Portugal of the Portuguese
Date: 2024-10-19T00:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Portugal

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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, 1917

Credits: The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PORTUGAL OF THE PORTUGUESE ***

Portugal of the Portuguese

UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME

Countries and Peoples Series

Each in imperial 16mo, cloth gilt, gilt top, with about 30 full-page plate illustrations, 6s. net.

Italy of the Italians

By Helen Zimmern

France of the French

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Spain of the Spanish

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Germany of the Germans

By Robert M. Berry

Turkey of the Ottomans

By Lucy M. J. Garnett

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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

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By Demetrius C. Boulger

Scandinavia of the Scandinavians

By H. Goddard Leach

Egypt of the Egyptians

By W. Lawrence Balls

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

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.

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.

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).

ROMAN TEMPLE, EVORA

[See p. 105

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.

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.

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.

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.)

“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.

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.”

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.

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.

WOMEN AT WORK

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.

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.

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.

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.

“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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.)

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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).

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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]

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.

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.

A FARMHOUSE, MINHO

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]

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.

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.

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.

A FARMER

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.

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).

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]

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.

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.

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.

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.

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).

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.

THE VINTAGE, DOURO

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.

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

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.”

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.

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.

TERREIRO DO PAÇO, LISBON

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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).

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.

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.

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.

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.

“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.

BOM JESUS DO MONTE, BRAGA

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

“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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.”

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.

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.

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.

A SHEPHERD

CHAPTER IV
RELIGION AND EDUCATION

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.

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.

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.”

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.”

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.

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.

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.

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]

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.

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.

“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

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.

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.

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.

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.”

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.

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 Average. | Winter Average. | Spring. | Summer. | Autumn.
(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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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).

CONVENTO DE JERONYMOS, BELEM

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.

CASTELLO DA PENA, CINTRA

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.

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.

CLOISTER OF D. DINIZ, ALCOBAÇA.

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.

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.

TOMB OF D. INÉS DE CASTRO, ALCOBAÇA

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

GENERAL VIEW, OPORTO

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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).

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

THE CONVENT, MAFRA

[See p. 91

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.

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.

THE CHURCH, BATALHA

[See p. 95

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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).

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

THE CATHEDRAL, BRAGA

[See p. 56

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.

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.

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.

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.”

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.

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.

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).

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.

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]

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.

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).

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.

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.

GENERAL VIEW, COIMBRA

[See p. 56

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.

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.

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.

The “Conto.”

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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

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.

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.

THE WASHING PLACE, COIMBRA

[See p. 99

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

CASTLE OF ALMOUROL

[See p. 100

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.

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.”

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.

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.

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).

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.”

GENERAL VIEW, VILLA REAL

[See p. 101

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.

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.

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.

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.

TOWER OF CASTLE, BEJA

[See p. 104

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

RUINED CASTLE, LEIRIA

[See p. 85

CHAPTER XI
FROM MONARCHY TO REPUBLIC

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.’”

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.

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.)

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.”

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

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.

“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.

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.

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.

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.

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).

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.”

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

DOORWAY OF THE UNFINISHED CHAPELS, BATALHA

[See p. 96

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

INTERIOR OF THE CHURCH, BATALHA

[See p. 96

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

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.

CONVENTO DE CHRISTO, THOMAR

[See p. 97

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.”

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

GENERAL VIEW, FARO

[See p. 106

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

A SQUARE, LISBON

[See p. 168

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.”

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.

CEDAR AVENUE, BUSSACO

[See p. 85

“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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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!

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

A STUDY IN COSTUMES

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.

“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.

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.

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.

“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.

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.

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.

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....”

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).

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Transcriber’s Note: Map is clickable for a larger version.

PORTUGAL.

GLOSSARY

A

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).

B

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.

C

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.

D

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.

E

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.

F

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).

G

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.

H

Herdade. Large farm or estate.

Horta. Vegetable garden.

Hospedaria. Inn, hôtel.

I

Ilha. Island.

Infeliz. Unhappy, miserable.

Ingreme. Steep.

J

Janeiras. Songs of New Year’s Day.

Janella. Window.

Jardim. Garden.

Junta. Committee.

Justiceiro. Just; practising justice.

L

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.

M

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.

N

Noite. Night.

Nortada. North wind.

Noticias. News.

Novidade. Novelty.

O

Oiro, Ouro. Gold.

Orvalhada, Orvalho. Dew.

P

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.

Q

Quadra. Quatrain.

Quanto, quantos? How much, How many?

Quem dá? Who gives?

Quentinha. Fem. dimin. of Quente, Hot. (Contraction of caliente.)

Quinta. Country-house.

R

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

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.

T

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

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.

Z

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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(2404)

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Table of Contents

- Portugal of the Portuguese

- PREFACE
- CONTENTS
- ILLUSTRATIONS

- Portugal of the Portuguese

- CHAPTER I CHARACTERISTICS
- CHAPTER II POPULATION AND EMPLOYMENT
- CHAPTER III LIFE IN TOWN AND COUNTRY
- CHAPTER IV RELIGION AND EDUCATION
- CHAPTER V A LAND OF FLOWERS
- CHAPTER VI CONVENTS AND PALACES
- CHAPTER VII HISTORICAL SURVEY
- CHAPTER VIII LITERATURE

- CHAPTER IX PLAYS—GIL VICENTE

- THE BITER BIT
- PEASANTS GOING TO THE FAIR
- THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE
- THE DISCONTENTED PEASANT
- THE COURTIER PRIEST
- FREI PAÇO GIVES A LESSON IN COURT MANNERS
- MOFINA MENDES
- VANITY OF VANITIES
- THE POOR GENTLEMAN
- THE MOÇO’S COMPLAINT
- THE NOBLEMAN’S CHAPLAIN
- THE POOR NOBLEMAN

- CHAPTER X POLITICS AND THE PRESS
- CHAPTER XI FROM MONARCHY TO REPUBLIC
- CHAPTER XII RECENT EVENTS
- CHAPTER XIII GREAT BRITAIN AND PORTUGAL
- CHAPTER XIV PORTUGAL OF THE FUTURE
- FOOTNOTES
- GLOSSARY
- INDEX
- THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE