal was
signed in the same year (27th December, 1703). On the strength of this
treaty. Great Britain has been accused, and is still sometimes accused,
of deliberately planning Portugal’s ruin, as if Great Britain were to
blame because her woollen goods were superior to those of Portuguese
manufacture, or because the Portuguese, in a short-sighted desire for
immediate profits, planted more than a due proportion of their land
with vines, till wine became commoner than water, while agriculture and
pasture lands were neglected. But it is certain that the neglect and lack
of enterprise of the Portuguese allowed a great part of Portuguese trade
to fall into the hands of the English.

[Sidenote: Pombal’s Attitude towards England.]

The Marquez de Pombal, who lived in England as Portuguese Ambassador
for six years, was able to compare England’s active business methods
with the lazy _laisser-aller_ of the Portuguese. England, he said, has
become master of the whole of Portugal’s trade. But however much he might
deplore and seek to remedy this fact, he recognised that the British
alliance must be the basis of all Portugal’s foreign policy. England and
Portugal, he said, were like man and wife: they might quarrel, but, if a
third party interfered, they would unite against the common foe.

[Sidenote: The Peninsular War.]

In 1805 the threats of Napoleon induced Portugal to declare war formally
against England and to close her harbours to British ships. Three hundred
English families, settled in business in Portugal, left the country.
Great Britain was willing to accept these measures as the results of
a necessity that knew no law, and although war was formally declared,
the British Ambassador, Lord Strangford, remained at Lisbon. But when
Portugal went still further, and at the bidding of France confiscated the
property of those English families that had remained, Lord Strangford
demanded his passports, and an English fleet blockaded the mouth of
the Tagus. Before the British Ambassador could leave the country Junot
had approached rapidly nearer to Lisbon. When Strangford received the
_Moniteur_ in which it was announced that “the House of Braganza has
ceased to reign,” he was able to induce the Prince Regent to sail for
Brazil. Portugal’s lot was now once more closely united with that of
Great Britain. The Peninsular War, in which Portuguese and English troops
fought side by side on many a field, could not fail to strengthen the old
alliance, however much individual differences of character might come to
the surface.

[Sidenote: Allies and Strangers.]

Yet, after seven centuries of constant intercourse between English
and Portuguese, it is indeed astonishing that in intellectual and
social relations they should have remained almost strangers. The blame
for this disappointing fact may be equally apportioned between them.
Certainly England cannot be acquitted of a certain narrowness and
angularity—whether it be the result of stupidity or pride—which has
driven Portugal, intellectually, into the hands of France or Germany. It
is to be regretted, in this respect, that the Commercial Treaty between
Portugal and Great Britain negotiated by Sir Arthur Hardinge and Mr.
Lancelot Carnegie, and signed in 1914, should not have included a clause
by which English books might share the favourable treatment as regards
Customs duties which is given to French books. A knowledge of English
literature would do much to increase the regard or diminish the dislike
of the Portuguese towards England. Latin nations give more importance to
literature than is perhaps attributed to it in England, and the fact that
Portuguese literature and Portuguese history meet with little sympathy
or study in England undoubtedly has its effect in Portugal when it is
compared with the attitude of Germany. The difference leaps to the eyes
of all educated persons in Portugal, and it must not be forgotten that in
Portugal the uneducated people—apart from the trained demagogues’ bands
in the cities—has no part or parcel in the affairs of the nation.

[Sidenote: German Ascendancy.]

If you ask what is the best history of Portugal, the answer is that of
Heinrich Schaefer, a German; there is not even an English translation
of it, although a considerable portion of it is English history. English
readers must read this in German or in the French translation. If you
inquire for the best history of Portuguese literature, if you wish to
consult important works on the Portuguese language, if you wish to read
all the works of Portugal’s chief poet in a translation, the language
necessary for your purpose is still not English, but German. It is not a
creditable fact, for England, and it may be that one result of the World
War will be to broaden England’s outlook: if so, it is to be hoped that
she will, especially, bestow more attention on the life and character,
literature, and history of the oldest of her allies.

CHAPTER XIV

PORTUGAL OF THE FUTURE

[Sidenote: Portuguese Finance.]

To find Portuguese finances in a satisfactory, above all, in a natural,
condition, it is perhaps necessary to go back to the days of King
Diniz, who, after spending much on the development of the country, left
a full treasury at his death in 1325. The succeeding kings maintained
this prosperity, but at the end of the fifteenth and beginning of the
sixteenth centuries the great change came which has made Portuguese
finance the most artificial in Europe. Precious stones and metals and
spices from the East took the place of money derived from patient
industry and the toil of men’s hands. Agriculture, which has always
been Portugal’s principal industry, was neglected, and the fields lay
desolate. The peasants willingly in a spirit of adventure, or eager
to exchange assured misery for an uncertainty, or forcibly enlisted,
were shipped off to the Indies. The great majority of them never saw
Portugal again: disease, battle, and shipwreck having done their work
well. The eyes of all in the country became fastened upon Lisbon, but the
wealth arriving at Lisbon rarely filtered into the provinces; far more
frequently it was employed in purchasing articles of luxury from abroad.
It is the situation of the present day, Lisbon importing motor-cars by
the score and innumerable luxuries, while the country remains undeveloped
and poverty-stricken. After the gold from India came the discovery of
gold in Brazil, a later possession of Portugal, and even to-day, when
Brazil is a separate State, the money coming to Portugal from rich
Portuguese _brazileiros_ props up a system which, on the failure of this
last resource, is in danger of falling with a crash, as indeed it fell in
1892.

[Sidenote: Direitos de Alfandega.]

The Customs duties constitute about a third of the entire revenue, and
the system of excessive protection enables Ministers of Finance to live
from year to year, but it may be described as a system which fills the
Exchequer and ruins the country. It is maintained for the simple reason
that it does enable the Government to avoid bankruptcy, and it is excused
as encouraging Portuguese industries. But in a country almost exclusively
agricultural as is Portugal, protection should be of a very moderate
kind. The most extreme protection cannot make Portuguese industries
flourish and it seriously injures agriculture. Because agricultural
machines and other implements imported from abroad are comparatively
lightly taxed (from 5 to 60 _réis_ per kilo), it is imagined that
agriculture does not suffer from a system which sends up the general
cost of living to an abnormal degree! It may be of interest to give some
examples of the Customs tariff. Motor-cars are taxed 120,000 _réis_ (20
_réis_ roughly = one penny), motor cycles 50,000, pianos 50,000, silk
articles up to 13,500 per kilo, woollen articles up to 3,500 per kilo,
cotton articles up to 1,600 per kilo, a kilo of tobacco 4,500, men’s hats
900 each, a kilo of biscuits 120, of sugar 120 and 145, of tea 1,000,
chocolate 200, jam 200, honey 35, cheese 300, butter 250. Horses pay from
24,500 to 32,500 each, donkeys 2,500, mules 14,500, goats 500, sheep
500, pigs 3,600, cows 7,500. Dynamite is taxed 270 per kilo, books—more
dangerous and less in demand than dynamite—if Portuguese and bound, 900
per kilo, _broché_ 400. Foreign books pay from 100 to 510 per kilo.
Books, however, coming from France, Belgium, or Brazil, are free (the
result being that the Lisbon bookshops are flooded with French books).
Wrought gold pays 120,000 per kilo, wrought silver 35,000 per kilo. Gold
and silver coins, says the _pauta_ published by the _Annuario Commercial
de Portugal_, are free; and one has to be humbly grateful for such
generosity. These Customs duties provide about one-third of the nation’s
revenue. As to the expenditure it will be found that a large proportion
of it never goes further than Lisbon. When the sums due for the
service of the external and internal debts are subtracted, the various
departments absorb the rest, that is, to a great extent, the officials of
the various departments and the officers of the army and navy retired or
on active service.

[Sidenote: Artificial Conditions.]

The rates of exchange, moreover, fluctuate more than in any other
country, the value of the pound sterling varying from 4,800 _réis_ to
7,000 or 8,000 _réis_. And since not only articles of luxury but a
large quantity of wheat is imported annually, this naturally has the
most serious effect on the life of the whole country. The imports of
Portugal stand to her exports in the proportion of at least 4 to 3. The
whole value of the imports is more than double that of the exports, but
about a third of the former are re-exported from Lisbon. The Customs
(_Alfandega_) duties yielded, in round figures, 20,000 _contos_ in 1911,
21,000 _contos_ in 1912, and 23,000 _contos_ in 1913. The Monarchy, as
now the Republic, has been powerless under a system of artificial finance
which has never borne a close relation to the resources of the country,
but lived first on spices from the colonies, then on gold from Brazil,
then on foreign loans, till the bankruptcy of 1892 rendered even these
impossible, since when it has been compelled to live on issues of paper
money and increase of the floating debt. The Portuguese Treasury during
centuries has closely resembled Gil Vicente’s poor nobleman, who with a
small and dwindling income, contracted heavy debts and maintained great
estate. It was alleged that the floating debt had sunk to 81,000 _contos_
a few months after the Revolution of October, 1910, but subsequent
figures disproved the optimism of January, 1911, and in January, 1914,
the floating debt which stood at 82,000 _contos_ in September, 1910, had
advanced to 89,851 _contos_.

[Sidenote: Dr. Costa’s Financial Methods.]

During his year of office in 1913 as Premier and Finance Minister, Dr.
Affonso Costa’s untiring efforts were directed towards abolishing the
annual deficit. This may seem to many the very first condition of an
improvement in the national finances, and the object was theoretically
excellent. But it may be attained by illegitimate means, as unfair
taxation or by postponing necessary payments, and in that case the
deficit will only be abolished at the expense of a far greater deficit
in a few years. It has always been one of the anomalies of Portuguese
finance that it is possible to have a full exchequer in a ruined country.
To take but one instance, if the crops in Portugal fail a huge additional
amount of wheat must be imported, and while the peasant is starving
the Exchequer rakes in a surplus in Customs duties. Dr. Costa’s narrow
methods—his great bid for popularity and a surplus—really increased
the artificial character of Portuguese finance, and its tendency to
live from hand to mouth and let the future take care of itself. It was
not only that he made of finance a party catchword and a source of
class-hatred, adopting Almeida Garrett’s extraordinary maxim that one
rich man means hundreds of poor men (_Viagens na minha terra_: “_Cada
homen rico, abastado, custa centos de infelizes, de miseraveis_”), but
that he bent all his ability or energy to the satisfaction of a personal
vanity—to be able to set it on record that his year was the year of no
deficit and—_après lui le déluge_. The object should have been rather to
encourage wealth in Portugal, even at a temporary loss to the Exchequer,
to give landed proprietors every incentive to dwell on and develop their
estates rather than to drive them out of the country by a new property
tax, by which they sometimes paid, in this and other contributions,
over a fourth of their income. This tax (_contribuição predial_) was
successful in immediately raising revenue, but unfortunately the annual
expenditure has also increased. Dr. Costa estimated it at 78,000 _contos_
for 1914-15, but in 1909-10 it stood at 74,000. Expenses connected with
the War in 1914 and 1915 have added at least another 40,000 _contos_, so
that Portuguese finances will now be hampered for many a year.

[Illustration: GENERAL VIEW, FARO

[_See p. 106_]

[Sidenote: The Public Debt.]

The whole ambition of Portuguese Finance Ministers is to make a huge
foreign loan, which has been impossible of late years, but which the
altered circumstances may now enable them to achieve. The total of the
Public Debt is in round figures, 900,000 _contos_, the annual interest
over 20,000 _contos_, say twelve shillings per inhabitant. Since the
conversion of the external debt in 1892 the interest has been faithfully
paid. It is guaranteed by the Customs duties. Whatever improvement future
years may bring to the Portuguese finances will not come at a bound
(reduction in the deficit in five days of 5,000 _contos_, a surplus of
hundreds, a surplus of thousands, the salvation of the country) but must
be very gradual, questions of finance never being questions of the moment
only but reacting far into the future. It will be the work of scientific
financiers, never of demagogues. He would be a very unreasonable critic,
or a very ignorant party politician, who should expect the Republic to
transform the financial situation inherited from the Monarchy from a
desert into a garden of roses at the mere wave of a magic wand. What is
expected of any Government worthy of the name is that it should be a firm
and stable Government, that it should maintain order, promote private
initiative and wealth, and inspire confidence by giving the country not
doses of mystification and paper money, but a straightforward account of
the state of its finances.

[Sidenote: The Colonies.]

The country needs to be enlightened, too, as to the advisability or the
reverse of parting with some of her colonies. With an area in Europe of
35,490 square miles, Portugal owns more than 800,000. It is an alarming
proportion, although of course that of the empires of Belgium, Holland
and Great Britain are even greater. But the Portuguese do not seem to
possess the energy and administrative ability needful to leaven the
whole lump of their possessions, in spite of the fact that they adapt
themselves readily to new conditions and to extremes of climate, and
are enterprising in ideas. “As navigators and not as conquerors, wrote
Oliveira Martins” (_Historia de Portugal_), “we unveiled all the
secrets of the seas, but our empire in the East was a disaster both for
the East and for us.” Many of the higher nobility—all that was best in
Portugal—were too proud to engage in trade in the New World. Others
went out in order to amass wealth by whatever means in the shortest
possible time. The colonies were mercilessly exploited by the mother
country. A close system of protection prevented foreign nations from
trading with the Portuguese colonies, and the Portuguese themselves did
little or nothing for the development of their resources. The unsound
administration in Portugal itself became more so in remote Madeira and
most so in the distant colonies, where more recently the Governors have
been fettered by the strict centralisation of power in Lisbon and driven
to despair by the constant changes of Government, which seem to make
any continuous policy impossible. As to the condition of the colonies
under the Republic a Republican newspaper—_O Seculo_—has described it
as a state of anarchy, “an ocean of disorder” (27th February, 1912).
“The Portuguese Parliament has given the natives not justice nor good
administration, but—the right to vote, and this in order that it may be
possible to say grandiloquently that all Portuguese, white or black, have
equal rights in the eyes of the law: To the native of Africa or Timor,
totally ignorant of what is a Parliament or politics, to the native from
whom we have torn his land, whom we have exploited for centuries, to this
native without education or hospitals or schools or roads, to whom we
give nothing, for whom we do nothing, and from whom we derive no small
profit in the plantations of São Thomé and the mines of the Rand and in
so many other ways. Parliament has granted not a better justice or more
protection or a good administration adequate to his present state, but
the right to vote” (_O Seculo_, 20th November, 1912). The same newspaper
declared in a subsequent article that the sale of any part of the
colonies would be a fatal blow to Portuguese nationality, and a public
confession of insolvency “so ardently desired by Germany.” The sale of
Timor or Macao or Guinea would only be the thin end of the wedge. This
is the view commonly held in Portugal. Yet Spain, after having looked
askance even at the co-operation of foreign capital in her colonies—as
does Portugal now—has learnt to regret bitterly that she did not sell
Cuba when she had the opportunity.

[Sidenote: Angola.]

Exception has been taken even to the decree allowing the transport of
foreign goods through Angola on payment of a moderate tariff, and as
this decree will not come into force until customs houses have been
built all along the frontier, many Governments are likely to have risen
and fallen in Lisbon before it ceases to be a dead letter. Meanwhile a
brisk smuggling trade goes on between Angola and the Belgian Congo. (The
duty on cotton goods imported to Angola is 250 _réis_ per kilo white,
500 _réis_ coloured. Foreign tobacco pays from 1,800 to 3,600 _réis_ per
kilo, and the duty on other articles amounts to 10, 12, 20, and 25 per
cent. of their value. Foreign imports to Portuguese Congo pay a smaller
duty, for the great majority of articles 6 per cent. _ad valorem_.)
Angola, with a thousand miles of coast, is divided into five districts:
Congo, Loanda, Benguella, Mossamedes, and Lunda, and is occupied by
5,000 troops, of which under 2,000 are Europeans. The total number of
Europeans in the colony is in normal times only about 9,000, or 2 per
cent. of the entire population. The chief exports are rubber, coffee,
wax, etc. It is a fertile land, capable of immense production when the
country can be opened up and exploited. Of course, the required outlay
for this is enormous, and the Portuguese have not been able to develop
their own European territory, have not the smallest prospect of being
able to develop Angola—a country many times the size of Portugal—not
in the twentieth century. It is sheer waste to allow this country to
remain undeveloped for want of capital which, chiefly owing to the large
potential production of rubber, would under capable administration, amply
repay itself. At present the annual deficit in Angola’s budget varies
from 800 to 1,500 _contos_, and the colony is moreover burdened by a
heavy debt. It is one of the most distressful colonies of Portugal.

[Sidenote: Mozambique.]

The immediate prospects of Mozambique are less distressing, and recently
a slight surplus has been attained, but here, too, the Hinterland is
totally undeveloped. Apart from the strip of territory along the coast
(1,400 miles in length), says M. Marvaud,[71] “l’autorité portugaise ne
se fait sentir aux indigènes qu’à coups d’expéditions militaires.” It
yields, among other products, rubber, cotton and sugar, but it depends
largely for prosperity on the traffic of the port of Lourenço Marques.
This traffic has been secured by the treaty of April, 1909, between
Mozambique and the Transvaal, but is envied by other African ports, which
may succeed in depriving Lourenço Marques of the traffic in a few years
hence, when the treaty expires. Meanwhile the natives of Mozambique leave
the colony to work in the mines of the Rand, and Mozambique thus prospers
artificially and temporarily, while its own resources are undeveloped and
the means of developing them decrease.

[Sidenote: Portuguese Guinea.]

Portuguese Guinea, with about 170,000 inhabitants, yields much the same
products as Mozambique, but its climate is unhealthy. Much of the trade
has been in the hands of Germany, and, although the soil is rich the
yearly deficit which the Lisbon Government has to meet for this colony
is, with that of Angola, the principal reason why it has been found
impossible to allow those colonies which have a surplus to keep it for
their own use.

[Sidenote: S. Thomé and Principe.]

Thus, the Budgets of the islands of São Thomé and Principe show a
yearly surplus, but they have not been permitted to utilise it for
the construction of the roads so greatly needed for their further
development. These islands produce coffee, rubber, tobacco, ginger, tea,
but over 90 per cent. of their exports consists in cocoa.

[Illustration: A SQUARE, LISBON

[_See p. 168_]

[Sidenote: The “Serviçaes.”]

As there is insufficient native labour, they are obliged to import
natives from Angola and elsewhere to work on the plantations. The
contracts with the natives stipulate that they shall be repatriated after
a certain period, but in practice they have often remained indefinitely
in a condition differing from slavery only in name. (Slavery, in name,
was abolished in 1875.) The Lisbon Government has shown a sincere desire
that the _serviçaes_ should be duly repatriated, but the interests of the
planters have been to obtain native workers where and how they could, and
to retain them permanently.

[Sidenote: Cape Verde Islands.]

Nearer home Portugal possesses the colony of the Cape Verde Islands,
population 150,000.[72] They produce maize, coffee, etc., but suffer from
drought. Their Budget hovers between a small surplus and a small deficit.

[Sidenote: Timor.]

Of their once mighty empire in the Far East the Portuguese retain Goa,
Diu, Macao, and the western half of the island of Timor (the Eastern
portion being owned by the Dutch). The administration of the Dutch
compares favourably with that of the Portuguese, and Timor’s revenue
has to be supplemented from the surplus of Macao—one of the most
disheartening features of Portugal’s colonial system.

[Sidenote: Portugal and her Colonial Empire.]

It is true that the Portuguese colonies have made some progress during
the last quarter of a century, and that their exports to Lisbon tend to
increase, but they are still a drag on Portugal’s energies and finances.
Yet, of course, the Portuguese have the feeling that if they refuse to
part with any of their overseas dominions and succeed at the cost of
every sacrifice in staving off bankruptcy, and keeping their colonies
together, a time may come two or three centuries hence when Portugal may
once more be a flourishing empire. Perhaps with less centralisation
and, consequently, more continuity in the administration of the colonies
a greater measure of success will be attained. No one will refuse to
pay a tribute to the energy and ability of some Portuguese colonial
Governors. Certainly Great Britain would rejoice to see these vast
regions ably administered and developed at the hands of her ancient
ally. But despite their obstinate resolution to part with no inch of
territory, the Portuguese have by no means learnt to think imperially;
indeed, the interest in the colonies seems only to flicker into life when
there is thought to be some danger of losing them. And it is clear that
generations must elapse before the most painstaking and energetic action
on their part meets with financial reward. Many observers have thus come
to the conclusion that Portugal would be well advised to sell a part of
her enormous overseas possessions.

[Sidenote: Portugal’s Future.]

But against the notion of those who say that Portugal is dying, slowly
dying, it is necessary to enter a strong protest. If reference is made to
Portugal’s future, “But has Portugal a future?” ask these sceptics. And
the answer is that she has not only a future but a great future. She is
in the fortunate position of having accomplished great deeds and having
great deeds to accomplish. By no means _un peuple qui s’en va_. Rather
_un peuple qui revient_. For, in the sixteenth century, Portugal may be
said to have conquered a whole world and lost her own soul. The reverse
process is now before her: to begin with Portugal’s own development and
prosperity and so work outwards, and no one will contend that to convert
Portugal from its miserable state into a flourishing and contented
country will not merit all the praises won by Portugal’s discoveries and
conquests of yore.

[Sidenote: The Republicans.]

But this prosperity cannot be sudden. Public opinion abroad, at least,
has never asked of the Republicans one half of what they have constantly
given, in words. No one expected the Portuguese people to become
enthusiastic electors after a century of indifference to politics, or
to cease to be illiterate at the promulgation of a decree. What is asked
of them is that they should not indulge in continual disturbances. The
majority of Portuguese Republicans are perhaps rather weak and vague, but
kindly, well-intentioned persons, anxious for peace and the prosperity
of Portugal, and it may be imagined how mortifying to them have been the
criticisms brought upon the Republic by action of the extremists. These
extremists have to be eliminated before it is possible to work for the
welfare of Portugal, that is, the gradual development of the Portuguese
nation on lines essentially Portuguese.

[Sidenote: The Clerical Question.]

With a people so ready to assimilate foreign customs, it is urgent not
to dose it with a French atmosphere, but to encourage all that is truly
national and all too ready to disappear. Along these lines it should not
be very difficult to find a solution for the clerical question which has
assumed serious proportions since the Revolution. On the occasion of
the third anniversary of the Law of Separation between Church and State
in Portugal, the Premier, Snr. Bernardino Machado, wrote that it was
“in its essence a law of defence and of social pacification.” Only if
pacification means unrest can these words correspond with reality. The
best way to restore a spirit of quietness will be to revise carefully
the Law of Separation, or, if the Democrats continue to oppose any such
revision, to repeal the law and enter into a new Concordat between
Portugal and the Vatican.

[Sidenote: Decentralisation.]

The character of the people will have to be consulted, too, in the
question of decentralisation. A sudden change is not likely to be more
beneficial than an imported anti-clericalism. The divorce between Lisbon
and the provinces will no doubt go lessening as communications improve.
So long as Portugal is in the grip of a stringently centralised political
machine, it is idle to expect any benefit from passing decrees which
entrust certain affairs, for instance, construction and repair of roads,
to the municipal authorities, more especially as these decrees do not
always provide any clue as to how the necessary funds are to be raised.

[Sidenote: Local Autonomy.]

But perhaps it would be possible to give the town councils a
provisional autonomy in the matter of primary schools, sanitation,
roads, etc., interesting their vanity in the result, taking advantage
of local patriotism; or, in cases of signal neglect, imposing fine
or disfranchisement. A decree of the Republic (dated 4th May, 1911)
has attempted something of the sort for agriculture by imposing an
additional tax of five _centavos_ per _hectare_ on uncultivated land,
and the condition that, if it is still uncultivated in twenty years, it
shall become State property. But that savours perhaps too much of State
interference in private property. At any rate, the advantage of some such
scheme of decentralisation would be that the State would say to the town
councils: “I will give you complete freedom in these matters, and, far
from interfering to a greater degree, will not interfere at all if you
will help yourselves.”

[Sidenote: On the Black List.]

A list of towns and villages might be printed at the end of ten years
and posted up throughout the country, or rather two lists, the second
being the black list of towns or villages which had failed to give any
serious attention to the schools, roads, etc. These would still be kept
under strict supervision, whereas the others might be allowed complete
independence in these matters, gradually, according to their degree of
merit. It would be a duty of the Civil Governors to visit the towns and
villages in their districts, with the help, when necessary, of Government
inspectors, and it might be possible to include the quality of bread, the
water supply, the cleanliness of hôtels and inns, tidiness of streets,
and a few such subjects in the inquiry without causing it to degenerate
into an inquisition. One is the more inclined to attribute vast
importance for Portugal’s future to little questions of this kind after
reading through lengthy decrees, many of the clauses of which are copied
more or less closely from earlier French decrees and are, in relation to
actual conditions in Portugal, of a theoretical, abstract nature.

[Illustration: CEDAR AVENUE, BUSSACO

[_See p. 85_]

[Sidenote: “Accursed Politics.”]

Politics are, unhappily, becoming more than ever the burning question
at the expense of administration, penetrating the whole life of the
nation, _a maldita politica_, as the Portuguese themselves say bitterly.
Perhaps future historians will regard as the gravest fault of the
Republic that it has thus exalted politics and even saturated education
with politics. Perhaps this is the natural result of a revolution by a
minority. The author of _Ethiopia Oriental_ tells a touching story of how
a lion chased its prey to a river’s bank, where it succeeded in seizing
its hindquarters. A hippopotamus, however, then put in an appearance,
and seized the rest, and in the tug-of-war that ensued, as Portugal
now between her political factions, the unfortunate animal had a very
disagreeable time. But the country becomes every day more disgusted with
politics, and craves for honest non-political administration. It is to be
hoped that the rotative politics of Lisbon will soon have had their day,
and that with the spread of education the Portuguese people will awake
from its long sleep of torpor and come into its own.

[Sidenote: The Restoration.]

Critics of the Republic have to ask themselves what they have to set in
its place. Is the Monarchy, which in October, 1910, melted away like
snow in the sun, even willing to return? The Royalists in Portugal have
amply shown their weakness, and the active supporters of King Manoel seem
to be as few as those of Dom Miguel. “Active,” since, just as in Spain
Carlism as an active cause is dead but survives in spirit, in Portugal
a spirit that would find greater satisfaction in a Restoration than
in the Republic is widespread. It is especially difficult to forecast
the future of Lisbon politics because in their general atmosphere of
indifference and _laissez-aller_ it is always open to a person or group
of persons to impose themselves—for a short period—in a sudden outbreak
of energy. It might not be difficult to restore the Monarchy temporarily
by a sudden _coup d’état_: the difficulty would be to maintain it. A
restoration brought about by force now would create a very dangerous and
unsatisfactory situation. Not to speak of the constant danger to which
the King would be exposed (and _O Mundo_, which has declared that there
is as little right to be a Royalist in Portugal as to be a protector
of assassins, has shown how closely it is in league with assassins by
warning King Manoel that he will be shot like his father if he returns
to Portugal), there would be a perpetual renewal of conspiracies.
The Republicans, far from being crushed, would gain new adherents by
constantly asserting that if they had but been given a free hand they
would have performed wonders for the people and for Portugal. It is
thus essential that the Republicans should be given a free hand to show
what they can do. This will be seen if they are left in peace by their
opponents till, say, the year 1920. Royalists who have their cause really
at heart will have the wisdom to wait and not injure it, perhaps fatally,
by foolish and precipitate action. The Royalists sometimes say that the
Republic has manifestly failed because it has increased the tendency
to disorder and indiscipline, and rendered the financial situation
more critical; but it would perhaps be fairer to say that it will have
manifestly failed should the next period of five or six years resemble
the first, since three or four years is not a very long period by which
to form a definite opinion of a new _régime_ after a revolution.

[Sidenote: The “Republica Radical.”]

But, judging from the past, no one can be very optimistic. A considerable
number of Republicans at Lisbon desire a more radical Republic. The
stages are to be from The Monarchy to Republic, and from _bourgeois_
Republic to Socialist Republic, or the _Republica Radical_. It was in the
same sense that Don Pablo Iglesias, leader of the Spanish Socialists,
prophesied in 1910 that the Portuguese Republic would not long be content
to remain of the _bourgeois_ type.

[Sidenote: Manual Labour.]

A Republic of workmen, in which all who did not spend at least five hours
a day in manual labour would be disfranchised, would be a delightful
experiment. A Republic of principles so excellent would not, however,
suit the character of the Portuguese very well—a people that still
looks askance at manual labour as illiberal, even to the carrying
of a parcel in the street, and loves the liberal professions and
idleness-with-a-sense-of-importance. Yet if Portugal wishes to be really
revolutionary she would adopt this programme of manual labour (with
alternative of military service) for all under sixty years of age from
Minister to miner, from President to ploughman, the only sure remedy for
a great many modern social problems. And there are other revolutionary
methods by which Portugal in the twentieth century might prove herself
original and win the admiration of Europe, for instance by ordaining that
women who do a man’s work should receive a man’s wages, or by teaching
the people to depend on themselves and not on the State, or by abolishing
the whole system of party politics.

[Sidenote: Abolition of Party Politics.]

Hitherto her revolutions have only increased the domain of politics, and
each party in turn beseeches the country to look to it exclusively with
mouth agape for the fruit to drop in. Yet it becomes increasingly evident
that the only problem for all Portuguese who love their country is the
rooting out of that kind of party politics which has infested and ruined
the country for three-quarters of a century. The remedy is for all such
true patriots to club together and found a party and a Press which will
have nothing to say to clericalism and anti-clericalism and other such
questions, never for a moment discuss them—what have they to do with the
government of a State?—will not concern itself with personal ambitions,
merely looking upon the State as a public department of police and civil
servants, implying hard work, and pay far less than would be earned by
men of similar intelligence devoted to industry.

[Sidenote: Work for Patriots.]

Above all, such a party would encourage the people to expect nothing from
the State and everything from themselves. It would thus begin with the
individual and teach him to cultivate his own garden, a lesson enormously
needed in a country so inclined to vague ideals and actual _desleixo_. In
its Press and in public speeches throughout the countries it would show
by concrete facts and figures the immeasurable good achieved in certain
districts by a single landowner living on his land and looking after
his tenants and estate, or a single priest looking after his parish and
leaving politics to look after themselves, or even on a smaller scale by
a single peasant family with a knowledge of cleanliness and good cooking.

[Sidenote: A Portuguese Party.]

These real patriots would be so undignified politicians that they
would not in their speeches mention a single “ism,” but they would
tell the people what one village had gained in health by a good
sanitation, what another had gained in wealth by having roads well
built and well repaired. They would not inveigh against the Capitalist
or the Conservative or the Anarchist, but they would attack and, if
possible, bring to book those who palm off on the people sandals made
of blotting-paper and bread made of sawdust. In a word, they would be
concerned with the concrete, leaving abstract problems for philosophers
of the study. And since most other parties are engaged in importing
high-sounding programmes from abroad, this new party might well call
itself the Portuguese Party, and its newspaper the Portuguese People.
The peasants of Portugal, witty, intelligent, eager to learn, will
respond to words that mean something to their daily lives, and are not
merely pompous polysyllables and the beating of the big political drum.
The future of Portugal lies with them, and the party which succeeds
in improving the people’s health in body and soul will have paved the
way for better times. In this, indeed, all parties are agreed, but
their favourite method is to make a great sound and fury of words, and
to promise the people that if it will but follow that party only some
decree will be passed which, before the new moon, will have changed them
from black to white, from lean kine into fat kine. Yet a party which
really had the people’s interests at heart would go to work much more
gradually, not through the abstract People but through the individual
and the family, and would make it clear that the people had nothing to
expect of the party, and the party asked nothing of the people. By such
obvious sincerity the people would be brought to listen to this party,
and to learn to live their own lives—each family its life in health and
independence. How far removed this creed from Liberty, Humanity, and
other such stereotyped catchwords, yet how infinitely more conducive to a
prosperous future for Portugal!

[Sidenote: Conciliatory Methods.]

It cannot be too often repeated that such strident questions as
anti-clericalism are to a great extent factitious in Portugal, and not of
natural growth. The more conciliatory and apparently weaker policy of Dr.
Arriaga, the President, and Snr. Antonio José de Almeida, has really been
less far removed from the realities of Portuguese life than the policy
of Dr. Affonso Costa, who is considered the clever practical politician
among his more idealist colleagues. The more tolerant attitude towards
priests and Royalists has proved to be not only the kindlier but the
wiser policy. This attitude became a fact in the hands of General Pimenta
de Castro. His wise and moderate government made it more doubtful than
ever if Portugal, which gained nothing by one revolution, would be the
gainer by a second.

[Sidenote: The Royalists.]

The Restoration must be peaceful and gradual if it is to be permanently
successful. The extreme usefulness to the Republic of Royalist
conspiracies has been fully recognised by the “White Ants” and
_Carbonarios_, and the Royalists themselves are now convinced that it is
not by incursion or conspiracy that they will advance their interests.
They realise that without any such methods Royalism is likely to gain
strength, has indeed already done so. No doubt many distrust the idea of
the accession of Dom Miguel because of the reactionary traditions of the
Miguelist party, a distrust antiquated but not unnatural. On the other
hand, the Manuelist cause is weak because King Manoel, being then in his
teens and brought suddenly to the throne by the murder of his father and
brother, had not time to show that he possessed the qualities of a strong
ruler. Strangely enough, some Portuguese who profess and call themselves
Portuguese, have no hesitation in saying that the best solution would be
a foreign prince, English or Italian, imposed by foreign intervention.

[Sidenote: Longing for Peace and Stability.]

The real inference is that they desire above all things a strong and
stable Government, and are heartily tired of a state of affairs which
seems to make a continuity of policy or any long period of order and
quiet alike impossible. A Restoration in a few years’ time may best
secure such continuity, and if there is a single fair and practical
reform opposed by the Royalists the Republicans will do well to name it.

[Sidenote: Monarchy and Empire.]

Not that a Restoration need be considered of any very great importance:
if the moderate Republicans can provide a stable Government sensible
Royalists would no doubt cease from all opposition to the Republic.
But, of course, a Monarchy is in accordance with the old traditions of
Portugal, and has value with regard to the colonial empire, in which
unrest has increased, and very naturally, since the Revolution: the
natives more readily yield obeisance to a king than to an abstraction.
And there would be no danger of the Royalists setting themselves to
persecute in their turn after a Restoration, since they are well aware
how great would be the outcry throughout Europe. A few political
careers, certainly, would be cut short, but perhaps the country would
not be greatly the loser. The Monarchy has value, too, in international
relations, and the Republicans do not attach sufficient importance,
for instance, to King Carlos’ foreign visits and to the visits of
foreign princes to Lisbon during his reign. They class them among the
extravagances of the Monarchy. These advantages will probably be thrown
into even greater relief by another five years of Republic.

[Sidenote: Labels.]

If the adversaries of the Republic will but refrain from all movement of
rebellion or incursion, the next five years will show with sufficient
clearness whether the permanent tranquillity ardently desired by the
Portuguese people is to be labelled Monarchy or Republic. It is after all
little more than a label (the label “Monarchy” being more useful in an
Empire); the _thing_ required is a Government willing and able to employ
the services of all Portuguese in the work of making Portugal once more
great and prosperous, to give free scope to individual energies under a
_régime_ of true liberty and toleration.

[Sidenote: Trifles.]

It has been the folly of the Republicans not to yield on small,
unessential questions. They have laid stress on such secondary matters as
the new flag (the loud and ugly colours of which will never be readily
accepted by the Portuguese nation, or so affirm those who know the
Portuguese intimately), on the alteration of names of streets and squares
throughout the country. They have made a parade of much legislation. A
new heaven and a new earth. Yet it would have been a wiser policy on
their part not to make so much of these little harassing novelties, but
more quietly to work at necessary essential changes.

[Sidenote: Internal Floating Debt.]

A writer in 1908 remarked that “If only the Government could cease to
have recourse to the floating debt agriculture in Portugal would be able
to obtain the cheap capital which it needs.” But the Republic has added
thousands of _contos_ yearly to the internal floating debt, and capital
has greater inducement than ever to flee from agriculture in order to
provide State loans. Here a radical change was required. Nor will Dr.
Costa’s property-tax benefit agriculture. It is more likely to increase
emigration. The docile peasants of Portugal, if they find the conditions
of their life becoming harder and more precarious, do not think of
protesting. A few conflicts have occurred between peasants and the
Republican Guard, and the villagers have armed themselves with scythes
and pitchforks to protect their churches in the North. But mostly they
emigrate, leaving the political parties at Lisbon to devise and squabble
over intricate and theoretical measures of legislation.

[Sidenote: Facts of Twofold Import.]

But there is a reverse and more promising side to all this. That Lisbon
politics are Lisbon politics, and are not genuinely Portuguese politics,
but a foreign froth on the surface of the sleeping nation, that the
majority of Portuguese cannot read or write, that many of those who can
read and write are perfectly indifferent to politics, are all facts of
twofold import, since, however deplorable in themselves, they imply
that the Portuguese people has not yet had fair trial, and that it may
well have a future before it. The character of the peasants outside the
immediate influence of Lisbon has many sterling qualities. The problem
consists in educating them without depriving them of their qualities,
in civilisation without the demoralising effect of great cities; and
indeed in the coming age of rapid communications city life will no doubt
be largely a thing of the past. The educated Portuguese of Lisbon, far
gone in introspective analysis and pessimism, is inclined readily to
believe that the Portuguese are a dying and decadent race; but the truer
view is that the Portuguese nation is still unborn. It may make its
mark on history in future centuries as a few individual Portuguese did
in the fifteenth and sixteenth. The future of the nation is, perhaps
fortunately, not bound up with that of the Democrats, as the Democrats
would have us believe, for the Portuguese nation with a future is
precisely all that part of the population which has remained indifferent
to the Republican creed, and has not been affected by Republican
promises.

[Illustration: A STUDY IN COSTUMES]

[Sidenote: Natural Reaction.]

It appears even that the educated youth (as at Coimbra), in a natural
reaction, is now more inclined to turn to religious and other serious
questions than it was a generation ago, and it is thus doubtful whether
the Republic will be able to renovate itself and whether new politicians
will come forward to take the place of the three or four now in evidence.

[Sidenote: “Un Petit Moyen.”]

Talleyrand would say in a serious political crisis that there was still
“un petit moyen,” meaning Talleyrand. Under the Portuguese Republic the
“petit moyen” in exactly the same way has been Dr. Affonso Costa, who
has Talleyrand’s presumption although he lacks his ability. Dr. Almeida
and Dr. Camacho have never had the strength to take office, nor the good
sense permanently to unite their parties. But since Dr. Costa has not
the will or has not the courage or has not the power to do without, and
indeed to crush Snr. França Borges and his _Mundo_, and the _Carbonario_
satellites organised by the Democrat party since the Revolution, the
outlook for the Republic is not very promising.

[Sidenote: The Lisbon Republic.]

The Republicans have become a shrinking circle. At Oporto, where the
Republicans were always few, they have not increased since 1910. This
is admitted sincere Republicans. For instance, _A Republica_ of 7th
March, 1914: “Oporto is not sensibly more Republican to-day than it was
on the 5th of October, 1910. The Republican party then at Oporto was
so plainly in a minority that it was unable even to win the municipal
elections.” Able men such as Dr. Duarte Leite and Snr. Bazilio Telles
tend more and more to hold aloof from politics. Only at Lisbon a great
part, probably the larger half of the inhabitants, in quantity if not
in quality, is enthusiastically Republican. It is likely to remain so
for several years. The Lisbon shopkeepers have accepted with all the
simple want of faith of the half-educated the assertion that all the
evils of Portugal came from religion and the Jesuits. For the present
they are kept in expectation of the golden age that was to follow the
expulsion of the religious orders by a multitude of projects. Every day
_O Seculo_, the most widely-read Republican newspaper, appears with some
new proposition, the reorganisation of the Army, the construction of a
fleet, the acquisition of aeroplanes, the extension of railways, roads, a
bridge across the Tagus, and so forth. Of course nothing is done, but the
illusion of a new age is maintained. If in a few more years it is seen
that nothing of all this has been accomplished, that deficits continue,
and taxes increase, probably the Lisbon world of industry and commerce
will reconsider its political opinions. There have been too many projects
and too much self-analysis at Lisbon. It may be seen from the quotations
given in this book that the Portuguese Republic has had a few bitter and
outspoken critics in its midst.

[Sidenote: Impunity for Outrages.]

The difficulty has been to translate their words into action. They have
called for the punishment of the authors of various outrages, but have
succeeded at the most in bringing about—an additional outrage. Thus,
when Snr. Pimenta, a member of the Evolutionist party, placed on his
programme at a recent election the punishment of the delators and of the
promoters of public disorder, he was set upon at Barreiro for his pains,
and had some difficulty in escaping from the mob. And the same class of
scoundrels who wrecked the offices of all the Royalist newspapers at
Lisbon and in the provinces, are waiting to return to their nefarious
practices should occasion offer. But indeed if the moderate Republicans
realise that by every feigned indifference, every timid acquiescence in
the excesses of the minority, they are driving a nail into the coffin of
Portugal, or at least into the coffin of the Republic, they will have the
courage to unite in restraining the actions of this minority, not only
for a few months, but for ever, and they will find that the country is on
their side. So far the Portuguese might paraphrase the words of Thiers,
and say that “the Republic is the form of government which divides us
_most_.” The one idea of saving the State or improving the situation is
to split up into more parties, to initiate a new movement, to form a new
group of defence, a band of spies and delators, such as the “White Ants,”
or a party of vague idealists. But the nation will become more and more
convinced that the road to prosperity does not lie through politics.

[Sidenote: “A Tolerant Progressive Republic.”]

“A violent change of Government at present,” wrote _O Socialista_ (14th
July, 1913), (now _A Vanguarda_, organ of the Socialists), “may be
welcomed by those honest Republicans and sincere patriots who desire a
modern, tolerant, progressive Republic, and a period of tranquillity
and careful work for their country.” A modern, tolerant, progressive
Government would unite all but the merest handful of extremists in the
common cause of Portugal. Only it is necessary to emphasise the fact
that the Government must not be tolerant of crimes and indiscipline,
since this appears to have been constantly overlooked by Republican
Governments. The punishment of one crime will save many. It is extremely
improbable that the second and far worse Gymnasio Theatre outrage would
have occurred had the authors of the first been punished. But low as the
Republic has sunk by thus winking at these iniquities, it is not too late
for it to consolidate and retrieve itself because the longing for peace
and tranquillity is so prevalent in the country, and the fear of another
political upheaval so great.

[Sidenote: Docility of the People.]

If the Republic proved itself not necessarily a very able or a very
original or a very attractive _régime_, but merely fair and conciliatory,
it could win over all the quiet, docile inhabitants of Portugal, that is,
over 90 per cent. of the population. Portugal should not be a difficult
country to govern if it is once made clear that those who get out of
hand and go from words (which no wise ruler in Portugal would ever
attempt to check) to deeds, will be exemplarily punished. Docility is the
rule, and acquiescence, so long as the acquiescent are allowed the right
of perpetual sarcasm and ridicule, which are, indeed, the safety-valve of
Portuguese politics. The occasional movements of a more serious nature
might be curbed more efficaciously by shooting one or two ringleaders
than by imprisoning hundreds of men for months and then trying and
acquitting them. They leave the prisons with a sense of injustice
suffered and are henceforth confirmed enemies of the Government. But the
Democrat Republicans have shown the strangest determination to turn the
indifferent into enemies and to alienate friends.

[Sidenote: The New Inquisition.]

There is scarcely a politician or newspaper outside the Democrat party
which has not been attacked and insulted. Under the searching action
of this party the Republic been in danger of being limited to a few
thousands, of convinced Democrats and ardent Republicans no doubt, but a
few isolated thousands. And so inquisitorial have been their methods that
they have in fact a right to consider themselves lineal descendants of
the Portuguese Inquisition, which so vigilantly sought out and punished
“new Christians” and heretics. They are thus disciples of the very body
of men whom they least admire, but extremes meet. (The pity is that the
extremists meet also, as the streets of Lisbon have reason to remember.)
They have been in too great a hurry. Fresh adherents to the Republic can
only come gradually if they come at all. And gradually must come the
benefits, if any, that the Republic is to confer upon Portugal. The evils
are four hundred years old, and it is absurd to attribute them to Dom
Luiz or Dom Carlos, or Snr. João Franco; and still more absurd to pretend
to end them by drawing up a hundred or so new laws.

[Sidenote: Confused Rhetoric.]

The work of the Provisional Government was “gigantic, marvellous,
superb,” declared the Republican deputy, Snr. Alexandre Braga. “Never
again,” he said in a dithyrambic speech, typical of the muddy thinking
of the day, “never again will the family in Portugal return to the state
demoralising hypocrisy to which it was nailed by the rigid dogma that
forbade divorce. Never again will woman’s dignity be bespattered by
lies and disloyalty and treachery through having to hide as a disgrace
the pure flame of her true love [_i.e._, for some one not her husband].
Never again will the children be poisoned by the lethal infiltration of a
Jesuit education. No more cloisters, no more superstition, no more showy
and mercenary charity....”

[Sidenote: Discipline.]

Yet it was more not less discipline that Portuguese society required.
Fatal to Portugal is likely to prove the policy which seeks deliberately
to undermine all authority—of the family (by new facilities given to
divorce); of the priest (by instituting public worship societies); of the
landowner (by taxing him to a fourth or more of his income), of the Army
(by subjecting it to the _Carbonarios_), of the police (by encouraging
“White Ants” and mob to take the law into their own hands), of justice
(by dismissing and banishing those judges who refuse to be influenced by
politics), of the law (by shaping it entirely to party ends).

[Sidenote: The Constitution.]

Some clauses of the present Constitution are excellent, but they are
dead letters. In Chapter II (concerning the rights and guarantees of
individuals), for instance, clause 4 decrees that “Liberty of conscience
and belief is inviolable.” So “No one can be persecuted on the ground
of religion” (clause 6); “Expression of thought in whatever form is
completely free, without previous censure” (clause 13; but, proceeds this
clause, the abuse of this right is liable to punishment); “The right
of meeting and association is free” (clause 14); “The inviolability of
private houses is guaranteed” (clause 15); “No one can be arrested
without a warrant” (clause 18); “The secrecy of the post is inviolable”
(clause 28); “Citizens may resist any order which infringes the
guarantees of the individual, unless these guarantees have been suspended
by law” (clause 37). It is certainly time to put these excellent precepts
into practice.

[Sidenote: The Tyranny of a Minority.]

“_Paz ponen los omes entre si á las vezes_,” said King Alfonso X some
seven centuries ago: “men sometimes make peace with one another”; and
this is still occasionally the case. There is no reason why all moderate
and patriotic Portuguese should not unite to eliminate the extremists.
It ill befits Portugal’s dignity that a body of some six thousand should
tyrannize over a population of six millions. There is scope for the
activities of all Portuguese, room for the interests of all, in Portugal
and in the Portuguese colonies.

[Sidenote: Foreigners and Portugal.]

But so long as this small minority dominates and systematically stifles
the voice of the majority of the Portuguese and gags the Portuguese
Press, foreign criticism will be legitimate and necessary. The Democrats
constantly misrepresent all such criticism as hostility towards Portugal
(instead of hostility towards the _Carbonarios_ and Democrats), a
misrepresentation which excites much amusement among those who know
that nine-tenths of the inhabitants of Portugal detest and fear their
despotism. Foreign critics must be few and ignorant indeed who are
animated by dislike of Portugal or the Portuguese. Most foreigners after
a sojourn in Portugal take away the most pleasant impressions of the
land and people, and they deplore the fact that it should be possible to
say of Portugal, as was once said of Spain, that it has been given every
blessing except that of a good Government. Rich in its sea and soil, and
subsoil and climate, rich in buildings, traditions and literature from a
glorious past, fortunate in the intelligent and progressive character of
the inhabitants, Portugal possesses splendid advantages.

[Sidenote: Individual Enterprise.]

That these advantages should be turned to account depends rather on the
individual energy and enterprise of every Portuguese than on politics.
All that should be desired of the Government is that it should afford a
fair and open field for individual effort. And every Portuguese who lives
not in Paris but in Portugal, who devotes himself to hard work instead of
some so-called liberal profession, and who in his own immediate sphere of
action encourages among the peasants cleanliness and regard for health,
and among the educated toleration and discipline, will do more for
Portugal than all the wordy warfare of the party politicians.

[Sidenote: Foreign Importations.]

Gil Vicente, four centuries ago, implored his countrymen “not to be
Genoese but very Portuguese,” and, if the Portuguese wish to renew that
respect in which, on account of their past history, they are still held
abroad, they will make Portugal not less but more Portuguese. And since
all the troubles of Portugal during the last hundred years have come
from foreign importations, of language, literature, politics, habits,
imperfectly adapted to the requirements, customs, and character of
Portugal, there are a hundred ways in which this can be done, as for
instance, by purifying the language from Gallicisms and empty pomposities
(a Lisbon political party has recently declared its programme to be
_procurar effectivar uma politica de realizações_: the gorgeous sound
of it stuns an audience, but the words are really as empty as a pod
that rattles in the wind after shedding all its seeds); by encouraging
regional literature; by living the Portuguese country life which formed
a delightful feature in Portugal before the foreign conquests of the
sixteenth century drew all men to Lisbon. Even the importation of foreign
capital has been a doubtful gain, and has either been squandered with
small result or been applied by foreigners. “Our principal railway
company is foreign, our electric trams foreign, the gas company is
largely constituted by foreign capital, our chief exports, as those of
cork, preserves, wine of Oporto and Madeira, copper, etc., are in the
hands of foreigners, a great part of our external commerce and transports
is carried on by foreigners” (_O Seculo_, 13th November, 1911). And,
worst of all, the political programmes are foreign. Foreigners may be
inclined to smile when they see foreign customs and institutions (as the
English parliamentary system) distorted and misapplied in Portugal, but
for all that is genuinely Portuguese they can have nothing but admiration
and respect.

[Sidenote: Local Influence.]

With a population so docile and ready to learn, above all so inclined
to prefer some distant uncertainty to the reality before them, it is
all-important to have a strong non-political influence in each parish,
whether that influence be of priest or professor, doctor or landowner.
Without some such nucleus more and more will vagueness and bewilderment
drive the peasant in a stream of emigration to Lisbon and Brazil, and
Portugal become denationalised.

[Sidenote: Scope for all Portuguese.]

That “violent change” advocated by _A Vanguarda_ in 1913 was brought
about two years later by the movement, without violence, which brought
General Pimenta de Castro into power. Snr. Manoel de Arriaga and General
Pimenta de Castro deserve the lasting gratitude of their country for
having attempted to provide the first indispensable conditions for all
those who wish to work for the good of Portugal. A Government of this
kind, impartial, conciliatory, and firm, offered to every Portuguese
without exception—even Snr. Paiva Conceiro, the leader of the Royalist
incursions of 1911 and 1912, was allowed to return—an opportunity to
lay politics aside and unite to raise Portugal from her present misery.
Every sincere Portuguese will admit that there is much work ready to his
hand which has little to say to politics, if it be only the development
of an acre of land or the reconciliation between two rival points of
view. And another sign of good omen is the more serious outlook on life
of the younger generation and the existence of a new party—that of the
Integralists—which is inclined to set to work obscurely, gradually,
unconventionally, with a view to the actual needs of the people, of the
professional working man.

[Sidenote: New Conquests.]

Every great—or small—landowner who takes a personal interest in his
property, every non-political politician—the phrase is no contradiction
in terms—who studies not rhetoric but reality, every Portuguese, however
humble, who cultivates his own garden, whether that garden be the
Portuguese language or literature or soil or subsoil or industry, will
go a step towards constituting a real Portugal of the Portuguese, and
will deserve as many laurels of his country as crown the brows of the old
_Conquistadores_.

FOOTNOTES

[1] _Censo da População de Portugal._ No 1ᵒ de Dezembro de 1911. Lisboa,
Imprensa Nacional, 1913.

[2] The only towns with over 20,000 inhabitants are Lisbon (435,359),
Oporto (194,009), Setubal (30,346), Braga (24,647), and Coimbra (20,581).

[3] 11th February, 1913.

[4] 12th February, 1913.

[5] _Sertorio do Monte Pereira. A producção agricola_ (in _Notas sobre
Portugal_).

[6] _Ambassade en Espagne et en Portugal_ (_en_ 1552). Par Philippe de
Caverel. Arras, 1860.

[7] _Milreis_, _duro_, dollar, or roughly 4s., but varying from 3s. to
4s., according to the exchange.

[8] Manuel Teles, _A Contribuição Predial_. Porto, 1914.

[9] The _hectare_ = two and a half acres.

[10] They yield resin, are used for building throughout Portugal, and are
exported for various purposes, including that of props in mines.

[11] A cork-tree is stripped once in ten years, yielding about £2.

[12] _Notas sobre Portugal._ Lisbon, 1908.

[13] Chiefly pine and oak, but also including ash, elm, poplar, nut,
eucalyptus, acacia, etc.

[14] Joaquim Ferreira Borges, _A Silvicultura em Portugal_ (in _Notas
sobre Portugal_).

[15] Trees, as well as fish and game, suffered severely from the decree
of King Manoel I, throwing open the private _coutadas_.

[16] In 1907 the roads in existence are given as 11,754 _kilomètres_
(6,058 main, 5,180 secondary, and 516 by-roads).

[17] 15th April, 1914.

[18] The posts and telegraphs in Portugal yield the State a steady yearly
surplus of several hundred _contos_.

[19] See Joaquim de Vasconcellos, _A Ceramica portuguesa_. Porto, 1894.
In 1905 the export of _azulejos_ was 53 tons (of which 37 went to Brazil).

[20] In an old chronicle a British force having landed to help a
Portuguese army in the siege of a town, one of the besiegers, to inform
the besieged of the fact, asks sarcastically if they are in need of cloth
from England.

[21] Commerce is not more flourishing than industry. The percentage of
merchant ships entering the Tagus has recently (_i.e._, just before the
war) been given as follows: 34 German, 33 British, 9 French, 9 Dutch, 7
Portuguese, and 8 of other nations.

[22] Some English wine companies at Oporto date from the seventeenth
century.

[23] An acre of vines may cost about £35 to plant, and will not really
repay the planter till after its sixth year.

[24] The cork is exported partly in a raw state, owing to the higher
Customs duty on manufactured cork in Germany and some other countries.
In Alemtejo it is so common that it is used to make articles of the most
various kinds, taking the place of wood or tin.

[25] Joaquim José Ventura da Silva: _Descripção topografica da
nobilissima cidade de Lisboa_. Lisboa, 1835.

[26] _Memoria sobre Chafarizes, Bicas, Fontes e Poços publicos._ Lisboa,
1851.

[27] By the Rev. William Bradford (London, 1814).

[28] See Dr. J. Leite de Vasconcellos’ fascinating _Ensaios
Ethnographicos_, 4 vols. (1896-1910).

[29] For the description of a _romaria_ (pilgrimage) see Snr. Teixeira de
Queiroz’ novel, _A Cantadeira_. Lisboa, 1913.

[30] See Dr. Alves dos Santos: _O Ensino primario em Portugal_, in _Notas
sobre Portugal_.

[31] _O Ensino._ Por Bernardino Machado. Coimbra, 1898.

[32] _Ibid._, p. 242.

[33] See _A Instrucção secundaria em Portugal_. Por Dr. José Maria
Rodrigues, in _Notas sobre Portugal_.

[34] Eça de Queiroz: _Ultimas Paginas_. Porto, 1912.

[35] _Miscellanea de Miguel Leitão de Andrade_, 2nd ed. Lisbon, 1867.

[36] _Livro das Grandezas de Lisboa._ 1620.

[37] Mendes dos Remedios: _Historia da Litteratura Portuguêsa desde as
origens até á actualidade_. 4a edição. Coimbra, 1914.

[38] _Obras_, 6 vols., Lisbon, 1853, with biography by Rebello da Silva;
8 vols., Porto, 1875-6, with biography by Theophilo Braga.

[39] Philéas Lebesgue: _Le Portugal littéraire d’aujourd’hui_. Paris,
1904.

[40] Fidelino de Figueiredo: _Historia da Litteratura Realista_
(1871-1900). Lisboa, 1914.

[41] That is, nearly thrice the pension (15,000 _réis_) given by King
Sebastian to the poet Camões.

[42] _Obras_, vol. ii, p. 143-6. _Floresta de Enganos._

[43] _Obras_, I, pp. 167-71. _Auto da Feira._

[44] _Obras_, II, pp. 498-502. _Romagem de Aggravados._

[45] _Obras_, II, pp. 496-7. _Rom. de Agg._

[46] _Obras_, II, pp. 520-2. _Rom. de Aggr._

[47] _Obras_, I, pp. 115-6. _Auto de Mofina Mendes._

[48] _Obras_, III, pp. 244-5. _O Clerigo da Beira._

[49] _Obras_, III, pp. 5-7. _Quem tem farelos?_

[50] _Obras_, III, pp. 179-80. _O Juiz da Beira._

[51] _Obras_, III, pp. 203-5. _Farça dos Almocreves._

[52] _Ibid._, pp. 208-9.

[53] Born at Ponta Delgada on 24th February, 1843. He took his degree at
Coimbra in 1868, and four years later became and for over forty years
has remained Professor of Literature at Lisbon. His untiring studies in
Portuguese literature have brought him a wide celebrity.

[54] Born at Valle da Vinha in 1866. He studied medicine at Coimbra
and took his degree in 1895. He wrote an article entitled “The Last
Bragança,” in a Coimbra newspaper in 1890, and was imprisoned for three
months. After his release he took part in the unsuccessful Republican
rising of 1891. He subsequently worked as a doctor in São Thomé for
nearly ten years.

[55] Born at Rio de Janeiro in 1851, the son of the first Baron Joanne.
He studied at Oporto, and was appointed Professor of Philosophy in 1879.
In 1882 he was elected deputy for Lamego, and in 1893 became Minister of
Public Works under Snr. Hintze Ribeiro. Minister for Foreign Affairs in
1910, he was then appointed Portuguese Minister at Rio de Janeiro, and
returned to become Portuguese Premier in February, 1914. In 1915 he was
elected President of the Republic by the Democrats.

[56] Born at Aljustrel. He studied medicine at Lisbon, and became an army
doctor. He succeeded the first Minister of _Fomento_, Snr. Antonio Luiz
Gomes, on 23rd November, 1910.

[57] Born at Ceia in the Serra da Estrella in 1871. He took his degree at
Coimbra in 1895, and practised as an advocate with success. In 1900 he
was returned as Republican deputy for Oporto, and took a prominent part
in opposing successive governments till the fall of the Monarchy. From
January, 1913, to January, 1914, he was Premier.

[58] Born at Lisbon in 1875. He was a lieutenant in the Navy at the
time of the Revolution, in preparing which (and in organising the
_Carbonarios_) he had taken a principal part. After the Revolution he was
raised to the rank of captain and granted a pension of 3 _contos_ (£600).

[59] Joaquim Pereira Pimenta de Castro, born at Pias, near Vianna
do Castello, in the province of Minho, in 1846. He entered the Army
(Engineers) in October, 1867, and became captain in 1874, major in
1883, lieut.-colonel in 1887, colonel in 1892, general in 1900. He has
published various works, all of a practical character, including “A
Rational and Practical Solution of the Electoral Problem,” written in
1890, and translated into French and English in 1904.

[60] João Chagas, _Cartas politicas_ (December, 1908).

[61] The decentralisation was to be less than that granted in 1878, which
over-reached itself. Each _Junta Geral_ was to be composed of twenty-five
_procuradores_ (proctors), whose duty it would be to look after the
general interests and finance of the district, the State conceding part
of its revenues to the local treasuries.

[62] Republican Ministers of Finance have taken up this project. On the
22nd of March, 1912, Snr. Sidonio Paes introduced a Bill, proposing that
all duties, excepting those on corn, rice, sugar and colonial products,
should be paid in gold. The idea, however, meets with opposition in the
Lisbon commercial world. Snr. Anselmo de Andrade’s project referred to
payment in gold of one half of the duty only.

[63] “Legislation for the moon,” according to the Republican _O
Intransigente_.

[64] The President only receives 18 _contos_, under £4,000, a year.

[65] Dr. Manoel de Arriaga 121 votes, Dr. Bernardino Machado 86 votes
(24th August, 1911). The first President of the Portuguese Republic
comes of an ancient family and has a Basque name (“the place of stones,”
or “a heap of stones,” _arri_ being probably the same word as in
Biarritz: two rocks). He was born at Horta on the 8th of July, 1840,
and studied at Coimbra. For some years he was professor of English at
the Lisbon _Lycée_. He was elected deputy for Madeira. Besides some
well-known volumes of poems it may be noted that he published in 1889
an essay condemning the penitentiary system. Although Dr. Arriaga has
never, during the last forty years or more, swerved from his Republican
principles, he has done his utmost as President to moderate the action of
the extremists, and to secure for the Republic that respect and affection
which are universally felt towards himself.

[66] Snr. Chagas, more pamphleteer than statesman, is, like many educated
Portuguese, intimately acquainted with Paris and with modern French
literature. In English literature his interest is slight, if we may judge
from his remark that “_Hamlet_ is very boring.” Yet he admires that
modern Hamlet, M. Anatole France.

[67] Dr. Brito Camacho regarded his party as a kind of make-weight
between the Radical and Conservative tendencies.

[68] It must be remembered that these are the words of a party organ
anxious to overthrow Dr. Costa’s influence. When Dr. Costa fell in 1914
the Evolutionists found themselves quite incapable of forming a Ministry.

[69] The Minister of Public Works was Snr. Antonio Maria da Silva, a
member of the _Alta Venda_ of the _Carbonaria_.

[70] _A Alliança Inglesa. Processo da Monarchia em Portugal._ Por Affonso
Ferreira. Coimbra, 1910.

[71] _Le Portugal et ses Colonies._ Par Angel Marvaud. Paris, 1912.

[72] Madeira and the Azores are considered as districts of Portugal
proper.

[Illustration: PORTUGAL.]

GLOSSARY

=Abastado.= Wealthy.

=Aga.= H.

=Agoadeiro.= Water-carrier.

=Agoureiro.= Prophetic.

=Alfandega.= Customs-house (from _Arab._).

=Alcachofra.= Thistle or artichoke (from _Arab._).

=Alem.= _Adv._ beyond (from _alli ende_). _Lancaster_, in Portuguese,
became _Alem-castro_.

=Alforges.= Saddlebags (from _Arab._).

=Algarvio.= Inhabitant of Algarve; chatterer.

=Almocreve.= Carrier (from _Arab._).

=Alto.= High.

=Amanhã.= To-morrow.

=Amendoa.= Almond.

=Amigo.= Friend.

=Andar.= To walk, to go.

=Andorinha.= Swallow.

=Anichar.= Find a place for.

=Armazem=, _plur._ _-ns_. Store, stores (from. _Arab._).

=Arranjar.= Arrange.

=Avenida.= Avenue.

=Azinheira.= Evergreen oak.

=Azulejo.= Glazed tile (from _Arab._, though commonly derived from
_azul_, blue).

=Bacalhau.= Stock-fish.

=Barraca.= Hut.

=Beirão.= Inhabitant of Beira.

=Benzedor.= Lit. = Blesser.

=Bica.= Spout of fountain, etc.

=Bilha.= Water-jar.

=Boeirinha.= _Fem. Dimin._ of _boeiro_ = Fr. _bouvier_, ox-man.

=Boas Festas.= _Bonne fête._

=Branco.= White.

=Brando.= Soft, gentle.

=Brazileiro.= Portuguese returned rich from Brazil.

=Broa.= For _Boroa_, _Borona_ (probably corruption of _Morona_),
maize-bread.

=Broinha.= _Dimin._ of _broa_.

=Bruxa.= Witch. Also night-light; also earthenware jar with holes.

=Cabo.= Cape.

=Cabula.= Idler.

=Calaceiro.= Idler.

=Calçada.= Paved way, street.

=Caloiro.= First-year student at Coimbra University.

=Campo.= Field. =No c.= In the country.

=Canga.= Yoke.

=Cantadeira.= Girl improvising songs at _romarias_, etc.

=Cantiga.= Song. Short poem = =Canto=, =Cantar=.

=Cantoneiro.= Road-mender (Fr. _cantonier_).

=Capa.= Cloak.

=Carta.= Letter.

=Casado.= Married.

=Castanha.= Chestnut.

=Cauteleiro.= Street seller of lottery tickets.

=Cavaco.= Gossip.

=Centavo= = _dezreis_, a halfpenny.

=Cera.= Wax.

=Cervo.= Stag.

=Chafariz.= Fountain (from _Arab._).

=Chegar.= To arrive.

=Charneca.= Moorland (from _Span._).

=Cheia.= Flood (from Lat. _plenus_).

=Cheiro.= Scent.

=Chiste.= Quip, jest.

=Choupal.= Poplar grove (from _choupo_).

=Chuva.= Rain (Lat. _pluvia_, Fr. _pluie_, Sp. _lluvia_).

=Cidade.= City.

=Cisne.= Swan.

=Ciume.= Jealousy.

=Clerigo.= Priest.

=Collareja.= Vegetable-seller (from village of Collares).

=Comedia= = =Comedoria=. Food.

=Conquistador.= Conqueror.

=Consoada.= Light supper, or extra meal, especially on Christmas Eve.

=Conto.= Story. =Conto (de réis)=, a tale of a million _réis_ (=
about £200).

=Cordoaria.= Place where cords or ropes are made.

=Coroça.= Cloak of reeds.

=Coutada.= Enclosed park.

=Crescer.= To grow.

=Cruz.= Cross.

=Deixarse-estar.= Let oneself be, or drift.

=Deixarse-ir.= (Fr. _laisser aller_).

=Demissionario.= Of Minister or Government about to resign.

=Desabado, Chapeo d.= Wide-brimmed hat.

=Desde.= Since, from.

=Desejar.= Desire.

=Desleixo.= Slovenliness.

=Despesas.= Expenses.

=Deus.= God.

=Dia.= Day.

=Diario.= Daily newspaper.

=Dom=, =Dona=. Sp. _Don_, _Doña_; Lat. _Dominus_.

=Donzellinha.= _Dimin._ of _donzella_, Maiden.

=Doutor.= Doctor (_e.g._, of Divinity). Doctor (M.D.) is =Medico=.

=Empregomania.= Bureaucracy.

=Ensino.= Education.

=Escudo= = _Milreis_ = about 5 francs.

=Esfolhada.= Gathering of men and women to separate maize-cobs from
their sheath.

=Esperança.= Hope.

=Estalagem.= Inn.

=Exma.= = _Excellentissima_ = most excellent.

=Fado.= Melancholy modern ballad (connected with the word “fate”).

=Fé.= Faith.

=Festa.= Holiday.

=Festejar.= Celebrate.

=Feiticeiro.= Sorcerer. Also _adj._, Charming (from _feitiço_, charm;
_cf._ Fetish).

=Fidalgo.= Nobleman.

=Fiel, eis.= Faithful.

=Filho.= Son.

=Fogareiro.= Stove.

=Formiga.= Ant.

=Fregues.= Customer.

=Furtar.= To steal.

=Futrica.= Town as opposed to Gown (at Coimbra).

=Gallo.= Cock.

=Gallego.= Inhabitant of Galicia.

=Garrido.= Fine, fair, smart.

=Gente.= People. The peasants use _a gente_ as = “I” or “we.”

=Geral.= _Adj._, General.

=Gosto.= Pleasure.

=Herdade.= Large farm or estate.

=Horta.= Vegetable garden.

=Hospedaria.= Inn, hôtel.

=Ilha.= Island.

=Infeliz.= Unhappy, miserable.

=Ingreme.= Steep.

=Janeiras.= Songs of New Year’s Day.

=Janella.= Window.

=Jardim.= Garden.

=Junta.= Committee.

=Justiceiro.= Just; practising justice.

=Ladainha.= Litany.

=Lagrimas.= Tears.

=Lamuria.= Blind beggar’s complaint.

=Laranjeira.= Orange-tree.

=Lareira.= Hearth.

=Largo.= Square.

=Lavrador.= Peasant; ploughman.

=Leilão.= Auction.

=Leziria.= Alluvial land.

=Lisboeta.= Inhabitant of Lisbon.

=Livro.= Book.

=Lua.= Moon.

=Lume.= Fire.

=Luta=, =Lucta=. Strife, struggle.

=Maçã.= Apple.

=Magico.= Magician.

=Mais.= More. (=Mas= = But.)

=Magusto.= Fire for roasting chestnuts.

=Maldito.= Accursed.

=Mansamente.= Gently.

=Marinha.= Salt-pits.

=Matto.= Moorland.

=Mavioso=, =Meigo=. Charming, delicate.

=Meia duzia.= Half-a-dozen.

=Menagem.= Oath (_Homenagem_).

=Metter.= To put, place.

=Minhoto.= Inhabitant of Minho.

=Missa.= Mass.

=Moça.= Girl.

=Mocidade.= Youth.

=Molhadinho.= _Dimin._ of _Molhado_, Wet.

=Monte.= Estate (in Alemtejo or Algarve).

=Morango= and =Morangão=. Strawberry.

=Morgadinha.= _Fem. dimin._ of _Morgado_, Heir of entailed estate.

=Mosteiro.= Monastery.

=Mundo.= World.

=Municipio.= Town Hall, Town Council.

=Murta.= Myrtle.

=Noite.= Night.

=Nortada.= North wind.

=Noticias.= News.

=Novidade.= Novelty.

=Oiro=, =Ouro=. Gold.

=Orvalhada=, =Orvalho=. Dew.

=Paço=, =Palacio=. Palace.

=Padre.= Priest (Father is Pae).

=Palmellão.= Wind from Palmella.

=Para que serve?= What is the use of?

=Passarinho.= _Dimin._ of _Passaro_, Bird.

=Pauta.= Tariff.

=Pavoroso.= Terrible.

=Pega.= Magpie.

=Poblador.= Founder = _Povoador_.

=Poço.= Well.

=Podridão.= Rottenness.

=Praça.= Square.

=Praia.= Shore.

=Pregões.= Street cries.

=Primo= or =Primo Coirmão=. Cousin.

=Pronto.= Ready.

=Pronunciamento= = Sp. _Pronunciamiento_.

=Quadra.= Quatrain.

=Quanto=, =quantos?= How much, How many?

=Quem dá?= Who gives?

=Quentinha.= _Fem. dimin._ of _Quente_, Hot. (Contraction of
_caliente_.)

=Quinta.= Country-house.

=Rabadão.= Shepherd (= _Rebanheiro_).

=Redondilhas.= Verses of four lines of eight syllables.

=Regateira.= Market-woman.

=Reis.= Kings.

=Réis.= Plural of _real_ (20 _réis_ = a penny).

=Republica.= At Coimbra University a group of students living
together.

=Rocio= = =Praça=. Square (formerly _recio_).

=Roda.= Wheel.

=Romance=, =Cantar romance=. Old ballad usually in lines of sixteen
syllables. Formerly _romance_ = common (Portuguese) language
as opposed to Latin. In modern Portuguese it = “novel.” (Fr.
_roman_.)

=Romaria.= Pilgrimage.

=Rosmaninho.= Rosemary.

=Rua.= Street. =Rua Nova=, New Street.

=S.= = =São=. Saint.

=Saber.= To know.

=Sala.= Hall.

=Saloio.= Peasant of neighbourhood of Lisbon.

=Saudade.= Wistfulness; bittersweet regret.

=Saudoso.= Filled with regret or longing.

=Sé.= Cathedral.

=Sebastianismo.= The attitude of mind that looks for the return of
King Sebastian.

=Senhor.= Sir; lord.

=Serra.= Mountain range.

=Serviçaes.= Servants; day-labourers.

=Simples.= Simple.

=Taverna=, =Taberna=. Tavern; wayside inn.

=Tejo.= Tagus (Sp. _Tajo_).

=Terra.= Earth; country.

=Terreiro.= Terrace.

=Torre.= Tower.

=Tosquia.= Shearing.

=Tourada.= Bull-fight.

=Trabalho.= Labour; sorrow; trouble.

=Trato.= Commerce.

=Tratos.= Torture.

=Travessa.= Passage; side street.

=Troça, Fazer troça de.= Satire, skit.

=V.E.= or =V. Exa.= = _Vossa Excellencia_. Your Excellence.

=Vámos.= Let us go.

=Varina.= Fishwoman (= =woman= of (O)var).

=Velho.= Old.

=Venda.= Inn (Sp. _venta_).

=Venho.= I come.

=Veraneantes.= Summer residents.

=Viagem.= Journey.

=Vintem.= Penny.

=Vossé.= You.

=Vossemecé.= Your Worship = you.

=Zagal=, =aes=. Shepherd boy (from _Arab._).

INDEX

Affonso, Prince, 116-7

⸺ I, 93, 107-8

⸺ II, 109

⸺ III, 109, 110

⸺ IV, 111

⸺ V, 115, 116

⸺ VI, 124, 125

Afforestation, 32, 33

Agriculture, 29, 37, 40

Aguadeiros, 43

Alba, Duke of, 121

Albuquerque (Affonso d’), 6, 22, 88, 117, 118, 119

Albuquerque (Bras d’), 138

Alcacer, 115

Alcacer do Sal, 109

Alcacer-Kebir, 100, 120

Alcachofras, 54

Alcoa, The, 94

Alcobaça, 21, 79, 84, 92-5

Alcoforado (Marianna de), 142

Alemtejo, 25, 31, 32, 39, 47, 59, 60, 79, 80, 82, 103, 106

Alfama, 48

Alfarrobeira, Battle of, 115

Alfonso X, 109, 110, 134

Algarve, 25, 79, 80, 82, 103, 106, 109

Algarvios, 4

Aljubarrota, 84, 95, 113, 222

Almeida (Antonio José de), 169, 176, 177, 184, 187, 245, 249

⸺ (D. João de), 204

Almeida Garrett (J. B. da S. L.) Viscount, 41, 76, 145, 152

Almourol, 100

Alpoim (José de), 186

Alvares (João), 96

_Amadis of Gaul_, 133

Amarante, 37

Ameixial, Battle of, 125

Amélie, Queen. _See_ MARIE AMÉLIE

Andrade (Anselmo de), 193

⸺ Caminha (Pedro de), 140

Angola, 235

Anti-clericalism, 29, 61-7

Antonio, Prior of Crato, 121, 122

Areias, 91

Armada, The, 122

Army, 74

Arriaga (Manoel de), 67, 201, 210, 212, 215, 245, 256

Arte de Furtar, 57, 83

Atouguia, Count of, 128

Aveiro, 39, 79

⸺ (Pantaleão de), 138

⸺, Duke of, 128

Azevedo (Victor Hugo de), 211

Azulejos, 36, 43

Azurara (Gomez Eannes de), 115, 136

Bacalhau, 30, 36

Baça, The, 94

Barbosa Machado (Diogo), 142

Barreiro, 35, 47

Barros (João de), 46, 137

Basto, 37

Batalha, 21, 84, 95-7

Beckford (William), 1

Begging, 56, 57

Beira, 25, 53, 59

Beirões, 3, 4

Beja, 38, 39, 83, 103-4

Belem, 88-9, 96

Beresford, General, 129, 130

Bernardes (Diogo), 100, 140

Bernardes (Manoel), 142

Blake, William, 72

Bocage (M. Barbosa du), 143

Bombarda (Miguel), 195

Bom Jesus, 50

Botelho (Abel), 148

Braga, 25, 38, 39, 56, 83, 100

⸺ (Alexandre), 253, 212

⸺ (Theophilo), 8, 15, 20, 70, 133, 150, 165, 166, 176, 195, 198,
215

Bragança, 38, 39, 101

Braganza, Duke of, 116

Brazileiros, 27, 55

Brito (Bernardo de), 141

⸺ Camacho (Manuel), 169, 177, 203, 249

Broas, 45, 50

Buarcos, 45

Bucellas, 37

Buiça (Manuel dos Reis), 189

Bull-fights, 55

Bureaucracy, 57, 73

Bussaco, 45, 85

Byron, Lord, 14

Cabral (Pedro Alvares), 119

Calcoen, 6-7

Caldas da Rainha, 45, 79, 82

Cambridge, Earl of, 221, 222

Camões (Luis de), 89, 140, 154-166

Canalejas (José), 175

Candido dos Reis, Admiral, 195

Cangas, 59

Cantigas, 16-19, 51-54

Cape Espichel, 91

⸺ Verde Islands, 237

Carbonaria, 180, 181, 182, 200, 204

Carcavellos, 37

Carlos I, 131, 132, 183, 184, 188, 190, 247

Carlotta, Queen, 130

Carnegie (Hon. Lancelot), 227

Cascaes, 45, 85, 121, 122

Castello Branco, 38, 39

⸺ (Camillo), 146

⸺ Melhor, Count of, 124

Castilho (A. F. de), 144

Castro (Eugenio de), 94

⸺ (Inés de), 93-5

⸺ (João de), 6, 138

⸺ (José Luciano de), 183, 191

Catharina, Queen, 224

Caverel (Philippe de), 30

Centenarians, 26

Ceuta, 114

Chagas (João), 172, 187, 190, 201, 202, 214, 218

Charneca, 91

Chestnuts, 45, 46

Chiado, 41

Cintra, 44, 45, 76, 86, 89, 91

Clenardus (N.), 83

Clergy, 63

Climate, 80

Coelho (F. Adolpho), 15

Coimbra, 25, 38, 39, 57, 58, 73, 94, 98-100

Collares, 37, 44, 78, 86

Colonies, 13, 233-8

Commerce, 37

Consiglieri Pedroso (Z.), 15

Consoadas, 50

Contos, 148

Cork, 39

Coroças, 59

Correa (Gaspar de), 137

⸺ (Garção), 143

Cortesão (Jaime), 16

Costa (Affonso da), 13, 65, 169, 171, 176, 177, 178, 179, 184, 187,
192, 205, 209, 210, 231, 232, 245, 249

⸺ (Alfredo Luis da), 189

Couto (Diogo do), 107, 137

Covilhã, 36, 100

Crato, 100

Cruz (Agostinho da), 140

⸺ (Gaspar da), 138

Customs Dues, 230

Delgado (A. G.), 80

Denis. _See_ DINIZ

Description de Lisbonne, 20

Desleixo, 10, 11

Deus (João de), 144

Diercks (Gustav), 220

Diniz, King, 33, 92, 94, 95, 103, 110, 111, 112, 135, 221, 229

⸺ (Julio), 17, 147

Douro, The, 101

Drake, 122

Drama, 149, 152

Duarte, Infante, 124

⸺ King, 5, 95, 96, 114

⸺ Leite, 205, 249

Eça de Queiroz (J. M.), 22, 74, 75, 147

Education, 58, 67-73

Elvas, 103

Elysio (Filinto), 143

Emigrants, 26, 27, 47

Esfolhadas, 15

Estoril, Os Estoris, 45, 76, 80, 81, 85, 86

Estremadura, 25, 39, 80

Euzebio (A. M.), 20

Evora, 39

Falcão (Christovam), 140, 141

Faro, 39, 79, 106

Ferdinand of Saxe Coburg Gotha, 90, 131

Fernando I, 112

⸺ Infante, 95, 96, 114

Fernandes Galvão (Francisco), 139

⸺ Trancoso (Gonçalo). _See_ TRANCOSO

Ferreira (Antonio), 95, 140, 152

⸺ d’Almeida (João), 165

Ficalho, Conde de, 60

Figueiredo (Fidelino de), 149

Finances, 229-233

Fishing, 35, 36

Folk-lore, 15

Food, 21

Foreigners and Portugal, 11, 12, 26, 254

França Borges, 187, 249

France and Portugal, viii, 75, 125

France (Anatole), 44, 202

Franco (João), 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 188, 190

Freire d’Andrade (Jacinto), 141

Freitas (João de), 209, 214

Fructuoso (Gaspar), 138

Funerals, 22

Gaia, 103

Galicia, 30, 56, 82, 107, 111

Gama (Vasco da), 6, 89, 115, 117, 138

Garrett. _See_ ALMEIDA GARRETT

Gaunt (John of), 221

Germany and Portugal, 219, 220, 227, 228

Goes (Damião de), 134, 136

Goethe (J. W. von), 62, 72

Gomes Coelho (J. G.). _See_ DINIZ (JULIO)

⸺ Freire de Andrade, General, 130

Gonçalves (Nuno), 150

⸺ Crespo, 145

Great Britain and Portugal, vii, 123, 124, 125, 216-28

Guarda, 100

Guerra Junqueiro (Abilio), 8, 17, 22, 145, 206

Guimarães, 36

Guinea, 236

Hardinge (Sir Arthur), 227

Henry, Cardinal, 120, 121

⸺ Infante, 95, 96, 98, 102, 114, 115, 150, 222

⸺ of Burgundy, 93, 100, 107

Herculano (Alexandre), 9, 40, 61, 146

Hintze Ribeiro, 183

Historia Tragico-Maritima, 138

Holdings, 30-31

Holland and Portugal, 123, 124, 125

Iglesias (Pablo de), 242

Illiterates, 1, 67, 68

Imports, 38, 39

Inns, 83, 84

Inquisition, The, 6

Integralists, 257

Irish and Portuguese, 1

Irrigation, 32

Janeiras, 50

Jesuits, 63, 128, 200

Jesus (Thomé de), 139

Jews, 4, 6

João I, 95, 96, 113, 114, 222

⸺ II, 116, 117

⸺ III, 77, 89, 119, 120

⸺ IV, 123, 223

⸺ V, 126, 127, 128

⸺ VI, 129, 130

José I, 127, 128

Juan I, 95, 112, 113

Juana, Princess, 116

Lagos, 103

Leça, The, 79

Leiria, 33, 38, 85

Leitão de Andrade (M.), 85

Leite de Vasconcellos (José), 15, 53, 151

Leonor, Queen, 113

Lima, The, 100

Limoeiro, 49

Lisbon, 4, 25, 38, 41-9, 63, 70, 88, 101, 112, 113, 168

Lopes (Fernão), 136

⸺ de Castanheda (F.), 137

⸺ de Haro (Mecia), 109

⸺ Vieira (Affonso), 94

Louzã, 100

Lucena (João de), 139

Luiz I, 131

Luso, 85

Macedo (Antonio Sousa de), 124, 125

⸺ (J. A. de), 143

Machado (Bernardino), 70, 176, 183, 192, 210, 211, 219, 239

⸺ Santos (M.), 169, 174, 177, 195, 209

Macieira (A.), 69

Mafra, 91-2

Magalhães (Luiz de), 148

Magusto, 50

Manoel I, 2, 89, 104

⸺ II, 104, 188, 191, 194, 196, 246

Manoeline Architecture, 21, 88, 96, 97

Manufactures, 36

Maria I, 128, 129

⸺ II, 90, 130, 131

⸺ Pia, Queen, 189

Marie Amélie, Queen, 90, 132, 189

Martyres (Bartholomeu dos), 138, 141

Marvell (Christopher), 90

Mathilde, Countess, 110, 111

Melgaço, 100

Mello (F. M. de), 141

Mendes Pinto (F.), 137-138

Meneses (João de), 118

Methuen Treaty, 37, 126, 225, 226

Michaëlis de Vasconcellos (C.), 133

Miguel, Dom, 131-132

Mines, 35

Minho, 20, 25, 30, 37, 39, 50, 59

Minhotos, 3, 4, 8, 56, 100

Missa do Gallo, 50

Monchique, 103

Mondego, The, 58, 79, 99

Monsão, 37

Montes Claros, Battle of, 125

Motor-cars, 34, 36

Mozambique, 236

Nabantia, 97

Nabão, The, 97

Negroes, 4

Niza, Family of, 134

Novels, 146-8

Nun’ Alvares Pereira, 22, 88, 93, 95, 113, 114, 222

Octogenarians, 26

Olive oil, 38

Oliveira (Fernando d’), 55

⸺ (Nicolas), 86

⸺ Martins (J. P.), 4, 146

Oman (C. W. C.), 194

Oporto, 25, 38, 39, 56, 70, 101-3

Ovar, 44

Pacheco Pereira (Duarte), 117

Paes (Gualdim), 97

⸺ (Maria), 108

Paiva de Andrade (Diogo), 138

⸺ Conceiro, Captain, 202, 256

Palmeirim of England, 100

Palmella, 47, 100

Payalvo, 97

Pedro I, 93, 111-2

⸺ II, 125, 126, 225

⸺ IV, 130, 131

⸺ II, 125

⸺ V, 131

⸺, Infante, 115

Pena Longa, 16

Philip II of Spain, 121

Philippa, Queen, 95, 96, 222

Pimenta de Castro, General, 179, 212, 213, 214, 215, 245, 256

Pina (Ruy de), 136

Pinto (Heitor), 139

Pires (A. T.), 15, 16

Poinsard (Léon), 23, 28

Pombal, Marquez de, 127, 128, 226

Population, 25, 26

Portalegre, 36, 39

Portimão, 103

Portugal (Manoel de), 140

Posts, 35

Povoa de Varzim, 100

Praia das Maçãs, 91

⸺ da Rocha, 103

Principe, I, 236

Prisons, 49, 50

Progressistas, 131

Protestantism, 9

Pucaros, 21

Quadras, 16

Quental (Anthero de), 144

Quintas, 21

Quita (D. dos R.), 143

Railways, 35

Regeneradores, 131

Religious Orders, 61, 62

Republicas, 58

Resende (André de), 104

⸺ (Garcia de), 94, 134, 135

Rhodes, (Cecil), 65

Ribatejo, 37

Ribeira de Pena Longa, 77

Ribeiro (Antonio), 41

⸺ (Bernardim), 90, 140

⸺ (João Pinto), 123

⸺ (Thomaz), 145

Roads, 33

Roman Catholics, 9, 61, 62

Romantics, 144

Romarias, 50

Rupert, Prince, 223

Sá de Meneses (F. de), 140

Sá de Miranda (F. de), 139

Sado, The, 79

Sagres, 103

Saint John’s Fires, 51-4

Salado, Battle of, 111

Salaries, 27, 28

Saloios, 47

Sancho I, 108

⸺ II, 109

Sanitation, 29

Santarem, 38, 39, 79

Santos (João dos), 7, 241

⸺ (Miguel dos), 138

S. Thomé, 236

Schaefer (Heinrich), 112, 227

Schomberg, Count of, 125

Schools, 68-70

Sebastian, King, 118, 120, 122

Sebastianismo, 5, 169

Serra de Arrabida, 79

⸺ Cintra, 77, 78, 79, 91

⸺ da Estrella, 32, 59, 60, 82

⸺ do Gerez, 32, 82

⸺ de Monchique, 82

Sertorius, 107

Setubal, 25, 37, 79, 86, 103

Shepherds, 59, 60

Silva (A. J. da), 143

Silveira (Alberto), 181

Silver, 103

Sines, 103

Soares (Manoel), 7, 204

Sobieski (J.), 4

Sociedade Propaganda de Portugal, 34, 84

Sousa (Luis de), 141

⸺ Viterbo (F. M. de), 140

Spain and Portugal, 2, 10, 13, 121-3, 125, 126, 216, 217, 218, 224

Sport, 55

Stevenson (R. L.), 7

Strangford, Lord, 226

Street Cries, 44, 45

Superstitions, 15, 54

Tagus, 47, 79

Tangiers, 114, 115

Tavora, Family of, 128

Teixeira de Queiroz, 64, 185, 193

⸺ Sousa, 64, 148

Telles (Bazilio), 249

⸺ (Leonor), 112

⸺ (Maria), 112

⸺ da Gama (Constança), 134

Tenreiro (Antonio), 138

Theresa, Countess, 107, 108

Thomar, 96, 97

Timor, 237

Torre do Tombo, 134

Touradas Nocturnas, 55

Trancoso (Gonçalo Fernandes), 104, 139

Traz os Montes, 25, 32, 39, 59, 100, 101

Usque (Samuel), 139

Vasconcellos (Augusto de), 203, 205

⸺ (Joaquim de), 150

Vaz de Carvalho (M. A.), 148

Vez, The, 79

Vianna do Alemtejo, 103

⸺ do Castello, 39, 100, 121

Vicente (Gil), 60, 135, 139, 152-63, 255

Vieira (Antonio), 142

Vilhena (Filippa de), 123

Villa do Conde, 100

⸺ Real, 39, 101

⸺ ⸺ de S. Antonio, 79

Villages, 49, 85

Viriathus, 107

Vives (Luis), 14

Vizeu, 138

⸺ Duke of, 116, 117

Voltaire, 24

Water, 43

Wellington, Duke of, 129

White Ants, 58

Wines, 37

Women, 7, 8, 26

Woollens, 36

Wyche (Sir Peter), 2

THE END

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