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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/31532-8.txt b/31532-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ba3ef1e --- /dev/null +++ b/31532-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6365 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Romantic Spain, by John Augustus O'Shea + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Romantic Spain + A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) + +Author: John Augustus O'Shea + +Release Date: March 7, 2010 [EBook #31532] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROMANTIC SPAIN *** + + + + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by the +Digital & Multimedia Center, Michigan State University +Libraries.) + + + + + + + + + +ROMANTIC SPAIN: + +_A RECORD OF PERSONAL EXPERIENCES._ + + + + +ROMANTIC SPAIN: + +A Record of Personal Experiences. + +BY + +JOHN AUGUSTUS O'SHEA, + +AUTHOR OF + +"LEAVES FROM THE LIFE OF A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT," +"AN IRON-BOUND CITY," ETC. + +"Oh, lovely Spain! renowned, romantic land!" +CHILDE HAROLD. + +IN TWO VOLUMES. + +VOL. II. + +LONDON: +WARD AND DOWNEY, +12, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN, W.C. +1887. +[_All Rights Reserved._] + + + + +CONTENTS OF VOL. II. + + +CHAPTER I. + + Page + +A Tidy City--A Sacred Corpse--Remarkable Features +of Puerto--A Calesa--Lady Blanche's Castle--A +Typical English Engineer--British Enterprise--"Success +to the Cadiz Waterworks!"--Visit to a +Bodega--Wine and Women--The Coming Man--A +Strike 1-18 + +CHAPTER II. + +The Charms of Cadiz--Seville-by-the-Sea--Cervantes--Daughters +of Eve--The Ladies who Prayed and +the Women who Didn't--Fasting Monks--Notice to +Quit on the Nuns--The Rival Processions--Gutting +a Church--A Disorganized Garrison--Taking it Easy--The +Mysterious "Mr. Crabapple"--The Steamer +_Murillo_--An Unsentimental Navvy--Bandaged +Justice--Tricky Ship-Owning--Painting Black +White 19-41 + +CHAPTER III. + +Expansion of Carlism--A Pseudo-Democracy--Historic +Land and Water Marks--An Impudent Stowaway--Spanish +Respect for Providence--A Fatal +Signal--Playing with Fire--Across the Bay--Farewell +to Andalusia--British Spain 42-50 + +CHAPTER IV. + +Gabriel Tar--A Hard Nut to Crack--In the Cemetery--An +Old Tipperary Soldier--Marks of the Broad +Arrow--The "Scorpions"--The Jaunting-Cars--Amusements +on the Rock--Mrs. Damages' Complaint--The +Bay, the Alameda, and Tarifa--How +to Learn Spanish--Types of the British Officer--The +Wily Ben Solomon--A Word for the Subaltern--Sunset +Gun--The Sameness of Sutlersville 51-75 + +CHAPTER V. + +From Pillar to Pillar--Historic Souvenirs--Off to +Africa--The Sweetly Pretty Albert--Gibraltar by +Moonlight--The Chain-Gang--Across the Strait--A +Difficult Landing--Albert is Hurt--"Fat Mahomet"--The +Calendar of the Centuries Put Back--Tangier: +the People, the Streets, the Bazaar--Our Hotel--A +Coloured Gentleman--Seeing the Sights--Local +Memoranda--Jewish Disabilities--Peep at a Photographic +Album--The Writer's Notions on Harem +Life 76-102 + +CHAPTER VI. + +A Pattern Despotism--Some Moorish Peculiarities--A +Hell upon Earth--Fighting for Bread--An Air-Bath--Surprises +of Tangier--On Slavery--The +Writer's Idea of a Moorish Squire--The Ladder of +Knowledge--Gulping Forbidden Liquor--Division +of Time--Singular Customs--The Shereef of Wazan--The +Christian who Captivated the Moor--The +Interview--Moslem Patronage of Spain--A Slap for +England--A Vision of Beauty--An English Desdemona: +Her Plaint--One for the Newspaper Men--The +Ladies' Battle--Farewell--The English Lady's +Maid--Albert is Indisposed--The Writer Sums up +on Morocco 103-135 + +CHAPTER VII. + +Back to Gibraltar--The Parting with Albert--The +Tongue of Scandal--Voyage to Malaga--"No Police, +no Anything"--Federalism Triumphant--Madrid _in +Statu Quo_--Orense--Progress of the Royalists--On +the Road Home--In the Insurgent Country--Stopped +by the Carlists--An Angry Passenger is +Silenced 136-151 + +CHAPTER VIII. + +On the Wing--Ordered to the Carlist Headquarters--Another +_Petit Paris_--Carlists from Cork--How +Leader was Wounded--Beating-up for an Anglo-Irish +Legion--Pontifical Zouaves--A Bad Lot--Oddities +of Carlism--Santa Cruz Again--Running +a Cargo--On Board a Carlist Privateer--A Descendant +of Kings--"Oh, for an Armstrong Twenty-Four +Pounder!"--Crossing the Border--A Remarkable +Guide--Mountain Scenery--In Navarre--Challenged +at Vera--Our Billet with the Parish Priest--The Sad +Story of an Irish Volunteer--Dialogue with Don +Carlos--The Happy Valley--Bugle-Blasts--The +Writer in a Quandary--The Fifth Battalion of +Navarre--The Distribution of Arms--The Bleeding +Heart--Enthusiasm of the Chicos 152-187 + +CHAPTER IX. + +The Cura of Vera--Fueros of the Basques--Carlist Discipline--Fate +of the _San Margarita_--The Squadron +of Vigilance--How a Capture was Effected--The +Sea-Rovers in the Dungeon--Visit to the Prisoners--San +Sebastian--A Dead Season--The Defences of a +Threatened City--Souvenirs of War--The Miqueletes--In +a Fix--A German Doctor's Warning 188-210 + +CHAPTER X. + +Belcha's Brigands--Pale-Red Republicans--The Hyena--More +about the _San Margarita_--Arrival of a Republican +Column--The Jaunt to Los Pasages--A +Sweet Surprise--"The Prettiest Girl in Spain"--A +Madrid Acquaintance--A Costly Pull--The Diligence +at Last--Renteria and its Defences--A Furious Ride--In +France Again--Unearthing Santa Cruz--The +Outlaw in his Lair--Interviewed at Last--The Truth +about the Endarlasa Massacre--A Death-Warrant--The +Buried Gun--Fanaticism of the Partisan-Priest 211-238 + +CHAPTER XI. + +An Audible Battle--"Great Cry and Little Wool"--A +Carlist Court Newsman--The Religious War--The +Siege of Oyarzun--Madrid Rebels--"The Money of +Judas"--A Manifesto from Don Carlos--An Ideal +Monarch--Necessity of Social and Political Reconstruction +Proclaimed--A Free Church--A Broad +Policy--The King for the People--The Theological +Question--Austerity in Alava--Clerical and Non-Clerical +Carlists--Disavowal of Bigotry--A Republican +Editor on the Carlist Creed--Character of +the Basques--Drill and Discipline--Guerilleros _versus_ +Regulars 239-268 + +CHAPTER XII. + +Barbarossa--Royalist-Republicans--Squaring a Girl--At +Irun--"Your Papers?"--The Barber's Shop--A +Carlist Spy--An Old Chum--The Alarm--A Breach +of Neutrality--Under Fire--Caught in the Toils--The +Heroic Thomas--We Slope--A Colleague Advises +Me--"A Horse! a Horse!"--State of Bilbao--Don +Carlos at Estella--Sanchez Bregua Recalled--Tolosa +Invites--Republican Ineptitude--Do not Spur a Free +Horse--Very Ancient Boys--Meditations in Bed--A +Biscay Storm 269-299 + +CHAPTER XIII. + +Nearing the End--Firing on the Red Cross--Perpetuity +of War--Artistic Hypocrites--The Jubilee Year--The +Conflicts of a Peaceful Reign--Major Russell--Quick +Promotion--The Foreign Legion--The Aspiring +Adventurer--A Leader's Career--A Piratical +Proposal--The "Ojaladeros" of Biarritz--A Friend +in Need--Buying a Horse--Gilpin Outdone--"Fred +Burnaby" 300-317 + +FOOTNOTES + +NOTES OF THE TRANSCRIBER + + + + +ROMANTIC SPAIN. + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + A Tidy City--A Sacred Corpse--Remarkable Features of Puerto--A + Calesa--Lady Blanche's Castle--A Typical English Engineer--British + Enterprise--"Success to the Cadiz Waterworks!"--Visit to a + Bodega--Wine and Women--The Coming Man--A Strike. + + +PUERTO de Santa Maria has the name of being the neatest and tidiest city +in Spain, and neatness and tidiness are such dear homely virtues, I +thought I could not do better than hie me thither to see if the tale +were true. With a wrench I tore myself from the soft capital of +Andalusia, delightful but demoralizing. I was growing lazier every day I +spent there; I felt energy oozing out of every pore of my body; and in +the end I began to get afraid that if I stopped much longer I should +only be fit to sing the song of the sluggard:--"You have waked me too +soon, let me slumber again." Seville is a dangerous place; it is worse +than Capua; it would enervate Cromwell's Ironsides. Happily for me the +mosquitoes found out my bedroom, and pricked me into activity, or I +might not have summoned the courage to leave it for weeks, the more +especially as I had a sort of excuse for staying. The Cardinal +Archbishop had promised a friend of mine to let him inspect the body of +St. Fernando, and my friend had promised to take me with him. Now, this +was a great favour. St. Fernando is one of the patrons of Seville; he +has been dead a long time, but his corpse refuses to putrefy, like those +of ordinary mortals; it is a sacred corpse, and in a beatific state of +preservation. Three times a year the remains of the holy man are +uncovered, and the faithful are admitted to gaze on his incorruptible +features. This was not one of the regular occasions; the Cardinal +Archbishop had made an exception in compliment to my friend, who is a +rising young diplomat, so that the favour was really a favour. I +declined it with thanks--very much obliged, indeed--pressure of +business called me elsewhere--the cut-and-dry form of excuse; but I +never mentioned a word about the mosquitoes. I told my friend to thank +the prelate for his graciousness; the prelate expressed his sorrow that +my engagements did not permit me to wait, and begged that I would oblige +him by letting the British public know the shameful way he and his +priests were treated by the Government They had not drawn a penny of +salary for three years. This was a fact; and very discreditable it was +to the Government, and a good explanation of the disloyalty of their +reverences. If a contract is made it should be kept; the State +contracted to support the Church, but since Queen Isabella decamped the +State had forgotten its engagement. + +Puerto de Santa Maria deserves the name it has got. It is a clean and +shapely collection of houses, regularly built. People in England are apt +to associate the idea of filth with Spain; this, at least in Andalusia, +is a mistake. The cleanliness is Flemish. Soap and the scrubbing-brush +are not spared; linen is plentiful and spotless, and water is used for +other purposes than correcting the strength of wine. Walking down the +long main street with its paved causeways and pebbly roadway, with its +straight lines of symmetric houses, coquettish in their marble balconies +and brightly-painted shutters and railings, one might fancy himself in +Brock or Delft but that the roofs are flat, that the gables are not +turned to the street, and that the sky is a cloudless blue. I am +speaking now of fine days; but there are days when the sky is cloudy and +the wind blows, and the waters in the Bay of Cadiz below surge up sullen +and yeasty, and there are days when the rain comes down quick, thick, +and heavy as from a waterspout, and the streets are turned for the +moment into rivulets. But the effects of the rain do not last long; +Spain is what washerwomen would call a good drying country. Beyond its +neatness and tidiness, Puerto has other features to recommend it to the +traveller. It has a bookseller's shop, where the works of Eugène Sue and +Paul de Kock can be had in choice Spanish, side by side with the Carlist +Almanack, "by eminent monarchical writers," and the calendar of the +Saragossan prophet (the Spanish Old Moore); but it is not to that I +refer--half a hundred Andalusian towns can boast the same. It has its +demolished convent, but since the revolution of '68 that is no more a +novelty than the Alameda, or sand-strewn, poplar-planted promenade, +which one meets in every Spanish hamlet. It has the Atlantic waves +rolling in at its feet, and a pretty sight it is to mark the feluccas, +with single mast crossed by single yard, like an unstrung bow, moored by +the wharf or with outspread sail bellying before the breeze on their way +to Cadiz beyond, where she sits throned on the other side of the bay, +"like a silver cup" glistening in the sunshine, when sunshine there is. +The silver cup to which the Gaditanos are fond of comparing their city +looked more like dirty pewter as I approached it by water from Puerto; +but I was in a tub of a steamer, there was a heavy sea on and a heavy +mist out, and perhaps I was qualmish. Not for its booksellers' shops, +for its demolished convent, or for its vulgar Atlantic did this Puerto, +which the guide-books pass curtly by as "uninteresting," impress me as +interesting, but for two features that no seasoned traveller could, +would, or should overlook; its female population is the most attractive +in Andalusia, and it is the seat of an agreeable English colony. I +happened on the latter in a manner that is curious, so curious as to +merit relation. + +I had intended to proceed to Cadiz from Seville after I had taken a peep +at Puerto, but that little American gentleman whom I met at Córdoba was +with me, and persuaded me to stop by the story of a wonderful castle +prison, a sort of _Tour de Nesle_, which was to be seen in the vicinity, +where the _bonne amie_ of a King of Spain had been built up in the good +old times when monarchs raised favourites from the gutter one day, and +sometimes ordered their weazands to be slit the next. This show-place is +about a league from Puerto, in the valley of Sidonia, and is called El +Castillo de Doña Blanca. We took a calesa to go there. My companion +objected to travelling on horseback; he could not stomach the peculiar +Moorish saddle with its high-peaked cantle and crupper, and its +catch-and-carry stirrups. We took a calesa, as I have said. To my dying +day I shall not forget that vehicle of torture. But it may be necessary +to tell what is a calesa. Procure a broken-down hansom, knock off the +driver's seat, paint the body and wheels the colour of a roulette-table +at a racecourse, stud the hood with brass nails of the pattern of those +employed to beautify genteel coffins, remove the cushions, and replace +them with a wisp of straw, smash the springs, and put swing-leathers +underneath instead, cover the whole article with a coating of liquid +mud, leave it to dry in a mouldy place where the rats shall have free +access to the leather for gnawing practice, return in seven years, and +you will find a tolerably correct imitation of that decayed machine, the +Andalusian calesa. It is more picturesque than the Neapolitan +_corricolo_; it is all ribs and bones, and is much given to inward +groaning as it jerks and jolts along. Such a trap we took; the driver +lazily clambered on the shafts, and away hobbled our lean steed. + +The road to Lady Blanche's Castle is like that to Jordan in the nigger +songs; it is "a hard road to travel"--a road full of holes and quagmires +and jutting rocks; and yet the driver told me it had once been a good +road, but that was in the reign of Queen Isabella. Everything seems to +have been allowed to go to dilapidation since. On the outskirts of +Puerto we passed an English cemetery; I am glad to say it is almost +uninhabited. If there is an English dead settlement there ought to be a +live one, I reasoned, unless those who are buried here date from +Peninsular battles. The first part of the road to Blanche's Castle is +level, and bordered with thick growths of prickly pear; there is a view +of the sea, and of the Guadalate, spanned by a metal bridge--a Menai on +a small scale. Farther on, as we get to a district called La Piedad, the +country is diversified by swampy flats at one side and sandy hills at +the other. Blanche's Castle was a commonplace ruin, a complete "sell," +and we turned our horse's head rather savagely. As we were coming back, +the little American shortening the way by Sandford and Merton +observations of this nature--"Prickly pear makes a capital hedge; no +cattle will face it; the spikes of the plant are as tenacious as +fish-hooks. The fibres of the aloe are unusually strong; they make +better cordage than hemp, but will not bear the wet so well"--a sight +caught my eyes which caused me to stare. A tall young fellow, with his +trousers tucked up, was wading knee-deep in the bottoms beside the road. +He wore a suit of Oxford mixture. + +"Who or what is that gentleman?" I asked the driver. + +"An English engineer," was the answer. + +I stopped the calesa, hailed him, and inquired was he fond of rheumatic +fever. He laughed, and pronounced the single word, "Duty." A little +word, but one that means much. A Spanish engineer would never have done +this; they are great in offices and at draughting on paper, but they +seldom tuck up their sleeves, much less their trousers, to labour out of +doors as the young Englishman was doing. I made his acquaintance, and he +willingly consented to show me over the works in which he was engaged, +which were intended to supply Cadiz with water. In England water is to +be had too easily to be estimated at its proper value. At Cadiz it is a +marketable commodity. Even the parrots there squeak "agua." Every drop +of rain that falls is carefully gathered in cisterns, and the +conveyance of water in boatloads from Puerto across the Bay is a regular +trade. An English company had been formed to supply the parched seaport +and the ships that call there with fresh water, and its reservoirs were +situated at La Piedad. In the bowels of the flats below, where the +snipe-shooting ought to be good, our countryman told me the water was to +be sought. Galleries had been sunk in every direction in land which the +company had purchased, and pumps and engines are soon to be erected that +will raise the liquid collected there up to the reservoirs which have +been hewn out of the hills above. These reservoirs, approached by +passages excavated out of the rough sandstone, are stout and solid +specimens of the mason's craft directed by the engineer's skill. Here we +met a second gentleman superintending the labours of the men, but he was +surely a Spaniard; he spoke the language with the readiness of one born +on the soil; still, he had a matter-of-fact, resolute quickness about +him that was hardly Spanish. Doubts as to his nationality were soon +dispelled; the engineer we had surprised in the swamp presented us to +his colleague Forrest, engineer to Messrs. Barnett and Gale, of +Westminster, the contractors, as thoroughbred an Englishman as ever came +out of the busy town of Blackburn. + +Mr. Forrest at once stood to cross-examination by the American, who had +all the inquisitiveness of his race. + +"We employ a couple of hundred men, on an average, here," he said, "all +of whom, with but two exceptions, are Spaniards, and very fair +hard-working fellows they are; in the town below we have a small colony +of English, and if you don't take it amiss I shall be happy to present +you to our society." + +I know little of the technicalities of engineering, but I saw enough of +this work to be certain that it was well and truly done, and I heard +enough of the scarcity of water in Cadiz to be convinced it will be a +great boon when finished. The reservoirs are constructed in colonnades, +supported by ashlar pillars and roofed with rubble; for the water must +be shaded from the sun in this hot climate; the pillars are buttered +over with cement, and there is over a foot of cement concrete on the +flooring, to guard against filtration. As we paced about the sombre +aisles, echo multiplied every syllable we uttered; the repetition of +sound is as distinct as in the whispering gallery of St. Paul's, and I +could not help remarking, "What a splendid robber's cave this would +make!" + +"Too tell-tale," said the practical American; "make a better cave of +harmony." + +"The only pipes that are ever likely to blow here are water-pipes," +smilingly put in the engineer; "we intend to lay them from this to +Cadiz, some twenty-eight miles distant. Roughly speaking, we are about +ninety feet above the level of the place, so that the highest building +there can be supplied with ease." + +The Romans were benefactors to many portions of this dry land of Spain; +they built up aqueducts which are still in use, but they neglected +Cadiz. The town has been dependent on these springs of La Piedad for its +water supply, except such as dropped from heaven, for three hundred +years, and attempts to obtain water from wells or borings in the +neighbourhood have invariably failed. The water which is found in this +basin, held by capillary attraction in the permeable strata through +which it soaks till the hard impermeable stratum is met--retained, in +short, in a natural reservoir--is excellent in quality, limpid and +sparkling. Puerto has been supplied from the place for time out of mind, +and Puerto has been so well supplied that it could afford to sell +panting Cadiz its surplus. With English capital and enterprise putting +new life into those old hills, and cajoling the precious beverage out of +their bosom, which unskilled engineers let go to waste, Cadiz should +shortly have reason to bless the foreign company that relieves its +thirst. Clear virgin water, such as will course down the tunnels to +bubble up in the Gaditanian fountains, is the greatest luxury of life +here; "Agua fresca, cool as snow," is the most welcome of cries in the +summer, and temperate Spain is as devoted to the colourless liquid that +the temperance lecturer Gough and his compeers call Adam's ale, as ever +London drayman was to Barclay's Entire. Success, then, to the Cadiz +Waterworks Company: we drank the toast on the hill-side of "Piety" they +were making fruitful of good, drank it in tipple of their and nature's +brewing, but had latent hopes that Forrest or his colleague would help +us to a bumper of the generous grape-juice for which the district is +famed, when we got down to the pleasant companionship of the English +colony below. + +Nor were our hopes disappointed. There are innumerable bodegas, or +wine-vaults, in the town, in which bottles and barrels of wine are +neatly caged in labelled array, according to age, quality, and kind. +Very clean and roomy these stores of vinous treasure are, with an +indescribable semi-medicinal odour languidly pervading them. We visited +a bodega belonging to an Englishman, who ranks as a grandee of the +first-class, the Duke of Ciudad Rodrigo and eke of Vitoria, but who is +better known as the Duke of Wellington. The natural wine of this +district is too thin for insular palates. They crave something fiery, +and, by my word, they get it. Like that Irish car-driver who rejected my +choicest, oily, mellow "John Jameson," but thanked me after gulping a +hell-glass of new spirit, violent assault liquefied, they want a drink +that will catch them by the throat and assert its prerogative going +down. What a beamy old imposition is that rich brown sherry of city +banquets, over which the idiot of a connoisseur cunningly smacks his +lips and rolls his moist eyes. If he were only told how much of it was +real and how much artificial, would he not gasp and crimson! It would be +unmerciful to inform him that his pet cordial is charged with sulphuric +acid gas, that it is sweetened with cane-sugar, that it is flavoured +with "garnacha dulce," that it is coloured with plastered _must_ and +fortified with brandy, before it is shipped. Let us leave him in +blissful ignorance. We tasted many samples before we left, but I own I +have no liking for sherries, simple or doctored. Among Spanish wines I +far prefer the full-bodied astringent sub-acidity of the common Val de +Peñas, beloved of Cervantes. But the Queen of wines is sound Bordeaux. +To that Queen, however, a delicate etherous Amontillado might be +admitted as Spanish maid-of-honour, preceding the royal footsteps, while +the syrupy Malaga from the Doradillo grape might follow as attendant in +her train. + +From wine to women is an easy transition. Both are benedictions from on +high, and I have no patience with the foul churl who cannot enjoy the +one with proper continence, and rise the better and more chivalrous from +the society of the other. Wine well used is a good familiar +creature--kindles, soothes, and inspirits: the cup of wine warmed by the +smile of woman gives courage to the soldier and genius to the minstrel. +With Burns--and he was no ordinary seer--I hold that the sweetest hours +that e'er we spend are spent among the lasses. I will go farther and say +the most profitable hours. And some sweet and profitable hours 'twas +mine to spend among the fawn-orbed lasses of Puerto, with their +childlike gaiety, their desire to please, and their fetching freedom +from affectation. Would that the wines exported from the district were +half as unsophisticated! These lasses were not learned in the "ologies" +or the "isms," but they were sincere; and their locks flowed long and +free, and when they laughed the coral sluices flying open gave scope to +a full silvery music cascading between pales of gleaming pearl. An +admixture of this strain with the fair-skinned men of the North should +produce a magnificent race; and, indeed, if we paid half the attention +to the improvement of the human animal which we do to that of the equine +or the porcine, the experiment would not have been left untried so long. +In-and-in breeding is a mistake, and can only commend itself, and that +for selfish reasons, to the Aztec in physique and the imbecile in mind. +The families which take most pride in their purity are the most +degenerate; the stock which is the most robust and handsome is that +which has in it a liberal infusion of foreign bloods. In my opinion, the +coming man, the highest form of well-balanced qualities--moral, +intellectual, and masculine--the nearest approach to perfection, must +ultimately be developed in the United States. + +Puerto has a wide-spread reputation as the nursery-ground for +bull-fighters. To the arena it is what Newmarket is to the British turf. +Everybody there walks about armed, but murder is not more rife in +proportion than in London. As it happened, a fellow was shot while I was +there, but that would not justify one in coming to the conclusion that +homicide was a flourishing indigenous product. Still, the natives did +not escape the contagion of unrest of their countrymen. For example, the +last news I heard before leaving my English friends was that the men in +the vineyards had struck work. These lazy scoundrels had the impudence +to demand that they should have half an hour after arrival on the +ground, and before beginning work, to smoke cigarettes, the same grace +after the breakfast hour, two hours for a siesta in the middle of the +day, another interval for a bout of smoking in the afternoon, and +finally that each should be entitled to an arroba (more than three and a +half gallons English) of wine per acre at the end of the season. They go +on the same basis as some trades' unions we are acquainted +with--reduction of hours of labour and increase of wages. "Will you give +in to them?" I asked of an English settler, in the wine trade. "Give +in------" but it is unnecessary to repeat the expletive; "I'll quietly +shut up my bodega." + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + The Charms of Cadiz--Seville-by-the-Sea--Cervantes-Daughters of + Eve--The Ladies who Prayed and the Women who Didn't--Fasting + Monks--Notice to Quit on the Nuns--The Rival Processions--Gutting a + Church--A Disorganized Garrison--Taking it Easy--The Mysterious + "Mr. Crabapple"--The Steamer _Murillo_--An Unsentimental + Navvy--Bandaged Justice--Tricky Ship-Owning--Painting Black White. + + +THE man who pitched on Cadiz as the site of a city knew what he was +about. Without exception it is the most charmingly-located place I ever +set foot in. Its white terraces, crowded with white pinnacles, +belvederes, and turrets, glistening ninety-nine days out of the hundred +in clear sunlight, rise gently out of a green sea necked with foam; the +harbour is busy with commerce, crowded with steamers and sailing ships +coming and going from the Mediterranean shores, from France, from +England, or from the distant countries beyond the Atlantic; the waters +around (for Cadiz is built on a peninsula, and peeps of water make the +horizon of almost every street) are dotted with fishing craft or +scudding curlews; the public squares are everlastingly verdant with the +tall fern-palm, the feathery mimosa, the myrtle, and the silvery ash, +which only recalls the summer the better for its suggestive appearance +of having been recently blown over with dust; the gaze inland is repaid +with the sight of hills brown by distance, of sheets of pasture, and +pyramidal salt-mounds of creamy grey; and the gaze upwards--to lend a +glow to the ravishing picture--is delighted by such a cope of dreamy +blue, deep and pure, and unstained by a single cloudlet, as one seldom +has the happiness of looking upon in England outside the doors of an +exhibition of paintings. The climate is dry and genial, and not so hot +as Seville. The Sevillanos know that, and come to Cadiz when the heats +make residence in their own city insupportable. Winter is unknown; +skating has never been witnessed by Gaditanos, except when exhibited by +foreign professors, clad in furs, who glide on rollers over polished +floors; and small British boys who are fond of snowballing when they +come out here are obliged to pelt each other with oranges to keep their +hands in. One enthusiastic traveller compares it to a pearl set in +sapphires and emeralds, but adds--lest we should all be running to hug +the jewel--there is little art here and less society. + +"Letters of exchange are the only belles-lettres." Indeed. Now this is +one of those wiseacres who are _in_ a community, but not _of_ it, who +materially are present, but can never mentally, so to speak, get +themselves inside the skins of the inhabitants. That city cannot be said +to be without letters which has its poetic brotherhood, limited though +it be, and which reveres the memory of Cervantes, as the memory of +Shakespeare is revered in no English seaport. Wiseacre should hie him to +Cadiz on the 23rd of April, when the birth of Cervantes is celebrated, +for in spite of intestine broils, Spaniards are true to the worship of +the author of "Don Quixote," and his no less immortal attendant, whom +Gandalin, friend to Amadis of Gaul, affectionately apostrophizes thus: + + "Salve! Sancho with the paunch, + Thou most famous squire, + Fortune smiled as Escudero she did dub thee + Tho' Fate insisted 'gainst the world to rub thee. + Fortune gave wit and common-sense, + Philosophy, ambition to aspire; + While Chivalry thy wallet stored, + And led thee harmless through the fire." + +With the respect he deserves for this wandering critic and no more, I +will take the liberty of saying that there is art, and a great deal of +art, in the site of the clean town; and that there is society, and good +society, in that forest of spars in the roadstead, and in the fishing +and shooting in the neighbourhood. When the Tauchnitz editions have been +exhausted, and when the stranger has mastered Cervantes and Lope de +Vega, Espronceda, Larra, and Rivas, there is always that book which Dr. +Johnson loved, the street, or that lighter literature which Moore sings, +"woman's looks," to fall back upon. I am afraid some prudes may be +misjudging my character on account of the frequency of my allusions to +the sex lately; but I beg them to recollect that this is Andalusia, and +that woman is a very important element in the population of Cadiz. She +rules the roost, and the courtly Spaniard of the south forgets that +there was ever such an undutiful person as Eve. Woman played a +remarkable part in the events of the couple of months after the Royal +crown was punched out of the middle of the national flag. She is +political here, and is not shy of declaring her opinions. Ladies of the +better classes of Cadiz are attentive to the duties of their religion; +kneeling figures gracefully draped in black may be seen at all hours of +the day in the churches during this Lenten season, telling their beads +or turning over their missals. Those ladies are Carlist to a man, as +Paddy would say; they naturally exert an influence over their husbands, +though the influence falls short of making their husbands accompany them +to church except on great festivals such as Easter Sunday, or on what +may be called occasions of social rendezvous, such as a Requiem service +for a deceased friend. The men seem to be of one mind with the French +freethinker, who abjured religion himself, or put off thoughts of it +till his dying day, but pronounced it necessary for peasants and +wholesome for women and children. But _les femmes du peuple_, the +fishwives, the labourers' daughters, the bouncing young fruit-sellers, +and the like, are not religious in Cadiz. They have been bitten with the +revolutionary mania; they are staunch Red Republicans, and have the bump +of veneration as flat as the furies that went in procession to +Versailles at the period of the Great Revolution, or their great +granddaughters who fought on the barricades of the Commune. The nymphs +of the pavement sympathize strongly with the Republic likewise; but +their ideal of a Republic is not that of Señores Castelar and Figueras. +They want bull-fights and distribution of property, and object to all +religious confraternities unless based on the principles of "the Monks +of the Screw," whose charter-song, written by that wit in wig and gown, +Philpot Curran, was of the least ascetic: + + "My children, be chaste--till you're tempted; + While sober, be wise and discreet, + And humble your bodies with--fasting, + Whene'er you have nothing to eat." + +So long ago as 1834 a sequestration of convents was ordered in Spain, +but the Gaditanos never had the courage to enforce the decree till +after the revolution that sent Queen Isabella into exile. A few years +ago the convent of Barefooted Carmelites on the Plaza de los Descalzados +was pulled down; the decree that legalized the act provided an +indemnity, but the unfortunate monks who were turned bag and baggage out +of their house never got a penny. They have had to humble their bodies +with fasting since. For those amongst them who were old or infirm that +was a grievance; but for the lusty young fellows who could handle a +spade there need not be much pity, for Spain had more of their sort than +was good for her. Even at that date the revolutionists of Cadiz had some +respect left for the nunneries. But they progressed; the example of +Paris was not lost upon them. The ayuntamiento which came into power +with the Republic was Federal. Barcelona and Malaga were stirring; the +ayuntamiento made up its mind that Cadiz should be as good as its +neighbours and show vigour too. The cheapest way to show vigour was to +make war on the weak and defenceless, and that was what this +enlightened and courageous municipality did. The nuns in the convent of +the Candelaria were told that their house and the church adjoining were +in a bad state, that they must clear out, and that both should be razed +in the interests of public safety. It was not that the presence of +ladies devoted to God after their own wishes and the traditions of their +creed was offensive to the Republic; no, not by any means. The nuns +protested that if their convent and church were in a dangerous condition +the proper measure to take was to prop them up, not pull them down. But +the blustering heroes of the municipality would not listen to this +reasoning; they were too careful of the lives of the citizens, the nuns +included; down the edifices must come. The Commune of Paris over again. +The ladies of Cadiz, those who pass to and fro, prayer-book in hand, in +the streets, and startle the flashing sunshine with their solemn +mantillas, were wroth with the municipality. They saw through its +designs, and they resolved to defeat them. To the number of some five +hundred they formed a procession, and marched four deep to the +Town-house to beg of their worships, the civic tyrants, to revoke their +order. If the convent and church were in ruins, the ladies were prepared +to pay out of their own pockets the expense of all repairs. That +procession was a sight to see; there was the beauty, the rank, the +fashion, and the worth of the city, in "linked sweetness long drawn +out," coiling through the thoroughfares on pious errand. The fair +petitioners were dressed as for a _fete_; diamonds sparkled in their +hair, and the potent fan, never deserted by the Andalusians, was +agitated by five hundred of the smallest of hands in the softest of +gloves. But the civic tyrants were more severe than Coriolanus. They +were not to be mollified by woman's entreaties, but rightly fearing her +charms they fled. When the procession arrived at the Town-house, there +was but a solitary intrepid bailie to receive it. They told him their +tale. He paid them the usual compliments, kissed their feet in the grand +Oriental way individually and collectively, said he would lay their +wishes before his colleagues, but that he could give no promise to +recall the mandate of the municipality--it was more than he dare +undertake to do, and so forth. The long and short of it was, he politely +sent them about their business. They came away, working the fans more +pettishly than ever, and liquid voices were heard to hiss scornfully +that the Republic, which proclaimed respect for all religions and +rights, was a lie, for its first thought was to trample on the national +religion, and to dispossess an inoffensive corporation of cloistered +ladies of their right to then property. Here the first act of the drama +ended. + +The second was, if anything, more sensational, though infinitely less +attractive. The Federals bit their thumbs, and cried: + +"Ah, this is the work of the priests!" + +So it was; not a doubt of that. The Federals meditated, and this was the +fruit of their meditations: + +"Let us organize a counter-procession!" + +That counter-procession was a sight to see, too; the feature of elegance +was conspicuous by its absence, but there was more colour in it. +Harridans of seventy crawled after hussies of seventeen; bare arms and +bandannas were more noticeable than black veils and fans; the _improbæ +Gaditanæ_, known of old to certain lively satirists, Martial and Juvenal +by name, turned out in force. Mayhap it is prejudice, but Republican +females, methinks, are rather muscular than good-looking. Still they +have influence sometimes, and when they said their say at the Town-house +the ladies plainly betrayed how much they dreaded that influence. They +wrote to Madrid praying that the municipality should be arrested in its +course. Señor Castelar did send a remonstrance; some say he ordered the +local authorities not to touch the church or convent, but they laughed +at his letter, and contented themselves by reflecting that he was not in +possession of the facts--that is, if they reflected at all, which is +doubtful. + +Act the third was in representation during my stay. I passed the +Candelaria one morning. Scaffolding poles were erected in the street +alongside in preparation for the demolition of the building, and a party +of workmen in the pay of the municipality were engaged gutting the +church of its contents, and carting them off to a place of deposit, +where they were to be sold by public auction. These workmen looked +cheerful over their sacrilege. A waggon was outside the door laden with +ornaments ripped from the walls, gilt picture-frames, fragments of +altar-rails, and the head of a cherub. Half a dozen rough fellows in +guernseys had their shoulders under a block of painted wood-carving. As +far as I could make out, it was the effigy of one of the Evangelists. I +was refused admittance to the building, but I was told the sacramental +plate had been removed with the same indifference. The nuns escaped +without insult, thanks to the good offices of some friends outside, who +brought up carriages at midnight to the doors of the convent and +conveyed them to secret places of safety put at their disposal by the +bishop. + +The people who committed this mean piece of desecration were all Federal +Republicans. They disobeyed orders from Madrid, and would disobey them +again. They were as deaf to the commands of Señor Castelar as to the +prayers and entreaties of the wives and daughters of respectable +fellow-citizens. And all this time that the central authority were +defied, artillerymen and linesmen were loitering about the streets of +Cadiz. Eventually it was plain they would be disarmed, as they were +disarmed at Malaga; and they would not offer serious opposition to the +process. Their officers were barely tolerated by them. The Guardia Civil +were true to duty, but when the crisis came, what could they do any more +than their comrades at Malaga? They were but as a drop of water in a +well. Disarmament is not liked by the old soldiers who have money to +their credit, but there is a large proportion of mere conscripts in the +ranks, and they are glad to jump at the chance of returning home. + +Troubles worse than any may yet be in store; meanwhile the sun shines, +and Cadiz, like Seville, takes it easy. But there is a bad spirit +abroad, and it is growing. A pack of ruffians forcibly entered a mansion +at San Lucar, and annexed what was in it in the name of Republican +freedom; the "volunteers of liberty" have taken the liberty of breaking +into the houses of the consuls at Malaga in search for arms; an excited +mob attacked the printing-office of _El Oriente_ at Seville after I +left, smashed the type, and threatened to strangle the editor if he +brought out the paper again; and the precious municipality of Cadiz has +nothing better to do than order that no mourners shall be allowed in +future to use religious exercises or emblems, to sing litanies or carry +crosses, at the open graves of relatives in the cemeteries. + +In the merchants' club (of which I was made free) they were saddened at +the disrupted state of society, but took it as kismet, and seemed to +think that all would come right in the end, by the interposition of some +_Deus ex machinâ_. But who that God was they could not tell: he was +hidden in the womb of Fate. As Cadiz accepted its destiny with +equanimity, I accommodated myself to the situation, and did as the +natives did. I helped to fly kites from the flat housetops--a favourite +pastime of mature manhood here; I opened mild flirtations with the +damsels in cigar-shops, and discovered that they were not slow to meet +advances; I expended hours every day cheapening a treatise on the +mystery of bull-fighting, with accompanying engravings, in vain--its +price was above rubies. But my great distraction was a strange character +I met at dinner at the house of the British Consul. I did not catch his +name at our introduction, so I mentally named him Mr. Crabapple. He was +short and stout, had a round wizened face freckled to the fuscous tint +of a russedon apple, and was endowed with a voice which had all the +husky sonority of a greengrocer's. He was beardless and sandy-haired, +and one of those persons whose age is a puzzle to define; he might have +been anything between fifteen and five-and-thirty. As he talked of +Harrow as if he had left it but yesterday, I was disposed to set him +down as a queer public-school boy on vacation, until I was astounded by +some self-possessed remark on Jamaica dyewoods. We stopped in the same +hotel. One morning he descended the stairs, a sort of dressing-case in +hand, and yelled to an urchin at the door: + +"Here, you son of a sea-calf, take this down to the waterside for me!" + +"Will he understand you?" I said. + +"Bound to," Mr. Crabapple replied; "never talk to them any other way, +anyhow. 'Tis their business to understand. Ta, ta--deuce of a hurry." + +"Where are you going, may I ask?" + +"Read the Church Service--rather a bore--Sunday, you know." + +The nondescript, then, was a chaplain. + +The same evening he returned to the hotel, and on the following morning +I saw him again descending the stairs, the same dressing-case in hand. +He nodded salute, slung his luggage to the same urchin with the cry, +"Hook it, you lubber!" and, turning to me, said, "Ta, ta, sheering off +again." + +"Where to now?" + +"Mediterranean." + +"There's no boat to-day." + +"There is, though--there's mine;" and he was off. + +The supposed chaplain was a stray-away from a novel by Marryat, +commanded her Majesty's gunboat _Catapult_, and was at Cadiz on the duty +of protecting British interests. At the moment his mission was to carry +important despatches to Gibraltar. + +My mission to Cadiz was, partly, to ascertain the progress of the +inquiry into the case of the _Murillo_ steamer, more than suspected of +having run down the _Northfleet_, a vessel laden with railway-iron and +navvies, off Dungeness, on the night of the 22nd of January previous. +Three hundred lives had been lost on the occasion. I knew something of +that wreck, for I had seen and spoken with the survivors in the Sailors' +Home at Dover on the following evening. A dazed, stupid lot they were, +of an exceedingly low standard of intelligence. The sense of their own +rescue had overcome the poignancy of grief. I envied them their +stolidity, which I explained to my own mind by the rush of the engulfing +waters still swirling and singing knell of sudden doom in their ears. + +"Guv'nor," said one clown to me, "I seed my ole 'ooman go down afore my +eyes, and I felt that grieved a'most as if I was agoin' down myself, and +I chewed a bit o' baccer." + +I saw the _Murillo_ lying quietly a little distance off the land--a +handsome, shapely craft, fine in the lines, with a sharp stem fashioned +like that of a ram. She was painted black, with the exception of a band +of pink above the water-line, where she was coated with Peacock's +mixture. The British Consul informed me that he understood the inquiry +into the guilt of the master was to be carried on _secretly_. He would +not be allowed to attend it. Copies of the depositions of the accused, +and permission to see them, had also been denied to the agents of the +British Government, who applied for them for the purposes of the Board +of Trade inquiry. Though Spaniards, in private conversation, own that +the _Murillo_ is the criminal ship, they seem, for some unaccountable +reason, to be anxious that she should escape the penalty of her +wickedness, as if the national honour were concerned, and the national +honour would be served by cloaking an offence cruel and mean in itself, +and awful in its consequences. + +There is a sentence in the Comminations which would keep running in my +mind every time I thought of that emigrant ship sent to the bottom off +Dungeness--"Cursed is he who smiteth his enemy secretly." But if he who +smites his enemy secretly is accursed, what is he who smites his +neighbour and then flees away like a coward in the dark? Is he not twice +and thrice wicked, and to be branded with malediction deeper still? Such +a thing the _Murillo_ steamer did--there could be no manner of doubt +about it; every seafaring man and every Spaniard admits her +blood-guiltiness; yet there she lies off Puntales, near the Trocadero, +calmly expecting soon to be under weigh again with her criminal master +and crew on board, with no punishment registered against her or them. +The Consul-General of Spain in London wrote to the papers after the loss +of the _Northfleet_, saying if this man was the wrongdoer he would be +punished, and sent to Ceuta or Tetuan. But he is the wrongdoer, and he +will never be sent to Ceuta or Tetuan. The master of the _Murillo_ and +the sailors of the watch on the fatal night are in prison, but they will +never be brought to serious account. The figure of Justice in these +latitudes is true to the sculptor's ideal in one sense: the eyes are +bandaged, not that Justice shall be impartial, but that she may not +see. + +This instance of the _Murillo_ is but one of many, and as it illustrates +an artifice of tricky ship-owning, it will be well to state why the +_Murillo_ will go scot-free, and may audaciously turn up again in +British waters disguised by a few coats of paint, exhibiting a fresh +figure-head, and bearing a new name in gilt lettering on her stern. + +In the first place, the _Murillo_ belonged not to Spanish so much as +English owners. The line of steamers of which she was one was the +property of a company of shareholders. The company was anxious that +their vessels should fly the Spanish flag, so they made one Don Miguel +Styles the nominal head of the firm. This individual was a mere clerk in +their office, a man of straw, and at the date of the catastrophe Don +Miguel Styles had no more substantial existence than our old friend John +Styles: he was dead, and in his grave. + +Nextly, Mr. Daniel Macpherson, one of the most eminent merchants in the +port of Cadiz and Lloyd's agent, had been served with an instrument +claiming damages to the amount of 50,000 pesetas (£2,000), because that +he had calumniated the good ship _Murillo_, and caused her prejudice and +injury by detaining her a couple of months in the waters of Cadiz. The +persons who instituted this action forget that the Spanish courts have +no jurisdiction in the matter of libels published in England. And as for +the prejudice caused to the vessel, it is incredible that the British +Government should be so weak as to wait for letters from Lloyd's agent +before opening an inquiry into the deaths of some three hundred of its +subjects and the identity of the dastardly scoundrel who was the cause +of their deaths, who disabled the ship that held them, and then slunk +off, leaving them to the mercy of the midnight sea. That the _Murillo_ +was that vessel, even those who maintain that she cannot be proved +legally guilty do not attempt to deny. It is true, as they say, that +moral certainty is one thing, legal certainty another. But there was +seldom a clearer chain of circumstantial evidence pointing to the +perpetrator of any crime than that which convicted the _Murillo_ of +being the misdemeanant. She was off Dungeness at the hour of the +disaster, and she was in contact with a ship; this the imprisoned master +admitted in his log. But he alleged that the ship could not have been +the _Northfleet_. He said he came into collision with a vessel; that he +stood by her for half an hour; that one of her boats put off with some +persons on board carrying a lantern; that they went round her examining +whether there was anything wrong; and that no call having been made to +him for assistance he steamed away. But there was a discrepancy between +the entry in his log and that in the log of the engineer. The latter, an +Englishman, stated that the engines of the _Murillo_ were backed before +the collision, that she went astern afterwards, and then went on ahead. +The delay altogether was only for a few minutes. No mention of the +half-hour. The engineer had no object in telling a lie. The master of +the _Murillo_ had. No other ship was in collision off Dungeness that +night. Besides, what meant the order to the _Murillo_ to come on at once +to Cadiz if she had been in collision, and not stop at Lisbon, whither +she was bound as port of call, if not to get her into limits where +justice is notoriously blind and halt? Argument is unnecessary and +childish; it was the _Murillo_ which cut down the _Northfleet_. But +Spain will never exact retribution for the destruction of the property +and the sacrifice of the lives of aliens. Cosas de España. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + Expansion of Carlism--A Pseudo-Democracy--Historic Land and Water + Marks--An Impudent Stowaway--Spanish Respect for Providence--A + Fatal Signal--Playing with Fire--Across the Bay--Farewell to + Andalusia--British Spain. + + +TOWARDS the close of February, a grave official report was published in +the _Gaceta_ of Madrid, announcing that an engagement had been fought +with the Carlists and a victory scored, _one_ of the enemy having been +killed. We were now in April, some six weeks later, and Carlism still +showed lively signs of existence, notwithstanding the death of that +solitary combatant. The statement of the troops employed against it will +be the best measure of its importance. These consisted of a battalion +and two companies of Engineers, four companies of Foot Artillery, a +battery of Horse and five batteries of Mountain Artillery; eight +squadrons of Cuirassiers, seven of Lancers, four of Hussars, a section +of Mounted Chasseurs (Tiradores), and eighteen battalions of Infantry of +the line, with five of Cazadores, or light infantry. Behind this force +of regulars were the Francos or Free-shooters of Navarre (who were about +as good as their prototypes, the _francs-tireurs_ of France--no better), +some mobilized Volunteers, and the Carabineros, or revenue police. There +were some who imagined that the hosts of Don Carlos might crown the +hills of Vallecas, and present themselves before the gate of Atocha to +the consternation of Madrid, as did those of his predecessor in the +September of 1837. But the Federals of the south did not mind. What did +not touch them, they cared not a jot for. They were of the +pseudo-democracy which wants to live without working, consume without +producing, obtain posts without being trained for them, and arrive at +honours without desert--the selfish and purblind pseudo-democracy of +incapacity and cheek. + +As I had no pecuniary interest in salt, wine, phosphate of soda, hides, +or cork--the chief exports of Cadiz--I left the much-bombarded port on +the _Vinuesa_, one of the boats of the Alcoy line plying to Malaga. My +immediate destination was the Hock, but we went no nearer than +Algeciras, the town on the opposite side of the bay, off which Saumarez +gave such a stern account of the Spanish and French combined on the 12th +of July, 1801. The sea was without a ripple. The bright coasts of two +Continents were in view. On such a day as this the first adventurers +must have crossed from Africa to Europe. Hero might almost have swum +across. Even Mr. Brownsmith of Eastchepe might rig a craft out of an +empty sugar hogshead, set up his walking-stick for mast, tie his +pocket-handkerchief to it for sail, and trust to the waves in +safety--that is, if Mr. Brownsmith of Eastchepe had in him the heart of +Raleigh, not of Bumble. Some men are born to be drivers of tram-cars, +some to be captains of corsairs. The pioneer of navigation must have +been cut out by nature to be a High-Admiral of bold buccaneers. + +We were only five passengers on the steamer, and we amused ourselves +comparing notes. One told of a voyage from Barcelona to Alicante which +he had once undertaken. The first night out they lost a sailor; he was +seized with a fit and died; and then came the poser. When they would +arrive at Alicante and muster the crew for the inspection of the health +officers one would be wanting; suspicions would be aroused that he had +fallen a victim to contagious disease, and they ran the hazard of being +stuck into quarantine unless they could succeed in buying themselves off +with an exorbitant bribe. While they were in a quandary, a white head +popped above a gangway forward and a voice sang out: + +"I'll get you out of the hole for a consideration." + +"Who the deuce are you? Where did you spring from?" cried the skipper. + +"A stowaway,--a flour-barrel. I'll parade as the dead man's substitute +for ten dollars and a square meal." + +In the end they were glad to accept the impudent proposal; the corpse +was flung overboard, and the stowaway entered the port of Alicante an +honest British tar, looking the whole world in the face like +Longfellow's village blacksmith, and jingling ten dollars in his +pocket. + +We passed by Barrosa, where Graham gave the French such a thrashing in +1811, and the 87th Irish Fusiliers earned their glorious surname of the +"Eagle-takers;" and over the waves of Trafalgar where Nelson did his +duty, and was smitten with a bullet in the spine; and passing into the +Straits and rounding the point by Tarifa, stood in for the Bay of +Gibraltar. A spacious swelling spread of live water it is, and safe, +except, as one of my fellow-passengers informed me, for a rock off the +Punta del Carnero, or Mutton Point. The rock is covered when the tide is +high (for there is a tide here), but rears its tortoise-like back over +the surface for some hours at the ebb. The Channel squadron was coming +out of Gib some years before when an ironclad grounded on this rock, but +was got off without more damage than a scraping. As the danger to the +navigation was outside the limits of the fortress, the British +authorities applied to the Spanish for permission to clear away the +obstruction. It was easily to be accomplished. A party of sappers could +set a caisson round it, bore a gallery, insert a charge, and blast the +rock into smithereens with safety and despatch. But the Spaniards would +not consent to such an interference with the designs of Providence; the +poor fishermen on the coast were often dependent for their livelihood on +what they could pick up from wrecks, and if this rock were removed +Nature would be sacrilegiously altered, and the interesting wreckers +deprived of many an honest coin. I tell the tale as it was told to me. I +wonder should it be dedicated to the amphibious corps. + +Another story bearing on the successful revolution inaugurated by Prim +is worth relating, as it deals with an episode of Spanish politics which +is repeated almost every other year with slender variations. The play is +the same; the scene and the _dramatis personæ_ are merely shifted. One +of the stereotyped military risings was to be initiated at Algeciras on +the arrival of Prim from England. The intimation that he was at hand was +to be made by the firing of two rockets from the ship which carried him. +On a certain night at the close of August, 1868, two rockets blazed in +the sky, and were noticed by the impatient conspirators at Algeciras, +who flew to arms to cries of "Down with the Queen," and "Live Prim and +Liberty." But no Prim landed. The alarm was premature, the rising a +flash in the pan. What they had taken for the bright herald of the +advent of "El Paladino" was the signal of a Peninsular and Oriental +steamer which had arrived on her passage to Port Said. For the sake of +appearances, a number of unfortunate fools were set up against a wall +and had their brains blown out in tribute to law and order. But the +fruit was ripening. Within little more than a fortnight came the +insurrection of the fleet at Cadiz, upon the appearance in that port of +the popular hero, and before the end of the month Queen Isabella had +fled over the French frontier, never to return to Spain as a sovereign. +Prim's plot was attended with a fortune in excess of his most sanguine +hopes; he entered Madrid in triumph in October, and was created a +Marshal in November. All was joy and enthusiasm, but the hapless tools +of ambition who had helped to prepare the way for him below in Algeciras +were not of the jubilee. + +At first sight the rock looms up large like a frowning inhospitable +islet, the stretch of the Neutral Ground being so low that one cannot +detect it above the sea-level until almost right upon it. We left the +_Vinuesa_ and entered a boat with a couple of sturdy rowers, who offered +to pull us across the Bay for five dollars. As I dipped a hand in the +brine one of them raised a cry of "Take care!" there were "mala pesca" +there. Mr. Shark, who is an ugly customer, had been cruising in the +neighbourhood, and had taken a morsel out of an American swimmer a +little time before. There were three masts protruding over the water at +one spot, the relics of some gallant ship, and index to one of those +godsends which the Spanish Government is solicitous to guarantee to the +distressed and deserving local fishermen. What a pity it was not the +_Murillo_! That would have been poetic retribution. + +No matter: with all thy faults I like thee, Spain, and especially that +brown dusty province of Andalusia, with its oranges and pomegranates; +its dancing fountains splashed with sunshine; its winsome damozels with +such lisping languors of voice; its philosophic waiters upon the morrow, +happy in a cigarette, a melon and a guitar; its muleteers crooning +snatches of lazy song; its peasants with hair tied in beribboned +pigtail; its tawny boys in Manola colours; aye, and its artistic +beggars. + +"Ah! now you see the Neutral Ground; that village to the left is Lineas, +where you can get a glass of Manzanilla cheap," exclaimed a companion. + +I do not set exceeding store by your pale thin Manzanilla, nor do I care +to load my mouth with the flavour of a drug store. + +"There are the sheds we put up the time Prim was expected; they are on +the Neutral Ground, ha, ha! where the soil is supposed to be inviolate; +but we have forgotten to take them down since. We were too many for +them." + +And now we are by the landing-stairs, and the Customs' officer demands +our passport in English. We answer him cheerily that we need none, and +to his smiling welcome we step on the soil of British Spain; but it +would be unpardonable to begin describing it at the tail of a chapter. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + Gabriel Tar--A Hard Nut to Crack--In the Cemetery--An Old Tipperary + Soldier--Marks of the Broad Arrow--The "Scorpions"--The + Jaunting-Cars--Amusements on the Bock--Mrs. Damages' Complaint--The + Bay, the Alameda, and Tarifa--How to Learn Spanish--Types of the + British Officer--The Wily Ben Solomon--A Word for the + Subaltern--Sunset Gun--The Sameness of Sutlersville. + + +WHERE I went to school, we had a droll lad, whose humour developed +itself in mispronunciation. In my nonage I considered that unique. Now I +know it is a rather common order of quaintness. Hugh used to call Sierra +Leone, "Sarah Alone;" Cambodia, "Gamboge;" Stromboli, "Storm-boiler;" +and Gibraltar, "Gabriel Tar." How we used to wrinkle with laughter at +his sallies, launched with an artistically unconscious air, until the +swooping cane came swishing down on our backs! And here I was in Gabriel +Tar. I vow the first inclination I felt was to write to Hugh with the +date engraved on the note-paper, and indeed so I should have done, but +that I had not seen him for nigh twenty years, and when last I heard of +him he was married, and had learned to be serious and to speak with +precision. The fun had been driven out of him by responsibility. +Propriety had come with prosperity. + +Call it by what name you will, Gabriel Tar, or Gibraltar, that +infinitesimal scrap of territory over which the Union Jack floats, is +supremely unpalatable and insolently insulting to the Spaniard. It is a +bitter pill to swallow, an adamantine nut to crack. I suppose he is +welcome to take it--when he can; but he knows better than to try. It is +the gate of the Mediterranean. Logically, it is an injustice that a +stranger should sit in the porter's lodge and swing the key at his +girdle; but it is as well that the porter is one who is too surly to +barter his trust for gold. So Gabriel Tar will remain intact, until the +porter grows feeble or falls asleep. + +British Spain, or "the Rock," or Gib, as it is indifferently termed, or +Sutlersville, as I prefer to name it, can be converted into an island at +the will of its defenders. The sandy spit of Neutral Ground at one side +of which Tommy Atkins, fresh-faced, does his sentry-go in brick-red +tunic and white pith-helmet, and at the other side of which swarthy +Sancho Panza y Toro, in projecting cap and long blue coat, fondles a +rifle in the bend of his arm, can readily be flooded; and the bare, +sheer, lofty north front, with scores of cannon of the deadliest modern +pattern lying in wait behind the irregular embrasures that grimly pit +its surface, hardly invites attack. It frowns a calm but determined +defiance; and even the Cid himself might be excused if he turned on his +heel and puffed a meditative cigarette after he had surveyed it. + +British Spain is small, being but one and seven-eighth square miles +English in area; but it is mighty strong. The population, comprising the +garrison, is less than fifteen thousand; but behind that slender cipher +of souls are the millions of the broadest and biggest of empires. I do +not know what the population of the cemetery is, but it receives rapid +and numerous accessions at each periodical outbreak of cholera. I paid a +visit to it--I have a fondness for sauntering in God's acre--and arrived +in time to witness a funeral. When the coffin was laid in the grave, a +young man, probably the husband of the deceased, threw himself prone on +the turf beside the open burial-trench, and burst into such a passionate +tempest of heart-rending sobs and moans and wailings, that I had to move +away. These Southerners are more demonstrative in their grief than the +men of the North. I question if their sorrows spring from deeper depths, +or are so lasting. The caretaker of the cemetery, an elderly Tipperary +soldier, with a short _dudheen_ in his mouth, was seated smoking on a +head-stone by a goat-willow. We got into conversation. + +"There were worse places than Gib--singing-birds were raysonable here, +and some of them had rayl beautiful plumage." + +My countryman, like the Duke of Argyll, had a weakness for ornithology. + +"That spread of land beyant was where the races were held, and small-arm +parties from the fleet sometimes kem ashore and practised there. They +used to play cricket there, too. The symmetry wasn't a gay place, but +there were worse. There were some beautiful tombs--now _there_ was a +parable ov wan; 'twas put up by their frinds to some officers who were +dhrownded while they were crossing a flooded sthrame on their way back +from a shooting excursion. The car-drivers, who were dhrownded wid them, +had no monument. 'Twas a quare world; a poor man had the chance of dying +wid a rich man, but was not to be berrid in his company. Well, he +supposed it was for the best," and here he hammered the heel-tap out of +his pipe on the side of his shoe; "when the last bugle sounded a +field-officer would feel uncomfortable like if he had to be looking for +his bones in the same plot wid a lance-corporal." + +Truly, a queer world. Death with impartial summons knocks at the cabin +of the poor and the palace of the wealthy; but in the undertaker's +interest the equality of the grave must not be conceded. The plebeian +who commits _felo de se_ is served properly if he is hidden at the +cross-roads by night and a stake driven through his body. The lunatic +King who drowns himself, and drags his doctor to the same fate--who is a +suicide duplicated with the suspicion of murder--is embalmed and laid to +rest in consecrated ground amid incense and music, lights and flowers, +the tolling of bells, and the chanting of dirges. + +The funeral was over; they were just finishing the _De Profundis_. My +countryman had to quit me. "_Oyeh!_ that fellow who was making such a +lamentation might be married agin in a twelvemonth. The army plan was +the best; after the 'Dead March' in _Saul_ came 'Tow-row-row.'--another +so'jer was to be had for a shilling. He did not drink; he thanked me all +the same--had taken the pledge from Father Mathew whin he was a boy, and +meant to stick by it; but he would accept the price of a singing-bird he +had set his mind upon, since it was pressed upon him." + +Gibraltar is but a huge garrison. In the moat by the gate, as I +re-entered, a big drummer and a tiny mannikin-soldier with cymbals were +practising how to lead off a marching-past tune. The "Fortune of War" +tavern elbows "Horse-Barrack Lane;" a print of "The Siege of Kars" is +side by side in a shop-window with Dr. Bennett's "Songs for Soldiers." +The Plazas and Calles of the mainland of Spain have been parted with. +The names of streets, hostelries, and stores are English. Instead of +tiendas and almacenes and fondas, you have fancy repositories, +regimental shoe-shops, and porter-houses. There, for example, is the +celebrated "Cock and Bottle," and farther on "The Calfs Head Hotel." If +you traverse Cathedral Square, no larger than an ordinary-sized +skittle-alley, you arrive by Sunnyside Steps to the Europa Pass. Notices +are posted by the roadside cautioning against plucking flowers or +treading on the beds under pain of prosecution. But the bazaar bewilders +you with its alien figures, its confusion of tongues, and its eccentric +contrasts of dress. In five minutes you meet Spanish officers; nuns in +broad-leaved white bonnets; a bearded sergeant nursing a baby; +bare-legged, sun-burnished Moors; pink-and-white cheeked ladies'-maids +from Kent; local mashers in such outrageously garish tweeds; stiff +brass-buttoned turnkeys; Jews in skull-cap and Moslems in fez; and while +you are lost in admiration of a burly negro, turbaned and in grass-green +robe, with face black and shiny as a newly-polished stove, you are +hustled by a sailor on cordial terms with himself who is vigorously +attempting to whistle "Garry Owen." + +But above and before all, the sights and sounds are military. Sappers +and linesmen and artillerists pullulate at every corner; fatigue-parties +are confronted at every turn; the bayonet of the sentinel flashes in +every angle of the fortress from the minute the sun, bursting into +instantaneous radiance from behind the great barrier of craggy hill, +lights up the town and bastions and moles, until the boom of the +sunset-gun gives signal for the gates to be closed. Every tavern looks +like a canteen; the gossip is of things martial; the music is that of +the reveille or tattoo--the blare of brass, the rub-a-dub of parchment, +or the shrill sound-revel of Highland pipes (for there is usually a +Scotch regiment here). The ladies one meets all have husbands, or +fathers, or uncles in the Service; even the children--those of English +parents well understood--keep step as they walk, and the boys amongst +them compliment any well-dressed stranger with a home face by rendering +him the regulation salute. This is highly gratifying to the civilian +sojourning in the place; for he insensibly succumbs to the _genius +loci_, squares his shoulders, expands his chest, and feels that if he is +not an officer he ought to be one. + +Except the enterprising gentry who devote themselves to cheating the +Spanish excise by smuggling cigars and English goods across the border, +the Scorpions live by and on the garrison, and therefore do I name their +habitat Sutlersville. "Scorpion," I should add, for the benefit of the +uninitiated, is the _sobriquet_ conferred by Tommy Atkins on the natives +of the Rock, as that of "Smiches" is merrily applied by him to the +Maltese, and of "Yamplants" to the denizens of St. Helena. There is a +tolerable infusion of English blood among the Scorpions, but it is +hardly of the healthiest or most respectable. + +Gib is familiar to thousands of Englishmen, but it must be unfamiliar to +many thousands more. This is my excuse for exhuming some notes of my +stay there. Don't be afraid, I am not going to pester you with +guide-book erudition. Let others take you to the galleries and caves, +lead you up the ascent to the Moorish tower, inform you that the one +spot in Europe where there is an indigenous colony of monkeys (the +patriarch of which is styled the "town major") is here, and enlighten +you as to the interesting fact that this is the only locality out of +Ireland where the Irish jaunting-car is to be objurgated. Mine be a +humbler task. + +Society in Gib is select, but limited. It is uniform, like the clothes +of the influential portion of the inhabitants. Gib is the wrong place to +bring out a young lady, though Major Dalrymple's daughters, immortalized +in Lever's novel, could not well have found a better hunting-ground. But +then Major Dalrymple's daughters were regular garrison hacks--so the +irreverent subs of the Rovers used to call them--and never stood a +chance beside the daughters of the county families. There are racing and +chasing at the station, and theatricals and balls. I arrived at the +wrong season. The three days' local racing, for horses of every breed +but English, was over, and most of the men were going to Cadiz by +special boat next day, _en route_ for the Jerez races, which are the +best--indeed, I might almost say the solitary--meeting in Spain. + +"There are only two things in this land worth talking about," said an +English merchant to me at Cadiz; "the steamers of Lopez and the races of +Jerez." + +The hunting (thanks to brave old Admiral Fleming for having started that +diversion) was over too. The meets have to come off, naturally, outside +the frontier of British Spain. The sport is pretty good--one cannot +quite expect the Melton country, of course--the riding hard, and the +horses invariably Spanish; no English horses would do, for no English +horse would be equal to climbing up a perpendicular bank with sixteen +stone on his back, and that is a feat the native steeds, bestridden by +British warriors in pink who follow the Calpe pack, have sometimes to +accomplish. There is a Spanish lyrical and theatrical troop in the town; +but it is Holy Week, and lyricals and theatricals are under taboo. +Occasionally charity concerts are given by amateurs, and plays are even +performed in Lent Champagne, of the Fizzers, has won a reputation by his +success on the boards when he dons the habiliments of lovely woman +beyond a certain age. But, as I told you before, I arrived at the wrong +season. There are no balls at the Convent, which is the Governor's +residence; and, touching these balls, I have a grievance to ventilate, +at the request of Mrs. Quartermaster Damages. She specially imported +frilled petticoats from England to display in the mazy dance, and she +assured me they were turning sere and yellow in her boxes. She never +gets a chance of bringing them out except once in the twelvemonth, when +she is asked to the "Quartermasters' Ball." But there is a reason for +everything, and Mrs. Quartermaster Damages is fat and forty, and not +fair, and--tell it not out of mess--they say she has a tongue. + +At this particular time, you perceive, this fortified fragment of the +empire was dull; but usually it is gay, and the officer quartered there +has always an excellent opportunity of learning his trade and acquiring +skill in the gentlemanly game of billiards. He can make maps and surveys +of the neutral ground, and watch the guard mounting on the Alameda, or +read the account of the siege in Drinkwater's days; and when he tires of +the green cloth and its distractions, and of his own noble profession, +he can throw a sail to the breeze in the unequalled Bay, or take a +flying trip to Tarifa to sketch the beautiful from the living model, or +go to Ceuta to see the Spanish galley-slaves and disciplinary regiments, +forgetful of our own chain-gangs; or steam across to Tangier to riot in +Nature and a day's pig-sticking. + +The Bay, the Alameda, and Tarifa--these are the three delights of +Gibraltar. + +You have heard of the Bay of Naples, and the Bay of Dublin, which equals +it in Paddy Murphy's estimation. I know both; and Gibraltar, the +little-spoken-of, leaves them nowhere. The sky, and the undulating +mirror below that reflects it, are such a blue; the rocks are such an +ashen-grey; the Spanish sierras such a leonine brown, with summits +wrapped in clouds like rolling smoke; and the sun goes down to his bath +in the west 'mid such a vaporous glow of yellowing purple and rosy gold! + +The Alameda is a bower of Venus cinctured by Mars. Here is a gravelled +expanse bounded by hill and sea, with cosy benches under the shade of +palmitos--the civilization of the West in alliance with the rich +vegetation of the East. Sometimes, in the morning, five hundred men or +more--garrison artillery, engineers, and infantry--muster there, +previous to marching to their posts; there is a banging of drums, a +blowing of bugles, a bobbing vision of cocked-hats, and a roar of hoarse +words of command--all the pomp and pride and circumstance of glorious +war before the fighting begins. Sometimes, in the evening, a band plays, +and the Alameda is the resort of fashion and of nursery-maids. + +Tarifa, shining in the sunset across the water, is a tempting morsel for +the landscape-painter, and the dwellers in Tarifa are the best teachers +of Spanish. A British subaltern bent on improving his mind could +encounter an infinitely better preceptor there than "Jingling Johnny," +the self-appointed professor to the garrison, who hires himself on +Monday, makes you a present of a guitar-tutor on Tuesday, and asks you +to favour him with six months' payment in advance on Wednesday. To be +sure, the Spanish those Tarifans speak is slightly Arabified; but their +tones of voice are persuasive, and their methods of teaching agreeable. +The professor taken by the British subaltern is invariably a female, and +the females of Tarifa are not the ugliest in the world. They still +retain many customs peculiar to their Moorish ancestors. They wear a +manta, not a mantilla--a sort of large-hooded mantle, with which they +hide the light of their countenance, except an eye--but that is a +piercer, ye gods I and they keep it open for business. When a stranger +passes, especially if he looks like a sucking lieutenant from the +fortress beyond, the manta falls, disclosing the soft loveliness +beneath, and the wearer affects a pretty confusion, and hastens with +judicious slowness to re-adjust its folds. The British subaltern reels +to his quarters seriously wounded, and may be seen the following +morning, with his hair blown back, spouting poetry to the zephyrs on +Europa Point. Oh no!--that only occurs in romances; but he may be seen +drinking brandy-and-soda moderately in the Club-House. + +Poor British subaltern! How Sutlersville does exploit him! He is a +sheep, and bears his fleecing without a kick. Watch those lazy, +lounging, able-bodied, smoking, and salivating loons who prop up every +street-corner, and monopolize the narrow pathways--these all live by +him; they eat up his substance, and fatten thereupon. These are the +touting and speculating sons of the Rock, the veritable Scorpions, who +are ever ready to find the "cap'n" a dog or a horse or a boat, or +something not so harmless, to help him on the road to ruin, and whisper +in his ear what a fine fellow he is--"As ver fine a fellow--real +gemman--as Lord Tomnoddy, who give me such a many dollars when he go +away." The first word these loons pronounce after coming into the world +must be _baksheesh_. They are born with beggary in their mouths, and the +British subaltern acts as if he were born to be their victim. There he +is below, of every type, lolling outside the hotel-door that looks on +that Commercial Square which is so thorough a barrack-square, with its +romping children, its dogs, its dust, its guard-house with chatting +soldiers on a form in front, and the important sentinel pacing to and +fro, regular and rigid as a pendulum, keeping vigilant watch and ward +over nothing in particular. We have a rare company to-day; besides the +engineers and bombardiers, and the linesmen of the 24th, 31st, 71st, and +81st, the four infantry regiments on the station, we have men on leave +from Malta. They came up to the races, and are waiting for the P. and O. +steamer to take them back. That fat little customer is your sporting +sub. I only wonder he is not in cords, tops, and spurs. What a hearty +voice he talks in! He asks for the _Field_ as if he were giving a +view-halloo. Then there is the moist-eyed, mottle-cheeked, puffy, +convivial sub, who is knowing on the condition of ale, and is too +friendly with Saccone's sherry. The convivial sub, I am happy to say, is +dying out. Then there is the prig, who is "going in" for his profession. +I call him a prig, because when people are going in for anything they +should have the good sense not to blow about it. To hear Mr. Shells and +his prattle about Hamley and Brialmont and Jomini, _kriegspiel_ and the +new drill, you would imagine he was bound to put the extinguisher on +Marlborough, Wellington, Wolseley, and the rest of them; and yet the +chances are, if you meet him twenty years hence, he will be a captain on +the recruiting service, with no forces to marshal but six growing +children. Then there is the sentimental sub, the perfect ladies' man, +who plays croquet and the flute, pleads guilty to having cultivated the +Nine, and affects a simpering pooh-pooh when he is impeached with having +inspired that wicked but so witty bit of scandal in the local paper. By +singularity of pairing, his fast friend is the muscular sub, who walks +against time, and can write his initials with a hundredweight hanging +from his index-finger. + +Happy dogs in the heyday of life, all of them; how I envy them their +buoyant spirits, their rollicking enjoyment of to-day, and their +contempt for the morrow! But the morrow will come nevertheless, and +with it Black Care will come often. Gib is a haunt of the Hebrews; they +or their myrmidons beset the subaltern at genial hours, after luncheon +or after mess, pester him with vamped-up knick-knacks for sale, appeal +to him to patronize a poor man by buying articles he does not and never +by any means can want--"pay me when you likes, Cap'n, one yearsh, two +yearsh." The "cap'n," who may have left Sandhurst but six months, may be +weakly good-natured, and ignore the fact that his income is not elastic; +some day that he thinks of taking a run to England Ben Solomon, who +seems to be able to read the books in the Adjutant-General's Office +through the walls, pounces upon him with his little bill, and he is +arrested if he cannot satisfy his Jewish benefactor. Loans are advanced +at a high rate "per shent" by the harpies, and enable him to stave off +the temporary embarrassment; the "cap'n" is happy for the moment, but +the reckoning is only deferred that it may grow. The arrival of Black +Care is adjourned, not averted. The plain truth of it is, Gibraltar is a +den of thieves, and has been the burial-pit of many a promising young +fellow's hopes. There are two tariffs for everything--one for natives, +the other for the British subaltern and the British tourist; and the +British subaltern and the British tourist are foolish enough to submit +to the extortion in most cases. With some half-dozen honourable +exceptions, the traders are what is popularly known as "Jews" in their +mode of dealing. They cozen on principle, sell articles that will not +last, and charge preposterous prices for them; they impose upon the +young officer's softness or delicate gentlemanly feeling, and consider +themselves smart for so doing. In this manner Gibraltar, with all its +discomforts, is dearer than the most expensive and luxurious quarter in +the British Isles. + +But we have other specimens of the genus officer in the lounging +slaughterers by profession, who are so busy killing time. The lean +bronzed aristocratic major, whose temper long years in India have not +soured; the squat pursy paymaster (why are paymasters so fearfully +inclined to fat?); the raw-boned young surgeon with the Aberdeen accent; +"the ranker," erect and grizzled, and looking ever so little not quite +at his ease, you know, for the languid lad with fawn-coloured moustache +straddling on the chair beside him is an Honourable; the jovial portly +Yorkshireman, who is in the Highland Light Infantry, naturally; and the +lively loud-voiced Irishman, laughing consumedly at his own jokes--all +are here, conversing, smoking, mildly chaffing each other, and +exchanging "tips" as to the next Derby. They make a book in a quiet way, +and occasionally invest in a dozen tickets in a Spanish lottery. What +will you? One cannot perpetually play shop, and the British officer has +a rooted objection to it, although he does his duty like a man when the +tug of war arises. Better that he should join in a regimental +sweepstakes, or lose what he can afford to lose to a comrade, than give +way to the blues. He does not gamble or curse, like his Spanish +_confrère_; his potations are not deep, nor is he quick to quarrel. Then +let him race on the Neutral Ground; let him hunt with the Calpe pack; +and let him back his fancy for the big event at Epsom. Those are his +chief excitements at Gib, and help to give a fillip to life in that +circumscribed microcosm, pending the anxiously expected morn when the +route will come, or, mayhap, the call to active service, in one of those +petty wars which are constantly breaking the monotony of this so-called +pacific reign. + +"Guard, turn out!" cries the Highland Light Infantry sentinel under my +window, and the smart soldier laddies fall in for the inspection of the +officer of the day. What a thoroughly military town it is! By-and-by the +evening gun booms from the heights above, where Sergeant Munro, taking +time from his sun-dial and the town major, notifies the official sunset. +Bang go the gates. We are imprisoned. Anon the streets are traversed by +patrols in Indian file to warn loiterers to return to barracks, the +pipers of the 71st skirl a few wild tunes on Commercial Square, the +buglers sound the last post, the second gun-fire is heard, and a hush +falls over the town, broken only by the challenges of sentries or their +regular echoing footfalls on their weary beats. The thunder of artillery +wakes you in the morning anew, and if you venture out for a walk before +breakfast you thread your way through waggons of the army train or +fatigue-parties in white jackets. You stumble across cannon and +symmetric pyramids of shot where you least expect them; the line of +sea-wall is intersected by figures in brick-red tunic, moving back and +forward on ledges of masonry; the morning air is alive with drum-beats +and bugle and trumpet-calls; everything is of the barrack most +barrack-like; the broad arrow is indented in large deep character on the +Rock. It is impossible to shake off the Ordnance atmosphere. The Irish +jaunting-cars are all driven by the sons of soldiers' wives; the +clergy-men are all military chaplains; those goats are going up to be +milked for the major's delicate daughter; that lady practising horse +exercise in a ring in her garden is wife to Pillicoddy of the Control +Department, and is merely correcting the neglected education of her +youth; the very monkeys--diminishing sadly, it grieves me to say--recall +associations of the mess-room, for you never fail to hear of that +terrible sportsman, "one of Cardwell's gents," who thought it excellent +fun to shoot one some time ago. Luckily, the rules of the service did +not permit him to be tried by court-martial, or the wretched boy might +have been ordered out for instant execution, so great was the +indignation. But if he was not shot he was roasted as fearfully as ever +St. Laurence was; he was reminded a thousand times if once that +fratricide is a fearful crime, and if ever Nemesis visits his pillow it +will be in the shape of a monkey without a tail. + +One wearies of the same scenes of beauty, and would fain barter the Cork +Woods for the chestnuts in Bushy Park; the bright Bay and the watchet +sky pall on the senses, and a dull river and drab clouds would be +welcomed for change. The day rises when the conversation of the same +set, the stories repeated as often as that famous one of grouse in the +gun-room, and the stale jokes anent the Sheeref of Wazan and the rival +innkeepers of Tangier, black Martin and "Lord James," cloy like treacle; +the fiction palmed upon the latest novice that he must go and have a few +shots at the monkeys, if he wishes to curry favour at headquarters, +misses fire; the calls of the P. and O. steamers, and the thought that +their passengers within a week either have seen, or will see, the +little village works its effect; even bull-fighting is adjudged a bore, +and one sighs for Regent Street and the "Rag and Famish," flaxen +ringlets, and roast bee£ A twelvemonth might pass pleasantly on the +Rock; but after that the "damnable iteration" of existence must jar on +the nerves like the note of a cuckoo. Still, as my philosopher of the +cemetery remarked, there are worse places--far worse, Assouan and Aden, +for example; so let not the gallant gentleman repine whom Fate has +assigned to a round of duty in Sutlersville. For Tommy Atkins of the +rank and file, it is wearisome when he is young; he should not be asked +to stay there longer than a twelvemonth while he is at the age which +yearns for novelty, and during that twelvemonth he should be drilled as +at the depôt. For the old soldier it is a good station, and should be +made a haven of rest. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + From Pillar to Pillar--Historic Souvenirs--Off to Africa--The + Sweetly Pretty Albert--Gibraltar by Moonlight--The + Chain-Gang--Across the Strait--A Difficult Landing--Albert is + Hurt--"Fat Mahomet"--The Calendar of the Centuries Put + Back--Tangier: the People, the Streets, the Bazaar--Our Hotel--A + Coloured Gentleman--Seeing the Sights--Local Memoranda--Jewish + Disabilities--Peep at a Photographic Album--The Writer's Notions on + Harem Life. + + +I WAS gradually getting into the mood of Pistol, and cried a foutra for +the world of business and worldlings base. My soul was longing for +"Africa and golden joys." Here I was at the elbow, so to speak, of the +mysterious Continent, where the geographers set down elephants for want +of towns. Why should I not visit it? I might never have such a chance +again. I stood in the shadow of one Pillar of Hercules. Why not make +pilgrimage to the other? Having notched Calpe on my staff, I resolved to +add Abyla to the record. + +I was the more inclined to this, as I had recollection that Tangier had +been part of the British dominions for one-and-twenty years. In 1662 +Catharine of Braganza, the "olivader-complexioned queen of low stature, +but prettily shaped," whose teeth wronged her mouth by sticking a little +too far out, brought it as portion of her dowry to Charles II. The 2nd, +or Queen's Own Regiment, was raised to garrison the post, and sported +its sea-green facings, the favourite colour of her Majesty, for long in +the teeth of the threatening Moors. The 1st Dragoons still bear the +nickname of "the Tangier Horse," and were originally formed from some +troops of cuirassiers who assisted in the defence of the African +stronghold for seventeen years; and the 1st Foot Regiment owes its title +of "Royal" to the distinction it gained by capturing a flag from the +Moors in 1680. That was the year when old John Evelyn noted in his diary +that Lord Ossorie was deeply touched at having been appointed Governor +and General of the Forces, "to regaine the losses we had lately +sustain'd from the Moors, when Inchqueene was Governor." His lordship +relished the commission so little--indeed, it was a forlorn errand--that +he took a malignant fever after a supper at Fishmongers' Hall, went +home, and died. In 1683 the Merry Monarch caused the works of Tangier to +be blown up, and abandoned the place, declaring it was not worth the +cost of keeping. The Merry Monarch was not prescient. A century +afterwards Gibraltar was indebted for a large proportion of its +supplies, during the great siege, to the dismantled and deserted +British-African fortress. For many reasons Tangier was not to be missed. + +By a happy coincidence a party of three in the Club-House Hotel--a +retired army captain, his wife, and a lady companion--were anxious to +take a trip to Africa. We agreed to go together, and had scarcely made +up our minds, when another retired captain, who habitually resided in +Tangier, gratified us by the information that he was returning there, +and would be happy to give us every assistance in his power. Retired +Captain No. 1 was a jolly fellow, fond of good living and not +overburdened with æstheticism--a capital specimen of a hearty +Yorkshireman. He looked after the provand. His wife, portly and short of +temper, was as good-natured as he. She insisted on discharging the +bills. The lady-companion was thin, accomplished, and melancholy. She +kept us in sentiment. Retired Captain No. 2 was a fellow-countryman of +mine, bright-brained and waggish. He was the walking guide-book, with +philosophy and friendship combined. I was nigh forgetting one, and not +by any means the least important, member of the party--Albert. Mrs. +Captain introduced him to me as a sweetly pretty creature. At her +request I looked after him. Tastes vary as to what constitutes beauty, +but I candidly think a broad thick head, crop ears, a flattish nose, and +heavy jowls could not be called sweetly pretty without straining a +point; and all these Albert possessed. He was a bull-dog (I believe his +real name was Bill, and that he had been brought up in Whitechapel). As +a bull-dog he had excellent points, and might be esteemed a model of +symmetry and breeding by the fancy, or even pronounced a beauty and +exquisitely proportioned by connoisseurs; but sweetly pretty--never! I +could not stomach that, especially when Albert growled and laid bare his +ruthless set of sound white teeth. + +Before leaving Gibraltar I had two novel sensations, nocturnal and +matutinal. The first was a view of the Bay by moonlight, the white +crescent shining clearly down on a portion of the inner waters brinded +by shipping, and on the outer spread of sleepy, cadenced wavelets +rippling phosphorescently under the pallid rays. By the Mole were +visible the outlines of barques, steamers, coal-brigs, and xebecs; away +to the left were the _Catapult_ and a few of her mosquito companions; +and far out rode at anchor a stately frigate of the United States' +fleet. The twinkling lamps of the city afloat sending out reddish lines, +and the fuller, clearer, luminous pencillings of the gas-lamps of the +city ashore, made a not ungrateful contrast to the quivering chart of +poetic moonbeams. Bending over their edge were the deep shadows of the +massive Rock; and bounding them, at the other side, the barren +foot-hills of Algeciras mellowed into a phantom softness by distance and +the night. + +Next morning, as I strolled by the sea-wall towards the Ragged Staff +Battery, I saw a sight that took away my appetite for breakfast. Pacing +slowly to their work to the music of clanking chains was a column of +wretched convicts.[A] What haggard faces, with low foreheads, sunken +eyes, and dogged moody expression or utter blankness of expression! +Purely animal the most of that legion of despair and desperation looked, +and sallow and sickly of complexion. They were a blot on the fresh +sunshine. How hideous their coarse garb of pied jackets branded with the +broad arrow, their knickerbockers and clumsy shoes! Wistfully they moved +along, hardly daring to glance at me, through fear of the turnkeys with +loaded rifles marching at their sides. I almost felt that, if I had the +power, I would demand their release, as did the Knight of La Mancha that +of the criminals on their way to the galleys, although they might have +been as ungrateful as Gines de Passamonte; but those hang-dog +countenances banished impulses of chivalry. + +The little steamer, the _Spahi_, which conveyed us across the Strait, +was seaworthy for all her cranky appearance, and made the passage of +thirty-two miles quickly and comfortably for all her roughness of +accommodation. She was a cargo-boat, but her skipper was English, and +did his best to make the ladies feel at home. Besides, Captain No. 1 had +brought a select basket of provisions and a case of dry, undoctored +champagne. One of our first experiences as we cleared Algeciras, with +turrets like our martello-towers sentinelling the hills, and the +three-masted wreck--"Been twenty-one days there," said the skipper, "and +not an effort has been made to raise it yet, and not even a warning +light is hung over it at night"--was to sight a bottle-nosed whale +puffing and spewing its predatory course. + +"What are those ruins upon the Spanish shore for?" asked the +accomplished lady. + +When she was informed that they were the beacons raised in the days of +old, when the Moorish corsairs haunted that coast, and that the moment +the pirate sail was descried in the offing (I hope this is correctly +nautical) the warning fire blazed by night, or the warning plume of +smoke went up by day, to summon Spain's chivalry to the rescue, she was +enchanted, and recited a passage from Macaulay's "Armada." + +We made the transit in a little over three hours, and, rounding the +Punta de Malabata, cut into the Bay of Tangier, and eased off steam at +some distance from the Atlantic-washed shore. There is no pier, but a +swell and discoloration, projecting in straight line seawards, marks +where a mole had once stood. That was a piece of British handiwork; but +the Moor, who is no more tormented by the demon of progress than the +Turk, had literally let it slide, until it sank under the waters. + +The Sultana of Moorish cities Tangier is sometimes called, and truly she +does wear a regal, sultana-like air as seen from afar, cushioned in +state on the hillside, her white flat roofs rising one above another +like the steps of a marble staircase, the tall minarets of the mosques +piercing the air, and the multitudinous many-coloured flags of all +nations fluttering above the various consulates. But in this, as in so +many other instances, it is distance which lends enchantment to the +view. + +We went as near to the shore as we could in small boats, and when we +grounded, a fellowship of clamouring, unkempt, half-naked Barbary Jews, +skull-capped, with their shirts tied at their waists and short cotton +drawers, rushed forward to meet us, and carry us pickaback to dry land. +The ladies were borne in chairs, slung over the shoulders of two of +these amphibious porters, or on an improvised seat made by their linked +hands, but to preserve their equilibrium the dear creatures had to clasp +their arms tightly round the necks of the natives. This would not look +well in a picture, above all if the lady were a professional beauty. But +there was nothing wrong in it, any more than in Amaryllis clinging to +the embrace of Strephon in the whirling of a waltz. Custom reconciles to +everything. On stepping into the small boat I had my first difficulty +with Albert. I trod on his tail. The dog looked reproachfully, but did +not moan. His mistress scowled, and warned me to take care what I was +about for an awkward fool. Her husband, with a pained look on his face, +mutely apologized for her, and I humbly excused myself and vowed +amendment. I am not revengeful, but I did enjoy it when one of the +porters, tottering under the weight of the fat lady, made a false step +and nearly gave her a sousing. I clambered on my particular Berber's +back, dear Albert in my arms, and we splashed merrily along; but Captain +No. 1, who turned the scales at seventeen stone two pounds, had not so +uneventful a landing. Twice his bearer halted, and the warrior, +abandoning himself to his fate, swore he would make the Berber's nose +probe the sand if he stumbled. + +As I was discharged on the beach, I was confronted by a majestic Moor. +His grave brown face was fringed with a closely-trimmed jet-black beard, +and his upper lip was shaded with a jet-black moustache. He wore a white +turban and a wide-sleeved ample garment of snowy white, flowing in +graceful folds below his knees; and on his feet were loose yellow +slippers, peaked and turned up at the toes. This was Mahomet Lamarty, +better known as "Fat Mahomet," who had acted as interpreter to the +British troops in the Crimea, and who, at this period, was making an +income by supplying subalterns from Gib with masquerade suits to take +home and horses to ride. Mahomet in his sphere was a great man. He was +none of your loquacious _valets de place_, no courier of the +Transcendental school. He had made the pilgrimage to Mecca and was a +Hadji; he was a chieftain of a tribe in the vicinity, and had fought in +the war against the Spanish infidels; he could borrow his purest and +finest Arab from the Kadi; he was free to the sacred garden of the +Shereef, or Pope-Sultan, one of the descendants of the Prophet, Allah be +praised! + +Mahomet, who was known to both the Captains, passed our small +impedimenta through the custom-house--there is an orthodox custom-house, +though there is no proper accommodation for shipping--and we trailed at +his heels up the close, crowded, rough alleys which did duty as streets. +It would be hard to imagine a more thorough-going change than our scurry +across the waves had effected. We were in another world completely. We +had been transported as on the carpet of the magician. It was as if the +calendar had been put back for centuries, and the half-forgotten +personages of the "Thousand-and-One Nights" were revivified and had +their being around us. + +Tangier is a walled and fortified town; but Vauban had no hand in the +fortifications, and it is my private opinion the walls would go down +before a peremptory horn-blast quicker than those of Jericho. It swarms +with a motley population much addicted to differences in shades of +complexion. The Tangerines exhaust the primitive colours and most of the +others in their features. There are lime-white Tangerines, copper and +canary-countenanced Tangerines, olive and beetroot-hued Tangerines, +Tangerines of the tint of the bottom of pots, Tangerines of every--no, I +beg to recall that, there are no well-defined blue or green Tangerines; +at least, none that came under my ken. The town is as old as the hills +and courageously uncivilized. There is no gasholder, no railway-station, +no theatre, no cab-stand, no daily paper, and no drainage board to go +into controversy over. It is unconsciously backward, near as it is to +Europe--a rifle-shot off the track of ships plying from the West to the +ports of the Mediterranean. It preserves its Eastern aroma with a fine +Moslem conservatism. Its ramparts of crumbling masonry are ornamented +with ancient cannon useless for offence, useless for defence. There is +said to be a saluting-battery; but the legend runs that the gunners +require a week's clear notice before firing a salute.[B] There is no +locomotion save in boxes and on the backs of quadrupeds; and quadrupeds +of the inferior order are usually, when overtaken by death, thrown in +the streets to decompose. But if the irregularity of the town would +galvanize the late Monsieur Haussmann in his grave, its situation would +satisfy the most exacting Yankee engineer. It is huddled in a sheltered +nest on the fringe of a land of milk and honey; it has the advantage of +a spread of level beach, and rejoices in the balmiest of climes. + +The streets are so narrow that you could light a cigar from your +neighbour's window on the opposite side; but there is no window, neither +at this side nor the other. A hole with a grating is the only window +that is visible. Moors are jealous, and to be able to appreciate their +household comforts you must first succeed in turning their houses inside +out. Those who have dived into the recesses say the fruit is as savoury +as the husk is repulsive. The windowless houses with their backs +grudgingly turned to the thoroughfares are low for the most part, and +the thoroughfares are--oh! so crooked--zigzag, up and down, staggering +in a drunken way over hard cobble-stones and leading nowhere. There are +mosques and stores entered by horse-shoe arches, a bazaar dotted over +with squatting women, cowled with dirty blankets, selling warm +griddle-cakes; moving here and there are the same spectral figures, +similar dirty blankets veiling them from head to foot; over the way are +cylinders of mat, with nets caging the apertures at each end, to hold +the cocks and hens, rabbits and pigeons, brought for sale by Riffians, +descendants of the corsairs of that ilk, stalwart, brown, and +bare-legged, with heads shaven but for the twisted scalp-lock left for +the convenience of Asrael when he is dragging them up to Paradise. +Hebrews have their standings around, and deal in strips of cotton, brass +dishes, and slippers, or change money, or are ready for anything in the +shape of barter. Seated in the shade of that small niche in the wall, as +on a tailor's shop-board, is an adool, or public notary, selling advice +to a client; in the alcove next him is a worker in beads and filigree; +from a dusty forge beyond comes the clang of anvils, where half-naked +smiths are hammering out bits or fashioning horse-shoes. Mules with +Bedouins perched, chin on shin, amid the bales of merchandise on their +backs, cross the bazaar at every moment; or files of donkeys, stooping +under bundles of faggots, pick their careful way. By-and-by--but this is +not a frequent sight--a Moslem swell ambles past on a barb, gorgeous in +caparisons, the enormous peaked saddle held in its place by girths round +the beast's breast and quarters, and covered with scarlet hammer-cloth. +If we move about and examine the stalls, we see lumps of candied +sweetmeats here; charms, snuff-boxes made of young cocoanuts and beads +there; and jars of milk or baskets of dates elsewhere. At the fountain +yonder, contrived in the wall, mud approached by rugged, sloppy steps, +water-carriers, wide-mouthed negro slaves, male and female, with brass +curtain-rings in their ears, and skins blacker than the moonless +midnight, come and go the whole day long, and gossip or wrangle with +loafers in coarse mantles and burnous of stuff striped like +leopard-skin. Beside the silent, gliding, ghost-like Mahometan women and +the Hottentot Venus, you have Rebecca in gaudy kerchief and Doña Dolores +in silken skirt and lace mantilla from neighbouring Spain. In the +mingling crowd all is novelty, all is noise, all is queer and shifting +and diversified. + +The hotel where we put up was owned by Bruzeaud, formerly a messman of a +British regiment. It was approached by a filthy lane, and commanded a +prospect of a square not much larger than a billiard-table. In the +middle of this square was the limp body of a deceased mongoose. At the +opposite side of it was a Mahometan school, where the children were +instructed in the Koran, and their treble voices as they recited the +inspired verses in unison kept up drone for hours. The build and +surroundings of the hostelry left much opening for improvement, but we +had no valid ground for complaint. The beds were clean, Bruzeaud was a +good cook, the waiter was attentive and smiled perpetually, which made +up for his stupidity; we had a single agreeable fellow-guest in a +Frenchman, who spoke Arabic, and had lived in the city of Morocco as a +pretended follower of the Prophet; and, besides, there was that dry +undoctored champagne, which it is permissible to drink at all meals in +Africa. + +There was another hotel in Tangier, a more pretentious establishment, +owned by one Martin--surname unknown. Martin was a character. He was an +unmitigated coloured gentleman, blubber-lipped and black as the ace of +spades, with saffron-red streaks at the corners of his optics. He was a +native of one of the West India Islands, I believe, but I will not be +positive. Mahomet Lamarty pressed me to tell him in what English county +Englishmen were born black, and when I said in none, he gravely +ejaculated that in that case Martin was a liar, and habitually ate dirt. +To avert possible complications into which I might have been drawn, I +had to hasten to explain that Martin might possibly have been born in a +part of England known as the Black Country. He had served in the +steward's department on the ship of war where the Duke of Edinburgh, +then Prince Alfred and a middy, was picking up seamanship. Hence his +Jove-like hauteur. He had rubbed-skirts with Royalty, and to his +fetter-shadowed soul some of the divinity which hedges kings and their +relatives had adhered to him. I never met a darkey who could put on such +fearful and wonderful airs. Where he did not order he condescended. He +showed me an Irish constabulary revolver which he had received from "his +old friend, Lord Francis Conyngham--'pon honour, he was delighted to +meet him. It was good for sore eyes--who'd a-thought of his turning up +there!" Splendidly inflated Martin was when he spoke of "his servants." +This thing was entertaining until he grew presumptuous. If you are +polite to some people they are familiar, and want to take an ell for +every inch you have conceded. And then you have to tell them to keep +their place. But Martin, with the instincts of his race, saw in time +when it was coming to that. What a misery it must be for a coloured +gentleman of ambition that the tell-tale _odor stirpis_ cannot be +eliminated! Martin spent extraordinary amounts of money on the purchase +of essences, but to no effect; he could not escape from himself; the +scent of the nigger, _che puzzo!_ would hang round him still. He was a +great coward with all his magniloquence, and when cholera attacked +Tangier, left it in craven terror, and sequestered himself in a country +house a few miles off. + +The two captains and I "did" Tangier conscientiously, with the zest of +Bismarck over a yellow-covered novel, and the thoroughness of a Cook's +tourist on his first invasion of Paris. We crawled into a stifling crib +of a dark coffee-house, and sucked thick brown sediment out of +liliputian cups; we smoked hemp from small-bowled pipes until we fell +off into a state of visionary stupor known as "kiff;" we paid our +respects to the Kadi, exchanged our boots for slippers, and settled down +cross-legged on mats as if we were the three tailors of Tooley Street; +we almost consented to have ourselves bled by a Moorish barber--Mahomet +Lamarty's particular, who lanced him in the nape of the neck every +spring--for the Moorish barber still practises the art of Sangrado, and +also extracts teeth. But in my note-taking I was sorely handicapped by +my ignorance of the language. Arabic is spoken in the stretch extending +from Tetuan to Mogador by the coast, and for some distance in the +interior; Chleuh is the dialect of the inhabitants of the Atlas range, +and Guinea of the negroes. Spanish is slightly understood in Tangier and +its vicinity, and is well understood by the Jews. The houses are +generally built of chalk and flint (_tabia_) on the ground-floor, and of +bricks on the upper story. Moorish bricks are good, but rough and +crooked in make. The houses inhabited by Jews are obliged to be coated +with a yellow wash, those of natives are white, those of Christians may +be of any colour. The Jews are made to feel that they are a despised +stock, and yet with Jewish subtlety and perseverance they have managed +to get and keep the trade of the place in their hands. That fact may be +plainly gathered from the absence of business movement in the bazaars +and public resorts of Tangier on the Jewish Sabbath. Your Hebrew does +not poignantly feel or bitterly resent being reviled and spat upon, +provided he hears the broad gold pieces rattling in the courier-bag +slung over his shoulder. He nurses his vengeance, but he has the common +sense to perceive that the readiest and fullest manner of exacting it is +by cozening his neighbour. At this semi-European edge of Africa he +enjoys comparative license, although he is forced to appear in skull-cap +and a long narrow robe of a dark colour something like a priest's +soutane. But the son of Israel when he has a taste for finery (and which +of them has not?) compensates for the gloom of his outer garment by +wearing an embroidered vest, a girdle of some bright hue, and white +drawers. + +The daughters of Israel--but my conscience charges me with want of +gallantry towards them in a previous chapter, and now I can honestly +relieve it and win back their favour. They are the only beautiful women +who mollify the horizon of Tangier: the Mahometan ladies are not +visible, those of Spanish descent are coarse, and of English are +washed-out; while their lips are against the negresses. I have a batch +of photographs of females in an album--aye, of believers in the Prophet +amongst them, for it is a folly to imagine you cannot obtain that which +is forbidden. Hercules, I fancy, must have overcome with a golden sword +the dragon that watched the gardens of the Hesperides--which, by the +way, were in the neighbourhood of Tangier, if Apollodorus is to be +credited. On looking over that album, the majority of the faces are +distinctly those of Aaronites, and most favourable specimens of the +family, too There are melting black orbs curtained with pensive lashes, +luxuriant black hair, regular features, and straight, delicately +chiselled noses. These Jewesses generally wear handkerchiefs disposed +in curving folds over their heads, and are as fond of loudly-tinted +raiment and the gauds of trinketry as their sisters who parade the sands +at Ramsgate during the season. There is a photograph before me, as I +write, of a Jewish matron, fat, dull, double-chinned, and sleepy-eyed, +who must have been a belle before she fell into flesh. She wears massy +filigree ear-rings, two strings of precious stones as necklaces, +ponderous bracelets, edgings of pearls on her bodice, and rings on all +her fingers. Her shoulders are covered with costly lace, and the front +of her skirt is like an altar-cloth heavy with embroidery. I dare say, +if one might peep under it, she has gold bangles on her ankles. It would +surprise me if she had an idea in her head beyond the decoration of her +person. As we turn the leaf, there is a full-blooded negress with a +striped napkin twisted gracefully turban-wise round her hair, and coils +of beads, large and small, sinuously dangling on her breast, like the +chains over the Debtor's Door at Newgate. A very fine animal indeed, +this negress, with power in her strong shiny features; a nose of +courage, thin in the nostrils, and cheek-bones high, but not so high as +those of a Red Indian. If she were white, she might pass for a +Caucasian, but for that gibbous under-lip. She lacks the wide mouth and +the hinted intelligent archness of the Two-Headed Nightingale, and has +not the moody expression and semi-sensuous, semi-ferocious development +of the muscular widows of Cetewayo; but for a negress she is handsome +and well-built, and would fetch a very good price in the market. The +slave-trade still flourishes in Morocco. On the next page we meet two +types of young Moorish females: one a peasant, taken surreptitiously as +she stood in a horse-shoe archway; the other a lady of the harem, +taken--no matter by what artifice. The peasant, swathed from tip to heel +in white like a ghost in a penny booth, and shading her face with a +cart-wheel of a palm-leaf hat looped from brim to crown, and with one +extremity of its great margins curled, is a prematurely worn, +weather-stained, common-looking wench, with a small nose and screwed-up +mouth. She is a free woman, but I would not exchange the dusky +bondswoman for five of her class. Centuries of bad food, much +baby-nursing, and field-labour sink their imprint into a race. The harem +lady, whose likeness was filched as she leaned an elbow against a low +table, is in a state of repose. She squats tailor-fashion, her fingers +are twined one in another in her lap, her eyes are closed, and her +expression is one of drowsy, listless voluptuousness. She is fair, and +her dress (for she is not arrayed for the reception of visitors) is +simple--a peignoir, and a sash, and a fold of silk binding her long rich +tresses. A soft die-away face, with no sentiment more strongly defined +than the abandonment to pleasure and its consequent weariness. By no +means an attractive piece of flesh and blood, and yet a good sample of +the class that go to upholster a seraglio. + +I have never had the slightest anxiety to penetrate the secrets of the +Moslem household, and I consider the man who would wish to poke his nose +into its seclusion no better than Peeping Tom of Coventry--an insolent, +lecherous cad. I would not traverse the street to-morrow to inspect the +champion wives of the Sultan of Turkey and Shah of Persia amalgamated; +and I deserve no credit for it, for I know that they are puppets, and +that more engaging women are to be seen any afternoon shopping in Regent +Street or pirouetting in the ballets of half-a-dozen theatres. + +Your lady of the harem is an insipid, pasty-complexioned doll, nine +times out of ten, and would be vastly improved in looks and temperament +if she were subjected to a course of shower-baths, and compelled to take +horse-exercise regularly and earn her bread before she ate it. + +How do I know this? it may be asked. Who dares to deny it? is my answer. + +But here is a digression from our theme of the condition of the Jews at +Tangier, and all on account of a few poor photographs! In one sentence, +that condition is shameful. It is a reproach to the so-called civilized +Powers that they do not interfere to influence the Emir-al-Mumenin to +behave with more of the spirit of justice towards his Jewish subjects. +In Fez and other cities they have to dwell in a quarter to +themselves--"El Melah" (the dirty spot) it is called in Morocco city; +and when they leave the Melah they have to go bare-footed. They are not +permitted to ride on mules, nor yet to walk on the same side of the +street as Arabs. + +The late Sir Moses Montefiore, a very exemplary old man in some +respects, visited Morocco in his eightieth year to intercede on behalf +of his co-religionists, and promises of better treatment were made; but +promises are not always kept. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + A Pattern Despotism--Some Moorish Peculiarities--A Hell upon + Earth--Fighting for Bread--An Air-Bath--Surprises of Tangier--On + Slavery--The Writer's Idea of a Moorish Squire--The Ladder of + Knowledge--Gulping Forbidden Liquor--Division of Time--Singular + Customs--The Shereef of Wazan--The Christian who Captivated the + Moor--The Interview--Moslem Patronage of Spain--A Slap for + England--A Vision of Beauty--An English Desdemona: Her Plaint--One + for the Newspaper Men--The Ladies' Battle--Farewell--The English + Lady's Maid--Albert is Indisposed--The Writer Sums up on Morocco. + + +THE Government in Morocco would satisfy the most ardent admirer of +force. It is an unbridled despotism. The Sultan is head of the Church as +of the State, and master of the lives and property of his subjects. He +dispenses with ministers, and deliberates only with favourites. When +favourites displease him, he can order their heads to be taken off. +Favourites are careful not to displease him. The land is a _terra +incognita_ to Europeans, and is rich in beans, maize, and wool, which +are exported, and in wheat and barley, which are not always permitted to +be exported. Altogether the form of administration is very primitive and +simple. It is a rare privilege for a European to be admitted into the +Imperial presence, and indeed the only occasions, one might say, when +Europeans have the privilege are those furnished by the visits of +foreign Missions to submit credentials and presents. It is advisable for +a private traveller not to go to the chief city unless attached to one +of these official caravans; but by those who have money a journey to Fez +may be compassed with an escort. This escort consists of the Sultan's +very irregular soldiers, who are armed with very long and very rusty +matchlocks, of a pattern common nowadays in museums and curiosity shops. +Ostensibly the escort is intended to protect the traveller from the +regularly organized bands of robbers which infest the interior; but the +experience of the traveller is that when the robbers swoop down he has +to protect the escort. Christians are looked upon as dogs by all the +self-satisfied natives, and treated so by some of them when they can be +saucy with impunity. It was my lot to be called a dog by a small +fanatic, who hissed at me with the asperity and industry of a disturbed +gander, and pelted me with stones. But two can play at that game, and +that boy will think twice before he lapidates a full-grown Christian +again. But he will hate him for evermore, and when he has reached man's +estate will teach his son to repeat the doggerel: "The Christian to the +hook, the Jew to the spit, and the Moslem to see the sight." + +The Sultan collects his revenue (estimated at half a million pounds +sterling a year, great part of which is derived from the Government +monopoly of the sale of opium) by the aid of his army; but as he never +nears the greater portion of his dominions, there must be some nice +pickings off that revenue by minor satraps before it reaches his sacred +hands. There is quite a phalanx of under-strappers of State in this +despotism. For instance, at Tangier there is a Bacha or Governor, a +Caliph or Vice-Governor, a Nadheer or Administrator of the Mosques, a +Mohtasseb or Administrator of the Markets, and a Moul-el-Dhoor or Chief +of the Night Police. There is a leaven of the guild system, too, as in +more advanced countries. Each trade has its Amin, each quarter its +Mokaderrin. There is a Kadi, or Minister of Worship and Justice, to whom +we paid our respects. Justice is quick in its action, and stern in the +penalties it inflicts. The legs and hands are cut off pilferers, heads +are cut off sometimes and preserved in salt and camphor, and the +bastinado is an ordinary punishment for lesser crimes. But the Moors +must be thick in the soles, nor is it astonishing, as the practice is to +chastise children by beating them on the feet. Mahomet Lamarty +volunteered to procure a criminal who would submit to the bastinado for +a peseta. In the market-place I compassionated an unfortunate thief +minus his right hand and left leg. We took a walk to the prison, which +is on the summit of the hill, Captain No. 1 thoughtfully providing +himself with a basket of bread. What a hell upon earth was that sordid, +stifling, noisome, gloomy keep, with its crowds of starving +sore-covered inmates. In filth it was a pig-sty, in smell a +monkey-house, in ventilation another Black-hole of Calcutta. Turn to the +next page, reader mine, if you are squeamish. Heaven be my witness, I +have no desire to minister to morbid tastes; but I have an object in +describing this dreadful _oubliette_, for it still exists--exists within +thirty-two miles of British territory, and it is a scandal that some +effort is not made to mitigate its horrors. Through the bars of a +padlocked door, from which spurt blasts of mephitic heat, we can descry +amid the steam of foul exhalations, as soon as our eyes become +accustomed to the dimness, a mob of seething, sweating, sweltering +captives, like in aspect as a whole to so many gaunt wild beasts. Some +are gibbering like fiends, others jabbering like idiots. They are there +young and old; a few--the maniacs those--are chained; all are crawled +over by vermin, most are crusted with excretions. The sight made me feel +faint at the time, the very recollection of it to this day makes my +flesh creep. We were fascinated by this peep at the Inferno. The moment +these caged wretches caught a glimpse of us they rushed to the door, +and on bended knees, or with hands uplifted, or with pinched cheeks +pressed against the bars, raised a clamour of entreaty. We drew back as +the rancid plague-current smote our faces, and questioned Mahomet by our +looks as to what all this meant. + +"They want food," he explained. + +These prisoners are allowed two loaves a day out of the revenues of the +Mosques; but two loaves, even if scrupulously given, which I doubt, are +but irritating pittance. They may make cushions or baskets, but their +remuneration is uncertain and slender. Those who are lucky get +sustenance from relatives in the town, but the majority are +half-starving, and are dependent for a full meal on the bounty of chance +visitors. We poked a loaf through the bars. It was ravenously snapped +at, torn into little bits, and devoured amid the howls of those who were +disappointed. Then a loaf was cast over the door. What a savage +scramble! The bread was caught, tossed in the air, jumped at, and +finally the emaciated rivals fell upon one another as in a football +scrimmage, and there was a moving huddle of limbs and a diabolical +chorus of shrieks and yells. That could not be done again; it was too +painful in result Mahomet undertook to distribute the remainder of our +stock through an inlet in the wall, and we drew away sick in head and +heart from that den of repulsive degradation, greed, brutality, cruelty, +selfishness, and all infuriate and debased passion--that damnable +magazine of disease physical and moral. It is undeniable that there were +many there whose faces were passport to the Court of Lucifer--murderers, +and dire malefactors; but better to have decapitated them than to have +committed them to the slow torture of this citadel of woe. There were +inmates who had been immured for years--inmates for debt whose hair had +whitened in the fetid imprisonment, whose laugh had in it a harsh +hollow-sounding jangle, and whose brows had fixed themselves into the +puckers of a sullen, hopeless, apathetic submission to fate. Their lack +of intelligence was a blessing. Had they been more sensitive they would +have been goaded into raging lunacy. + +Let us to the outer freshness and make bold endeavour to fling off this +weight of nightmare which oppresses us. Passing by the ruinous gate +yonder with its wild-looking sentry, we reach the open space where +crouching hill-men are reposing on the stunted grass, and ungainly +camels, kneeling in a circle, are chewing the cud in patience, or +venting that uncanny half-whine, half-bellow, which is their only +attempt at conversation. Let us take a long look at the country beyond +with its gardens teeming with fruit and musical with bird-voices; walk +up to the crown of that slant and survey the valleys, the plateaux, the +brushwood, the flower-patches, spreading away to the hills that swell +afar until the peaks of the Atlas, cool with everlasting snow, close the +view. One is tempted to linger there lovingly, though darkness is +falling. There is a gift of blandness and briskness in the very +breathing of the air. When you have had your fill of the beauties on the +land side, turn to the sea, meet the evening breeze that comes floating +up with a flavour of iodine upon it, range round the sweeping vista, +from giant Calpe away over the Strait flecked with sails on to +Trafalgar, smiling peacefully as if it had never been a bay of blood, +and finish by the vision of the great globe of fire descending into the +Atlantic billows. + +Our stay in Tangier was most gratifying because of its variety and +unending surprises. Existence there was out of the beaten track, and +kept curiosity on the constant alert. It was a treat to pretend to be +Legree, and to negotiate for a strong likely growing nigger-boy. I +discovered I could have bought one for ten pounds sterling, a perfect +bargain, warranted free from vice or blemish; but as I was not prepared +to stop in Africa just then, I did not close with the offer. It may be a +shocking admission to make, but if I were to settle down in Morocco, I +confess, I should most certainly keep slaves. There is a deal of +sentimental drivel spouted about the condition of slaves. Those I have +seen seemed very happy. In Morocco they are well treated; and if +desirous to change masters the law empowers them to make a demand to +that effect. It is true that a slave's oath is not deemed valid, but +Cuffy bears the slight with praiseworthy equanimity. I am sure if Cuffy +were in my service he would never ask to leave it, and I would teach him +to appraise his word as much as any other man's oath (except his +master's), by my patented plan for negro-training, based on Mr. Rarey's +theories. As the land about Tangier was rated at prairie value--an acre +could be had for a dollar--I might have been induced to invest in a +holding of a couple of hundred thousands of acres, but that my ship had +not yet come within hail of the port. What a healthy, free, aristocratic +life, combining feudal dignity with educated zest, a wise man could lead +there--if he had an establishment of, say, three hundred slaves, a +private band, a bevy of dancing girls, Bruzeaud for _chef_, an extensive +library, sixteen saddle-horses, and relays of jolly fellows from +Gibraltar to help him chase the wild boar and tame bores, eat +couscoussu, and drink green-tea well sweetened. He should Moorify +himself, but he need not change his religion, and if he went about it +rightly, I am sure, like the village pastor, he could make himself to +all the country dear. Take the educational question, for example. If he +were diplomatic he would pay the school-fees of the urchins of Tangier. +These are not extravagant--a few heads of barley daily, equivalent to +the sod of turf formerly carried by the pupils to the hedge academies in +dear Ireland, and a halfpenny on Friday. He should affect an interest in +the Koran, and make it a point of applauding the Koran-learned boy when +he is promenaded on horseback and named a bachelor. He might--indeed he +should--follow the career of his _protégé_ at the Mhersa, where he +studies the principles of arithmetic, the rudiments of history, the +elements of geometry, and the theology of Sidi-Khalil, until he emerges +in a few years a Thaleb, or lettered man. Perhaps the Thaleb may go +farther, and become an Adoul or notary, a Fekky or doctor, nay--who +knows?--an Alem or sage. Ah! how pleasant that Moorish squire might be +by his own ruddy fire of rushes, palm branches, and sun-dried leaves; +and what a profit he might make by judicious speculation in +jackal-skins, oil, pottery, carpets, and leather stained with the +pomegranate bark! He would have his mills turned by water or by horses; +he would eat his bread with its liberal admixture of bran; he would rear +his storks and rams. The professors who charm snakes and munch +live-coals would all be hangers-on of his house; and he would have +periodical concerts by those five musicians who played such desert +lullabies for us--conspicuously one patriarch whose double-bass was made +from an orange-tree--and would not forget to supplement their honorarium +of five dollars with jorums of white wine. Sly special pleaders! They +argue with the German play-wright: "_Mahomet verbot den Wein, doch vom +Champagner sprach er nicht._" + +From the Frenchman at the hotel, whose knowledge of Morocco was +"extensive and peculiar," I acquired much of my information on the +manners and customs of the people. Watches are only worn and looked at +for amusement. Instead of by hours, time is thus noted: El Adhen, an +hour before sunrise; Fetour (repast) el Hassoua, or sunrise; Dah el Aly, +ten in the morning; El Only, a quarter past twelve; El Dhoor, half-past +one; El Asser, from a quarter past three to a quarter to four; El +Moghreb, sunset; El Achâ, half-an-hour after sunset; and El Hameir, +gun-shot. Meals are taken at Dah el Aly, El Asser, and El Moghreb. The +houses are built with elevated lateral chambers, but there is a narrow +staircase leading to the Doeria, a reception-room, where visitors can be +welcomed without passing the ground-floor. The walls are plastered, and +covered with arabesques or verses of the Koran incrusted in colours. The +wells inside the houses are only used for cleansing linen; water for +drinking purposes is sought outside. + +Among many singular customs--singular to us--I noted that a popular +remedy for illness is to play music and to recite prayers to scare away +the devil. An enlightened Moor might think the practices of the Peculiar +People quite as strange, and question the infallibility of cure-all +pills at thirteen-pence-halfpenny the box. The dead in Morocco are +hurried to their graves at a hand-gallop. That, I submit, is no more +unreasonable than many English funeral usages, such as incurring debt +for the pomp of mourning. At Moorish weddings the bride is carried in +procession in a palanquin to her husband's house amid a _fantasia_ of +gunpowder--the reckless rejoicing discharges of ancient muskets in the +streets. Well, white favours, gala coaches, and _feux de joie_ at +marriages of the great are not entirely unknown among us. Nobody sees +the Moorish wife for a year, not even her mother-in-law, which I +consider a not wholly unkind dispensation. The Moorish wife paints her +toe-nails, which, after all, is a harmless vanity, and less obtrusive +than that of the ladies who impart artificial redness to their lips. +And, lastly, the Moorish wife waits on her husband. Personally, I fail +to discover anything blamable in that act, though I must concede that it +is eccentric, very eccentric. These allusions to the Moorish wife in +general lead up naturally to one in particular in whom I took a +professional interest, for she was as remarkable in her way as Lady +Ellenborough or Lady Hester Stanhope, or that strong-minded Irishwoman +who married the Moslem, Prince Izid Aly, and whose son reigned after his +father's death. + +The Shereef has been mentioned. He is the great man of the district, +with an authority only second to that of the Sultan himself. Claiming +to be a lineal descendant of Mahomet, he is entitled to wear the green +turban. His name at full length is long, but not so long as that of most +Spanish Infantes--Abd-es-Selam ben Hach el Arbi. He is a saint and a +miracle-worker. He has been seen simultaneously at Morocco, Wazan, and +Tangier, according to the belief of his co-religionists, wherein he +beats the record of Sir Boyle Roche's bird, which was only in two places +at once. Like Jacob, he has wrestled with angels. He is head of the +Muley-Taib society, a powerful secret organization, which has its +ramifications throughout the Islamitic world. He draws fees from the +mosques, and has gifts bestowed upon him in profusion by his admirers, +who feel honoured when he accepts them. Exalted and wide-spreading is +his repute where the Moslem holds sway, and unassailable is his +orthodoxy, yet he has had the temerity to take to himself a Christian +wife. This lady had been a governess in an American family at Tangier. +There the Shereef made her acquaintance, wooed and won her. They were +married at the residence of the British Minister Plenipotentiary; the +officers of a British man-of-war were present at the ceremony, and +slippers and a shower of rice, as at home, followed the bride on leaving +the building. The Shereef and, if possible, the Shereefa were personages +to be seen, and Mahomet Lamarty was the very man to help us to the +favour. His Highness lived four miles away, and we formed a cavalcade +one afternoon and set off for his garden, the ladies accompanying us. We +passed through cultivated fields of barley and _dra_ (a kind of millet), +crossed the river Wadliahoodi, and ascended a road which faced abruptly +towards the hills. An agreeable road it was, and not lonesome; we had +the carol of birds and the piping of bull-frogs to lighten the way, and +leafy branches made reverence overhead. There were abundance of fruit +and such beautiful shrubs that I rail at myself for not being botanist +enough to be able to enlarge upon them. There were orange-groves, yellow +broom, dog-rose, and apples, pears, peaches, apricots, plums, +pomegranates, figs, and vines. It was such an oasis as a very young +Etonian in the warmth of a midsummer vacation might have likened to +Heaven. The range of hills of El Jebel rose left and right, and at parts +presented a steep cliff to the ocean. This ridge is about twelve miles +in width, and its fertile slopes amply merit to be lauded as the best +fruit-producers in the empire, "as bounteous as Paradise itself." + +Mahomet Lamarty, who was our guide, entered the Shereef's grounds to +prepare for our introduction; and now the ladies, who had insisted on +coming with us, rebelled, and said point-blank they would not salute the +Shereefa as "Your Highness." They were impatient to see her, but they +declined to give countenance to a Christian who had demeaned herself by +wedding a heathen. + +"The visit was of your own seeking, ladies," I said; "if you are not +willing to treat Her Highness with deference, better stay outside." + +They were not equal to that sacrifice after riding four miles. + +"Who'll start the conversation?" said Captain No. 1. "You start it" (to +me) "like a good fellow, and I'll take up the running." + +Captain No. 2 said he would hang about for us outside. + +Mahomet beckoned to us and we ventured into the garden. Coming down a +pathway we saw an austere, swarthy, obese man of the middle height. He +was white-gloved, and wore a red fez, a sort of Zouave upper garment of +blue, with burnous, baggy trousers, white stockings, and Turkish +slippers. It was the Shereef. I had agreed to open the interview, but +when it came to the trial my Arabic (I had been only studying it for two +hours) abandoned me. Mahomet did the needful. I thanked His Highness for +his kindness in admitting us to his demesne, and he smiled a modest, +solemn smile, and looked greeting from his small eyes. When he +discovered that I had been travelling in Spain, he asked me--always +through Mahomet--what they were doing there. On having my reply--that +they were tasting the miseries of civil war--translated to him, he shook +his head, shrugged his shoulders, and slowly ejaculated: + +"Unhappy Spain! Silly, unfortunate people! That is the way with them +always. They are at perpetual strife one with another." + +And then Mahomet interposed with a parenthesis of his own depreciatory +of the Spaniards, whom he loathed and despised. He had fought against +them in the war of 1839-1860, and the Shereef had also headed his +countrymen, and had shown great courage and coolness in action. His +presence had infused a high spirit of enthusiasm into the undisciplined +troops. + +"Bismillah!" grunted Mahomet. "The Spaniard is beneath contempt. He was +almost licked in one battle. He was four months here, and how far did he +get into the interior?" + +Mahomet conveniently forgot the defeat of Guad-el-ras, the occupation of +Tetuan, and the indemnity of four hundred millions of reals which was +exacted as the price of peace; but he was literally correct, the +victorious O'Donnell did not flaunt his flag beyond a very exiguous +strip of the territory of Sidi-Muley-Mahomet. + +We were walking as we talked, and by this time had reached the brow of a +wooded rise which commanded an uninterrupted prospect of the ocean. The +flowery cistus flourished on the eminence, and cork-trees, chestnuts, +and willows shielded us from the fierceness of the sun. Behind and +around were a succession of richly-planted gardens. We halted, and the +Shereef, scanning the horizon in the direction of the Rock, suddenly put +a question to me which almost took my breath away: + +"Do they buy commissions over the way still?" + +"No; that system has been abolished." + +"It is well," he remarked, with a scarcely suppressed sneer. "It was +incredible that a great nation and a fighting nation should make a +traffic of the command of men, as if a clump of spears were a kintal of +maize," and as he relapsed into silence a soldierly fire gleamed in his +irides, his frame seemed to straighten and swell, and the nature of the +prophet retired before that of the warrior. + +From where we stood we could ferret out a house with a veranda in front, +built on a terrace and begirt with trees. That was the residence of His +Highness; but we turned our eyes in another direction, lest we should be +suspected of rude curiosity by this courteous African. I was trying to +divine the tally of years our host had numbered. No Arab knows his own +age, and here it may be useful to tell the reader wherein the +distinction lies between the Moor and the Arab. Virtually they are the +same; but the name of Moor is given to those who dwell in cities, of +Arab to those who roam the plains. Mahomet came to my aid. His Highness +had whiskers when Tangier was bombarded by Prince de Joinville. That was +in August, 1844, a good nine-and-twenty years before, so that +Abd-es-Salam must have long doubled the cape of forty, which would leave +him considerably the senior of his Frankish wife. + +We turned at a noise--the creak of a rustic wooden gate on its hinges; a +figure approached. And then it was given to me to gaze upon Her Highness +the Shereefa of Wazan. She was not called Zuleika, but Emily--her maiden +name had been Keene, and she came not from the rose-bordered bowers of +Bendemeer's stream, nightingale-haunted, but from the prosaic levels of +South London, where her father was governor of a gaol. Truly she was a +vision of gratefulness in that paynim tract--a rich brunette, with +large black eyes, long black ringletted tresses, and a well-filled shape +with goodly bust. Her attire was neat and graceful and not Oriental. She +was clad in a riding-habit of ruby brocaded velvet, with jacket to +match, had a cloud of lace round her throat, and an Alpine hat with +cock's feather poised on her well-set head. She might serve as the model +for a Spanish Ann Chute. Bracelets on her plump wrists and rings on her +taper fingers caught the sunshine as she occasionally twirled her +cutting-whip. Her voice was bell-like and melodious, with the faintest +accent of decision, and her manner, after an opening flush of +embarrassment, was cordial and debonair. The embarrassment was because +of her inability to extend to us the hospitality she desired. She +explained that she had to receive us in the garden as the house was +undergoing repairs. After the customary commonplaces, she freely entered +into conversation, and took opportunity at once to deny that she was a +renegade; she wore European costume, as we saw, and attended the rites +of the English Church, for it was one of the stipulations of the +marriage contract that she should have perfect liberty to follow her own +faith. + +"I wish every English girl were as happily married as I," she said, "and +had as loving a husband." + +It was gratifying, therefore, to note that she found herself as women +wish to be who love their lords. She had been married on the 27th of +January, and as the Shereef had entered into his present residence but +recently, they were still at sixes and sevens. It was his habit to spend +the winter in the country and the summer in town. She had been but two +years in Morocco, and had not yet mastered Arabic. + +"His Highness understands English?" She shook her head, and quickly +interpreting a lifting of my eyelids, she smilingly added, "Spanish was +the medium of our courtship." And then, as we promenaded the garden +path, she became communicative, and dwelt with pardonable expansion on +the virtues of her lord and master, who followed behind side by side +with the portly Yorkshireman. His charity, she said, was unbounded. +Slaves were frequently sent to him as presents, but he kept none. He was +modest on his own merits, and yet he was the most enlightened of Moors. +He had visited Marseilles, a war-ship having been put at his disposal by +the French Government, and was most anxious to take a tour to Paris and +Vienna, and above all to England. It was his desire that railways should +be constructed in Morocco, and he was glad when he was told that there +was some likelihood of a telegraph cable being laid to Tangier. + +"Then," interrupted I, "with your Highness's influence on the tribes +around, exercised through your husband, there should be a fair prospect +of pushing civilization here." + +"Ah, yes!" she exclaimed, with a glow on her cheeks, "that is one of my +dearest hopes, that is my great ambition. I believe that my marriage, +which has been cruelly commented upon in England, may effect good both +for these poor misunderstood Moors and my own country people." + +"Is the Shereef on friendly terms with the Sultan?" + +"No, I am sorry to say there is a feud between them at the moment. The +Sultan objects to my husband for using an English saddle." + +"Hum!" (to myself mentally) "if the august Muley cannot brook an English +saddle, what must he think of an English wife? Or do these Moslems, like +some Christians I know, strain at a gnat and swallow a camel? Mayhap it +is even so. The pigeon-prompted camel-driver, who built up his creed +with plentiful blood-cement, saw fit to add a new chapter to the Koran, +when he fell in love with the Coptic maiden, Mary." + +The Shereefa told me that her father and mother had come out to see her. +They were averse to the alliance at first, but were satisfied that she +had done the right thing when she told them how content she was, and +with what high-bred consideration for her wishes in the matter of +religion her husband had behaved. Their intention was to stop for four +days, but they extended their visit to fourteen. "And now," she +continued, "I can use to my lord the words of Ruth to Naomi, 'Whither +thou goest I will go; and where thou lodgest I will lodge; thy people +shall be my people'"--a pause--"yes, and 'thy God my God,' for there is +but one"--archly--"the matter of the Prophet we shall leave aside." + +I admired the lady's pluck, and if I were that Moorish squire I have +tried to sketch, I should esteem it an honour to have her on my visiting +list. But I am a theological oddity, and my wallet of prejudices, it is +to be feared, is sadly unfurnished. I never could rise to that +sublimated self-sufficiency of intellect that I could consign any +fellow-creature to everlasting pains for the audacity of differing in +dogma with myself. I have met good and bad of every creed, Mahometans I +could respect--whose word was their bond--and so-called Christians and +Christian ministers with a most uncharitable spiritual pride, whom I +could not respect. The liver of the persecutor was denied me. Were the +fires of Smithfield to be rekindled, my prayers would be sent up for the +floods of Heaven to quench them, and for the lightnings of Heaven to +annihilate the fiends who had piled the faggots. + +"By-the-bye," said the Shereefa, "do you know any of those people who +write for the papers in London?" + +I admitted that I had that misfortune. + +"Some of them are fools as well as cowards," she went on. "They have +written articles about me full of ignorance and malice. Have they no +consideration for the feelings of others?" + +"I am afraid, your Highness, some of them are more brilliant than +conscientious; they would rather point an epigram than sacrifice style +to truth or good-nature." + +"One of them in particular," she said, and there was an irritated ring +in her voice, "has singled me out for attack, and given me in derision a +name which he believes to be Mahometan, but which is really Jewish." + +And with her cutting-whip she viciously snapped off the heads of some +poppies. The episode of Tarquin's answer to the emissary of Sextus +occurred to me, and I felt that if my colleague, Horace St. J----, were +there, he would have passed a very bad quarter of an hour. + +The females of our party joined us, and I formally presented them, +taking a malicious pleasure in emphasizing the "your Highness." The +Shereefa received them right graciously, but it was easy to notice that +a chill came over the conversation. They were careful never to use the +title to their English sister. In fact, it was a tacit ladies' battle. + +It was time to leave, and the Shereefa presented her visitors with two +nosegays, gathered by her own hands. The act had in it something very +royal, with the smallest trace of sly condescension. The Shereef +accompanied us to the outer gate. On the way I motioned to Captain No. 1 +to offer him a cigar. He did; his Highness accepted it, bowed, and +gravely put it in his pocket. As we stood on the road at parting, a +peasant was passing with a load of twigs on his shoulders. He cast them +off, threw himself on his knees, kissed the hem of the holy man's +garments, and the back of his proffered hand. + +We were descending the hill when a rustle in the bushes attracted me, +and a white face peeped out and a voice besought me in English to stop. +It was the Shereefa's London lady's-maid. She could not resist the +temptation of enjoying a few sentences with one of her own race. From +her I learned that there were twenty-seven Moorish women in her master's +household; that there was a tank at Wazan large enough to float a ship; +that her master had been married before, and had two sons and a lovely +Mahometan child, a daughter, to whom the Shereefa was teaching English +and the piano; "but remember, please," and here she grew important, and +had all the dignity of a retainer, with a great sense of what was due to +her caste and the proprieties, "that my mistress's children, if she have +any, will be Europeans!" + +As we got back to our hotel the muezzins were summoning the faithful to +their vesper orisons, and Albert was moaning ruefully under the +sideboard. Mrs. Captain had out her sweetly pretty pet at once, and +covered him with caresses and endearments. + +"Somebody has given him something that has disagreed with him. Was it +you?" she said to me, and there was that in her tone which made me quake +in my shoes. + +Meekly and truthfully I protested that I had not; I had fed him in the +morning in her own presence; the darling was in his usual health and +spirits when we left, but--intercede for me, Puck, and you aerial imps +of mischief, for no other spirit will--I could not help murmuring in +audible soliloquy, "The carcase of that mongoose, which was on the +square outside this morning, is no longer there." + +The scene that followed, to borrow the hackneyed phrase, beggars +description. The house was turned upside down; to my mental vision arose +sal volatile and burnt feathers, swoons and hysterics. Mahomet's dove +alone can tell how all might have ended had not the Frenchman suggested +a bolus. Captain No. 1 and I were commissioned to inquire into the +mystery of the disappearance of that baleful mongoose. When we got out +of earshot of the hotel there was the popping of a cork, and we emptied +effervescing beakers to the speedy recovery of Albert the Beloved. +Certes, that bull-dog had a very bad fit of dyspepsia; but the bolus did +him a world of good, and before we retired to rest we had the felicity +to hear him crunching a bone. Peace spread its wings over our pillows. + +The next day we took a trip to the lighthouse on Cape Spartel, the women +labouring in the field making curious inspection of the cavalcade as it +wended by, but quickly turning away their faces as we males tried to +snatch a look at them. The road was no better than a rugged track on a +stony plateau. There was a spacious view from the Phare, which was an +iron and stone building put up at the cost of three or four of the +European Powers (I forget which now), the keepers being chosen from each +of the contributory nations. The Sultan had given the site, but refused +to hand over a blankeel towards the expenses, arguing that as he had no +fleet, he had no personal object in making provision against wrecks. We +were well mounted, but these Barbary cattle have a nasty trick of +lashing out, so that it is prudent to give a wide range to their +hind-hoofs. Mahomet, riding with very short stirrups, led the party. My +saddle was an ancient, rude, and rotten contrivance, and as I loitered +on the road home, giving myself up to idle fantasy, my friends got on +far ahead. Waking from my day-dream I gave the nag the heel, and as it +sprang forward at a canter the girth turned completely round, and I was +pitched over in unpleasant nearness to a hedge of cactus. The ground was +soft, and I was not much bruised; but when I rose the nag had +disappeared round a corner, and I was left alone in the African +twilight. Presently a sinewy fiery-eyed Moor came with panther-step in +sight leading me back the nag. He had a basket of oranges on his back, +and gave me one with a respectful salaam as I vaulted on my Arab steed +and galloped Tangier-ward bareback. + +Judging from the scanty rags upon him, this man was of the poorest, yet +he asked for nothing; there were sympathy, innate politeness and +independence withal in his bearing. To him I abandoned the saddle; it +was the least he might have for his friendly act. Talking over this +incident with the Frenchman at Bruzeaud's, who knew the country, he told +me that the Moor was intelligent, honest, faithful to his engagements, +and had a go in him that, under advantageous circumstances, would +enable him to spring again to his former height of power and riches. But +he struck me as happy, although some of his social customs recalled the +feudal age, and he lived under the always-present contingency of +decapitation. May it be long before speculation rears the horrid front +of a joint-stock hotel in Tangier, or the prospectors go divining for +copper, coal, iron, silver and gold. I could wish the Moorish women, +however, would wash their children's heads occasionally, and not take +them up by the ankles when they spank them. After a sojourn in every way +pleasurable--pshaw! Albert's illness was a trifle, and we soon resigned +ourselves to the miseries of the prisoners on the hill--we ate our last +morsel of the Jewish pasch-bread of flour and juice of orange, cracked +our last bottle of champagne, and took our leave of the Dark Continent +with lightsome heart. The impression this little by-journey left upon me +was so agreeable that I could not avoid the enticement to communicate it +to the reader. If I have wandered from romantic Spain, it was only to +take him to a land more romantic still. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + Back to Gibraltar--The Parting with Albert--The Tongue of + Scandal--Voyage to Malaga--"No Police, no Anything"--Federalism + Triumphant--Madrid _in Statu Quo_--Orense--Progress of the + Royalists--On the Road Home--In the Insurgent Country--Stopped by + the Carlists--An Angry Passenger is Silenced. + + +"How like a boulder tossed by Titans at play!" said the sentimental +lady, as we approached Gibraltar on our return. + +"More like a big-sized molar tooth," broke in Mrs. Captain. + +And, indeed, this latter simile, if less poetic, gave a better idea of +the conformation of the fortified hill, with the gum-coloured outline of +all that was left of a Moorish wall skirting its side. The tooth is +hollow, but the hollow is plugged with the best Woolwich stuffing, and +potentially it can bite and grind and macerate, for all the peaceful +gardens and frescades of the Alameda that circle its base like a belt +of faded embroidery. At Gibraltar our party separated, the Yorkshire +Captain and his friends taking the P. and O. boat to Southampton, my +countryman going back to Tangier after having made some purchases, and I +electing to voyage to Malaga by one of Hall's packets, which was lying +at the mercantile Mole discharging the two hundred tons of Government +material which it is obliged to carry by contract on each fortnightly +voyage. When Albert and I parted no tears were shed; we resigned +ourselves to the decree of destiny with equanimity. But I humbly submit +that Mrs. Captain, when thanking me for my good intentions towards him, +might have spared me the ironical advice not to volunteer for duties in +future which I was not qualified to fulfil. "Volunteer," ye gods! when +she had absolutely entreated me to take him in charge. + +Before leaving the Club-House, I was pressed to relate our adventures in +Africa. I had no pig-sticking exploits to make boast over; but I turned +the deaf side of my head to certain whispers about holy men who +imported wine in casks labelled "Petroleum," who affected to be +delivering the incoherent messages of inspiration when they were merely +trying to pronounce "The scenery is truly rural" in choice Arabic, and +who accounted for the black eye contracted by collision with the kerb by +a highly-coloured narrative of an engagement in mid-air with an emissary +of Sheitan. Neither did I accord any pleased attention to anecdotes of a +"lella," or Arab lady, who tempted the Scorpions to charge ten times its +value for everything she bought by telling them to send them to a +personage whose title was exalted. Gib is a very small place, and, like +most diminutive communities, is a veritable school for scandal. I took +my last walk over the Rock, past the "Esmeralda Confectionery," which +still had up the notice that hot-cross buns were to be had from seven to +ten a.m. on Good Friday, and paced to the light-house on the nose of the +promontory, where the meteor flag, ringed by a bracelet of cannon, flies +in the breeze. And then I meandered back, and began to ask myself, had +Marryat aught to do with the sponsorship of this outpost of the British +Empire? Shingle Point, Blackstrap Bay, the Devil's Tower, O'Hara's +Folly, Bayside Barrier, and Jumper's Bastion--the names were all +redolent of the Portsmouth Hard; and I almost anticipated a familiar +hail at every moment from the open door of "The Nut," and an inquiry as +to what cheer from the fog-Babylon. + +The trip to Malaga on one of the Hall steamers which trade regularly +between London and that port, calling at Cadiz and Gibraltar, was very +agreeable, and the change to such dietary as liver and bacon was a +treat. We were but three passengers--a steeple-chasing sub of the 71st, +Señor Heredia, of Malaga, and myself. And now I have to make an open +confession. I am unable to decipher the log of that passage. I have a +distinct recollection of the liver and bacon, but more important events +have worn away from my mind. There are the traces of pencil-marks before +me; I dare say they were full of meaning when I scrawled them down, but +now I have lost the key. "Jolly captain--left his wife--forty +years--electric light deceives on a low beach--fourteen children--El +Cano--break in the head of wine-casks": there is a literal copy of the +contents of a page, which may mean nothing or anything, frivolity or a +thesaurus of serious information. Memory, what a treacherous jade thou +art! It may be said, why did I not take copious notes in short-hand? I +would have done so were I a stenographer; but I am not. I tried to +acquire the accomplishment once, and ignobly failed. I could write +short-hand slightly quicker than long-hand, but when written, I could +not transcribe my jottings. + +Flanking a beautiful coast, mostly hill-fringed--with hills, too, of +such metallic richness that lead and iron were positively to be quarried +out of their bosoms--we steamed into the harbour of Malaga, and landed +at the Custom-House quay. But there were no Customs' officers to trouble +us with inquiry. A red-bearded, flat-capped, dirty fellow in bare feet, +holding a bayoneted rifle with a jaunty clumsiness, accosted Señor +Heredia with a laughing voice. He was a sentinel of the provisional +government established in Malaga. The nature of that government may be +judged from his frank avowal: "We've no police--no anything." There were +French and German war-vessels at anchor, which was some guarantee of +protection for strangers. A novel tricolour of red, white, and a +washed-out purple had replaced the national flag. The Federal Republic +existed there, and yet the city was quiet; and official bulletins were +extant, recommending the citizens to preserve order. But this quietude +was not to be relied on over-much. One of the magnificoes under the new +_régime_ was a dancing-house keeper, and his principal claim to +administrative ability lay in the ownership of a Phrygian cap. Another, +who styled himself President of the Republic of Alhaurin de la Torre, a +territory more limited than the kingdom of Kippen, had stabbed a lady at +a masked ball a few months previously, for a consideration of sixty-five +duros. Still, it would be unfair to infer from that example that every +Malagueño was a mercenary ruffian, Señor Heredia related to me an +anecdote of a poor man who had found a purse with value in it to the +amount of thirty thousand reals, and had given it up without mention of +recompense. But a city where the wine-shops had nine doors, and +potato-gin was dispensed at a peseta the bottle, and there were "no +police--no anything," was not a desirable residence; and, as I had no +call there, and weeks might elapse before another revolution might be +sprung, I gladly took train to the capital. + +Madrid was tranquil, but with no more confidence in the duration of +tranquillity than when I left it. The army was still in a state akin to +disruption, with this difference--the rascals who had rifled the pockets +of the dead Ibarreta a few weeks before, would sell the bodies of their +slain officers now, if there was any resurrectionist near to make a bid. +Worse; I was given to understand that there were suspicions that the +gallant staff-colonel had been shot by his own men. The dismissed +gunners were still wearily beating the pavements, and a subscription +organized on their behalf among the officers of the other branches of +the service by the _Correo Militar_ was open. What were these gentlemen +to do? There was a rumour that they had been invited to enter the +French service, to which they would have been an undoubted acquisition, +bringing with them skill, scientific knowledge, and experience. But they +were Spaniards, not soldiers of fortune, and would decline to transfer +their allegiance, even if France were disposed to bid for it. Still, what +were they to do? In Spain as in Austria-- + + "Le militaire n'est pas riche, + Chacun salt ça." + +But the _militaire_ must live. Othello's occupation being gone, the +artillery officers had no alternative but to do what Othello would have +done had he been a Spaniard--conspire. + +The usual manoeuvring and manipulations were going on as preparation +for the election of the Constituent Cortes, and the extreme Republicans +were full of faith in their approaching triumph all along the line. They +were awaiting Señor Orense, but if he did not hasten it was thought +events so important would eclipse his arrival that, when he did come, +the Madrileños would pay as small heed to him as the Parisians did to +Hugo when he surveyed the boulevards anew after years of exile. They +would honour him with a procession, and no more. The venerable +Republican, by the way, is a nobleman, Marquis of Albaida. But he is not +equal to the democratic pride of Mirabeau, marquis, who took a shop and +painted on the signboard, "_Mirabeau, marchand de draps._" + +"If you are a true Republican, why don't you renounce your title?" +somebody asked once of Orense. + +"If it were only myself was concerned I would willingly," responded the +Spaniard; "but I have a son!" Rousseau was a freethinker, but Rousseau +had his daughters baptized all the same. + +Meanwhile the Carlists were making headway. The Vascongadas, Navarre, +and Logroño, with the exception of the larger towns and isolated +fortified posts, were now in their power. Antonio Dorregaray, who was in +supreme command, was reported to have 3,200 men regularly organized, +well clad, and equipped with Remingtons. The Remington had been selected +so that the Royalists might be able to use the ammunition they reckoned +upon helping themselves with from the pouches of the Nationalists. In +addition to this force of 3,200, which might be regarded as the regular +army of Carlism, there were formidable guerrilla bands scattered over +the provinces. Our old acquaintance, Santa Cruz, had 900 followers in +Guipúzcoa. The other cabecillas in that region were Francisco, Macazaga, +Garmendia, Iturbe, and Culetrina, all men with local popularity and +intimate knowledge of the mountains. In Biscay, the commander was +Valesco, and his lieutenants were Belaustegui, del Campo, and the +Marquis de Valdespina, son of the chieftain who raised the standard of +revolution at Vitoria in 1833. Their factions were estimated at 2,500. +After Dorregaray, the most dangerous opponent to the Government troops +was Ollo, an old ex-army officer, who was licking the volunteers into +shape; and after Santa Cruz, the most noted and dreaded chief of +irregulars was Rada, who was also operating in "the kingdom," as their +province is proudly called by the daring Navarrese. The elements in +which the Royalists were wanting were cavalry and artillery; but they +had some money, foreign friends were active, the French frontier was not +too strictly watched nor the Cantabrian coast inaccessible, and Don +Carlos--Pretender or King, as the reader chooses to call him--was biding +his time in a villa not a hundred miles from Bayonne. When the hour was +considered favourable, he was ready to cross the border and take the +field, or rather the hills; and his presence, it was calculated, would +be worth a _corps d'armée_ in the fillip it would give to the enthusiasm +of his adherents. + +And yet the "only court" held its tertulias, and the doñas talked +millinery, and bald politicians sighed for a snug post in the +Philippines, and the gambling-tables and the bull-ring retained their +spell upon the community. It was the old story: Rome was on the verge of +ruin, and the senate of Tiberius discussed a new sauce for turbot. + +As I saw no immediate prospect of the outburst of those important +events, which were cloud-gathering over Madrid, and nearly all my +colleagues had departed, I resolved to pursue my journey to London. I +had _carte blanche_ to return when I deemed there was no further scope +for my pen; but there was an obstacle in the way. Miranda was the +terminus of the rail to the north; the track thence to the Bidassoa had +been closed by order of the lieutenants of his Majesty _in nubibus_, +King Charles VII. In other words, 179 kilometres of the main iron line, +the great artery of communication with France, were held by the +insurgents. Obstacles are made to be met, and, if steadily met, to be +overcome. Surely, I reasoned, there must be some intercourse carried on +in these districts. I passed through territory occupied by Carlists +before. Why not again? Besides, I had nothing to fear from the Carlists, +the tramp carols in the presence of the footpad (which, I submit, is a +neat paraphrase of a classic saw); and if I did chance to meet them, +there would be that dear touch of romance for which the lady-reader has +been looking out so long in vain. + +I started. The journey to Miranda I pass by. One is not qualified to +write an essay on a country from inspection through the windows of a +railway-carriage in motion, more particularly at night. As well attempt +to describe a veiled panorama, unrolling itself at a hand-gallop. At +Miranda, which was crowded with soldiers, there was a diligence that +plied to San Sebastian by tacit arrangement with the knights of the +road--that is, the adherents of Don Carlos. As the fares were very +expensive, I suspect the speculator who ran the coach was heavily taxed +for the privilege, and recouped himself by shifting the imposition to +the shoulders of passengers. The day was fine, the roads were good, the +vehicle was well-horsed, and we got away from the boundary of republican +civilization at a rattling pace. My fellow-voyagers were mostly French, +some of them of the gentle sex, and chattered like pies until they fell +asleep. I believe it is admitted by those who know me best that I can do +my own share of sleep. On the slightest provocation--yea, on what might +be condemned as no reasonable provocation--I can drop my head upon my +breast and go off into oblivion. Nor am I particular where I sit or if I +sit at all. Any ordinary person can fall asleep on a sofa or at a +sermon, but it requires a practitioner with an inborn faculty for the +art to achieve the triumphs of somnolence which stand to my credit. I +have taken a nap on horseback; I have marched for miles, a musket on my +shoulder, in complete slumberous unconsciousness; I have nodded while +Phelps was acting, snoozed while Mario was singing, and played the +marmot while Remenyi was fiddling; awful confession, I have dozed +through an important debate in the House of Commons! I am yawning at +present. It is to be hoped the reader is not. And so I burned daylight +the while we drove through a country reputed to be pregnant with +surprises of scenery until, at long last, the diligence drew up in the +straggling street of Tolosa. We halted here for dinner, and resumed our +journey with a fresh team at an enlivening speed, until about two miles +outside the town we came to an abrupt stop. + +"An accident, driver?" + +"No, señor, but the Carlists." + +Some of my fellow-passengers turned pale, the ladies did not know +whether to scream or consult their smelling-bottles; and before they +could decide, a tall, slight, gentlemanly-looking man of some +four-and-twenty years, with a sword by his side, a revolver in his belt, +an opera-glass slung across his shoulder, and a silver tassel depending +from a scarlet boina, the cap of the country, appeared at the hinder +door of the diligence, bowed, and asked for our papers. He glanced at +them much as a railway-guard would at a set of tickets, inquired if we +were carrying any arms or contraband despatches, and being answered in +the negative, gave us a polite "Go you with God," and motioned to the +driver that he might pass on. As we galloped off, all eyes were turned +in the direction of the stranger; he leisurely walked over a field +towards a hill, two peasants equipped with rifles and side-arms +following at his heels. They were young and strong, and wore no nearer +approach to uniform than their officer. + +"This is abominable," cried a French commercial traveller (so I took him +to be), as soon as we had got out of hearing of the trio. "The notion of +these three miscreants stopping a whole coachful of travellers in broad +daylight is atrocious!" + +"They did not detain us long," said I. + +"They did us no harm," said another. + +"And that officer, I am sure, was very polite, and looked quite a +D'Artagnan--so chivalrous and handsome," added one of the ladies. + +"They are no better than bandits," said the commercial traveller. +"Driver, why did you not resist?" + +For reply, the driver pointed with his whip to a wall, under the lee of +which a party of at least fifty armed men, portion of the main body from +which the outpost of three had been detached, were smoking, chatting, or +sleeping. The commercial traveller relapsed into silence. We met with no +further adventure in our ride to the frontier, but experienced much +fatigue. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + On the Wing--Ordered to the Carlist Headquarters--Another _Petit + Paris_--Carlists from Cork--How Leader was Wounded--Beating-up for + an Anglo-Irish Legion--Pontifical Zouaves--A Bad Lot--Oddities of + Carlism--Santa Cruz Again--Running a Cargo--On Board a Carlist + Privateer--A Descendant of Kings--"Oh, for an Armstrong Twenty-Four + Pounder!"--Crossing the Border--A Remarkable Guide--Mountain + Scenery--In Navarre--Challenged at Vera--Our Billet with the Parish + Priest--The Sad Story of an Irish Volunteer--Dialogue with Don + Carlos--The Happy Valley--Bugle-Blasts--The Writer in a + Quandary--The Fifth Battalion of Navarre--The Distribution of + Arms--The Bleeding Heart--Enthusiasm of the Chicos. + + +AFTER a short stay in London I was despatched to Stockholm, to attend +the coronation of Oscar II of Sweden and his spouse, which took place in +the Storkyrkan, on the 12th of May. At the Hotel Rydberg I met my Madrid +acquaintance, Mr. Russell Young, who was a bird of passage like myself, +and had just arrived from Vienna, where he had been detailing the +ceremonial at the opening of the International Exhibition in the Prater. +While enjoying myself at a ball at the Norwegian Minister's, I received +a telegraphic message, ordering me at once to the Austrian capital. I +was very sorry to leave, for I was delighted with peaceful airy +Stockholm and the free-hearted Swedes--it was such a change after Spain; +but I had neither license nor leisure to grumble, and flitted to Vienna +as fast as steam could carry me. The Weltausstellung did not prove to be +a lodestone, although in justice it must be admitted it was one of the +finest shows ever planned, and was fixed in one of the most agreeable of +sites. It was too far away, however, to attract the British public, and +there were rumours of cholera lurking in the Kaiserstadt; so I was +recalled, but to be sent to Spain once more. My mission was to +penetrate, if possible, to the headquarters of the Carlists, with the +view of giving a fair and full report of the strength, peculiarities, +and prospects of their movement. + +At the London office of the sympathizers with the cause I was furnished +with the address of certain Carlists in confidential positions in +France, and letters were sent on in advance, so as to secure me a +favourable reception. Armed with a sheet of flimsy stamped in blue with +the escutcheon of Charles VII., and the legend "Secretaria Militar de +Lóndres," and with, what was more potent, a big credit on a +banking-house, I started afresh on the now familiar route. + +Before undertaking the journey into the territory in revolt I halted at +Bayonne to procure the necessary passes. These were obtained with ease +from the Junta sitting in the Rue des Ecoles, the members of which +professed that they desired nothing so much as the presence of the +representatives of impartial foreign journals, so that the truth about +the struggle should be made known to the rest of Europe. From Bayonne I +proceeded to Biarritz, where I had a conference with the Duke de La +Union de Cuba, a warm Carlist partisan, to whom I had an introduction, +and thence I went to St. Jean de Luz, a drowsy, quaint, world-forgotten +nook. A _petit Paris_ it was called in a vaunting quatrain by some +minstrel of yore. But Brussels may be comforted. It is nothing of the +kind, but something infinitely better. The breezes from the main and the +mountains, from the Bay of Biscay and the Pyrenees, conspire to supply +it with ozone. There is music in the boom of the surf as it pulsates +regularly on the velvet sands of a semicircular inlet, where dogs frisk +and youngsters gambol in the sunshine. + +In a hotel on the edge of that inlet, the Fonda de la Playa, where I put +up, a young Irish gentleman named Leader was recuperating from a severe +wound in the leg. He had received it in the service of Don Carlos, in a +skirmish near Azpeitia, where he was the only man hit. He was out with a +party of the guerrilleros, and came across a company of the Madrid +troops. To encourage his own people, or rather the people with whom he +had cast in his fortunes, he went well to the front, and mounting on a +bank of earth, hurled defiance at the enemy. He was picked down by a +stray shot, and if he had been taken prisoner it is probable that he +would have paid for his temerity with his life. The Spaniards were not +clement towards foreigners who interposed in their domestic quarrel. +Leader was carried off by his companions and secreted in a peasant's +hut. The troops, swearing vengeance, searched the hut next to it, but, +by some accident, failed to continue the quest to the refuge of the +wounded man. He bled profusely, but the hæmorrhage was finally arrested +by some rude bandaging, and at night he was helped astride a donkey, and +conveyed across the frontier into France. He told me he had suffered +excruciating torments at every jolt of the jog-trotting animal on that +mountain journey. Had the bullet struck him an inch higher he would have +had to suffer amputation; but his luck stood to him, and at the time we +met he was getting on fairly towards recovery, thanks to youth, a good +constitution, and the healthy air of St. Jean de Luz. I could not +understand the ardour of Leader's partisanship for the Carlists. He +spoke the merest smattering of Spanish, and had no profound intimacy +with the vexed question of Spanish politics or the rights of the rival +Spanish houses. The ill-natured whispered that he was crying "Viva la +República" when he was knocked over. It is possible, for he had fought +for the French Republic with Bourbaki's army, and may, in his +excitement, have forgotten under what flag he was serving. I take it he +was a soldier by instinct, and ranged himself on the side of Don Carlos +more from the love of adventure than from any other motive. He was a +fine athletic young fellow, with a handsome determined cast of features. +He had been an ensign in the 30th Foot, and had resigned his commission +to enjoy a spell of active service when the Franco-German war was +proclaimed. That he had behaved bravely in the campaign which led to +internment in Switzerland was evidenced by the ribbon of the Legion of +Honour which he wore. Leader was very anxious that an Anglo-Irish legion +in aid of Don Carlos should be organized. I felt it my duty to warn +those to whom he appealed to think twice before they embarked on such a +crusade. He was very wroth with me for having thrown cold water on the +project, but that did not affect me. I had more experience of such +follies than he, and my conscience approved me. A man may be justified +in playing with his own life, but he should be slow in playing with the +lives of others. He prepares a vexing responsibility for himself if he +is sensitive. + +In the next room to Leader was a fellow-enthusiast, Mr. Smith Sheehan, +an ex-officer of Pontifical Zouaves, and son of a popular and eccentric +town-councillor of Cork. He was an agile stripling, skilled in all +gymnastic exercises. He had also done some fighting with the Carlists, +and was in France on furlough, which the soldiers in the Royalist force +appeared to have no insuperable difficulty in getting. He told me there +was a large infusion of his old regiment amongst the guerrilleros, and +that they helped to bind the partisan levies in the withes of +discipline. Most of them had smelt gunpowder at Mentana and Patay. The +famous cabecilla, Saballs, had been a captain at Rome, and Captain +Wills, a Dutchman, who had been killed in a brush at Igualada, had been +sergeant-major in Sheehan's company. + +There was another ex-British officer of short service, who had a +remarkably imposing and well-cultivated growth of moustache. He was a +violent doctrinaire Carlist, but suffered from a chronic malady which +prevented him from taking the field; still there was none who could plot +with a more tremendous air of mystery. He was a Carlist because it was +"the correct thing" to be one in the fashionable ring at St. Jean de +Luz, where he had settled, and because he inherited a name associated +with chivalric insurrection. For the sake of his family I shall call him +Barbarossa. He was no honour to his house, for he was an inveterate +gambler, and was not careful in discharging the obligations he wantonly +contracted. He is dead. His death was no loss to society. In fact, if +the whole host of gamblers, lock, stock and barrel, were swept by a +fairy-blast to the regions of thick-ribbed ice, the world would be the +gainer. + +When I left Spain, Carlism was to be put down in a fortnight--in Madrid. +Now it threatened to last as long as a Chinese play. The Royalists--I +suppose they had earned the title to be so named by their +perseverance--had achieved numerous small successes which had raised +their _morale_, and they were being supplied with arms of precision from +abroad, and trained to their use. They had even taken some mountain-guns +from their enemy. Leader made me laugh with his accounts of Lizarraga +shouting "Artillería al frente!" and a couple of mules, with one +wretched little piece, moving forward; and of the intimidating clatter +made by three shrunk cavaliers in cuirasses a world too wide for them, +and alpargatas, trotting up a village street. The alpargata is the +mountain-shoe of canvas, with a hempen sole, worn by the Basque +peasants. The association of surcoats of mail and rope slippers is +incongruous; but what does that reck? Those cuirasses were _spolia +opima_. + +And Santa Cruz? + +The honest gentleman had retired into private life. His excesses had +raised such a storm of opprobrium against the Carlists that they had to +request him to desist. Lizarraga summoned him to render himself up a +prisoner. "Come and take me," replied Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz had near +two thousand followers; Lizarraga a few hundred. Lizarraga declined the +invitation. But the priest caused seven-and-twenty Carabineros, taken +prisoners at the bridge of Endarlasa, near Irun, to be shot, and this +filled the cup to overflowing. The Carlists averred they would slay him; +the Republicans vowed they would garrote him for a Madrid holiday; the +French Government declared its intention of putting him under lock and +key if it caught him within its jurisdiction. His band was disarmed "by +order of the King," and dispersed, and the Cura himself nebulously +vanished--whither we may see anon. + +There was a large accretion to the population of St. Jean de Luz in +Iberian refugees, and as they sat and conversed under the foliage of the +public promenade, frequent sighs might be overheard, and remarks that if +this sort of thing were to go on, "Spain would soon be in as bad a +condition as France." At all hours there came to the beach poor exiles +of Spain, who turned their eyes sadly to the line where sky met ocean. +Of what were their thoughts--of home and friends, of the flutters of +the casino or the ecstasies of the bull-ring? If they were looking for +the Spanish fleet they did not see it, for a reason as old as the +"Critic." It was not in sight. They came down in numbers in front of my +hotel at nine o'clock on the morning of Monday, July 28th, a few days +after my arrival, when a strange yellow funnel turned the point, and a +long low Red-Roverish three-masted schooner-yacht steamed into Socoa, +the roadstead of St. Jean de Luz. If the exiles were correctly informed, +that was the Spanish fleet in a sense--the notorious Carlist privateer, +the _San Margarita_, which had recently landed arms and ammunition for +the Royalists at Lequeieto and elsewhere. She had been doing a stroke of +business in the same line that morning. In the grey dawn she had dropped +into the embouchure of the Bidassoa, at a few hundred yards from the +town of Fontarabia. The work was well and quickly done. Boats +requisitioned by friends on land put off to her, and returned laden with +bales of merchandise. These artless bales were packages of +breechloaders, with bayonets to match, wrapped in sail-cloth. As soon +as they were received on shore they were distributed amongst some +thousands of Carlists in waiting, who at once proceeded to fix bayonets, +fall into ranks, and with shouts of exultation march off in good order. + +Meanwhile, the "volunteers of liberty," as the Basque Republicans called +themselves, ensconced their persons out of range in a sort of castle +beside the church of Fontarabia's "wooded height," and amused themselves +taking pot-shots at the rising sun. But they did not venture from their +shelter; they knew a large body of armed Royalists were watching their +movements from the summit of Cape Higuer, and only awaited the provoke +to pounce down upon and swallow them. A detachment of Frenchmen from the +frontier hamlet of Hendaye quietly took up ground on the strand to see +that there was no breach of neutrality, and had an uninterrupted view of +the whole operation. As soon as the daring little privateer had done her +work she innocently steamed to Socoa; the Carlists on the hills waved +adieu and disappeared; the French soldiers returned to their quarters; +and the Fontarabian "volunteers of liberty "--well, most probably they +swore terribly, and effected a masterly retrograde movement on the +nearest posada. + +I had a call to board the _San Margarita_. Not a boat could be had in +St. Jean de Luz for love or money; the passage from the sea into the +harbour is narrow, and the fishermen, though hardy navigators, are shy +of facing the current when the sea is rough. Leader and myself walked by +the goat-path on the crags leading to the southern side of the harbour +so as to avoid the bar, and succeeded in chartering a skiff at Socoa. A +quarter of an hour's pull brought us alongside the yacht, and on sending +up our cards we were at once invited on board by the owner. To my +surprise I discovered that the entire crew was British, as reckless a +set of dare-devils as ever cut out a craft from under an enemy's guns. +The skipper, Mr. Travers, was a Cork man, an ex-officer of the Indian +Navy, who had lost a finger during the Mutiny; but the life and soul of +the enterprise was an ex-officer of the Austrian and Mexican armies, +Charles-Edward Stuart, Count d'Albanie, great-grandson of "the Young +Pretender." His uncle, John Sobieski Stuart, had resigned his claim to +the throne of England on his behalf,[C] so that I actually shook the +hand of the man who under other circumstances might be wielding the +sceptre of that empire on which the sun never sets. Instead of a crown +he wore the genuine old Highland bonnet--not that modern innovation, the +military feather-bonnet. In face this descendant of royalty was an +unmistakable Stuart, with the characteristic aquiline nose, and a proud +dignity of expression. He might have sat for the portrait of Charles the +Martyr-King, by Vandyck, in Windsor. He was a convinced and earnest +supporter of the claims of Cárlos Séptimo, whom he regarded as a cousin, +and a sort of modern counterpart of the young Chevalier, the "darling +Charlie" of Jacobite minstrelsy. He received us with the hospitality of +his nation, and we had a long chat as we paced the deck briskly, the +Count discussing the prospects of the rising, and then verging off into +gay anecdotes of his military career in Austria, and inquiries after +mutual acquaintances in London. By-and-by Captain Travers made his +appearance, a tall weather-beaten navigator in orthodox naval dress, +with a glass in his eye. He bowed severely to the Stuart, who as coldly +returned his salute. It was easy to perceive that there was a restraint +in the demeanour of the men on both sides; but there was a tacit +armistice for the occasion. I heard afterwards that they did not talk to +each other, except on strict matters of duty, and when taking their +short walks on deck, one confined himself religiously to the larboard, +the other to the starboard. Travers took me in tow, while the alert +Count with his quick manner strode to and fro with Leader, and kept up a +jerky fire of conversation nearly all to himself, occasionally twirling +his peaked beard. Travers and I lolled over the bulwarks, and laughed +and sampled the contents of an aqua-vitæ bottle, "Special Jury" whisky +from Ireland, and I learned that this ill-assorted pair had been +sharing some close hazards on their audacious cruiser. + +A few days previously they had been chased by _El Aspirante_, a Spanish +gun-boat, which gave them eight shots. One caught them on the port +quarter, and shivered some timbers, but effected no more serious damage. + +"I wish we had only an Armstrong twenty-four pounder close handy," said +the mate, "and we'd have saved them 'ere dons the price of a coffin, I'd +take my davy!" + +From what I saw of the seamen, I think this was no empty boast. Some of +them had served with one Captain Semmes on a certain craft called the +_Alabama_, and had been picked up after the fight with the _Keasarge_, +off Cherbourg, by Mr. John Lancaster's yacht, the _Deerhound_. There is +no need for concealment now, so that I may freely admit that the +_Deerhound_ and the _San Margarita_ were one and the same. Travers, who +was in love with the yacht, told me if he had another blade to the screw +he could give leg-bail to the fastest ship in the Spanish navy. At +leaving, I was asked to take a trip with them; they were about to visit +their floating arsenal in the Bay of Biscay, load, and try to run +another cargo. I respectfully declined--fortunately for myself; my +orders were to get to the Carlist headquarters, not to go playing Paul +Jones. + +Leader and Smith Sheehan were about to cross the border, and readily +acceded to my request to form one of the party. We rose at daybreak next +morning and looked out of window for the _San Margarita_. The roadstead +of Socoa was a blank. She had steamed away during the night. After the +customary chocolate we started blithely, in a light basket-carriage with +a pair of fast-trotting ponies, that whisked us in less than two hours +to the foot of the Pyrenees. Here we had to alight, the road up the +mountain being impracticable for vehicles. A boy guide was in waiting to +show us over the border by the smuggler's path--a wild short-cut through +a labyrinth of brushwood. The guide was a remarkable youth in his way; +he understood not a syllable of French or Spanish, and spoke only Basque +which none of us comprehended, so that our parley with him was somewhat +uninteresting. Yet I was anxious to elicit the opinions of that guide. A +lad who could strike the path up the mountain with such truth might, by +some instinct, have seen his way through Spanish politics. Our walk was +a trial of endurance. I had traversed the Pyrenees in snow, and that was +fatiguing enough in all conscience; but now the sun was beating cruelly +on the parched herbage, and plodding up the ascent was like treading +burning marl. I had to cry halt half-a-dozen times before we reached the +summit; and yet that marvellous guide, with the baggage of all three on +his head, kept on with a springy step and serene smile, like the youth +in "Excelsior." It was an alternation of wheezing and stumbling with me, +with a continuous ooze of perspiration, till I arrived heaving and +panting on the crown of the ridge, and flung myself on the turf beside a +pile of planking fresh from the woodcutter's axe. There was no further +need to be wary, for this was Spain. We were over the border, and now my +companions could breathe freely in every sense. Before they had passed +the imaginary line they were liable to be arrested by the gendarmes, +conducted back and interned, for they had that about their persons which +betrayed that they were no innocent travellers. At every noise ahead, a +scud was made to the cover of the tall ferns and brambles by the +wayside, and an advance party of one was thrown out to reconnoitre. The +precautions were superfluous, if we knew but all. From the 15th of July, +the French patrols had got the hint to be blind. So lax was the cordon +on the day we crossed, that a brigade of Carlists, each man with a +repeating rifle on his shoulder and two revolvers in his belt, might +have gone into Spain and never have had their sight offended by a +solitary French uniform. + +The view from the comb of the hills, as grasped on a sunny day, repays +all the toil and trouble of the ascent; and looking round, one begins to +realize the fascination of mountain-climbing. On one side extend the +plains of France, washed by the greenish-blue waves of the Bay of +Biscay, and studded as with pearls by the coast-towns of Fontarabia, +St. Jean de Luz, Biarritz, Bayonne, and so on northwards till the vision +fails. On the other side rise in convoluting swells the mountains of +Navarre and Guipúzcoa, their slopes dyed in every shade of green from +grass and lichen, shrub and tree, except where the naked rocks, bursting +with ore, expose themselves. Iron, lead, silver, are all to be found in +the bosom of the earth in this richest and most beautiful of lands. +Nature has been lavish beyond measure, and man, instead of using her +gifts, has ungratefully diverted them for generations to the purposes of +guerrilla warfare and cheating the Custom-House officers. But this high +moral tone hardly sits well on a man who was aiding and abetting the +entry of a couple of foreign free-lances, on homicidal thoughts intent, +and perhaps doing a stroke of contraband on his own account. We suffered +no molestation; but others might not have escaped unpleasantness. The +agent of a Hatton Garden jeweller might have had to pay toll, if the +story were true that a few of the dispersed "Black Legion" had got off +with their rifles and started a joint-stock company in the +bush-whacking line, and were doing a pretty fair business. + +The descent on the Spanish side was almost precipitous, and had to be +effected with exceeding care. At times we ran down the track, rugged +with sharp crags, almost head foremost, and only saved ourselves from +falling by clinging to the nearest sapling. But there is an end to +everything, and at last we came on the road that dips into the village +of Echalar, in the district of Pampeluna, province of Navarre. Here we +dismissed our guide, and here I encountered, for the first time, a +regularly organized Carlist company, detached from the fifth battalion +of Navarre, which was in garrison at Vera, some eight miles distant; but +as I shall have opportunity to speak of the entire battalion soon, I +defer comment on its appearance. + +My companions were desirous of pushing forward, and the provisional +alcalde of the village gave us a trap to take us on. There is an +excellent road by the mountain-side, until a tunnel to the right is +reached, when we entered a most picturesque, well-wooded defile, through +which the Bidassoa pours its waters. We dashed along gaily until we +came in sight of the steeple of the church of Vera at twilight. + +A cry of "Who goes there?" from the gloom arrested us at the entrance of +the town. + +Leader sung out, "España." + +Again came the sentinel's cry, "What people?" and cheerily ran the +answer, "Voluntarios de Carlos Séptimo!" + +"Pass," was the reply; and we took the street at a trot, and pulled up +at the door of the parish priest's dwelling, where the Irish soldiers of +fortune promised me a billet for the night. The kindly pastor was equal +to expectations; we had a cordial welcome, a good dinner, and beds with +clean sheets. + +Sad tidings met my companions--those of the death of a young friend, Mr. +John Scannel Taylor, a native of Cork, in the service of Don Carlos. A +few months previously he had been a promising law student in the Queen's +University of Ireland, with every prospect of a bright career before +him. He arrived from England in the middle of June, and attached +Himself to the partida of General Lizarraga in order to be near his +fellow-countryman, Smith Sheehan. Previous to Mr. Sheehan's returning to +Bayonne with despatches, he tossed up a coin to decide whether he or +Taylor should have the choice of the duty. Poor Taylor won, and elected +to remain with Lizarraga, as there was likelihood of fighting at hand. +The very next day Yvero, where the Republicans held a +strongly-intrenched position, was attacked, and the young Irish +volunteer made himself conspicuous in the onset. While advancing in the +open, setting a pattern of bravery to all by the steady way he delivered +his fire, the gallant fellow was struck by a bullet in the leg. He kept +on limping until he was touched a second time in the arm, but still he +persevered with a dogged courage, when a third bullet struck him in the +forehead, and he dropped with outspread arms, raising a little cloud of +dust. He must have been stone-dead before he reached the ground. His +conduct was "muy valiente," so said his Spanish comrades. He was picked +up after the affair, and decently interred side by side with two +officers who met their deaths in his company. This was the first time he +was under fire, as it was the last; but there is a fatality in those +things. + +This young Irishman, Taylor, was luckier than some of his fellows in one +respect. Short as he had been in the service, he had attracted the +notice of Don Carlos. His comrade Sheehan and he were pointed out to +"the King" by Lizarraga as two modest deserving young soldiers who had +offered to fight in the ranks--a trait of unselfishness that must have +astonished the Carlist leaders, as most of the volunteers they had from +France came out with the full intention of commanding brigades, when +divisions were not to be had. + +"I wish I had a thousand like them," said Lizarraga, who was a genuine +soldier, and one of the few Spaniards not unjust to foreigners. + +Don Carlos shook hands with Mr. Taylor and thanked him. His Majesty +spoke some few minutes in French with Mr. Sheehan, and, as the +conversation gives some insight into Carlism, I may venture to repeat +it. + +Don Carlos.--"You have served before?" + +Irish Soldier.--"Yes, sire, in the Pontifical Zouaves." + +Don Carlos.--"Ha! good. In the same company with my brother, perhaps?" + +Irish Soldier.--"No; but I had the privilege of knowing Don Alfonso." + +Don Carlos.--"He is in Catalonia now, and has many of your old +companions in arms with him. You are serving the same cause here as in +Rome--the cause of religion and of order and of legitimate right." + +Irish Soldier (bowing).--"I should not be here if I did not feel that, +your Majesty." + +Don Carlos (smiling).--"I thank you sincerely. General Lizarraga tells +me you are Irish." + +Irish Soldier.--"I come from the south of Ireland, sire." + +Don Carlos.--"A country I feel much sympathy for. She has been very +unhappy, has she not? Are things better now?" + +Irish Soldier.--"For some years Ireland has been, improving, sire." + +Don Carlos.--"That is well. She deserves better fortune, for she has a +noble, faithful people." + +Don Carlos drew back a pace and made a stiff military nod; the Irishman +brought his rifle to the "present arms," turned on his heel, and marched +back to the ranks, and thus the interview terminated. + +The valley in which the little town of Vera nestles might have been that +where Rasselas was brought up, so secluded, smiling, and peaceful it +looks. The Bidassoa, famous in tales of the Peninsular War, flows +through it, no doubt; but the Bidassoa here is a trout stream winding +through meadows and fields of maize, and thoughts of bloodshed are the +last that would occur to anyone contemplating its mild current. The +mountains walling in the vale are lined with growths of heather, fern, +and blossoming furze to their very crests, and the verdurous picture +they hem is one of poetic calm and plenty. Labourers are digging away in +the fields below, the tinkle of cow-bells is heard from the pastures, +and anon blends with their Arcadian music the soft chiming of +church-bells summoning to prayer; there is a mill with its clacking +wheel, and a foundry with a tuft of smoke curling from its chimney; +orchards and vineyards lie side by side with patches of corn, and along +the high-road peasants pass and repass, shortening their way with song +and laughter, and strings of mules or droves of swine scamper by. +Another Sweet Auburn of Goldsmith, in another Happy Valley of Johnson, +this cosy Vera with its river and trees would seem to any English +tourist ignorant of its history; but how the English tourist would be +misled! Though the peasants laugh and sing, and the labourers dig, and +there are outer tokens of peace, there is no peace in the valley or +town; there are sights and sounds there of war, and that of the worst +kind--civil war. The mill is grinding corn for the commissariat stores, +the foundry turns out shot instead of ploughshares, the boxes on the +mules' backs are packed with ammunition. If you listen, you will hear +the roll of drums and the shrill blowing of bugles more often than the +soothing bells; if you watch, you will notice that not one man in ten is +unprovided with a firearm, for this quiet-looking place is the very +hotbed of Carlism; the insurrectionary headquarters for the province of +Navarre; the arsenal and recruiting depôt for all the provinces in +revolt. The disciples of the rod have fled from it, and those of the +musket have come in their stead. + +At half-past four on the morning after our arrival in the mountains, I +was roused from a profound sleep by the sound of the bugle. A solitary +performer was blowing spiritedly into his instrument; what piece of +music he was trying to execute I could not make out, but that his +primary object was to "murder sleep" was evident, and he succeeded. +Losing all note of time and place, I thought for a moment I was in +London, and that this was a visit from the Christmas waits. But there +was a liveliness in the tones incompatible with the season when the +clarionet, trombone, and cornet-à-piston form a syndicate of noise, and +parade the streets for halfpence. The bugle was in a jocular mood. Judge +of my astonishment when I learned that this merry melody was the +Carlist's reveille! The insurgents had got so far with their military +organization that they had actually buglers and bugle-calls. Nay, more, +they had drummers and a brass band! + +Now I think of it, there is an inadvisability in my calling them +insurgents while in their power; but what phrase am I to employ? In the +pass in my pocket I am recommended to "the Chiefs of the Royal Army of +his Catholic Majesty Charles VII.," as an inoffensive "corresponsal +particular," to whom aid and protection may be safely extended. But then +there are the Republicans, and if they catch me giving premature +recognition in pen-and-ink to the Royalist cause, they may rightly +complain that a British subject is flying in the face of the great +British policy of non-intervention. I think I have discovered an escape +from the dilemma. The Carlists speak of themselves as the Chicos, "the +bhoys," so Chicos let them be for the future, and their opponents the +troops--not that it is by any means intended to be conveyed that the +troops so called are much more martial than the Chicos. + +Well, the boys have got buglers who bugle with a will. They blow a blast +to rouse us, another for distribution of rations; they have the +assembly, the retreat, the "lights out," and all the rest, as regular as +the Diddlesex Militia. I got up in the Cora's house, looked at the +Cura's pictures--which were more meritorious as works of piety than as +works of art--and hastened to the Plaza, where I was told there was +about to be a muster of the Chicos, and I would have a leisurely +opportunity of passing them under inspection. The Plaza is a flagged +space enclosed on two sides by houses, some of which are over a couple +of centuries old, with armorial bearings sculptured over the doors; on +the third by the Municipality; and on the fourth by a grey church, lofty +and large, seated on an eminence and approached by a flight of stone +steps. The Municipality is a massive building, level with the street, +with a colonnaded portico, and a front over which some artist in +distemper had passed his brush. This façade is eloquent with mural +painting, if one could only understand it all. There are symbolic +figures of heroic size, coveys of cherubs, hatchments, masonic-looking +emblems, and inscriptions. A Carlist sentry, dandling a naked bayonet in +the hollow of his arm, was pacing to and fro in the portico, and the +remaining warriors of the post were lounging about, cigarette in mouth, +much as our own fellows do outside the guard-house on Commercial Square, +at Gibraltar. I was curious to see the Carlist uniform. Assuredly the +uniform does not make the soldier, but it goes a great way towards it. +Uniformity was the least striking feature in the dress of the men before +me. They were clad in the ordinary garb of the mountain-peasants. Short +coarse jackets and loose trousers, confined at the waist by a faja, or +girdle of bright-coloured woollen stuff, were worn by some; blouses of +serge, knee-breeches, and stockings or gaiters, by others; but all, +without exception, had the boina, or pancake-shaped woollen cap of the +Basque provinces, and the alpargatas, or flat-soled canvas shoes. +By-and-by was heard a bugle-blast and the quick, regular tread of +marching men, and the head of a company came in sight. In perfect time +the company paced, four deep, into the Plaza, halted, and fell into line +in two ranks. Thus, in succession, seven other companies arrived, +forming the fifth, battalion of Navarre, a vigorous, wiry set of men, +impressing the experienced eye as excellent raw material for soldiers, +albeit got up in costume very much resembling that of brigands of the +Comic Opera. Physically, the natives of the hilly northern provinces are +the pick of Spain. The battalion had its flag, white between two stripes +of scarlet, on which was inscribed the name of the corps, and the +legend, "The country for ever, but always in honour." This was, of +course, written in Basque, of which my rendering is rather free, but it +gives exactly the sense of the sentiment. It was soon palpable to +anybody, who knows anything of such matters, that the Chicos were weak +in officers of the proper stamp, and still more so in under-officers. +Smoking was common in the ranks, and when the men stood at ease, they +stood very much at ease indeed. The officers, in some cases, were +distinguished in dress from the privates solely by gold or silver +tassels dependent from their boinas, and their boinas were of blue, +white, brown, or even Republican red, according to the fancy of the +wearer. All the officers had revolvers and swords. The men were armed +somewhat indiscriminately, one company with Chassepots, another with +Remingtons; there were carbines, and percussion rifles, and +smooth-bores, and even a few flint-locks; but I failed to discern a +single specimen of the trabuco, the bell-mouthed blunderbuss we are +accustomed to associate with the Spanish knight of the road. Ammunition +was carried in a waist-belt, with a surrounding row of leather tubes +lined with tin, each of which held a cartridge--in fact, the Circassian +cartouch-case. There were many grizzled weather-stained veterans in the +ranks who had fought with Zumalacárregui and Mina in the Seven Years' +War; but as a rule the Chicos were literally boys in age, and here and +there a child of twelve or fourteen might be seen measuring himself +beside a patriotic musket. In relief to the peasant dresses were to be +noticed frequent attempts at more soldierly costume in the shape of worn +tunics of the French National Guards or Moblots, and some half-dozen +uniforms of the Spanish Line, with the glazed képi exchanged for the +boina. On the top of many of the boinas, fastening the tassel, was a +huge brass button, with the monogram of the "King," and the inscription, +"Voluntarios, Dios, Patria, y Rey." Another sign particular of this +irregular force that impressed me much was a bleeding heart embroidered +on a small scrap of cloth, and sewn on the left breasts of nearly all on +the ground. This appeared to be worn as a charm against bullets; and +with a strong notion that it would protect them in the hour of danger, I +am convinced nine out of ten of those peasants carried it. It may be as +well to add that inside that embroidered patch were written, in Spanish, +the words, "Stop; the heart of Jesus is here; defend me, Jesus." Many +others of the Carlists carried scapulars, rosary beads, and blessed +medals as pious reminders. The habit of wearing this representation of +the heart of the Saviour over the region of the human heart dates so far +back as the Vendean War, and had been introduced in the present instance +by M. Cathelineau, grandson of the celebrated French Royalist loader. + +The battalion had assembled on the Plaza to give up their old arms, and +to receive a portion of those which had been landed from the _San +Margarita_. They deposited those they had with them by sections in the +Municipality, and emerged with the others, bright, brand-new Berdan +breechloaders. They seemed proud of their weapons; some went so far as +to kiss them; and, if looks were any criterion of feelings, their +glowing faces said, as emphatically as it could be said, "Now that we +have good tools, we shall show what good work we can do." Boxes of +metallic ball-cartridges, centre-primed, were piled on the Plaza, and +were quickly and quietly opened and distributed. Not an accident +occurred in the process. Many a less wonderful phenomenon has been +advertised as a miracle. I fully expected to have my coat spattered with +some warrior's brains every other moment, with such a reckless rashness +were the rifle-muzzles poked about. One shot did go off, while a high +private was trying if his cartridge fitted to the chamber; the charge +singed the hair of a captain, and the bullet lodged in the middle of the +word "Prudencia" on the façade of the Municipality. The captain would +have it that he was killed, spun round on his own centre like a +humming-top, and finally, coming to himself, shook out his clothes in +search of the lead. There was a roar of laughter, and the careless +soldier who had endangered the life of his officer was allowed to pass +without rebuke. That was the worst point in Carlist discipline I had +seen yet. There was too much familiarity towards superiors; the rank and +file lacked that fear and respect for the officers which are the +strongest cement of the military fabric. This was to be explained partly +because the officers were not above the men in social position, and +partly because any enterprising gentleman who bought gold braid and +tassels, sported a sword, and appraised himself an officer, was accepted +at his own valuation. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + The Cura of Vera--Fueros of the Basques--Carlist Discipline--Fate + of the _San Margarita_--The Squadron of Vigilance--How a Capture + was Effected--The Sea-Rovers in the Dungeon--Visit to the + Prisoners--San Sebastian--A Dead Season--The Defences of a + Threatened City--Souvenirs of War--The Miqueletes--In a Fix--A + German Doctor's Warning. + + +THESE horrible and bloodthirsty Carlists turned out to be amiable +individuals on acquaintance. I suppose they could put on a frown for +their enemies, but for my companions and myself they had nothing but +open smiles and hearty hand-grips. One great recommendation was our +being billeted on the parish priest. His reverence had none of the Santa +Cruz in him; he was a gentle, zealous, studious clergyman, yet was +filled with the purest enthusiasm for the cause of what he regarded as +legitimacy. The Don Carlos who raised the standard in 1833, he +maintained, was the rightful heir to the throne of Spain. The law by +which the succession had been changed was an _ex post facto_ law, passed +after his birth, and not promulgated until Ferdinand VII. had a female +child. In May, 1845, that Don Carlos, really Charles V., resigned in +favour of his son, Charles VI., and in September, 1868, he, in his turn, +relinquished his rights to the present claimant to the throne, Charles +VII., whom might God preserve. + +The Cura was unusually civil towards us because we were Irish, and as +Irish were presumably of clean lineage--that is to say, free from +kinship with Jews or infidels. As reputed descendants of settlers from +Bilbao, we were entitled to a full share in all the privileges of the +province of Biscay. This was as well to know. It was a consolation to us +to learn that it was an advantage to be Irish somewhere under the sun. +The King of Spain is but Lord of Biscay, and has to swear under the +oak-tree of Guernica to respect the fueros or customs of the province. +Don Carlos had so done; he was in Spain, it was true, but where he was +at the moment the Cura was unable to say; his court was perambulatory. + +The fueros were abolished by the Cortes in 1841 and but partially +restored in 1844, so that in inscribing them as one of the watchwords on +their banner, the Basques were fighting for something more solid than +glory. They cling to their rights as Britons do to Magna Charta, only +with this difference--they have a clearer conception of what they are. I +had been trying to arrive at some knowledge of the fueros, and obtained +much information from a volume by the late Earl of Carnarvon.[D] +Guipúzcoa, Alava, and Biscay, though an integral part of the Spanish +monarchy, for ages enjoyed their own laws, and a recapitulation of some +which were in force in Biscay will be a fair sample of all. Biscay was +governed by its own national assemblies, arranged its own taxation, +yielded contributions to the Sovereign as a free gift, had no militia +laws, was exempt from naval impressment, provided for its own police in +peace and its own defence in war. No monopoly, public or private, could +be established there. Only Biscayans by birth could be nominated to +ecclesiastical appointments; every Biscayan was noble, and his house was +inviolable; there was perfect equality of civil rights. In short, those +Basques flourished under the amplest measure of Home Rule, and had all +the benefits of the Habeas Corpus Act under another name long before +that Bill was legalized by the Parliament of Charles II. The +liberty-loving Basques were tolerant as well as independent. The +Inquisition was never vouchsafed breathing-room in their midst. When +Protestants escaped from France after the massacre of St. Bartholomew, +they were treated to asylum amongst them.[E] + +We moved about among the guerrilleros. They were mostly light-limbed and +stalwart men, and were none the worse for the sprinkling of seniors of +sixty and lads of sixteen. Many had the bow-legs of the mountaineer, +built like the hinder pair of artillery-horses--the legs that tell of +muscularity and lasting stamina. Their drill was very loose, and skill +in musketry left much to be desired. They had no perception of +distance-judging, and some were so grossly ignorant of the mechanism of +their weapons that they knocked off the back-sights of their rifles, +alleging that they hindered them from taking correct aim. The Marquis de +la Hormazas--a meagre, tall, elderly man--was commandant of the +battalion, and was stern in the exaction of discipline. During the stay +of the Navarrese at Vera, a captain was degraded to the ranks for having +entered the lists of illicit love. The Frenchwoman who was the partner +of his amour was politely shown over the mountain and warned not to +return. + +The battalion left for the interior of the province. Leader was still +too weak to enter on a campaign; Sheehan had to look after the +belongings of his comrade Taylor, and break the news of his death to his +mother; and I saw plainly that it was out of the question attempting to +catch up the flitting headquarters of Don Carlos without a horse. +Besides, I had to complete arrangements for the transmission of letters +and telegraphic messages when I had any to send, and for the reception +of money; in sum, to open up communication with a base. So we returned +to France as we came. + +On arriving at St. Jean de Luz, a startling rumour awaited us. The +steel-built Carlist privateer had been captured at the mouth of the +Adour; she had been taken a prize to San Sebastian; Stuart and Travers +were in close custody; and there were alarmists who whispered that they +would be tried by drum-head as pirates, and hung up in chains in the +cause of humanity. It was well for me I did not accept the invitation to +that water-party. I ran over to Bayonne to ascertain what particulars I +could, saw the Carlist Junta, the British and Spanish Vice-Consuls, and +from their combined and conflicting narratives was able to sift some +grains of the authentic. But the sudden first report was undeniable. The +weasel had been caught asleep. + +The _San Margarita_ was a serious loss to the cause. She had cost +£3,500. She was very fast, being capable of a speed of between ten and +eleven knots an hour, and should be equal to fourteen knots if her +lifting screw had another blade. A three-bladed screw had been provided, +and was to have been fitted to her stern on her return from the +ill-fated expedition which put an end to her roving career. It was true +that the descendant of kings was under bolts and bars. The French +journals described him as a "Monsieur Stuart, a Scotch colonel, +entrusted by the English Catholics with collections for the Carlist +cause." They had never heard of his royal lineage, of his connection +with the Austrian cavalry, or of his exploits by the side of the unhappy +Maximilian in Mexico. He assumed the responsibility of ownership of the +vessel. The hue-and-cry description of him was "a man of forty to +forty-five years of age, over middle height, figure spare, features +thin, and resolute in expression." + +The burly bronzed Corkonian was also in durance, and with the pair of +officers were a picked crew of thirteen Englishmen, including engineers, +steward, stokers, and able-bodied seamen, and one Spanish cabin-boy. A +Basque pilot, an old smuggler, familiar with every nook and crevice of +the Bay of Biscay, had escaped. + +If reports were credible, the _San Margarita_ had already landed two +millions of cartridges, and an immense quantity of arms. Much vexation +was caused to the officers of the Spanish navy in those quarters by the +stories of the daring feats she had achieved, absolutely discharging a +cargo once on the very wharf of Lequeieto, as if she were a peaceful +merchantman, and on another occasion sending off rifles and ammunition +by small boats in the dead of night, a man-of-war lying sleepily +oblivious of what was going on just outside her. It was felt that her +continued impunity was a reproach, and three small vessels of the +Spanish navy were commissioned to cruise between Bilbao and Bayonne on +the look-out for her. This little squadron of vigilance consisted of _El +Aspirante_ and _El Capricho_, gun-boats, and the _Buenaventura_, a +three-gun steam-brig. On Tuesday, August 12th, the _Buenaventura_, +flying a George's Jack at her peak, was off Fontarabia for a portion of +the day, close in shore. At nightfall she disappeared--it is now +supposed into the sheltered and almost invisible inlet of Los Pasages, +between Fontarabia and San Sebastian. Before daybreak on Wednesday, the +Carlists under Dorregaray swarmed down from the hills covering Cape +Higuer. The _San Margarita_ came in sight, and began landing arms in the +same spot where the undisturbed landing of the 28th July had been +effected. Not more than three hundred stand had been put on shore, and +about one hundred thousand cartridges in boxes, labelled in English +"metallic rolled cartridges, centre-primed," when she had to get away, +as the daylight began to play the informer. She dropped down towards +Bayonne, and appears to have reached a point some four miles from the +French shore (the exact distance is a moot question), where she laid to +and allowed her furnaces to cool The men were "dead tired out" after +their night's work, and the captain considered that he was within the +protection of French waters. But there is a very ancient proverb about a +pitcher and a veil, and the period of its realization had been reached +at last Whilst the _San Margarita_ was effecting the landing, a +coastguard's boat had slipped from under the heights of Fontarabia, and +given notice of what was going on to the _Buenaventura_ in Los Pasages, +and the brig steamed out, still with the British colours at her peak +Whilst the Carlist privateer was motionless in fancied security--there +was some want of prudence or vigilance there, surely--the gun-brig crept +down and overhauled her before alarm could be given, and the rakish +schooner-yacht, the skimmer of the seas, had the humiliation of falling +a prey to a wretched slow boat that she could laugh at with steam up in +the open sea. The arrest was made in the usual manner, and the captors +behaved with the customary naval courtesy. They were over-joyed at their +good fortune, and gave their prisoners to eat and to drink--champagne to +the officers and chacoli to the men. They towed their prize into the bay +of St. Sebastian, and there was triumph. The yellow and scarlet flag of +Spain was over the wee _San Margarita_ as she entered, and Colonel +Stuart and Captain Travers and their companions must have felt sore, +for all the good cheer and generous wine. Still there was quite a +courtly scene on board--hand-shakings and reciprocal compliments--as +they were marched off to the dungeon of the Castillo de la Mota on a +hill in the city, where they were incarcerated. There they did not fall +on such pleasant lines as afloat. The Republicans lost no time in +unloading the vessel. They took off her, with a hurry that betrayed +apprehension, 1,545 carbines and six Berdan breech-loaders, with a +number of armourer's tools. It was remarked that the rifles supplied to +the regular troops from Madrid were sighted to eight hundred metres, but +that the range of those seized from the Carlists did not exceed five +hundred. + +I went over to San Sebastian by tug from Socoa on the 16th of August, +and sent up my card to M. de Brunet, the British Vice-Consul. He said he +had called on the prisoners, and that the sailors murmured at their +treatment. If I went to the citadel, after three--as it was Saturday +afternoon, and visiting hours commenced then--I could see them without +difficulty. I did clamber up the hill, and found this was not the case. +On owning that I had no pass from the military governor, I was denied +admittance. Happening to meet the commandant, I represented what I +wanted, and he very civilly granted me leave to visit the prisoners +"para un momento." As the gates were thrown open Stuart advanced and met +me, grasping my hand cordially, and slipping a letter up the sleeve of +my coat. He had caught sight of me labouring up the hill, and had +immediately hastened to scribble a few lines which he trusted to my +sympathy with misfortune to smuggle to their destination for him. He was +not mistaken, and in so doing I had no qualm of conscience. I +accompanied him to his cell, and he told me the story of the capture of +the _San Margarita_. It was substantially as I have related; they +thought they were in a _mare clausum_, at all events they had drifted +out of it on the tide of fate; but there was a nice question of +international law. The _ruse_ of hoisting the British flag was +legitimate if the _Buenaventura_ substituted her own flag before +proceeding to board them. The _San Margarita_ had the flags of more +than one nation in her lockers; but the gun-brig had no power to act the +policeman in neutral waters. There was the point. Travers was in a +separate lodging; they had been accommodated at first in the one cell, +but they could not agree--ashore as afloat the old feud existed. +However, both assented to a truce in order to have a talk with me. They +were cheerful, had cigars _ad libitum_ (at their own expense, of +course), and were permitted to get their rations from the Hôtel de +Londres in the city. The cells they occupied were bare, white-washed, +low-ceiled rooms, some eight paces by six. They were not so clean or +well-ventilated as Newgate cells, and the beds were spread on the floor. +The captives had access to newspapers and writing materials, and it is +but the due of the officers in charge to testify that they were +extremely affable and disposed to make their prisoners as comfortable as +possible. Still, in the close, stifling weather, to be locked up within +the narrow circuit of a dungeon was limbo. The pair wore their own +clothes, Travers still retaining a navy-jacket with brass buttons +engraved with the initials of some yacht club, and did not complain of +having been subjected to indignities. While I was with them the shadow +of a face darkened the window; it was a Carlist prisoner who had hoisted +himself up on the shoulders of a comrade from a yard below; he had a +letter in his mouth. I took it, and slipped him a bundle of cigars for +distribution among his fellow cage-birds. From this it may be deduced +that the gaol regulations were not very stringent. The Carlists were +treated as forfeit of war, not felons, and had no honest chance of +illuminating their brows with the martyr halo of Baron von Trenck or +Silvio Pellico. + +San Sebastian is the most modern town in the Peninsula, having been +re-built in 1816, three years after its destruction by the incensed +allied troops. It is a great summer resort of wealthy Spanish idlers--a +sort of Madrid-super-Mare. The attractions of the capital are to be had +there, with the supplementary advantages of pure air, mountain scenery, +and luxurious sea-bathing on a level sandy beach. There is a public +casino, and a score of clandestine hells where a fortune can be lost in +a night at monté--in short, every infernal facility for Satanic +gambling. Cigarettes are cheap, and so are knives. There is an Alameda, +where the band plays, and a passable imitation, of the Puerta del Sol, +less the fountain, in the broad arcaded Plaza de la Constitution. There +is a small theatre, a spacious bull-ring, and several commodious +churches, where Pepita can talk the language of fans to her heart's +content. Every attraction of Madrid which could reasonably be expected +is to be had, I repeat, and hidalgos and sloe-eyed senoras speckle the +promenades in the gloaming, and impart a mingled aroma of garlic and +gentility, pomade and pretentiousness, to the chief town of Guipúzcoa. +San Sebastian would be for Madrileños what Paris is for Bostonians, if a +few of the attractions of the "only court," which could not reasonably +be expected, were not lacking--say an occasional walk round of the +Intransigentes, to show their political muscles; a grandiloquent, frothy +word-tempest in the Congress, and the Sunday cock-fight. I am speaking, +be it understood, of San Sebastian in ordinary summers. A short +twelvemonth before my visit, a pair of pouting English lips told me it +was "awfully jolly." + +At the date with which I am concerned, it was anything but "awfully +jolly." The fifteen thousand rich visitors who were wont to flock into +the city during the season had gone elsewhere to recruit their health on +the sands and lose their money at the gaming-tables. They had been +frightened to the coasts of France by the apparition of Carlism, and San +Sebastian was plaintive. Her streets and her coffers were empty. The +campamento of bathing-huts was ranged as usual on the velvet rim of the +ear-like bay, but no bathers were there. There were more domestics than +guests in the hotels; and at the _table d'hôte_ three sat down in a +saloon designed for a hundred to breakfast in; and we had no butter. The +peasants in the country round were afraid to bring in the produce of +their dairies and barn-yards. The bull-ring was to let; conscientious +barbers shaved each other or dressed the hair on the wax busts in their +windows, in order to keep alive the traditions of their craft; the +fiddlers in the concert-room of the casino scraped lamentations to +imaginary listeners. A Sahara of dust had settled on the curtain of the +theatre, and fleet-footed spiders made forages athwart it from one +cobwebby stronghold to another. The once festive resort had lost its +spirits completely, and all on account of this civil war. It was summer, +but the city was in a state of hibernation. No business was done in the +shops, the cafés were empty, most of the resident population who could +afford it had emigrated, and the public squares were as vacant as if +there were a perpetual siesta. There was no sign of animation, as we +understand it in England. There were but three vessels in the west +bay--the _Buenaventura_, a merchant steamer, and the _San Margarita_, +pinioned at last, her yellow funnel cold. Sojourn in the place was +insupportable. I knew not how to kill the tedious hours. I climbed again +to the Castle of the Mota, inspected some English tombs on the slope of +the acclivity, and noticed that if the citadel is still a position of +strength, nature deserves much of the credit. The defences recently +thrown up had been devised and executed carefully, and if the defenders +were only true to themselves, the Carlists, with no better artillery +than they possessed, might as well think of taking the moon as of +entering San Sebastian. They would have a formidable fire from +well-planted cannon to face; stockades, and strong earthworks, and more +than one blockhouse cunningly pierced with loopholes, to carry. Even if +San Sebastian was entered, the configuration of the streets was such as +to give every aid to disciplined men as opposed to mere guerrilleros. +The city is built in blocks, on the American system; the wide +thoroughfares cross each other at right-angles, and all of them could be +swept as with a besom by a few guns _en barbette_ behind a breastwork at +either end. In this sort of work, accuracy of aim is not called for, as +in that warfare up in the mountains. If it were, not much reliance could +be placed on the Republican artillery. General Hidalgo had well-nigh +nullified that arm of the service. A Carlist leader, in whose +information and whose word confidence could be reposed, assured me that +not a single Carlist had yet been killed or wounded by the Republican +gunners. The estimated lists of the enemy's casualties given by both +parties during the struggle, I may remark _en passant_, were grossly +exaggerated. The butcher's bill was very small in proportion to the +expenditure of gunpowder. Returning to the question of the defence of +San Sebastian--even on the supposition that the main works and town were +to fall into the hands of the Carlists, the citadel still remained, +where a determined leader could hold out till relief came, as long as +his provisions lasted. This lofty citadel is almost impregnable. It was +hither the French retired in 1813, and it took General Graham all that +he knew to dislodge them. If I were asked what were the prospects of the +Carlists getting into the place, I should say there was but one--by +crossing over a golden bridge. But that implied the possession of money, +and money was precisely what the Carlists declared they needed most. + +There was always the remote hazard of a Carlist rising in San Sebastian, +for there were in the city the children of settlers from the rural +districts who bit their thumbs at the sight of the muzzled _San +Margarita_, and prayed that Charles VII. might have "his ain again." But +they were in the minority. The Miqueletes, a soldierly body of men in +scarlet Basque scones very like to the Carlist head-gear, and a blue +capote with cape attached, garrisoned the citadel. They were brave and +loyal to the Republic, and the object of deep grudge to the Chicos, for +they were Basques of the towns. Many of these provincial militiamen had +come in from the small pueblos in the neighbourhood, where they ran the +risk of being eaten up by "the bhoys;" and this was the only accession +to the population which redeemed the dismal, tradeless port from the +appearance of having been stricken by plague and abandoned, and lent it +at intervals an artificial bustle. + +I sickened of San Sebastian, with its angular propriety; its high, +haughty houses, holding up their heads in architectural primness; its +wide geometrical streets, where there is no shade in the sun, no shelter +in the wind. I began to hate it for its rectilinearity, and dub it a +priggish, stuck-up, arrogant upstart among cities. What business had it +to be so straight and clean and airy? Fain would I shake the dust off my +feet in testimony against it; but here was the trouble. How to get +away--that was a knotty problem. The railway had been torn up for +months, and the armour-vested locomotives were rusting on the sidings at +Hendaye. The dirty hot little tug, the _Alcorta_, that plies between the +quay and Socoa, had left; and I grieved not, for the thought of a +passage by her was nausea. Three more torturing hours never dragged +their slow length along for me than those I spent on board her coming +over. Try and call up to yourself three hours in a low-class cook-shop, +coated an inch thick with filth, and fitted over the boiler of a penny +steamer dancing a marine break-down on the Thames, opposite the outlet +of the main-drainage pipes. That, intensified by strange oaths and +slop-basins, was the passage by the _Alcorta_. But dreary, lonely San +Sebastian was not to be endured. Those poor fellows above, accustomed to +the wild freshness and freedom of the sea, how they must mourn and +repine! By some means or other I must get back to the world that is not +petrified. No diligences dare to affront the dangers of the short +journey to the Irun railway-station, since three were stopped some days +before, the traces cut, the horses stolen, the windows shattered, the +woodwork burned, and the charred wreck left on the roadside, a terror to +those who neglect to obey the commands of the Royalist leaders. + +"Royalist prigants, serr!" shouted a corpulent German doctor, connected +with mines in the neighbourhood, who retained fierce recollections of +having been robbed of a "boney, capitalest of boneys for crossing a +mountain." + +I told the doctor I was about to trust to luck, and set out on foot if I +could persuade nobody to provide me with a vehicle. + +"Serr, you air mad, foolish mad," said the doctor. "Those horrid +beebles, I tell you, are worse than prigants; if you hayff money, they +will dake it; if you hayff not money, they will stroke your pack fifty +times, pecause you hayff it not. They will cut your ears off; they will +cut your nose off; they are plack tevils!" + +I determined to trust to luck all the same. The black devils might not +be all out so black as they were painted. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + Belcha's Brigands--Pale-Red Republicans--The Hyena--More about the + _San Margarita_--Arrival of a Republican Column--The Jaunt to Los + Pasages--A Sweet Surprise--"The Prettiest Girl in Spain"--A Madrid + Acquaintance--A Costly Pull--The Diligence at Last--Renteria and + its Defences--A Furious Ride--In France Again--Unearthing Santa + Cruz--The Outlaw in his Lair--Interviewed at Last--The Truth about + the Endarlasa Massacre--A Death-Warrant--The Buried Gun--Fanaticism + of the Partisan-Priest. + + +THERE is fine scope for exaggeration in civil war; but he who wants the +truth about the Montagues does not consult the Capulets. There must be +bad characters amongst the Carlists, I reflected; and when they are on +outpost duty at a distance from officers, and have taken a drop of +aguardiente too much, they may sometimes fail to appreciate the nice +distinction between _meum_ and _tuum_. The band of one Belcha, which was +hovering in the neighbourhood of San Sebastian, had a shady reputation. +It would be unjust to tempt these simple-minded guerrilleros with the +sight of a Derringer, a hunting-watch, a tobacco-pouch, or a +reconnoitring-glass. All these articles are useful on the hills. But +even Belcha's looters had some conscience; they drew the line at money +and wedding-rings. Besides, in cases of robbery restitution was +invariably made when the chiefs of the revolt were appealed to in proper +form, so that on the whole the Carlists did not deserve the name the +German doctor had given them. Regular soldiers do not always carry the +Decalogue in their kit; there was marauding in the Peninsula, +notwithstanding the iron discipline of the Iron Duke; the Summer Palace +at Pekin was despoiled of its treasures by gentlemen in epaulettes, and +the Franco-German War was not entirely unconnected with stories about +vanishing clocks. So I would not be diverted from my purpose. + +Before leaving San Sebastian I tried to obtain permission for a second +visit to the citadel-prison in order to see the crew of the _San +Margarita_, but without avail. Yet the officers in charge (all of the +regular army), and indeed the privates of the local militia, were +anything but truculent gaolers; they seemed willing to strain a point to +oblige. The Republicanism of the officers was of a very pale red; but +there was one hirsute Volunteer of Liberty who acted as chief warder, +and took a delight in the occupation. He rattled his bunch of keys as if +their metallic dissonance were music, grumbled at the urbanity of his +superiors, and bore himself altogether as if their politics were +suspicious; and he, a pure of the pure, were there as warder over that +too. I nicknamed him the hyena in my own mind; but I could not conceive +him laughing anywhere save in front of a garrote with a Royalist neck in +the rundel, and then his laugh at best would be but the inward chuckle +of a Modoc. + +Stuart took the hyena coolly, regarding him as an amusing phenomenon; +Travers surveyed him as he would the portrait of the Nabob on London +hoardings, and pronounced him a whimsical illustration of Republican +sauce. Stuart, I should have stated, was anxious that it should be +known that he had caused the name of the whilom _Deerhound_ to be erased +from the list of yachts, when he chartered her as a merchant-steamer, +renamed her, and went into the contraband-of-war line. It was contrary +to his wish to compromise any club. The confiscated cargo was the last +he had intended delivering, but he told me with a smile that ten +thousand stand of rifles had already found their way to Vera. There was +no legitimate explanation of the capture of the hare by the tortoise, +although Travers was prepared to swear he was in French waters--he +thought he was, no doubt--but he was just on the wrong side of the +limit. There was one comfort. On the way to Bayonne a boat-load of men +had been landed at Socoa on leave, amongst them the Basque pilot, who +might otherwise have been helped to a short shrift, and the dog's death +from a yard-arm. + +Carlist sympathizers endeavoured to procure me a conveyance to Irun, but +nobody cared to affront the loss of horses, for Belcha's band +requisitioned the cattle even of those identical in political +feeling--the good of the cause was their plea--so at last I was forced +to say I should be glad of a trap to Los Pasages, a few miles off, +whence I might be able to go forward on foot. + +While I was waiting for the arrival of the vehicle, and reading _El +Diario_, the local daily paper--a sheet the size of the palm of one's +hand--until I had the contents by rote, an incident occurred to beguile +suspense. The vanguard of the corps of Sanchez Bregua, the commander of +the Republican Army of the North, rode into the city. They had come from +Zarauz, a seaside village four leagues away--a section of mounted +Chasseurs in a uniform like to that of the old British Light Dragoons. +The troopers were in campaign order, with rifled carbines slung over +their backs, pugarees hanging from their shakoes over their necks, and +were dust-covered and sunburnt, but soldierly. They were horsed +unevenly, and for light cavalry carried too great a burden. But that is +not a fault peculiar to Spanish light cavalry. The average weight of the +British Hussar equipped is eighteen stone. A quarter of an hour later +the main body came in sight, a long column of infantry marching by +fours. It was headed by a party of Civil Guards, acting as guides. As +the column reached the open space by the quay, it deployed into line of +companies, a movement capitally executed. The men were bigger and +tougher than those of the French Line. Their uniform was similar, except +that they had wings to their capotes instead of worsted epaulettes. All +wore mountain-shoes, but were not hampered with tenting equipage on +their knapsacks. Each battalion was led by a staff-officer, who was +splendidly, or wretchedly, mounted, as his luck had served him. The +company officers carried alpenstocks, and their orderlies had officers' +cast foraging-caps on top of their glazed shakoes. I noticed a battalion +of Cazadores, distinguished by the emblematic brass horn of chase +wrought on their collars, and two companies of Engineers in uniforms +entirely blue, with towers on their collars. These latter were robust, +sinewy young fellows. After the infantry came a company of the 2nd +Regiment of Mountain Artillery with four small pieces, each drawn by a +single mule, and behind them a squadron of Mounted Chasseurs, and a +long cavalcade of pack-horses and mules. + +After a deal of exploration a driver was dug up, and after a deal of +negotiation he consented to take me to Los Pasages. Thanks to Republican +vigilance, but principally it may have been to the nature of the ground, +the road thither was clear. We started at six o'clock in the evening, +and after a lively spin through sylvan scenery drew up in less than an +hour at the outskirts of a village on the edge of a quiet pool, which we +had bordered for nigh a mile. No papers had been asked for, on leaving, +at the bridge over the Urumea, where a post of volunteers kept guard by +an antique and stumpy bronze howitzer, mounted on a siege-carriage, and +furnished with the dolphin-handles to be seen on some of the +last-century guns in the Tower Arsenal. No papers were asked for either +at the Customs' station, some hundred yards farther on; but the +Carabineros looked upon me as a lunatic, and significantly sibilated. +None were asked for at the approach to the village. Scarcely had I +alighted when a fishwife ran out of a cabin and addressed me in Basque. +I could not understand her, and motioned her away, when a winsome lassie +of some eighteen summers, tripping up the road, came to my aid, and +began speaking in French as if she were anticipating my arrival. + +"Monsieur wants a shallop to go to France?" + +I was taken aback, but answered, "Yes." + +"Monsieur will follow me." + +And she gave me a meaning sign--half a wink, half a monition. I +followed, and examined my volunteer guide more attentively. What a prize +of a girl! Hair black as night, but with a glossy blackness, was parted +on her smooth forehead, and retained behind, after the fashion of the +country, by a coloured snood, but two thick Gretchen plaits escaped, and +hung down to her waist, making one wish that she had let her whole +wealth of tresses wander free. Eyes blue-black, full by turns of soft +love and sparkling mischief; Creole complexion, with blood rich as +marriage-wine coursing in the dimpled cheeks; teeth white as the fox's; +lips of clove-pink. And what a shape had she--ripe, firm, and piquant! +Do you wonder that I followed her with joy? Do you wonder that I began +weaving a romance? If you do, I pity you. Did I want a shallop? Of +course I did; but alas! might I not have echoed Burger's lament: + + "The shallop of my peace is wrecked + On Beauty's shore." + +She was a Carlist, I was sure of that. All the comely maidens were +Carlists. In the service of the King the most successful crimps were +"dashing white sergeants" in garter and girdle. And she took me for an +interesting Carlist fugitive, and she was determined to aid in my +escape. How ravishing! She was a Flora Macdonald, and I--would be a +Pretender. I had fully wound myself up to that as we entered Los +Pasages. + +Los Pasages consists of rows of houses built on either side of a basin +of the sea, entered by a narrow chasm in the high rocky coast. Sailing +by it, one would never imagine that that cleft in the shore-line was a +gate to a natural harbour, locked against every wind, and large enough +to accommodate fleets, and whose waters are generally placid as a lake. +This secure haven, _statio benefida carinis_, is hidden away in the lap +of the timbered hills, and is approached by a passage (from which its +name is borrowed) which can be traversed in fifteen minutes. The change +from the boisterous Bay of Biscay, with its "white horses capering +without, to this Venetian expanse of water in a Swiss valley, dotted +with chalets and cottages, must have the effect of a magic +transformation on the emotional tar who has never been here before, and +whose chance it was to lie below when his ship entered. The refuge is +not unknown to English seamen, for there is a stirring trade in minerals +with Cardiff, in more tranquil times. But now Los Pasages is deserted +from the bar down to the uttermost point of its long river-like stretch +inland, except by the smacks and small boats of the native fishers, a +tiny tug, and a large steamer from Seville which is lying by the wharf. +There is no noise of traffic; the one narrow street echoes to our +tramping feet as I follow my charming cicerone, who has started up for +me like some good spirit of a fairy-tale. She leads me to an inn, bids +me enter, and flies in search of the owner of the shallop. The landlord +comes to greet me, and I recognise in him an acquaintance--Maurice, a +former waiter in the Fonda de Paris, in Madrid. I questioned Maurice as +to my chances of getting across to Irun by land that night; but he +assured me it was too late, and really dangerous; that the road was +infested by gangs of desperadoes; and that it would be safer for me to +travel, even in the day-time, without money or valuables. The owner of +the shallop came, but as he had the audacity to ask eighty francs for +transporting me round to Fontarabia, and as I had found Maurice, I +resolved to stop in Los Pasages for the night. + +"You have only to cross the water to-morrow morning," said Maurice, "and +you are in Kenteria, where you will be sure to get a vehicle." + +The backs of the houses all overlook the port, and all are balconied and +furnished with flowered terraces, from which one can fish, look at his +reflection, or take a header into the water at pleasure. A glorious nook +for a reading-party's holiday, Los Pasages. Not if fair mysteries like +my friend crop up there; but where is she, by-the-way? She does not +re-appear; but Maurice will help me to discover who and what she is. + +"Maurice, are there any pretty girls here?" + +Maurice looks at me reproachfully. + +"Señor, you have been conducted to my house by one who is acknowledged +to be the prettiest in all Spain." + +That night I dreamt of Eugenia, the baker's daughter, the pride of Los +Pasages, who was waiting for a husband, but would have none but one who +helps Charles VII. to the throne. I recorded that dream for the +bachelors of Britain, and conjured them to make haste to propose for +her--not that the Carlist war was hurrying to a close; but I have +remarked that girls inclined to be plump at eighteen sometimes develop +excessive embonpoint about eight-and-twenty. On inquiry, I found a key +to the enigma which had filled me with sweet excitement. Eugenia, who +had been to the citadel-prison to carry provisions to a friend in +trouble, had seen me speaking to Colonel Stuart, and was anxious to +serve me because of my supposed Carlist tincture. My supposed Carlist +tincture did not prevent a lusty Basque boatman from charging five +francs next morning for the five minutes' pull across the water to the +road to Renteria, where I caught a huge yellow diligence, which had +ventured to leave San Sebastian at last with the detained mails of a +week. The machine was horsed in the usual manner--that is, with three +mules and two nags--but how different from usual was the way-bill! With +the exception of the driver and his aide, a youngster who jumped down +from the box every hundred yards, and belaboured the beasts with a +wattle, there was not one passenger fit to carry arms. We had a load of +women and babies, a decrepit patriarch, and two boys under the fighting +age. We halted at Renteria, harnessed a fresh team to our conveniency, +and sent on a messenger to ascertain if the Carlists had been seen on +the road. Everybody in Renteria carried a musket. All the approaches +were defended by loopholed works, roofed with turf, and a perfect +fortress was constructed in the centre of the town by a series of +communications which had been established between the church and a block +of houses in front by _caponnières_. The church windows were built up +and loopholed, and a semicircular _tambour_, banked with earth to +protect it from artillery, was thrown up against the houses in the +middle of the street, so as to enfilade it at either side in case of +attack. There were troops of the line in Renteria, but no artillerymen, +nor was there artillery to be served. Without artillery, however, the +place, if properly provisioned, could not be taken, if the defending +force was worth its salt. + +The messenger having returned with word that all was right, we went +ahead at a fearful pace on a very good road, lined with poplars, and +running through a neat park-like country. Over to the right we could see +the church-spire of Oyarzun, and the smoke curling from the chimneys; a +little farther on we passed the debris of a diligence on the wayside; +the telegraph wires along the route were broken down, and the poles +taken away for firewood; we dived under a railway bridge, but never a +Carlist saw we during the continuous brief mad progress over the eight +miles from Renteria to the rise into Irun. + +We clattered up to the rail way-station at a hand-gallop, the people +rushing to the doors of the houses, and beaming welcome from smiling +countenances. There was a faint attempt to cheer us. At the station a +number of officials, a couple of Carabineros, and a knot of idlers were +gathered. The driver descended with the gait of a conquering hero, and +turned his glances in the direction of a cottage close by. An old man on +crutches, a blooming matron with rosary beads at her waist, and a +nut-brown maid with laughing eyes stood under the porch, embowered in +tamarisk and laurel-rose. The driver strode over to them, crying out +triumphantly: + +"El primero! Lo! I am the first." + +"How valiant you are, Pedro!" said the nut-brown maid, advancing to meet +him. + +"How lucky you are!" said the matron, with a grave shake of the head. + +"How rash you are!" mumbled the grandfather; "you were always so." + +I envied that driver, for the nut-brown maid kissed him, as she had the +right to do, for she was his affianced, and had not seen him for five +days. + +From the Irun station to Hendaye was free from danger. I walked down +through a field of maize to the Bidassoa, crossed by a ferry-boat to the +other side, where a post of the 49th of the French Line were peacefully +playing cards for buttons in the shade of a chestnut, and a few minutes +afterwards was seated in front of a bottle of Dublin stout with the +countryman who forwarded my letters and telegrams from over the border. + +Naturally I had a desire to ascertain the whereabouts of Santa Cruz. The +man had almost grown mythical with me. I had heard at San Sebastian that +ten thousand crowns had been offered for his scalp at Tolosa, and the +fondest yearning--the one satisfying aspiration of the hyena--was to +tear him into shreds, chop him into sausage-meat, gouge out his eyes, or +roast him before a slow fire. Which form of torment he would prefer, he +had not quite settled. A sort of intuitive faculty, which has seldom +led me astray, said to me that Santa Cruz was somewhere near. I revolved +the matter in my mind, and fixed upon the man under whose roof he was +most likely to be concealed. I went to that man and requested him +bluntly to take me to the outlawed priest--I wished very much to speak +to him. + +He smiled and answered, "He is not here." + +"The bird is flown," I said, "but the nest is warm. He is not far away." + +"True," he said, "come with me." + +We drove some miles--I will not say how many--and drew up at an enclosed +villa, which may have been in France, but was not of it. To be plain, it +was neutral territory, and my host, who knew me thoroughly, disappeared +for a few moments, and said Santa Cruz was sleeping, but that he had +roused him, and that he would be with us presently. + +I was sitting on a garden-seat in front of the house where he was +stopping, when he presented himself on the threshold, bareheaded, and in +his shirt-sleeves. The outlaw priest was no slave to the +conventionalities of society. He did not adjust his necktie before +receiving visitors. I am not sure that he wore a necktie at all. Let me +try and draw his portrait as he stood there in the doorway, in +questioning attitude. A thick, burly man under thirty years of age, some +five feet five in height, with broad sallow face, brawny bull-neck, and +wide square-set shoulders--a squat Hercules; dark-brown hair, cut short, +lies close to his head; he is bearded, and has a dark-brown pointed +moustache; shaggy brows overhang his small steel-gray eyes; his nose is +coarse and devoid of character; but his jaws are massive, his lips firm, +and his chin determined. He is dressed like the better class of peasant, +wears sandals, canvas trousers, a light brownish-gray waistcoat, and has +a large leathern belt, like a horse's girth, round his waist. His +expression is severe, as of one immersed in thought; with an occasional +frown, as if the thought were disagreeable. His brows knit, and a shadow +passes over his features when anything is mentioned that displeases him; +but I was told when he smiled, the smile was of the sweetest and most +amiable. I cannot say I saw him in smiling mood, but I saw him frown, +and never did anyone so truly translate to me the figure of speech of +"looking black." He advanced with self-possession, returned my salute +without coldness or _empressement_, as if it were a mere matter of form, +and sat down beside me. We had a long chat. Santa Cruz did not take much +active part in it, but listened as his host spoke, punctuating what was +said with nods of assent, and now and again dropping a guttural +sentence. His maxim was that deeds were of more value than words, and he +adhered to it. His host, I may interpose, was the most devoted of +Carlists, and had given largely of his means to aid the cause. He had +great faith in Santa Cruz, and told me in his presence (but in French, +which the Cura understood but slightly) that while Santa Cruz was in the +northern provinces, the King had half-a-man in his service, and that if +he would now call on Cabrera he would have a man and a half, for that +Santa Cruz would act with Cabrera. + +"If Don Carlos does not consent to that," said my host, "you will see +that he will have to return into France, and live in ignominy for the +rest of his days!" + +This Cura, represented in the Madrid play-house as half-drunk and +dancing lewdly, was the most abstemious and chastest of men, and neither +smoked nor drank wine. His fame went on increasing, as did the number of +his followers. He effected prodigies with the means at his command. His +friends in France supplied him with two cannon, which were smuggled +across the border. He turned the foundry at Vera into a munition +factory; employed women to make uniforms for his men; and insisted that +the intervals between his expeditions should be given up to drill. He +was dreaded, respected, admired by his band; he was strong and hardy; +faced perils and privations in common with the lowest, but used no +weapon but his walking-stick The priest, the anointed of God, may not +shed blood. The affair of Endarlasa was the coping-stone of his career. +Various accounts were related of that event; it is only fair to let +Santa Cruz himself speak. This is what he told me: + +At three one morning he opened fire on the guard-house occupied by the +Carabineros, at the bridge over the Bidassoa, between Vera and Irun. A +white flag was hoisted on the guard-house. He ordered the fire to cease, +and advanced to negotiate the conditions of surrender. The enemy, who +had invited him to approach, by the white flag, fired and wounded one of +his men. He issued directions to take the place, and spare nobody. The +place was taken, and nobody was spared. Twenty-seven dead bodies +littered the Vera road that morning. + +"Is it true that you pardoned two?" I asked the priest. + +"No, ninguno! Porqué?" he answered with astonishment. "Not one. Why +should I?" + +The reason I had asked was that I had been told that a couple of the +Carabineros had plunged into the Bidassoa and tried to swim to the other +side; but the Cura, on his own avowal, with Rhadamanthine justice had +commanded them to be shot as they breasted the current, and they were +shot. He was no believer in half-measures. + +A lady partisan of his, who had dined with him the day before, told me +he never breathed a syllable of the attack he meditated, to her or any +of his band. An English gentleman, who visited the ground while the +corpses were still upon it, assured me that the sight was horrifying, +and, such was the panic in Irun, that he verily believed Santa Cruz +might have taken the town the same afternoon, had he appeared before it +with four men. + +To pursue the story of the redoubtable Cura. The bruit of his exploits +had gone abroad, and among certain Carlists it seemed to be the opinion, +as one of them remarked to me, that "_Il a fait de grandes choses, mais +de grandes bêtises aussi._" He was making war altogether too seriously +for their tastes. Antonio Lizarraga was appointed Commandant-General of +Guipúzcoa about that period, and ordered Santa Cruz to report to him. +Santa Cruz, who was in the field before him, and had five times as many +men under his control, paid no heed to his orders. Lizarraga then sent +him a death-warrant, which is so curious a document that I make no +apology for appending it in full: + + TRANSLATION. + + (A seal on which is inscribed "Royal Army of the North, General + Command of Guipúzcoa.") + + "The sixteenth day of the present month, I gave orders to all the + forces under my command, that they should proceed to capture you, + and that immediately after you had received the benefit of clergy + they should execute you. + + "This sentence I pronounced on account of your insubordination + towards me, you having disobeyed me several times, and having taken + no notice of the repeated commands I sent you to present yourself + before me to declare what you had to say in your own defence in the + inquiry instituted against you by my directions. + + "For the last time I ask of you to present yourself to me, the + instant this communication is received; in default of which I + notify to you that every means will be used to effect your arrest; + that your disobedience and the unqualifiable acts laid to your + charge will be published in all the newspapers; and that the + condign punishment they deserve will be duly exacted. + + "God grant you many years. + + "The Brigadier-General Commanding. + + (Signed) "ANTONIO LIZARRAGA. + + "Campo Del Honor, 28th of March, 1873. + + "Señor Don Manuel Santa Cruz." + + "Note.--Have the goodness to acknowledge this, my + communication." + + +This missive was received by Santa Cruz, but he never acknowledged it. +His host permitted me to read and copy the original. + +"Is not that arbitrary?" he said to me in English; "very much like what +you call Jedburgh justice; hanging a man first and trying him +afterwards. Lizarraga says, 'This sentence I pronounced'--all is +finished apparently there; and yet he cites the man whom he has ordered +to be immediately executed to appear before him to declare what he has +to say!" + +Another phrase in this death-warrant, which escaped the host, impressed +me with its naïveté: + +"_God grant you many years._" + +But Lizarraga, in this politeness of custom, meant no more, it is to be +presumed, than did the Irish hangman who expostulated with his client in +the condemned cell: + +"Long life to ye, Mr. Hinery! and make haste, the people are getting +onpatient." + +Santa Cruz bit his way out of the toils, however, but not so his band. +They were surrounded at Vera, caught, with a few exceptions, disarmed, +assembled and addressed in Spanish by the Marquis de Valdespina, whose +remarks were translated to them into Basque by the Cura of Ollo. They +cried "Viva el Rey!" Their arms were subsequently restored to them, and +the men were distributed among other battalions. But they still regret +their old leader, and Santa Cruz is popular by the firesides of the +mountaineers of Guipúzcoa. One of his mountain guns fell into the hands +of Lizarraga, but the other was buried in some spot only known to +himself and a few trusted companions. + +During my interview I made it my business to study the priest +attentively, and this is what I honestly thought of him. He was a +fanatic, a sullen self-willed man with but one idea--the success of the +cause; and but one ambition--that it should be said of him that it was +he, Santa Cruz, who put Don Carlos on the throne of his ancestors. The +globe for him was bounded by the Pyrenees and the sea; he had but one +antipathy after the heretics (all who did not worship God as he did) and +the Liberals, and that was Lizarraga. I considered it a mistake that +Lizarraga was not the Cura of Hernialde, and Santa Cruz the +Commandant-General of Guipúzcoa. The priest had a natural military +instinct--I would almost go so far as to say a spice of military +genius; and had he had a knowledge of the profession of arms would +probably have developed into a great general of the Cossack type. His +hatred to Lizarraga led him into littleness and injustice. He chuckled +at the idea of Lizarraga not being able to find the buried gun, as if +that were any great triumph over him; and he sneered at the idea of +Lizarraga, who was not able to take Oyarzun, meditating an attempt on +Tolosa. I could thoroughly understand that the Carlist priest bore +malice to the officer who supplanted him and condemned him to death. But +what Lizarraga did was done in compliance with the King's will. At the +same time there could be no doubt that Santa Cruz was treated with scant +courtesy after all he had accomplished, and had a right to feel himself +ill-used, and the victim of jealous rivalry. He said that he was +prepared, any day the King permitted him, to traverse the four +provinces, and hold his enemies _in terrorem_ with five hundred men. And +he was the very worthy to do it. He complained bitterly that three of +his followers had been shot by Lizarraga. One story relates that they +stole into Guipúzcoa to levy blackmail, another that they merely went to +dig up some money that was interred when the legion was disbanded. In +any case they appeared in arms in a forbidden district, and incurred the +capital penalty. Santa Cruz went to Bordeaux to beg for their lives at +the feet of Doña Margarita. She received him most graciously, and +promised to send a special courier to her husband to intercede in their +behalf. Before the King's reprieve could possibly have arrived the three +were executed. + +As we were about to leave, a colleague who was with me asked the Cura if +he would permit him to visit his camp, if it came to pass that he took +up arms again in Spain. + +"We shall see," said Santa Cruz; "wait till I am there." + +My own conviction is that the priest held correspondents in abhorrence, +and that his first impulse would have been to tie a zealous one up to a +tree, and have thirty-nine blows given him with a stick. Perhaps I did +him wrong, but if ever he did take up arms again, it was my firm +intention to be south when he was north, for he was about the last +person in creation to whose tender mercies I should care to entrust +myself. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + An Audible Battle--"Great Cry and Little Wool"--A Carlist Court + Newsman--A Religious War--The Siege of Oyarzun--Madrid Rebels--"The + Money of Judas"--A Manifesto from Don Carlos--An Ideal + Monarch--Necessity of Social and Political Reconstruction + Proclaimed--A Free Church--A Broad Policy--The King for the + People--The Theological Question--Austerity in Alava--Clerical and + Non-Clerical Carlists--Disavowal of Bigotry--A Republican Editor on + the Carlist Creed--Character of the Basques--Drill and + Discipline--Guerilleros _versus_ Regulars. + + +WHEN a man's office is to chronicle war and he is within hearing of the +echoes of battle, but cannot reach a spot from which the scene of action +might be commanded, it is annoying in the extreme. Such was my strait on +the 21st of August, a few days after my arrival from San Sebastian. I +was at Hendaye, the border-town of France. From the Spanish frontier the +report of heavy firing was audible for hours, apparently coming from a +point between Oyarzun and Renteria. First one could distinguish the +faint spatter of musketry, and afterwards the undeniable muffled roar of +artillery. Then came a succession of sustained rolls as of +volley-firing. About noon the action must have been at its height. The +distant din was subsequently to be caught only at long intervals, as if +changes of position were in course of being effected; but at three +o'clock it regained force, and raged with fury until five, when it +suddenly died away. + +I was burning with impatience, and made several unavailing attempts to +cross the Bidassoa. The ferryman, acting under instructions from the +gendarmes, refused to take passengers. By the evening train a delegate +from the Paris Society for the Succour of the Wounded arrived from +Bayonne with a box of medicine and surgical appliances. He, too, was +unable to pass into Spain. Meantime, rumour ran riot. Stories were +current that there had been fearful losses. + +"At eleven o'clock men were falling like flies," said one eye-witness, +who succeeded in running away from the field before he fell. + +Not a single medical man would leave France in response to the call of +the Paris delegate for volunteers to accompany him. Were they all +Republicans? Did they fear that Belcha might take a fancy to their +probes and forcipes? Or did they look upon the big battles and +tremendous lists of casualties in this most uncivil of civil wars as +illustrations of a great cry and little wool? If the latter was their +notion, they were right. Three days after this serious engagement, I +learned the particulars of what had taken place. General Loma, a +brigadier under Sanchez Bregua, with a column of 1,500 men, came out +from San Sebastian to cover a working-party while they were endeavouring +to throw up a redoubt for his guns on an eminence between Irun and +Oyarzun, so as to put an end to the tussle over the possession of the +latter hamlet, which was a perpetual bone of contention. The Carlists +fired upon him from behind the rocks in a gorge to which he had +committed himself, but were outnumbered. Word was sent to the cabecilla, +Martinez, at Lesaca, and he arrived with reinforcements at the double, +and encompassed Loma with such a cloud of sulphurous smoke that the +Republicans had to fall back upon San Sebastian. The casualties in this +Homeric combat were not appalling; there was more gunpowder than blood +expended. The losses on the Republican side were one killed and fifteen +wounded. On the Carlist side they were less, for the Carlists kept under +cover of the fern and furze. But then it must be considered that the +firing only lasted nine hours! + +Don Carlos was not slow in calling the printing-press to his aid. One of +his first acts after his entry into his dominions was to start an +official gazette, _El Cuartel Real_, the first number of which is before +me as I write. I have seen queer papers in my travels, from the +_Bugler_, a regimental record brought out by the 68th Light Infantry in +Burmah, to the _Fiji Times_, and the _Epitaph_, the leading organ of +Tombstone City, in the territory of Arizona; but this assuredly was the +queerest. It was published by Cristóbal Perez, on the summit of Peña de +la Plata, a Pyrenean peak. There might be less acceptable reading than a +_résumé_ of its contents. + +_El Cuartel Real_ does not impose by its magnitude. It is about +one-eighth the size of a London daily journal; but if it is not great by +quantity it is by quality. Over the three columns of the opening page +figure the three watchwords of the Royal cause, "God, Country, King." +The paragraph which has the post of honour is headed "Oficial," and has +in it a flavour of the _Court Newsman_. Here it is as it appears in the +original, boldly imprinted in black type: + +"S. M. el Rey (q.D.g.) continúa sin novedad al frente de su leal y +valiente ejército. + +"S. M. la Reina y sus augustos hijos continúan tambien sin novedad en su +importante salud." + +As it is not vouchsafed to everyone to understand Castilian, I may as +well give a rough translation, which read herewith: + +"His Majesty the King (whom God guard) continues without change at the +front of his loyal and valiant army. + +"Her Majesty the Queen and her august children also continue without +alteration in their precious health." + +Then _El Cuartel Real_ appends what takes the place of its leading +article--a reproduction of a letter from Don Carlos to his "august +brother," Don Alfonso, setting forth the principles on which he appeals +for Spanish support. This document is so important that I must return to +it anon. Then comes a circular from the "Real Junta Gubernativa del +Reino de Navarra," in session at Vera. The purport of this, epitomized +in a sentence, is to raise money. Next, we arrive at the "Seccion +Oficial," the most important paragraph of which announces that the +Chief, Merendon, has inaugurated a Carlist movement in Toledo, with a +well-armed force, exceeding 280 men--to wit, 150 horsemen and 130 +infantry--and that he hopes shortly to gather numerous recruits. The +"Seccion de Noticias" makes up the body of the paper, and is richer in +information. We are told that the most excellent and illustrious Bishop +of Urgel, accompanied by several sacerdotal and other dignitaries, +arrived in the town of Urdaniz, at half-past seven on the previous +Wednesday evening. His Lordship rested a night in the house of the +Vicar, and left the following morning, escorted by his friend and host, +the said Vicar, Brigadier Gamundi, and Colonel D. Fermin Irribarren, +veterans of the Carlist army, for Elisondo. From that the prelate was +reported to have started to headquarters, "to salute the King of Spain, +august representative of the Christian monarchy, which is the only plank +of safety in the shipwreck of the country." + +The _Cuartel Real_ warmly congratulates the Bishop on the fact of his +having come to the conviction that "the present war is a religious war, +and on that account eminently social"--(social in Spanish must have some +peculiar shade of meaning unknown to strangers, for otherwise there is +no sequence here)--and proceeds to speak with an eloquence that recalls +that wretched Republican, Castelar, of the standard of faith in which +resides Spanish honour and--here come two words that puzzle me, _la +hidalguia y la caballerosidad_; but I suppose they mean nobility and +chivalry, and everything of that kind. The next notice in the royal +gazette is purely military, and makes known that the siege of the +important town of Oyarzun has begun. "On the 20th the batteries opened +fire, and, according to report, the enemy had one hundred men _hors de +combat_." The batteries! There is a touch of genius in that phrase. +Reading it, one would imagine that the Royalists had a royal regiment of +artillery, and that eight pieces of cannon, at the very least, played +upon the unfortunate Oyarzun. A jennet with a 4-pounder at its heels +would be a more correct representation of the strength of the Carlist +ordnance. + +To resume the story of the siege of Oyarzun. "On the 21st," adds _El +Cuartel Real_, "there was talk of a capitulation, and it is possible +that the place has surrendered at this hour." The paragraph that +succeeds it is a gem: "Of the 1,010 armed rebels in Eibar (Guipúzcoa), +210 betook themselves to San Sebastian, when they suspected the approach +of the Royal forces, and the 800 remaining gave up to General Lizarraga +their rifles, all of the Remington system." There is no quibble about +the latter statement. The Carlists had easier ways of procuring arms +than by running cargoes from England. But is there not something +inimitable in the epithet "rebels"? There can be no question but that +everyone is a rebel in romantic Spain--in the opinion of somebody else. +The only question is, Who are the constituted authorities? Until that is +settled the editor of _El Cuartel Real_ is perfectly justified in +treating the volunteers of liberty, in those districts where Charles +VII. virtually reigns, as armed rebels. Although this town of Eibar had +frequently risen up against the legitimate authorities named by his +Majesty, it is pleasant to learn that General Lizarraga did not impose +the slightest chastisement on the population, thus giving a lesson of +forbearance to the "factious generals." Next we are informed that on the +day the Royal forces entered Vergara, the ignominious monument erected +by the Liberals in record of the greatest of treasons (the treaty +between the treacherous Maroto and Espartero in 1839) was destroyed +amidst enthusiasm, and the parchment in the municipal archives +commemorating its erection was taken out and burned in the public +square. I may add (but this I had from private sources) that the coin +dug up from under the monument was cast to the wind as the money of +Judas. Navarre, continues _El Cuartel Real_, is dominated by our valiant +soldiers under the skilful direction of his Majesty; Lizarraga has +occupied in a few days Mondragon, Eibar, Plasencia, Azpeitia, Vergara, +and other important places in Guipúzcoa, and obtained "considerable +booty of war;" the standard of legitimacy is waving triumphantly in +Biscay, and Bilbao is blockaded. There the tale of victory ends; but we +arrive at matters not less gratifying in another sense. The +distinguished engineer, Don Mariano Lana y Sarto, has been appointed to +look after the repair of the bridges destroyed by Nouvilas. Don Matias +Schaso Gomez, a member of the press militant, has been promoted to be a +commandant for his valour at Astigarraga, and is nominated for the +laurelled cross of San Fernando; and the illustrious doctor, Señor Don +Alejandro Rodriguez Hidalgo, has been named chief of the sanitary staff, +and entrusted with the establishment of military hospitals. + +The last paragraph in this curious little gazette, printed up amid the +clouds on the summit of the Silver Hill, states that the Royal quarters +were at Abarzuzu on the 17th instant, and that Estella, close by, was +stubbornly resisting, but would soon be in the power of the Royalists. A +column which had attempted to relieve the garrison was energetically +driven back towards Lerin by two battalions commanded by his Majesty in +person. But by the time _El Cuartel Real_ came under my notice Estella +had fallen, and the Carlists had put to their credit a genuine success. + +As the question of Carlism is still one of prominent interest--is, +indeed, what the French term an "actuality," and may crop up again any +day, the letter of the claimant to the throne to Don Alfonso (alluded to +some sentences above) is worth translating. It is the authoritative +exposition of the aims of the would-be monarch, and of the line of +policy he intended to pursue should he ever take up his residence in +that coveted palace at Madrid. Its date is August 23rd, 1873, and the +contents are these: + + * * * * * + +"MY DEAR BROTHER, + +"Spain has already had opportunities enough to ascertain my ideas +and sentiments as man and King in various periodicals and +newspapers. Yielding, nevertheless, to a general and anxiously +expressed desire which has reached me from all parts of the +Peninsula, I write this letter, in which I address myself, not +merely to the brother of my heart, but without exception to all +Spaniards, for they are my brothers as well. + +"I cannot, my dear Alfonso, present myself to Spain as a Pretender +to the Crown. It is my duty to believe, and I do believe, that the +Crown of Spain is already placed on my forehead by the consecrated +hand of the law. With this right I was born, a right which has +grown, now that the fitting time has come, to a sacred obligation; +but I desire that the right shall be confirmed to me by the love of +my people. My business, henceforth, is to devote to the service of +that people all my thoughts and powers--to die for it, or save it. + +"To say that I aspire to be King of Spain, and not of a party, is +superfluous, for what man worthy to be a king would be satisfied to +reign over a party? In such a case he would degrade himself in his +own person, descending from the high and serene region where +majesty dwells, and which is beyond the reach of mean and pitiful +triflings. + +"I ought not to be, and I do not desire to be, King, except of all +Spaniards; I exclude nobody, not even those who call themselves my +enemies, for a king can have no enemies. I appeal affectionately to +all, in the name of the country, even to those who appear the most +estranged; and if I do not need the help of all to arrive at the +throne of my ancestors, I do perhaps need their help to establish +on solid and immovable bases the government of the State, and to +give prosperous peace and true liberty to my beloved Spain. + +"When I reflect how weighty a task it is to compass those great +ends, the magnitude of the undertaking almost oppresses me with +fear. True, I am filled with the most fervent desire to begin, and +the resolute will to carry out, the enterprise; but I cannot hide +from myself that the difficulties are immense, and that they can +only be overcome by the co-operation of the men of notability, the +most impartial and honest in the kingdom; and, above all, by the +co-operation of the kingdom itself, gathered together in the +Cortes which would truly represent the living forces and +Conservative elements of Spain. + +"I am prepared with such Cortes to give to Spain, as I said in my +letter to the Sovereigns of Europe, a fundamental code which would +prove, I trust, definitive and Spanish. + +"Side by side, my brother, we have studied modern history, +meditating over those great catastrophes which are at once lessons +to rulers and a warning to the people. Side by side, we have also +thought over and formed a common judgment that every century ought +to have, and actually has, its legitimate necessities and natural +aspirations. + +"Old Spain stood in need of great reforms; in modern Spain we have +had simply immense convulsions of overthrow. Much has been +destroyed; little has been reformed. Ancient institutions, some of +which cannot be revivified, have died out. An attempt has been made +to create others in their place, but scarcely had they seen the +light when symptoms of death set in. So much has been done, and no +more. I have before me a stupendous labour, an immense social and +political reconstruction. I have to set myself to building up, in +this desolated country, on bases whose solidity is guaranteed by +experience, a grand edifice, where every legitimate interest and +every reasonable personality can find admittance. + +"I do not deceive myself, my brother, when I feel confident that +Spain is hungry and thirsty for justice; that she feels the urgent +and imperious necessity of a government, worthy and energetic, +severe and respected; and that she anxiously wishes that the law to +which we all, great and small, should be subject, should reign with +undisputed sway. + +"Spain is not willing that outrage or offence should be offered to +the faith of her fathers, believing that in Catholicity reposes the +truth she understands, and that to accomplish to the full its +divine mission, the Church must be free. + +"Whilst knowing and not forgetting that the nineteenth century is +not the sixteenth, Spain is resolved to preserve from every danger +Catholic unity--the symbol of our glories, the essence of our +laws, and the holy bond of concord between all Spaniards. + +"The Spanish people, taught by a painful experience, desires the +truth in everything, and that the King should be a king in reality, +and not the shadow of a king; and that its Cortes should be the +regularly appointed and peaceful gathering of the independent and +incorruptible elect of the constituencies, and not tumultuous and +barren assemblies of office-holders and office-seekers, servile +majorities and seditious minorities. + +"The Spanish people is favourable to decentralisation, and will +always be so; and you know well, my dear Alfonso, that should my +desires be carried out, instead of assimilating the Basque +provinces to the rest of Spain, which the revolutionary spirit +would fain bring to pass, the rest of Spain would be lifted to an +equality in internal administration with those fortunate and noble +provinces. + +"It is my wish that the municipality should retain its separate +existence, and the provinces likewise, proper precautions being +employed to prevent possible abuses. + +"My cherished thought as constant desire is to give to Spain +exactly that which she does not possess, in spite of the lying +clamour of some deluded people--that liberty which she only knows +by name; liberty, which is the daughter of the gospel, not +liberalism, which is the son of disbelief (_de la protesta_); +liberty, in fine, which is the supremacy of the laws when the laws +are just--that is to say, conformable to the designs of nature and +of God. + +"We, descendants of kings, admit that the people should not exist +for the King so much as the King for the people; that a king should +be the most honoured man amongst his people, as he is the first +caballero; and that a king for the future should glory in the +special title of 'father of the poor' and 'guardian of the weak.' + +"At present, my dear brother, there is a very formidable question +in our Spain, that of the finances. The Spanish debt is something +frightful to think of; the productive forces of the country are not +enough to cover it--bankruptcy is imminent. I do not know if I can +save Spain from that calamity; but, if it be possible, a +legitimate sovereign alone can do it. An unshakable will works +wonders. If the country is poor, let all live frugally, even to the +ministers; nay, even to the King himself, who should be one in +feeling with Don Enrique El Doliente. If the King is foremost in +setting the example, all will be easy. Let ministries be +suppressed, provincial governments be reduced, offices be +diminished, and the administration economized at the same time that +agriculture is encouraged, industry protected, and commerce +assisted. To put the finances and credit of Spain on a proper +footing is a Titanic enterprise to which all governments and +peoples should lend aid." + + * * * * * + +Here follow a repudiation of free trade as applied to Spain, and a few +well-turned periods dealing in the usual Spanish manner with the duties +of the ruler, laying down, among other axioms, that "virtue and +knowledge are the chiefest nobility," and that the person of the +mendicant should be as sacred as that of the patrician. + +At the close there is a very sensible sentence, affirming that one +Christian monarch in Spain would be better than three hundred petty +kings disputing in a noisy assembly. "The chiefs of parties," continues +the letter, "naturally yearn for honours or riches or place; but what in +the world can a Christian king desire but the good of his people? What +could he want to be happy but the love of his people?" + +The letter winds up by the affirmation that Don Carlos is faithful to +the good traditions of the old and glorious Spanish monarchy, and that +he believed he would be found to act also as "a man of the present age." +The last sentence is a prayer to his brother, "who had the enviable +privilege of serving in the Papal army," to ask their spiritual king at +Rome for his apostolic benediction for Spain and the writer. + +If this document was written _propriâ manu_, by Don Carlos, he must be +endowed with higher intellectual faculties than most Kings or Pretenders +possess. It is undeniably clever, and is more progressive than one would +expect from an upholder of the doctrine of Divine right. It may be, as +Tennyson sings, that the thoughts of men (even when they are Bourbons) +are widened with the process of the suns. But I protest that there is +such a masterly mistiness in it here and there, such a careful elusion +of rocks and ruggednesses political, and such a fine wind-beating +flourish of the banner of glittering generality, that I think there were +more heads than one engaged in the concoction of the manifesto. I have +studiously refrained from the introduction of the religious topic as far +as I could in this work--it is outside my sphere; but I should be unjust +to the reader did I not give him some information (not from the +controversial standpoint) on a subject which will obtrude itself in any +discussion on the merits of the conflict which has twice distracted +Spain and may divide the country again. It is unfortunately indisputable +that religion was poked into the quarrel. The struggle was described in +_El Cuartel Real_ as a religious war; the theological allegiance of the +partisans of Don Carlos was appealed to, and their ardent attachment to +the Papacy was worked upon, as in the concluding sentence of the +proclamation of Don Carlos. In those portions of the north where Carlism +was all-powerful, the authorities were emphatically showing that those +who served under them must be practical Roman Catholics _nolentes +volentes_. An austere placard, signed by Barona, member of the Carlist +war committee, was posted in the province of Alava, and ordained among +other articles: Firstly, that the town councillors of every municipality +should assist in a body at High Mass; secondly, that the mayors should +interdict, under the most severe penalties, all games and public +diversions, and the opening of all public establishments during Divine +service; and thirdly, that all blasphemers, and all who worked on a +holiday, who gave scandal, or who danced indecently, should be +_scourged_. The first of these articles is lawful enough in a country +which is almost exclusively Roman Catholic. In England nothing can be +said against it, seeing that British soldiers of all denominations are +compelled to attend Church parade, and the prisoners in all gaols have +to register themselves as belonging to some religion. There is just +this theoretical objection, however--the article implies that municipal +honours are to be limited to members of one creed, which is intolerant. +That which underlay the antipathy of numerous Conservatives outside +Spain to the Royalist cause, was the belief entertained that the success +of Don Carlos would lead to the re-assertion of clerical preponderance, +would destroy liberty of conscience as understood in most European +nations, and would set up a political priesthood. The manifesto of Don +Carlos does not deal with those points in the full and categorical +manner desirable. I was told there were two parties in the Carlist camp, +the clerical and--for want of a better name, let it be called--the +non-clerical The former, the Basques, and those who gave Carlism its +great primary impulsion, were as zealously Roman Catholic as ever Manuel +Santa Cruz was. They looked forward to the re-acquisition of the +ecclesiastical domains and the re-establishment of the Catholic Church +in all its ancient supremacy of wealth and power. The non-clericals knew +that the Basques, even assuming them all to be Carlists, were but +660,000 in number, a small minority of the population, and that the +existence of a State unduly influenced by a Church--things temporal +controlled by personages bound to things spiritual--was antagonistic to +the feelings of the majority of Spaniards. + +Having met a nobleman distinguished for his services to Carlism, I put +it to him bluntly, "Would Don Carlos on the throne mean a relapse into +religious bigotry?" + +He answered me with candour, "I am a Roman Catholic, and if I thought so +I should be the last man to lend a penny to his cause." + +"But," I urged, "that is the general impression in England, where he is +trying to negotiate a loan, and if it is left uncorrected it does him +injury. Why does he not repel the impeachment?" + +"The truth is," he said, "Don Carlos has made too many public +explanations." + +I returned to the charge, challenging my acquaintance to deny that many +of the supporters of Don Carlos would fall away if they had not the +thorough belief that his cause was as much identified with the triumph +of Roman Catholicism as with that of legitimacy. His reply was not a +denial, but an admission of the fact, with the addition that in war one +must not be too particular as to the means of enlisting aid, and +stimulating the enthusiasm of supporters, which is an argument as true +as it is old. Don Carlos, in his manifesto, goes on the assumption that +the Republicans are all atheists, or something very like it. It is only +fair to let the Republicans speak for themselves, and explain what is +the Republican estimate of the Carlist religion. The San Sebastian +newspaper, _El Diario_, may be assumed to be a fair exponent of the +sentiments of the anti-Carlists, and thus emphatically, and not without +a spice of antithesis, it delivers itself: + +"The religion which has the commandment, 'Thou shalt not kill,' forbids +murder. + +"The religion which has the commandment, 'Thou shalt not steal,' forbids +robbery. + +"The religion which is peace, obedience, and love, is no friend of war, +rebellion, and massacre. + +"Resigned and joyous in other days, its martyrs went to death in the +amphitheatre of Rome, and on the plains of Saragossa, pardon in their +souls and prayer on their lips; to-day pardon is exchanged for wrath, +and prayer for reproach. Instead of the martyr's palm, we have the +Berdan breech-loader and the flash of petroleum. + +"Anointed of the Lord, ministers of Him who died invoking blessings on +His enemies, kindle the fires of fratricidal strife, which they call a +sacred war, and lead on and inflame their dupes by the pretence that the +gates of Paradise are to be forced open by gunshot. + +"Meanwhile the bishops are silent, Rome is dumb, the moral law sleeps, +the canon law is forgotten; and these pastors, transforming their flocks +into packs of wolves, scour the plains, blessing murder and sanctifying +conflagration. + +"'King by Divine right,' they cry, like the legists of the Lower Empire; +'Die or believe,' like the sons of the Prophet. Apostles without knowing +it, they seek to achieve the triumph of a Pagan principle by a Saracenic +process. + +"They say that religion is lost, because it is shorn of the honour and +power their kings gave it; that the portals of heaven are barred, +because they have forfeited their tithes and first-fruits, their rents +and fat benefices; and they try to convince us by discharges of musketry +that our whole future life depends, on the one hand, on a question of +vanity, and on the other, on a question of stomach. + +"Holy Apostles, disciples of Him who had not a stone whereon to lay His +head, you who conquered the earth with no arms but those of word and +example, oh! would you not say if you returned here below, 'Those who +preach by the voice of platoons; those who evangelize from the mouth of +cannon; those are not, cannot be, our disciples and successors, for they +are not fishers of souls, but fishers of snug posts under government'? + +"And you, glorious martyrs of the Roman circus and Saragossan fields, +oh! would you not say, 'No, this Christianity, which goes about sowing +battle; desolation, tears, and blood wherever it passes, is not +ours--no, this Christianity at the bottom of the slaughter of Endarlasa, +of the hecatomb of Cirauqui, of the sack of Igualada, and of a hundred +other cruelties, is not ours. Our religion says "Kill not," and this +murders; says "Steal not," and this robs. No, this is not the +Christian, but the Carlist religion'?" + +That is a good specimen of the rhetorical school of writing popular in +Spanish newspapers; but all that is written is not gospel. From personal +observation it was evident to me that these Republicans of the Spanish +towns of the north were not so scrupulous in the outward observances of +religion as the tone of this indignant Christian leading article would +convey; neither were the Carlists the "packs of wolves" they were +represented to be. + +Let us see how this inflamed sense of so-called religion affected the +rank and file among the adherents of Don Carlos. + +Indubitably the Royalists, with a very few exceptions, were more than +moral--they were sincerely pious, and esteemed it a grateful incense to +the Most High to kill as many of their Republican countrymen as they +could without over-exertion. They bowed their heads and repeated prayers +with the chaplains who accompanied them; as the echoes of the Angelus +bell were heard they were marched to Divine worship every evening, when +they were in the neighbourhood of a church; they were palpably impressed +with deep devotional convictions, and yet they were not sour-faced like +the grim Covenanters of Argyle, nor puritanically uncharitable like the +stern propounders of the Blue Laws of Connecticut. Their beads returned +to the pocket or the prayers finished, they laughed and jested, were +frolicsome as schoolboys in their playhour, and the slightest tinkle of +music set them dancing. Hospitable and fanatic, faithful and ignorant, +temperate and dirty--such are some prominent traits in the character of +the brave Basque people of the rural districts who wished to govern +Spain, but who were Spaniards neither by race, nor language, nor +temperament, nor feeling. + +Taken all in all, they are a right manly breed, and, with education to +correct inevitable prejudices, would be capable of great things. But +before they could become efficient soldiers, they needed a severe course +of training. In the flat country, south of the Ebro, it would be cruel +and foolish to oppose them to regular troops. As guerrilleros, they +were without parallel, being content with short commons, and ever ready +to play ball after the longest march; but they were ignorant of +soldiering as technically understood. In the copses and crags of their +own provinces they were invincible, and could carry on the struggle +while there was a cartridge or an onion left in the land. But where the +tactics of the "contrabandista" no longer availed, where surprises were +impossible and mysterious disappearances not easy, and where the bulk of +the people were not willing spies, the aspect of affairs was different. +They were mediocre marksmen with long-range arms of precision, and had +no proper conception of allowances for wind or sun. Target-practice was +not encouraged, and yet it was not through thrift of ammunition, for the +waste of powder in every skirmish was extravagant, and one could not +rest a night in a village held by the Carlists without being disturbed +by frequent careless discharges. + +With the bayonet, as far as I could learn, they were impetuous in the +onset, and stubborn, especially the Navarrese. But bayonet-charges +cannot carry stone walls or mud-banks; and in the face of the almost +incessant peppering of breech-loaders, rushes of the kind have become +slightly old-fashioned. To the Carlists, in any case, was due the credit +of readiness to have recourse to the steel whenever there was a rift for +hand-to-hand fighting. Their military education unfortunately confined +itself to the rudiments of the drill-book. They fell in, dressed up, +formed fours by the right, extended into sections on column of march and +went through the like movements very well--so well that it was a pity +they had not an opportunity of adding to their stock of knowledge. They +had an instinctive aptitude for skirmishing, and were expert at forming +square, the utility of which, by the way, is as questionable nowadays as +that of charging. + +More attention was paid to discipline than to drill. Pickets patrolled +the towns into which they entered, and repressed all disorder after +nightfall; outpost duty was strictly enforced; "larking" was not +tolerated, and punishments were always inflicted for known and grave +breaches of order. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + Barbarossa--Royalist-Republicans--Squaring a Girl--At Iron--"Your + Papers?"--The Barber's Shop--A Carlist Spy--An Old Chum--The + Alarm--A Breach of Neutrality--Under Fire--Caught in the Toils--The + Heroic Tomas--We Slope--A Colleague Advises Me--"A Horse! a + Horse!"--State of Bilbao--Don Carlos at Estella--Sanchez Bregua + Recalled--Tolosa Invites--Republican Ineptitude--Do not Spur a Free + Horse--Very Ancient Boys--Meditations in Bed--A Biscay Storm. + + +BARBAROSSA, who had never been over the border, suggested to me that I +should take a trip to Irun, which was held by the anti-Carlists. It +would be incorrect to write them down as Republicans; they were sprung +from the Cristinos of the previous generation, and as such were opposed +to any scion of the house against which their fathers had fought for +years. All of them were _de facto_ Republicans, and had more knowledge +and enjoyment of Republican freedom than those who prattled and raved +of Republicanism in Madrid and the south; but they did not take kindly +to the name. As my friend the late J. A. MacGahan wittily said of +them--"They were the Royalist-Republicans of Spain." They were as fond +of their fueros as any Carlist in the crowd, but they stood up for +Madrid less that they cared for the policy or personages of the central +government, than that they had a deep-seated hereditary hatred of their +neighbours of the rural districts. At heart they were in favour of a +restoration of the throne, and on that throne they would fain seat the +young Prince of the Asturias. In those latitudes the lines of John Byrom +a century before would well apply: + + "God bless the King, I mean the faith's defender; + God bless--no harm in blessing--the Pretender; + But who Pretender is, or who is King, + God bless us all--that's quite another thing!" + +"If you go to Irun," said Barbarossa, stroking his moustache, "I am game +to go with you." + +"I am satisfied," said I; "but recollect, you undertake the job at your +own risk. You are known as an associate of Carlists, and suspected to +be a Carlist agent. I am a stranger and comparatively safe." + +He had weighed all that, and was ready to face possible perils. But he +was not fit to undergo probable fatigues. He could sit at a green table +in an ill-ventilated atmosphere the night long, but he could not walk +three miles at a stretch. Neither could he (on account of his illness) +venture on horseback. To effect a crossing by the railway bridge from +Hendaye to Irun was out of the question; it was barrier impenetrable. +The Frenchman would not allow you to pass in your own interest; the +Spaniard declined to admit you in his so-considered interest. To take +the mountain-route was tedious, and in the case of Barbarossa not to be +thought of; the bridge of Endarlasa was broken--a most contorted +specimen of artistic dilapidation. To be sure, one could manage to creep +to the other side by the submerged coping of the parapet, if endowed +with the balancing powers of a rope-walker and the lustihood of the +navvy. But Barbarossa was not a Blondin, and had not a physical +constitution proof against a wetting. I had got across that bridge +once, holding on by my teeth and nails, and retained recollection of it +in a fit of the cold shivers; but I did not care to repeat the +operation. In our dilemma, Barbarossa, who was a plucky knave, hit upon +the plan which ought to have commended itself to us at first. + +"Let us stray up the river-bank a few hundred yards," he said, "seize a +boat, and row ourselves across." + +No sooner was the proposition made than it was adopted; but we were +saved from the ephemeral disgrace of posing as petty amphibious pirates, +degenerate Schinderhannes of the Bidassoa. We saw a boat; a girl was +near. The boat was her father's; she engaged to take us over for a +consideration--I am certain she had set her heart on a string of +straw-coloured ribbons and a sky-blue feather in a shop-window in +Hendaye--and to await our return at nightfall. We arranged the signal, +and stealthily stole across, drifting diagonally most of the way; and I +entrusted the speculative French damsel with my revolver and my Carlist +pass, and paid her a farewell compliment on her face and figure as I +stepped ashore. Giving her the revolver and pass enlisted her +confidence. We strolled along with apparent carelessness, entered a +posada on the road by the waterside and had refreshments. I said I +should feel much obliged if they could let us have a trap to Irun and +back, as we had business there, and my friend was tired and not much of +a pedestrian. An open carriage was provided, and off we drove by the +skirt of the hill of St. Marcial, where the Spaniards gave Soult such a +dressing in 1813, passed a series of outer defences with their covering +and working parties, and entered one of the gates of the town, and never +a question was asked. Ditches had been dug round the place and +earthworks thrown up; but the principal reliance of the garrison seemed +to be in loophooled breastworks made of sand-bags superimposed. Here and +there were walls of loose stones--more of a danger than a +protection--rude shelter-trenches, and mud-built, wattle-knitted +refuges, round-topped, and disguised with branches. They had made the +position strong; but they should have gone in for more spade and less +stones, more mole and less beaver. + +We trotted over the narrow paved street, with its flagged sidepaths, and +drew up on the Plaza, overlooked by the solid square-stone mansion of +the Ayuntamiento. The windows were screened with planks, and armed +groups lounged in front; there were barrels of water and heaps of gravel +at intervals upon the ground; memories of Paris rose to my mind--Irun +was preparing for bombardment. If the Carlists had no serious artillery +in fact, they had a powerful ordnance in the apprehensions of their +adversaries. Perhaps this was the explanation of the rhodomontade about +the batteries in _El Cuartel Real_. We were congratulating ourselves on +the ease with which we had run the blockade, when an officer of the +Miqueletes approached our carriage and demanded our papers. I showed my +Foreign Office passport, with the visa of the Spanish Consulate at +London upon it. He gave a cursory look at it, bowed, and returned it to +me. Then came the turn of Barbarossa, and there was a flash of shrewd +spitefulness in his eyes. + +"Your papers, señor?" + +"I have none. I didn't think any were required." + +"Ah! doubtless you thought Irun was in Carlist occupation. You are +wrong." + +"No; I knew it was not in Carlist occupation. What has that to do with +me? I am an Englishman," producing a packet of letters. + +"I don't want to see them. I know you. What do you want here?" + +"To see a friend." + +"Who is your friend?" + +Barbarossa was not in the least nonplussed. He said he had heard a +fellow-countryman, a comrade of his, was in the town. + +"You will have to turn back the way you came, and thank your stars you +are permitted." + +"But I am hungry." + +"And the horse wants a feed," interposed the driver, who no doubt had +his own object to serve. + +"Well, you may stay here for refreshment, but you must get outside our +gates before dark." + +We drove to the principal inn, where we alighted and ordered dinner. +Barbarossa sat down, and I went out to look at the place and search for +a barber's shop, for I sorely needed a shave. Irun is a well-constructed +town on the shelving slope of a smaller rise between Mounts Jaizquivel +and Aya, not far from the coast. It has a population of some 5,000, and +in ordinary years does a good trade in tiles and bricks, tanned leather, +and smith's work, besides sending wood to Los Pasages for the purposes +of the boat-builders. The Bidassoa at its base branches, and thus forms +the islet of Faisanes, off which the prosperous fisherman can fill his +basket with trout, salmon, and mullet, aye, and lumpish eels, if his +predilections so tend. + +But I have no intention to describe Irun. Théophile Gautier has done +that before me, and I am not sacrilegious. There was another customer in +the barber's shop. As I left after the shave he followed, and accosted +me on the flagway confidentially. + +"How are you, captain?" + +"You are in error," I answered. "I am no captain." + +"What! Did I not see you take a boat for the _San Margarita_ at Socoa?" + +"That may be; but I only boarded her through curiosity." + +"Do not be afraid," he whispered. "How is Don Guillermo?" + +"What Don Guillermo?" + +"Señor Leader. I was with him when he was wounded; I am a Carlist. I am +here on the same mission as yourself; to spy what the vermin are doing." + +"Ha! good; ramble on, and don't notice me. It is dangerous." + +He sauntered along the causeway, hands in pockets and whistling, and +presently popped into a tavern, and I re-entered the fonda. Hardly had I +set foot over the threshold when I was stupefied by a welcome in a +familiar voice, none other than that of Mr. William O'Donovan, who had +been my comrade and amanuensis throughout the irksome beleaguerment of +Paris.[F] We did not throw our arms round our respective necks, hug and +kiss each other--I reserve my kisses for pretty girls, newly-washed +babes, and dead male friends, and then kiss only the brow--but we did +join hands cordially and long. In answer to my query as to what had +brought him to this queer corner at the back of God-speed, he explained +that he was acting as correspondent of a Dublin paper; for, it appeared, +the people of Ireland were consumed with anxiety as to the progress of +the Carlist rising--details of which, of course, they could not obtain +in the mere London papers--and were particularly desirous to have record +of the doings of the Foreign Legion, a great majority of whom were sons +of the Emerald Isle. His younger brother, a medical student, was likely +to come out to join that Legion, and as for Kaspar (a name by which we +knew his brother Edmond, afterwards triumvir at Merv), he was sure to +turn up. Mother Carey's chicken hovers near when the elements are at +strife. He was immensely satisfied with his diggings, he said, liked +the natives, and considered this a splendid chance for improving his +Spanish. He was reading "Don Quixote" in the vernacular. In a sense, I +looked upon his presence as a perfect godsend to us, as he came in most +appropriately as a _Deus ex machinâ_ to create the character of +Barbarossa's invented friend. O'Donovan was in good standing with the +Republicans of the town, as he was a staunch Republican himself, and +could spin yarns of the Republics of antiquity, and of the greatness of +Paris, and the glories of the United States. He was getting on famously +with Castilian, and was charmed with the redundancy of its vocabulary of +vituperation, which was only to be equalled by the Irish, of which his +father had been such a master. I made Barbarossa and my old chum known +to one another, and we dined together, pledging the past in a cup of +wine tempered with the living waters which bubbled up in the sacristy of +the parish church, and were distributed in bronze conduits through Irun. +After the meal and the meditative smoke of custom, O'Donovan sat down to +write a letter, which I guaranteed to post for him in France, and +Barbarossa and I sallied forth for a walk. + +We were lounging about the Calle Mayor gazing at the escutcheons over +every hall-door--your bellows-mender and cobbler in this democratic town +were invariably of the seed of Noah in right line--when the alarm was +raised that fifty horses had been carried off by the Carlists almost at +the gates, and that two shots had been heard. The bugler sounded the +call "To arms," and forthwith a little company consisting of thirty-two +men, the bugler aforesaid, and a captain, set out at a quick step for a +high ground beside a signal-tower at one end of the town. We hurried +forward with them, and passed out through one of the four gates, on the +side next the mountains. The soldiers took a position on the slope of a +hill a couple of hundred yards from the gate, and Barbarossa and I +sheltered ourselves behind an orchard-wall, from which there was an +uninterrupted view of the billowy tract of meadow and pasture land +beneath, cut into patches by thick hedges. Quick on our heels emerged +from the town some half-dozen intrepid "volunteers of liberty," and the +inevitable small boy, a red cap stuck jauntily on three hairs of his +head and a large cigarette in his mouth. One of the volunteers--he who +had demanded our papers on the Plaza--looked viciously at Barbarossa, +who assumed a most artistic pretence of stolidity. + +"Come here, señor, and you will have a better vision of your friends," +he said with mock suavity. + +Barbarossa smiled, thanked him, and walked quietly to the place +indicated, an exposed opening beside the wall. + +"I can see nothing," he said. + +I adjusted my long-distance glass, and ranged over the wide stretch of +landscape, but could see nothing either. As I shut it up and returned it +to the case, a sergeant advanced from the party of soldiers on the slope +and marched directly towards me. I was puzzled and, I own, a trifle +unnerved. + +"Señor," he said to me, "I carry the compliments of my captain, and his +request that you would lend him your glass, as he has forgotten his +own." + +"With pleasure," I answered readily, much relieved. "I will take it to +him myself, as it is London-made, and he may not understand how it is +sighted." + +This may have been a breach of neutrality, but what was I to do? If I +refused, the glass would have been taken from me, and I should have been +compromised. I handed it to the officer with my best bow, explained its +mechanism to him; he bowed to me, and from that moment I felt that I was +under his wing. I may be wrong, but I have a notion that in a skirmish +it is much better to be near regulars than volunteers, and I stood in a +line with the military a few paces away. + +Suddenly there was a spark and a report away down in a field of maize, +some six hundred yards below us, and the whizz of a bullet was heard. + +"Steady, men!" said the captain; "don't discharge your rifles." + +The sight was very pretty as they stood in a group on the green hillside +in attitude of suspense, their weapons held at the ready, and all eyes +fixed on the front, from which the smoke was rising. It was very like +to the celebrated picture by Protais, familiar in every cabaret in +France, "_Avant le Combat;_" but even more picturesque than that, for +these soldiers were dressed most irregularly--some in tattered capote, +others in shirt-sleeves, some in shako, others in _bonnet de police_. A +few civilians had crept out of the town by this time, and the chief of +the Miqueletes roared peremptorily to have that gate shut. This was not +an agreeable position for Barbarossa and myself. Our retreat was cut +off. We were unarmed. If one of those amateur warriors were killed, we +ran the imminent hazard of being massacred by his comrades. On the other +hand, there was the liability of being ourselves shot by the Carlists. +How were they to distinguish a neutral or a sympathizer from their foes? +I confess I could not help smiling as the thought occurred to me what a +piece of irony in action it would be if Barbarossa were to be helped to +a morsel of lead by his friends, the enemy. With a cheerful equanimity I +contemplated the prospect of his receiving a very slight contusion from +a spent bullet on a soft part of his frame. + +Ping, ping, came a few reports, but evidently out of range. Each +smoke-wreath was in a different direction. + +"This may get hot," I said to myself; "the Carlists may not be +sharpshooters, but this clump of uniforms in relief on the grass must +present a blur that will be an enticing target for them. I dare not go +back to the wall, but it might be discreet to lie down. There is no +disgrace in offering them a small elevation of corpus." I stretched +myself on the sward, acted nonchalance, and lit a cigar. + +The volunteers could no longer be held in control. They opened action on +their own account, one fellow distinguishing himself by the rapidity of +his fire, and the intensity with which he aimed at something--or +nothing. + +"Ah, that's Tomas!" said a portly civilian connoisseur, with his hands +in his pockets. "We know him, he is making music; he wants to get +himself remarked." + +The soldiers did not deliver a shot, but the volunteers kept cracking +away, and the invisible Carlists replied. Nobody was hit, though +bullets could be heard whizzing overhead for twenty minutes, and one +did actually knock a chip off a wall. That was the sole damage done to +the Republican position; the damage to the Carlist must have been less. +Two of the Miqueletes ventured stealthily down a road leading towards +the point from which the nearest jets of smoke curled, following the +ditch by the side, stooping and peering through the bushes. There was a +volley from afar. They hesitated and stood, as if undecided whether to +advance. + +"Sound the retire for those men," said the captain; and as the call rang +out they returned. + +That volley was the last sign the Carlists gave; and after waiting ten +minutes, the captain shut up my glass, returned it to me, and remarked +that the attack was a feint, and had no object beyond worrying his men. +He gave the order "March," the gate was opened, Barbarossa rejoined me, +and we returned to Irun, taking care to keep as near the regulars as we +could. "Nada--nothing," cried the captain to an inquiring lady on a +balcony, and the town-gates were closed after the volunteers had +returned and tramped to the Plaza with the proud bearing of citizens who +had done their duty. + +How that heroic Tomas did strut! A fighter he of the choicest brand, one +not to stop at trifles; there was martial ire in his flaming glance; +defiance breathed from his nostrils; triumph sat on his lips; he swung +his arms like destructive flails; and as he entered a tavern one could +only fancy him calling in a voice of Stentor for a jug of rum and blood +plentifully besprinkled with gunpowder and cayenne pepper to assuage the +thirst of combat. + +O'Donovan gave me his letter. Barbarossa hinted that it was our best +course to slope, and slope we did, as soon as the horse was harnessed. +As we passed down the street a grinning face saluted me from a doorway. +It was that of my acquaintance from the barber's shop. He gave me a +meaning wink. The artful Carlists had evidently succeeded in their +object, whatever it might have been. On the river-bank our fair and +faithful ferry-maid awaited us. We were conveyed over in safety, and at +the hotel of Hendaye soon forgot the perils we had encountered. + +Barbarossa was dead-beat, and threw himself on a sofa, where he sank +back heavy-eyed and exhausted; and I, almost feared that he would drop +into a coma, as the penalty of overstraining nature, until the sight of +a pack of cards restored him as if by a spell to his normal wakefulness. + +Even in a disturbed region it is needful to have a change of linen, so +we got back next morning to St. Jean de Luz, where I had left my +baggage. There I met M. Thieblin, a colleague, whom I had seen last at +Metz, previous to the siege of that fortress in the Franco-German war. +He was now representing the _New York Herald_, and had just returned +from Estella, at the taking of which place, the most important the +Carlists had yet seized, he had the luck to be present. He assured me +that it was utter fatuity to dream of following the Carlists, except I +had at least one horse--but that it would be sensible to take two if I +could manage to procure them. It was more than an ordinary man was +qualified to cope with, to make his observations, write his letters, and +look after their transmission, without having to attend to his nag, and +do an odd turn of cooking at a pinch. The riddle was how to get the +horse--a sound hardy animal that would not call for elaborate grooming, +or refuse a feed of barley. Horse-flesh was at a premium, but he thought +I might be able to have what I wanted at Bayonne, on payment of an +extravagant price. A requisition for forage and corn could be had +through the Junta; and I should have no trouble in getting an orderly on +applying with my credentials to the chief of staff of any of the Carlist +columns to which I might attach myself. We had a long conversation, and +Thieblin frankly informed me that in his opinion the Carlists had not +the ghost of a chance outside their own territory. There they were cocks +of the walk. What the end might be he could not pretend to vaticinate, +but "El Pretendiente" would never reign in Madrid. The conflict might +last for months--might last for years; but the Carlists owed the +vitality they had as much to the divisions and inefficiency of their +adversaries as to their own strength. There would be no important +engagements--to dignify them by the epithet--until the organization of +the insurrectionary forces was regularized, and they had a stronger +artillery and an adequate cavalry. M. Thieblin did not stray far from +the bull's-eye in his prophecy. + +I went to bed in the mood of Crookback on Bosworth Field, and felt that +my dream-talk would shape itself into the cry, "A horse! a horse!" + +Until that coveted steed had been lassoed, stolen, or bought, I must +only endeavour to justify my existence--that is to say, render value for +the money expended on me by picking up "copy" anywhere and everywhere. + +I was advised to go to Bilbao by sea, but the advice came too late. The +last steamer from Bayonne had ventured there four-and-twenty hours +before I sought my passage, and even on that last steamer the few +voyagers were unable to insure their lives with the Accidental Company, +although they consented to promise that they would descend into the hold +the instant they heard a shot. It was almost as full of jeopardy to +travel to Bilbao by sea as to sail down the Mississippi with a racing +captain and a lading of rye-whisky on board. One Monsieur Gueno, master +of the barque _Numa_, of Vannes, made moan that he was seriously knocked +about while he lay in the Nervion, off the Luchana bridge, during a +skirmish between the Carlists and the troops. They both fought +vigorously, but they gave him most of the blows. One of his crew, in a +punt behind, was killed, and twenty-five bullets were embedded in a +single mast. He had the tricolour flying all the time. A +fellow-countryman of his, Monsieur Jarmet, of the ship _Pierre-Alcide_, +of Nantes, sent in a claim for an indemnity of £160 for damages +sustained by his vessel much in the like manner. A Spanish war-craft, +moored behind him, began pelting the Carlists with shot; the Carlists +replied, and the _Pierre-Alcide_ came in for the bulk of the favours +distributed. Three bullets penetrated the captain's cabin, and four rent +holes in the French flag. Neither pilots nor tugs were for hire at +Bilbao, and captains of sailing vessels had only to whistle for a +favouring wind and rely on their own good fortune and skill. Bilbao had +to be dismissed on the merits. + +Taking it for granted that I had that evasive horse, I reasoned, as I +tossed on my bed, to the restless whimper of the Bay of Biscay, over +which a storm was brewing, that "el Cuartel Real," the headquarters of +the King, was the natural goal. There first information was to be had, +and it was felt that it was about the safest place to be; but the King +seldom stopped under the same roof two nights successively, and no one +could tell where he would be two days beforehand. If he was at Estella +when one started, he might be at Vera or Durango, or goodness knows +where, when one got to Estella. So far his progress had been a success; +he was present at the taking of Estella, and exercised his Royal +clemency by releasing the captured prisoners. It would have been more +politic to have demanded an exchange, for there were partisans of his +own in Republican dungeons (Englishmen amongst them); but then prisoners +have to be fed and guarded, so on the whole it was as well they were set +free. It was very much the case of the man who won the elephant at a +raffle. If the stories, spread assiduously by the Republicans, of the +massacre and maltreatment of captives by the Carlists were correct, +here was the opportunity for the exercise of wholesale cruelty; but +there was not a particle of truth in such charges, which, by the way, +one hears in every civil war. Where Don Carlos might advance next, or +where severe fighting--not such brushes as that I witnessed at +Irun--might take place, was a mystery. The movements of the Republican +leaders were inexplicable, and conducted in contravention of all known +principles of the art of war. They harassed their men by long and +objectless marches. They ordered towns to be put in a state of defence +at first, and then withdrew the garrisons. They engaged whole columns in +defiles, where a company of invisible guerrilleros could tease them. +They acted, in most instances, as if they had no information or wrong +information. The latter, I believe, was nearer the truth. Their system +of espionage was inefficient, as the information they got was +untrustworthy, and always would be, in the northern provinces, for the +feeling of the masses of the people was against them. Instead of making +headway they were losing ground every day, and would so continue until +they received reinforcements with fibre, and were commanded by officers +who really meant to win, and had the knowledge or the instinct to +conceive a proper plan of campaign. The generals could hardly be +censured, for their hands were tied; they were forbidden to be severe; +they dared not squelch insubordination. Capital punishment, even in the +army, and at such a crisis as this, was abolished. There had been, I +heard, something suspiciously resembling a mutiny in the column of +Sanchez Bregua. A certain Colonel Castañon was put under arrest on a +charge of Alfonsist proclivities; but the Cazadores and Engineers +threatened to rebel unless he was liberated; and Sanchez Bregua, instead +of decimating the Cazadores and Engineers, as Lord Strathnairn would +have done, liberated the Colonel. + +But to that question of my route. Peradventure the presence to my dozing +vision of the General commanding the Republican troops of the north that +had been might help me towards a solution. + +"That had been" is written advisedly, for Sanchez Bregua had been +recalled to Madrid, not a day too soon. He was one of those generals +whose spine had been curved by lengthened bending over a desk. Loma, who +was active and dashing, and had the rare gift of confidence in himself, +had taken his stand at Tolosa, and was awaiting the advent of Lizarraga. +All his men, and every able-bodied male in the town, were diligently +excavating ditches and making entrenchments. Until Tolosa was captured +by the Carlists, no serious attack on Pampeluna was probable; and that +attack was likely to assume the form of an investment. Estella was to +the south of Pampeluna, and all the country round, from which provisions +could be drawn, was in the occupation of the Carlists. Tolosa was the +objective point of the moment, and to Tolosa I determined to go. An +attempt on San Sebastian could not enter into the calculations of the +Carlist leaders at this stage of their revolt. The stronghold was almost +inaccessible on the land side, and men, munitions, and provisions could +be easily thrown into it by water. Irun, Fontarabia, and even Renteria +(were artillery available) could be seized whenever the comparatively +small sacrifice of lives involved would be advisable. But the game was +not worth the candle yet. Were Irun or Fontarabia in the hands of the +Carlists, there was the always-present danger of shells being pitched +into them from a gunboat in the Bidassoa; and Renteria, outside of which +the Republican troops only stirred on sufferance, was to all intents as +serviceable to the Carlists as if it were tenanted by a Carlist +garrison, which would thereby be condemned to idleness. + +That whirlwind ride from Renteria to Irun would come before me as the +storm battalions mustered outside, and the waves began lashing +themselves into violence of temper. What if I had to go to Madrid while +such weather as this was brooding? To get to the capital one is obliged +to embark at Bayonne for Santander, and proceed thence by rail--so long +as no Carlist partidas meddle with the track. Romantic Spain! + +But are not those Republicans who affect that they know how to govern a +country primarily and principally to blame? Only consider the continued +interruption of that short piece of road between San Sebastian and +Irun. Is it not disgraceful to them? One of our old Indian officers, I +dare venture to believe, with eighteen horsemen and a couple of +companies of foot, could hold it open in spite of the Carlists. But such +a simple idea as the establishment of cavalry patrols of three, keeping +vigil backwards and forwards along the line of eighteen miles, with +stout infantry posts always on the alert in blockhouses at intervals, +seems never to have entered into the obtuse heads of those officers +lately promoted from the ranks. Seeing that the intercourse of different +towns with each other and with the coast and abroad has been so long +broken up, I cannot fathom the secret of how the population lives. The +troops arrive in a village one day and levy contributions, the +guerrilleros arrive the next and do the same; the fields must be +neglected, trade must droop, yet nobody apparently wants food. True, the +land is wonderfully fat; but some day the cry of famine will be heard. +No land could bear this perpetual drain on its resources. And then I +thought of Carlists whom I met in France, who had given of their goods +to support the cause. With them I talked on this very subject. They +were respectable and respected men; they prayed for success to Don +Carlos with sincere heart; but they had left Spain, and they complained +that this condition of disturbance was lasting too long. + +"You ask me why I did not remain," said one to me; "wait, and you shall +see." + +He opened a door and pointed to three lovely little girls at play, and +continued, "These are my reasons; I have made more sacrifices than I was +able for the Royal cause, and they asked me at last for another +contribution, which would have ruined me. I love my King; but for no +King, señor, could I afford to make those darlings paupers." + +Had these Carlists any glimmer of the sunshine of a victorious issue to +their uprising? (egad, that was a strong blast, and the waves do swish +as if they were enraged at last!). Thieblin thinks not. And yet they are +active, and, like the storm outside, they are gaining strength. Those of +them under arms are four times as numerous as the Republicans in the +northern provinces. Leader swears to me that everyone who can shoulder a +musket is a Carlist. There are no more Chicos to be had, unless the +volunteers of liberty come over, rifles, accoutrements and all, to +Prince Charlie--a liberty they are volunteering to take somewhat freely. + +I was rash in saying there were no more Chicos. Did not a company of +"bhoys" trudge over to Lesaca to offer their services recently? But they +were very ancient boys. The youngest of them was sixty-five. They were +veterans of the Seven Years' War, and mostly colonels. Their fidelity +was thankfully acknowledged, but their services were not gratefully +accepted. The aged and ferocious fire-eaters were sent back to their +arrowroot and easy-chairs. At all events, they had more of the timber of +heroism in them than those diplomatic Carlists of the _gandin_ order, +who are Carlists because it makes them interesting in the sight of the +ladies, but whose campaigning is confined to an occasional three days' +incursion on Spanish territory, with a cook and a valet, saddle-bags +full of potted lobster and _pâté de foie gras_, and a dressing-case +newly packed with _au Botot_ and essence of Jockey Club. There are +personages of this class not unknown to society at Biarritz and +Bayonne, who have been going to the front for the last three months, and +have not got there yet. One would think their game of chivalry ought to +be pretty well "played out;" but to the folly of the vain man, as to the +appetite of the lean pig, there is no limit. + +By Jove! There is a clatter; the casement is blown open, and the light +is blown out, and through the gap whistles the cool, briny breath of the +Atlantic, and I can almost feel the wash of the white spray in my hair. +Better a stable cell in the Castle of the Mota to-night than a tumbling +berth in the _San Margarita_. This was the close of my interview with +myself, and I turned over on my pillow and fell precipitately into a +profound dreamless sleep. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + Nearing the End--Firing on the Red Cross--Perpetuity of + War--Artistic Hypocrites--The Jubilee Year--The Conflicts of a + Peaceful Reign--Major Russell--Quick Promotion--The Foreign + Legion--An Aspiring Adventurer--Leader's Career--A Piratical + Proposal--The "Ojaladeros" of Biarritz--A Friend in Need--Buying a + Horse--Gilpin Outdone--"Fred Burnaby." + + +AND now I take up the last chapter of this book, and I have not half +finished with the subject I had set before myself at starting. By the +figures at the head of the last page I perceive that I have almost +reached the orthodox length of a volume, and perforce must stop. For +some weeks past I have been looking and longing for the end, for I have +been ill, weary and worried, and my labour has become a task. Slowly +toiling day by day, I knew I must be nearing the goal; yet, like the +strenuous Webb on his swim from Dover to Calais, the horizon seemed to +come no closer. The land in sight grew no plainer, although each +breast-stroke--the pleasure of a while agone, but oh! such a tax +now--must have lessened the distance. Even to that excursion there came +an hour of accomplishment and repose; but to this, of pen over paper, I +cannot flatter myself that the hour is yet. I have to abandon the work +incomplete. As it has happened to me before, the theme has expanded +under my hands, and I shall have to rise from my desk before I penetrate +to the Carlist headquarters, of which I had to say much, or have +experiences of that strangest of Communes in Murcia, with its sea and +land skirmishes and its motley rabble of mutineers, convicts, and +nondescripts, of which I had to say much likewise. + +Whether I shall have the privilege of recounting my adventures at the +court and camp of Don Carlos, and by the side of the General directing +the siege of Cartagena, who admitted me as a sort of supernumerary on +his staff, will depend on the reception of this, the first instalment of +my experiences in Spain. + +An act of unjustifiable barbarism or stupidity, or both--for barbarism +is but another form of stupidity--was perpetrated by some Carlists +outside Irun while I was negotiating for that indispensable horse. An +ambulance-waggon, displaying the Red Cross of Geneva, had sallied from +the town, and was fired upon. The Paris delegate I had met at Hendaye +was in charge of it, and averred that it was wantonly and wilfully +attacked. I thought it, singular that nobody was hurt, and reasoned that +the man was excitable, and got into range unconsciously. The duty of the +Geneva Society properly begins after, and not during a combat; and when +gentlemen are busy at the game of professional manslaughter, no +philanthropic outsider has any right to distract them from their +occupation by indiscreet obstruction. The Parisian did not view it in +that light, and downfaced me that these rustics, to whose aid he was +actually going, tried to murder him of malice prepense. It was useless +to represent to him that these rustics may have never heard of the +modern benevolent institution for the softening of strife, and may have +regarded the huge Red Cross as a defiant symbol of Red Republicanism, +and perhaps a parody of what is sacred. So in the estimation of that +citizen of the most enlightened capital in the universe, these Basques +were ruthless boobies with an insatiable passion for lapping blood. But +mistakes and exaggerations will occur in every war. The only way to +obviate them is to put an end to war altogether--_which will never be +done_! When Christ came into the world, peace was proclaimed; when He +left it, peace was bequeathed. War has been the usual condition of +mankind since, as it had been before; and Christians cut each other's +throats with as much alacrity and expertness as Pagans, often in the +name of the religion of peace. + +I heard two eminent war-correspondents lecture recently, and I noticed +that those passages where fights were described were applauded to the +echo. The more ferocious the combat the more vigorous the cheers. The +faces of small boys flushed, and their hands clinched at the vivid +recital. The nature of the savage, which has not been extirpated by +School Boards, was betraying itself in them. Yet these two +war-correspondents thought it an acquittal of conscience after their +kindling periods to dwell on the immorality of war. The one spoke of the +beauty of Bible precepts, the other disburdened himself on the cruelty +and wickedness of a battle. What artistic hypocrisy! It was as if one +were to strike up the "Faerie Voices" waltz, and tell a girl to keep her +feet still; as if one were to lend "Robinson Crusoe" to a boy, and warn +him not to think of running away to sea. Still, I must even add my voice +to the orthodox chorus, and affirm that warfare is bad, brutal, +fraudful, a thing of meretricious gauds, a clay idol, fetish of humbug +and havoc, whose feet are soaking in muddy gore and salt tears; yet in +the privacy of my own study I might sadly admit that the Millennium is +remote, that the Parliament of Nations exists but in the dreams of the +poet, and that Longfellow's forecast of the days down through the dark +future when the holy melodies of love shall oust the clangours of +conflict is a pretty conceit--and no more. + +War is inexcusable, and is foolish and ugly; but, like the poor and the +ailing, we shall have it always with us. It is criminal, except as +protest against intolerable persecution, or in maintenance of national +honour or defence of national territory; and even in these cases it +should be undertaken only when all devices of conciliation have been +tried in vain. Next to the vanquished, it does most harm to the victor. +Yet about it, as about high play, there is a fascination, and I have to +plead guilty to the weak feeling that I would not look with overwhelming +aversion on an order, should it come to me to-morrow, to prepare to +chronicle a new campaign and face the chronicler's risks; and they are +real. But I should not go into it with a light heart, like M. Emile +Ollivier. I might be, in a quiet way, happy as Queen Victoria was +(according to Count Vitzthum) for she danced much the night before the +declaration of hostilities against Russia, but spoke of what was coming +with amiable candour and great regret. + +We are on the eve of a Jubilee Year, when the halcyon shall plume his +wing, and we shall hear much oratorical trash and hebetude about the +peacefulness of this happy reign. + +Does the reader reflect how many wars we have had in the pacific +half-century which is lapsing? The tale will astonish him, and should +silence the thoughtless word-spinners of the platforms. The door of the +temple of Janus has been seldom closed for long. Our campaigns, great +and small, and military enterprises of the lesser sort, could not be +counted on the fingers of both hands. We have had fighting with Afghans +and Burmese (twice); Scinde, Gwalior, and Sikh wars; hostilities with +Kaffirs, Russians, Persians, Chinese, and Maoris (twice), Abyssinians, +Ashantis, Zulus, Boers, and Soudanese, not to mention the repression of +the most stupendous of mutinies, a martial promenade in Egypt, and +expeditions against Jowakis, Bhootanese, Looshais, Red River rebels, and +such pitiful minor fry. + +In St. Jean de Luz, the nearest point to the disputed ground and the +best place from which to transmit information, there was a small and +select British colony, mostly consisting of retired naval and military +officers. A dear friend of mine amongst them was Major Russell, who had +spent a lengthened span of years in the East--an admirable type of the +calm, firm, courteous Anglo-Indian--who had never soured his temper and +spoiled his liver with excessive "pegs," who understood and respected +the natives, who had shown administrative ability, and who, like many +another honest, dutiful officer, had not shaken much fruit off the +pagoda-tree, or even secured the C.B. which is so often given to +tarry-at-home nonentities. Russell used to pay me a regular visit to the +Fonda de la Playa. One morning as we were chatting, Leader strode into +the coffee-room, a vision of splendour. He had got on his uniform as +Commandant of the Foreign Legion--a uniform which did much credit to his +fancy, for he had designed it himself. He wore a white boina with gold +tassel, a blue tunic with black braid, red trousers, and brown gaiters. +He had donned the gala-costume with the object of getting himself +photographed. Commandant is the equivalent of Major in the British +service, so we agreed to dub the young Irishman henceforth and for ever, +until he became colonel or captain-general, Major Leader. + +"Promotion is quick in this army," murmured Russell. "I served all my +active life under the suns of India, and here I am only a major at the +close. Leader joined the Carlists less than three months ago, and he is +already my equal in rank." + +"The fortune of war, Russell," said I; "don't be jealous. I was offered +command of a brigade under the Commune, but I declined the tribute to my +merit, or I would not be here to-day. I met a man in Bayonne yesterday, +and he was ready to assume control of the entire insurrectionary +forces." + +"Who? Cabrera?" + +"No," I answered; "catch Cabrera coming here. He is too much afraid of a +ruler who is no pretender. The renowned Commander-in-Chief of Aragon and +Valencia, Don Ramon the Rough and Ready, is Conde Something-or-other +now, a willing slave to petticoat government. He is to be seen any day +pottering about Windsor." + +"And who is this speculator in bloodshed?" + +"A foreign adventurer," I explained, "who does not know a word of +Spanish, much less Basque, is unacquainted with the topography of the +country, and has not the faintest inkling of the idiosyncrasies of the +lieutenants who would serve under him, or of the mode of humouring the +prejudices of the people of the different provinces in revolt." + +"What answer did they give to his application for employment?" + +"A polite negative. They told him they could not appoint him a leader +without offending the susceptibilities of adherents with claims upon +them men of local influence, and so forth. Behind his back, they laughed +at his entertaining temerity." + +That Foreign Legion never came to maturity. Leader showed me a +commission authorizing him to organize it. Lesaca was to be the depôt, +French the language of command, and Smith Sheehan the adjutant. It might +have developed into a very fine Foreign Legion, but no volunteers +presented themselves to join it but two young Englishmen, one of whom +was sick when he was not drunk, and the other of whom felt it to be a +grievance on a campaign that a cup of tea could not be got at regular +hours. How Sheehan did chaff this amiable amateur! + +"You will have nothing to do but draw your pay, my lad," he said. "The +cookery is hardly A 1, but 'twill pass. Think of the beds, pillows of +hops under your head; and every regiment has its own set of +billiard-markers and a select string-band, every performer an artist." + +After an arduous service of one day and a half that gentleman returned +to the maternal apron-strings, laden to the ground with the most +harrowing legends of the horrors of war. Leader was not a warrior of +this stamp--far from it; he had vindicated his manliness at Ladon +outside Orleans, where Ogilvie, of the British Royal Artillery, had met +his fate by his side, and there was something soldierly in the way he +bore himself in his vanity of dress. Not that I think the dandies are +the best soldiers--that is merest popular paradox. To me it is as +ridiculous for a man to array himself in fine clothes when he is going +to kill or be killed, as it would be for him to put on gewgaws when he +was going to be hanged. As Leader disappears from my account of Carlist +doings after this--we were associated with different columns--it may be +of interest to tell of his subsequent career. He served in a cavalry +squadron on the staff of the King, and when the cause collapsed came to +London. His uncle tried to induce him to settle down to some steady +employment in the City. Leader expressed himself satisfied to make an +experiment at desk-work. + +"It was useless," said Leader with a hearty crow as he related the story +to me. "The friend who had promised to create a vacancy for me in his +office ordered his chief clerk to lock the safe and send for the police +when he heard of my antecedents. He invited me to dinner, but candidly +told me that a rifle was more in my line than a quill." + +And yet it was in the service of the quill the young soldier ended his +days. He got an appointment as an auxiliary correspondent to a great +London daily paper during the Russo-Turkish war. He was elate; the road +to fame and fortune now lay open before him. The next I heard of him was +that he had succumbed to typhoid fever at Philippopolis. + +A Scotch _spadassin_ arrived in our midst about this period. He was most +anxious to draw a blade for Don Carlos, but he had a decided objection +to serve in any capacity but that of command. He did not appreciate the +fun of losing the number of his mess as an obscure hero of the rank and +file, though he would not mind sacrificing an arm, I do think, at the +head of a charging column, provided that he had a showy uniform on, and +that the fact of his valour was properly advertised in the despatches. +He had an idea that would commend itself to Belcha's bushwhackers, but +it was not entertained. It was to take passage with a few trusty men on +the tug for San Sebastian when she was reported to be conveying specie +for the payment of the Spanish Republican troops, to drive the voyagers +down the hold, throttle the skipper, intimidate the crew, take the wheel +and turn her head to the coast, seize and land the money under Carlist +protection, and then scuttle her. The least recompense, he calculated, +which could be awarded to him for that exploit by his Majesty Charles +VII. was the Order of the Golden Fleece; and a very appropriate order +too. + +There was a set of Carlist sympathizers known to the fighting-men as +"ojaladeros," or warriors with much decoration in the shape of polished +buttons. Their depôt was at Biarritz, an aristocratic watering-place +born under the second French Empire, and not ignorant of some of the +vices of the Byzantine Empire. There are healthful breezes there, but +they do not quite sweep away the scent of frangipani. Warlike, with a +proviso, the Scot might have been designated, but he was not to be +compared with these ojaladeros; he would fight if he had a lime-lit +stage to posture upon; they would not fight at all, but they moved about +mysteriously, as if their bosoms were big with the fate of dynasties, +held hugger-mugger caucus, and were the oracles of boudoirs. + +At Bayonne there was a better class of Carlist sympathizers; such of +them as were of the fighting age were there in the intervals of duty. To +a job-master's in the city by the Adour I was recommended as the most +likely place to procure a steed. At the Hôtel St. Etienne, where I +stopped, I was gratified by an unexpected encounter with the genial +captain[G] (Ronald Campbell), who had brought a juicy leg of mutton at +his saddle-skirts to the relief of my household after the siege of +Paris. He went with me to the job-master's--it is as well to have a +friend with you when you do a horse-deal. I had no choice but Hobson's. +The job-master was desolated, but he had sold three animals the day +before to an English milord, a very big gentleman, and his party. He had +just one horse, but it was a beauty. The horse was trotted out. It was +well groomed--they always are, and arsenic does impart a nice gloss to +the hide--and looked imposing, a tall three-quarter-bred bay gelding. + +"You'll have to take it," said the captain, "though I fear it will not +be a great catch for mountain-work. Seems to me that it stumbles--that +lie-back of the ears is vicious--ha! rears too--and by Jove! it has been +fired. No matter. Where needs must, you know, there's no alternative. +Buy it by all means." + +I closed with the bargain, got a loan of a saddle, bought a pair of +jack-boots, and ordered my purchase to be brought round to the door of +the hotel within half-an-hour. I am no rough-rider, and I had not +counted on the high mettle of this, which was literally a "fiery, +untamed steed." It had been fed for the market, and had had no exercise +for two days previous. I meant to try its paces to St. Jean de Luz, and +show off before the damsels of Biarritz; but, lack-a-day! what a +declension was in store for me. It had best be given in the words of a +letter to my kindly compatriot, written while defeat was fresh in my +mind. Thus the epistle runs: + + * * * * * + +"DEAR CAMPBELL, + +"My first essay on my eight hundred francs' worth of horse-power +was a sight to see. + +"_Imprimis_, the stirrup-leathers were long enough for you. + +"_En suite_, I gave the dear gelding his head because he took it, +and he incontinently faced a post of the French army at the Porte +d'Espagne. The sentry came to the charge and cried, _On ne passe +pas ici._ The blood-horse went at him, the sentry funked, and then, +as if satisfied with his demonstration, the blood-horse--the bit +always in his mouth--made a _demi-tour_, and faced a post of +douaniers. This also was sacred ground, it appears, but the +douaniers let the blood-horse pass, not even making the feint to +prod his inside for contraband. The scene now changes to the Place +de la Comédie (there's something in a name), where by virtue of +vigorous tugging at curb and snaffle I just succeeded in keeping my +gallant gelding off the cobble-stones. He went a burster over the +bridge by a short turn down a street and to the door of his stable, +and there he positively stopped, and I swear I felt his sides +shaking with laughter. I called the groom; said I thought it would +rain; besides, I did not know the road. On the whole, I had +reconsidered the matter, and would go to St. Jean de Luz by train. +The groom was awfully polite, pretended to believe me, and provided +a man to take forward my eight--oh, hang it! we shan't think of the +price. + +"Humiliation! you will say. Yes, sir, and I feel it; but that horse +will feel it too. When I get him somewhere that none can see, and +where sentries, douaniers, and stables of refuge don't abound, I +shall ask him to try how long he can keep up a gallop; but, by the +body of the Claimant, I shall have sixteen stone on his back. + +"Yours with knees unwearied and soul unsubdued." + + * * * * * + +At St. Jean de Luz I learned at the principal hotel that the English +milord was Captain Frederick Burnaby of "the Queen of England's Blue +Guards." He was supposed to have some secret official mission to Don +Carlos, to whose headquarters he had directed his steps, and I at once +took measures to follow in his tracks. + + + + +THE END. + + * * * * * + + +BILLING & SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD. + + +_BY THE AUTHOR OF "ROMANTIC SPAIN."_ + + +AN IRON-BOUND CITY; or, Five Months of Peril and Privation. 2 vols. 21s. + + "A story of peril, adventure, privation, + Is told, in two vols., to your great delectation, + With shrewd common sense and uncommon sensation! + Here's the painful account of Parisians defeated: + And Paris besieged is most 'specially' treated: + Like a trusty Tapleyan, bright, hopeful, and witty, + O'Shea tells the tale of 'AN IRON-BOUND CITY.'"--_Punch._ + +"We can listen with unjaded interest to the oft-told tale of the fall of +Paris when it is told by so genial and sunny-minded an +historian."--_Saturday Review._ + + +LEAVES PROM THE LIFE OF A SPECIAL + +CORRESPONDENT. 2 vols. 21s. + +"The great charm of his pages is the entire absence of dulness, and the +evidence they afford of a delicate sense of humour, considerable powers +of observation, a store of apposite and racy anecdote, and a keen +enjoyment of life."--_Standard._ + +"Redolent of stories throughout, told with such a cheery spirit, in so +genial a manner, that even those they sometimes hit hard cannot, when +they read, refrain from laughing, for Mr. O'Shea is a modern Democritus; +and yet there runs a vein of sadness, as if, like Figaro, he made haste +to laugh lest he should have to weep."--_Society._ + +"Delightful reading.... A most enjoyable book.... It is kinder to +readers to leave them to find out the good things for themselves. They +will find material for amusement and instruction on every page; and if +the lesson is sometimes in its way as melancholy as the moral of Firmin +Maillard's 'Les Derniers Bohemes,' it is conveyed after a fashion that +recalls the light-hearted gaiety of Paul de Kock's 'Damoiselle du +Cinquième' and the varied pathos and humour of Henri +Murger."--_Whitehall Review._ + + +WARD AND DOWNEY, PUBLISHERS, LONDON. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[A] Gibraltar is no longer a penal settlement. + +[B] That has all been changed since. There are serviceable rifled guns +at Tangier now, and the Sultan has some approach to a regular army, +organized by an ex-English soldier. + +[C] Stuart married Lady Alice Hay, grand-daughter of William IV., in +London, in 1874, and is now dead. He left no heir, so that the House of +Hanover may rest easy. The story that the Cardinal of York ("Henry +IX."), who died in 1807, was the last of the Stuart line, is all bosh. +Charles-Edward had a son by the daughter of Prince Sobieski. + +[D] Review of the social and political state of the Basque Provinces, at +the end of a book on "Portugal and Galicia," published in 1848 by John +Murray. + +[E] It should be noted that in July, 1876, directly after the war was +over, the fueros were entirely done away with by a special law. + +[F] See my last book, "An Iron-Bound City." Poor Willie died in New York +of a complication of diseases on last Easter Sunday--an anniversary of +hopefulness. His path of existence here was thorny. Unsurfeiting +happiness be his portion in the meads of asphodel! + +[G] Now Colonel the Baron Craignish, Equerry to his Royal Highness the +Grand Duke of Saxe-Coburg Gotha. + + * * * * * + +NOTES OF THE TRANSCRIBER OF THIS ETEXT. + +The following typographical errors in the book have been corrected in +making this etext: + +Abd-es-Salem changed to Abd-es-Salam + +Dorregarray changed to Dorregaray + +Ojoladeros changed to Ojaladeros + +Enderlasa changed to Endarlasa + +Enderlaza changed to Endarlasa + +I deserve no creditor changed to I deserve no credit for + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Romantic Spain, by John Augustus O'Shea + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROMANTIC SPAIN *** + +***** This file should be named 31532-8.txt or 31532-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/5/3/31532/ + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by the +Digital & Multimedia Center, Michigan State University +Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Romantic Spain + A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) + +Author: John Augustus O'Shea + +Release Date: March 7, 2010 [EBook #31532] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROMANTIC SPAIN *** + + + + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by the +Digital & Multimedia Center, Michigan State University +Libraries.) + + + + + + +</pre> + +<hr class="full" /> +<h1>ROMANTIC SPAIN:</h1> + +<h2>A Record of Personal Experiences.</h2> + +<p class="c top5">BY</p> + +<h2>JOHN AUGUSTUS O'SHEA,</h2> + +<p class="c">AUTHOR OF<br/> +"LEAVES FROM THE LIFE OF A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT,"<br /> +"AN IRON-BOUND CITY," ETC.</p> + +<p class="c">"Oh, lovely Spain! renowned, romantic land!"<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 8em;"><span class="smcap">Childe Harold.</span></span></p> + +<p class="c top5">IN TWO VOLUMES.<br /> +VOL. II.</p> + +<p class="c top5">LONDON:<br /> +WARD AND DOWNEY,<br /> +12, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN, W.C.<br /> +1887.<br /> +<span class="sml"><b>[<i>All Rights Reserved.</i>]</b></span></p> + +<h3><a name="page_v" id="page_v"></a>CONTENTS OF VOL. II.</h3> + +<table summary="toc" +cellspacing="0" +cellpadding="5"> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td> </td><td align="right" class="sml">Page</td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>A Tidy City—A Sacred Corpse—Remarkable Features +of Puerto—A Calesa—Lady Blanche's Castle—A +Typical English Engineer—British Enterprise—"Success +to the Cadiz Waterworks!"—Visit to a +Bodega—Wine and Women—The Coming Man—A +Strike</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_1">1-18</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>The Charms of Cadiz—Seville-by-the-Sea—Cervantes—Daughters +of Eve—The Ladies who Prayed and +the Women who Didn't—Fasting Monks—Notice to +Quit on the Nuns—The Rival Processions—Gutting +a Church—A Disorganized Garrison—Taking it Easy—The +Mysterious "Mr. Crabapple"—The Steamer +<i>Murillo</i>—An Unsentimental Navvy—Bandaged +Justice—Tricky Ship-Owning—Painting Black +White</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_19">19-41</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>Expansion of Carlism—A Pseudo-Democracy—Historic +Land and Water Marks—An Impudent Stowaway—Spanish +Respect for Providence—A Fatal +Signal—Playing with Fire—Across the Bay—Farewell +to Andalusia—British Spain</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_42">42-50</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td><a name="page_vi" id="page_vi"></a>Gabriel Tar—A Hard Nut to Crack—In the Cemetery—An +Old Tipperary Soldier—Marks of the Broad +Arrow—The "Scorpions"—The Jaunting-Cars—Amusements +on the Rock—Mrs. Damages' Complaint—The +Bay, the Alameda, and Tarifa—How +to Learn Spanish—Types of the British Officer—The +Wily Ben Solomon—A Word for the Subaltern—Sunset +Gun—The Sameness of Sutlersville</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_51">51-75</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>From Pillar to Pillar—Historic Souvenirs—Off to +Africa—The Sweetly Pretty Albert—Gibraltar by +Moonlight—The Chain-Gang—Across the Strait—A +Difficult Landing—Albert is Hurt—"Fat Mahomet"—The +Calendar of the Centuries Put Back—Tangier: +the People, the Streets, the Bazaar—Our Hotel—A +Coloured Gentleman—Seeing the Sights—Local +Memoranda—Jewish Disabilities—Peep at a Photographic +Album—The Writer's Notions on Harem +Life</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_76">76-102</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>A Pattern Despotism—Some Moorish Peculiarities—A +Hell upon Earth—Fighting for Bread—An Air-Bath—Surprises +of Tangier—On Slavery—The +Writer's Idea of a Moorish Squire—The Ladder of +Knowledge—Gulping Forbidden Liquor—Division +of Time—Singular Customs—The Shereef of Wazan—The +Christian who Captivated the Moor—The +Interview—Moslem Patronage of Spain—A Slap for +England—A Vision of Beauty—An English Desdemona: +Her Plaint—One for the Newspaper Men—The +Ladies' Battle—Farewell—The English Lady's +Maid—Albert is Indisposed—The Writer Sums up +on Morocco</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_103">103-135</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>Back to Gibraltar—The Parting with Albert—The +Tongue of Scandal—Voyage to Malaga—"No Police, +no Anything"—Federalism Triumphant—Madrid <i>in +Statu Quo</i>—Orense—Progress of the Royalists—On +the Road Home—In the Insurgent Country—Stopped +by the Carlists—An Angry Passenger is +Silenced</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_136">136-151</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>On the Wing—Ordered to the Carlist Headquarters—Another +<i>Petit Paris</i>—Carlists from Cork—How +Leader was Wounded—Beating-up for an Anglo-Irish +Legion—Pontifical Zouaves—A Bad Lot—Oddities +of Carlism—Santa Cruz Again—Running +a Cargo—On Board a Carlist Privateer—A Descendant +of Kings—"Oh, for an Armstrong Twenty-Four +Pounder!"—Crossing the Border—A Remarkable +Guide—Mountain Scenery—In Navarre—Challenged +at Vera—Our Billet with the Parish Priest—The Sad +Story of an Irish Volunteer—Dialogue with Don +Carlos—The Happy Valley—Bugle-Blasts—The +Writer in a Quandary—The Fifth Battalion of +Navarre—The Distribution of Arms—The Bleeding +Heart—Enthusiasm of the Chicos</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_152">152-187</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>The Cura of Vera—Fueros of the Basques—Carlist Discipline—Fate +of the <i>San Margarita</i>—The Squadron +of Vigilance—How a Capture was Effected—The +Sea-Rovers in the Dungeon—Visit to the Prisoners—San +Sebastian—A Dead Season—The Defences of a +Threatened City—Souvenirs of War—The Miqueletes—In +a Fix—A German Doctor's Warning</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_188">188-210</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>Belcha's Brigands—Pale-Red Republicans—The Hyena—More +about the <i>San Margarita</i>—Arrival of a Republican +Column—The Jaunt to Los Pasages—A +Sweet Surprise—"The Prettiest Girl in Spain"—A +Madrid Acquaintance—A Costly Pull—The Diligence +at Last—Renteria and its Defences—A Furious Ride—In +France Again—Unearthing Santa Cruz—The +Outlaw in his Lair—Interviewed at Last—The Truth +about the Endarlasa Massacre—A Death-Warrant—The +Buried Gun—Fanaticism of the Partisan-Priest</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_211">211-238</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>An Audible Battle—"Great Cry and Little Wool"—A +Carlist Court Newsman—The Religious War—The +Siege of Oyarzun—Madrid Rebels—"The Money of +<a name="page_ix" id="page_ix"></a>Judas"—A Manifesto from Don Carlos—An Ideal +Monarch—Necessity of Social and Political Reconstruction +Proclaimed—A Free Church—A Broad +Policy—The King for the People—The Theological +Question—Austerity in Alava—Clerical and Non-Clerical +Carlists—Disavowal of Bigotry—A Republican +Editor on the Carlist Creed—Character of +the Basques—Drill and Discipline—Guerilleros <i>versus</i> +Regulars</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_239">239-268</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>Barbarossa—Royalist-Republicans—Squaring a Girl—At +Irun—"Your Papers?"—The Barber's Shop—A +Carlist Spy—An Old Chum—The Alarm—A Breach +of Neutrality—Under Fire—Caught in the Toils—The +Heroic Thomas—We Slope—A Colleague Advises +Me—"A Horse! a Horse!"—State of Bilbao—Don +Carlos at Estella—Sanchez Bregua Recalled—Tolosa +Invites—Republican Ineptitude—Do not Spur a Free +Horse—Very Ancient Boys—Meditations in Bed—A +Biscay Storm</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_269">269-299</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="center" class="chap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII.</a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td>Nearing the End—Firing on the Red Cross—Perpetuity +of War—Artistic Hypocrites—The Jubilee Year—The +Conflicts of a Peaceful Reign—Major Russell—Quick +Promotion—The Foreign Legion—The Aspiring +Adventurer—A Leader's Career—A Piratical +Proposal—The "Ojaladeros" of Biarritz—A Friend +in Need—Buying a Horse—Gilpin Outdone—"Fred +Burnaby"</td><td align="right"><a href="#page_300">300-317</a><a name="page_x" id="page_x"></a></td></tr> + +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="left"><a href="#FOOTNOTES">Footnotes</a></td></tr> +<tr valign="bottom"><td colspan="2" align="left"><a href="#NOTES">Notes of the transcriber</a></td></tr> +</table> + +<p><a name="page_1" id="page_1"></a></p> + +<h1>ROMANTIC SPAIN.</h1> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I.</h3> + +<p class="head">A Tidy City—A Sacred Corpse—Remarkable Features of Puerto—A +Calesa—Lady Blanche's Castle—A Typical English Engineer—British +Enterprise—"Success to the Cadiz Waterworks!"—Visit to a +Bodega—Wine and Women—The Coming Man—A Strike.</p> + +<p class="nind">P<span class="smcap">uerto de Santa Maria</span> has the name of being the neatest and tidiest city +in Spain, and neatness and tidiness are such dear homely virtues, I +thought I could not do better than hie me thither to see if the tale +were true. With a wrench I tore myself from the soft capital of +Andalusia, delightful but demoralizing. I was growing lazier every day I +spent there; I felt energy oozing out of every pore of my body; and in +the end I began to get afraid that if I stopped much longer I should +only be fit<a name="page_2" id="page_2"></a> to sing the song of the sluggard:—"You have waked me too +soon, let me slumber again." Seville is a dangerous place; it is worse +than Capua; it would enervate Cromwell's Ironsides. Happily for me the +mosquitoes found out my bedroom, and pricked me into activity, or I +might not have summoned the courage to leave it for weeks, the more +especially as I had a sort of excuse for staying. The Cardinal +Archbishop had promised a friend of mine to let him inspect the body of +St. Fernando, and my friend had promised to take me with him. Now, this +was a great favour. St. Fernando is one of the patrons of Seville; he +has been dead a long time, but his corpse refuses to putrefy, like those +of ordinary mortals; it is a sacred corpse, and in a beatific state of +preservation. Three times a year the remains of the holy man are +uncovered, and the faithful are admitted to gaze on his incorruptible +features. This was not one of the regular occasions; the Cardinal +Archbishop had made an exception in compliment to my friend, who is a +rising young diplomat, so that the favour was really a favour. I +declined it with thanks—very much<a name="page_3" id="page_3"></a> obliged, indeed—pressure of +business called me elsewhere—the cut-and-dry form of excuse; but I +never mentioned a word about the mosquitoes. I told my friend to thank +the prelate for his graciousness; the prelate expressed his sorrow that +my engagements did not permit me to wait, and begged that I would oblige +him by letting the British public know the shameful way he and his +priests were treated by the Government They had not drawn a penny of +salary for three years. This was a fact; and very discreditable it was +to the Government, and a good explanation of the disloyalty of their +reverences. If a contract is made it should be kept; the State +contracted to support the Church, but since Queen Isabella decamped the +State had forgotten its engagement.</p> + +<p>Puerto de Santa Maria deserves the name it has got. It is a clean and +shapely collection of houses, regularly built. People in England are apt +to associate the idea of filth with Spain; this, at least in Andalusia, +is a mistake. The cleanliness is Flemish. Soap and the scrubbing-brush +are not spared; linen is plentiful and spotless, and water is<a name="page_4" id="page_4"></a> used for +other purposes than correcting the strength of wine. Walking down the +long main street with its paved causeways and pebbly roadway, with its +straight lines of symmetric houses, coquettish in their marble balconies +and brightly-painted shutters and railings, one might fancy himself in +Brock or Delft but that the roofs are flat, that the gables are not +turned to the street, and that the sky is a cloudless blue. I am +speaking now of fine days; but there are days when the sky is cloudy and +the wind blows, and the waters in the Bay of Cadiz below surge up sullen +and yeasty, and there are days when the rain comes down quick, thick, +and heavy as from a waterspout, and the streets are turned for the +moment into rivulets. But the effects of the rain do not last long; +Spain is what washerwomen would call a good drying country. Beyond its +neatness and tidiness, Puerto has other features to recommend it to the +traveller. It has a bookseller's shop, where the works of Eugène Sue and +Paul de Kock can be had in choice Spanish, side by side with the Carlist +Almanack, "by eminent monarchical writers," and the calendar of<a name="page_5" id="page_5"></a> the +Saragossan prophet (the Spanish Old Moore); but it is not to that I +refer—half a hundred Andalusian towns can boast the same. It has its +demolished convent, but since the revolution of '68 that is no more a +novelty than the Alameda, or sand-strewn, poplar-planted promenade, +which one meets in every Spanish hamlet. It has the Atlantic waves +rolling in at its feet, and a pretty sight it is to mark the feluccas, +with single mast crossed by single yard, like an unstrung bow, moored by +the wharf or with outspread sail bellying before the breeze on their way +to Cadiz beyond, where she sits throned on the other side of the bay, +"like a silver cup" glistening in the sunshine, when sunshine there is. +The silver cup to which the Gaditanos are fond of comparing their city +looked more like dirty pewter as I approached it by water from Puerto; +but I was in a tub of a steamer, there was a heavy sea on and a heavy +mist out, and perhaps I was qualmish. Not for its booksellers' shops, +for its demolished convent, or for its vulgar Atlantic did this Puerto, +which the guide-books pass curtly by as "uninteresting," impress me as +interesting,<a name="page_6" id="page_6"></a> but for two features that no seasoned traveller could, +would, or should overlook; its female population is the most attractive +in Andalusia, and it is the seat of an agreeable English colony. I +happened on the latter in a manner that is curious, so curious as to +merit relation.</p> + +<p>I had intended to proceed to Cadiz from Seville after I had taken a peep +at Puerto, but that little American gentleman whom I met at Córdoba was +with me, and persuaded me to stop by the story of a wonderful castle +prison, a sort of <i>Tour de Nesle</i>, which was to be seen in the vicinity, +where the <i>bonne amie</i> of a King of Spain had been built up in the good +old times when monarchs raised favourites from the gutter one day, and +sometimes ordered their weazands to be slit the next. This show-place is +about a league from Puerto, in the valley of Sidonia, and is called El +Castillo de Doña Blanca. We took a calesa to go there. My companion +objected to travelling on horseback; he could not stomach the peculiar +Moorish saddle with its high-peaked cantle and crupper, and its +catch-and-carry stirrups. We took a calesa, as I have said.<a name="page_7" id="page_7"></a> To my dying +day I shall not forget that vehicle of torture. But it may be necessary +to tell what is a calesa. Procure a broken-down hansom, knock off the +driver's seat, paint the body and wheels the colour of a roulette-table +at a racecourse, stud the hood with brass nails of the pattern of those +employed to beautify genteel coffins, remove the cushions, and replace +them with a wisp of straw, smash the springs, and put swing-leathers +underneath instead, cover the whole article with a coating of liquid +mud, leave it to dry in a mouldy place where the rats shall have free +access to the leather for gnawing practice, return in seven years, and +you will find a tolerably correct imitation of that decayed machine, the +Andalusian calesa. It is more picturesque than the Neapolitan +<i>corricolo</i>; it is all ribs and bones, and is much given to inward +groaning as it jerks and jolts along. Such a trap we took; the driver +lazily clambered on the shafts, and away hobbled our lean steed.</p> + +<p>The road to Lady Blanche's Castle is like that to Jordan in the nigger +songs; it is "a hard road to travel"—a road full of holes and quagmires +and<a name="page_8" id="page_8"></a> jutting rocks; and yet the driver told me it had once been a good +road, but that was in the reign of Queen Isabella. Everything seems to +have been allowed to go to dilapidation since. On the outskirts of +Puerto we passed an English cemetery; I am glad to say it is almost +uninhabited. If there is an English dead settlement there ought to be a +live one, I reasoned, unless those who are buried here date from +Peninsular battles. The first part of the road to Blanche's Castle is +level, and bordered with thick growths of prickly pear; there is a view +of the sea, and of the Guadalate, spanned by a metal bridge—a Menai on +a small scale. Farther on, as we get to a district called La Piedad, the +country is diversified by swampy flats at one side and sandy hills at +the other. Blanche's Castle was a commonplace ruin, a complete "sell," +and we turned our horse's head rather savagely. As we were coming back, +the little American shortening the way by Sandford and Merton +observations of this nature—"Prickly pear makes a capital hedge; no +cattle will face it; the spikes of the plant are as tenacious as +fish-hooks. The fibres of the aloe are unusually strong; they make +better cordage than<a name="page_9" id="page_9"></a> hemp, but will not bear the wet so well"—a sight +caught my eyes which caused me to stare. A tall young fellow, with his +trousers tucked up, was wading knee-deep in the bottoms beside the road. +He wore a suit of Oxford mixture.</p> + +<p>"Who or what is that gentleman?" I asked the driver.</p> + +<p>"An English engineer," was the answer.</p> + +<p>I stopped the calesa, hailed him, and inquired was he fond of rheumatic +fever. He laughed, and pronounced the single word, "Duty." A little +word, but one that means much. A Spanish engineer would never have done +this; they are great in offices and at draughting on paper, but they +seldom tuck up their sleeves, much less their trousers, to labour out of +doors as the young Englishman was doing. I made his acquaintance, and he +willingly consented to show me over the works in which he was engaged, +which were intended to supply Cadiz with water. In England water is to +be had too easily to be estimated at its proper value. At Cadiz it is a +marketable commodity. Even the parrots there squeak "agua." Every drop +of rain that falls is carefully gathered<a name="page_10" id="page_10"></a> in cisterns, and the +conveyance of water in boatloads from Puerto across the Bay is a regular +trade. An English company had been formed to supply the parched seaport +and the ships that call there with fresh water, and its reservoirs were +situated at La Piedad. In the bowels of the flats below, where the +snipe-shooting ought to be good, our countryman told me the water was to +be sought. Galleries had been sunk in every direction in land which the +company had purchased, and pumps and engines are soon to be erected that +will raise the liquid collected there up to the reservoirs which have +been hewn out of the hills above. These reservoirs, approached by +passages excavated out of the rough sandstone, are stout and solid +specimens of the mason's craft directed by the engineer's skill. Here we +met a second gentleman superintending the labours of the men, but he was +surely a Spaniard; he spoke the language with the readiness of one born +on the soil; still, he had a matter-of-fact, resolute quickness about +him that was hardly Spanish. Doubts as to his nationality were soon +dispelled; the engineer we had surprised in the swamp presented us to +his colleague Forrest,<a name="page_11" id="page_11"></a> engineer to Messrs. Barnett and Gale, of +Westminster, the contractors, as thoroughbred an Englishman as ever came +out of the busy town of Blackburn.</p> + +<p>Mr. Forrest at once stood to cross-examination by the American, who had +all the inquisitiveness of his race.</p> + +<p>"We employ a couple of hundred men, on an average, here," he said, "all +of whom, with but two exceptions, are Spaniards, and very fair +hard-working fellows they are; in the town below we have a small colony +of English, and if you don't take it amiss I shall be happy to present +you to our society."</p> + +<p>I know little of the technicalities of engineering, but I saw enough of +this work to be certain that it was well and truly done, and I heard +enough of the scarcity of water in Cadiz to be convinced it will be a +great boon when finished. The reservoirs are constructed in colonnades, +supported by ashlar pillars and roofed with rubble; for the water must +be shaded from the sun in this hot climate; the pillars are buttered +over with cement, and there is over a foot of cement concrete on the +flooring,<a name="page_12" id="page_12"></a> to guard against filtration. As we paced about the sombre +aisles, echo multiplied every syllable we uttered; the repetition of +sound is as distinct as in the whispering gallery of St. Paul's, and I +could not help remarking, "What a splendid robber's cave this would +make!"</p> + +<p>"Too tell-tale," said the practical American; "make a better cave of +harmony."</p> + +<p>"The only pipes that are ever likely to blow here are water-pipes," +smilingly put in the engineer; "we intend to lay them from this to +Cadiz, some twenty-eight miles distant. Roughly speaking, we are about +ninety feet above the level of the place, so that the highest building +there can be supplied with ease."</p> + +<p>The Romans were benefactors to many portions of this dry land of Spain; +they built up aqueducts which are still in use, but they neglected +Cadiz. The town has been dependent on these springs of La Piedad for its +water supply, except such as dropped from heaven, for three hundred +years, and attempts to obtain water from wells or borings in the +neighbourhood have invariably failed. The<a name="page_13" id="page_13"></a> water which is found in this +basin, held by capillary attraction in the permeable strata through +which it soaks till the hard impermeable stratum is met—retained, in +short, in a natural reservoir—is excellent in quality, limpid and +sparkling. Puerto has been supplied from the place for time out of mind, +and Puerto has been so well supplied that it could afford to sell +panting Cadiz its surplus. With English capital and enterprise putting +new life into those old hills, and cajoling the precious beverage out of +their bosom, which unskilled engineers let go to waste, Cadiz should +shortly have reason to bless the foreign company that relieves its +thirst. Clear virgin water, such as will course down the tunnels to +bubble up in the Gaditanian fountains, is the greatest luxury of life +here; "Agua fresca, cool as snow," is the most welcome of cries in the +summer, and temperate Spain is as devoted to the colourless liquid that +the temperance lecturer Gough and his compeers call Adam's ale, as ever +London drayman was to Barclay's Entire. Success, then, to the Cadiz +Waterworks Company: we drank the toast on the hill-side of "Piety" they +were<a name="page_14" id="page_14"></a> making fruitful of good, drank it in tipple of their and nature's +brewing, but had latent hopes that Forrest or his colleague would help +us to a bumper of the generous grape-juice for which the district is +famed, when we got down to the pleasant companionship of the English +colony below.</p> + +<p>Nor were our hopes disappointed. There are innumerable bodegas, or +wine-vaults, in the town, in which bottles and barrels of wine are +neatly caged in labelled array, according to age, quality, and kind. +Very clean and roomy these stores of vinous treasure are, with an +indescribable semi-medicinal odour languidly pervading them. We visited +a bodega belonging to an Englishman, who ranks as a grandee of the +first-class, the Duke of Ciudad Rodrigo and eke of Vitoria, but who is +better known as the Duke of Wellington. The natural wine of this +district is too thin for insular palates. They crave something fiery, +and, by my word, they get it. Like that Irish car-driver who rejected my +choicest, oily, mellow "John Jameson," but thanked me after gulping a +hell-glass of new spirit, violent assault liquefied, they want a drink<a name="page_15" id="page_15"></a> +that will catch them by the throat and assert its prerogative going +down. What a beamy old imposition is that rich brown sherry of city +banquets, over which the idiot of a connoisseur cunningly smacks his +lips and rolls his moist eyes. If he were only told how much of it was +real and how much artificial, would he not gasp and crimson! It would be +unmerciful to inform him that his pet cordial is charged with sulphuric +acid gas, that it is sweetened with cane-sugar, that it is flavoured +with "garnacha dulce," that it is coloured with plastered <i>must</i> and +fortified with brandy, before it is shipped. Let us leave him in +blissful ignorance. We tasted many samples before we left, but I own I +have no liking for sherries, simple or doctored. Among Spanish wines I +far prefer the full-bodied astringent sub-acidity of the common Val de +Peñas, beloved of Cervantes. But the Queen of wines is sound Bordeaux. +To that Queen, however, a delicate etherous Amontillado might be +admitted as Spanish maid-of-honour, preceding the royal footsteps, while +the syrupy Malaga from the Doradillo grape might follow as attendant in +her train.<a name="page_16" id="page_16"></a></p> + +<p>From wine to women is an easy transition. Both are benedictions from on +high, and I have no patience with the foul churl who cannot enjoy the +one with proper continence, and rise the better and more chivalrous from +the society of the other. Wine well used is a good familiar +creature—kindles, soothes, and inspirits: the cup of wine warmed by the +smile of woman gives courage to the soldier and genius to the minstrel. +With Burns—and he was no ordinary seer—I hold that the sweetest hours +that e'er we spend are spent among the lasses. I will go farther and say +the most profitable hours. And some sweet and profitable hours 'twas +mine to spend among the fawn-orbed lasses of Puerto, with their +childlike gaiety, their desire to please, and their fetching freedom +from affectation. Would that the wines exported from the district were +half as unsophisticated! These lasses were not learned in the "ologies" +or the "isms," but they were sincere; and their locks flowed long and +free, and when they laughed the coral sluices flying open gave scope to +a full silvery music cascading between pales of gleaming pearl. An<a name="page_17" id="page_17"></a> +admixture of this strain with the fair-skinned men of the North should +produce a magnificent race; and, indeed, if we paid half the attention +to the improvement of the human animal which we do to that of the equine +or the porcine, the experiment would not have been left untried so long. +In-and-in breeding is a mistake, and can only commend itself, and that +for selfish reasons, to the Aztec in physique and the imbecile in mind. +The families which take most pride in their purity are the most +degenerate; the stock which is the most robust and handsome is that +which has in it a liberal infusion of foreign bloods. In my opinion, the +coming man, the highest form of well-balanced qualities—moral, +intellectual, and masculine—the nearest approach to perfection, must +ultimately be developed in the United States.</p> + +<p>Puerto has a wide-spread reputation as the nursery-ground for +bull-fighters. To the arena it is what Newmarket is to the British turf. +Everybody there walks about armed, but murder is not more rife in +proportion than in London. As it happened, a fellow was shot while I was +there, but that would<a name="page_18" id="page_18"></a> not justify one in coming to the conclusion that +homicide was a flourishing indigenous product. Still, the natives did +not escape the contagion of unrest of their countrymen. For example, the +last news I heard before leaving my English friends was that the men in +the vineyards had struck work. These lazy scoundrels had the impudence +to demand that they should have half an hour after arrival on the +ground, and before beginning work, to smoke cigarettes, the same grace +after the breakfast hour, two hours for a siesta in the middle of the +day, another interval for a bout of smoking in the afternoon, and +finally that each should be entitled to an arroba (more than three and a +half gallons English) of wine per acre at the end of the season. They go +on the same basis as some trades' unions we are acquainted +with—reduction of hours of labour and increase of wages. "Will you give +in to them?" I asked of an English settler, in the wine trade. "Give +in———" but it is unnecessary to repeat the expletive; "I'll quietly +shut up my bodega."<a name="page_19" id="page_19"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h3> + +<p class="head">The Charms of Cadiz—Seville-by-the-Sea—Cervantes-Daughters of +Eve—The Ladies who Prayed and the Women who Didn't—Fasting +Monks—Notice to Quit on the Nuns—The Rival Processions—Gutting a +Church—A Disorganized Garrison—Taking it Easy—The Mysterious +"Mr. Crabapple"—The Steamer <i>Murillo</i>—An Unsentimental +Navvy—Bandaged Justice—Tricky Ship-Owning—Painting Black White.</p> + +<p class="nind">T<span class="smcap">he</span> man who pitched on Cadiz as the site of a city knew what he was +about. Without exception it is the most charmingly-located place I ever +set foot in. Its white terraces, crowded with white pinnacles, +belvederes, and turrets, glistening ninety-nine days out of the hundred +in clear sunlight, rise gently out of a green sea necked with foam; the +harbour is busy with commerce, crowded with steamers and sailing ships +coming and going from the Mediterranean shores, from France, from +England, or from the distant countries beyond the<a name="page_20" id="page_20"></a> Atlantic; the waters +around (for Cadiz is built on a peninsula, and peeps of water make the +horizon of almost every street) are dotted with fishing craft or +scudding curlews; the public squares are everlastingly verdant with the +tall fern-palm, the feathery mimosa, the myrtle, and the silvery ash, +which only recalls the summer the better for its suggestive appearance +of having been recently blown over with dust; the gaze inland is repaid +with the sight of hills brown by distance, of sheets of pasture, and +pyramidal salt-mounds of creamy grey; and the gaze upwards—to lend a +glow to the ravishing picture—is delighted by such a cope of dreamy +blue, deep and pure, and unstained by a single cloudlet, as one seldom +has the happiness of looking upon in England outside the doors of an +exhibition of paintings. The climate is dry and genial, and not so hot +as Seville. The Sevillanos know that, and come to Cadiz when the heats +make residence in their own city insupportable. Winter is unknown; +skating has never been witnessed by Gaditanos, except when exhibited by +foreign professors, clad in furs, who glide on rollers over polished +floors;<a name="page_21" id="page_21"></a> and small British boys who are fond of snowballing when they +come out here are obliged to pelt each other with oranges to keep their +hands in. One enthusiastic traveller compares it to a pearl set in +sapphires and emeralds, but adds—lest we should all be running to hug +the jewel—there is little art here and less society.</p> + +<p>"Letters of exchange are the only belles-lettres." Indeed. Now this is +one of those wiseacres who are <i>in</i> a community, but not <i>of</i> it, who +materially are present, but can never mentally, so to speak, get +themselves inside the skins of the inhabitants. That city cannot be said +to be without letters which has its poetic brotherhood, limited though +it be, and which reveres the memory of Cervantes, as the memory of +Shakespeare is revered in no English seaport. Wiseacre should hie him to +Cadiz on the 23rd of April, when the birth of Cervantes is celebrated, +for in spite of intestine broils, Spaniards are true to the worship of +the author of "Don Quixote," and his no less immortal attendant, whom +Gandalin, friend to Amadis of Gaul, affectionately apostrophizes thus:<a name="page_22" id="page_22"></a></p> + +<p class="poem"> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"Salve! Sancho with the paunch,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3.5em;">Thou most famous squire,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Fortune smiled as Escudero she did dub thee</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">Tho' Fate insisted 'gainst the world to rub thee.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3.5em;">Fortune gave wit and common-sense,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">Philosophy, ambition to aspire;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3.5em;">While Chivalry thy wallet stored,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 4.5em;">And led thee harmless through the fire."</span><br /> +</p> + +<p>With the respect he deserves for this wandering critic and no more, I +will take the liberty of saying that there is art, and a great deal of +art, in the site of the clean town; and that there is society, and good +society, in that forest of spars in the roadstead, and in the fishing +and shooting in the neighbourhood. When the Tauchnitz editions have been +exhausted, and when the stranger has mastered Cervantes and Lope de +Vega, Espronceda, Larra, and Rivas, there is always that book which Dr. +Johnson loved, the street, or that lighter literature which Moore sings, +"woman's looks," to fall back upon. I am afraid some prudes may be +misjudging my character on account of the frequency of my allusions to +the sex lately; but I beg them to recollect that this is Andalusia, and +that woman is a very important element in the popula<a name="page_23" id="page_23"></a>tion of Cadiz. She +rules the roost, and the courtly Spaniard of the south forgets that +there was ever such an undutiful person as Eve. Woman played a +remarkable part in the events of the couple of months after the Royal +crown was punched out of the middle of the national flag. She is +political here, and is not shy of declaring her opinions. Ladies of the +better classes of Cadiz are attentive to the duties of their religion; +kneeling figures gracefully draped in black may be seen at all hours of +the day in the churches during this Lenten season, telling their beads +or turning over their missals. Those ladies are Carlist to a man, as +Paddy would say; they naturally exert an influence over their husbands, +though the influence falls short of making their husbands accompany them +to church except on great festivals such as Easter Sunday, or on what +may be called occasions of social rendezvous, such as a Requiem service +for a deceased friend. The men seem to be of one mind with the French +freethinker, who abjured religion himself, or put off thoughts of it +till his dying day, but pronounced it necessary for peasants and +whole<a name="page_24" id="page_24"></a>some for women and children. But <i>les femmes du peuple</i>, the +fishwives, the labourers' daughters, the bouncing young fruit-sellers, +and the like, are not religious in Cadiz. They have been bitten with the +revolutionary mania; they are staunch Red Republicans, and have the bump +of veneration as flat as the furies that went in procession to +Versailles at the period of the Great Revolution, or their great +granddaughters who fought on the barricades of the Commune. The nymphs +of the pavement sympathize strongly with the Republic likewise; but +their ideal of a Republic is not that of Señores Castelar and Figueras. +They want bull-fights and distribution of property, and object to all +religious confraternities unless based on the principles of "the Monks +of the Screw," whose charter-song, written by that wit in wig and gown, +Philpot Curran, was of the least ascetic:</p> + +<p class="poem"> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"My children, be chaste—till you're tempted;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3.5em;">While sober, be wise and discreet,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">And humble your bodies with—fasting,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3.5em;">Whene'er you have nothing to eat."</span><br /> +</p> + +<p>So long ago as 1834 a sequestration of convents was ordered in Spain, +but the Gaditanos never had<a name="page_25" id="page_25"></a> the courage to enforce the decree till +after the revolution that sent Queen Isabella into exile. A few years +ago the convent of Barefooted Carmelites on the Plaza de los Descalzados +was pulled down; the decree that legalized the act provided an +indemnity, but the unfortunate monks who were turned bag and baggage out +of their house never got a penny. They have had to humble their bodies +with fasting since. For those amongst them who were old or infirm that +was a grievance; but for the lusty young fellows who could handle a +spade there need not be much pity, for Spain had more of their sort than +was good for her. Even at that date the revolutionists of Cadiz had some +respect left for the nunneries. But they progressed; the example of +Paris was not lost upon them. The ayuntamiento which came into power +with the Republic was Federal. Barcelona and Malaga were stirring; the +ayuntamiento made up its mind that Cadiz should be as good as its +neighbours and show vigour too. The cheapest way to show vigour was to +make war on the weak and defenceless, and that was what this +enlightened<a name="page_26" id="page_26"></a> and courageous municipality did. The nuns in the convent of +the Candelaria were told that their house and the church adjoining were +in a bad state, that they must clear out, and that both should be razed +in the interests of public safety. It was not that the presence of +ladies devoted to God after their own wishes and the traditions of their +creed was offensive to the Republic; no, not by any means. The nuns +protested that if their convent and church were in a dangerous condition +the proper measure to take was to prop them up, not pull them down. But +the blustering heroes of the municipality would not listen to this +reasoning; they were too careful of the lives of the citizens, the nuns +included; down the edifices must come. The Commune of Paris over again. +The ladies of Cadiz, those who pass to and fro, prayer-book in hand, in +the streets, and startle the flashing sunshine with their solemn +mantillas, were wroth with the municipality. They saw through its +designs, and they resolved to defeat them. To the number of some five +hundred they formed a procession, and marched four deep to the +Town-<a name="page_27" id="page_27"></a>house to beg of their worships, the civic tyrants, to revoke their +order. If the convent and church were in ruins, the ladies were prepared +to pay out of their own pockets the expense of all repairs. That +procession was a sight to see; there was the beauty, the rank, the +fashion, and the worth of the city, in "linked sweetness long drawn +out," coiling through the thoroughfares on pious errand. The fair +petitioners were dressed as for a <i>fete</i>; diamonds sparkled in their +hair, and the potent fan, never deserted by the Andalusians, was +agitated by five hundred of the smallest of hands in the softest of +gloves. But the civic tyrants were more severe than Coriolanus. They +were not to be mollified by woman's entreaties, but rightly fearing her +charms they fled. When the procession arrived at the Town-house, there +was but a solitary intrepid bailie to receive it. They told him their +tale. He paid them the usual compliments, kissed their feet in the grand +Oriental way individually and collectively, said he would lay their +wishes before his colleagues, but that he could give no promise to +recall the mandate of the municipality—it was<a name="page_28" id="page_28"></a> more than he dare +undertake to do, and so forth. The long and short of it was, he politely +sent them about their business. They came away, working the fans more +pettishly than ever, and liquid voices were heard to hiss scornfully +that the Republic, which proclaimed respect for all religions and +rights, was a lie, for its first thought was to trample on the national +religion, and to dispossess an inoffensive corporation of cloistered +ladies of their right to then property. Here the first act of the drama +ended.</p> + +<p>The second was, if anything, more sensational, though infinitely less +attractive. The Federals bit their thumbs, and cried:</p> + +<p>"Ah, this is the work of the priests!"</p> + +<p>So it was; not a doubt of that. The Federals meditated, and this was the +fruit of their meditations:</p> + +<p>"Let us organize a counter-procession!"</p> + +<p>That counter-procession was a sight to see, too; the feature of elegance +was conspicuous by its absence, but there was more colour in it. +Harridans of seventy crawled after hussies of seventeen;<a name="page_29" id="page_29"></a> bare arms and +bandannas were more noticeable than black veils and fans; the <i>improbæ +Gaditanæ</i>, known of old to certain lively satirists, Martial and Juvenal +by name, turned out in force. Mayhap it is prejudice, but Republican +females, methinks, are rather muscular than good-looking. Still they +have influence sometimes, and when they said their say at the Town-house +the ladies plainly betrayed how much they dreaded that influence. They +wrote to Madrid praying that the municipality should be arrested in its +course. Señor Castelar did send a remonstrance; some say he ordered the +local authorities not to touch the church or convent, but they laughed +at his letter, and contented themselves by reflecting that he was not in +possession of the facts—that is, if they reflected at all, which is +doubtful.</p> + +<p>Act the third was in representation during my stay. I passed the +Candelaria one morning. Scaffolding poles were erected in the street +alongside in preparation for the demolition of the building, and a party +of workmen in the pay of the municipality were engaged gutting the +church<a name="page_30" id="page_30"></a> of its contents, and carting them off to a place of deposit, +where they were to be sold by public auction. These workmen looked +cheerful over their sacrilege. A waggon was outside the door laden with +ornaments ripped from the walls, gilt picture-frames, fragments of +altar-rails, and the head of a cherub. Half a dozen rough fellows in +guernseys had their shoulders under a block of painted wood-carving. As +far as I could make out, it was the effigy of one of the Evangelists. I +was refused admittance to the building, but I was told the sacramental +plate had been removed with the same indifference. The nuns escaped +without insult, thanks to the good offices of some friends outside, who +brought up carriages at midnight to the doors of the convent and +conveyed them to secret places of safety put at their disposal by the +bishop.</p> + +<p>The people who committed this mean piece of desecration were all Federal +Republicans. They disobeyed orders from Madrid, and would disobey them +again. They were as deaf to the commands of Señor Castelar as to the +prayers and entreaties<a name="page_31" id="page_31"></a> of the wives and daughters of respectable +fellow-citizens. And all this time that the central authority were +defied, artillerymen and linesmen were loitering about the streets of +Cadiz. Eventually it was plain they would be disarmed, as they were +disarmed at Malaga; and they would not offer serious opposition to the +process. Their officers were barely tolerated by them. The Guardia Civil +were true to duty, but when the crisis came, what could they do any more +than their comrades at Malaga? They were but as a drop of water in a +well. Disarmament is not liked by the old soldiers who have money to +their credit, but there is a large proportion of mere conscripts in the +ranks, and they are glad to jump at the chance of returning home.</p> + +<p>Troubles worse than any may yet be in store; meanwhile the sun shines, +and Cadiz, like Seville, takes it easy. But there is a bad spirit +abroad, and it is growing. A pack of ruffians forcibly entered a mansion +at San Lucar, and annexed what was in it in the name of Republican +freedom; the "volunteers of liberty" have taken the liberty of breaking<a name="page_32" id="page_32"></a> +into the houses of the consuls at Malaga in search for arms; an excited +mob attacked the printing-office of <i>El Oriente</i> at Seville after I +left, smashed the type, and threatened to strangle the editor if he +brought out the paper again; and the precious municipality of Cadiz has +nothing better to do than order that no mourners shall be allowed in +future to use religious exercises or emblems, to sing litanies or carry +crosses, at the open graves of relatives in the cemeteries.</p> + +<p>In the merchants' club (of which I was made free) they were saddened at +the disrupted state of society, but took it as kismet, and seemed to +think that all would come right in the end, by the interposition of some +<i>Deus ex machinâ</i>. But who that God was they could not tell: he was +hidden in the womb of Fate. As Cadiz accepted its destiny with +equanimity, I accommodated myself to the situation, and did as the +natives did. I helped to fly kites from the flat housetops—a favourite +pastime of mature manhood here; I opened mild flirtations with the +damsels in cigar-shops, and discovered that they were not slow to meet +advances; I ex<a name="page_33" id="page_33"></a>pended hours every day cheapening a treatise on the +mystery of bull-fighting, with accompanying engravings, in vain—its +price was above rubies. But my great distraction was a strange character +I met at dinner at the house of the British Consul. I did not catch his +name at our introduction, so I mentally named him Mr. Crabapple. He was +short and stout, had a round wizened face freckled to the fuscous tint +of a russedon apple, and was endowed with a voice which had all the +husky sonority of a greengrocer's. He was beardless and sandy-haired, +and one of those persons whose age is a puzzle to define; he might have +been anything between fifteen and five-and-thirty. As he talked of +Harrow as if he had left it but yesterday, I was disposed to set him +down as a queer public-school boy on vacation, until I was astounded by +some self-possessed remark on Jamaica dyewoods. We stopped in the same +hotel. One morning he descended the stairs, a sort of dressing-case in +hand, and yelled to an urchin at the door:</p> + +<p>"Here, you son of a sea-calf, take this down to the waterside for me!"<a name="page_34" id="page_34"></a></p> + +<p>"Will he understand you?" I said.</p> + +<p>"Bound to," Mr. Crabapple replied; "never talk to them any other way, +anyhow. 'Tis their business to understand. Ta, ta—deuce of a hurry."</p> + +<p>"Where are you going, may I ask?"</p> + +<p>"Read the Church Service—rather a bore—Sunday, you know."</p> + +<p>The nondescript, then, was a chaplain.</p> + +<p>The same evening he returned to the hotel, and on the following morning +I saw him again descending the stairs, the same dressing-case in hand. +He nodded salute, slung his luggage to the same urchin with the cry, +"Hook it, you lubber!" and, turning to me, said, "Ta, ta, sheering off +again."</p> + +<p>"Where to now?"</p> + +<p>"Mediterranean."</p> + +<p>"There's no boat to-day."</p> + +<p>"There is, though—there's mine;" and he was off.</p> + +<p>The supposed chaplain was a stray-away from a novel by Marryat, +commanded her Majesty's gunboat <i>Catapult</i>, and was at Cadiz on the duty +of protecting British interests. At the moment his<a name="page_35" id="page_35"></a> mission was to carry +important despatches to Gibraltar.</p> + +<p>My mission to Cadiz was, partly, to ascertain the progress of the +inquiry into the case of the <i>Murillo</i> steamer, more than suspected of +having run down the <i>Northfleet</i>, a vessel laden with railway-iron and +navvies, off Dungeness, on the night of the 22nd of January previous. +Three hundred lives had been lost on the occasion. I knew something of +that wreck, for I had seen and spoken with the survivors in the Sailors' +Home at Dover on the following evening. A dazed, stupid lot they were, +of an exceedingly low standard of intelligence. The sense of their own +rescue had overcome the poignancy of grief. I envied them their +stolidity, which I explained to my own mind by the rush of the engulfing +waters still swirling and singing knell of sudden doom in their ears.</p> + +<p>"Guv'nor," said one clown to me, "I seed my ole 'ooman go down afore my +eyes, and I felt that grieved a'most as if I was agoin' down myself, and +I chewed a bit o' baccer."</p> + +<p>I saw the <i>Murillo</i> lying quietly a little distance<a name="page_36" id="page_36"></a> off the land—a +handsome, shapely craft, fine in the lines, with a sharp stem fashioned +like that of a ram. She was painted black, with the exception of a band +of pink above the water-line, where she was coated with Peacock's +mixture. The British Consul informed me that he understood the inquiry +into the guilt of the master was to be carried on <i>secretly</i>. He would +not be allowed to attend it. Copies of the depositions of the accused, +and permission to see them, had also been denied to the agents of the +British Government, who applied for them for the purposes of the Board +of Trade inquiry. Though Spaniards, in private conversation, own that +the <i>Murillo</i> is the criminal ship, they seem, for some unaccountable +reason, to be anxious that she should escape the penalty of her +wickedness, as if the national honour were concerned, and the national +honour would be served by cloaking an offence cruel and mean in itself, +and awful in its consequences.</p> + +<p>There is a sentence in the Comminations which would keep running in my +mind every time I thought of that emigrant ship sent to the bottom<a name="page_37" id="page_37"></a> off +Dungeness—"Cursed is he who smiteth his enemy secretly." But if he who +smites his enemy secretly is accursed, what is he who smites his +neighbour and then flees away like a coward in the dark? Is he not twice +and thrice wicked, and to be branded with malediction deeper still? Such +a thing the <i>Murillo</i> steamer did—there could be no manner of doubt +about it; every seafaring man and every Spaniard admits her +blood-guiltiness; yet there she lies off Puntales, near the Trocadero, +calmly expecting soon to be under weigh again with her criminal master +and crew on board, with no punishment registered against her or them. +The Consul-General of Spain in London wrote to the papers after the loss +of the <i>Northfleet</i>, saying if this man was the wrongdoer he would be +punished, and sent to Ceuta or Tetuan. But he is the wrongdoer, and he +will never be sent to Ceuta or Tetuan. The master of the <i>Murillo</i> and +the sailors of the watch on the fatal night are in prison, but they will +never be brought to serious account. The figure of Justice in these +latitudes is true to the sculptor's ideal in one sense: the eyes are +bandaged, not that<a name="page_38" id="page_38"></a> Justice shall be impartial, but that she may not +see.</p> + +<p>This instance of the <i>Murillo</i> is but one of many, and as it illustrates +an artifice of tricky ship-owning, it will be well to state why the +<i>Murillo</i> will go scot-free, and may audaciously turn up again in +British waters disguised by a few coats of paint, exhibiting a fresh +figure-head, and bearing a new name in gilt lettering on her stern.</p> + +<p>In the first place, the <i>Murillo</i> belonged not to Spanish so much as +English owners. The line of steamers of which she was one was the +property of a company of shareholders. The company was anxious that +their vessels should fly the Spanish flag, so they made one Don Miguel +Styles the nominal head of the firm. This individual was a mere clerk in +their office, a man of straw, and at the date of the catastrophe Don +Miguel Styles had no more substantial existence than our old friend John +Styles: he was dead, and in his grave.</p> + +<p>Nextly, Mr. Daniel Macpherson, one of the most eminent merchants in the +port of Cadiz and Lloyd's agent, had been served with an instrument +claiming<a name="page_39" id="page_39"></a> damages to the amount of 50,000 pesetas (£2,000), because that +he had calumniated the good ship <i>Murillo</i>, and caused her prejudice and +injury by detaining her a couple of months in the waters of Cadiz. The +persons who instituted this action forget that the Spanish courts have +no jurisdiction in the matter of libels published in England. And as for +the prejudice caused to the vessel, it is incredible that the British +Government should be so weak as to wait for letters from Lloyd's agent +before opening an inquiry into the deaths of some three hundred of its +subjects and the identity of the dastardly scoundrel who was the cause +of their deaths, who disabled the ship that held them, and then slunk +off, leaving them to the mercy of the midnight sea. That the <i>Murillo</i> +was that vessel, even those who maintain that she cannot be proved +legally guilty do not attempt to deny. It is true, as they say, that +moral certainty is one thing, legal certainty another. But there was +seldom a clearer chain of circumstantial evidence pointing to the +perpetrator of any crime than that which convicted the <i>Murillo</i> of +being the misdemeanant. She was off Dungeness<a name="page_40" id="page_40"></a> at the hour of the +disaster, and she was in contact with a ship; this the imprisoned master +admitted in his log. But he alleged that the ship could not have been +the <i>Northfleet</i>. He said he came into collision with a vessel; that he +stood by her for half an hour; that one of her boats put off with some +persons on board carrying a lantern; that they went round her examining +whether there was anything wrong; and that no call having been made to +him for assistance he steamed away. But there was a discrepancy between +the entry in his log and that in the log of the engineer. The latter, an +Englishman, stated that the engines of the <i>Murillo</i> were backed before +the collision, that she went astern afterwards, and then went on ahead. +The delay altogether was only for a few minutes. No mention of the +half-hour. The engineer had no object in telling a lie. The master of +the <i>Murillo</i> had. No other ship was in collision off Dungeness that +night. Besides, what meant the order to the <i>Murillo</i> to come on at once +to Cadiz if she had been in collision, and not stop at Lisbon, whither +she was bound as port of call, if not to get her into limits where +justice<a name="page_41" id="page_41"></a> is notoriously blind and halt? Argument is unnecessary and +childish; it was the <i>Murillo</i> which cut down the <i>Northfleet</i>. But +Spain will never exact retribution for the destruction of the property +and the sacrifice of the lives of aliens. Cosas de España.<a name="page_42" id="page_42"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h3> + +<p class="head">Expansion of Carlism—A Pseudo-Democracy—Historic Land and Water +Marks—An Impudent Stowaway—Spanish Respect for Providence—A +Fatal Signal—Playing with Fire—Across the Bay—Farewell to +Andalusia—British Spain.</p> + +<p class="nind">T<span class="smcap">owards</span> the close of February, a grave official report was published in +the <i>Gaceta</i> of Madrid, announcing that an engagement had been fought +with the Carlists and a victory scored, <i>one</i> of the enemy having been +killed. We were now in April, some six weeks later, and Carlism still +showed lively signs of existence, notwithstanding the death of that +solitary combatant. The statement of the troops employed against it will +be the best measure of its importance. These consisted of a battalion +and two companies of Engineers, four companies of Foot Artillery, a +battery of Horse and five batteries of Mountain Artillery; eight +squadrons of Cuirassiers,<a name="page_43" id="page_43"></a> seven of Lancers, four of Hussars, a section +of Mounted Chasseurs (Tiradores), and eighteen battalions of Infantry of +the line, with five of Cazadores, or light infantry. Behind this force +of regulars were the Francos or Free-shooters of Navarre (who were about +as good as their prototypes, the <i>francs-tireurs</i> of France—no better), +some mobilized Volunteers, and the Carabineros, or revenue police. There +were some who imagined that the hosts of Don Carlos might crown the +hills of Vallecas, and present themselves before the gate of Atocha to +the consternation of Madrid, as did those of his predecessor in the +September of 1837. But the Federals of the south did not mind. What did +not touch them, they cared not a jot for. They were of the +pseudo-democracy which wants to live without working, consume without +producing, obtain posts without being trained for them, and arrive at +honours without desert—the selfish and purblind pseudo-democracy of +incapacity and cheek.</p> + +<p>As I had no pecuniary interest in salt, wine, phosphate of soda, hides, +or cork—the chief exports of Cadiz—I left the much-bombarded port on +the<a name="page_44" id="page_44"></a> <i>Vinuesa</i>, one of the boats of the Alcoy line plying to Malaga. My +immediate destination was the Hock, but we went no nearer than +Algeciras, the town on the opposite side of the bay, off which Saumarez +gave such a stern account of the Spanish and French combined on the 12th +of July, 1801. The sea was without a ripple. The bright coasts of two +Continents were in view. On such a day as this the first adventurers +must have crossed from Africa to Europe. Hero might almost have swum +across. Even Mr. Brownsmith of Eastchepe might rig a craft out of an +empty sugar hogshead, set up his walking-stick for mast, tie his +pocket-handkerchief to it for sail, and trust to the waves in +safety—that is, if Mr. Brownsmith of Eastchepe had in him the heart of +Raleigh, not of Bumble. Some men are born to be drivers of tram-cars, +some to be captains of corsairs. The pioneer of navigation must have +been cut out by nature to be a High-Admiral of bold buccaneers.</p> + +<p>We were only five passengers on the steamer, and we amused ourselves +comparing notes. One told of a voyage from Barcelona to Alicante which +he had<a name="page_45" id="page_45"></a> once undertaken. The first night out they lost a sailor; he was +seized with a fit and died; and then came the poser. When they would +arrive at Alicante and muster the crew for the inspection of the health +officers one would be wanting; suspicions would be aroused that he had +fallen a victim to contagious disease, and they ran the hazard of being +stuck into quarantine unless they could succeed in buying themselves off +with an exorbitant bribe. While they were in a quandary, a white head +popped above a gangway forward and a voice sang out:</p> + +<p>"I'll get you out of the hole for a consideration."</p> + +<p>"Who the deuce are you? Where did you spring from?" cried the skipper.</p> + +<p>"A stowaway,—a flour-barrel. I'll parade as the dead man's substitute +for ten dollars and a square meal."</p> + +<p>In the end they were glad to accept the impudent proposal; the corpse +was flung overboard, and the stowaway entered the port of Alicante an +honest British tar, looking the whole world in the face like +Longfellow's village blacksmith, and jingling ten dollars in his +pocket.<a name="page_46" id="page_46"></a></p> + +<p>We passed by Barrosa, where Graham gave the French such a thrashing in +1811, and the 87th Irish Fusiliers earned their glorious surname of the +"Eagle-takers;" and over the waves of Trafalgar where Nelson did his +duty, and was smitten with a bullet in the spine; and passing into the +Straits and rounding the point by Tarifa, stood in for the Bay of +Gibraltar. A spacious swelling spread of live water it is, and safe, +except, as one of my fellow-passengers informed me, for a rock off the +Punta del Carnero, or Mutton Point. The rock is covered when the tide is +high (for there is a tide here), but rears its tortoise-like back over +the surface for some hours at the ebb. The Channel squadron was coming +out of Gib some years before when an ironclad grounded on this rock, but +was got off without more damage than a scraping. As the danger to the +navigation was outside the limits of the fortress, the British +authorities applied to the Spanish for permission to clear away the +obstruction. It was easily to be accomplished. A party of sappers could +set a caisson round it, bore a gallery, insert a charge, and blast the +rock into<a name="page_47" id="page_47"></a> smithereens with safety and despatch. But the Spaniards would +not consent to such an interference with the designs of Providence; the +poor fishermen on the coast were often dependent for their livelihood on +what they could pick up from wrecks, and if this rock were removed +Nature would be sacrilegiously altered, and the interesting wreckers +deprived of many an honest coin. I tell the tale as it was told to me. I +wonder should it be dedicated to the amphibious corps.</p> + +<p>Another story bearing on the successful revolution inaugurated by Prim +is worth relating, as it deals with an episode of Spanish politics which +is repeated almost every other year with slender variations. The play is +the same; the scene and the <i>dramatis personæ</i> are merely shifted. One +of the stereotyped military risings was to be initiated at Algeciras on +the arrival of Prim from England. The intimation that he was at hand was +to be made by the firing of two rockets from the ship which carried him. +On a certain night at the close of August, 1868, two rockets blazed in +the sky, and were noticed by the impatient conspirators at<a name="page_48" id="page_48"></a> Algeciras, +who flew to arms to cries of "Down with the Queen," and "Live Prim and +Liberty." But no Prim landed. The alarm was premature, the rising a +flash in the pan. What they had taken for the bright herald of the +advent of "El Paladino" was the signal of a Peninsular and Oriental +steamer which had arrived on her passage to Port Said. For the sake of +appearances, a number of unfortunate fools were set up against a wall +and had their brains blown out in tribute to law and order. But the +fruit was ripening. Within little more than a fortnight came the +insurrection of the fleet at Cadiz, upon the appearance in that port of +the popular hero, and before the end of the month Queen Isabella had +fled over the French frontier, never to return to Spain as a sovereign. +Prim's plot was attended with a fortune in excess of his most sanguine +hopes; he entered Madrid in triumph in October, and was created a +Marshal in November. All was joy and enthusiasm, but the hapless tools +of ambition who had helped to prepare the way for him below in Algeciras +were not of the jubilee.<a name="page_49" id="page_49"></a></p> + +<p>At first sight the rock looms up large like a frowning inhospitable +islet, the stretch of the Neutral Ground being so low that one cannot +detect it above the sea-level until almost right upon it. We left the +<i>Vinuesa</i> and entered a boat with a couple of sturdy rowers, who offered +to pull us across the Bay for five dollars. As I dipped a hand in the +brine one of them raised a cry of "Take care!" there were "mala pesca" +there. Mr. Shark, who is an ugly customer, had been cruising in the +neighbourhood, and had taken a morsel out of an American swimmer a +little time before. There were three masts protruding over the water at +one spot, the relics of some gallant ship, and index to one of those +godsends which the Spanish Government is solicitous to guarantee to the +distressed and deserving local fishermen. What a pity it was not the +<i>Murillo</i>! That would have been poetic retribution.</p> + +<p>No matter: with all thy faults I like thee, Spain, and especially that +brown dusty province of Andalusia, with its oranges and pomegranates; +its dancing fountains splashed with sunshine; its win<a name="page_50" id="page_50"></a>some damozels with +such lisping languors of voice; its philosophic waiters upon the morrow, +happy in a cigarette, a melon and a guitar; its muleteers crooning +snatches of lazy song; its peasants with hair tied in beribboned +pigtail; its tawny boys in Manola colours; aye, and its artistic +beggars.</p> + +<p>"Ah! now you see the Neutral Ground; that village to the left is Lineas, +where you can get a glass of Manzanilla cheap," exclaimed a companion.</p> + +<p>I do not set exceeding store by your pale thin Manzanilla, nor do I care +to load my mouth with the flavour of a drug store.</p> + +<p>"There are the sheds we put up the time Prim was expected; they are on +the Neutral Ground, ha, ha! where the soil is supposed to be inviolate; +but we have forgotten to take them down since. We were too many for +them."</p> + +<p>And now we are by the landing-stairs, and the Customs' officer demands +our passport in English. We answer him cheerily that we need none, and +to his smiling welcome we step on the soil of British Spain; but it +would be unpardonable to begin describing it at the tail of a chapter.<a name="page_51" id="page_51"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h3> + +<p class="head">Gabriel Tar—A Hard Nut to Crack—In the Cemetery—An Old Tipperary +Soldier—Marks of the Broad Arrow—The "Scorpions"—The +Jaunting-Cars—Amusements on the Bock—Mrs. Damages' Complaint—The +Bay, the Alameda, and Tarifa—How to Learn Spanish—Types of the +British Officer—The Wily Ben Solomon—A Word for the +Subaltern—Sunset Gun—The Sameness of Sutlersville.</p> + +<p class="nind">W<span class="smcap">here</span> I went to school, we had a droll lad, whose humour developed +itself in mispronunciation. In my nonage I considered that unique. Now I +know it is a rather common order of quaintness. Hugh used to call Sierra +Leone, "Sarah Alone;" Cambodia, "Gamboge;" Stromboli, "Storm-boiler;" +and Gibraltar, "Gabriel Tar." How we used to wrinkle with laughter at +his sallies, launched with an artistically unconscious air, until the +swooping cane came swishing down on our backs! And here I was in Gabriel +Tar. I vow the first inclination I<a name="page_52" id="page_52"></a> felt was to write to Hugh with the +date engraved on the note-paper, and indeed so I should have done, but +that I had not seen him for nigh twenty years, and when last I heard of +him he was married, and had learned to be serious and to speak with +precision. The fun had been driven out of him by responsibility. +Propriety had come with prosperity.</p> + +<p>Call it by what name you will, Gabriel Tar, or Gibraltar, that +infinitesimal scrap of territory over which the Union Jack floats, is +supremely unpalatable and insolently insulting to the Spaniard. It is a +bitter pill to swallow, an adamantine nut to crack. I suppose he is +welcome to take it—when he can; but he knows better than to try. It is +the gate of the Mediterranean. Logically, it is an injustice that a +stranger should sit in the porter's lodge and swing the key at his +girdle; but it is as well that the porter is one who is too surly to +barter his trust for gold. So Gabriel Tar will remain intact, until the +porter grows feeble or falls asleep.</p> + +<p>British Spain, or "the Rock," or Gib, as it is<a name="page_53" id="page_53"></a> indifferently termed, or +Sutlersville, as I prefer to name it, can be converted into an island at +the will of its defenders. The sandy spit of Neutral Ground at one side +of which Tommy Atkins, fresh-faced, does his sentry-go in brick-red +tunic and white pith-helmet, and at the other side of which swarthy +Sancho Panza y Toro, in projecting cap and long blue coat, fondles a +rifle in the bend of his arm, can readily be flooded; and the bare, +sheer, lofty north front, with scores of cannon of the deadliest modern +pattern lying in wait behind the irregular embrasures that grimly pit +its surface, hardly invites attack. It frowns a calm but determined +defiance; and even the Cid himself might be excused if he turned on his +heel and puffed a meditative cigarette after he had surveyed it.</p> + +<p>British Spain is small, being but one and seven-eighth square miles +English in area; but it is mighty strong. The population, comprising the +garrison, is less than fifteen thousand; but behind that slender cipher +of souls are the millions of the broadest and biggest of empires. I do +not know what the population of the cemetery is, but it<a name="page_54" id="page_54"></a> receives rapid +and numerous accessions at each periodical outbreak of cholera. I paid a +visit to it—I have a fondness for sauntering in God's acre—and arrived +in time to witness a funeral. When the coffin was laid in the grave, a +young man, probably the husband of the deceased, threw himself prone on +the turf beside the open burial-trench, and burst into such a passionate +tempest of heart-rending sobs and moans and wailings, that I had to move +away. These Southerners are more demonstrative in their grief than the +men of the North. I question if their sorrows spring from deeper depths, +or are so lasting. The caretaker of the cemetery, an elderly Tipperary +soldier, with a short <i>dudheen</i> in his mouth, was seated smoking on a +head-stone by a goat-willow. We got into conversation.</p> + +<p>"There were worse places than Gib—singing-birds were raysonable here, +and some of them had rayl beautiful plumage."</p> + +<p>My countryman, like the Duke of Argyll, had a weakness for ornithology.</p> + +<p>"That spread of land beyant was where the races were held, and small-arm +parties from the fleet<a name="page_55" id="page_55"></a> sometimes kem ashore and practised there. They +used to play cricket there, too. The symmetry wasn't a gay place, but +there were worse. There were some beautiful tombs—now <i>there</i> was a +parable ov wan; 'twas put up by their frinds to some officers who were +dhrownded while they were crossing a flooded sthrame on their way back +from a shooting excursion. The car-drivers, who were dhrownded wid them, +had no monument. 'Twas a quare world; a poor man had the chance of dying +wid a rich man, but was not to be berrid in his company. Well, he +supposed it was for the best," and here he hammered the heel-tap out of +his pipe on the side of his shoe; "when the last bugle sounded a +field-officer would feel uncomfortable like if he had to be looking for +his bones in the same plot wid a lance-corporal."</p> + +<p>Truly, a queer world. Death with impartial summons knocks at the cabin +of the poor and the palace of the wealthy; but in the undertaker's +interest the equality of the grave must not be conceded. The plebeian +who commits <i>felo de se</i> is served properly if he is hidden at the +cross-roads by<a name="page_56" id="page_56"></a> night and a stake driven through his body. The lunatic +King who drowns himself, and drags his doctor to the same fate—who is a +suicide duplicated with the suspicion of murder—is embalmed and laid to +rest in consecrated ground amid incense and music, lights and flowers, +the tolling of bells, and the chanting of dirges.</p> + +<p>The funeral was over; they were just finishing the <i>De Profundis</i>. My +countryman had to quit me. "<i>Oyeh!</i> that fellow who was making such a +lamentation might be married agin in a twelvemonth. The army plan was +the best; after the 'Dead March' in <i>Saul</i> came 'Tow-row-row.'—another +so'jer was to be had for a shilling. He did not drink; he thanked me all +the same—had taken the pledge from Father Mathew whin he was a boy, and +meant to stick by it; but he would accept the price of a singing-bird he +had set his mind upon, since it was pressed upon him."</p> + +<p>Gibraltar is but a huge garrison. In the moat by the gate, as I +re-entered, a big drummer and a tiny mannikin-soldier with cymbals were +practising how to lead off a marching-past tune. The<a name="page_57" id="page_57"></a> "Fortune of War" +tavern elbows "Horse-Barrack Lane;" a print of "The Siege of Kars" is +side by side in a shop-window with Dr. Bennett's "Songs for Soldiers." +The Plazas and Calles of the mainland of Spain have been parted with. +The names of streets, hostelries, and stores are English. Instead of +tiendas and almacenes and fondas, you have fancy repositories, +regimental shoe-shops, and porter-houses. There, for example, is the +celebrated "Cock and Bottle," and farther on "The Calfs Head Hotel." If +you traverse Cathedral Square, no larger than an ordinary-sized +skittle-alley, you arrive by Sunnyside Steps to the Europa Pass. Notices +are posted by the roadside cautioning against plucking flowers or +treading on the beds under pain of prosecution. But the bazaar bewilders +you with its alien figures, its confusion of tongues, and its eccentric +contrasts of dress. In five minutes you meet Spanish officers; nuns in +broad-leaved white bonnets; a bearded sergeant nursing a baby; +bare-legged, sun-burnished Moors; pink-and-white cheeked ladies'-maids +from Kent; local mashers in such outrageously garish tweeds;<a name="page_58" id="page_58"></a> stiff +brass-buttoned turnkeys; Jews in skull-cap and Moslems in fez; and while +you are lost in admiration of a burly negro, turbaned and in grass-green +robe, with face black and shiny as a newly-polished stove, you are +hustled by a sailor on cordial terms with himself who is vigorously +attempting to whistle "Garry Owen."</p> + +<p>But above and before all, the sights and sounds are military. Sappers +and linesmen and artillerists pullulate at every corner; fatigue-parties +are confronted at every turn; the bayonet of the sentinel flashes in +every angle of the fortress from the minute the sun, bursting into +instantaneous radiance from behind the great barrier of craggy hill, +lights up the town and bastions and moles, until the boom of the +sunset-gun gives signal for the gates to be closed. Every tavern looks +like a canteen; the gossip is of things martial; the music is that of +the reveille or tattoo—the blare of brass, the rub-a-dub of parchment, +or the shrill sound-revel of Highland pipes (for there is usually a +Scotch regiment here). The ladies one meets all have husbands, or +fathers, or uncles in the Service; even the children—those<a name="page_59" id="page_59"></a> of English +parents well understood—keep step as they walk, and the boys amongst +them compliment any well-dressed stranger with a home face by rendering +him the regulation salute. This is highly gratifying to the civilian +sojourning in the place; for he insensibly succumbs to the <i>genius +loci</i>, squares his shoulders, expands his chest, and feels that if he is +not an officer he ought to be one.</p> + +<p>Except the enterprising gentry who devote themselves to cheating the +Spanish excise by smuggling cigars and English goods across the border, +the Scorpions live by and on the garrison, and therefore do I name their +habitat Sutlersville. "Scorpion," I should add, for the benefit of the +uninitiated, is the <i>sobriquet</i> conferred by Tommy Atkins on the natives +of the Rock, as that of "Smiches" is merrily applied by him to the +Maltese, and of "Yamplants" to the denizens of St. Helena. There is a +tolerable infusion of English blood among the Scorpions, but it is +hardly of the healthiest or most respectable.</p> + +<p>Gib is familiar to thousands of Englishmen, but it must be unfamiliar to +many thousands more.<a name="page_60" id="page_60"></a> This is my excuse for exhuming some notes of my +stay there. Don't be afraid, I am not going to pester you with +guide-book erudition. Let others take you to the galleries and caves, +lead you up the ascent to the Moorish tower, inform you that the one +spot in Europe where there is an indigenous colony of monkeys (the +patriarch of which is styled the "town major") is here, and enlighten +you as to the interesting fact that this is the only locality out of +Ireland where the Irish jaunting-car is to be objurgated. Mine be a +humbler task.</p> + +<p>Society in Gib is select, but limited. It is uniform, like the clothes +of the influential portion of the inhabitants. Gib is the wrong place to +bring out a young lady, though Major Dalrymple's daughters, immortalized +in Lever's novel, could not well have found a better hunting-ground. But +then Major Dalrymple's daughters were regular garrison hacks—so the +irreverent subs of the Rovers used to call them—and never stood a +chance beside the daughters of the county families. There are racing and +chasing at the station, and theatricals and balls. I arrived at the +wrong season. The<a name="page_61" id="page_61"></a> three days' local racing, for horses of every breed +but English, was over, and most of the men were going to Cadiz by +special boat next day, <i>en route</i> for the Jerez races, which are the +best—indeed, I might almost say the solitary—meeting in Spain.</p> + +<p>"There are only two things in this land worth talking about," said an +English merchant to me at Cadiz; "the steamers of Lopez and the races of +Jerez."</p> + +<p>The hunting (thanks to brave old Admiral Fleming for having started that +diversion) was over too. The meets have to come off, naturally, outside +the frontier of British Spain. The sport is pretty good—one cannot +quite expect the Melton country, of course—the riding hard, and the +horses invariably Spanish; no English horses would do, for no English +horse would be equal to climbing up a perpendicular bank with sixteen +stone on his back, and that is a feat the native steeds, bestridden by +British warriors in pink who follow the Calpe pack, have sometimes to +accomplish. There is a Spanish lyrical and theatrical troop in the town; +but it is Holy Week, and lyricals and theatricals<a name="page_62" id="page_62"></a> are under taboo. +Occasionally charity concerts are given by amateurs, and plays are even +performed in Lent Champagne, of the Fizzers, has won a reputation by his +success on the boards when he dons the habiliments of lovely woman +beyond a certain age. But, as I told you before, I arrived at the wrong +season. There are no balls at the Convent, which is the Governor's +residence; and, touching these balls, I have a grievance to ventilate, +at the request of Mrs. Quartermaster Damages. She specially imported +frilled petticoats from England to display in the mazy dance, and she +assured me they were turning sere and yellow in her boxes. She never +gets a chance of bringing them out except once in the twelvemonth, when +she is asked to the "Quartermasters' Ball." But there is a reason for +everything, and Mrs. Quartermaster Damages is fat and forty, and not +fair, and—tell it not out of mess—they say she has a tongue.</p> + +<p>At this particular time, you perceive, this fortified fragment of the +empire was dull; but usually it is gay, and the officer quartered there +has always an excellent opportunity of learning his trade and<a name="page_63" id="page_63"></a> acquiring +skill in the gentlemanly game of billiards. He can make maps and surveys +of the neutral ground, and watch the guard mounting on the Alameda, or +read the account of the siege in Drinkwater's days; and when he tires of +the green cloth and its distractions, and of his own noble profession, +he can throw a sail to the breeze in the unequalled Bay, or take a +flying trip to Tarifa to sketch the beautiful from the living model, or +go to Ceuta to see the Spanish galley-slaves and disciplinary regiments, +forgetful of our own chain-gangs; or steam across to Tangier to riot in +Nature and a day's pig-sticking.</p> + +<p>The Bay, the Alameda, and Tarifa—these are the three delights of +Gibraltar.</p> + +<p>You have heard of the Bay of Naples, and the Bay of Dublin, which equals +it in Paddy Murphy's estimation. I know both; and Gibraltar, the +little-spoken-of, leaves them nowhere. The sky, and the undulating +mirror below that reflects it, are such a blue; the rocks are such an +ashen-grey; the Spanish sierras such a leonine brown, with summits +wrapped in clouds like rolling smoke; and the<a name="page_64" id="page_64"></a> sun goes down to his bath +in the west 'mid such a vaporous glow of yellowing purple and rosy gold!</p> + +<p>The Alameda is a bower of Venus cinctured by Mars. Here is a gravelled +expanse bounded by hill and sea, with cosy benches under the shade of +palmitos—the civilization of the West in alliance with the rich +vegetation of the East. Sometimes, in the morning, five hundred men or +more—garrison artillery, engineers, and infantry—muster there, +previous to marching to their posts; there is a banging of drums, a +blowing of bugles, a bobbing vision of cocked-hats, and a roar of hoarse +words of command—all the pomp and pride and circumstance of glorious +war before the fighting begins. Sometimes, in the evening, a band plays, +and the Alameda is the resort of fashion and of nursery-maids.</p> + +<p>Tarifa, shining in the sunset across the water, is a tempting morsel for +the landscape-painter, and the dwellers in Tarifa are the best teachers +of Spanish. A British subaltern bent on improving his mind could +encounter an infinitely better pre<a name="page_65" id="page_65"></a>ceptor there than "Jingling Johnny," +the self-appointed professor to the garrison, who hires himself on +Monday, makes you a present of a guitar-tutor on Tuesday, and asks you +to favour him with six months' payment in advance on Wednesday. To be +sure, the Spanish those Tarifans speak is slightly Arabified; but their +tones of voice are persuasive, and their methods of teaching agreeable. +The professor taken by the British subaltern is invariably a female, and +the females of Tarifa are not the ugliest in the world. They still +retain many customs peculiar to their Moorish ancestors. They wear a +manta, not a mantilla—a sort of large-hooded mantle, with which they +hide the light of their countenance, except an eye—but that is a +piercer, ye gods I and they keep it open for business. When a stranger +passes, especially if he looks like a sucking lieutenant from the +fortress beyond, the manta falls, disclosing the soft loveliness +beneath, and the wearer affects a pretty confusion, and hastens with +judicious slowness to re-adjust its folds. The British subaltern reels +to his quarters seriously wounded, and may be seen<a name="page_66" id="page_66"></a> the following +morning, with his hair blown back, spouting poetry to the zephyrs on +Europa Point. Oh no!—that only occurs in romances; but he may be seen +drinking brandy-and-soda moderately in the Club-House.</p> + +<p>Poor British subaltern! How Sutlersville does exploit him! He is a +sheep, and bears his fleecing without a kick. Watch those lazy, +lounging, able-bodied, smoking, and salivating loons who prop up every +street-corner, and monopolize the narrow pathways—these all live by +him; they eat up his substance, and fatten thereupon. These are the +touting and speculating sons of the Rock, the veritable Scorpions, who +are ever ready to find the "cap'n" a dog or a horse or a boat, or +something not so harmless, to help him on the road to ruin, and whisper +in his ear what a fine fellow he is—"As ver fine a fellow—real +gemman—as Lord Tomnoddy, who give me such a many dollars when he go +away." The first word these loons pronounce after coming into the world +must be <i>baksheesh</i>. They are born with beggary in their mouths, and the +British subaltern acts as if he were born to be<a name="page_67" id="page_67"></a> their victim. There he +is below, of every type, lolling outside the hotel-door that looks on +that Commercial Square which is so thorough a barrack-square, with its +romping children, its dogs, its dust, its guard-house with chatting +soldiers on a form in front, and the important sentinel pacing to and +fro, regular and rigid as a pendulum, keeping vigilant watch and ward +over nothing in particular. We have a rare company to-day; besides the +engineers and bombardiers, and the linesmen of the 24th, 31st, 71st, and +81st, the four infantry regiments on the station, we have men on leave +from Malta. They came up to the races, and are waiting for the P. and O. +steamer to take them back. That fat little customer is your sporting +sub. I only wonder he is not in cords, tops, and spurs. What a hearty +voice he talks in! He asks for the <i>Field</i> as if he were giving a +view-halloo. Then there is the moist-eyed, mottle-cheeked, puffy, +convivial sub, who is knowing on the condition of ale, and is too +friendly with Saccone's sherry. The convivial sub, I am happy to say, is +dying out. Then there is the prig, who is "going in" for his profession. +I call him a<a name="page_68" id="page_68"></a> prig, because when people are going in for anything they +should have the good sense not to blow about it. To hear Mr. Shells and +his prattle about Hamley and Brialmont and Jomini, <i>kriegspiel</i> and the +new drill, you would imagine he was bound to put the extinguisher on +Marlborough, Wellington, Wolseley, and the rest of them; and yet the +chances are, if you meet him twenty years hence, he will be a captain on +the recruiting service, with no forces to marshal but six growing +children. Then there is the sentimental sub, the perfect ladies' man, +who plays croquet and the flute, pleads guilty to having cultivated the +Nine, and affects a simpering pooh-pooh when he is impeached with having +inspired that wicked but so witty bit of scandal in the local paper. By +singularity of pairing, his fast friend is the muscular sub, who walks +against time, and can write his initials with a hundredweight hanging +from his index-finger.</p> + +<p>Happy dogs in the heyday of life, all of them; how I envy them their +buoyant spirits, their rollicking enjoyment of to-day, and their +contempt for the morrow! But the morrow will come never<a name="page_69" id="page_69"></a>theless, and +with it Black Care will come often. Gib is a haunt of the Hebrews; they +or their myrmidons beset the subaltern at genial hours, after luncheon +or after mess, pester him with vamped-up knick-knacks for sale, appeal +to him to patronize a poor man by buying articles he does not and never +by any means can want—"pay me when you likes, Cap'n, one yearsh, two +yearsh." The "cap'n," who may have left Sandhurst but six months, may be +weakly good-natured, and ignore the fact that his income is not elastic; +some day that he thinks of taking a run to England Ben Solomon, who +seems to be able to read the books in the Adjutant-General's Office +through the walls, pounces upon him with his little bill, and he is +arrested if he cannot satisfy his Jewish benefactor. Loans are advanced +at a high rate "per shent" by the harpies, and enable him to stave off +the temporary embarrassment; the "cap'n" is happy for the moment, but +the reckoning is only deferred that it may grow. The arrival of Black +Care is adjourned, not averted. The plain truth of it is, Gibraltar is a +den of thieves, and has been the burial-pit of many<a name="page_70" id="page_70"></a> a promising young +fellow's hopes. There are two tariffs for everything—one for natives, +the other for the British subaltern and the British tourist; and the +British subaltern and the British tourist are foolish enough to submit +to the extortion in most cases. With some half-dozen honourable +exceptions, the traders are what is popularly known as "Jews" in their +mode of dealing. They cozen on principle, sell articles that will not +last, and charge preposterous prices for them; they impose upon the +young officer's softness or delicate gentlemanly feeling, and consider +themselves smart for so doing. In this manner Gibraltar, with all its +discomforts, is dearer than the most expensive and luxurious quarter in +the British Isles.</p> + +<p>But we have other specimens of the genus officer in the lounging +slaughterers by profession, who are so busy killing time. The lean +bronzed aristocratic major, whose temper long years in India have not +soured; the squat pursy paymaster (why are paymasters so fearfully +inclined to fat?); the raw-boned young surgeon with the Aberdeen accent; +"the ranker," erect and grizzled, and looking ever<a name="page_71" id="page_71"></a> so little not quite +at his ease, you know, for the languid lad with fawn-coloured moustache +straddling on the chair beside him is an Honourable; the jovial portly +Yorkshireman, who is in the Highland Light Infantry, naturally; and the +lively loud-voiced Irishman, laughing consumedly at his own jokes—all +are here, conversing, smoking, mildly chaffing each other, and +exchanging "tips" as to the next Derby. They make a book in a quiet way, +and occasionally invest in a dozen tickets in a Spanish lottery. What +will you? One cannot perpetually play shop, and the British officer has +a rooted objection to it, although he does his duty like a man when the +tug of war arises. Better that he should join in a regimental +sweepstakes, or lose what he can afford to lose to a comrade, than give +way to the blues. He does not gamble or curse, like his Spanish +<i>confrère</i>; his potations are not deep, nor is he quick to quarrel. Then +let him race on the Neutral Ground; let him hunt with the Calpe pack; +and let him back his fancy for the big event at Epsom. Those are his +chief excitements at Gib, and help to give a fillip to life in that<a name="page_72" id="page_72"></a> +circumscribed microcosm, pending the anxiously expected morn when the +route will come, or, mayhap, the call to active service, in one of those +petty wars which are constantly breaking the monotony of this so-called +pacific reign.</p> + +<p>"Guard, turn out!" cries the Highland Light Infantry sentinel under my +window, and the smart soldier laddies fall in for the inspection of the +officer of the day. What a thoroughly military town it is! By-and-by the +evening gun booms from the heights above, where Sergeant Munro, taking +time from his sun-dial and the town major, notifies the official sunset. +Bang go the gates. We are imprisoned. Anon the streets are traversed by +patrols in Indian file to warn loiterers to return to barracks, the +pipers of the 71st skirl a few wild tunes on Commercial Square, the +buglers sound the last post, the second gun-fire is heard, and a hush +falls over the town, broken only by the challenges of sentries or their +regular echoing footfalls on their weary beats. The thunder of artillery +wakes you in the morning anew, and if you venture out for a walk before +breakfast you thread your way through<a name="page_73" id="page_73"></a> waggons of the army train or +fatigue-parties in white jackets. You stumble across cannon and +symmetric pyramids of shot where you least expect them; the line of +sea-wall is intersected by figures in brick-red tunic, moving back and +forward on ledges of masonry; the morning air is alive with drum-beats +and bugle and trumpet-calls; everything is of the barrack most +barrack-like; the broad arrow is indented in large deep character on the +Rock. It is impossible to shake off the Ordnance atmosphere. The Irish +jaunting-cars are all driven by the sons of soldiers' wives; the +clergy-men are all military chaplains; those goats are going up to be +milked for the major's delicate daughter; that lady practising horse +exercise in a ring in her garden is wife to Pillicoddy of the Control +Department, and is merely correcting the neglected education of her +youth; the very monkeys—diminishing sadly, it grieves me to say—recall +associations of the mess-room, for you never fail to hear of that +terrible sportsman, "one of Cardwell's gents," who thought it excellent +fun to shoot one some time ago. Luckily, the rules of the service<a name="page_74" id="page_74"></a> did +not permit him to be tried by court-martial, or the wretched boy might +have been ordered out for instant execution, so great was the +indignation. But if he was not shot he was roasted as fearfully as ever +St. Laurence was; he was reminded a thousand times if once that +fratricide is a fearful crime, and if ever Nemesis visits his pillow it +will be in the shape of a monkey without a tail.</p> + +<p>One wearies of the same scenes of beauty, and would fain barter the Cork +Woods for the chestnuts in Bushy Park; the bright Bay and the watchet +sky pall on the senses, and a dull river and drab clouds would be +welcomed for change. The day rises when the conversation of the same +set, the stories repeated as often as that famous one of grouse in the +gun-room, and the stale jokes anent the Sheeref of Wazan and the rival +innkeepers of Tangier, black Martin and "Lord James," cloy like treacle; +the fiction palmed upon the latest novice that he must go and have a few +shots at the monkeys, if he wishes to curry favour at headquarters, +misses fire; the calls of the P. and O. steamers, and the thought that +their passengers<a name="page_75" id="page_75"></a> within a week either have seen, or will see, the +little village works its effect; even bull-fighting is adjudged a bore, +and one sighs for Regent Street and the "Rag and Famish," flaxen +ringlets, and roast bee£ A twelvemonth might pass pleasantly on the +Rock; but after that the "damnable iteration" of existence must jar on +the nerves like the note of a cuckoo. Still, as my philosopher of the +cemetery remarked, there are worse places—far worse, Assouan and Aden, +for example; so let not the gallant gentleman repine whom Fate has +assigned to a round of duty in Sutlersville. For Tommy Atkins of the +rank and file, it is wearisome when he is young; he should not be asked +to stay there longer than a twelvemonth while he is at the age which +yearns for novelty, and during that twelvemonth he should be drilled as +at the depôt. For the old soldier it is a good station, and should be +made a haven of rest.<a name="page_76" id="page_76"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h3> + +<p class="head">From Pillar to Pillar—Historic Souvenirs—Off to Africa—The +Sweetly Pretty Albert—Gibraltar by Moonlight—The +Chain-Gang—Across the Strait—A Difficult Landing—Albert is +Hurt—"Fat Mahomet"—The Calendar of the Centuries Put +Back—Tangier: the People, the Streets, the Bazaar—Our Hotel—A +Coloured Gentleman—Seeing the Sights—Local Memoranda—Jewish +Disabilities—Peep at a Photographic Album—The Writer's Notions on +Harem Life.</p> + +<p class="nind">I <span class="smcap">was</span> gradually getting into the mood of Pistol, and cried a foutra for +the world of business and worldlings base. My soul was longing for +"Africa and golden joys." Here I was at the elbow, so to speak, of the +mysterious Continent, where the geographers set down elephants for want +of towns. Why should I not visit it? I might never have such a chance +again. I stood in the shadow of one Pillar of Hercules. Why not make +pilgrimage to the other? Having notched Calpe on my staff, I resolved to +add Abyla to the record.<a name="page_77" id="page_77"></a></p> + +<p>I was the more inclined to this, as I had recollection that Tangier had +been part of the British dominions for one-and-twenty years. In 1662 +Catharine of Braganza, the "olivader-complexioned queen of low stature, +but prettily shaped," whose teeth wronged her mouth by sticking a little +too far out, brought it as portion of her dowry to Charles II. The 2nd, +or Queen's Own Regiment, was raised to garrison the post, and sported +its sea-green facings, the favourite colour of her Majesty, for long in +the teeth of the threatening Moors. The 1st Dragoons still bear the +nickname of "the Tangier Horse," and were originally formed from some +troops of cuirassiers who assisted in the defence of the African +stronghold for seventeen years; and the 1st Foot Regiment owes its title +of "Royal" to the distinction it gained by capturing a flag from the +Moors in 1680. That was the year when old John Evelyn noted in his diary +that Lord Ossorie was deeply touched at having been appointed Governor +and General of the Forces, "to regaine the losses we had lately +sustain'd from the Moors, when Inchqueene was Governor."<a name="page_78" id="page_78"></a> His lordship +relished the commission so little—indeed, it was a forlorn errand—that +he took a malignant fever after a supper at Fishmongers' Hall, went +home, and died. In 1683 the Merry Monarch caused the works of Tangier to +be blown up, and abandoned the place, declaring it was not worth the +cost of keeping. The Merry Monarch was not prescient. A century +afterwards Gibraltar was indebted for a large proportion of its +supplies, during the great siege, to the dismantled and deserted +British-African fortress. For many reasons Tangier was not to be missed.</p> + +<p>By a happy coincidence a party of three in the Club-House Hotel—a +retired army captain, his wife, and a lady companion—were anxious to +take a trip to Africa. We agreed to go together, and had scarcely made +up our minds, when another retired captain, who habitually resided in +Tangier, gratified us by the information that he was returning there, +and would be happy to give us every assistance in his power. Retired +Captain No. 1 was a jolly fellow, fond of good living and not +overburdened with æstheticism—a capital specimen<a name="page_79" id="page_79"></a> of a hearty +Yorkshireman. He looked after the provand. His wife, portly and short of +temper, was as good-natured as he. She insisted on discharging the +bills. The lady-companion was thin, accomplished, and melancholy. She +kept us in sentiment. Retired Captain No. 2 was a fellow-countryman of +mine, bright-brained and waggish. He was the walking guide-book, with +philosophy and friendship combined. I was nigh forgetting one, and not +by any means the least important, member of the party—Albert. Mrs. +Captain introduced him to me as a sweetly pretty creature. At her +request I looked after him. Tastes vary as to what constitutes beauty, +but I candidly think a broad thick head, crop ears, a flattish nose, and +heavy jowls could not be called sweetly pretty without straining a +point; and all these Albert possessed. He was a bull-dog (I believe his +real name was Bill, and that he had been brought up in Whitechapel). As +a bull-dog he had excellent points, and might be esteemed a model of +symmetry and breeding by the fancy, or even pronounced a beauty and +exquisitely proportioned by connois<a name="page_80" id="page_80"></a>seurs; but sweetly pretty—never! I +could not stomach that, especially when Albert growled and laid bare his +ruthless set of sound white teeth.</p> + +<p>Before leaving Gibraltar I had two novel sensations, nocturnal and +matutinal. The first was a view of the Bay by moonlight, the white +crescent shining clearly down on a portion of the inner waters brinded +by shipping, and on the outer spread of sleepy, cadenced wavelets +rippling phosphorescently under the pallid rays. By the Mole were +visible the outlines of barques, steamers, coal-brigs, and xebecs; away +to the left were the <i>Catapult</i> and a few of her mosquito companions; +and far out rode at anchor a stately frigate of the United States' +fleet. The twinkling lamps of the city afloat sending out reddish lines, +and the fuller, clearer, luminous pencillings of the gas-lamps of the +city ashore, made a not ungrateful contrast to the quivering chart of +poetic moonbeams. Bending over their edge were the deep shadows of the +massive Rock; and bounding them, at the other side, the barren +foot-hills of Algeciras mellowed into a phantom softness by distance and +the night.<a name="page_81" id="page_81"></a></p> + +<p>Next morning, as I strolled by the sea-wall towards the Ragged Staff +Battery, I saw a sight that took away my appetite for breakfast. Pacing +slowly to their work to the music of clanking chains was a column of +wretched convicts.<a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a> What haggard faces, with low foreheads, sunken +eyes, and dogged moody expression or utter blankness of expression! +Purely animal the most of that legion of despair and desperation looked, +and sallow and sickly of complexion. They were a blot on the fresh +sunshine. How hideous their coarse garb of pied jackets branded with the +broad arrow, their knickerbockers and clumsy shoes! Wistfully they moved +along, hardly daring to glance at me, through fear of the turnkeys with +loaded rifles marching at their sides. I almost felt that, if I had the +power, I would demand their release, as did the Knight of La Mancha that +of the criminals on their way to the galleys, although they might have +been as ungrateful as Gines de Passamonte; but those hang-dog +countenances banished impulses of chivalry.<a name="page_82" id="page_82"></a></p> + +<p>The little steamer, the <i>Spahi</i>, which conveyed us across the Strait, +was seaworthy for all her cranky appearance, and made the passage of +thirty-two miles quickly and comfortably for all her roughness of +accommodation. She was a cargo-boat, but her skipper was English, and +did his best to make the ladies feel at home. Besides, Captain No. 1 had +brought a select basket of provisions and a case of dry, undoctored +champagne. One of our first experiences as we cleared Algeciras, with +turrets like our martello-towers sentinelling the hills, and the +three-masted wreck—"Been twenty-one days there," said the skipper, "and +not an effort has been made to raise it yet, and not even a warning +light is hung over it at night"—was to sight a bottle-nosed whale +puffing and spewing its predatory course.</p> + +<p>"What are those ruins upon the Spanish shore for?" asked the +accomplished lady.</p> + +<p>When she was informed that they were the beacons raised in the days of +old, when the Moorish corsairs haunted that coast, and that the moment +the pirate sail was descried in the offing (I hope<a name="page_83" id="page_83"></a> this is correctly +nautical) the warning fire blazed by night, or the warning plume of +smoke went up by day, to summon Spain's chivalry to the rescue, she was +enchanted, and recited a passage from Macaulay's "Armada."</p> + +<p>We made the transit in a little over three hours, and, rounding the +Punta de Malabata, cut into the Bay of Tangier, and eased off steam at +some distance from the Atlantic-washed shore. There is no pier, but a +swell and discoloration, projecting in straight line seawards, marks +where a mole had once stood. That was a piece of British handiwork; but +the Moor, who is no more tormented by the demon of progress than the +Turk, had literally let it slide, until it sank under the waters.</p> + +<p>The Sultana of Moorish cities Tangier is sometimes called, and truly she +does wear a regal, sultana-like air as seen from afar, cushioned in +state on the hillside, her white flat roofs rising one above another +like the steps of a marble staircase, the tall minarets of the mosques +piercing the air, and the multitudinous many-coloured flags of all +nations fluttering above the various consu<a name="page_84" id="page_84"></a>lates. But in this, as in so +many other instances, it is distance which lends enchantment to the +view.</p> + +<p>We went as near to the shore as we could in small boats, and when we +grounded, a fellowship of clamouring, unkempt, half-naked Barbary Jews, +skull-capped, with their shirts tied at their waists and short cotton +drawers, rushed forward to meet us, and carry us pickaback to dry land. +The ladies were borne in chairs, slung over the shoulders of two of +these amphibious porters, or on an improvised seat made by their linked +hands, but to preserve their equilibrium the dear creatures had to clasp +their arms tightly round the necks of the natives. This would not look +well in a picture, above all if the lady were a professional beauty. But +there was nothing wrong in it, any more than in Amaryllis clinging to +the embrace of Strephon in the whirling of a waltz. Custom reconciles to +everything. On stepping into the small boat I had my first difficulty +with Albert. I trod on his tail. The dog looked reproachfully, but did +not moan. His mistress scowled, and warned me to take care<a name="page_85" id="page_85"></a> what I was +about for an awkward fool. Her husband, with a pained look on his face, +mutely apologized for her, and I humbly excused myself and vowed +amendment. I am not revengeful, but I did enjoy it when one of the +porters, tottering under the weight of the fat lady, made a false step +and nearly gave her a sousing. I clambered on my particular Berber's +back, dear Albert in my arms, and we splashed merrily along; but Captain +No. 1, who turned the scales at seventeen stone two pounds, had not so +uneventful a landing. Twice his bearer halted, and the warrior, +abandoning himself to his fate, swore he would make the Berber's nose +probe the sand if he stumbled.</p> + +<p>As I was discharged on the beach, I was confronted by a majestic Moor. +His grave brown face was fringed with a closely-trimmed jet-black beard, +and his upper lip was shaded with a jet-black moustache. He wore a white +turban and a wide-sleeved ample garment of snowy white, flowing in +graceful folds below his knees; and on his feet were loose yellow +slippers, peaked and turned up at the toes. This was Mahomet Lamarty, +better<a name="page_86" id="page_86"></a> known as "Fat Mahomet," who had acted as interpreter to the +British troops in the Crimea, and who, at this period, was making an +income by supplying subalterns from Gib with masquerade suits to take +home and horses to ride. Mahomet in his sphere was a great man. He was +none of your loquacious <i>valets de place</i>, no courier of the +Transcendental school. He had made the pilgrimage to Mecca and was a +Hadji; he was a chieftain of a tribe in the vicinity, and had fought in +the war against the Spanish infidels; he could borrow his purest and +finest Arab from the Kadi; he was free to the sacred garden of the +Shereef, or Pope-Sultan, one of the descendants of the Prophet, Allah be +praised!</p> + +<p>Mahomet, who was known to both the Captains, passed our small +impedimenta through the custom-house—there is an orthodox custom-house, +though there is no proper accommodation for shipping—and we trailed at +his heels up the close, crowded, rough alleys which did duty as streets. +It would be hard to imagine a more thorough-going change than our scurry +across the waves had effected. We<a name="page_87" id="page_87"></a> were in another world completely. We +had been transported as on the carpet of the magician. It was as if the +calendar had been put back for centuries, and the half-forgotten +personages of the "Thousand-and-One Nights" were revivified and had +their being around us.</p> + +<p>Tangier is a walled and fortified town; but Vauban had no hand in the +fortifications, and it is my private opinion the walls would go down +before a peremptory horn-blast quicker than those of Jericho. It swarms +with a motley population much addicted to differences in shades of +complexion. The Tangerines exhaust the primitive colours and most of the +others in their features. There are lime-white Tangerines, copper and +canary-countenanced Tangerines, olive and beetroot-hued Tangerines, +Tangerines of the tint of the bottom of pots, Tangerines of every—no, I +beg to recall that, there are no well-defined blue or green Tangerines; +at least, none that came under my ken. The town is as old as the hills +and courageously uncivilized. There is no gasholder, no railway-station, +no theatre, no cab-stand, no daily<a name="page_88" id="page_88"></a> paper, and no drainage board to go +into controversy over. It is unconsciously backward, near as it is to +Europe—a rifle-shot off the track of ships plying from the West to the +ports of the Mediterranean. It preserves its Eastern aroma with a fine +Moslem conservatism. Its ramparts of crumbling masonry are ornamented +with ancient cannon useless for offence, useless for defence. There is +said to be a saluting-battery; but the legend runs that the gunners +require a week's clear notice before firing a salute.<a name="FNanchor_B_2" id="FNanchor_B_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_B_2" class="fnanchor">[B]</a> There is no +locomotion save in boxes and on the backs of quadrupeds; and quadrupeds +of the inferior order are usually, when overtaken by death, thrown in +the streets to decompose. But if the irregularity of the town would +galvanize the late Monsieur Haussmann in his grave, its situation would +satisfy the most exacting Yankee engineer. It is huddled in a sheltered +nest on the fringe of a land of milk and honey; it has the advantage of +a<a name="page_89" id="page_89"></a> spread of level beach, and rejoices in the balmiest of climes.</p> + +<p>The streets are so narrow that you could light a cigar from your +neighbour's window on the opposite side; but there is no window, neither +at this side nor the other. A hole with a grating is the only window +that is visible. Moors are jealous, and to be able to appreciate their +household comforts you must first succeed in turning their houses inside +out. Those who have dived into the recesses say the fruit is as savoury +as the husk is repulsive. The windowless houses with their backs +grudgingly turned to the thoroughfares are low for the most part, and +the thoroughfares are—oh! so crooked—zigzag, up and down, staggering +in a drunken way over hard cobble-stones and leading nowhere. There are +mosques and stores entered by horse-shoe arches, a bazaar dotted over +with squatting women, cowled with dirty blankets, selling warm +griddle-cakes; moving here and there are the same spectral figures, +similar dirty blankets veiling them from head to foot; over the way are +cylinders of mat, with nets caging the apertures at each end, to<a name="page_90" id="page_90"></a> hold +the cocks and hens, rabbits and pigeons, brought for sale by Riffians, +descendants of the corsairs of that ilk, stalwart, brown, and +bare-legged, with heads shaven but for the twisted scalp-lock left for +the convenience of Asrael when he is dragging them up to Paradise. +Hebrews have their standings around, and deal in strips of cotton, brass +dishes, and slippers, or change money, or are ready for anything in the +shape of barter. Seated in the shade of that small niche in the wall, as +on a tailor's shop-board, is an adool, or public notary, selling advice +to a client; in the alcove next him is a worker in beads and filigree; +from a dusty forge beyond comes the clang of anvils, where half-naked +smiths are hammering out bits or fashioning horse-shoes. Mules with +Bedouins perched, chin on shin, amid the bales of merchandise on their +backs, cross the bazaar at every moment; or files of donkeys, stooping +under bundles of faggots, pick their careful way. By-and-by—but this is +not a frequent sight—a Moslem swell ambles past on a barb, gorgeous in +caparisons, the enormous peaked saddle held in its place by girths round +the beast's breast and<a name="page_91" id="page_91"></a> quarters, and covered with scarlet hammer-cloth. +If we move about and examine the stalls, we see lumps of candied +sweetmeats here; charms, snuff-boxes made of young cocoanuts and beads +there; and jars of milk or baskets of dates elsewhere. At the fountain +yonder, contrived in the wall, mud approached by rugged, sloppy steps, +water-carriers, wide-mouthed negro slaves, male and female, with brass +curtain-rings in their ears, and skins blacker than the moonless +midnight, come and go the whole day long, and gossip or wrangle with +loafers in coarse mantles and burnous of stuff striped like +leopard-skin. Beside the silent, gliding, ghost-like Mahometan women and +the Hottentot Venus, you have Rebecca in gaudy kerchief and Doña Dolores +in silken skirt and lace mantilla from neighbouring Spain. In the +mingling crowd all is novelty, all is noise, all is queer and shifting +and diversified.</p> + +<p>The hotel where we put up was owned by Bruzeaud, formerly a messman of a +British regiment. It was approached by a filthy lane, and commanded a +prospect of a square not much larger than a billiard-table. In the +middle of this square<a name="page_92" id="page_92"></a> was the limp body of a deceased mongoose. At the +opposite side of it was a Mahometan school, where the children were +instructed in the Koran, and their treble voices as they recited the +inspired verses in unison kept up drone for hours. The build and +surroundings of the hostelry left much opening for improvement, but we +had no valid ground for complaint. The beds were clean, Bruzeaud was a +good cook, the waiter was attentive and smiled perpetually, which made +up for his stupidity; we had a single agreeable fellow-guest in a +Frenchman, who spoke Arabic, and had lived in the city of Morocco as a +pretended follower of the Prophet; and, besides, there was that dry +undoctored champagne, which it is permissible to drink at all meals in +Africa.</p> + +<p>There was another hotel in Tangier, a more pretentious establishment, +owned by one Martin—surname unknown. Martin was a character. He was an +unmitigated coloured gentleman, blubber-lipped and black as the ace of +spades, with saffron-red streaks at the corners of his optics. He was a +native of one of the West India Islands, I believe,<a name="page_93" id="page_93"></a> but I will not be +positive. Mahomet Lamarty pressed me to tell him in what English county +Englishmen were born black, and when I said in none, he gravely +ejaculated that in that case Martin was a liar, and habitually ate dirt. +To avert possible complications into which I might have been drawn, I +had to hasten to explain that Martin might possibly have been born in a +part of England known as the Black Country. He had served in the +steward's department on the ship of war where the Duke of Edinburgh, +then Prince Alfred and a middy, was picking up seamanship. Hence his +Jove-like hauteur. He had rubbed-skirts with Royalty, and to his +fetter-shadowed soul some of the divinity which hedges kings and their +relatives had adhered to him. I never met a darkey who could put on such +fearful and wonderful airs. Where he did not order he condescended. He +showed me an Irish constabulary revolver which he had received from "his +old friend, Lord Francis Conyngham—'pon honour, he was delighted to +meet him. It was good for sore eyes—who'd a-thought of his turning up<a name="page_94" id="page_94"></a> +there!" Splendidly inflated Martin was when he spoke of "his servants." +This thing was entertaining until he grew presumptuous. If you are +polite to some people they are familiar, and want to take an ell for +every inch you have conceded. And then you have to tell them to keep +their place. But Martin, with the instincts of his race, saw in time +when it was coming to that. What a misery it must be for a coloured +gentleman of ambition that the tell-tale <i>odor stirpis</i> cannot be +eliminated! Martin spent extraordinary amounts of money on the purchase +of essences, but to no effect; he could not escape from himself; the +scent of the nigger, <i>che puzzo!</i> would hang round him still. He was a +great coward with all his magniloquence, and when cholera attacked +Tangier, left it in craven terror, and sequestered himself in a country +house a few miles off.</p> + +<p>The two captains and I "did" Tangier conscientiously, with the zest of +Bismarck over a yellow-covered novel, and the thoroughness of a Cook's +tourist on his first invasion of Paris. We crawled into a stifling crib +of a dark coffee-house, and sucked thick brown sediment out of +liliputian<a name="page_95" id="page_95"></a> cups; we smoked hemp from small-bowled pipes until we fell +off into a state of visionary stupor known as "kiff;" we paid our +respects to the Kadi, exchanged our boots for slippers, and settled down +cross-legged on mats as if we were the three tailors of Tooley Street; +we almost consented to have ourselves bled by a Moorish barber—Mahomet +Lamarty's particular, who lanced him in the nape of the neck every +spring—for the Moorish barber still practises the art of Sangrado, and +also extracts teeth. But in my note-taking I was sorely handicapped by +my ignorance of the language. Arabic is spoken in the stretch extending +from Tetuan to Mogador by the coast, and for some distance in the +interior; Chleuh is the dialect of the inhabitants of the Atlas range, +and Guinea of the negroes. Spanish is slightly understood in Tangier and +its vicinity, and is well understood by the Jews. The houses are +generally built of chalk and flint (<i>tabia</i>) on the ground-floor, and of +bricks on the upper story. Moorish bricks are good, but rough and +crooked in make. The houses inhabited by Jews are obliged to be coated +with a yellow wash, those<a name="page_96" id="page_96"></a> of natives are white, those of Christians may +be of any colour. The Jews are made to feel that they are a despised +stock, and yet with Jewish subtlety and perseverance they have managed +to get and keep the trade of the place in their hands. That fact may be +plainly gathered from the absence of business movement in the bazaars +and public resorts of Tangier on the Jewish Sabbath. Your Hebrew does +not poignantly feel or bitterly resent being reviled and spat upon, +provided he hears the broad gold pieces rattling in the courier-bag +slung over his shoulder. He nurses his vengeance, but he has the common +sense to perceive that the readiest and fullest manner of exacting it is +by cozening his neighbour. At this semi-European edge of Africa he +enjoys comparative license, although he is forced to appear in skull-cap +and a long narrow robe of a dark colour something like a priest's +soutane. But the son of Israel when he has a taste for finery (and which +of them has not?) compensates for the gloom of his outer garment by +wearing an embroidered vest, a girdle of some bright hue, and white +drawers.<a name="page_97" id="page_97"></a></p> + +<p>The daughters of Israel—but my conscience charges me with want of +gallantry towards them in a previous chapter, and now I can honestly +relieve it and win back their favour. They are the only beautiful women +who mollify the horizon of Tangier: the Mahometan ladies are not +visible, those of Spanish descent are coarse, and of English are +washed-out; while their lips are against the negresses. I have a batch +of photographs of females in an album—aye, of believers in the Prophet +amongst them, for it is a folly to imagine you cannot obtain that which +is forbidden. Hercules, I fancy, must have overcome with a golden sword +the dragon that watched the gardens of the Hesperides—which, by the +way, were in the neighbourhood of Tangier, if Apollodorus is to be +credited. On looking over that album, the majority of the faces are +distinctly those of Aaronites, and most favourable specimens of the +family, too There are melting black orbs curtained with pensive lashes, +luxuriant black hair, regular features, and straight, delicately +chiselled noses. These Jewesses generally wear handkerchiefs disposed +in<a name="page_98" id="page_98"></a> curving folds over their heads, and are as fond of loudly-tinted +raiment and the gauds of trinketry as their sisters who parade the sands +at Ramsgate during the season. There is a photograph before me, as I +write, of a Jewish matron, fat, dull, double-chinned, and sleepy-eyed, +who must have been a belle before she fell into flesh. She wears massy +filigree ear-rings, two strings of precious stones as necklaces, +ponderous bracelets, edgings of pearls on her bodice, and rings on all +her fingers. Her shoulders are covered with costly lace, and the front +of her skirt is like an altar-cloth heavy with embroidery. I dare say, +if one might peep under it, she has gold bangles on her ankles. It would +surprise me if she had an idea in her head beyond the decoration of her +person. As we turn the leaf, there is a full-blooded negress with a +striped napkin twisted gracefully turban-wise round her hair, and coils +of beads, large and small, sinuously dangling on her breast, like the +chains over the Debtor's Door at Newgate. A very fine animal indeed, +this negress, with power in her strong shiny features; a nose of +courage, thin in the nostrils, and<a name="page_99" id="page_99"></a> cheek-bones high, but not so high as +those of a Red Indian. If she were white, she might pass for a +Caucasian, but for that gibbous under-lip. She lacks the wide mouth and +the hinted intelligent archness of the Two-Headed Nightingale, and has +not the moody expression and semi-sensuous, semi-ferocious development +of the muscular widows of Cetewayo; but for a negress she is handsome +and well-built, and would fetch a very good price in the market. The +slave-trade still flourishes in Morocco. On the next page we meet two +types of young Moorish females: one a peasant, taken surreptitiously as +she stood in a horse-shoe archway; the other a lady of the harem, +taken—no matter by what artifice. The peasant, swathed from tip to heel +in white like a ghost in a penny booth, and shading her face with a +cart-wheel of a palm-leaf hat looped from brim to crown, and with one +extremity of its great margins curled, is a prematurely worn, +weather-stained, common-looking wench, with a small nose and screwed-up +mouth. She is a free woman, but I would not exchange the dusky +bondswoman for five of her class.<a name="page_100" id="page_100"></a> Centuries of bad food, much +baby-nursing, and field-labour sink their imprint into a race. The harem +lady, whose likeness was filched as she leaned an elbow against a low +table, is in a state of repose. She squats tailor-fashion, her fingers +are twined one in another in her lap, her eyes are closed, and her +expression is one of drowsy, listless voluptuousness. She is fair, and +her dress (for she is not arrayed for the reception of visitors) is +simple—a peignoir, and a sash, and a fold of silk binding her long rich +tresses. A soft die-away face, with no sentiment more strongly defined +than the abandonment to pleasure and its consequent weariness. By no +means an attractive piece of flesh and blood, and yet a good sample of +the class that go to upholster a seraglio.</p> + +<p>I have never had the slightest anxiety to penetrate the secrets of the +Moslem household, and I consider the man who would wish to poke his nose +into its seclusion no better than Peeping Tom of Coventry—an insolent, +lecherous cad. I would not traverse the street to-morrow to inspect the +champion wives of the Sultan of Turkey and Shah<a name="page_101" id="page_101"></a> of Persia amalgamated; +and I deserve no credit for it, for I know that they are puppets, and that +more engaging women are to be seen any afternoon shopping in Regent +Street or pirouetting in the ballets of half-a-dozen theatres.</p> + +<p>Your lady of the harem is an insipid, pasty-complexioned doll, nine +times out of ten, and would be vastly improved in looks and temperament +if she were subjected to a course of shower-baths, and compelled to take +horse-exercise regularly and earn her bread before she ate it.</p> + +<p>How do I know this? it may be asked. Who dares to deny it? is my answer.</p> + +<p>But here is a digression from our theme of the condition of the Jews at +Tangier, and all on account of a few poor photographs! In one sentence, +that condition is shameful. It is a reproach to the so-called civilized +Powers that they do not interfere to influence the Emir-al-Mumenin to +behave with more of the spirit of justice towards his Jewish subjects. +In Fez and other cities they have to dwell in a quarter to +themselves—"El Melah" (the dirty spot) it is called in Morocco city; +and<a name="page_102" id="page_102"></a> when they leave the Melah they have to go bare-footed. They are not +permitted to ride on mules, nor yet to walk on the same side of the +street as Arabs.</p> + +<p>The late Sir Moses Montefiore, a very exemplary old man in some +respects, visited Morocco in his eightieth year to intercede on behalf +of his co-religionists, and promises of better treatment were made; but +promises are not always kept.<a name="page_103" id="page_103"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h3> + +<p class="head">A Pattern Despotism—Some Moorish Peculiarities—A Hell upon +Earth—Fighting for Bread—An Air-Bath—Surprises of Tangier—On +Slavery—The Writer's Idea of a Moorish Squire—The Ladder of +Knowledge—Gulping Forbidden Liquor—Division of Time—Singular +Customs—The Shereef of Wazan—<a name="page_vii" id="page_vii"></a>The Christian who Captivated the +Moor—The Interview—Moslem Patronage of Spain—A Slap for +England—A Vision of Beauty—An English Desdemona: Her Plaint—One +for the Newspaper Men—The Ladies' Battle—Farewell—The English +Lady's Maid—Albert is Indisposed—The Writer Sums up on Morocco.</p> + +<p class="nind">T<span class="smcap">he</span> Government in Morocco would satisfy the most ardent admirer of +force. It is an unbridled despotism. The Sultan is head of the Church as +of the State, and master of the lives and property of his subjects. He +dispenses with ministers, and deliberates only with favourites. When +favourites displease him, he can order their heads to be taken off. +Favourites are careful not to displease him.<a name="page_104" id="page_104"></a> The land is a <i>terra +incognita</i> to Europeans, and is rich in beans, maize, and wool, which +are exported, and in wheat and barley, which are not always permitted to +be exported. Altogether the form of administration is very primitive and +simple. It is a rare privilege for a European to be admitted into the +Imperial presence, and indeed the only occasions, one might say, when +Europeans have the privilege are those furnished by the visits of +foreign Missions to submit credentials and presents. It is advisable for +a private traveller not to go to the chief city unless attached to one +of these official caravans; but by those who have money a journey to Fez +may be compassed with an escort. This escort consists of the Sultan's +very irregular soldiers, who are armed with very long and very rusty +matchlocks, of a pattern common nowadays in museums and curiosity shops. +Ostensibly the escort is intended to protect the traveller from the +regularly organized bands of robbers which infest the interior; but the +experience of the traveller is that when the robbers swoop down he has +to protect the escort. Christians are looked upon as dogs by all the +self-satisfied<a name="page_105" id="page_105"></a> natives, and treated so by some of them when they can be +saucy with impunity. It was my lot to be called a dog by a small +fanatic, who hissed at me with the asperity and industry of a disturbed +gander, and pelted me with stones. But two can play at that game, and +that boy will think twice before he lapidates a full-grown Christian +again. But he will hate him for evermore, and when he has reached man's +estate will teach his son to repeat the doggerel: "The Christian to the +hook, the Jew to the spit, and the Moslem to see the sight."</p> + +<p>The Sultan collects his revenue (estimated at half a million pounds +sterling a year, great part of which is derived from the Government +monopoly of the sale of opium) by the aid of his army; but as he never +nears the greater portion of his dominions, there must be some nice +pickings off that revenue by minor satraps before it reaches his sacred +hands. There is quite a phalanx of under-strappers of State in this +despotism. For instance, at Tangier there is a Bacha or Governor, a +Caliph or Vice-Governor, a Nadheer or Administrator of<a name="page_106" id="page_106"></a> the Mosques, a +Mohtasseb or Administrator of the Markets, and a Moul-el-Dhoor or Chief +of the Night Police. There is a leaven of the guild system, too, as in +more advanced countries. Each trade has its Amin, each quarter its +Mokaderrin. There is a Kadi, or Minister of Worship and Justice, to whom +we paid our respects. Justice is quick in its action, and stern in the +penalties it inflicts. The legs and hands are cut off pilferers, heads +are cut off sometimes and preserved in salt and camphor, and the +bastinado is an ordinary punishment for lesser crimes. But the Moors +must be thick in the soles, nor is it astonishing, as the practice is to +chastise children by beating them on the feet. Mahomet Lamarty +volunteered to procure a criminal who would submit to the bastinado for +a peseta. In the market-place I compassionated an unfortunate thief +minus his right hand and left leg. We took a walk to the prison, which +is on the summit of the hill, Captain No. 1 thoughtfully providing +himself with a basket of bread. What a hell upon earth was that sordid, +stifling, noisome, gloomy keep, with its crowds of starving +sore-<a name="page_107" id="page_107"></a>covered inmates. In filth it was a pig-sty, in smell a +monkey-house, in ventilation another Black-hole of Calcutta. Turn to the +next page, reader mine, if you are squeamish. Heaven be my witness, I +have no desire to minister to morbid tastes; but I have an object in +describing this dreadful <i>oubliette</i>, for it still exists—exists within +thirty-two miles of British territory, and it is a scandal that some +effort is not made to mitigate its horrors. Through the bars of a +padlocked door, from which spurt blasts of mephitic heat, we can descry +amid the steam of foul exhalations, as soon as our eyes become +accustomed to the dimness, a mob of seething, sweating, sweltering +captives, like in aspect as a whole to so many gaunt wild beasts. Some +are gibbering like fiends, others jabbering like idiots. They are there +young and old; a few—the maniacs those—are chained; all are crawled +over by vermin, most are crusted with excretions. The sight made me feel +faint at the time, the very recollection of it to this day makes my +flesh creep. We were fascinated by this peep at the Inferno. The moment +these caged wretches caught a glimpse of us they rushed<a name="page_108" id="page_108"></a> to the door, +and on bended knees, or with hands uplifted, or with pinched cheeks +pressed against the bars, raised a clamour of entreaty. We drew back as +the rancid plague-current smote our faces, and questioned Mahomet by our +looks as to what all this meant.</p> + +<p>"They want food," he explained.</p> + +<p>These prisoners are allowed two loaves a day out of the revenues of the +Mosques; but two loaves, even if scrupulously given, which I doubt, are +but irritating pittance. They may make cushions or baskets, but their +remuneration is uncertain and slender. Those who are lucky get +sustenance from relatives in the town, but the majority are +half-starving, and are dependent for a full meal on the bounty of chance +visitors. We poked a loaf through the bars. It was ravenously snapped +at, torn into little bits, and devoured amid the howls of those who were +disappointed. Then a loaf was cast over the door. What a savage +scramble! The bread was caught, tossed in the air, jumped at, and +finally the emaciated rivals fell upon one another as in a football +scrimmage, and<a name="page_109" id="page_109"></a> there was a moving huddle of limbs and a diabolical +chorus of shrieks and yells. That could not be done again; it was too +painful in result Mahomet undertook to distribute the remainder of our +stock through an inlet in the wall, and we drew away sick in head and +heart from that den of repulsive degradation, greed, brutality, cruelty, +selfishness, and all infuriate and debased passion—that damnable +magazine of disease physical and moral. It is undeniable that there were +many there whose faces were passport to the Court of Lucifer—murderers, +and dire malefactors; but better to have decapitated them than to have +committed them to the slow torture of this citadel of woe. There were +inmates who had been immured for years—inmates for debt whose hair had +whitened in the fetid imprisonment, whose laugh had in it a harsh +hollow-sounding jangle, and whose brows had fixed themselves into the +puckers of a sullen, hopeless, apathetic submission to fate. Their lack +of intelligence was a blessing. Had they been more sensitive they would +have been goaded into raging lunacy.<a name="page_110" id="page_110"></a></p> + +<p>Let us to the outer freshness and make bold endeavour to fling off this +weight of nightmare which oppresses us. Passing by the ruinous gate +yonder with its wild-looking sentry, we reach the open space where +crouching hill-men are reposing on the stunted grass, and ungainly +camels, kneeling in a circle, are chewing the cud in patience, or +venting that uncanny half-whine, half-bellow, which is their only +attempt at conversation. Let us take a long look at the country beyond +with its gardens teeming with fruit and musical with bird-voices; walk +up to the crown of that slant and survey the valleys, the plateaux, the +brushwood, the flower-patches, spreading away to the hills that swell +afar until the peaks of the Atlas, cool with everlasting snow, close the +view. One is tempted to linger there lovingly, though darkness is +falling. There is a gift of blandness and briskness in the very +breathing of the air. When you have had your fill of the beauties on the +land side, turn to the sea, meet the evening breeze that comes floating +up with a flavour of iodine upon it, range round the sweeping vista, +from giant Calpe away<a name="page_111" id="page_111"></a> over the Strait flecked with sails on to +Trafalgar, smiling peacefully as if it had never been a bay of blood, +and finish by the vision of the great globe of fire descending into the +Atlantic billows.</p> + +<p>Our stay in Tangier was most gratifying because of its variety and +unending surprises. Existence there was out of the beaten track, and +kept curiosity on the constant alert. It was a treat to pretend to be +Legree, and to negotiate for a strong likely growing nigger-boy. I +discovered I could have bought one for ten pounds sterling, a perfect +bargain, warranted free from vice or blemish; but as I was not prepared +to stop in Africa just then, I did not close with the offer. It may be a +shocking admission to make, but if I were to settle down in Morocco, I +confess, I should most certainly keep slaves. There is a deal of +sentimental drivel spouted about the condition of slaves. Those I have +seen seemed very happy. In Morocco they are well treated; and if +desirous to change masters the law empowers them to make a demand to +that effect. It is true that a slave's oath is not deemed<a name="page_112" id="page_112"></a> valid, but +Cuffy bears the slight with praiseworthy equanimity. I am sure if Cuffy +were in my service he would never ask to leave it, and I would teach him +to appraise his word as much as any other man's oath (except his +master's), by my patented plan for negro-training, based on Mr. Rarey's +theories. As the land about Tangier was rated at prairie value—an acre +could be had for a dollar—I might have been induced to invest in a +holding of a couple of hundred thousands of acres, but that my ship had +not yet come within hail of the port. What a healthy, free, aristocratic +life, combining feudal dignity with educated zest, a wise man could lead +there—if he had an establishment of, say, three hundred slaves, a +private band, a bevy of dancing girls, Bruzeaud for <i>chef</i>, an extensive +library, sixteen saddle-horses, and relays of jolly fellows from +Gibraltar to help him chase the wild boar and tame bores, eat +couscoussu, and drink green-tea well sweetened. He should Moorify +himself, but he need not change his religion, and if he went about it +rightly, I am sure, like the village pastor, he could make himself to +all the country dear. Take the educational<a name="page_113" id="page_113"></a> question, for example. If he +were diplomatic he would pay the school-fees of the urchins of Tangier. +These are not extravagant—a few heads of barley daily, equivalent to +the sod of turf formerly carried by the pupils to the hedge academies in +dear Ireland, and a halfpenny on Friday. He should affect an interest in +the Koran, and make it a point of applauding the Koran-learned boy when +he is promenaded on horseback and named a bachelor. He might—indeed he +should—follow the career of his <i>protégé</i> at the Mhersa, where he +studies the principles of arithmetic, the rudiments of history, the +elements of geometry, and the theology of Sidi-Khalil, until he emerges +in a few years a Thaleb, or lettered man. Perhaps the Thaleb may go +farther, and become an Adoul or notary, a Fekky or doctor, nay—who +knows?—an Alem or sage. Ah! how pleasant that Moorish squire might be +by his own ruddy fire of rushes, palm branches, and sun-dried leaves; +and what a profit he might make by judicious speculation in +jackal-skins, oil, pottery, carpets, and leather stained with the +pomegranate bark! He would have his mills turned by water<a name="page_114" id="page_114"></a> or by horses; +he would eat his bread with its liberal admixture of bran; he would rear +his storks and rams. The professors who charm snakes and munch +live-coals would all be hangers-on of his house; and he would have +periodical concerts by those five musicians who played such desert +lullabies for us—conspicuously one patriarch whose double-bass was made +from an orange-tree—and would not forget to supplement their honorarium +of five dollars with jorums of white wine. Sly special pleaders! They +argue with the German play-wright: "<i>Mahomet verbot den Wein, doch vom +Champagner sprach er nicht.</i>"</p> + +<p>From the Frenchman at the hotel, whose knowledge of Morocco was +"extensive and peculiar," I acquired much of my information on the +manners and customs of the people. Watches are only worn and looked at +for amusement. Instead of by hours, time is thus noted: El Adhen, an +hour before sunrise; Fetour (repast) el Hassoua, or sunrise; Dah el Aly, +ten in the morning; El Only, a quarter past twelve; El Dhoor, half-past +one; El Asser, from a quarter past three to a quarter to four; El +Moghreb,<a name="page_115" id="page_115"></a> sunset; El Achâ, half-an-hour after sunset; and El Hameir, +gun-shot. Meals are taken at Dah el Aly, El Asser, and El Moghreb. The +houses are built with elevated lateral chambers, but there is a narrow +staircase leading to the Doeria, a reception-room, where visitors can be +welcomed without passing the ground-floor. The walls are plastered, and +covered with arabesques or verses of the Koran incrusted in colours. The +wells inside the houses are only used for cleansing linen; water for +drinking purposes is sought outside.</p> + +<p>Among many singular customs—singular to us—I noted that a popular +remedy for illness is to play music and to recite prayers to scare away +the devil. An enlightened Moor might think the practices of the Peculiar +People quite as strange, and question the infallibility of cure-all +pills at thirteen-pence-halfpenny the box. The dead in Morocco are +hurried to their graves at a hand-gallop. That, I submit, is no more +unreasonable than many English funeral usages, such as incurring debt +for the pomp of mourning. At Moorish weddings the bride is carried in +procession in a palanquin to her husband's<a name="page_116" id="page_116"></a> house amid a <i>fantasia</i> of +gunpowder—the reckless rejoicing discharges of ancient muskets in the +streets. Well, white favours, gala coaches, and <i>feux de joie</i> at +marriages of the great are not entirely unknown among us. Nobody sees +the Moorish wife for a year, not even her mother-in-law, which I +consider a not wholly unkind dispensation. The Moorish wife paints her +toe-nails, which, after all, is a harmless vanity, and less obtrusive +than that of the ladies who impart artificial redness to their lips. +And, lastly, the Moorish wife waits on her husband. Personally, I fail +to discover anything blamable in that act, though I must concede that it +is eccentric, very eccentric. These allusions to the Moorish wife in +general lead up naturally to one in particular in whom I took a +professional interest, for she was as remarkable in her way as Lady +Ellenborough or Lady Hester Stanhope, or that strong-minded Irishwoman +who married the Moslem, Prince Izid Aly, and whose son reigned after his +father's death.</p> + +<p>The Shereef has been mentioned. He is the great man of the district, +with an authority only<a name="page_117" id="page_117"></a> second to that of the Sultan himself. Claiming +to be a lineal descendant of Mahomet, he is entitled to wear the green +turban. His name at full length is long, but not so long as that of most +Spanish Infantes—Abd-es-Selam ben Hach el Arbi. He is a saint and a +miracle-worker. He has been seen simultaneously at Morocco, Wazan, and +Tangier, according to the belief of his co-religionists, wherein he +beats the record of Sir Boyle Roche's bird, which was only in two places +at once. Like Jacob, he has wrestled with angels. He is head of the +Muley-Taib society, a powerful secret organization, which has its +ramifications throughout the Islamitic world. He draws fees from the +mosques, and has gifts bestowed upon him in profusion by his admirers, +who feel honoured when he accepts them. Exalted and wide-spreading is +his repute where the Moslem holds sway, and unassailable is his +orthodoxy, yet he has had the temerity to take to himself a Christian +wife. This lady had been a governess in an American family at Tangier. +There the Shereef made her acquaintance, wooed and won her. They were +married at the residence of the<a name="page_118" id="page_118"></a> British Minister Plenipotentiary; the +officers of a British man-of-war were present at the ceremony, and +slippers and a shower of rice, as at home, followed the bride on leaving +the building. The Shereef and, if possible, the Shereefa were personages +to be seen, and Mahomet Lamarty was the very man to help us to the +favour. His Highness lived four miles away, and we formed a cavalcade +one afternoon and set off for his garden, the ladies accompanying us. We +passed through cultivated fields of barley and <i>dra</i> (a kind of millet), +crossed the river Wadliahoodi, and ascended a road which faced abruptly +towards the hills. An agreeable road it was, and not lonesome; we had +the carol of birds and the piping of bull-frogs to lighten the way, and +leafy branches made reverence overhead. There were abundance of fruit +and such beautiful shrubs that I rail at myself for not being botanist +enough to be able to enlarge upon them. There were orange-groves, yellow +broom, dog-rose, and apples, pears, peaches, apricots, plums, +pomegranates, figs, and vines. It was such an oasis as a very young +Etonian in the warmth of a midsummer vaca<a name="page_119" id="page_119"></a>tion might have likened to +Heaven. The range of hills of El Jebel rose left and right, and at parts +presented a steep cliff to the ocean. This ridge is about twelve miles +in width, and its fertile slopes amply merit to be lauded as the best +fruit-producers in the empire, "as bounteous as Paradise itself."</p> + +<p>Mahomet Lamarty, who was our guide, entered the Shereef's grounds to +prepare for our introduction; and now the ladies, who had insisted on +coming with us, rebelled, and said point-blank they would not salute the +Shereefa as "Your Highness." They were impatient to see her, but they +declined to give countenance to a Christian who had demeaned herself by +wedding a heathen.</p> + +<p>"The visit was of your own seeking, ladies," I said; "if you are not +willing to treat Her Highness with deference, better stay outside."</p> + +<p>They were not equal to that sacrifice after riding four miles.</p> + +<p>"Who'll start the conversation?" said Captain No. 1. "You start it" (to +me) "like a good fellow, and I'll take up the running."<a name="page_120" id="page_120"></a></p> + +<p>Captain No. 2 said he would hang about for us outside.</p> + +<p>Mahomet beckoned to us and we ventured into the garden. Coming down a +pathway we saw an austere, swarthy, obese man of the middle height. He +was white-gloved, and wore a red fez, a sort of Zouave upper garment of +blue, with burnous, baggy trousers, white stockings, and Turkish +slippers. It was the Shereef. I had agreed to open the interview, but +when it came to the trial my Arabic (I had been only studying it for two +hours) abandoned me. Mahomet did the needful. I thanked His Highness for +his kindness in admitting us to his demesne, and he smiled a modest, +solemn smile, and looked greeting from his small eyes. When he +discovered that I had been travelling in Spain, he asked me—always +through Mahomet—what they were doing there. On having my reply—that +they were tasting the miseries of civil war—translated to him, he shook +his head, shrugged his shoulders, and slowly ejaculated:</p> + +<p>"Unhappy Spain! Silly, unfortunate people! That is the way with them +always. They are at perpetual strife one with another."<a name="page_121" id="page_121"></a></p> + +<p>And then Mahomet interposed with a parenthesis of his own depreciatory +of the Spaniards, whom he loathed and despised. He had fought against +them in the war of 1839-1860, and the Shereef had also headed his +countrymen, and had shown great courage and coolness in action. His +presence had infused a high spirit of enthusiasm into the undisciplined +troops.</p> + +<p>"Bismillah!" grunted Mahomet. "The Spaniard is beneath contempt. He was +almost licked in one battle. He was four months here, and how far did he +get into the interior?"</p> + +<p>Mahomet conveniently forgot the defeat of Guad-el-ras, the occupation of +Tetuan, and the indemnity of four hundred millions of reals which was +exacted as the price of peace; but he was literally correct, the +victorious O'Donnell did not flaunt his flag beyond a very exiguous +strip of the territory of Sidi-Muley-Mahomet.</p> + +<p>We were walking as we talked, and by this time had reached the brow of a +wooded rise which commanded an uninterrupted prospect of the ocean. The +flowery cistus flourished on the eminence, and<a name="page_122" id="page_122"></a> cork-trees, chestnuts, +and willows shielded us from the fierceness of the sun. Behind and +around were a succession of richly-planted gardens. We halted, and the +Shereef, scanning the horizon in the direction of the Rock, suddenly put +a question to me which almost took my breath away:</p> + +<p>"Do they buy commissions over the way still?"</p> + +<p>"No; that system has been abolished."</p> + +<p>"It is well," he remarked, with a scarcely suppressed sneer. "It was +incredible that a great nation and a fighting nation should make a +traffic of the command of men, as if a clump of spears were a kintal of +maize," and as he relapsed into silence a soldierly fire gleamed in his +irides, his frame seemed to straighten and swell, and the nature of the +prophet retired before that of the warrior.</p> + +<p>From where we stood we could ferret out a house with a veranda in front, +built on a terrace and begirt with trees. That was the residence of His +Highness; but we turned our eyes in another direction, lest we should be +suspected of rude curiosity by this courteous African. I was trying<a name="page_123" id="page_123"></a> to +divine the tally of years our host had numbered. No Arab knows his own +age, and here it may be useful to tell the reader wherein the +distinction lies between the Moor and the Arab. Virtually they are the +same; but the name of Moor is given to those who dwell in cities, of +Arab to those who roam the plains. Mahomet came to my aid. His Highness +had whiskers when Tangier was bombarded by Prince de Joinville. That was +in August, 1844, a good nine-and-twenty years before, so that +Abd-es-Salam must have long doubled the cape of forty, which would leave +him considerably the senior of his Frankish wife.</p> + +<p>We turned at a noise—the creak of a rustic wooden gate on its hinges; a +figure approached. And then it was given to me to gaze upon Her Highness +the Shereefa of Wazan. She was not called Zuleika, but Emily—her maiden +name had been Keene, and she came not from the rose-bordered bowers of +Bendemeer's stream, nightingale-haunted, but from the prosaic levels of +South London, where her father was governor of a gaol. Truly she was a +vision of gratefulness in that<a name="page_124" id="page_124"></a> paynim tract—a rich brunette, with +large black eyes, long black ringletted tresses, and a well-filled shape +with goodly bust. Her attire was neat and graceful and not Oriental. She +was clad in a riding-habit of ruby brocaded velvet, with jacket to +match, had a cloud of lace round her throat, and an Alpine hat with +cock's feather poised on her well-set head. She might serve as the model +for a Spanish Ann Chute. Bracelets on her plump wrists and rings on her +taper fingers caught the sunshine as she occasionally twirled her +cutting-whip. Her voice was bell-like and melodious, with the faintest +accent of decision, and her manner, after an opening flush of +embarrassment, was cordial and debonair. The embarrassment was because +of her inability to extend to us the hospitality she desired. She +explained that she had to receive us in the garden as the house was +undergoing repairs. After the customary commonplaces, she freely entered +into conversation, and took opportunity at once to deny that she was a +renegade; she wore European costume, as we saw, and attended the rites +of the English Church, for it was one of the stipulations<a name="page_125" id="page_125"></a> of the +marriage contract that she should have perfect liberty to follow her own +faith.</p> + +<p>"I wish every English girl were as happily married as I," she said, "and +had as loving a husband."</p> + +<p>It was gratifying, therefore, to note that she found herself as women +wish to be who love their lords. She had been married on the 27th of +January, and as the Shereef had entered into his present residence but +recently, they were still at sixes and sevens. It was his habit to spend +the winter in the country and the summer in town. She had been but two +years in Morocco, and had not yet mastered Arabic.</p> + +<p>"His Highness understands English?" She shook her head, and quickly +interpreting a lifting of my eyelids, she smilingly added, "Spanish was +the medium of our courtship." And then, as we promenaded the garden +path, she became communicative, and dwelt with pardonable expansion on +the virtues of her lord and master, who followed behind side by side +with the portly Yorkshireman. His charity, she said, was<a name="page_126" id="page_126"></a> unbounded. +Slaves were frequently sent to him as presents, but he kept none. He was +modest on his own merits, and yet he was the most enlightened of Moors. +He had visited Marseilles, a war-ship having been put at his disposal by +the French Government, and was most anxious to take a tour to Paris and +Vienna, and above all to England. It was his desire that railways should +be constructed in Morocco, and he was glad when he was told that there +was some likelihood of a telegraph cable being laid to Tangier.</p> + +<p>"Then," interrupted I, "with your Highness's influence on the tribes +around, exercised through your husband, there should be a fair prospect +of pushing civilization here."</p> + +<p>"Ah, yes!" she exclaimed, with a glow on her cheeks, "that is one of my +dearest hopes, that is my great ambition. I believe that my marriage, +which has been cruelly commented upon in England, may effect good both +for these poor misunderstood Moors and my own country people."</p> + +<p>"Is the Shereef on friendly terms with the Sultan?"<a name="page_127" id="page_127"></a></p> + +<p>"No, I am sorry to say there is a feud between them at the moment. The +Sultan objects to my husband for using an English saddle."</p> + +<p>"Hum!" (to myself mentally) "if the august Muley cannot brook an English +saddle, what must he think of an English wife? Or do these Moslems, like +some Christians I know, strain at a gnat and swallow a camel? Mayhap it +is even so. The pigeon-prompted camel-driver, who built up his creed +with plentiful blood-cement, saw fit to add a new chapter to the Koran, +when he fell in love with the Coptic maiden, Mary."</p> + +<p>The Shereefa told me that her father and mother had come out to see her. +They were averse to the alliance at first, but were satisfied that she +had done the right thing when she told them how content she was, and +with what high-bred consideration for her wishes in the matter of +religion her husband had behaved. Their intention was to stop for four +days, but they extended their visit to fourteen. "And now," she +continued, "I can use to my lord the words of Ruth to Naomi, 'Whither +thou goest I will go; and where thou lodgest I will<a name="page_128" id="page_128"></a> lodge; thy people +shall be my people'"—a pause—"yes, and 'thy God my God,' for there is +but one"—archly—"the matter of the Prophet we shall leave aside."</p> + +<p>I admired the lady's pluck, and if I were that Moorish squire I have +tried to sketch, I should esteem it an honour to have her on my visiting +list. But I am a theological oddity, and my wallet of prejudices, it is +to be feared, is sadly unfurnished. I never could rise to that +sublimated self-sufficiency of intellect that I could consign any +fellow-creature to everlasting pains for the audacity of differing in +dogma with myself. I have met good and bad of every creed, Mahometans I +could respect—whose word was their bond—and so-called Christians and +Christian ministers with a most uncharitable spiritual pride, whom I +could not respect. The liver of the persecutor was denied me. Were the +fires of Smithfield to be rekindled, my prayers would be sent up for the +floods of Heaven to quench them, and for the lightnings of Heaven to +annihilate the fiends who had piled the faggots.</p> + +<p>"By-the-bye," said the Shereefa, "do you know<a name="page_129" id="page_129"></a> any of those people who +write for the papers in London?"</p> + +<p>I admitted that I had that misfortune.</p> + +<p>"Some of them are fools as well as cowards," she went on. "They have +written articles about me full of ignorance and malice. Have they no +consideration for the feelings of others?"</p> + +<p>"I am afraid, your Highness, some of them are more brilliant than +conscientious; they would rather point an epigram than sacrifice style +to truth or good-nature."</p> + +<p>"One of them in particular," she said, and there was an irritated ring +in her voice, "has singled me out for attack, and given me in derision a +name which he believes to be Mahometan, but which is really Jewish."</p> + +<p>And with her cutting-whip she viciously snapped off the heads of some +poppies. The episode of Tarquin's answer to the emissary of Sextus +occurred to me, and I felt that if my colleague, Horace St. J——, were +there, he would have passed a very bad quarter of an hour.</p> + +<p>The females of our party joined us, and I formally<a name="page_130" id="page_130"></a> presented them, +taking a malicious pleasure in emphasizing the "your Highness." The +Shereefa received them right graciously, but it was easy to notice that +a chill came over the conversation. They were careful never to use the +title to their English sister. In fact, it was a tacit ladies' battle.</p> + +<p>It was time to leave, and the Shereefa presented her visitors with two +nosegays, gathered by her own hands. The act had in it something very +royal, with the smallest trace of sly condescension. The Shereef +accompanied us to the outer gate. On the way I motioned to Captain No. 1 +to offer him a cigar. He did; his Highness accepted it, bowed, and +gravely put it in his pocket. As we stood on the road at parting, a +peasant was passing with a load of twigs on his shoulders. He cast them +off, threw himself on his knees, kissed the hem of the holy man's +garments, and the back of his proffered hand.</p> + +<p>We were descending the hill when a rustle in the bushes attracted me, +and a white face peeped out and a voice besought me in English to stop. +It<a name="page_131" id="page_131"></a> was the Shereefa's London lady's-maid. She could not resist the +temptation of enjoying a few sentences with one of her own race. From +her I learned that there were twenty-seven Moorish women in her master's +household; that there was a tank at Wazan large enough to float a ship; +that her master had been married before, and had two sons and a lovely +Mahometan child, a daughter, to whom the Shereefa was teaching English +and the piano; "but remember, please," and here she grew important, and +had all the dignity of a retainer, with a great sense of what was due to +her caste and the proprieties, "that my mistress's children, if she have +any, will be Europeans!"</p> + +<p>As we got back to our hotel the muezzins were summoning the faithful to +their vesper orisons, and Albert was moaning ruefully under the +sideboard. Mrs. Captain had out her sweetly pretty pet at once, and +covered him with caresses and endearments.</p> + +<p>"Somebody has given him something that has disagreed with him. Was it +you?" she said to me, and there was that in her tone which made me quake +in my shoes.<a name="page_132" id="page_132"></a></p> + +<p>Meekly and truthfully I protested that I had not; I had fed him in the +morning in her own presence; the darling was in his usual health and +spirits when we left, but—intercede for me, Puck, and you aerial imps +of mischief, for no other spirit will—I could not help murmuring in +audible soliloquy, "The carcase of that mongoose, which was on the +square outside this morning, is no longer there."</p> + +<p>The scene that followed, to borrow the hackneyed phrase, beggars +description. The house was turned upside down; to my mental vision arose +sal volatile and burnt feathers, swoons and hysterics. Mahomet's dove +alone can tell how all might have ended had not the Frenchman suggested +a bolus. Captain No. 1 and I were commissioned to inquire into the +mystery of the disappearance of that baleful mongoose. When we got out +of earshot of the hotel there was the popping of a cork, and we emptied +effervescing beakers to the speedy recovery of Albert the Beloved. +Certes, that bull-dog had a very bad fit of dyspepsia; but the bolus did +him a world of good, and before we retired to<a name="page_133" id="page_133"></a> rest we had the felicity +to hear him crunching a bone. Peace spread its wings over our pillows.</p> + +<p>The next day we took a trip to the lighthouse on Cape Spartel, the women +labouring in the field making curious inspection of the cavalcade as it +wended by, but quickly turning away their faces as we males tried to +snatch a look at them. The road was no better than a rugged track on a +stony plateau. There was a spacious view from the Phare, which was an +iron and stone building put up at the cost of three or four of the +European Powers (I forget which now), the keepers being chosen from each +of the contributory nations. The Sultan had given the site, but refused +to hand over a blankeel towards the expenses, arguing that as he had no +fleet, he had no personal object in making provision against wrecks. We +were well mounted, but these Barbary cattle have a nasty trick of +lashing out, so that it is prudent to give a wide range to their +hind-hoofs. Mahomet, riding with very short stirrups, led the party. My +saddle was an ancient, rude, and rotten contrivance, and as I loitered +on the road home, giving myself up to idle fantasy,<a name="page_134" id="page_134"></a> my friends got on +far ahead. Waking from my day-dream I gave the nag the heel, and as it +sprang forward at a canter the girth turned completely round, and I was +pitched over in unpleasant nearness to a hedge of cactus. The ground was +soft, and I was not much bruised; but when I rose the nag had +disappeared round a corner, and I was left alone in the African +twilight. Presently a sinewy fiery-eyed Moor came with panther-step in +sight leading me back the nag. He had a basket of oranges on his back, +and gave me one with a respectful salaam as I vaulted on my Arab steed +and galloped Tangier-ward bareback.</p> + +<p>Judging from the scanty rags upon him, this man was of the poorest, yet +he asked for nothing; there were sympathy, innate politeness and +independence withal in his bearing. To him I abandoned the saddle; it +was the least he might have for his friendly act. Talking over this +incident with the Frenchman at Bruzeaud's, who knew the country, he told +me that the Moor was intelligent, honest, faithful to his engagements, +and had a go in him that, under advantageous circumstances,<a name="page_135" id="page_135"></a> would +enable him to spring again to his former height of power and riches. But +he struck me as happy, although some of his social customs recalled the +feudal age, and he lived under the always-present contingency of +decapitation. May it be long before speculation rears the horrid front +of a joint-stock hotel in Tangier, or the prospectors go divining for +copper, coal, iron, silver and gold. I could wish the Moorish women, +however, would wash their children's heads occasionally, and not take +them up by the ankles when they spank them. After a sojourn in every way +pleasurable—pshaw! Albert's illness was a trifle, and we soon resigned +ourselves to the miseries of the prisoners on the hill—we ate our last +morsel of the Jewish pasch-bread of flour and juice of orange, cracked +our last bottle of champagne, and took our leave of the Dark Continent +with lightsome heart. The impression this little by-journey left upon me +was so agreeable that I could not avoid the enticement to communicate it +to the reader. If I have wandered from romantic Spain, it was only to +take him to a land more romantic still.<a name="page_136" id="page_136"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h3> + +<p class="head">Back to Gibraltar—The Parting with Albert—The Tongue of +Scandal—Voyage to Malaga—"No Police, no Anything"—Federalism +Triumphant—Madrid <i>in Statu Quo</i>—Orense—Progress of the +Royalists—On the Road Home—In the Insurgent Country—Stopped by +the Carlists—An Angry Passenger is Silenced.</p> + +<p>"How like a boulder tossed by Titans at play!" said the sentimental +lady, as we approached Gibraltar on our return.</p> + +<p>"More like a big-sized molar tooth," broke in Mrs. Captain.</p> + +<p>And, indeed, this latter simile, if less poetic, gave a better idea of +the conformation of the fortified hill, with the gum-coloured outline of +all that was left of a Moorish wall skirting its side. The tooth is +hollow, but the hollow is plugged with the best Woolwich stuffing, and +potentially it can bite and grind and macerate, for all the peaceful +gardens and frescades<a name="page_137" id="page_137"></a> of the Alameda that circle its base like a belt +of faded embroidery. At Gibraltar our party separated, the Yorkshire +Captain and his friends taking the P. and O. boat to Southampton, my +countryman going back to Tangier after having made some purchases, and I +electing to voyage to Malaga by one of Hall's packets, which was lying +at the mercantile Mole discharging the two hundred tons of Government +material which it is obliged to carry by contract on each fortnightly +voyage. When Albert and I parted no tears were shed; we resigned +ourselves to the decree of destiny with equanimity. But I humbly submit +that Mrs. Captain, when thanking me for my good intentions towards him, +might have spared me the ironical advice not to volunteer for duties in +future which I was not qualified to fulfil. "Volunteer," ye gods! when +she had absolutely entreated me to take him in charge.</p> + +<p>Before leaving the Club-House, I was pressed to relate our adventures in +Africa. I had no pig-sticking exploits to make boast over; but I turned +the deaf side of my head to certain<a name="page_138" id="page_138"></a> whispers about holy men who +imported wine in casks labelled "Petroleum," who affected to be +delivering the incoherent messages of inspiration when they were merely +trying to pronounce "The scenery is truly rural" in choice Arabic, and +who accounted for the black eye contracted by collision with the kerb by +a highly-coloured narrative of an engagement in mid-air with an emissary +of Sheitan. Neither did I accord any pleased attention to anecdotes of a +"lella," or Arab lady, who tempted the Scorpions to charge ten times its +value for everything she bought by telling them to send them to a +personage whose title was exalted. Gib is a very small place, and, like +most diminutive communities, is a veritable school for scandal. I took +my last walk over the Rock, past the "Esmeralda Confectionery," which +still had up the notice that hot-cross buns were to be had from seven to +ten a.m. on Good Friday, and paced to the light-house on the nose of the +promontory, where the meteor flag, ringed by a bracelet of cannon, flies +in the breeze. And then I meandered back, and began to ask myself, had<a name="page_139" id="page_139"></a> +Marryat aught to do with the sponsorship of this outpost of the British +Empire? Shingle Point, Blackstrap Bay, the Devil's Tower, O'Hara's +Folly, Bayside Barrier, and Jumper's Bastion—the names were all +redolent of the Portsmouth Hard; and I almost anticipated a familiar +hail at every moment from the open door of "The Nut," and an inquiry as +to what cheer from the fog-Babylon.</p> + +<p>The trip to Malaga on one of the Hall steamers which trade regularly +between London and that port, calling at Cadiz and Gibraltar, was very +agreeable, and the change to such dietary as liver and bacon was a +treat. We were but three passengers—a steeple-chasing sub of the 71st, +Señor Heredia, of Malaga, and myself. And now I have to make an open +confession. I am unable to decipher the log of that passage. I have a +distinct recollection of the liver and bacon, but more important events +have worn away from my mind. There are the traces of pencil-marks before +me; I dare say they were full of meaning when I scrawled them down, but +now I have lost the key. "Jolly captain—left<a name="page_140" id="page_140"></a> his wife—forty +years—electric light deceives on a low beach—fourteen children—El +Cano—break in the head of wine-casks": there is a literal copy of the +contents of a page, which may mean nothing or anything, frivolity or a +thesaurus of serious information. Memory, what a treacherous jade thou +art! It may be said, why did I not take copious notes in short-hand? I +would have done so were I a stenographer; but I am not. I tried to +acquire the accomplishment once, and ignobly failed. I could write +short-hand slightly quicker than long-hand, but when written, I could +not transcribe my jottings.</p> + +<p>Flanking a beautiful coast, mostly hill-fringed—with hills, too, of +such metallic richness that lead and iron were positively to be quarried +out of their bosoms—we steamed into the harbour of Malaga, and landed +at the Custom-House quay. But there were no Customs' officers to trouble +us with inquiry. A red-bearded, flat-capped, dirty fellow in bare feet, +holding a bayoneted rifle with a jaunty clumsiness, accosted Señor +Heredia with a laughing voice. He was a sentinel of the provisional +government<a name="page_141" id="page_141"></a> established in Malaga. The nature of that government may be +judged from his frank avowal: "We've no police—no anything." There were +French and German war-vessels at anchor, which was some guarantee of +protection for strangers. A novel tricolour of red, white, and a +washed-out purple had replaced the national flag. The Federal Republic +existed there, and yet the city was quiet; and official bulletins were +extant, recommending the citizens to preserve order. But this quietude +was not to be relied on over-much. One of the magnificoes under the new +<i>régime</i> was a dancing-house keeper, and his principal claim to +administrative ability lay in the ownership of a Phrygian cap. Another, +who styled himself President of the Republic of Alhaurin de la Torre, a +territory more limited than the kingdom of Kippen, had stabbed a lady at +a masked ball a few months previously, for a consideration of sixty-five +duros. Still, it would be unfair to infer from that example that every +Malagueño was a mercenary ruffian, Señor Heredia related to me an +anecdote of a poor man who had found a purse with value in it to the +amount of<a name="page_142" id="page_142"></a> thirty thousand reals, and had given it up without mention of +recompense. But a city where the wine-shops had nine doors, and +potato-gin was dispensed at a peseta the bottle, and there were "no +police—no anything," was not a desirable residence; and, as I had no +call there, and weeks might elapse before another revolution might be +sprung, I gladly took train to the capital.</p> + +<p>Madrid was tranquil, but with no more confidence in the duration of +tranquillity than when I left it. The army was still in a state akin to +disruption, with this difference—the rascals who had rifled the pockets +of the dead Ibarreta a few weeks before, would sell the bodies of their +slain officers now, if there was any resurrectionist near to make a bid. +Worse; I was given to understand that there were suspicions that the +gallant staff-colonel had been shot by his own men. The dismissed +gunners were still wearily beating the pavements, and a subscription +organized on their behalf among the officers of the other branches of +the service by the <i>Correo Militar</i> was open. What were these gentlemen +to do? There was a<a name="page_143" id="page_143"></a> rumour that they had been invited to enter the +French service, to which they would have been an undoubted acquisition, +bringing with them skill, scientific knowledge, and experience. But they +were Spaniards, not soldiers of fortune, and would decline to transfer +their allegiance, even if France were disposed to bid for it. Still, what +were they to do? In Spain as in Austria—</p> + +<p class="poem"> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"Le militaire n'est pas riche,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">Chacun salt ça."</span><br /> +</p> + +<p>But the <i>militaire</i> must live. Othello's occupation being gone, the +artillery officers had no alternative but to do what Othello would have +done had he been a Spaniard—conspire.</p> + +<p>The usual manœuvring and manipulations were going on as preparation +for the election of the Constituent Cortes, and the extreme Republicans +were full of faith in their approaching triumph all along the line. They +were awaiting Señor Orense, but if he did not hasten it was thought +events so important would eclipse his arrival that, when he did come, +the Madrileños would pay as small heed to him as the Parisians did to +Hugo when he sur<a name="page_144" id="page_144"></a>veyed the boulevards anew after years of exile. They +would honour him with a procession, and no more. The venerable +Republican, by the way, is a nobleman, Marquis of Albaida. But he is not +equal to the democratic pride of Mirabeau, marquis, who took a shop and +painted on the signboard, "<i>Mirabeau, marchand de draps.</i>"</p> + +<p>"If you are a true Republican, why don't you renounce your title?" +somebody asked once of Orense.</p> + +<p>"If it were only myself was concerned I would willingly," responded the +Spaniard; "but I have a son!" Rousseau was a freethinker, but Rousseau +had his daughters baptized all the same.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile the Carlists were making headway. The Vascongadas, Navarre, +and Logroño, with the exception of the larger towns and isolated +fortified posts, were now in their power. Antonio Dorregaray, who was in +supreme command, was reported to have 3,200 men regularly organized, +well clad, and equipped with Remingtons. The Remington had been selected +so that the Royalists might be able to use the ammunition they reckoned +upon<a name="page_145" id="page_145"></a> helping themselves with from the pouches of the Nationalists. In +addition to this force of 3,200, which might be regarded as the regular +army of Carlism, there were formidable guerrilla bands scattered over +the provinces. Our old acquaintance, Santa Cruz, had 900 followers in +Guipúzcoa. The other cabecillas in that region were Francisco, Macazaga, +Garmendia, Iturbe, and Culetrina, all men with local popularity and +intimate knowledge of the mountains. In Biscay, the commander was +Valesco, and his lieutenants were Belaustegui, del Campo, and the +Marquis de Valdespina, son of the chieftain who raised the standard of +revolution at Vitoria in 1833. Their factions were estimated at 2,500. +After Dorregaray, the most dangerous opponent to the Government troops +was Ollo, an old ex-army officer, who was licking the volunteers into +shape; and after Santa Cruz, the most noted and dreaded chief of +irregulars was Rada, who was also operating in "the kingdom," as their +province is proudly called by the daring Navarrese. The elements in +which the Royalists were wanting were cavalry and artillery;<a name="page_146" id="page_146"></a> but they +had some money, foreign friends were active, the French frontier was not +too strictly watched nor the Cantabrian coast inaccessible, and Don +Carlos—Pretender or King, as the reader chooses to call him—was biding +his time in a villa not a hundred miles from Bayonne. When the hour was +considered favourable, he was ready to cross the border and take the +field, or rather the hills; and his presence, it was calculated, would +be worth a <i>corps d'armée</i> in the fillip it would give to the enthusiasm +of his adherents.</p> + +<p>And yet the "only court" held its tertulias, and the doñas talked +millinery, and bald politicians sighed for a snug post in the +Philippines, and the gambling-tables and the bull-ring retained their +spell upon the community. It was the old story: Rome was on the verge of +ruin, and the senate of Tiberius discussed a new sauce for turbot.</p> + +<p>As I saw no immediate prospect of the outburst of those important +events, which were cloud-gathering over Madrid, and nearly all my +colleagues had departed, I resolved to pursue my journey to London. I +had <i>carte blanche</i> to return when I<a name="page_147" id="page_147"></a> deemed there was no further scope +for my pen; but there was an obstacle in the way. Miranda was the +terminus of the rail to the north; the track thence to the Bidassoa had +been closed by order of the lieutenants of his Majesty <i>in nubibus</i>, +King Charles VII. In other words, 179 kilometres of the main iron line, +the great artery of communication with France, were held by the +insurgents. Obstacles are made to be met, and, if steadily met, to be +overcome. Surely, I reasoned, there must be some intercourse carried on +in these districts. I passed through territory occupied by Carlists +before. Why not again? Besides, I had nothing to fear from the Carlists, +the tramp carols in the presence of the footpad (which, I submit, is a +neat paraphrase of a classic saw); and if I did chance to meet them, +there would be that dear touch of romance for which the lady-reader has +been looking out so long in vain.</p> + +<p>I started. The journey to Miranda I pass by. One is not qualified to +write an essay on a country from inspection through the windows of a +railway-carriage in motion, more particularly at night.<a name="page_148" id="page_148"></a> As well attempt +to describe a veiled panorama, unrolling itself at a hand-gallop. At +Miranda, which was crowded with soldiers, there was a diligence that +plied to San Sebastian by tacit arrangement with the knights of the +road—that is, the adherents of Don Carlos. As the fares were very +expensive, I suspect the speculator who ran the coach was heavily taxed +for the privilege, and recouped himself by shifting the imposition to +the shoulders of passengers. The day was fine, the roads were good, the +vehicle was well-horsed, and we got away from the boundary of republican +civilization at a rattling pace. My fellow-voyagers were mostly French, +some of them of the gentle sex, and chattered like pies until they fell +asleep. I believe it is admitted by those who know me best that I can do +my own share of sleep. On the slightest provocation—yea, on what might +be condemned as no reasonable provocation—I can drop my head upon my +breast and go off into oblivion. Nor am I particular where I sit or if I +sit at all. Any ordinary person can fall asleep on a sofa or at a +sermon, but it requires a practitioner with an<a name="page_149" id="page_149"></a> inborn faculty for the +art to achieve the triumphs of somnolence which stand to my credit. I +have taken a nap on horseback; I have marched for miles, a musket on my +shoulder, in complete slumberous unconsciousness; I have nodded while +Phelps was acting, snoozed while Mario was singing, and played the +marmot while Remenyi was fiddling; awful confession, I have dozed +through an important debate in the House of Commons! I am yawning at +present. It is to be hoped the reader is not. And so I burned daylight +the while we drove through a country reputed to be pregnant with +surprises of scenery until, at long last, the diligence drew up in the +straggling street of Tolosa. We halted here for dinner, and resumed our +journey with a fresh team at an enlivening speed, until about two miles +outside the town we came to an abrupt stop.</p> + +<p>"An accident, driver?"</p> + +<p>"No, señor, but the Carlists."</p> + +<p>Some of my fellow-passengers turned pale, the ladies did not know +whether to scream or consult their smelling-bottles; and before they +could decide,<a name="page_150" id="page_150"></a> a tall, slight, gentlemanly-looking man of some +four-and-twenty years, with a sword by his side, a revolver in his belt, +an opera-glass slung across his shoulder, and a silver tassel depending +from a scarlet boina, the cap of the country, appeared at the hinder +door of the diligence, bowed, and asked for our papers. He glanced at +them much as a railway-guard would at a set of tickets, inquired if we +were carrying any arms or contraband despatches, and being answered in +the negative, gave us a polite "Go you with God," and motioned to the +driver that he might pass on. As we galloped off, all eyes were turned +in the direction of the stranger; he leisurely walked over a field +towards a hill, two peasants equipped with rifles and side-arms +following at his heels. They were young and strong, and wore no nearer +approach to uniform than their officer.</p> + +<p>"This is abominable," cried a French commercial traveller (so I took him +to be), as soon as we had got out of hearing of the trio. "The notion of +these three miscreants stopping a whole coachful of travellers in broad +daylight is atrocious!"<a name="page_151" id="page_151"></a></p> + +<p>"They did not detain us long," said I.</p> + +<p>"They did us no harm," said another.</p> + +<p>"And that officer, I am sure, was very polite, and looked quite a +D'Artagnan—so chivalrous and handsome," added one of the ladies.</p> + +<p>"They are no better than bandits," said the commercial traveller. +"Driver, why did you not resist?"</p> + +<p>For reply, the driver pointed with his whip to a wall, under the lee of +which a party of at least fifty armed men, portion of the main body from +which the outpost of three had been detached, were smoking, chatting, or +sleeping. The commercial traveller relapsed into silence. We met with no +further adventure in our ride to the frontier, but experienced much +fatigue.<a name="page_152" id="page_152"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h3> + +<p class="head">On the Wing—Ordered to the Carlist Headquarters—Another <i>Petit +Paris</i>—Carlists from Cork—How Leader was Wounded—Beating-up for +an Anglo-Irish Legion—Pontifical Zouaves—A Bad Lot—Oddities of +Carlism—Santa Cruz Again—Running a Cargo—On Board a Carlist +Privateer—A Descendant of Kings—"Oh, for an Armstrong Twenty-Four +Pounder!"—Crossing the Border—A Remarkable Guide—Mountain +Scenery—In Navarre—Challenged at Vera—Our Billet with the Parish +Priest—The Sad Story of an Irish Volunteer—Dialogue with Don +Carlos—The Happy Valley—Bugle-Blasts—The <a name="page_viii" id="page_viii"></a>Writer in a +Quandary—The Fifth Battalion of Navarre—The Distribution of +Arms—The Bleeding Heart—Enthusiasm of the Chicos.</p> + +<p class="nind">A<span class="smcap">fter</span> a short stay in London I was despatched to Stockholm, to attend +the coronation of Oscar II of Sweden and his spouse, which took place in +the Storkyrkan, on the 12th of May. At the Hotel Rydberg I met my Madrid +acquaintance, Mr. Russell Young, who was a bird of passage like<a name="page_153" id="page_153"></a> myself, +and had just arrived from Vienna, where he had been detailing the +ceremonial at the opening of the International Exhibition in the Prater. +While enjoying myself at a ball at the Norwegian Minister's, I received +a telegraphic message, ordering me at once to the Austrian capital. I +was very sorry to leave, for I was delighted with peaceful airy +Stockholm and the free-hearted Swedes—it was such a change after Spain; +but I had neither license nor leisure to grumble, and flitted to Vienna +as fast as steam could carry me. The Weltausstellung did not prove to be +a lodestone, although in justice it must be admitted it was one of the +finest shows ever planned, and was fixed in one of the most agreeable of +sites. It was too far away, however, to attract the British public, and +there were rumours of cholera lurking in the Kaiserstadt; so I was +recalled, but to be sent to Spain once more. My mission was to +penetrate, if possible, to the headquarters of the Carlists, with the +view of giving a fair and full report of the strength, peculiarities, +and prospects of their movement.<a name="page_154" id="page_154"></a></p> + +<p>At the London office of the sympathizers with the cause I was furnished +with the address of certain Carlists in confidential positions in +France, and letters were sent on in advance, so as to secure me a +favourable reception. Armed with a sheet of flimsy stamped in blue with +the escutcheon of Charles VII., and the legend "Secretaria Militar de +Lóndres," and with, what was more potent, a big credit on a +banking-house, I started afresh on the now familiar route.</p> + +<p>Before undertaking the journey into the territory in revolt I halted at +Bayonne to procure the necessary passes. These were obtained with ease +from the Junta sitting in the Rue des Ecoles, the members of which +professed that they desired nothing so much as the presence of the +representatives of impartial foreign journals, so that the truth about +the struggle should be made known to the rest of Europe. From Bayonne I +proceeded to Biarritz, where I had a conference with the Duke de La +Union de Cuba, a warm Carlist partisan, to whom I had an introduction, +and thence I went to St. Jean de Luz, a drowsy, quaint, world-<a name="page_155" id="page_155"></a>forgotten +nook. A <i>petit Paris</i> it was called in a vaunting quatrain by some +minstrel of yore. But Brussels may be comforted. It is nothing of the +kind, but something infinitely better. The breezes from the main and the +mountains, from the Bay of Biscay and the Pyrenees, conspire to supply +it with ozone. There is music in the boom of the surf as it pulsates +regularly on the velvet sands of a semicircular inlet, where dogs frisk +and youngsters gambol in the sunshine.</p> + +<p>In a hotel on the edge of that inlet, the Fonda de la Playa, where I put +up, a young Irish gentleman named Leader was recuperating from a severe +wound in the leg. He had received it in the service of Don Carlos, in a +skirmish near Azpeitia, where he was the only man hit. He was out with a +party of the guerrilleros, and came across a company of the Madrid +troops. To encourage his own people, or rather the people with whom he +had cast in his fortunes, he went well to the front, and mounting on a +bank of earth, hurled defiance at the enemy. He was picked down by a +stray shot, and if he had been taken prisoner it is pro<a name="page_156" id="page_156"></a>bable that he +would have paid for his temerity with his life. The Spaniards were not +clement towards foreigners who interposed in their domestic quarrel. +Leader was carried off by his companions and secreted in a peasant's +hut. The troops, swearing vengeance, searched the hut next to it, but, +by some accident, failed to continue the quest to the refuge of the +wounded man. He bled profusely, but the hæmorrhage was finally arrested +by some rude bandaging, and at night he was helped astride a donkey, and +conveyed across the frontier into France. He told me he had suffered +excruciating torments at every jolt of the jog-trotting animal on that +mountain journey. Had the bullet struck him an inch higher he would have +had to suffer amputation; but his luck stood to him, and at the time we +met he was getting on fairly towards recovery, thanks to youth, a good +constitution, and the healthy air of St. Jean de Luz. I could not +understand the ardour of Leader's partisanship for the Carlists. He +spoke the merest smattering of Spanish, and had no profound intimacy +with the vexed question of Spanish politics or the rights of<a name="page_157" id="page_157"></a> the rival +Spanish houses. The ill-natured whispered that he was crying "Viva la +República" when he was knocked over. It is possible, for he had fought +for the French Republic with Bourbaki's army, and may, in his +excitement, have forgotten under what flag he was serving. I take it he +was a soldier by instinct, and ranged himself on the side of Don Carlos +more from the love of adventure than from any other motive. He was a +fine athletic young fellow, with a handsome determined cast of features. +He had been an ensign in the 30th Foot, and had resigned his commission +to enjoy a spell of active service when the Franco-German war was +proclaimed. That he had behaved bravely in the campaign which led to +internment in Switzerland was evidenced by the ribbon of the Legion of +Honour which he wore. Leader was very anxious that an Anglo-Irish legion +in aid of Don Carlos should be organized. I felt it my duty to warn +those to whom he appealed to think twice before they embarked on such a +crusade. He was very wroth with me for having thrown cold water on the +project, but that did<a name="page_158" id="page_158"></a> not affect me. I had more experience of such +follies than he, and my conscience approved me. A man may be justified +in playing with his own life, but he should be slow in playing with the +lives of others. He prepares a vexing responsibility for himself if he +is sensitive.</p> + +<p>In the next room to Leader was a fellow-enthusiast, Mr. Smith Sheehan, +an ex-officer of Pontifical Zouaves, and son of a popular and eccentric +town-councillor of Cork. He was an agile stripling, skilled in all +gymnastic exercises. He had also done some fighting with the Carlists, +and was in France on furlough, which the soldiers in the Royalist force +appeared to have no insuperable difficulty in getting. He told me there +was a large infusion of his old regiment amongst the guerrilleros, and +that they helped to bind the partisan levies in the withes of +discipline. Most of them had smelt gunpowder at Mentana and Patay. The +famous cabecilla, Saballs, had been a captain at Rome, and Captain +Wills, a Dutchman, who had been killed in a brush at Igualada, had been +sergeant-major in Sheehan's company.<a name="page_159" id="page_159"></a></p> + +<p>There was another ex-British officer of short service, who had a +remarkably imposing and well-cultivated growth of moustache. He was a +violent doctrinaire Carlist, but suffered from a chronic malady which +prevented him from taking the field; still there was none who could plot +with a more tremendous air of mystery. He was a Carlist because it was +"the correct thing" to be one in the fashionable ring at St. Jean de +Luz, where he had settled, and because he inherited a name associated +with chivalric insurrection. For the sake of his family I shall call him +Barbarossa. He was no honour to his house, for he was an inveterate +gambler, and was not careful in discharging the obligations he wantonly +contracted. He is dead. His death was no loss to society. In fact, if +the whole host of gamblers, lock, stock and barrel, were swept by a +fairy-blast to the regions of thick-ribbed ice, the world would be the +gainer.</p> + +<p>When I left Spain, Carlism was to be put down in a fortnight—in Madrid. +Now it threatened to last as long as a Chinese play. The Royalists—I +suppose they had earned the title to be so named<a name="page_160" id="page_160"></a> by their +perseverance—had achieved numerous small successes which had raised +their <i>morale</i>, and they were being supplied with arms of precision from +abroad, and trained to their use. They had even taken some mountain-guns +from their enemy. Leader made me laugh with his accounts of Lizarraga +shouting "Artillería al frente!" and a couple of mules, with one +wretched little piece, moving forward; and of the intimidating clatter +made by three shrunk cavaliers in cuirasses a world too wide for them, +and alpargatas, trotting up a village street. The alpargata is the +mountain-shoe of canvas, with a hempen sole, worn by the Basque +peasants. The association of surcoats of mail and rope slippers is +incongruous; but what does that reck? Those cuirasses were <i>spolia +opima</i>.</p> + +<p>And Santa Cruz?</p> + +<p>The honest gentleman had retired into private life. His excesses had +raised such a storm of opprobrium against the Carlists that they had to +request him to desist. Lizarraga summoned him to render himself up a +prisoner. "Come and take<a name="page_161" id="page_161"></a> me," replied Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz had near +two thousand followers; Lizarraga a few hundred. Lizarraga declined the +invitation. But the priest caused seven-and-twenty Carabineros, taken +prisoners at the bridge of Endarlasa, near Irun, to be shot, and this +filled the cup to overflowing. The Carlists averred they would slay him; +the Republicans vowed they would garrote him for a Madrid holiday; the +French Government declared its intention of putting him under lock and +key if it caught him within its jurisdiction. His band was disarmed "by +order of the King," and dispersed, and the Cura himself nebulously +vanished—whither we may see anon.</p> + +<p>There was a large accretion to the population of St. Jean de Luz in +Iberian refugees, and as they sat and conversed under the foliage of the +public promenade, frequent sighs might be overheard, and remarks that if +this sort of thing were to go on, "Spain would soon be in as bad a +condition as France." At all hours there came to the beach poor exiles +of Spain, who turned their eyes sadly to the line where sky met ocean. +Of what were their<a name="page_162" id="page_162"></a> thoughts—of home and friends, of the flutters of +the casino or the ecstasies of the bull-ring? If they were looking for +the Spanish fleet they did not see it, for a reason as old as the +"Critic." It was not in sight. They came down in numbers in front of my +hotel at nine o'clock on the morning of Monday, July 28th, a few days +after my arrival, when a strange yellow funnel turned the point, and a +long low Red-Roverish three-masted schooner-yacht steamed into Socoa, +the roadstead of St. Jean de Luz. If the exiles were correctly informed, +that was the Spanish fleet in a sense—the notorious Carlist privateer, +the <i>San Margarita</i>, which had recently landed arms and ammunition for +the Royalists at Lequeieto and elsewhere. She had been doing a stroke of +business in the same line that morning. In the grey dawn she had dropped +into the embouchure of the Bidassoa, at a few hundred yards from the +town of Fontarabia. The work was well and quickly done. Boats +requisitioned by friends on land put off to her, and returned laden with +bales of merchandise. These artless bales were packages of +breechloaders, with bayonets to match,<a name="page_163" id="page_163"></a> wrapped in sail-cloth. As soon +as they were received on shore they were distributed amongst some +thousands of Carlists in waiting, who at once proceeded to fix bayonets, +fall into ranks, and with shouts of exultation march off in good order.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile, the "volunteers of liberty," as the Basque Republicans called +themselves, ensconced their persons out of range in a sort of castle +beside the church of Fontarabia's "wooded height," and amused themselves +taking pot-shots at the rising sun. But they did not venture from their +shelter; they knew a large body of armed Royalists were watching their +movements from the summit of Cape Higuer, and only awaited the provoke +to pounce down upon and swallow them. A detachment of Frenchmen from the +frontier hamlet of Hendaye quietly took up ground on the strand to see +that there was no breach of neutrality, and had an uninterrupted view of +the whole operation. As soon as the daring little privateer had done her +work she innocently steamed to Socoa; the Carlists on the hills waved +adieu and disappeared; the French soldiers returned to their quarters; +and the<a name="page_164" id="page_164"></a> Fontarabian "volunteers of liberty "—well, most probably they +swore terribly, and effected a masterly retrograde movement on the +nearest posada.</p> + +<p>I had a call to board the <i>San Margarita</i>. Not a boat could be had in +St. Jean de Luz for love or money; the passage from the sea into the +harbour is narrow, and the fishermen, though hardy navigators, are shy +of facing the current when the sea is rough. Leader and myself walked by +the goat-path on the crags leading to the southern side of the harbour +so as to avoid the bar, and succeeded in chartering a skiff at Socoa. A +quarter of an hour's pull brought us alongside the yacht, and on sending +up our cards we were at once invited on board by the owner. To my +surprise I discovered that the entire crew was British, as reckless a +set of dare-devils as ever cut out a craft from under an enemy's guns. +The skipper, Mr. Travers, was a Cork man, an ex-officer of the Indian +Navy, who had lost a finger during the Mutiny; but the life and soul of +the enterprise was an ex-officer of the Austrian and Mexican armies, +Charles-Edward Stuart, Count d'Albanie, great-grandson of "the<a name="page_165" id="page_165"></a> Young +Pretender." His uncle, John Sobieski Stuart, had resigned his claim to +the throne of England on his behalf,<a name="FNanchor_C_3" id="FNanchor_C_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_C_3" class="fnanchor">[C]</a> so that I actually shook the +hand of the man who under other circumstances might be wielding the +sceptre of that empire on which the sun never sets. Instead of a crown +he wore the genuine old Highland bonnet—not that modern innovation, the +military feather-bonnet. In face this descendant of royalty was an +unmistakable Stuart, with the characteristic aquiline nose, and a proud +dignity of expression. He might have sat for the portrait of Charles the +Martyr-King, by Vandyck, in Windsor. He was a convinced and earnest +supporter of the claims of Cárlos Séptimo, whom he regarded as a cousin, +and a sort of modern counterpart of the young Chevalier, the "darling +Charlie" of Jacobite minstrelsy. He received us with the hospitality of +his nation, and we had a long chat as<a name="page_166" id="page_166"></a> we paced the deck briskly, the +Count discussing the prospects of the rising, and then verging off into +gay anecdotes of his military career in Austria, and inquiries after +mutual acquaintances in London. By-and-by Captain Travers made his +appearance, a tall weather-beaten navigator in orthodox naval dress, +with a glass in his eye. He bowed severely to the Stuart, who as coldly +returned his salute. It was easy to perceive that there was a restraint +in the demeanour of the men on both sides; but there was a tacit +armistice for the occasion. I heard afterwards that they did not talk to +each other, except on strict matters of duty, and when taking their +short walks on deck, one confined himself religiously to the larboard, +the other to the starboard. Travers took me in tow, while the alert +Count with his quick manner strode to and fro with Leader, and kept up a +jerky fire of conversation nearly all to himself, occasionally twirling +his peaked beard. Travers and I lolled over the bulwarks, and laughed +and sampled the contents of an aqua-vitæ bottle, "Special Jury" whisky +from Ireland, and I learned that this ill-<a name="page_167" id="page_167"></a>assorted pair had been +sharing some close hazards on their audacious cruiser.</p> + +<p>A few days previously they had been chased by <i>El Aspirante</i>, a Spanish +gun-boat, which gave them eight shots. One caught them on the port +quarter, and shivered some timbers, but effected no more serious damage.</p> + +<p>"I wish we had only an Armstrong twenty-four pounder close handy," said +the mate, "and we'd have saved them 'ere dons the price of a coffin, I'd +take my davy!"</p> + +<p>From what I saw of the seamen, I think this was no empty boast. Some of +them had served with one Captain Semmes on a certain craft called the +<i>Alabama</i>, and had been picked up after the fight with the <i>Keasarge</i>, +off Cherbourg, by Mr. John Lancaster's yacht, the <i>Deerhound</i>. There is +no need for concealment now, so that I may freely admit that the +<i>Deerhound</i> and the <i>San Margarita</i> were one and the same. Travers, who +was in love with the yacht, told me if he had another blade to the screw +he could give leg-bail to the fastest ship in the Spanish navy. At +leaving, I was asked to<a name="page_168" id="page_168"></a> take a trip with them; they were about to visit +their floating arsenal in the Bay of Biscay, load, and try to run +another cargo. I respectfully declined—fortunately for myself; my +orders were to get to the Carlist headquarters, not to go playing Paul +Jones.</p> + +<p>Leader and Smith Sheehan were about to cross the border, and readily +acceded to my request to form one of the party. We rose at daybreak next +morning and looked out of window for the <i>San Margarita</i>. The roadstead +of Socoa was a blank. She had steamed away during the night. After the +customary chocolate we started blithely, in a light basket-carriage with +a pair of fast-trotting ponies, that whisked us in less than two hours +to the foot of the Pyrenees. Here we had to alight, the road up the +mountain being impracticable for vehicles. A boy guide was in waiting to +show us over the border by the smuggler's path—a wild short-cut through +a labyrinth of brushwood. The guide was a remarkable youth in his way; +he understood not a syllable of French or Spanish, and spoke only Basque +which none of us com<a name="page_169" id="page_169"></a>prehended, so that our parley with him was somewhat +uninteresting. Yet I was anxious to elicit the opinions of that guide. A +lad who could strike the path up the mountain with such truth might, by +some instinct, have seen his way through Spanish politics. Our walk was +a trial of endurance. I had traversed the Pyrenees in snow, and that was +fatiguing enough in all conscience; but now the sun was beating cruelly +on the parched herbage, and plodding up the ascent was like treading +burning marl. I had to cry halt half-a-dozen times before we reached the +summit; and yet that marvellous guide, with the baggage of all three on +his head, kept on with a springy step and serene smile, like the youth +in "Excelsior." It was an alternation of wheezing and stumbling with me, +with a continuous ooze of perspiration, till I arrived heaving and +panting on the crown of the ridge, and flung myself on the turf beside a +pile of planking fresh from the woodcutter's axe. There was no further +need to be wary, for this was Spain. We were over the border, and now my +companions could breathe freely in every sense.<a name="page_170" id="page_170"></a> Before they had passed +the imaginary line they were liable to be arrested by the gendarmes, +conducted back and interned, for they had that about their persons which +betrayed that they were no innocent travellers. At every noise ahead, a +scud was made to the cover of the tall ferns and brambles by the +wayside, and an advance party of one was thrown out to reconnoitre. The +precautions were superfluous, if we knew but all. From the 15th of July, +the French patrols had got the hint to be blind. So lax was the cordon +on the day we crossed, that a brigade of Carlists, each man with a +repeating rifle on his shoulder and two revolvers in his belt, might +have gone into Spain and never have had their sight offended by a +solitary French uniform.</p> + +<p>The view from the comb of the hills, as grasped on a sunny day, repays +all the toil and trouble of the ascent; and looking round, one begins to +realize the fascination of mountain-climbing. On one side extend the +plains of France, washed by the greenish-blue waves of the Bay of +Biscay, and studded as with pearls by the coast-towns of<a name="page_171" id="page_171"></a> Fontarabia, +St. Jean de Luz, Biarritz, Bayonne, and so on northwards till the vision +fails. On the other side rise in convoluting swells the mountains of +Navarre and Guipúzcoa, their slopes dyed in every shade of green from +grass and lichen, shrub and tree, except where the naked rocks, bursting +with ore, expose themselves. Iron, lead, silver, are all to be found in +the bosom of the earth in this richest and most beautiful of lands. +Nature has been lavish beyond measure, and man, instead of using her +gifts, has ungratefully diverted them for generations to the purposes of +guerrilla warfare and cheating the Custom-House officers. But this high +moral tone hardly sits well on a man who was aiding and abetting the +entry of a couple of foreign free-lances, on homicidal thoughts intent, +and perhaps doing a stroke of contraband on his own account. We suffered +no molestation; but others might not have escaped unpleasantness. The +agent of a Hatton Garden jeweller might have had to pay toll, if the +story were true that a few of the dispersed "Black Legion" had got off +with their rifles and started a joint-stock company in the<a name="page_172" id="page_172"></a> +bush-whacking line, and were doing a pretty fair business.</p> + +<p>The descent on the Spanish side was almost precipitous, and had to be +effected with exceeding care. At times we ran down the track, rugged +with sharp crags, almost head foremost, and only saved ourselves from +falling by clinging to the nearest sapling. But there is an end to +everything, and at last we came on the road that dips into the village +of Echalar, in the district of Pampeluna, province of Navarre. Here we +dismissed our guide, and here I encountered, for the first time, a +regularly organized Carlist company, detached from the fifth battalion +of Navarre, which was in garrison at Vera, some eight miles distant; but +as I shall have opportunity to speak of the entire battalion soon, I +defer comment on its appearance.</p> + +<p>My companions were desirous of pushing forward, and the provisional +alcalde of the village gave us a trap to take us on. There is an +excellent road by the mountain-side, until a tunnel to the right is +reached, when we entered a most picturesque, well-wooded defile, through +which the Bidassoa<a name="page_173" id="page_173"></a> pours its waters. We dashed along gaily until we +came in sight of the steeple of the church of Vera at twilight.</p> + +<p>A cry of "Who goes there?" from the gloom arrested us at the entrance of +the town.</p> + +<p>Leader sung out, "España."</p> + +<p>Again came the sentinel's cry, "What people?" and cheerily ran the +answer, "Voluntarios de Carlos Séptimo!"</p> + +<p>"Pass," was the reply; and we took the street at a trot, and pulled up +at the door of the parish priest's dwelling, where the Irish soldiers of +fortune promised me a billet for the night. The kindly pastor was equal +to expectations; we had a cordial welcome, a good dinner, and beds with +clean sheets.</p> + +<p>Sad tidings met my companions—those of the death of a young friend, Mr. +John Scannel Taylor, a native of Cork, in the service of Don Carlos. A +few months previously he had been a promising law student in the Queen's +University of Ireland, with every prospect of a bright career before +him. He arrived from England in the middle of June,<a name="page_174" id="page_174"></a> and attached +Himself to the partida of General Lizarraga in order to be near his +fellow-countryman, Smith Sheehan. Previous to Mr. Sheehan's returning to +Bayonne with despatches, he tossed up a coin to decide whether he or +Taylor should have the choice of the duty. Poor Taylor won, and elected +to remain with Lizarraga, as there was likelihood of fighting at hand. +The very next day Yvero, where the Republicans held a +strongly-intrenched position, was attacked, and the young Irish +volunteer made himself conspicuous in the onset. While advancing in the +open, setting a pattern of bravery to all by the steady way he delivered +his fire, the gallant fellow was struck by a bullet in the leg. He kept +on limping until he was touched a second time in the arm, but still he +persevered with a dogged courage, when a third bullet struck him in the +forehead, and he dropped with outspread arms, raising a little cloud of +dust. He must have been stone-dead before he reached the ground. His +conduct was "muy valiente," so said his Spanish comrades. He was picked +up after the affair, and decently interred<a name="page_175" id="page_175"></a> side by side with two +officers who met their deaths in his company. This was the first time he +was under fire, as it was the last; but there is a fatality in those +things.</p> + +<p>This young Irishman, Taylor, was luckier than some of his fellows in one +respect. Short as he had been in the service, he had attracted the +notice of Don Carlos. His comrade Sheehan and he were pointed out to +"the King" by Lizarraga as two modest deserving young soldiers who had +offered to fight in the ranks—a trait of unselfishness that must have +astonished the Carlist leaders, as most of the volunteers they had from +France came out with the full intention of commanding brigades, when +divisions were not to be had.</p> + +<p>"I wish I had a thousand like them," said Lizarraga, who was a genuine +soldier, and one of the few Spaniards not unjust to foreigners.</p> + +<p>Don Carlos shook hands with Mr. Taylor and thanked him. His Majesty +spoke some few minutes in French with Mr. Sheehan, and, as the +conversation gives some insight into Carlism, I may venture to repeat +it.<a name="page_176" id="page_176"></a></p> + +<p>Don Carlos.—"You have served before?"</p> + +<p>Irish Soldier.—"Yes, sire, in the Pontifical Zouaves."</p> + +<p>Don Carlos.—"Ha! good. In the same company with my brother, perhaps?"</p> + +<p>Irish Soldier.—"No; but I had the privilege of knowing Don Alfonso."</p> + +<p>Don Carlos.—"He is in Catalonia now, and has many of your old +companions in arms with him. You are serving the same cause here as in +Rome—the cause of religion and of order and of legitimate right."</p> + +<p>Irish Soldier (bowing).—"I should not be here if I did not feel that, +your Majesty."</p> + +<p>Don Carlos (smiling).—"I thank you sincerely. General Lizarraga tells +me you are Irish."</p> + +<p>Irish Soldier.—"I come from the south of Ireland, sire."</p> + +<p>Don Carlos.—"A country I feel much sympathy for. She has been very +unhappy, has she not? Are things better now?"</p> + +<p>Irish Soldier.—"For some years Ireland has been, improving, sire."<a name="page_177" id="page_177"></a></p> + +<p>Don Carlos.—"That is well. She deserves better fortune, for she has a +noble, faithful people."</p> + +<p>Don Carlos drew back a pace and made a stiff military nod; the Irishman +brought his rifle to the "present arms," turned on his heel, and marched +back to the ranks, and thus the interview terminated.</p> + +<p>The valley in which the little town of Vera nestles might have been that +where Rasselas was brought up, so secluded, smiling, and peaceful it +looks. The Bidassoa, famous in tales of the Peninsular War, flows +through it, no doubt; but the Bidassoa here is a trout stream winding +through meadows and fields of maize, and thoughts of bloodshed are the +last that would occur to anyone contemplating its mild current. The +mountains walling in the vale are lined with growths of heather, fern, +and blossoming furze to their very crests, and the verdurous picture +they hem is one of poetic calm and plenty. Labourers are digging away in +the fields below, the tinkle of cow-bells is heard from the pastures, +and anon blends with their Arcadian music the soft chiming of +church-bells<a name="page_178" id="page_178"></a> summoning to prayer; there is a mill with its clacking +wheel, and a foundry with a tuft of smoke curling from its chimney; +orchards and vineyards lie side by side with patches of corn, and along +the high-road peasants pass and repass, shortening their way with song +and laughter, and strings of mules or droves of swine scamper by. +Another Sweet Auburn of Goldsmith, in another Happy Valley of Johnson, +this cosy Vera with its river and trees would seem to any English +tourist ignorant of its history; but how the English tourist would be +misled! Though the peasants laugh and sing, and the labourers dig, and +there are outer tokens of peace, there is no peace in the valley or +town; there are sights and sounds there of war, and that of the worst +kind—civil war. The mill is grinding corn for the commissariat stores, +the foundry turns out shot instead of ploughshares, the boxes on the +mules' backs are packed with ammunition. If you listen, you will hear +the roll of drums and the shrill blowing of bugles more often than the +soothing bells; if you watch, you will notice that not one man in ten is +unprovided with a firearm, for this<a name="page_179" id="page_179"></a> quiet-looking place is the very +hotbed of Carlism; the insurrectionary headquarters for the province of +Navarre; the arsenal and recruiting depôt for all the provinces in +revolt. The disciples of the rod have fled from it, and those of the +musket have come in their stead.</p> + +<p>At half-past four on the morning after our arrival in the mountains, I +was roused from a profound sleep by the sound of the bugle. A solitary +performer was blowing spiritedly into his instrument; what piece of +music he was trying to execute I could not make out, but that his +primary object was to "murder sleep" was evident, and he succeeded. +Losing all note of time and place, I thought for a moment I was in +London, and that this was a visit from the Christmas waits. But there +was a liveliness in the tones incompatible with the season when the +clarionet, trombone, and cornet-à-piston form a syndicate of noise, and +parade the streets for halfpence. The bugle was in a jocular mood. Judge +of my astonishment when I learned that this merry melody was the +Carlist's reveille! The insurgents had got so far with their military +organiza<a name="page_180" id="page_180"></a>tion that they had actually buglers and bugle-calls. Nay, more, +they had drummers and a brass band!</p> + +<p>Now I think of it, there is an inadvisability in my calling them +insurgents while in their power; but what phrase am I to employ? In the +pass in my pocket I am recommended to "the Chiefs of the Royal Army of +his Catholic Majesty Charles VII.," as an inoffensive "corresponsal +particular," to whom aid and protection may be safely extended. But then +there are the Republicans, and if they catch me giving premature +recognition in pen-and-ink to the Royalist cause, they may rightly +complain that a British subject is flying in the face of the great +British policy of non-intervention. I think I have discovered an escape +from the dilemma. The Carlists speak of themselves as the Chicos, "the +bhoys," so Chicos let them be for the future, and their opponents the +troops—not that it is by any means intended to be conveyed that the +troops so called are much more martial than the Chicos.</p> + +<p>Well, the boys have got buglers who bugle with a will. They blow a blast +to rouse us, another for<a name="page_181" id="page_181"></a> distribution of rations; they have the +assembly, the retreat, the "lights out," and all the rest, as regular as +the Diddlesex Militia. I got up in the Cora's house, looked at the +Cura's pictures—which were more meritorious as works of piety than as +works of art—and hastened to the Plaza, where I was told there was +about to be a muster of the Chicos, and I would have a leisurely +opportunity of passing them under inspection. The Plaza is a flagged +space enclosed on two sides by houses, some of which are over a couple +of centuries old, with armorial bearings sculptured over the doors; on +the third by the Municipality; and on the fourth by a grey church, lofty +and large, seated on an eminence and approached by a flight of stone +steps. The Municipality is a massive building, level with the street, +with a colonnaded portico, and a front over which some artist in +distemper had passed his brush. This façade is eloquent with mural +painting, if one could only understand it all. There are symbolic +figures of heroic size, coveys of cherubs, hatchments, masonic-looking +emblems, and inscriptions. A Carlist sentry, dandling a naked bayonet in +the<a name="page_182" id="page_182"></a> hollow of his arm, was pacing to and fro in the portico, and the +remaining warriors of the post were lounging about, cigarette in mouth, +much as our own fellows do outside the guard-house on Commercial Square, +at Gibraltar. I was curious to see the Carlist uniform. Assuredly the +uniform does not make the soldier, but it goes a great way towards it. +Uniformity was the least striking feature in the dress of the men before +me. They were clad in the ordinary garb of the mountain-peasants. Short +coarse jackets and loose trousers, confined at the waist by a faja, or +girdle of bright-coloured woollen stuff, were worn by some; blouses of +serge, knee-breeches, and stockings or gaiters, by others; but all, +without exception, had the boina, or pancake-shaped woollen cap of the +Basque provinces, and the alpargatas, or flat-soled canvas shoes. +By-and-by was heard a bugle-blast and the quick, regular tread of +marching men, and the head of a company came in sight. In perfect time +the company paced, four deep, into the Plaza, halted, and fell into line +in two ranks. Thus, in succession, seven other companies arrived, +form<a name="page_183" id="page_183"></a>ing the fifth, battalion of Navarre, a vigorous, wiry set of men, +impressing the experienced eye as excellent raw material for soldiers, +albeit got up in costume very much resembling that of brigands of the +Comic Opera. Physically, the natives of the hilly northern provinces are +the pick of Spain. The battalion had its flag, white between two stripes +of scarlet, on which was inscribed the name of the corps, and the +legend, "The country for ever, but always in honour." This was, of +course, written in Basque, of which my rendering is rather free, but it +gives exactly the sense of the sentiment. It was soon palpable to +anybody, who knows anything of such matters, that the Chicos were weak +in officers of the proper stamp, and still more so in under-officers. +Smoking was common in the ranks, and when the men stood at ease, they +stood very much at ease indeed. The officers, in some cases, were +distinguished in dress from the privates solely by gold or silver +tassels dependent from their boinas, and their boinas were of blue, +white, brown, or even Republican red, according to the fancy of the +wearer. All the officers had revolvers and swords.<a name="page_184" id="page_184"></a> The men were armed +somewhat indiscriminately, one company with Chassepots, another with +Remingtons; there were carbines, and percussion rifles, and +smooth-bores, and even a few flint-locks; but I failed to discern a +single specimen of the trabuco, the bell-mouthed blunderbuss we are +accustomed to associate with the Spanish knight of the road. Ammunition +was carried in a waist-belt, with a surrounding row of leather tubes +lined with tin, each of which held a cartridge—in fact, the Circassian +cartouch-case. There were many grizzled weather-stained veterans in the +ranks who had fought with Zumalacárregui and Mina in the Seven Years' +War; but as a rule the Chicos were literally boys in age, and here and +there a child of twelve or fourteen might be seen measuring himself +beside a patriotic musket. In relief to the peasant dresses were to be +noticed frequent attempts at more soldierly costume in the shape of worn +tunics of the French National Guards or Moblots, and some half-dozen +uniforms of the Spanish Line, with the glazed képi exchanged for the +boina. On the top of many of the boinas, fastening the tassel, was a<a name="page_185" id="page_185"></a> +huge brass button, with the monogram of the "King," and the inscription, +"Voluntarios, Dios, Patria, y Rey." Another sign particular of this +irregular force that impressed me much was a bleeding heart embroidered +on a small scrap of cloth, and sewn on the left breasts of nearly all on +the ground. This appeared to be worn as a charm against bullets; and +with a strong notion that it would protect them in the hour of danger, I +am convinced nine out of ten of those peasants carried it. It may be as +well to add that inside that embroidered patch were written, in Spanish, +the words, "Stop; the heart of Jesus is here; defend me, Jesus." Many +others of the Carlists carried scapulars, rosary beads, and blessed +medals as pious reminders. The habit of wearing this representation of +the heart of the Saviour over the region of the human heart dates so far +back as the Vendean War, and had been introduced in the present instance +by M. Cathelineau, grandson of the celebrated French Royalist loader.</p> + +<p>The battalion had assembled on the Plaza to give up their old arms, and +to receive a portion of<a name="page_186" id="page_186"></a> those which had been landed from the <i>San +Margarita</i>. They deposited those they had with them by sections in the +Municipality, and emerged with the others, bright, brand-new Berdan +breechloaders. They seemed proud of their weapons; some went so far as +to kiss them; and, if looks were any criterion of feelings, their +glowing faces said, as emphatically as it could be said, "Now that we +have good tools, we shall show what good work we can do." Boxes of +metallic ball-cartridges, centre-primed, were piled on the Plaza, and +were quickly and quietly opened and distributed. Not an accident +occurred in the process. Many a less wonderful phenomenon has been +advertised as a miracle. I fully expected to have my coat spattered with +some warrior's brains every other moment, with such a reckless rashness +were the rifle-muzzles poked about. One shot did go off, while a high +private was trying if his cartridge fitted to the chamber; the charge +singed the hair of a captain, and the bullet lodged in the middle of the +word "Prudencia" on the façade of the Municipality. The captain would +have it that he was killed,<a name="page_187" id="page_187"></a> spun round on his own centre like a +humming-top, and finally, coming to himself, shook out his clothes in +search of the lead. There was a roar of laughter, and the careless +soldier who had endangered the life of his officer was allowed to pass +without rebuke. That was the worst point in Carlist discipline I had +seen yet. There was too much familiarity towards superiors; the rank and +file lacked that fear and respect for the officers which are the +strongest cement of the military fabric. This was to be explained partly +because the officers were not above the men in social position, and +partly because any enterprising gentleman who bought gold braid and +tassels, sported a sword, and appraised himself an officer, was accepted +at his own valuation.<a name="page_188" id="page_188"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h3> + +<p class="head">The Cura of Vera—Fueros of the Basques—Carlist Discipline—Fate +of the <i>San Margarita</i>—The Squadron of Vigilance—How a Capture +was Effected—The Sea-Rovers in the Dungeon—Visit to the +Prisoners—San Sebastian—A Dead Season—The Defences of a +Threatened City—Souvenirs of War—The Miqueletes—In a Fix—A +German Doctor's Warning.</p> + +<p class="nind">T<span class="smcap">hese</span> horrible and bloodthirsty Carlists turned out to be amiable +individuals on acquaintance. I suppose they could put on a frown for +their enemies, but for my companions and myself they had nothing but +open smiles and hearty hand-grips. One great recommendation was our +being billeted on the parish priest. His reverence had none of the Santa +Cruz in him; he was a gentle, zealous, studious clergyman, yet was +filled with the purest enthusiasm for the cause of what he regarded as +legitimacy. The Don Carlos who raised the standard in<a name="page_189" id="page_189"></a> 1833, he +maintained, was the rightful heir to the throne of Spain. The law by +which the succession had been changed was an <i>ex post facto</i> law, passed +after his birth, and not promulgated until Ferdinand VII. had a female +child. In May, 1845, that Don Carlos, really Charles V., resigned in +favour of his son, Charles VI., and in September, 1868, he, in his turn, +relinquished his rights to the present claimant to the throne, Charles +VII., whom might God preserve.</p> + +<p>The Cura was unusually civil towards us because we were Irish, and as +Irish were presumably of clean lineage—that is to say, free from +kinship with Jews or infidels. As reputed descendants of settlers from +Bilbao, we were entitled to a full share in all the privileges of the +province of Biscay. This was as well to know. It was a consolation to us +to learn that it was an advantage to be Irish somewhere under the sun. +The King of Spain is but Lord of Biscay, and has to swear under the +oak-tree of Guernica to respect the fueros or customs of the province. +Don Carlos had so done; he was in Spain, it was true, but where he was +at the moment<a name="page_190" id="page_190"></a> the Cura was unable to say; his court was perambulatory.</p> + +<p>The fueros were abolished by the Cortes in 1841 and but partially +restored in 1844, so that in inscribing them as one of the watchwords on +their banner, the Basques were fighting for something more solid than +glory. They cling to their rights as Britons do to Magna Charta, only +with this difference—they have a clearer conception of what they are. I +had been trying to arrive at some knowledge of the fueros, and obtained +much information from a volume by the late Earl of Carnarvon.<a name="FNanchor_D_4" id="FNanchor_D_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_D_4" class="fnanchor">[D]</a> +Guipúzcoa, Alava, and Biscay, though an integral part of the Spanish +monarchy, for ages enjoyed their own laws, and a recapitulation of some +which were in force in Biscay will be a fair sample of all. Biscay was +governed by its own national assemblies, arranged its own taxation, +yielded contributions to the Sovereign as a free gift, had no militia +laws, was exempt from naval<a name="page_191" id="page_191"></a> impressment, provided for its own police in +peace and its own defence in war. No monopoly, public or private, could +be established there. Only Biscayans by birth could be nominated to +ecclesiastical appointments; every Biscayan was noble, and his house was +inviolable; there was perfect equality of civil rights. In short, those +Basques flourished under the amplest measure of Home Rule, and had all +the benefits of the Habeas Corpus Act under another name long before +that Bill was legalized by the Parliament of Charles II. The +liberty-loving Basques were tolerant as well as independent. The +Inquisition was never vouchsafed breathing-room in their midst. When +Protestants escaped from France after the massacre of St. Bartholomew, +they were treated to asylum amongst them.<a name="FNanchor_E_5" id="FNanchor_E_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_E_5" class="fnanchor">[E]</a></p> + +<p>We moved about among the guerrilleros. They were mostly light-limbed and +stalwart men, and were none the worse for the sprinkling of seniors of +sixty and lads of sixteen. Many had the bow-legs of the mountaineer, +built like the hinder pair<a name="page_192" id="page_192"></a> of artillery-horses—the legs that tell of +muscularity and lasting stamina. Their drill was very loose, and skill +in musketry left much to be desired. They had no perception of +distance-judging, and some were so grossly ignorant of the mechanism of +their weapons that they knocked off the back-sights of their rifles, +alleging that they hindered them from taking correct aim. The Marquis de +la Hormazas—a meagre, tall, elderly man—was commandant of the +battalion, and was stern in the exaction of discipline. During the stay +of the Navarrese at Vera, a captain was degraded to the ranks for having +entered the lists of illicit love. The Frenchwoman who was the partner +of his amour was politely shown over the mountain and warned not to +return.</p> + +<p>The battalion left for the interior of the province. Leader was still +too weak to enter on a campaign; Sheehan had to look after the +belongings of his comrade Taylor, and break the news of his death to his +mother; and I saw plainly that it was out of the question attempting to +catch up the flitting headquarters of Don Carlos without a horse.<a name="page_193" id="page_193"></a> +Besides, I had to complete arrangements for the transmission of letters +and telegraphic messages when I had any to send, and for the reception +of money; in sum, to open up communication with a base. So we returned +to France as we came.</p> + +<p>On arriving at St. Jean de Luz, a startling rumour awaited us. The +steel-built Carlist privateer had been captured at the mouth of the +Adour; she had been taken a prize to San Sebastian; Stuart and Travers +were in close custody; and there were alarmists who whispered that they +would be tried by drum-head as pirates, and hung up in chains in the +cause of humanity. It was well for me I did not accept the invitation to +that water-party. I ran over to Bayonne to ascertain what particulars I +could, saw the Carlist Junta, the British and Spanish Vice-Consuls, and +from their combined and conflicting narratives was able to sift some +grains of the authentic. But the sudden first report was undeniable. The +weasel had been caught asleep.</p> + +<p>The <i>San Margarita</i> was a serious loss to the cause. She had cost +£3,500. She was very fast,<a name="page_194" id="page_194"></a> being capable of a speed of between ten and +eleven knots an hour, and should be equal to fourteen knots if her +lifting screw had another blade. A three-bladed screw had been provided, +and was to have been fitted to her stern on her return from the +ill-fated expedition which put an end to her roving career. It was true +that the descendant of kings was under bolts and bars. The French +journals described him as a "Monsieur Stuart, a Scotch colonel, +entrusted by the English Catholics with collections for the Carlist +cause." They had never heard of his royal lineage, of his connection +with the Austrian cavalry, or of his exploits by the side of the unhappy +Maximilian in Mexico. He assumed the responsibility of ownership of the +vessel. The hue-and-cry description of him was "a man of forty to +forty-five years of age, over middle height, figure spare, features +thin, and resolute in expression."</p> + +<p>The burly bronzed Corkonian was also in durance, and with the pair of +officers were a picked crew of thirteen Englishmen, including engineers, +steward, stokers, and able-bodied seamen, and<a name="page_195" id="page_195"></a> one Spanish cabin-boy. A +Basque pilot, an old smuggler, familiar with every nook and crevice of +the Bay of Biscay, had escaped.</p> + +<p>If reports were credible, the <i>San Margarita</i> had already landed two +millions of cartridges, and an immense quantity of arms. Much vexation +was caused to the officers of the Spanish navy in those quarters by the +stories of the daring feats she had achieved, absolutely discharging a +cargo once on the very wharf of Lequeieto, as if she were a peaceful +merchantman, and on another occasion sending off rifles and ammunition +by small boats in the dead of night, a man-of-war lying sleepily +oblivious of what was going on just outside her. It was felt that her +continued impunity was a reproach, and three small vessels of the +Spanish navy were commissioned to cruise between Bilbao and Bayonne on +the look-out for her. This little squadron of vigilance consisted of <i>El +Aspirante</i> and <i>El Capricho</i>, gun-boats, and the <i>Buenaventura</i>, a +three-gun steam-brig. On Tuesday, August 12th, the <i>Buenaventura</i>, +flying a George's Jack at her peak, was off Fontarabia for a portion of +the day,<a name="page_196" id="page_196"></a> close in shore. At nightfall she disappeared—it is now +supposed into the sheltered and almost invisible inlet of Los Pasages, +between Fontarabia and San Sebastian. Before daybreak on Wednesday, the +Carlists under Dorregaray swarmed down from the hills covering Cape +Higuer. The <i>San Margarita</i> came in sight, and began landing arms in the +same spot where the undisturbed landing of the 28th July had been +effected. Not more than three hundred stand had been put on shore, and +about one hundred thousand cartridges in boxes, labelled in English +"metallic rolled cartridges, centre-primed," when she had to get away, +as the daylight began to play the informer. She dropped down towards +Bayonne, and appears to have reached a point some four miles from the +French shore (the exact distance is a moot question), where she laid to +and allowed her furnaces to cool The men were "dead tired out" after +their night's work, and the captain considered that he was within the +protection of French waters. But there is a very ancient proverb about a +pitcher and a veil, and the period of its realization had been<a name="page_197" id="page_197"></a> reached +at last Whilst the <i>San Margarita</i> was effecting the landing, a +coastguard's boat had slipped from under the heights of Fontarabia, and +given notice of what was going on to the <i>Buenaventura</i> in Los Pasages, +and the brig steamed out, still with the British colours at her peak +Whilst the Carlist privateer was motionless in fancied security—there +was some want of prudence or vigilance there, surely—the gun-brig crept +down and overhauled her before alarm could be given, and the rakish +schooner-yacht, the skimmer of the seas, had the humiliation of falling +a prey to a wretched slow boat that she could laugh at with steam up in +the open sea. The arrest was made in the usual manner, and the captors +behaved with the customary naval courtesy. They were over-joyed at their +good fortune, and gave their prisoners to eat and to drink—champagne to +the officers and chacoli to the men. They towed their prize into the bay +of St. Sebastian, and there was triumph. The yellow and scarlet flag of +Spain was over the wee <i>San Margarita</i> as she entered, and Colonel +Stuart and Captain Travers and their com<a name="page_198" id="page_198"></a>panions must have felt sore, +for all the good cheer and generous wine. Still there was quite a +courtly scene on board—hand-shakings and reciprocal compliments—as +they were marched off to the dungeon of the Castillo de la Mota on a +hill in the city, where they were incarcerated. There they did not fall +on such pleasant lines as afloat. The Republicans lost no time in +unloading the vessel. They took off her, with a hurry that betrayed +apprehension, 1,545 carbines and six Berdan breech-loaders, with a +number of armourer's tools. It was remarked that the rifles supplied to +the regular troops from Madrid were sighted to eight hundred metres, but +that the range of those seized from the Carlists did not exceed five +hundred.</p> + +<p>I went over to San Sebastian by tug from Socoa on the 16th of August, +and sent up my card to M. de Brunet, the British Vice-Consul. He said he +had called on the prisoners, and that the sailors murmured at their +treatment. If I went to the citadel, after three—as it was Saturday +afternoon, and visiting hours commenced then—I could see them without +difficulty. I did clamber up the hill,<a name="page_199" id="page_199"></a> and found this was not the case. +On owning that I had no pass from the military governor, I was denied +admittance. Happening to meet the commandant, I represented what I +wanted, and he very civilly granted me leave to visit the prisoners +"para un momento." As the gates were thrown open Stuart advanced and met +me, grasping my hand cordially, and slipping a letter up the sleeve of +my coat. He had caught sight of me labouring up the hill, and had +immediately hastened to scribble a few lines which he trusted to my +sympathy with misfortune to smuggle to their destination for him. He was +not mistaken, and in so doing I had no qualm of conscience. I +accompanied him to his cell, and he told me the story of the capture of +the <i>San Margarita</i>. It was substantially as I have related; they +thought they were in a <i>mare clausum</i>, at all events they had drifted +out of it on the tide of fate; but there was a nice question of +international law. The <i>ruse</i> of hoisting the British flag was +legitimate if the <i>Buenaventura</i> substituted her own flag before +proceeding to board them. The <i>San Margarita</i> had the flags of more<a name="page_200" id="page_200"></a> +than one nation in her lockers; but the gun-brig had no power to act the +policeman in neutral waters. There was the point. Travers was in a +separate lodging; they had been accommodated at first in the one cell, +but they could not agree—ashore as afloat the old feud existed. +However, both assented to a truce in order to have a talk with me. They +were cheerful, had cigars <i>ad libitum</i> (at their own expense, of +course), and were permitted to get their rations from the Hôtel de +Londres in the city. The cells they occupied were bare, white-washed, +low-ceiled rooms, some eight paces by six. They were not so clean or +well-ventilated as Newgate cells, and the beds were spread on the floor. +The captives had access to newspapers and writing materials, and it is +but the due of the officers in charge to testify that they were +extremely affable and disposed to make their prisoners as comfortable as +possible. Still, in the close, stifling weather, to be locked up within +the narrow circuit of a dungeon was limbo. The pair wore their own +clothes, Travers still retaining a navy-jacket with brass buttons +engraved with the initials of some yacht<a name="page_201" id="page_201"></a> club, and did not complain of +having been subjected to indignities. While I was with them the shadow +of a face darkened the window; it was a Carlist prisoner who had hoisted +himself up on the shoulders of a comrade from a yard below; he had a +letter in his mouth. I took it, and slipped him a bundle of cigars for +distribution among his fellow cage-birds. From this it may be deduced +that the gaol regulations were not very stringent. The Carlists were +treated as forfeit of war, not felons, and had no honest chance of +illuminating their brows with the martyr halo of Baron von Trenck or +Silvio Pellico.</p> + +<p>San Sebastian is the most modern town in the Peninsula, having been +re-built in 1816, three years after its destruction by the incensed +allied troops. It is a great summer resort of wealthy Spanish idlers—a +sort of Madrid-super-Mare. The attractions of the capital are to be had +there, with the supplementary advantages of pure air, mountain scenery, +and luxurious sea-bathing on a level sandy beach. There is a public +casino, and a score of clandestine hells where a fortune can be lost in +a<a name="page_202" id="page_202"></a> night at monté—in short, every infernal facility for Satanic +gambling. Cigarettes are cheap, and so are knives. There is an Alameda, +where the band plays, and a passable imitation, of the Puerta del Sol, +less the fountain, in the broad arcaded Plaza de la Constitution. There +is a small theatre, a spacious bull-ring, and several commodious +churches, where Pepita can talk the language of fans to her heart's +content. Every attraction of Madrid which could reasonably be expected +is to be had, I repeat, and hidalgos and sloe-eyed senoras speckle the +promenades in the gloaming, and impart a mingled aroma of garlic and +gentility, pomade and pretentiousness, to the chief town of Guipúzcoa. +San Sebastian would be for Madrileños what Paris is for Bostonians, if a +few of the attractions of the "only court," which could not reasonably +be expected, were not lacking—say an occasional walk round of the +Intransigentes, to show their political muscles; a grandiloquent, frothy +word-tempest in the Congress, and the Sunday cock-fight. I am speaking, +be it understood, of San Sebastian in ordinary summers. A short +twelvemonth before<a name="page_203" id="page_203"></a> my visit, a pair of pouting English lips told me it +was "awfully jolly."</p> + +<p>At the date with which I am concerned, it was anything but "awfully +jolly." The fifteen thousand rich visitors who were wont to flock into +the city during the season had gone elsewhere to recruit their health on +the sands and lose their money at the gaming-tables. They had been +frightened to the coasts of France by the apparition of Carlism, and San +Sebastian was plaintive. Her streets and her coffers were empty. The +campamento of bathing-huts was ranged as usual on the velvet rim of the +ear-like bay, but no bathers were there. There were more domestics than +guests in the hotels; and at the <i>table d'hôte</i> three sat down in a +saloon designed for a hundred to breakfast in; and we had no butter. The +peasants in the country round were afraid to bring in the produce of +their dairies and barn-yards. The bull-ring was to let; conscientious +barbers shaved each other or dressed the hair on the wax busts in their +windows, in order to keep alive the traditions of their craft; the +fiddlers in the concert-room of the casino scraped<a name="page_204" id="page_204"></a> lamentations to +imaginary listeners. A Sahara of dust had settled on the curtain of the +theatre, and fleet-footed spiders made forages athwart it from one +cobwebby stronghold to another. The once festive resort had lost its +spirits completely, and all on account of this civil war. It was summer, +but the city was in a state of hibernation. No business was done in the +shops, the cafés were empty, most of the resident population who could +afford it had emigrated, and the public squares were as vacant as if +there were a perpetual siesta. There was no sign of animation, as we +understand it in England. There were but three vessels in the west +bay—the <i>Buenaventura</i>, a merchant steamer, and the <i>San Margarita</i>, +pinioned at last, her yellow funnel cold. Sojourn in the place was +insupportable. I knew not how to kill the tedious hours. I climbed again +to the Castle of the Mota, inspected some English tombs on the slope of +the acclivity, and noticed that if the citadel is still a position of +strength, nature deserves much of the credit. The defences recently +thrown up had been devised and executed carefully, and if the defenders<a name="page_205" id="page_205"></a> +were only true to themselves, the Carlists, with no better artillery +than they possessed, might as well think of taking the moon as of +entering San Sebastian. They would have a formidable fire from +well-planted cannon to face; stockades, and strong earthworks, and more +than one blockhouse cunningly pierced with loopholes, to carry. Even if +San Sebastian was entered, the configuration of the streets was such as +to give every aid to disciplined men as opposed to mere guerrilleros. +The city is built in blocks, on the American system; the wide +thoroughfares cross each other at right-angles, and all of them could be +swept as with a besom by a few guns <i>en barbette</i> behind a breastwork at +either end. In this sort of work, accuracy of aim is not called for, as +in that warfare up in the mountains. If it were, not much reliance could +be placed on the Republican artillery. General Hidalgo had well-nigh +nullified that arm of the service. A Carlist leader, in whose +information and whose word confidence could be reposed, assured me that +not a single Carlist had yet been killed or wounded by the Republican<a name="page_206" id="page_206"></a> +gunners. The estimated lists of the enemy's casualties given by both +parties during the struggle, I may remark <i>en passant</i>, were grossly +exaggerated. The butcher's bill was very small in proportion to the +expenditure of gunpowder. Returning to the question of the defence of +San Sebastian—even on the supposition that the main works and town were +to fall into the hands of the Carlists, the citadel still remained, +where a determined leader could hold out till relief came, as long as +his provisions lasted. This lofty citadel is almost impregnable. It was +hither the French retired in 1813, and it took General Graham all that +he knew to dislodge them. If I were asked what were the prospects of the +Carlists getting into the place, I should say there was but one—by +crossing over a golden bridge. But that implied the possession of money, +and money was precisely what the Carlists declared they needed most.</p> + +<p>There was always the remote hazard of a Carlist rising in San Sebastian, +for there were in the city the children of settlers from the rural +districts<a name="page_207" id="page_207"></a> who bit their thumbs at the sight of the muzzled <i>San +Margarita</i>, and prayed that Charles VII. might have "his ain again." But +they were in the minority. The Miqueletes, a soldierly body of men in +scarlet Basque scones very like to the Carlist head-gear, and a blue +capote with cape attached, garrisoned the citadel. They were brave and +loyal to the Republic, and the object of deep grudge to the Chicos, for +they were Basques of the towns. Many of these provincial militiamen had +come in from the small pueblos in the neighbourhood, where they ran the +risk of being eaten up by "the bhoys;" and this was the only accession +to the population which redeemed the dismal, tradeless port from the +appearance of having been stricken by plague and abandoned, and lent it +at intervals an artificial bustle.</p> + +<p>I sickened of San Sebastian, with its angular propriety; its high, +haughty houses, holding up their heads in architectural primness; its +wide geometrical streets, where there is no shade in the sun, no shelter +in the wind. I began to hate it for its rectilinearity, and dub it a +priggish, stuck-<a name="page_208" id="page_208"></a>up, arrogant upstart among cities. What business had it +to be so straight and clean and airy? Fain would I shake the dust off my +feet in testimony against it; but here was the trouble. How to get +away—that was a knotty problem. The railway had been torn up for +months, and the armour-vested locomotives were rusting on the sidings at +Hendaye. The dirty hot little tug, the <i>Alcorta</i>, that plies between the +quay and Socoa, had left; and I grieved not, for the thought of a +passage by her was nausea. Three more torturing hours never dragged +their slow length along for me than those I spent on board her coming +over. Try and call up to yourself three hours in a low-class cook-shop, +coated an inch thick with filth, and fitted over the boiler of a penny +steamer dancing a marine break-down on the Thames, opposite the outlet +of the main-drainage pipes. That, intensified by strange oaths and +slop-basins, was the passage by the <i>Alcorta</i>. But dreary, lonely San +Sebastian was not to be endured. Those poor fellows above, accustomed to +the wild freshness and freedom of the sea, how they must mourn and +repine! By<a name="page_209" id="page_209"></a> some means or other I must get back to the world that is not +petrified. No diligences dare to affront the dangers of the short +journey to the Irun railway-station, since three were stopped some days +before, the traces cut, the horses stolen, the windows shattered, the +woodwork burned, and the charred wreck left on the roadside, a terror to +those who neglect to obey the commands of the Royalist leaders.</p> + +<p>"Royalist prigants, serr!" shouted a corpulent German doctor, connected +with mines in the neighbourhood, who retained fierce recollections of +having been robbed of a "boney, capitalest of boneys for crossing a +mountain."</p> + +<p>I told the doctor I was about to trust to luck, and set out on foot if I +could persuade nobody to provide me with a vehicle.</p> + +<p>"Serr, you air mad, foolish mad," said the doctor. "Those horrid +beebles, I tell you, are worse than prigants; if you hayff money, they +will dake it; if you hayff not money, they will stroke your pack fifty +times, pecause you hayff it not. They will<a name="page_210" id="page_210"></a> cut your ears off; they will +cut your nose off; they are plack tevils!"</p> + +<p>I determined to trust to luck all the same. The black devils might not +be all out so black as they were painted.<a name="page_211" id="page_211"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X.</h3> + +<p class="head">Belcha's Brigands—Pale-Red Republicans—The Hyena—More about the +<i>San Margarita</i>—Arrival of a Republican Column—The Jaunt to Los +Pasages—A Sweet Surprise—"The Prettiest Girl in Spain"—A Madrid +Acquaintance—A Costly Pull—The Diligence at Last—Renteria and +its Defences—A Furious Ride—In France Again—Unearthing Santa +Cruz—The Outlaw in his Lair—Interviewed at Last—The Truth about +the Endarlasa Massacre—A Death-Warrant—The Buried Gun—Fanaticism +of the Partisan-Priest.</p> + +<p class="nind">T<span class="smcap">here</span> is fine scope for exaggeration in civil war; but he who wants the +truth about the Montagues does not consult the Capulets. There must be +bad characters amongst the Carlists, I reflected; and when they are on +outpost duty at a distance from officers, and have taken a drop of +aguardiente too much, they may sometimes fail to appreciate the nice +distinction between <i>meum</i> and <i>tuum</i>. The band of one Belcha, which was +hovering in the<a name="page_212" id="page_212"></a> neighbourhood of San Sebastian, had a shady reputation. +It would be unjust to tempt these simple-minded guerrilleros with the +sight of a Derringer, a hunting-watch, a tobacco-pouch, or a +reconnoitring-glass. All these articles are useful on the hills. But +even Belcha's looters had some conscience; they drew the line at money +and wedding-rings. Besides, in cases of robbery restitution was +invariably made when the chiefs of the revolt were appealed to in proper +form, so that on the whole the Carlists did not deserve the name the +German doctor had given them. Regular soldiers do not always carry the +Decalogue in their kit; there was marauding in the Peninsula, +notwithstanding the iron discipline of the Iron Duke; the Summer Palace +at Pekin was despoiled of its treasures by gentlemen in epaulettes, and +the Franco-German War was not entirely unconnected with stories about +vanishing clocks. So I would not be diverted from my purpose.</p> + +<p>Before leaving San Sebastian I tried to obtain permission for a second +visit to the citadel-prison in order to see the crew of the <i>San +Margarita</i>, but<a name="page_213" id="page_213"></a> without avail. Yet the officers in charge (all of the +regular army), and indeed the privates of the local militia, were +anything but truculent gaolers; they seemed willing to strain a point to +oblige. The Republicanism of the officers was of a very pale red; but +there was one hirsute Volunteer of Liberty who acted as chief warder, +and took a delight in the occupation. He rattled his bunch of keys as if +their metallic dissonance were music, grumbled at the urbanity of his +superiors, and bore himself altogether as if their politics were +suspicious; and he, a pure of the pure, were there as warder over that +too. I nicknamed him the hyena in my own mind; but I could not conceive +him laughing anywhere save in front of a garrote with a Royalist neck in +the rundel, and then his laugh at best would be but the inward chuckle +of a Modoc.</p> + +<p>Stuart took the hyena coolly, regarding him as an amusing phenomenon; +Travers surveyed him as he would the portrait of the Nabob on London +hoardings, and pronounced him a whimsical illustration of Republican +sauce. Stuart, I<a name="page_214" id="page_214"></a> should have stated, was anxious that it should be +known that he had caused the name of the whilom <i>Deerhound</i> to be erased +from the list of yachts, when he chartered her as a merchant-steamer, +renamed her, and went into the contraband-of-war line. It was contrary +to his wish to compromise any club. The confiscated cargo was the last +he had intended delivering, but he told me with a smile that ten +thousand stand of rifles had already found their way to Vera. There was +no legitimate explanation of the capture of the hare by the tortoise, +although Travers was prepared to swear he was in French waters—he +thought he was, no doubt—but he was just on the wrong side of the +limit. There was one comfort. On the way to Bayonne a boat-load of men +had been landed at Socoa on leave, amongst them the Basque pilot, who +might otherwise have been helped to a short shrift, and the dog's death +from a yard-arm.</p> + +<p>Carlist sympathizers endeavoured to procure me a conveyance to Irun, but +nobody cared to affront the loss of horses, for Belcha's band +requisitioned the cattle even of those identical in political +feel<a name="page_215" id="page_215"></a>ing—the good of the cause was their plea—so at last I was forced +to say I should be glad of a trap to Los Pasages, a few miles off, +whence I might be able to go forward on foot.</p> + +<p>While I was waiting for the arrival of the vehicle, and reading <i>El +Diario</i>, the local daily paper—a sheet the size of the palm of one's +hand—until I had the contents by rote, an incident occurred to beguile +suspense. The vanguard of the corps of Sanchez Bregua, the commander of +the Republican Army of the North, rode into the city. They had come from +Zarauz, a seaside village four leagues away—a section of mounted +Chasseurs in a uniform like to that of the old British Light Dragoons. +The troopers were in campaign order, with rifled carbines slung over +their backs, pugarees hanging from their shakoes over their necks, and +were dust-covered and sunburnt, but soldierly. They were horsed +unevenly, and for light cavalry carried too great a burden. But that is +not a fault peculiar to Spanish light cavalry. The average weight of the +British Hussar equipped is eighteen stone. A quarter of an hour later +the main body came in<a name="page_216" id="page_216"></a> sight, a long column of infantry marching by +fours. It was headed by a party of Civil Guards, acting as guides. As +the column reached the open space by the quay, it deployed into line of +companies, a movement capitally executed. The men were bigger and +tougher than those of the French Line. Their uniform was similar, except +that they had wings to their capotes instead of worsted epaulettes. All +wore mountain-shoes, but were not hampered with tenting equipage on +their knapsacks. Each battalion was led by a staff-officer, who was +splendidly, or wretchedly, mounted, as his luck had served him. The +company officers carried alpenstocks, and their orderlies had officers' +cast foraging-caps on top of their glazed shakoes. I noticed a battalion +of Cazadores, distinguished by the emblematic brass horn of chase +wrought on their collars, and two companies of Engineers in uniforms +entirely blue, with towers on their collars. These latter were robust, +sinewy young fellows. After the infantry came a company of the 2nd +Regiment of Mountain Artillery with four small pieces, each drawn by a +single mule, and behind them a<a name="page_217" id="page_217"></a> squadron of Mounted Chasseurs, and a +long cavalcade of pack-horses and mules.</p> + +<p>After a deal of exploration a driver was dug up, and after a deal of +negotiation he consented to take me to Los Pasages. Thanks to Republican +vigilance, but principally it may have been to the nature of the ground, +the road thither was clear. We started at six o'clock in the evening, +and after a lively spin through sylvan scenery drew up in less than an +hour at the outskirts of a village on the edge of a quiet pool, which we +had bordered for nigh a mile. No papers had been asked for, on leaving, +at the bridge over the Urumea, where a post of volunteers kept guard by +an antique and stumpy bronze howitzer, mounted on a siege-carriage, and +furnished with the dolphin-handles to be seen on some of the +last-century guns in the Tower Arsenal. No papers were asked for either +at the Customs' station, some hundred yards farther on; but the +Carabineros looked upon me as a lunatic, and significantly sibilated. +None were asked for at the approach to the village. Scarcely had I +alighted when a fishwife ran out of a cabin and<a name="page_218" id="page_218"></a> addressed me in Basque. +I could not understand her, and motioned her away, when a winsome lassie +of some eighteen summers, tripping up the road, came to my aid, and +began speaking in French as if she were anticipating my arrival.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur wants a shallop to go to France?"</p> + +<p>I was taken aback, but answered, "Yes."</p> + +<p>"Monsieur will follow me."</p> + +<p>And she gave me a meaning sign—half a wink, half a monition. I +followed, and examined my volunteer guide more attentively. What a prize +of a girl! Hair black as night, but with a glossy blackness, was parted +on her smooth forehead, and retained behind, after the fashion of the +country, by a coloured snood, but two thick Gretchen plaits escaped, and +hung down to her waist, making one wish that she had let her whole +wealth of tresses wander free. Eyes blue-black, full by turns of soft +love and sparkling mischief; Creole complexion, with blood rich as +marriage-wine coursing in the dimpled cheeks; teeth white as the fox's; +lips of clove-pink. And what a shape had she—ripe, firm,<a name="page_219" id="page_219"></a> and piquant! +Do you wonder that I followed her with joy? Do you wonder that I began +weaving a romance? If you do, I pity you. Did I want a shallop? Of +course I did; but alas! might I not have echoed Burger's lament:</p> + +<p class="poem"> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"The shallop of my peace is wrecked</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">On Beauty's shore."</span><br /> +</p> + +<p>She was a Carlist, I was sure of that. All the comely maidens were +Carlists. In the service of the King the most successful crimps were +"dashing white sergeants" in garter and girdle. And she took me for an +interesting Carlist fugitive, and she was determined to aid in my +escape. How ravishing! She was a Flora Macdonald, and I—would be a +Pretender. I had fully wound myself up to that as we entered Los +Pasages.</p> + +<p>Los Pasages consists of rows of houses built on either side of a basin +of the sea, entered by a narrow chasm in the high rocky coast. Sailing +by it, one would never imagine that that cleft in the shore-line was a +gate to a natural harbour, locked against every wind, and large enough +to accommo<a name="page_220" id="page_220"></a>date fleets, and whose waters are generally placid as a lake. +This secure haven, <i>statio benefida carinis</i>, is hidden away in the lap +of the timbered hills, and is approached by a passage (from which its +name is borrowed) which can be traversed in fifteen minutes. The change +from the boisterous Bay of Biscay, with its "white horses capering +without, to this Venetian expanse of water in a Swiss valley, dotted +with chalets and cottages, must have the effect of a magic +transformation on the emotional tar who has never been here before, and +whose chance it was to lie below when his ship entered. The refuge is +not unknown to English seamen, for there is a stirring trade in minerals +with Cardiff, in more tranquil times. But now Los Pasages is deserted +from the bar down to the uttermost point of its long river-like stretch +inland, except by the smacks and small boats of the native fishers, a +tiny tug, and a large steamer from Seville which is lying by the wharf. +There is no noise of traffic; the one narrow street echoes to our +tramping feet as I follow my charming cicerone, who has started up for +me like some good spirit of a fairy-<a name="page_221" id="page_221"></a>tale. She leads me to an inn, bids +me enter, and flies in search of the owner of the shallop. The landlord +comes to greet me, and I recognise in him an acquaintance—Maurice, a +former waiter in the Fonda de Paris, in Madrid. I questioned Maurice as +to my chances of getting across to Irun by land that night; but he +assured me it was too late, and really dangerous; that the road was +infested by gangs of desperadoes; and that it would be safer for me to +travel, even in the day-time, without money or valuables. The owner of +the shallop came, but as he had the audacity to ask eighty francs for +transporting me round to Fontarabia, and as I had found Maurice, I +resolved to stop in Los Pasages for the night.</p> + +<p>"You have only to cross the water to-morrow morning," said Maurice, "and +you are in Kenteria, where you will be sure to get a vehicle."</p> + +<p>The backs of the houses all overlook the port, and all are balconied and +furnished with flowered terraces, from which one can fish, look at his +reflection, or take a header into the water at pleasure. A glorious nook +for a reading-party's holiday, Los<a name="page_222" id="page_222"></a> Pasages. Not if fair mysteries like +my friend crop up there; but where is she, by-the-way? She does not +re-appear; but Maurice will help me to discover who and what she is.</p> + +<p>"Maurice, are there any pretty girls here?"</p> + +<p>Maurice looks at me reproachfully.</p> + +<p>"Señor, you have been conducted to my house by one who is acknowledged +to be the prettiest in all Spain."</p> + +<p>That night I dreamt of Eugenia, the baker's daughter, the pride of Los +Pasages, who was waiting for a husband, but would have none but one who +helps Charles VII. to the throne. I recorded that dream for the +bachelors of Britain, and conjured them to make haste to propose for +her—not that the Carlist war was hurrying to a close; but I have +remarked that girls inclined to be plump at eighteen sometimes develop +excessive embonpoint about eight-and-twenty. On inquiry, I found a key +to the enigma which had filled me with sweet excitement. Eugenia, who +had been to the citadel-prison to carry provisions to a friend in +trouble, had seen me speaking to Colonel Stuart, and was<a name="page_223" id="page_223"></a> anxious to +serve me because of my supposed Carlist tincture. My supposed Carlist +tincture did not prevent a lusty Basque boatman from charging five +francs next morning for the five minutes' pull across the water to the +road to Renteria, where I caught a huge yellow diligence, which had +ventured to leave San Sebastian at last with the detained mails of a +week. The machine was horsed in the usual manner—that is, with three +mules and two nags—but how different from usual was the way-bill! With +the exception of the driver and his aide, a youngster who jumped down +from the box every hundred yards, and belaboured the beasts with a +wattle, there was not one passenger fit to carry arms. We had a load of +women and babies, a decrepit patriarch, and two boys under the fighting +age. We halted at Renteria, harnessed a fresh team to our conveniency, +and sent on a messenger to ascertain if the Carlists had been seen on +the road. Everybody in Renteria carried a musket. All the approaches +were defended by loopholed works, roofed with turf, and a perfect +fortress was constructed in the centre of the town by a series<a name="page_224" id="page_224"></a> of +communications which had been established between the church and a block +of houses in front by <i>caponnières</i>. The church windows were built up +and loopholed, and a semicircular <i>tambour</i>, banked with earth to +protect it from artillery, was thrown up against the houses in the +middle of the street, so as to enfilade it at either side in case of +attack. There were troops of the line in Renteria, but no artillerymen, +nor was there artillery to be served. Without artillery, however, the +place, if properly provisioned, could not be taken, if the defending +force was worth its salt.</p> + +<p>The messenger having returned with word that all was right, we went +ahead at a fearful pace on a very good road, lined with poplars, and +running through a neat park-like country. Over to the right we could see +the church-spire of Oyarzun, and the smoke curling from the chimneys; a +little farther on we passed the debris of a diligence on the wayside; +the telegraph wires along the route were broken down, and the poles +taken away for firewood; we dived under a railway bridge, but never a +Carlist saw we during the continuous brief<a name="page_225" id="page_225"></a> mad progress over the eight +miles from Renteria to the rise into Irun.</p> + +<p>We clattered up to the rail way-station at a hand-gallop, the people +rushing to the doors of the houses, and beaming welcome from smiling +countenances. There was a faint attempt to cheer us. At the station a +number of officials, a couple of Carabineros, and a knot of idlers were +gathered. The driver descended with the gait of a conquering hero, and +turned his glances in the direction of a cottage close by. An old man on +crutches, a blooming matron with rosary beads at her waist, and a +nut-brown maid with laughing eyes stood under the porch, embowered in +tamarisk and laurel-rose. The driver strode over to them, crying out +triumphantly:</p> + +<p>"El primero! Lo! I am the first."</p> + +<p>"How valiant you are, Pedro!" said the nut-brown maid, advancing to meet +him.</p> + +<p>"How lucky you are!" said the matron, with a grave shake of the head.</p> + +<p>"How rash you are!" mumbled the grandfather; "you were always so."<a name="page_226" id="page_226"></a></p> + +<p>I envied that driver, for the nut-brown maid kissed him, as she had the +right to do, for she was his affianced, and had not seen him for five +days.</p> + +<p>From the Irun station to Hendaye was free from danger. I walked down +through a field of maize to the Bidassoa, crossed by a ferry-boat to the +other side, where a post of the 49th of the French Line were peacefully +playing cards for buttons in the shade of a chestnut, and a few minutes +afterwards was seated in front of a bottle of Dublin stout with the +countryman who forwarded my letters and telegrams from over the border.</p> + +<p>Naturally I had a desire to ascertain the whereabouts of Santa Cruz. The +man had almost grown mythical with me. I had heard at San Sebastian that +ten thousand crowns had been offered for his scalp at Tolosa, and the +fondest yearning—the one satisfying aspiration of the hyena—was to +tear him into shreds, chop him into sausage-meat, gouge out his eyes, or +roast him before a slow fire. Which form of torment he would prefer, he +had not quite settled. A sort of intuitive faculty, which has<a name="page_227" id="page_227"></a> seldom +led me astray, said to me that Santa Cruz was somewhere near. I revolved +the matter in my mind, and fixed upon the man under whose roof he was +most likely to be concealed. I went to that man and requested him +bluntly to take me to the outlawed priest—I wished very much to speak +to him.</p> + +<p>He smiled and answered, "He is not here."</p> + +<p>"The bird is flown," I said, "but the nest is warm. He is not far away."</p> + +<p>"True," he said, "come with me."</p> + +<p>We drove some miles—I will not say how many—and drew up at an enclosed +villa, which may have been in France, but was not of it. To be plain, it +was neutral territory, and my host, who knew me thoroughly, disappeared +for a few moments, and said Santa Cruz was sleeping, but that he had +roused him, and that he would be with us presently.</p> + +<p>I was sitting on a garden-seat in front of the house where he was +stopping, when he presented himself on the threshold, bareheaded, and in +his shirt-sleeves. The outlaw priest was no slave to<a name="page_228" id="page_228"></a> the +conventionalities of society. He did not adjust his necktie before +receiving visitors. I am not sure that he wore a necktie at all. Let me +try and draw his portrait as he stood there in the doorway, in +questioning attitude. A thick, burly man under thirty years of age, some +five feet five in height, with broad sallow face, brawny bull-neck, and +wide square-set shoulders—a squat Hercules; dark-brown hair, cut short, +lies close to his head; he is bearded, and has a dark-brown pointed +moustache; shaggy brows overhang his small steel-gray eyes; his nose is +coarse and devoid of character; but his jaws are massive, his lips firm, +and his chin determined. He is dressed like the better class of peasant, +wears sandals, canvas trousers, a light brownish-gray waistcoat, and has +a large leathern belt, like a horse's girth, round his waist. His +expression is severe, as of one immersed in thought; with an occasional +frown, as if the thought were disagreeable. His brows knit, and a shadow +passes over his features when anything is mentioned that displeases him; +but I was told when he smiled, the smile was of the sweetest and most +amiable. I<a name="page_229" id="page_229"></a> cannot say I saw him in smiling mood, but I saw him frown, +and never did anyone so truly translate to me the figure of speech of +"looking black." He advanced with self-possession, returned my salute +without coldness or <i>empressement</i>, as if it were a mere matter of form, +and sat down beside me. We had a long chat. Santa Cruz did not take much +active part in it, but listened as his host spoke, punctuating what was +said with nods of assent, and now and again dropping a guttural +sentence. His maxim was that deeds were of more value than words, and he +adhered to it. His host, I may interpose, was the most devoted of +Carlists, and had given largely of his means to aid the cause. He had +great faith in Santa Cruz, and told me in his presence (but in French, +which the Cura understood but slightly) that while Santa Cruz was in the +northern provinces, the King had half-a-man in his service, and that if +he would now call on Cabrera he would have a man and a half, for that +Santa Cruz would act with Cabrera.</p> + +<p>"If Don Carlos does not consent to that," said my host, "you will see +that he will have to return<a name="page_230" id="page_230"></a> into France, and live in ignominy for the +rest of his days!"</p> + +<p>This Cura, represented in the Madrid play-house as half-drunk and +dancing lewdly, was the most abstemious and chastest of men, and neither +smoked nor drank wine. His fame went on increasing, as did the number of +his followers. He effected prodigies with the means at his command. His +friends in France supplied him with two cannon, which were smuggled +across the border. He turned the foundry at Vera into a munition +factory; employed women to make uniforms for his men; and insisted that +the intervals between his expeditions should be given up to drill. He +was dreaded, respected, admired by his band; he was strong and hardy; +faced perils and privations in common with the lowest, but used no +weapon but his walking-stick The priest, the anointed of God, may not +shed blood. The affair of Endarlasa was the coping-stone of his career. +Various accounts were related of that event; it is only fair to let +Santa Cruz himself speak. This is what he told me:</p> + +<p>At three one morning he opened fire on the<a name="page_231" id="page_231"></a> guard-house occupied by the +Carabineros, at the bridge over the Bidassoa, between Vera and Irun. A +white flag was hoisted on the guard-house. He ordered the fire to cease, +and advanced to negotiate the conditions of surrender. The enemy, who +had invited him to approach, by the white flag, fired and wounded one of +his men. He issued directions to take the place, and spare nobody. The +place was taken, and nobody was spared. Twenty-seven dead bodies +littered the Vera road that morning.</p> + +<p>"Is it true that you pardoned two?" I asked the priest.</p> + +<p>"No, ninguno! Porqué?" he answered with astonishment. "Not one. Why +should I?"</p> + +<p>The reason I had asked was that I had been told that a couple of the +Carabineros had plunged into the Bidassoa and tried to swim to the other +side; but the Cura, on his own avowal, with Rhadamanthine justice had +commanded them to be shot as they breasted the current, and they were +shot. He was no believer in half-measures.</p> + +<p>A lady partisan of his, who had dined with him<a name="page_232" id="page_232"></a> the day before, told me +he never breathed a syllable of the attack he meditated, to her or any +of his band. An English gentleman, who visited the ground while the +corpses were still upon it, assured me that the sight was horrifying, +and, such was the panic in Irun, that he verily believed Santa Cruz +might have taken the town the same afternoon, had he appeared before it +with four men.</p> + +<p>To pursue the story of the redoubtable Cura. The bruit of his exploits +had gone abroad, and among certain Carlists it seemed to be the opinion, +as one of them remarked to me, that "<i>Il a fait de grandes choses, mais +de grandes bêtises aussi.</i>" He was making war altogether too seriously +for their tastes. Antonio Lizarraga was appointed Commandant-General of +Guipúzcoa about that period, and ordered Santa Cruz to report to him. +Santa Cruz, who was in the field before him, and had five times as many +men under his control, paid no heed to his orders. Lizarraga then sent +him a death-warrant, which is so curious a document that I make no +apology for appending it in full:<a name="page_233" id="page_233"></a></p> + +<div class="blockquote"><p class="c smcap">Translation.</p> + +<p>(A seal on which is inscribed "Royal Army of the North, General +Command of Guipúzcoa.")</p> + +<p>"The sixteenth day of the present month, I gave orders to all the +forces under my command, that they should proceed to capture you, +and that immediately after you had received the benefit of clergy +they should execute you.</p> + +<p>"This sentence I pronounced on account of your insubordination +towards me, you having disobeyed me several times, and having taken +no notice of the repeated commands I sent you to present yourself +before me to declare what you had to say in your own defence in the +inquiry instituted against you by my directions.</p> + +<p>"For the last time I ask of you to present yourself to me, the +instant this communication is received; in default of which I +notify to you that every means will be used to effect your arrest; +that your disobedience and the unqualifiable acts laid to your +charge will be published in all the newspapers; and that the +condign punishment they deserve will be duly exacted.</p> + +<p>"God grant you many years.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 3em;">"The Brigadier-General Commanding.</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 50%;">(Signed)<span style="margin-left: 2em;"> </span>"<span class="smcap">Antonio Lizarraga.</span></span></p> + +<p>"Campo Del Honor, 28th of March, 1873.<br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"Señor Don Manuel Santa Cruz."</span></p> + +<p>"Note.—Have the goodness to acknowledge this, my +communication."</p></div> + +<p>This missive was received by Santa Cruz, but he never acknowledged it. +His host permitted me to read and copy the original.<a name="page_234" id="page_234"></a></p> + +<p>"Is not that arbitrary?" he said to me in English; "very much like what +you call Jedburgh justice; hanging a man first and trying him +afterwards. Lizarraga says, 'This sentence I pronounced'—all is +finished apparently there; and yet he cites the man whom he has ordered +to be immediately executed to appear before him to declare what he has +to say!"</p> + +<p>Another phrase in this death-warrant, which escaped the host, impressed +me with its naïveté:</p> + +<p>"<i>God grant you many years.</i>"</p> + +<p>But Lizarraga, in this politeness of custom, meant no more, it is to be +presumed, than did the Irish hangman who expostulated with his client in +the condemned cell:</p> + +<p>"Long life to ye, Mr. Hinery! and make haste, the people are getting +onpatient."</p> + +<p>Santa Cruz bit his way out of the toils, however, but not so his band. +They were surrounded at Vera, caught, with a few exceptions, disarmed, +assembled and addressed in Spanish by the Marquis de Valdespina, whose +remarks were translated to them into Basque by the Cura of Ollo. They +cried<a name="page_235" id="page_235"></a> "Viva el Rey!" Their arms were subsequently restored to them, and +the men were distributed among other battalions. But they still regret +their old leader, and Santa Cruz is popular by the firesides of the +mountaineers of Guipúzcoa. One of his mountain guns fell into the hands +of Lizarraga, but the other was buried in some spot only known to +himself and a few trusted companions.</p> + +<p>During my interview I made it my business to study the priest +attentively, and this is what I honestly thought of him. He was a +fanatic, a sullen self-willed man with but one idea—the success of the +cause; and but one ambition—that it should be said of him that it was +he, Santa Cruz, who put Don Carlos on the throne of his ancestors. The +globe for him was bounded by the Pyrenees and the sea; he had but one +antipathy after the heretics (all who did not worship God as he did) and +the Liberals, and that was Lizarraga. I considered it a mistake that +Lizarraga was not the Cura of Hernialde, and Santa Cruz the +Commandant-General of Guipúzcoa. The priest had a natural military +instinct—I would almost go so far<a name="page_236" id="page_236"></a> as to say a spice of military +genius; and had he had a knowledge of the profession of arms would +probably have developed into a great general of the Cossack type. His +hatred to Lizarraga led him into littleness and injustice. He chuckled +at the idea of Lizarraga not being able to find the buried gun, as if +that were any great triumph over him; and he sneered at the idea of +Lizarraga, who was not able to take Oyarzun, meditating an attempt on +Tolosa. I could thoroughly understand that the Carlist priest bore +malice to the officer who supplanted him and condemned him to death. But +what Lizarraga did was done in compliance with the King's will. At the +same time there could be no doubt that Santa Cruz was treated with scant +courtesy after all he had accomplished, and had a right to feel himself +ill-used, and the victim of jealous rivalry. He said that he was +prepared, any day the King permitted him, to traverse the four +provinces, and hold his enemies <i>in terrorem</i> with five hundred men. And +he was the very worthy to do it. He complained bitterly that three of +his<a name="page_237" id="page_237"></a> followers had been shot by Lizarraga. One story relates that they +stole into Guipúzcoa to levy blackmail, another that they merely went to +dig up some money that was interred when the legion was disbanded. In +any case they appeared in arms in a forbidden district, and incurred the +capital penalty. Santa Cruz went to Bordeaux to beg for their lives at +the feet of Doña Margarita. She received him most graciously, and +promised to send a special courier to her husband to intercede in their +behalf. Before the King's reprieve could possibly have arrived the three +were executed.</p> + +<p>As we were about to leave, a colleague who was with me asked the Cura if +he would permit him to visit his camp, if it came to pass that he took +up arms again in Spain.</p> + +<p>"We shall see," said Santa Cruz; "wait till I am there."</p> + +<p>My own conviction is that the priest held correspondents in abhorrence, +and that his first impulse would have been to tie a zealous one up to a +tree, and have thirty-nine blows given him with a stick.<a name="page_238" id="page_238"></a> Perhaps I did +him wrong, but if ever he did take up arms again, it was my firm +intention to be south when he was north, for he was about the last +person in creation to whose tender mercies I should care to entrust +myself.<a name="page_239" id="page_239"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h3> + +<p class="head">An Audible Battle—"Great Cry and Little Wool"—A Carlist Court +Newsman—A Religious War—The Siege of Oyarzun—Madrid Rebels—"The +Money of Judas"—A Manifesto from Don Carlos—An Ideal +Monarch—Necessity of Social and Political Reconstruction +Proclaimed—A Free Church—A Broad Policy—The King for the +People—The Theological Question—Austerity in Alava—Clerical and +Non-Clerical Carlists—Disavowal of Bigotry—A Republican Editor on +the Carlist Creed—Character of the Basques—Drill and +Discipline—Guerilleros <i>versus</i> Regulars.</p> + +<p class="nind">W<span class="smcap">hen</span> a man's office is to chronicle war and he is within hearing of the +echoes of battle, but cannot reach a spot from which the scene of action +might be commanded, it is annoying in the extreme. Such was my strait on +the 21st of August, a few days after my arrival from San Sebastian. I +was at Hendaye, the border-town of France. From the Spanish frontier the +report of heavy firing was audible for hours, apparently coming from a +point<a name="page_240" id="page_240"></a> between Oyarzun and Renteria. First one could distinguish the +faint spatter of musketry, and afterwards the undeniable muffled roar of +artillery. Then came a succession of sustained rolls as of +volley-firing. About noon the action must have been at its height. The +distant din was subsequently to be caught only at long intervals, as if +changes of position were in course of being effected; but at three +o'clock it regained force, and raged with fury until five, when it +suddenly died away.</p> + +<p>I was burning with impatience, and made several unavailing attempts to +cross the Bidassoa. The ferryman, acting under instructions from the +gendarmes, refused to take passengers. By the evening train a delegate +from the Paris Society for the Succour of the Wounded arrived from +Bayonne with a box of medicine and surgical appliances. He, too, was +unable to pass into Spain. Meantime, rumour ran riot. Stories were +current that there had been fearful losses.</p> + +<p>"At eleven o'clock men were falling like flies," said one eye-witness, +who succeeded in running away from the field before he fell.<a name="page_241" id="page_241"></a></p> + +<p>Not a single medical man would leave France in response to the call of +the Paris delegate for volunteers to accompany him. Were they all +Republicans? Did they fear that Belcha might take a fancy to their +probes and forcipes? Or did they look upon the big battles and +tremendous lists of casualties in this most uncivil of civil wars as +illustrations of a great cry and little wool? If the latter was their +notion, they were right. Three days after this serious engagement, I +learned the particulars of what had taken place. General Loma, a +brigadier under Sanchez Bregua, with a column of 1,500 men, came out +from San Sebastian to cover a working-party while they were endeavouring +to throw up a redoubt for his guns on an eminence between Irun and +Oyarzun, so as to put an end to the tussle over the possession of the +latter hamlet, which was a perpetual bone of contention. The Carlists +fired upon him from behind the rocks in a gorge to which he had +committed himself, but were outnumbered. Word was sent to the cabecilla, +Martinez, at Lesaca, and he arrived with reinforcements at the double, +and encompassed<a name="page_242" id="page_242"></a> Loma with such a cloud of sulphurous smoke that the +Republicans had to fall back upon San Sebastian. The casualties in this +Homeric combat were not appalling; there was more gunpowder than blood +expended. The losses on the Republican side were one killed and fifteen +wounded. On the Carlist side they were less, for the Carlists kept under +cover of the fern and furze. But then it must be considered that the +firing only lasted nine hours!</p> + +<p>Don Carlos was not slow in calling the printing-press to his aid. One of +his first acts after his entry into his dominions was to start an +official gazette, <i>El Cuartel Real</i>, the first number of which is before +me as I write. I have seen queer papers in my travels, from the +<i>Bugler</i>, a regimental record brought out by the 68th Light Infantry in +Burmah, to the <i>Fiji Times</i>, and the <i>Epitaph</i>, the leading organ of +Tombstone City, in the territory of Arizona; but this assuredly was the +queerest. It was published by Cristóbal Perez, on the summit of Peña de +la Plata, a Pyrenean peak. There might be less acceptable reading than a +<i>résumé</i> of its contents.<a name="page_243" id="page_243"></a></p> + +<p><i>El Cuartel Real</i> does not impose by its magnitude. It is about +one-eighth the size of a London daily journal; but if it is not great by +quantity it is by quality. Over the three columns of the opening page +figure the three watchwords of the Royal cause, "God, Country, King." +The paragraph which has the post of honour is headed "Oficial," and has +in it a flavour of the <i>Court Newsman</i>. Here it is as it appears in the +original, boldly imprinted in black type:</p> + +<p>"S. M. el Rey (q.D.g.) continúa sin novedad al frente de su leal y +valiente ejército.</p> + +<p>"S. M. la Reina y sus augustos hijos continúan tambien sin novedad en su +importante salud."</p> + +<p>As it is not vouchsafed to everyone to understand Castilian, I may as +well give a rough translation, which read herewith:</p> + +<p>"His Majesty the King (whom God guard) continues without change at the +front of his loyal and valiant army.</p> + +<p>"Her Majesty the Queen and her august children also continue without +alteration in their precious health."<a name="page_244" id="page_244"></a></p> + +<p>Then <i>El Cuartel Real</i> appends what takes the place of its leading +article—a reproduction of a letter from Don Carlos to his "august +brother," Don Alfonso, setting forth the principles on which he appeals +for Spanish support. This document is so important that I must return to +it anon. Then comes a circular from the "Real Junta Gubernativa del +Reino de Navarra," in session at Vera. The purport of this, epitomized +in a sentence, is to raise money. Next, we arrive at the "Seccion +Oficial," the most important paragraph of which announces that the +Chief, Merendon, has inaugurated a Carlist movement in Toledo, with a +well-armed force, exceeding 280 men—to wit, 150 horsemen and 130 +infantry—and that he hopes shortly to gather numerous recruits. The +"Seccion de Noticias" makes up the body of the paper, and is richer in +information. We are told that the most excellent and illustrious Bishop +of Urgel, accompanied by several sacerdotal and other dignitaries, +arrived in the town of Urdaniz, at half-past seven on the previous +Wednesday evening. His Lordship rested a night in the house of the +Vicar, and left<a name="page_245" id="page_245"></a> the following morning, escorted by his friend and host, +the said Vicar, Brigadier Gamundi, and Colonel D. Fermin Irribarren, +veterans of the Carlist army, for Elisondo. From that the prelate was +reported to have started to headquarters, "to salute the King of Spain, +august representative of the Christian monarchy, which is the only plank +of safety in the shipwreck of the country."</p> + +<p>The <i>Cuartel Real</i> warmly congratulates the Bishop on the fact of his +having come to the conviction that "the present war is a religious war, +and on that account eminently social"—(social in Spanish must have some +peculiar shade of meaning unknown to strangers, for otherwise there is +no sequence here)—and proceeds to speak with an eloquence that recalls +that wretched Republican, Castelar, of the standard of faith in which +resides Spanish honour and—here come two words that puzzle me, <i>la +hidalguia y la caballerosidad</i>; but I suppose they mean nobility and +chivalry, and everything of that kind. The next notice in the royal +gazette is purely military, and makes known that the siege of the +important town of Oyarzun<a name="page_246" id="page_246"></a> has begun. "On the 20th the batteries opened +fire, and, according to report, the enemy had one hundred men <i>hors de +combat</i>." The batteries! There is a touch of genius in that phrase. +Reading it, one would imagine that the Royalists had a royal regiment of +artillery, and that eight pieces of cannon, at the very least, played +upon the unfortunate Oyarzun. A jennet with a 4-pounder at its heels +would be a more correct representation of the strength of the Carlist +ordnance.</p> + +<p>To resume the story of the siege of Oyarzun. "On the 21st," adds <i>El +Cuartel Real</i>, "there was talk of a capitulation, and it is possible +that the place has surrendered at this hour." The paragraph that +succeeds it is a gem: "Of the 1,010 armed rebels in Eibar (Guipúzcoa), +210 betook themselves to San Sebastian, when they suspected the approach +of the Royal forces, and the 800 remaining gave up to General Lizarraga +their rifles, all of the Remington system." There is no quibble about +the latter statement. The Carlists had easier ways of procuring arms +than by running cargoes from England. But is there not something<a name="page_247" id="page_247"></a> +inimitable in the epithet "rebels"? There can be no question but that +everyone is a rebel in romantic Spain—in the opinion of somebody else. +The only question is, Who are the constituted authorities? Until that is +settled the editor of <i>El Cuartel Real</i> is perfectly justified in +treating the volunteers of liberty, in those districts where Charles +VII. virtually reigns, as armed rebels. Although this town of Eibar had +frequently risen up against the legitimate authorities named by his +Majesty, it is pleasant to learn that General Lizarraga did not impose +the slightest chastisement on the population, thus giving a lesson of +forbearance to the "factious generals." Next we are informed that on the +day the Royal forces entered Vergara, the ignominious monument erected +by the Liberals in record of the greatest of treasons (the treaty +between the treacherous Maroto and Espartero in 1839) was destroyed +amidst enthusiasm, and the parchment in the municipal archives +commemorating its erection was taken out and burned in the public +square. I may add (but this I had from private sources) that the coin +dug up from under<a name="page_248" id="page_248"></a> the monument was cast to the wind as the money of +Judas. Navarre, continues <i>El Cuartel Real</i>, is dominated by our valiant +soldiers under the skilful direction of his Majesty; Lizarraga has +occupied in a few days Mondragon, Eibar, Plasencia, Azpeitia, Vergara, +and other important places in Guipúzcoa, and obtained "considerable +booty of war;" the standard of legitimacy is waving triumphantly in +Biscay, and Bilbao is blockaded. There the tale of victory ends; but we +arrive at matters not less gratifying in another sense. The +distinguished engineer, Don Mariano Lana y Sarto, has been appointed to +look after the repair of the bridges destroyed by Nouvilas. Don Matias +Schaso Gomez, a member of the press militant, has been promoted to be a +commandant for his valour at Astigarraga, and is nominated for the +laurelled cross of San Fernando; and the illustrious doctor, Señor Don +Alejandro Rodriguez Hidalgo, has been named chief of the sanitary staff, +and entrusted with the establishment of military hospitals.</p> + +<p>The last paragraph in this curious little gazette, printed up amid the +clouds on the summit of the<a name="page_249" id="page_249"></a> Silver Hill, states that the Royal quarters +were at Abarzuzu on the 17th instant, and that Estella, close by, was +stubbornly resisting, but would soon be in the power of the Royalists. A +column which had attempted to relieve the garrison was energetically +driven back towards Lerin by two battalions commanded by his Majesty in +person. But by the time <i>El Cuartel Real</i> came under my notice Estella +had fallen, and the Carlists had put to their credit a genuine success.</p> + +<p>As the question of Carlism is still one of prominent interest—is, +indeed, what the French term an "actuality," and may crop up again any +day, the letter of the claimant to the throne to Don Alfonso (alluded to +some sentences above) is worth translating. It is the authoritative +exposition of the aims of the would-be monarch, and of the line of +policy he intended to pursue should he ever take up his residence in +that coveted palace at Madrid. Its date is August 23rd, 1873, and the +contents are these:</p> + +<p class="top5">"<span class="smcap">My dear Brother</span>,</p> + +<p class="spain">"Spain has already had opportunities enough to ascertain my ideas +and sentiments as man and<a name="page_250" id="page_250"></a> King in various periodicals and +newspapers. Yielding, nevertheless, to a general and anxiously +expressed desire which has reached me from all parts of the +Peninsula, I write this letter, in which I address myself, not +merely to the brother of my heart, but without exception to all +Spaniards, for they are my brothers as well.</p> + +<p>"I cannot, my dear Alfonso, present myself to Spain as a Pretender +to the Crown. It is my duty to believe, and I do believe, that the +Crown of Spain is already placed on my forehead by the consecrated +hand of the law. With this right I was born, a right which has +grown, now that the fitting time has come, to a sacred obligation; +but I desire that the right shall be confirmed to me by the love of +my people. My business, henceforth, is to devote to the service of +that people all my thoughts and powers—to die for it, or save it.</p> + +<p>"To say that I aspire to be King of Spain, and not of a party, is +superfluous, for what man worthy to be a king would be satisfied to +reign over a party? In such a case he would degrade himself in his +own person, descending from the high and<a name="page_251" id="page_251"></a> serene region where +majesty dwells, and which is beyond the reach of mean and pitiful +triflings.</p> + +<p>"I ought not to be, and I do not desire to be, King, except of all +Spaniards; I exclude nobody, not even those who call themselves my +enemies, for a king can have no enemies. I appeal affectionately to +all, in the name of the country, even to those who appear the most +estranged; and if I do not need the help of all to arrive at the +throne of my ancestors, I do perhaps need their help to establish +on solid and immovable bases the government of the State, and to +give prosperous peace and true liberty to my beloved Spain.</p> + +<p>"When I reflect how weighty a task it is to compass those great +ends, the magnitude of the undertaking almost oppresses me with +fear. True, I am filled with the most fervent desire to begin, and +the resolute will to carry out, the enterprise; but I cannot hide +from myself that the difficulties are immense, and that they can +only be overcome by the co-operation of the men of notability, the +most impartial and honest in the kingdom; and, above all, by the +co-operation of the kingdom itself,<a name="page_252" id="page_252"></a> gathered together in the +Cortes which would truly represent the living forces and +Conservative elements of Spain.</p> + +<p>"I am prepared with such Cortes to give to Spain, as I said in my +letter to the Sovereigns of Europe, a fundamental code which would +prove, I trust, definitive and Spanish.</p> + +<p>"Side by side, my brother, we have studied modern history, +meditating over those great catastrophes which are at once lessons +to rulers and a warning to the people. Side by side, we have also +thought over and formed a common judgment that every century ought +to have, and actually has, its legitimate necessities and natural +aspirations.</p> + +<p>"Old Spain stood in need of great reforms; in modern Spain we have +had simply immense convulsions of overthrow. Much has been +destroyed; little has been reformed. Ancient institutions, some of +which cannot be revivified, have died out. An attempt has been made +to create others in their place, but scarcely had they seen the +light when symptoms of death set in. So much has been done, and no +more. I have before me a stupendous<a name="page_253" id="page_253"></a> labour, an immense social and +political reconstruction. I have to set myself to building up, in +this desolated country, on bases whose solidity is guaranteed by +experience, a grand edifice, where every legitimate interest and +every reasonable personality can find admittance.</p> + +<p>"I do not deceive myself, my brother, when I feel confident that +Spain is hungry and thirsty for justice; that she feels the urgent +and imperious necessity of a government, worthy and energetic, +severe and respected; and that she anxiously wishes that the law to +which we all, great and small, should be subject, should reign with +undisputed sway.</p> + +<p>"Spain is not willing that outrage or offence should be offered to +the faith of her fathers, believing that in Catholicity reposes the +truth she understands, and that to accomplish to the full its +divine mission, the Church must be free.</p> + +<p>"Whilst knowing and not forgetting that the nineteenth century is +not the sixteenth, Spain is resolved to preserve from every danger +Catholic unity—the symbol of our glories, the essence of our<a name="page_254" id="page_254"></a> +laws, and the holy bond of concord between all Spaniards.</p> + +<p>"The Spanish people, taught by a painful experience, desires the +truth in everything, and that the King should be a king in reality, +and not the shadow of a king; and that its Cortes should be the +regularly appointed and peaceful gathering of the independent and +incorruptible elect of the constituencies, and not tumultuous and +barren assemblies of office-holders and office-seekers, servile +majorities and seditious minorities.</p> + +<p>"The Spanish people is favourable to decentralisation, and will +always be so; and you know well, my dear Alfonso, that should my +desires be carried out, instead of assimilating the Basque +provinces to the rest of Spain, which the revolutionary spirit +would fain bring to pass, the rest of Spain would be lifted to an +equality in internal administration with those fortunate and noble +provinces.</p> + +<p>"It is my wish that the municipality should retain its separate +existence, and the provinces likewise, proper precautions being +employed to prevent possible abuses.<a name="page_255" id="page_255"></a></p> + +<p>"My cherished thought as constant desire is to give to Spain +exactly that which she does not possess, in spite of the lying +clamour of some deluded people—that liberty which she only knows +by name; liberty, which is the daughter of the gospel, not +liberalism, which is the son of disbelief (<i>de la protesta</i>); +liberty, in fine, which is the supremacy of the laws when the laws +are just—that is to say, conformable to the designs of nature and +of God.</p> + +<p>"We, descendants of kings, admit that the people should not exist +for the King so much as the King for the people; that a king should +be the most honoured man amongst his people, as he is the first +caballero; and that a king for the future should glory in the +special title of 'father of the poor' and 'guardian of the weak.'</p> + +<p>"At present, my dear brother, there is a very formidable question +in our Spain, that of the finances. The Spanish debt is something +frightful to think of; the productive forces of the country are not +enough to cover it—bankruptcy is imminent. I do not know if I can +save Spain from that calamity;<a name="page_256" id="page_256"></a> but, if it be possible, a +legitimate sovereign alone can do it. An unshakable will works +wonders. If the country is poor, let all live frugally, even to the +ministers; nay, even to the King himself, who should be one in +feeling with Don Enrique El Doliente. If the King is foremost in +setting the example, all will be easy. Let ministries be +suppressed, provincial governments be reduced, offices be +diminished, and the administration economized at the same time that +agriculture is encouraged, industry protected, and commerce +assisted. To put the finances and credit of Spain on a proper +footing is a Titanic enterprise to which all governments and +peoples should lend aid."</p> + +<p class="top5">Here follow a repudiation of free trade as applied to Spain, and a few +well-turned periods dealing in the usual Spanish manner with the duties +of the ruler, laying down, among other axioms, that "virtue and +knowledge are the chiefest nobility," and that the person of the +mendicant should be as sacred as that of the patrician.<a name="page_257" id="page_257"></a></p> + +<p>At the close there is a very sensible sentence, affirming that one +Christian monarch in Spain would be better than three hundred petty +kings disputing in a noisy assembly. "The chiefs of parties," continues +the letter, "naturally yearn for honours or riches or place; but what in +the world can a Christian king desire but the good of his people? What +could he want to be happy but the love of his people?"</p> + +<p>The letter winds up by the affirmation that Don Carlos is faithful to +the good traditions of the old and glorious Spanish monarchy, and that +he believed he would be found to act also as "a man of the present age." +The last sentence is a prayer to his brother, "who had the enviable +privilege of serving in the Papal army," to ask their spiritual king at +Rome for his apostolic benediction for Spain and the writer.</p> + +<p>If this document was written <i>propriâ manu</i>, by Don Carlos, he must be +endowed with higher intellectual faculties than most Kings or Pretenders +possess. It is undeniably clever, and is more progressive than one would +expect from an<a name="page_258" id="page_258"></a> upholder of the doctrine of Divine right. It may be, as +Tennyson sings, that the thoughts of men (even when they are Bourbons) +are widened with the process of the suns. But I protest that there is +such a masterly mistiness in it here and there, such a careful elusion +of rocks and ruggednesses political, and such a fine wind-beating +flourish of the banner of glittering generality, that I think there were +more heads than one engaged in the concoction of the manifesto. I have +studiously refrained from the introduction of the religious topic as far +as I could in this work—it is outside my sphere; but I should be unjust +to the reader did I not give him some information (not from the +controversial standpoint) on a subject which will obtrude itself in any +discussion on the merits of the conflict which has twice distracted +Spain and may divide the country again. It is unfortunately indisputable +that religion was poked into the quarrel. The struggle was described in +<i>El Cuartel Real</i> as a religious war; the theological allegiance of the +partisans of Don Carlos was appealed to, and their ardent attachment to +the Papacy was worked upon,<a name="page_259" id="page_259"></a> as in the concluding sentence of the +proclamation of Don Carlos. In those portions of the north where Carlism +was all-powerful, the authorities were emphatically showing that those +who served under them must be practical Roman Catholics <i>nolentes +volentes</i>. An austere placard, signed by Barona, member of the Carlist +war committee, was posted in the province of Alava, and ordained among +other articles: Firstly, that the town councillors of every municipality +should assist in a body at High Mass; secondly, that the mayors should +interdict, under the most severe penalties, all games and public +diversions, and the opening of all public establishments during Divine +service; and thirdly, that all blasphemers, and all who worked on a +holiday, who gave scandal, or who danced indecently, should be +<i>scourged</i>. The first of these articles is lawful enough in a country +which is almost exclusively Roman Catholic. In England nothing can be +said against it, seeing that British soldiers of all denominations are +compelled to attend Church parade, and the prisoners in all gaols have +to register themselves as belonging to some religion.<a name="page_260" id="page_260"></a> There is just +this theoretical objection, however—the article implies that municipal +honours are to be limited to members of one creed, which is intolerant. +That which underlay the antipathy of numerous Conservatives outside +Spain to the Royalist cause, was the belief entertained that the success +of Don Carlos would lead to the re-assertion of clerical preponderance, +would destroy liberty of conscience as understood in most European +nations, and would set up a political priesthood. The manifesto of Don +Carlos does not deal with those points in the full and categorical +manner desirable. I was told there were two parties in the Carlist camp, +the clerical and—for want of a better name, let it be called—the +non-clerical The former, the Basques, and those who gave Carlism its +great primary impulsion, were as zealously Roman Catholic as ever Manuel +Santa Cruz was. They looked forward to the re-acquisition of the +ecclesiastical domains and the re-establishment of the Catholic Church +in all its ancient supremacy of wealth and power. The non-clericals knew +that the Basques, even assuming them all to be Carlists, were but +660,000 in number,<a name="page_261" id="page_261"></a> a small minority of the population, and that the +existence of a State unduly influenced by a Church—things temporal +controlled by personages bound to things spiritual—was antagonistic to +the feelings of the majority of Spaniards.</p> + +<p>Having met a nobleman distinguished for his services to Carlism, I put +it to him bluntly, "Would Don Carlos on the throne mean a relapse into +religious bigotry?"</p> + +<p>He answered me with candour, "I am a Roman Catholic, and if I thought so +I should be the last man to lend a penny to his cause."</p> + +<p>"But," I urged, "that is the general impression in England, where he is +trying to negotiate a loan, and if it is left uncorrected it does him +injury. Why does he not repel the impeachment?"</p> + +<p>"The truth is," he said, "Don Carlos has made too many public +explanations."</p> + +<p>I returned to the charge, challenging my acquaintance to deny that many +of the supporters of Don Carlos would fall away if they had not the +thorough belief that his cause was as much identified with the triumph +of Roman Catholicism as<a name="page_262" id="page_262"></a> with that of legitimacy. His reply was not a +denial, but an admission of the fact, with the addition that in war one +must not be too particular as to the means of enlisting aid, and +stimulating the enthusiasm of supporters, which is an argument as true +as it is old. Don Carlos, in his manifesto, goes on the assumption that +the Republicans are all atheists, or something very like it. It is only +fair to let the Republicans speak for themselves, and explain what is +the Republican estimate of the Carlist religion. The San Sebastian +newspaper, <i>El Diario</i>, may be assumed to be a fair exponent of the +sentiments of the anti-Carlists, and thus emphatically, and not without +a spice of antithesis, it delivers itself:</p> + +<p>"The religion which has the commandment, 'Thou shalt not kill,' forbids +murder.</p> + +<p>"The religion which has the commandment, 'Thou shalt not steal,' forbids +robbery.</p> + +<p>"The religion which is peace, obedience, and love, is no friend of war, +rebellion, and massacre.</p> + +<p>"Resigned and joyous in other days, its martyrs went to death in the +amphitheatre of Rome, and on the plains of Saragossa, pardon in their +souls<a name="page_263" id="page_263"></a> and prayer on their lips; to-day pardon is exchanged for wrath, +and prayer for reproach. Instead of the martyr's palm, we have the +Berdan breech-loader and the flash of petroleum.</p> + +<p>"Anointed of the Lord, ministers of Him who died invoking blessings on +His enemies, kindle the fires of fratricidal strife, which they call a +sacred war, and lead on and inflame their dupes by the pretence that the +gates of Paradise are to be forced open by gunshot.</p> + +<p>"Meanwhile the bishops are silent, Rome is dumb, the moral law sleeps, +the canon law is forgotten; and these pastors, transforming their flocks +into packs of wolves, scour the plains, blessing murder and sanctifying +conflagration.</p> + +<p>"'King by Divine right,' they cry, like the legists of the Lower Empire; +'Die or believe,' like the sons of the Prophet. Apostles without knowing +it, they seek to achieve the triumph of a Pagan principle by a Saracenic +process.</p> + +<p>"They say that religion is lost, because it is shorn of the honour and +power their kings gave it; that the portals of heaven are barred, +because they have<a name="page_264" id="page_264"></a> forfeited their tithes and first-fruits, their rents +and fat benefices; and they try to convince us by discharges of musketry +that our whole future life depends, on the one hand, on a question of +vanity, and on the other, on a question of stomach.</p> + +<p>"Holy Apostles, disciples of Him who had not a stone whereon to lay His +head, you who conquered the earth with no arms but those of word and +example, oh! would you not say if you returned here below, 'Those who +preach by the voice of platoons; those who evangelize from the mouth of +cannon; those are not, cannot be, our disciples and successors, for they +are not fishers of souls, but fishers of snug posts under government'?</p> + +<p>"And you, glorious martyrs of the Roman circus and Saragossan fields, +oh! would you not say, 'No, this Christianity, which goes about sowing +battle; desolation, tears, and blood wherever it passes, is not +ours—no, this Christianity at the bottom of the slaughter of Endarlasa, +of the hecatomb of Cirauqui, of the sack of Igualada, and of a hundred +other cruelties, is not ours. Our religion says "Kill not," and this +murders; says "Steal not," and<a name="page_265" id="page_265"></a> this robs. No, this is not the +Christian, but the Carlist religion'?"</p> + +<p>That is a good specimen of the rhetorical school of writing popular in +Spanish newspapers; but all that is written is not gospel. From personal +observation it was evident to me that these Republicans of the Spanish +towns of the north were not so scrupulous in the outward observances of +religion as the tone of this indignant Christian leading article would +convey; neither were the Carlists the "packs of wolves" they were +represented to be.</p> + +<p>Let us see how this inflamed sense of so-called religion affected the +rank and file among the adherents of Don Carlos.</p> + +<p>Indubitably the Royalists, with a very few exceptions, were more than +moral—they were sincerely pious, and esteemed it a grateful incense to +the Most High to kill as many of their Republican countrymen as they +could without over-exertion. They bowed their heads and repeated prayers +with the chaplains who accompanied them; as the echoes of the Angelus +bell were heard they were marched<a name="page_266" id="page_266"></a> to Divine worship every evening, when +they were in the neighbourhood of a church; they were palpably impressed +with deep devotional convictions, and yet they were not sour-faced like +the grim Covenanters of Argyle, nor puritanically uncharitable like the +stern propounders of the Blue Laws of Connecticut. Their beads returned +to the pocket or the prayers finished, they laughed and jested, were +frolicsome as schoolboys in their playhour, and the slightest tinkle of +music set them dancing. Hospitable and fanatic, faithful and ignorant, +temperate and dirty—such are some prominent traits in the character of +the brave Basque people of the rural districts who wished to govern +Spain, but who were Spaniards neither by race, nor language, nor +temperament, nor feeling.</p> + +<p>Taken all in all, they are a right manly breed, and, with education to +correct inevitable prejudices, would be capable of great things. But +before they could become efficient soldiers, they needed a severe course +of training. In the flat country, south of the Ebro, it would be cruel +and foolish to oppose them to regular troops. As guerrilleros,<a name="page_267" id="page_267"></a> they +were without parallel, being content with short commons, and ever ready +to play ball after the longest march; but they were ignorant of +soldiering as technically understood. In the copses and crags of their +own provinces they were invincible, and could carry on the struggle +while there was a cartridge or an onion left in the land. But where the +tactics of the "contrabandista" no longer availed, where surprises were +impossible and mysterious disappearances not easy, and where the bulk of +the people were not willing spies, the aspect of affairs was different. +They were mediocre marksmen with long-range arms of precision, and had +no proper conception of allowances for wind or sun. Target-practice was +not encouraged, and yet it was not through thrift of ammunition, for the +waste of powder in every skirmish was extravagant, and one could not +rest a night in a village held by the Carlists without being disturbed +by frequent careless discharges.</p> + +<p>With the bayonet, as far as I could learn, they were impetuous in the +onset, and stubborn, especially the Navarrese. But bayonet-charges +cannot<a name="page_268" id="page_268"></a> carry stone walls or mud-banks; and in the face of the almost +incessant peppering of breech-loaders, rushes of the kind have become +slightly old-fashioned. To the Carlists, in any case, was due the credit +of readiness to have recourse to the steel whenever there was a rift for +hand-to-hand fighting. Their military education unfortunately confined +itself to the rudiments of the drill-book. They fell in, dressed up, +formed fours by the right, extended into sections on column of march and +went through the like movements very well—so well that it was a pity +they had not an opportunity of adding to their stock of knowledge. They +had an instinctive aptitude for skirmishing, and were expert at forming +square, the utility of which, by the way, is as questionable nowadays as +that of charging.</p> + +<p>More attention was paid to discipline than to drill. Pickets patrolled +the towns into which they entered, and repressed all disorder after +nightfall; outpost duty was strictly enforced; "larking" was not +tolerated, and punishments were always inflicted for known and grave +breaches of order.<a name="page_269" id="page_269"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h3> + +<p class="head">Barbarossa—Royalist-Republicans—Squaring a Girl—At Iron—"Your +Papers?"—The Barber's Shop—A Carlist Spy—An Old Chum—The +Alarm—A Breach of Neutrality—Under Fire—Caught in the Toils—The +Heroic Tomas—We Slope—A Colleague Advises Me—"A Horse! a +Horse!"—State of Bilbao—Don Carlos at Estella—Sanchez Bregua +Recalled—Tolosa Invites—Republican Ineptitude—Do not Spur a Free +Horse—Very Ancient Boys—Meditations in Bed—A Biscay Storm.</p> + +<p class="nind">B<span class="smcap">arbarossa</span>, who had never been over the border, suggested to me that I +should take a trip to Irun, which was held by the anti-Carlists. It +would be incorrect to write them down as Republicans; they were sprung +from the Cristinos of the previous generation, and as such were opposed +to any scion of the house against which their fathers had fought for +years. All of them were <i>de facto</i> Republicans, and had more knowledge +and enjoyment of Republican freedom than those who prattled and raved<a name="page_270" id="page_270"></a> +of Republicanism in Madrid and the south; but they did not take kindly +to the name. As my friend the late J. A. MacGahan wittily said of +them—"They were the Royalist-Republicans of Spain." They were as fond +of their fueros as any Carlist in the crowd, but they stood up for +Madrid less that they cared for the policy or personages of the central +government, than that they had a deep-seated hereditary hatred of their +neighbours of the rural districts. At heart they were in favour of a +restoration of the throne, and on that throne they would fain seat the +young Prince of the Asturias. In those latitudes the lines of John Byrom +a century before would well apply:</p> + +<p class="poem"> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"God bless the King, I mean the faith's defender;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">God bless—no harm in blessing—the Pretender;</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">But who Pretender is, or who is King,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">God bless us all—that's quite another thing!"</span><br /> +</p> + +<p>"If you go to Irun," said Barbarossa, stroking his moustache, "I am game +to go with you."</p> + +<p>"I am satisfied," said I; "but recollect, you undertake the job at your +own risk. You are known as an associate of Carlists, and suspected to<a name="page_271" id="page_271"></a> +be a Carlist agent. I am a stranger and comparatively safe."</p> + +<p>He had weighed all that, and was ready to face possible perils. But he +was not fit to undergo probable fatigues. He could sit at a green table +in an ill-ventilated atmosphere the night long, but he could not walk +three miles at a stretch. Neither could he (on account of his illness) +venture on horseback. To effect a crossing by the railway bridge from +Hendaye to Irun was out of the question; it was barrier impenetrable. +The Frenchman would not allow you to pass in your own interest; the +Spaniard declined to admit you in his so-considered interest. To take +the mountain-route was tedious, and in the case of Barbarossa not to be +thought of; the bridge of Endarlasa was broken—a most contorted +specimen of artistic dilapidation. To be sure, one could manage to creep +to the other side by the submerged coping of the parapet, if endowed +with the balancing powers of a rope-walker and the lustihood of the +navvy. But Barbarossa was not a Blondin, and had not a physical +constitution proof against a wetting. I<a name="page_272" id="page_272"></a> had got across that bridge +once, holding on by my teeth and nails, and retained recollection of it +in a fit of the cold shivers; but I did not care to repeat the +operation. In our dilemma, Barbarossa, who was a plucky knave, hit upon +the plan which ought to have commended itself to us at first.</p> + +<p>"Let us stray up the river-bank a few hundred yards," he said, "seize a +boat, and row ourselves across."</p> + +<p>No sooner was the proposition made than it was adopted; but we were +saved from the ephemeral disgrace of posing as petty amphibious pirates, +degenerate Schinderhannes of the Bidassoa. We saw a boat; a girl was +near. The boat was her father's; she engaged to take us over for a +consideration—I am certain she had set her heart on a string of +straw-coloured ribbons and a sky-blue feather in a shop-window in +Hendaye—and to await our return at nightfall. We arranged the signal, +and stealthily stole across, drifting diagonally most of the way; and I +entrusted the speculative French damsel with my revolver and my Carlist<a name="page_273" id="page_273"></a> +pass, and paid her a farewell compliment on her face and figure as I +stepped ashore. Giving her the revolver and pass enlisted her +confidence. We strolled along with apparent carelessness, entered a +posada on the road by the waterside and had refreshments. I said I +should feel much obliged if they could let us have a trap to Irun and +back, as we had business there, and my friend was tired and not much of +a pedestrian. An open carriage was provided, and off we drove by the +skirt of the hill of St. Marcial, where the Spaniards gave Soult such a +dressing in 1813, passed a series of outer defences with their covering +and working parties, and entered one of the gates of the town, and never +a question was asked. Ditches had been dug round the place and +earthworks thrown up; but the principal reliance of the garrison seemed +to be in loophooled breastworks made of sand-bags superimposed. Here and +there were walls of loose stones—more of a danger than a +protection—rude shelter-trenches, and mud-built, wattle-knitted +refuges, round-topped, and disguised with branches. They had made the +position strong; but they should<a name="page_274" id="page_274"></a> have gone in for more spade and less +stones, more mole and less beaver.</p> + +<p>We trotted over the narrow paved street, with its flagged sidepaths, and +drew up on the Plaza, overlooked by the solid square-stone mansion of +the Ayuntamiento. The windows were screened with planks, and armed +groups lounged in front; there were barrels of water and heaps of gravel +at intervals upon the ground; memories of Paris rose to my mind—Irun +was preparing for bombardment. If the Carlists had no serious artillery +in fact, they had a powerful ordnance in the apprehensions of their +adversaries. Perhaps this was the explanation of the rhodomontade about +the batteries in <i>El Cuartel Real</i>. We were congratulating ourselves on +the ease with which we had run the blockade, when an officer of the +Miqueletes approached our carriage and demanded our papers. I showed my +Foreign Office passport, with the visa of the Spanish Consulate at +London upon it. He gave a cursory look at it, bowed, and returned it to +me. Then came the turn of Barbarossa, and there was a flash of shrewd +spitefulness in his eyes.<a name="page_275" id="page_275"></a></p> + +<p>"Your papers, señor?"</p> + +<p>"I have none. I didn't think any were required."</p> + +<p>"Ah! doubtless you thought Irun was in Carlist occupation. You are +wrong."</p> + +<p>"No; I knew it was not in Carlist occupation. What has that to do with +me? I am an Englishman," producing a packet of letters.</p> + +<p>"I don't want to see them. I know you. What do you want here?"</p> + +<p>"To see a friend."</p> + +<p>"Who is your friend?"</p> + +<p>Barbarossa was not in the least nonplussed. He said he had heard a +fellow-countryman, a comrade of his, was in the town.</p> + +<p>"You will have to turn back the way you came, and thank your stars you +are permitted."</p> + +<p>"But I am hungry."</p> + +<p>"And the horse wants a feed," interposed the driver, who no doubt had +his own object to serve.</p> + +<p>"Well, you may stay here for refreshment, but you must get outside our +gates before dark."</p> + +<p>We drove to the principal inn, where we alighted<a name="page_276" id="page_276"></a> and ordered dinner. +Barbarossa sat down, and I went out to look at the place and search for +a barber's shop, for I sorely needed a shave. Irun is a well-constructed +town on the shelving slope of a smaller rise between Mounts Jaizquivel +and Aya, not far from the coast. It has a population of some 5,000, and +in ordinary years does a good trade in tiles and bricks, tanned leather, +and smith's work, besides sending wood to Los Pasages for the purposes +of the boat-builders. The Bidassoa at its base branches, and thus forms +the islet of Faisanes, off which the prosperous fisherman can fill his +basket with trout, salmon, and mullet, aye, and lumpish eels, if his +predilections so tend.</p> + +<p>But I have no intention to describe Irun. Théophile Gautier has done +that before me, and I am not sacrilegious. There was another customer in +the barber's shop. As I left after the shave he followed, and accosted +me on the flagway confidentially.</p> + +<p>"How are you, captain?"</p> + +<p>"You are in error," I answered. "I am no captain."<a name="page_277" id="page_277"></a></p> + +<p>"What! Did I not see you take a boat for the <i>San Margarita</i> at Socoa?"</p> + +<p>"That may be; but I only boarded her through curiosity."</p> + +<p>"Do not be afraid," he whispered. "How is Don Guillermo?"</p> + +<p>"What Don Guillermo?"</p> + +<p>"Señor Leader. I was with him when he was wounded; I am a Carlist. I am +here on the same mission as yourself; to spy what the vermin are doing."</p> + +<p>"Ha! good; ramble on, and don't notice me. It is dangerous."</p> + +<p>He sauntered along the causeway, hands in pockets and whistling, and +presently popped into a tavern, and I re-entered the fonda. Hardly had I +set foot over the threshold when I was stupefied by a welcome in a +familiar voice, none other than that of Mr. William O'Donovan, who had +been my comrade and amanuensis throughout the irksome beleaguerment of +Paris.<a name="FNanchor_F_6" id="FNanchor_F_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_F_6" class="fnanchor">[F]</a> We did not throw our<a name="page_278" id="page_278"></a> arms round our respective necks, hug and +kiss each other—I reserve my kisses for pretty girls, newly-washed +babes, and dead male friends, and then kiss only the brow—but we did +join hands cordially and long. In answer to my query as to what had +brought him to this queer corner at the back of God-speed, he explained +that he was acting as correspondent of a Dublin paper; for, it appeared, +the people of Ireland were consumed with anxiety as to the progress of +the Carlist rising—details of which, of course, they could not obtain +in the mere London papers—and were particularly desirous to have record +of the doings of the Foreign Legion, a great majority of whom were sons +of the Emerald Isle. His younger brother, a medical student, was likely +to come out to join that Legion, and as for Kaspar (a name by which we +knew his brother Edmond, afterwards triumvir at Merv), he was sure to +turn up. Mother Carey's chicken hovers near when the elements are at +strife. He was immensely<a name="page_279" id="page_279"></a> satisfied with his diggings, he said, liked +the natives, and considered this a splendid chance for improving his +Spanish. He was reading "Don Quixote" in the vernacular. In a sense, I +looked upon his presence as a perfect godsend to us, as he came in most +appropriately as a <i>Deus ex machinâ</i> to create the character of +Barbarossa's invented friend. O'Donovan was in good standing with the +Republicans of the town, as he was a staunch Republican himself, and +could spin yarns of the Republics of antiquity, and of the greatness of +Paris, and the glories of the United States. He was getting on famously +with Castilian, and was charmed with the redundancy of its vocabulary of +vituperation, which was only to be equalled by the Irish, of which his +father had been such a master. I made Barbarossa and my old chum known +to one another, and we dined together, pledging the past in a cup of +wine tempered with the living waters which bubbled up in the sacristy of +the parish church, and were distributed in bronze conduits through Irun. +After the meal and the meditative smoke of custom, O'Donovan sat down to +write a letter, which I<a name="page_280" id="page_280"></a> guaranteed to post for him in France, and +Barbarossa and I sallied forth for a walk.</p> + +<p>We were lounging about the Calle Mayor gazing at the escutcheons over +every hall-door—your bellows-mender and cobbler in this democratic town +were invariably of the seed of Noah in right line—when the alarm was +raised that fifty horses had been carried off by the Carlists almost at +the gates, and that two shots had been heard. The bugler sounded the +call "To arms," and forthwith a little company consisting of thirty-two +men, the bugler aforesaid, and a captain, set out at a quick step for a +high ground beside a signal-tower at one end of the town. We hurried +forward with them, and passed out through one of the four gates, on the +side next the mountains. The soldiers took a position on the slope of a +hill a couple of hundred yards from the gate, and Barbarossa and I +sheltered ourselves behind an orchard-wall, from which there was an +uninterrupted view of the billowy tract of meadow and pasture land +beneath, cut into patches by thick hedges. Quick on our heels emerged +from the<a name="page_281" id="page_281"></a> town some half-dozen intrepid "volunteers of liberty," and the +inevitable small boy, a red cap stuck jauntily on three hairs of his +head and a large cigarette in his mouth. One of the volunteers—he who +had demanded our papers on the Plaza—looked viciously at Barbarossa, +who assumed a most artistic pretence of stolidity.</p> + +<p>"Come here, señor, and you will have a better vision of your friends," +he said with mock suavity.</p> + +<p>Barbarossa smiled, thanked him, and walked quietly to the place +indicated, an exposed opening beside the wall.</p> + +<p>"I can see nothing," he said.</p> + +<p>I adjusted my long-distance glass, and ranged over the wide stretch of +landscape, but could see nothing either. As I shut it up and returned it +to the case, a sergeant advanced from the party of soldiers on the slope +and marched directly towards me. I was puzzled and, I own, a trifle +unnerved.</p> + +<p>"Señor," he said to me, "I carry the compliments of my captain, and his +request that you would lend him your glass, as he has forgotten his +own."<a name="page_282" id="page_282"></a></p> + +<p>"With pleasure," I answered readily, much relieved. "I will take it to +him myself, as it is London-made, and he may not understand how it is +sighted."</p> + +<p>This may have been a breach of neutrality, but what was I to do? If I +refused, the glass would have been taken from me, and I should have been +compromised. I handed it to the officer with my best bow, explained its +mechanism to him; he bowed to me, and from that moment I felt that I was +under his wing. I may be wrong, but I have a notion that in a skirmish +it is much better to be near regulars than volunteers, and I stood in a +line with the military a few paces away.</p> + +<p>Suddenly there was a spark and a report away down in a field of maize, +some six hundred yards below us, and the whizz of a bullet was heard.</p> + +<p>"Steady, men!" said the captain; "don't discharge your rifles."</p> + +<p>The sight was very pretty as they stood in a group on the green hillside +in attitude of suspense, their weapons held at the ready, and all eyes +fixed on the front, from which the smoke was rising. It<a name="page_283" id="page_283"></a> was very like +to the celebrated picture by Protais, familiar in every cabaret in +France, "<i>Avant le Combat;</i>" but even more picturesque than that, for +these soldiers were dressed most irregularly—some in tattered capote, +others in shirt-sleeves, some in shako, others in <i>bonnet de police</i>. A +few civilians had crept out of the town by this time, and the chief of +the Miqueletes roared peremptorily to have that gate shut. This was not +an agreeable position for Barbarossa and myself. Our retreat was cut +off. We were unarmed. If one of those amateur warriors were killed, we +ran the imminent hazard of being massacred by his comrades. On the other +hand, there was the liability of being ourselves shot by the Carlists. +How were they to distinguish a neutral or a sympathizer from their foes? +I confess I could not help smiling as the thought occurred to me what a +piece of irony in action it would be if Barbarossa were to be helped to +a morsel of lead by his friends, the enemy. With a cheerful equanimity I +contemplated the prospect of his receiving a very slight contusion from +a spent bullet on a soft part of his frame.<a name="page_284" id="page_284"></a></p> + +<p>Ping, ping, came a few reports, but evidently out of range. Each +smoke-wreath was in a different direction.</p> + +<p>"This may get hot," I said to myself; "the Carlists may not be +sharpshooters, but this clump of uniforms in relief on the grass must +present a blur that will be an enticing target for them. I dare not go +back to the wall, but it might be discreet to lie down. There is no +disgrace in offering them a small elevation of corpus." I stretched +myself on the sward, acted nonchalance, and lit a cigar.</p> + +<p>The volunteers could no longer be held in control. They opened action on +their own account, one fellow distinguishing himself by the rapidity of +his fire, and the intensity with which he aimed at something—or +nothing.</p> + +<p>"Ah, that's Tomas!" said a portly civilian connoisseur, with his hands +in his pockets. "We know him, he is making music; he wants to get +himself remarked."</p> + +<p>The soldiers did not deliver a shot, but the volunteers kept cracking +away, and the invisible Carlists replied. Nobody was hit, though +bullets<a name="page_285" id="page_285"></a> could be heard whizzing overhead for twenty minutes, and one +did actually knock a chip off a wall. That was the sole damage done to +the Republican position; the damage to the Carlist must have been less. +Two of the Miqueletes ventured stealthily down a road leading towards +the point from which the nearest jets of smoke curled, following the +ditch by the side, stooping and peering through the bushes. There was a +volley from afar. They hesitated and stood, as if undecided whether to +advance.</p> + +<p>"Sound the retire for those men," said the captain; and as the call rang +out they returned.</p> + +<p>That volley was the last sign the Carlists gave; and after waiting ten +minutes, the captain shut up my glass, returned it to me, and remarked +that the attack was a feint, and had no object beyond worrying his men. +He gave the order "March," the gate was opened, Barbarossa rejoined me, +and we returned to Irun, taking care to keep as near the regulars as we +could. "Nada—nothing," cried the captain to an inquiring lady on a +balcony, and the town-gates were closed after the volunteers had<a name="page_286" id="page_286"></a> +returned and tramped to the Plaza with the proud bearing of citizens who +had done their duty.</p> + +<p>How that heroic Tomas did strut! A fighter he of the choicest brand, one +not to stop at trifles; there was martial ire in his flaming glance; +defiance breathed from his nostrils; triumph sat on his lips; he swung +his arms like destructive flails; and as he entered a tavern one could +only fancy him calling in a voice of Stentor for a jug of rum and blood +plentifully besprinkled with gunpowder and cayenne pepper to assuage the +thirst of combat.</p> + +<p>O'Donovan gave me his letter. Barbarossa hinted that it was our best +course to slope, and slope we did, as soon as the horse was harnessed. +As we passed down the street a grinning face saluted me from a doorway. +It was that of my acquaintance from the barber's shop. He gave me a +meaning wink. The artful Carlists had evidently succeeded in their +object, whatever it might have been. On the river-bank our fair and +faithful ferry-maid awaited us. We were conveyed over in safety, and at +the hotel of Hendaye soon forgot the perils we had encountered.<a name="page_287" id="page_287"></a></p> + +<p>Barbarossa was dead-beat, and threw himself on a sofa, where he sank +back heavy-eyed and exhausted; and I, almost feared that he would drop +into a coma, as the penalty of overstraining nature, until the sight of +a pack of cards restored him as if by a spell to his normal wakefulness.</p> + +<p>Even in a disturbed region it is needful to have a change of linen, so +we got back next morning to St. Jean de Luz, where I had left my +baggage. There I met M. Thieblin, a colleague, whom I had seen last at +Metz, previous to the siege of that fortress in the Franco-German war. +He was now representing the <i>New York Herald</i>, and had just returned +from Estella, at the taking of which place, the most important the +Carlists had yet seized, he had the luck to be present. He assured me +that it was utter fatuity to dream of following the Carlists, except I +had at least one horse—but that it would be sensible to take two if I +could manage to procure them. It was more than an ordinary man was +qualified to cope with, to make his observations, write his letters, and +look after their transmission, without having to attend to his nag, and<a name="page_288" id="page_288"></a> +do an odd turn of cooking at a pinch. The riddle was how to get the +horse—a sound hardy animal that would not call for elaborate grooming, +or refuse a feed of barley. Horse-flesh was at a premium, but he thought +I might be able to have what I wanted at Bayonne, on payment of an +extravagant price. A requisition for forage and corn could be had +through the Junta; and I should have no trouble in getting an orderly on +applying with my credentials to the chief of staff of any of the Carlist +columns to which I might attach myself. We had a long conversation, and +Thieblin frankly informed me that in his opinion the Carlists had not +the ghost of a chance outside their own territory. There they were cocks +of the walk. What the end might be he could not pretend to vaticinate, +but "El Pretendiente" would never reign in Madrid. The conflict might +last for months—might last for years; but the Carlists owed the +vitality they had as much to the divisions and inefficiency of their +adversaries as to their own strength. There would be no important +engagements—to dignify them by the epithet—until the organization of +the insurrec<a name="page_289" id="page_289"></a>tionary forces was regularized, and they had a stronger +artillery and an adequate cavalry. M. Thieblin did not stray far from +the bull's-eye in his prophecy.</p> + +<p>I went to bed in the mood of Crookback on Bosworth Field, and felt that +my dream-talk would shape itself into the cry, "A horse! a horse!"</p> + +<p>Until that coveted steed had been lassoed, stolen, or bought, I must +only endeavour to justify my existence—that is to say, render value for +the money expended on me by picking up "copy" anywhere and everywhere.</p> + +<p>I was advised to go to Bilbao by sea, but the advice came too late. The +last steamer from Bayonne had ventured there four-and-twenty hours +before I sought my passage, and even on that last steamer the few +voyagers were unable to insure their lives with the Accidental Company, +although they consented to promise that they would descend into the hold +the instant they heard a shot. It was almost as full of jeopardy to +travel to Bilbao by sea as to sail down the Mississippi with a racing +captain and a lading of rye-whisky on board.<a name="page_290" id="page_290"></a> One Monsieur Gueno, master +of the barque <i>Numa</i>, of Vannes, made moan that he was seriously knocked +about while he lay in the Nervion, off the Luchana bridge, during a +skirmish between the Carlists and the troops. They both fought +vigorously, but they gave him most of the blows. One of his crew, in a +punt behind, was killed, and twenty-five bullets were embedded in a +single mast. He had the tricolour flying all the time. A +fellow-countryman of his, Monsieur Jarmet, of the ship <i>Pierre-Alcide</i>, +of Nantes, sent in a claim for an indemnity of £160 for damages +sustained by his vessel much in the like manner. A Spanish war-craft, +moored behind him, began pelting the Carlists with shot; the Carlists +replied, and the <i>Pierre-Alcide</i> came in for the bulk of the favours +distributed. Three bullets penetrated the captain's cabin, and four rent +holes in the French flag. Neither pilots nor tugs were for hire at +Bilbao, and captains of sailing vessels had only to whistle for a +favouring wind and rely on their own good fortune and skill. Bilbao had +to be dismissed on the merits.</p> + +<p>Taking it for granted that I had that evasive<a name="page_291" id="page_291"></a> horse, I reasoned, as I +tossed on my bed, to the restless whimper of the Bay of Biscay, over +which a storm was brewing, that "el Cuartel Real," the headquarters of +the King, was the natural goal. There first information was to be had, +and it was felt that it was about the safest place to be; but the King +seldom stopped under the same roof two nights successively, and no one +could tell where he would be two days beforehand. If he was at Estella +when one started, he might be at Vera or Durango, or goodness knows +where, when one got to Estella. So far his progress had been a success; +he was present at the taking of Estella, and exercised his Royal +clemency by releasing the captured prisoners. It would have been more +politic to have demanded an exchange, for there were partisans of his +own in Republican dungeons (Englishmen amongst them); but then prisoners +have to be fed and guarded, so on the whole it was as well they were set +free. It was very much the case of the man who won the elephant at a +raffle. If the stories, spread assiduously by the Republicans, of the +massacre and maltreatment of captives by the<a name="page_292" id="page_292"></a> Carlists were correct, +here was the opportunity for the exercise of wholesale cruelty; but +there was not a particle of truth in such charges, which, by the way, +one hears in every civil war. Where Don Carlos might advance next, or +where severe fighting—not such brushes as that I witnessed at +Irun—might take place, was a mystery. The movements of the Republican +leaders were inexplicable, and conducted in contravention of all known +principles of the art of war. They harassed their men by long and +objectless marches. They ordered towns to be put in a state of defence +at first, and then withdrew the garrisons. They engaged whole columns in +defiles, where a company of invisible guerrilleros could tease them. +They acted, in most instances, as if they had no information or wrong +information. The latter, I believe, was nearer the truth. Their system +of espionage was inefficient, as the information they got was +untrustworthy, and always would be, in the northern provinces, for the +feeling of the masses of the people was against them. Instead of making +headway they were losing ground every day, and would so<a name="page_293" id="page_293"></a> continue until +they received reinforcements with fibre, and were commanded by officers +who really meant to win, and had the knowledge or the instinct to +conceive a proper plan of campaign. The generals could hardly be +censured, for their hands were tied; they were forbidden to be severe; +they dared not squelch insubordination. Capital punishment, even in the +army, and at such a crisis as this, was abolished. There had been, I +heard, something suspiciously resembling a mutiny in the column of +Sanchez Bregua. A certain Colonel Castañon was put under arrest on a +charge of Alfonsist proclivities; but the Cazadores and Engineers +threatened to rebel unless he was liberated; and Sanchez Bregua, instead +of decimating the Cazadores and Engineers, as Lord Strathnairn would +have done, liberated the Colonel.</p> + +<p>But to that question of my route. Peradventure the presence to my dozing +vision of the General commanding the Republican troops of the north that +had been might help me towards a solution.</p> + +<p>"That had been" is written advisedly, for Sanchez Bregua had been +recalled to Madrid, not a<a name="page_294" id="page_294"></a> day too soon. He was one of those generals +whose spine had been curved by lengthened bending over a desk. Loma, who +was active and dashing, and had the rare gift of confidence in himself, +had taken his stand at Tolosa, and was awaiting the advent of Lizarraga. +All his men, and every able-bodied male in the town, were diligently +excavating ditches and making entrenchments. Until Tolosa was captured +by the Carlists, no serious attack on Pampeluna was probable; and that +attack was likely to assume the form of an investment. Estella was to +the south of Pampeluna, and all the country round, from which provisions +could be drawn, was in the occupation of the Carlists. Tolosa was the +objective point of the moment, and to Tolosa I determined to go. An +attempt on San Sebastian could not enter into the calculations of the +Carlist leaders at this stage of their revolt. The stronghold was almost +inaccessible on the land side, and men, munitions, and provisions could +be easily thrown into it by water. Irun, Fontarabia, and even Renteria +(were artillery available) could be seized whenever the comparatively +small sacrifice of<a name="page_295" id="page_295"></a> lives involved would be advisable. But the game was +not worth the candle yet. Were Irun or Fontarabia in the hands of the +Carlists, there was the always-present danger of shells being pitched +into them from a gunboat in the Bidassoa; and Renteria, outside of which +the Republican troops only stirred on sufferance, was to all intents as +serviceable to the Carlists as if it were tenanted by a Carlist +garrison, which would thereby be condemned to idleness.</p> + +<p>That whirlwind ride from Renteria to Irun would come before me as the +storm battalions mustered outside, and the waves began lashing +themselves into violence of temper. What if I had to go to Madrid while +such weather as this was brooding? To get to the capital one is obliged +to embark at Bayonne for Santander, and proceed thence by rail—so long +as no Carlist partidas meddle with the track. Romantic Spain!</p> + +<p>But are not those Republicans who affect that they know how to govern a +country primarily and principally to blame? Only consider the continued +interruption of that short piece of road between<a name="page_296" id="page_296"></a> San Sebastian and +Irun. Is it not disgraceful to them? One of our old Indian officers, I +dare venture to believe, with eighteen horsemen and a couple of +companies of foot, could hold it open in spite of the Carlists. But such +a simple idea as the establishment of cavalry patrols of three, keeping +vigil backwards and forwards along the line of eighteen miles, with +stout infantry posts always on the alert in blockhouses at intervals, +seems never to have entered into the obtuse heads of those officers +lately promoted from the ranks. Seeing that the intercourse of different +towns with each other and with the coast and abroad has been so long +broken up, I cannot fathom the secret of how the population lives. The +troops arrive in a village one day and levy contributions, the +guerrilleros arrive the next and do the same; the fields must be +neglected, trade must droop, yet nobody apparently wants food. True, the +land is wonderfully fat; but some day the cry of famine will be heard. +No land could bear this perpetual drain on its resources. And then I +thought of Carlists whom I met in France, who had given of their goods +to support the cause.<a name="page_297" id="page_297"></a> With them I talked on this very subject. They +were respectable and respected men; they prayed for success to Don +Carlos with sincere heart; but they had left Spain, and they complained +that this condition of disturbance was lasting too long.</p> + +<p>"You ask me why I did not remain," said one to me; "wait, and you shall +see."</p> + +<p>He opened a door and pointed to three lovely little girls at play, and +continued, "These are my reasons; I have made more sacrifices than I was +able for the Royal cause, and they asked me at last for another +contribution, which would have ruined me. I love my King; but for no +King, señor, could I afford to make those darlings paupers."</p> + +<p>Had these Carlists any glimmer of the sunshine of a victorious issue to +their uprising? (egad, that was a strong blast, and the waves do swish +as if they were enraged at last!). Thieblin thinks not. And yet they are +active, and, like the storm outside, they are gaining strength. Those of +them under arms are four times as numerous as the Republicans in the +northern provinces. Leader swears to me that everyone who can shoulder a +musket is a<a name="page_298" id="page_298"></a> Carlist. There are no more Chicos to be had, unless the +volunteers of liberty come over, rifles, accoutrements and all, to +Prince Charlie—a liberty they are volunteering to take somewhat freely.</p> + +<p>I was rash in saying there were no more Chicos. Did not a company of +"bhoys" trudge over to Lesaca to offer their services recently? But they +were very ancient boys. The youngest of them was sixty-five. They were +veterans of the Seven Years' War, and mostly colonels. Their fidelity +was thankfully acknowledged, but their services were not gratefully +accepted. The aged and ferocious fire-eaters were sent back to their +arrowroot and easy-chairs. At all events, they had more of the timber of +heroism in them than those diplomatic Carlists of the <i>gandin</i> order, +who are Carlists because it makes them interesting in the sight of the +ladies, but whose campaigning is confined to an occasional three days' +incursion on Spanish territory, with a cook and a valet, saddle-bags +full of potted lobster and <i>pâté de foie gras</i>, and a dressing-case +newly packed with <i>au Botot</i> and essence of Jockey Club. There are +personages of this class<a name="page_299" id="page_299"></a> not unknown to society at Biarritz and +Bayonne, who have been going to the front for the last three months, and +have not got there yet. One would think their game of chivalry ought to +be pretty well "played out;" but to the folly of the vain man, as to the +appetite of the lean pig, there is no limit.</p> + +<p>By Jove! There is a clatter; the casement is blown open, and the light +is blown out, and through the gap whistles the cool, briny breath of the +Atlantic, and I can almost feel the wash of the white spray in my hair. +Better a stable cell in the Castle of the Mota to-night than a tumbling +berth in the <i>San Margarita</i>. This was the close of my interview with +myself, and I turned over on my pillow and fell precipitately into a +profound dreamless sleep.<a name="page_300" id="page_300"></a></p> + +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h3> + +<p class="head">Nearing the End—Firing on the Red Cross—Perpetuity of +War—Artistic Hypocrites—The Jubilee Year—The Conflicts of a +Peaceful Reign—Major Russell—Quick Promotion—The Foreign +Legion—An Aspiring Adventurer—Leader's Career—A Piratical +Proposal—The "Ojaladeros" of Biarritz—A Friend in Need—Buying a +Horse—Gilpin Outdone—"Fred Burnaby."</p> + +<p class="nind">A<span class="smcap">nd</span> now I take up the last chapter of this book, and I have not half +finished with the subject I had set before myself at starting. By the +figures at the head of the last page I perceive that I have almost +reached the orthodox length of a volume, and perforce must stop. For +some weeks past I have been looking and longing for the end, for I have +been ill, weary and worried, and my labour has become a task. Slowly +toiling day by day, I knew I must be nearing the goal; yet, like the +strenuous Webb on his swim from Dover to Calais, the horizon seemed to +come no closer. The land in sight<a name="page_301" id="page_301"></a> grew no plainer, although each +breast-stroke—the pleasure of a while agone, but oh! such a tax +now—must have lessened the distance. Even to that excursion there came +an hour of accomplishment and repose; but to this, of pen over paper, I +cannot flatter myself that the hour is yet. I have to abandon the work +incomplete. As it has happened to me before, the theme has expanded +under my hands, and I shall have to rise from my desk before I penetrate +to the Carlist headquarters, of which I had to say much, or have +experiences of that strangest of Communes in Murcia, with its sea and +land skirmishes and its motley rabble of mutineers, convicts, and +nondescripts, of which I had to say much likewise.</p> + +<p>Whether I shall have the privilege of recounting my adventures at the +court and camp of Don Carlos, and by the side of the General directing +the siege of Cartagena, who admitted me as a sort of supernumerary on +his staff, will depend on the reception of this, the first instalment of +my experiences in Spain.</p> + +<p>An act of unjustifiable barbarism or stupidity, or<a name="page_302" id="page_302"></a> both—for barbarism +is but another form of stupidity—was perpetrated by some Carlists +outside Irun while I was negotiating for that indispensable horse. An +ambulance-waggon, displaying the Red Cross of Geneva, had sallied from +the town, and was fired upon. The Paris delegate I had met at Hendaye +was in charge of it, and averred that it was wantonly and wilfully +attacked. I thought it, singular that nobody was hurt, and reasoned that +the man was excitable, and got into range unconsciously. The duty of the +Geneva Society properly begins after, and not during a combat; and when +gentlemen are busy at the game of professional manslaughter, no +philanthropic outsider has any right to distract them from their +occupation by indiscreet obstruction. The Parisian did not view it in +that light, and downfaced me that these rustics, to whose aid he was +actually going, tried to murder him of malice prepense. It was useless +to represent to him that these rustics may have never heard of the +modern benevolent institution for the softening of strife, and may have +regarded the huge Red Cross as a defiant symbol of Red Republicanism,<a name="page_303" id="page_303"></a> +and perhaps a parody of what is sacred. So in the estimation of that +citizen of the most enlightened capital in the universe, these Basques +were ruthless boobies with an insatiable passion for lapping blood. But +mistakes and exaggerations will occur in every war. The only way to +obviate them is to put an end to war altogether—<i>which will never be +done</i>! When Christ came into the world, peace was proclaimed; when He +left it, peace was bequeathed. War has been the usual condition of +mankind since, as it had been before; and Christians cut each other's +throats with as much alacrity and expertness as Pagans, often in the +name of the religion of peace.</p> + +<p>I heard two eminent war-correspondents lecture recently, and I noticed +that those passages where fights were described were applauded to the +echo. The more ferocious the combat the more vigorous the cheers. The +faces of small boys flushed, and their hands clinched at the vivid +recital. The nature of the savage, which has not been extirpated by +School Boards, was betraying itself in them. Yet these two +war-correspondents thought it an<a name="page_304" id="page_304"></a> acquittal of conscience after their +kindling periods to dwell on the immorality of war. The one spoke of the +beauty of Bible precepts, the other disburdened himself on the cruelty +and wickedness of a battle. What artistic hypocrisy! It was as if one +were to strike up the "Faerie Voices" waltz, and tell a girl to keep her +feet still; as if one were to lend "Robinson Crusoe" to a boy, and warn +him not to think of running away to sea. Still, I must even add my voice +to the orthodox chorus, and affirm that warfare is bad, brutal, +fraudful, a thing of meretricious gauds, a clay idol, fetish of humbug +and havoc, whose feet are soaking in muddy gore and salt tears; yet in +the privacy of my own study I might sadly admit that the Millennium is +remote, that the Parliament of Nations exists but in the dreams of the +poet, and that Longfellow's forecast of the days down through the dark +future when the holy melodies of love shall oust the clangours of +conflict is a pretty conceit—and no more.</p> + +<p>War is inexcusable, and is foolish and ugly; but, like the poor and the +ailing, we shall have it always with us. It is criminal, except as +protest against<a name="page_305" id="page_305"></a> intolerable persecution, or in maintenance of national +honour or defence of national territory; and even in these cases it +should be undertaken only when all devices of conciliation have been +tried in vain. Next to the vanquished, it does most harm to the victor. +Yet about it, as about high play, there is a fascination, and I have to +plead guilty to the weak feeling that I would not look with overwhelming +aversion on an order, should it come to me to-morrow, to prepare to +chronicle a new campaign and face the chronicler's risks; and they are +real. But I should not go into it with a light heart, like M. Emile +Ollivier. I might be, in a quiet way, happy as Queen Victoria was +(according to Count Vitzthum) for she danced much the night before the +declaration of hostilities against Russia, but spoke of what was coming +with amiable candour and great regret.</p> + +<p>We are on the eve of a Jubilee Year, when the halcyon shall plume his +wing, and we shall hear much oratorical trash and hebetude about the +peacefulness of this happy reign.</p> + +<p>Does the reader reflect how many wars we have<a name="page_306" id="page_306"></a> had in the pacific +half-century which is lapsing? The tale will astonish him, and should +silence the thoughtless word-spinners of the platforms. The door of the +temple of Janus has been seldom closed for long. Our campaigns, great +and small, and military enterprises of the lesser sort, could not be +counted on the fingers of both hands. We have had fighting with Afghans +and Burmese (twice); Scinde, Gwalior, and Sikh wars; hostilities with +Kaffirs, Russians, Persians, Chinese, and Maoris (twice), Abyssinians, +Ashantis, Zulus, Boers, and Soudanese, not to mention the repression of +the most stupendous of mutinies, a martial promenade in Egypt, and +expeditions against Jowakis, Bhootanese, Looshais, Red River rebels, and +such pitiful minor fry.</p> + +<p>In St. Jean de Luz, the nearest point to the disputed ground and the +best place from which to transmit information, there was a small and +select British colony, mostly consisting of retired naval and military +officers. A dear friend of mine amongst them was Major Russell, who had +spent a lengthened span of years in the East—an admirable<a name="page_307" id="page_307"></a> type of the +calm, firm, courteous Anglo-Indian—who had never soured his temper and +spoiled his liver with excessive "pegs," who understood and respected +the natives, who had shown administrative ability, and who, like many +another honest, dutiful officer, had not shaken much fruit off the +pagoda-tree, or even secured the C.B. which is so often given to +tarry-at-home nonentities. Russell used to pay me a regular visit to the +Fonda de la Playa. One morning as we were chatting, Leader strode into +the coffee-room, a vision of splendour. He had got on his uniform as +Commandant of the Foreign Legion—a uniform which did much credit to his +fancy, for he had designed it himself. He wore a white boina with gold +tassel, a blue tunic with black braid, red trousers, and brown gaiters. +He had donned the gala-costume with the object of getting himself +photographed. Commandant is the equivalent of Major in the British +service, so we agreed to dub the young Irishman henceforth and for ever, +until he became colonel or captain-general, Major Leader.</p> + +<p>"Promotion is quick in this army," murmured<a name="page_308" id="page_308"></a> Russell. "I served all my +active life under the suns of India, and here I am only a major at the +close. Leader joined the Carlists less than three months ago, and he is +already my equal in rank."</p> + +<p>"The fortune of war, Russell," said I; "don't be jealous. I was offered +command of a brigade under the Commune, but I declined the tribute to my +merit, or I would not be here to-day. I met a man in Bayonne yesterday, +and he was ready to assume control of the entire insurrectionary +forces."</p> + +<p>"Who? Cabrera?"</p> + +<p>"No," I answered; "catch Cabrera coming here. He is too much afraid of a +ruler who is no pretender. The renowned Commander-in-Chief of Aragon and +Valencia, Don Ramon the Rough and Ready, is Conde Something-or-other +now, a willing slave to petticoat government. He is to be seen any day +pottering about Windsor."</p> + +<p>"And who is this speculator in bloodshed?"</p> + +<p>"A foreign adventurer," I explained, "who does not know a word of +Spanish, much less Basque, is unacquainted with the topography of the +country, and has not the faintest inkling of the idiosyn<a name="page_309" id="page_309"></a>crasies of the +lieutenants who would serve under him, or of the mode of humouring the +prejudices of the people of the different provinces in revolt."</p> + +<p>"What answer did they give to his application for employment?"</p> + +<p>"A polite negative. They told him they could not appoint him a leader +without offending the susceptibilities of adherents with claims upon +them men of local influence, and so forth. Behind his back, they laughed +at his entertaining temerity."</p> + +<p>That Foreign Legion never came to maturity. Leader showed me a +commission authorizing him to organize it. Lesaca was to be the depôt, +French the language of command, and Smith Sheehan the adjutant. It might +have developed into a very fine Foreign Legion, but no volunteers +presented themselves to join it but two young Englishmen, one of whom +was sick when he was not drunk, and the other of whom felt it to be a +grievance on a campaign that a cup of tea could not be got at regular +hours. How Sheehan did chaff this amiable amateur!</p> + +<p>"You will have nothing to do but draw your<a name="page_310" id="page_310"></a> pay, my lad," he said. "The +cookery is hardly A 1, but 'twill pass. Think of the beds, pillows of +hops under your head; and every regiment has its own set of +billiard-markers and a select string-band, every performer an artist."</p> + +<p>After an arduous service of one day and a half that gentleman returned +to the maternal apron-strings, laden to the ground with the most +harrowing legends of the horrors of war. Leader was not a warrior of +this stamp—far from it; he had vindicated his manliness at Ladon +outside Orleans, where Ogilvie, of the British Royal Artillery, had met +his fate by his side, and there was something soldierly in the way he +bore himself in his vanity of dress. Not that I think the dandies are +the best soldiers—that is merest popular paradox. To me it is as +ridiculous for a man to array himself in fine clothes when he is going +to kill or be killed, as it would be for him to put on gewgaws when he +was going to be hanged. As Leader disappears from my account of Carlist +doings after this—we were associated with different columns—it may be +of interest to tell of his subsequent career. He served in a cavalry<a name="page_311" id="page_311"></a> +squadron on the staff of the King, and when the cause collapsed came to +London. His uncle tried to induce him to settle down to some steady +employment in the City. Leader expressed himself satisfied to make an +experiment at desk-work.</p> + +<p>"It was useless," said Leader with a hearty crow as he related the story +to me. "The friend who had promised to create a vacancy for me in his +office ordered his chief clerk to lock the safe and send for the police +when he heard of my antecedents. He invited me to dinner, but candidly +told me that a rifle was more in my line than a quill."</p> + +<p>And yet it was in the service of the quill the young soldier ended his +days. He got an appointment as an auxiliary correspondent to a great +London daily paper during the Russo-Turkish war. He was elate; the road +to fame and fortune now lay open before him. The next I heard of him was +that he had succumbed to typhoid fever at Philippopolis.</p> + +<p>A Scotch <i>spadassin</i> arrived in our midst about this period. He was most +anxious to draw a blade for Don Carlos, but he had a decided objection +to serve in any capacity but that of command. He<a name="page_312" id="page_312"></a> did not appreciate the +fun of losing the number of his mess as an obscure hero of the rank and +file, though he would not mind sacrificing an arm, I do think, at the +head of a charging column, provided that he had a showy uniform on, and +that the fact of his valour was properly advertised in the despatches. +He had an idea that would commend itself to Belcha's bushwhackers, but +it was not entertained. It was to take passage with a few trusty men on +the tug for San Sebastian when she was reported to be conveying specie +for the payment of the Spanish Republican troops, to drive the voyagers +down the hold, throttle the skipper, intimidate the crew, take the wheel +and turn her head to the coast, seize and land the money under Carlist +protection, and then scuttle her. The least recompense, he calculated, +which could be awarded to him for that exploit by his Majesty Charles +VII. was the Order of the Golden Fleece; and a very appropriate order +too.</p> + +<p>There was a set of Carlist sympathizers known to the fighting-men as +"ojaladeros," or warriors with much decoration in the shape of polished +buttons.<a name="page_313" id="page_313"></a> Their depôt was at Biarritz, an aristocratic watering-place +born under the second French Empire, and not ignorant of some of the +vices of the Byzantine Empire. There are healthful breezes there, but +they do not quite sweep away the scent of frangipani. Warlike, with a +proviso, the Scot might have been designated, but he was not to be +compared with these ojaladeros; he would fight if he had a lime-lit +stage to posture upon; they would not fight at all, but they moved about +mysteriously, as if their bosoms were big with the fate of dynasties, +held hugger-mugger caucus, and were the oracles of boudoirs.</p> + +<p>At Bayonne there was a better class of Carlist sympathizers; such of +them as were of the fighting age were there in the intervals of duty. To +a job-master's in the city by the Adour I was recommended as the most +likely place to procure a steed. At the Hôtel St. Etienne, where I +stopped, I was gratified by an unexpected encounter with the genial +captain<a name="FNanchor_G_7" id="FNanchor_G_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_G_7" class="fnanchor">[G]</a> (Ronald Campbell), who had<a name="page_314" id="page_314"></a> brought a juicy leg of mutton at +his saddle-skirts to the relief of my household after the siege of +Paris. He went with me to the job-master's—it is as well to have a +friend with you when you do a horse-deal. I had no choice but Hobson's. +The job-master was desolated, but he had sold three animals the day +before to an English milord, a very big gentleman, and his party. He had +just one horse, but it was a beauty. The horse was trotted out. It was +well groomed—they always are, and arsenic does impart a nice gloss to +the hide—and looked imposing, a tall three-quarter-bred bay gelding.</p> + +<p>"You'll have to take it," said the captain, "though I fear it will not +be a great catch for mountain-work. Seems to me that it stumbles—that +lie-back of the ears is vicious—ha! rears too—and by Jove! it has been +fired. No matter. Where needs must, you know, there's no alternative. +Buy it by all means."</p> + +<p>I closed with the bargain, got a loan of a saddle, bought a pair of +jack-boots, and ordered my purchase to be brought round to the door of +the<a name="page_315" id="page_315"></a> hotel within half-an-hour. I am no rough-rider, and I had not +counted on the high mettle of this, which was literally a "fiery, +untamed steed." It had been fed for the market, and had had no exercise +for two days previous. I meant to try its paces to St. Jean de Luz, and +show off before the damsels of Biarritz; but, lack-a-day! what a +declension was in store for me. It had best be given in the words of a +letter to my kindly compatriot, written while defeat was fresh in my +mind. Thus the epistle runs:</p> + +<p class="top5">"<span class="smcap">Dear Campbell</span>,</p> + +<p class="spain">"My first essay on my eight hundred francs' worth of horse-power +was a sight to see.</p> + +<p>"<i>Imprimis</i>, the stirrup-leathers were long enough for you.</p> + +<p>"<i>En suite</i>, I gave the dear gelding his head because he took it, +and he incontinently faced a post of the French army at the Porte +d'Espagne. The sentry came to the charge and cried, <i>On ne passe +pas ici.</i> The blood-horse went at him, the sentry funked, and then, +as if satisfied with his<a name="page_316" id="page_316"></a> demonstration, the blood-horse—the bit +always in his mouth—made a <i>demi-tour</i>, and faced a post of +douaniers. This also was sacred ground, it appears, but the +douaniers let the blood-horse pass, not even making the feint to +prod his inside for contraband. The scene now changes to the Place +de la Comédie (there's something in a name), where by virtue of +vigorous tugging at curb and snaffle I just succeeded in keeping my +gallant gelding off the cobble-stones. He went a burster over the +bridge by a short turn down a street and to the door of his stable, +and there he positively stopped, and I swear I felt his sides +shaking with laughter. I called the groom; said I thought it would +rain; besides, I did not know the road. On the whole, I had +reconsidered the matter, and would go to St. Jean de Luz by train. +The groom was awfully polite, pretended to believe me, and provided +a man to take forward my eight—oh, hang it! we shan't think of the +price.</p> + +<p>"Humiliation! you will say. Yes, sir, and I feel it; but that horse +will feel it too. When I get him somewhere that none can see, and +where sentries,<a name="page_317" id="page_317"></a> douaniers, and stables of refuge don't abound, I +shall ask him to try how long he can keep up a gallop; but, by the +body of the Claimant, I shall have sixteen stone on his back.</p> + +<p>"Yours with knees unwearied and soul unsubdued."</p> + +<p class="top5">At St. Jean de Luz I learned at the principal hotel that the English +milord was Captain Frederick Burnaby of "the Queen of England's Blue +Guards." He was supposed to have some secret official mission to Don +Carlos, to whose headquarters he had directed his steps, and I at once +took measures to follow in his tracks.</p> + +<p class="c top15">THE END.</p> + +<hr /> + +<p class="c top15 sml">BILLING & SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD.</p> + +<p class="c top15"><i>BY THE AUTHOR OF "ROMANTIC SPAIN."</i></p> + +<p class="c">AN IRON-BOUND CITY; or, Five Months of Peril and Privation. 2 vols. 21s.</p> + +<p class="poem sml"> +<span style="margin-left: 2em;">"A story of peril, adventure, privation,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">Is told, in two vols., to your great delectation,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">With shrewd common sense and uncommon sensation!</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">Here's the painful account of Parisians defeated:</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">And Paris besieged is most 'specially' treated:</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">Like a trusty Tapleyan, bright, hopeful, and witty,</span><br /> +<span style="margin-left: 2.5em;">O'Shea tells the tale of '<span class="smcap">An Iron-bound City.</span>'"—<i>Punch.</i></span><br /> +</p> + +<p class="sml">"We can listen with unjaded interest to the oft-told tale of the fall of +Paris when it is told by so genial and sunny-minded an +historian."—<i>Saturday Review.</i></p> + +<p class="c">LEAVES PROM THE LIFE OF A SPECIAL<br /> +CORRESPONDENT. 2 vols. 21s.</p> + +<p class="sml">The great charm of his pages is the entire absence of dulness, and the +evidence they afford of a delicate sense of humour, considerable powers +of observation, a store of apposite and racy anecdote, and a keen +enjoyment of life."—<i>Standard.</i></p> + +<p class="sml">"Redolent of stories throughout, told with such a cheery spirit, in so +genial a manner, that even those they sometimes hit hard cannot, when +they read, refrain from laughing, for Mr. O'Shea is a modern Democritus; +and yet there runs a vein of sadness, as if, like Figaro, he made haste +to laugh lest he should have to weep."—<i>Society.</i></p> + +<p class="sml">"Delightful reading.... A most enjoyable book.... It is kinder to +readers to leave them to find out the good things for themselves. They +will find material for amusement and instruction on every page; and if +the lesson is sometimes in its way as melancholy as the moral of Firmin +Maillard's 'Les Derniers Bohemes,' it is conveyed after a fashion that +recalls the light-hearted gaiety of Paul de Kock's 'Damoiselle du +Cinquième' and the varied pathos and humour of Henri +Murger."—<i>Whitehall Review.</i></p> + +<p class="c">WARD AND DOWNEY, PUBLISHERS, LONDON.</p> + +<div class="footnotes"> +<h3 class="top5"><a name="FOOTNOTES" id="FOOTNOTES"></a>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> Gibraltar is no longer a penal settlement.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_B_2" id="Footnote_B_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_B_2"><span class="label">[B]</span></a> That has all been changed since. There are serviceable +rifled guns at Tangier now, and the Sultan has some approach to a +regular army, organized by an ex-English soldier.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_C_3" id="Footnote_C_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_C_3"><span class="label">[C]</span></a> Stuart married Lady Alice Hay, grand-daughter of William +IV., in London, in 1874, and is now dead. He left no heir, so that the +House of Hanover may rest easy. The story that the Cardinal of York +("Henry IX."), who died in 1807, was the last of the Stuart line, is all +bosh. Charles-Edward had a son by the daughter of Prince Sobieski.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_D_4" id="Footnote_D_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_D_4"><span class="label">[D]</span></a> Review of the social and political state of the Basque +Provinces, at the end of a book on "Portugal and Galicia," published in +1848 by John Murray.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_E_5" id="Footnote_E_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_E_5"><span class="label">[E]</span></a> It should be noted that in July, 1876, directly after the +war was over, the fueros were entirely done away with by a special law.</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_F_6" id="Footnote_F_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_F_6"><span class="label">[F]</span></a> See my last book, "An Iron-Bound City." Poor Willie died in +New York of a complication of diseases on last Easter Sunday—an +anniversary of hopefulness. His path of existence here was thorny. +Unsurfeiting happiness be his portion in the meads of asphodel!</p></div> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_G_7" id="Footnote_G_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_G_7"><span class="label">[G]</span></a> Now Colonel the Baron Craignish, Equerry to his Royal +Highness the Grand Duke of Saxe-Coburg Gotha.</p></div> +</div> + +<p class="c"><a name="NOTES" id="NOTES"></a>Notes of the transcriber of this etext.</p> + +<p class="c">The following typographical errors in the book have been +corrected in making this etext:<br /> +Abd-es-Salem was changed to Abd-es-Salam<br /> +Dorregarray was changed to Dorregaray<br /> +Ojoladeros was changed to Ojaladeros<br /> +Enderlasa was changed to Endarlasa<br /> +Enderlaza changed to Endarlasa<br /> +I deserve no creditor changed to I deserve no credit for</p> + +<hr class="full" /> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Romantic Spain, by John Augustus O'Shea + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROMANTIC SPAIN *** + +***** This file should be named 31532-h.htm or 31532-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/5/3/31532/ + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by the +Digital & Multimedia Center, Michigan State University +Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Romantic Spain + A Record of Personal Experiences (Vol. II) + +Author: John Augustus O'Shea + +Release Date: March 7, 2010 [EBook #31532] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROMANTIC SPAIN *** + + + + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by the +Digital & Multimedia Center, Michigan State University +Libraries.) + + + + + + + + + +ROMANTIC SPAIN: + +_A RECORD OF PERSONAL EXPERIENCES._ + + + + +ROMANTIC SPAIN: + +A Record of Personal Experiences. + +BY + +JOHN AUGUSTUS O'SHEA, + +AUTHOR OF + +"LEAVES FROM THE LIFE OF A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT," +"AN IRON-BOUND CITY," ETC. + +"Oh, lovely Spain! renowned, romantic land!" +CHILDE HAROLD. + +IN TWO VOLUMES. + +VOL. II. + +LONDON: +WARD AND DOWNEY, +12, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN, W.C. +1887. +[_All Rights Reserved._] + + + + +CONTENTS OF VOL. II. + + +CHAPTER I. + + Page + +A Tidy City--A Sacred Corpse--Remarkable Features +of Puerto--A Calesa--Lady Blanche's Castle--A +Typical English Engineer--British Enterprise--"Success +to the Cadiz Waterworks!"--Visit to a +Bodega--Wine and Women--The Coming Man--A +Strike 1-18 + +CHAPTER II. + +The Charms of Cadiz--Seville-by-the-Sea--Cervantes--Daughters +of Eve--The Ladies who Prayed and +the Women who Didn't--Fasting Monks--Notice to +Quit on the Nuns--The Rival Processions--Gutting +a Church--A Disorganized Garrison--Taking it Easy--The +Mysterious "Mr. Crabapple"--The Steamer +_Murillo_--An Unsentimental Navvy--Bandaged +Justice--Tricky Ship-Owning--Painting Black +White 19-41 + +CHAPTER III. + +Expansion of Carlism--A Pseudo-Democracy--Historic +Land and Water Marks--An Impudent Stowaway--Spanish +Respect for Providence--A Fatal +Signal--Playing with Fire--Across the Bay--Farewell +to Andalusia--British Spain 42-50 + +CHAPTER IV. + +Gabriel Tar--A Hard Nut to Crack--In the Cemetery--An +Old Tipperary Soldier--Marks of the Broad +Arrow--The "Scorpions"--The Jaunting-Cars--Amusements +on the Rock--Mrs. Damages' Complaint--The +Bay, the Alameda, and Tarifa--How +to Learn Spanish--Types of the British Officer--The +Wily Ben Solomon--A Word for the Subaltern--Sunset +Gun--The Sameness of Sutlersville 51-75 + +CHAPTER V. + +From Pillar to Pillar--Historic Souvenirs--Off to +Africa--The Sweetly Pretty Albert--Gibraltar by +Moonlight--The Chain-Gang--Across the Strait--A +Difficult Landing--Albert is Hurt--"Fat Mahomet"--The +Calendar of the Centuries Put Back--Tangier: +the People, the Streets, the Bazaar--Our Hotel--A +Coloured Gentleman--Seeing the Sights--Local +Memoranda--Jewish Disabilities--Peep at a Photographic +Album--The Writer's Notions on Harem +Life 76-102 + +CHAPTER VI. + +A Pattern Despotism--Some Moorish Peculiarities--A +Hell upon Earth--Fighting for Bread--An Air-Bath--Surprises +of Tangier--On Slavery--The +Writer's Idea of a Moorish Squire--The Ladder of +Knowledge--Gulping Forbidden Liquor--Division +of Time--Singular Customs--The Shereef of Wazan--The +Christian who Captivated the Moor--The +Interview--Moslem Patronage of Spain--A Slap for +England--A Vision of Beauty--An English Desdemona: +Her Plaint--One for the Newspaper Men--The +Ladies' Battle--Farewell--The English Lady's +Maid--Albert is Indisposed--The Writer Sums up +on Morocco 103-135 + +CHAPTER VII. + +Back to Gibraltar--The Parting with Albert--The +Tongue of Scandal--Voyage to Malaga--"No Police, +no Anything"--Federalism Triumphant--Madrid _in +Statu Quo_--Orense--Progress of the Royalists--On +the Road Home--In the Insurgent Country--Stopped +by the Carlists--An Angry Passenger is +Silenced 136-151 + +CHAPTER VIII. + +On the Wing--Ordered to the Carlist Headquarters--Another +_Petit Paris_--Carlists from Cork--How +Leader was Wounded--Beating-up for an Anglo-Irish +Legion--Pontifical Zouaves--A Bad Lot--Oddities +of Carlism--Santa Cruz Again--Running +a Cargo--On Board a Carlist Privateer--A Descendant +of Kings--"Oh, for an Armstrong Twenty-Four +Pounder!"--Crossing the Border--A Remarkable +Guide--Mountain Scenery--In Navarre--Challenged +at Vera--Our Billet with the Parish Priest--The Sad +Story of an Irish Volunteer--Dialogue with Don +Carlos--The Happy Valley--Bugle-Blasts--The +Writer in a Quandary--The Fifth Battalion of +Navarre--The Distribution of Arms--The Bleeding +Heart--Enthusiasm of the Chicos 152-187 + +CHAPTER IX. + +The Cura of Vera--Fueros of the Basques--Carlist Discipline--Fate +of the _San Margarita_--The Squadron +of Vigilance--How a Capture was Effected--The +Sea-Rovers in the Dungeon--Visit to the Prisoners--San +Sebastian--A Dead Season--The Defences of a +Threatened City--Souvenirs of War--The Miqueletes--In +a Fix--A German Doctor's Warning 188-210 + +CHAPTER X. + +Belcha's Brigands--Pale-Red Republicans--The Hyena--More +about the _San Margarita_--Arrival of a Republican +Column--The Jaunt to Los Pasages--A +Sweet Surprise--"The Prettiest Girl in Spain"--A +Madrid Acquaintance--A Costly Pull--The Diligence +at Last--Renteria and its Defences--A Furious Ride--In +France Again--Unearthing Santa Cruz--The +Outlaw in his Lair--Interviewed at Last--The Truth +about the Endarlasa Massacre--A Death-Warrant--The +Buried Gun--Fanaticism of the Partisan-Priest 211-238 + +CHAPTER XI. + +An Audible Battle--"Great Cry and Little Wool"--A +Carlist Court Newsman--The Religious War--The +Siege of Oyarzun--Madrid Rebels--"The Money of +Judas"--A Manifesto from Don Carlos--An Ideal +Monarch--Necessity of Social and Political Reconstruction +Proclaimed--A Free Church--A Broad +Policy--The King for the People--The Theological +Question--Austerity in Alava--Clerical and Non-Clerical +Carlists--Disavowal of Bigotry--A Republican +Editor on the Carlist Creed--Character of +the Basques--Drill and Discipline--Guerilleros _versus_ +Regulars 239-268 + +CHAPTER XII. + +Barbarossa--Royalist-Republicans--Squaring a Girl--At +Irun--"Your Papers?"--The Barber's Shop--A +Carlist Spy--An Old Chum--The Alarm--A Breach +of Neutrality--Under Fire--Caught in the Toils--The +Heroic Thomas--We Slope--A Colleague Advises +Me--"A Horse! a Horse!"--State of Bilbao--Don +Carlos at Estella--Sanchez Bregua Recalled--Tolosa +Invites--Republican Ineptitude--Do not Spur a Free +Horse--Very Ancient Boys--Meditations in Bed--A +Biscay Storm 269-299 + +CHAPTER XIII. + +Nearing the End--Firing on the Red Cross--Perpetuity +of War--Artistic Hypocrites--The Jubilee Year--The +Conflicts of a Peaceful Reign--Major Russell--Quick +Promotion--The Foreign Legion--The Aspiring +Adventurer--A Leader's Career--A Piratical +Proposal--The "Ojaladeros" of Biarritz--A Friend +in Need--Buying a Horse--Gilpin Outdone--"Fred +Burnaby" 300-317 + +FOOTNOTES + +NOTES OF THE TRANSCRIBER + + + + +ROMANTIC SPAIN. + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + A Tidy City--A Sacred Corpse--Remarkable Features of Puerto--A + Calesa--Lady Blanche's Castle--A Typical English Engineer--British + Enterprise--"Success to the Cadiz Waterworks!"--Visit to a + Bodega--Wine and Women--The Coming Man--A Strike. + + +PUERTO de Santa Maria has the name of being the neatest and tidiest city +in Spain, and neatness and tidiness are such dear homely virtues, I +thought I could not do better than hie me thither to see if the tale +were true. With a wrench I tore myself from the soft capital of +Andalusia, delightful but demoralizing. I was growing lazier every day I +spent there; I felt energy oozing out of every pore of my body; and in +the end I began to get afraid that if I stopped much longer I should +only be fit to sing the song of the sluggard:--"You have waked me too +soon, let me slumber again." Seville is a dangerous place; it is worse +than Capua; it would enervate Cromwell's Ironsides. Happily for me the +mosquitoes found out my bedroom, and pricked me into activity, or I +might not have summoned the courage to leave it for weeks, the more +especially as I had a sort of excuse for staying. The Cardinal +Archbishop had promised a friend of mine to let him inspect the body of +St. Fernando, and my friend had promised to take me with him. Now, this +was a great favour. St. Fernando is one of the patrons of Seville; he +has been dead a long time, but his corpse refuses to putrefy, like those +of ordinary mortals; it is a sacred corpse, and in a beatific state of +preservation. Three times a year the remains of the holy man are +uncovered, and the faithful are admitted to gaze on his incorruptible +features. This was not one of the regular occasions; the Cardinal +Archbishop had made an exception in compliment to my friend, who is a +rising young diplomat, so that the favour was really a favour. I +declined it with thanks--very much obliged, indeed--pressure of +business called me elsewhere--the cut-and-dry form of excuse; but I +never mentioned a word about the mosquitoes. I told my friend to thank +the prelate for his graciousness; the prelate expressed his sorrow that +my engagements did not permit me to wait, and begged that I would oblige +him by letting the British public know the shameful way he and his +priests were treated by the Government They had not drawn a penny of +salary for three years. This was a fact; and very discreditable it was +to the Government, and a good explanation of the disloyalty of their +reverences. If a contract is made it should be kept; the State +contracted to support the Church, but since Queen Isabella decamped the +State had forgotten its engagement. + +Puerto de Santa Maria deserves the name it has got. It is a clean and +shapely collection of houses, regularly built. People in England are apt +to associate the idea of filth with Spain; this, at least in Andalusia, +is a mistake. The cleanliness is Flemish. Soap and the scrubbing-brush +are not spared; linen is plentiful and spotless, and water is used for +other purposes than correcting the strength of wine. Walking down the +long main street with its paved causeways and pebbly roadway, with its +straight lines of symmetric houses, coquettish in their marble balconies +and brightly-painted shutters and railings, one might fancy himself in +Brock or Delft but that the roofs are flat, that the gables are not +turned to the street, and that the sky is a cloudless blue. I am +speaking now of fine days; but there are days when the sky is cloudy and +the wind blows, and the waters in the Bay of Cadiz below surge up sullen +and yeasty, and there are days when the rain comes down quick, thick, +and heavy as from a waterspout, and the streets are turned for the +moment into rivulets. But the effects of the rain do not last long; +Spain is what washerwomen would call a good drying country. Beyond its +neatness and tidiness, Puerto has other features to recommend it to the +traveller. It has a bookseller's shop, where the works of Eugene Sue and +Paul de Kock can be had in choice Spanish, side by side with the Carlist +Almanack, "by eminent monarchical writers," and the calendar of the +Saragossan prophet (the Spanish Old Moore); but it is not to that I +refer--half a hundred Andalusian towns can boast the same. It has its +demolished convent, but since the revolution of '68 that is no more a +novelty than the Alameda, or sand-strewn, poplar-planted promenade, +which one meets in every Spanish hamlet. It has the Atlantic waves +rolling in at its feet, and a pretty sight it is to mark the feluccas, +with single mast crossed by single yard, like an unstrung bow, moored by +the wharf or with outspread sail bellying before the breeze on their way +to Cadiz beyond, where she sits throned on the other side of the bay, +"like a silver cup" glistening in the sunshine, when sunshine there is. +The silver cup to which the Gaditanos are fond of comparing their city +looked more like dirty pewter as I approached it by water from Puerto; +but I was in a tub of a steamer, there was a heavy sea on and a heavy +mist out, and perhaps I was qualmish. Not for its booksellers' shops, +for its demolished convent, or for its vulgar Atlantic did this Puerto, +which the guide-books pass curtly by as "uninteresting," impress me as +interesting, but for two features that no seasoned traveller could, +would, or should overlook; its female population is the most attractive +in Andalusia, and it is the seat of an agreeable English colony. I +happened on the latter in a manner that is curious, so curious as to +merit relation. + +I had intended to proceed to Cadiz from Seville after I had taken a peep +at Puerto, but that little American gentleman whom I met at Cordoba was +with me, and persuaded me to stop by the story of a wonderful castle +prison, a sort of _Tour de Nesle_, which was to be seen in the vicinity, +where the _bonne amie_ of a King of Spain had been built up in the good +old times when monarchs raised favourites from the gutter one day, and +sometimes ordered their weazands to be slit the next. This show-place is +about a league from Puerto, in the valley of Sidonia, and is called El +Castillo de Dona Blanca. We took a calesa to go there. My companion +objected to travelling on horseback; he could not stomach the peculiar +Moorish saddle with its high-peaked cantle and crupper, and its +catch-and-carry stirrups. We took a calesa, as I have said. To my dying +day I shall not forget that vehicle of torture. But it may be necessary +to tell what is a calesa. Procure a broken-down hansom, knock off the +driver's seat, paint the body and wheels the colour of a roulette-table +at a racecourse, stud the hood with brass nails of the pattern of those +employed to beautify genteel coffins, remove the cushions, and replace +them with a wisp of straw, smash the springs, and put swing-leathers +underneath instead, cover the whole article with a coating of liquid +mud, leave it to dry in a mouldy place where the rats shall have free +access to the leather for gnawing practice, return in seven years, and +you will find a tolerably correct imitation of that decayed machine, the +Andalusian calesa. It is more picturesque than the Neapolitan +_corricolo_; it is all ribs and bones, and is much given to inward +groaning as it jerks and jolts along. Such a trap we took; the driver +lazily clambered on the shafts, and away hobbled our lean steed. + +The road to Lady Blanche's Castle is like that to Jordan in the nigger +songs; it is "a hard road to travel"--a road full of holes and quagmires +and jutting rocks; and yet the driver told me it had once been a good +road, but that was in the reign of Queen Isabella. Everything seems to +have been allowed to go to dilapidation since. On the outskirts of +Puerto we passed an English cemetery; I am glad to say it is almost +uninhabited. If there is an English dead settlement there ought to be a +live one, I reasoned, unless those who are buried here date from +Peninsular battles. The first part of the road to Blanche's Castle is +level, and bordered with thick growths of prickly pear; there is a view +of the sea, and of the Guadalate, spanned by a metal bridge--a Menai on +a small scale. Farther on, as we get to a district called La Piedad, the +country is diversified by swampy flats at one side and sandy hills at +the other. Blanche's Castle was a commonplace ruin, a complete "sell," +and we turned our horse's head rather savagely. As we were coming back, +the little American shortening the way by Sandford and Merton +observations of this nature--"Prickly pear makes a capital hedge; no +cattle will face it; the spikes of the plant are as tenacious as +fish-hooks. The fibres of the aloe are unusually strong; they make +better cordage than hemp, but will not bear the wet so well"--a sight +caught my eyes which caused me to stare. A tall young fellow, with his +trousers tucked up, was wading knee-deep in the bottoms beside the road. +He wore a suit of Oxford mixture. + +"Who or what is that gentleman?" I asked the driver. + +"An English engineer," was the answer. + +I stopped the calesa, hailed him, and inquired was he fond of rheumatic +fever. He laughed, and pronounced the single word, "Duty." A little +word, but one that means much. A Spanish engineer would never have done +this; they are great in offices and at draughting on paper, but they +seldom tuck up their sleeves, much less their trousers, to labour out of +doors as the young Englishman was doing. I made his acquaintance, and he +willingly consented to show me over the works in which he was engaged, +which were intended to supply Cadiz with water. In England water is to +be had too easily to be estimated at its proper value. At Cadiz it is a +marketable commodity. Even the parrots there squeak "agua." Every drop +of rain that falls is carefully gathered in cisterns, and the +conveyance of water in boatloads from Puerto across the Bay is a regular +trade. An English company had been formed to supply the parched seaport +and the ships that call there with fresh water, and its reservoirs were +situated at La Piedad. In the bowels of the flats below, where the +snipe-shooting ought to be good, our countryman told me the water was to +be sought. Galleries had been sunk in every direction in land which the +company had purchased, and pumps and engines are soon to be erected that +will raise the liquid collected there up to the reservoirs which have +been hewn out of the hills above. These reservoirs, approached by +passages excavated out of the rough sandstone, are stout and solid +specimens of the mason's craft directed by the engineer's skill. Here we +met a second gentleman superintending the labours of the men, but he was +surely a Spaniard; he spoke the language with the readiness of one born +on the soil; still, he had a matter-of-fact, resolute quickness about +him that was hardly Spanish. Doubts as to his nationality were soon +dispelled; the engineer we had surprised in the swamp presented us to +his colleague Forrest, engineer to Messrs. Barnett and Gale, of +Westminster, the contractors, as thoroughbred an Englishman as ever came +out of the busy town of Blackburn. + +Mr. Forrest at once stood to cross-examination by the American, who had +all the inquisitiveness of his race. + +"We employ a couple of hundred men, on an average, here," he said, "all +of whom, with but two exceptions, are Spaniards, and very fair +hard-working fellows they are; in the town below we have a small colony +of English, and if you don't take it amiss I shall be happy to present +you to our society." + +I know little of the technicalities of engineering, but I saw enough of +this work to be certain that it was well and truly done, and I heard +enough of the scarcity of water in Cadiz to be convinced it will be a +great boon when finished. The reservoirs are constructed in colonnades, +supported by ashlar pillars and roofed with rubble; for the water must +be shaded from the sun in this hot climate; the pillars are buttered +over with cement, and there is over a foot of cement concrete on the +flooring, to guard against filtration. As we paced about the sombre +aisles, echo multiplied every syllable we uttered; the repetition of +sound is as distinct as in the whispering gallery of St. Paul's, and I +could not help remarking, "What a splendid robber's cave this would +make!" + +"Too tell-tale," said the practical American; "make a better cave of +harmony." + +"The only pipes that are ever likely to blow here are water-pipes," +smilingly put in the engineer; "we intend to lay them from this to +Cadiz, some twenty-eight miles distant. Roughly speaking, we are about +ninety feet above the level of the place, so that the highest building +there can be supplied with ease." + +The Romans were benefactors to many portions of this dry land of Spain; +they built up aqueducts which are still in use, but they neglected +Cadiz. The town has been dependent on these springs of La Piedad for its +water supply, except such as dropped from heaven, for three hundred +years, and attempts to obtain water from wells or borings in the +neighbourhood have invariably failed. The water which is found in this +basin, held by capillary attraction in the permeable strata through +which it soaks till the hard impermeable stratum is met--retained, in +short, in a natural reservoir--is excellent in quality, limpid and +sparkling. Puerto has been supplied from the place for time out of mind, +and Puerto has been so well supplied that it could afford to sell +panting Cadiz its surplus. With English capital and enterprise putting +new life into those old hills, and cajoling the precious beverage out of +their bosom, which unskilled engineers let go to waste, Cadiz should +shortly have reason to bless the foreign company that relieves its +thirst. Clear virgin water, such as will course down the tunnels to +bubble up in the Gaditanian fountains, is the greatest luxury of life +here; "Agua fresca, cool as snow," is the most welcome of cries in the +summer, and temperate Spain is as devoted to the colourless liquid that +the temperance lecturer Gough and his compeers call Adam's ale, as ever +London drayman was to Barclay's Entire. Success, then, to the Cadiz +Waterworks Company: we drank the toast on the hill-side of "Piety" they +were making fruitful of good, drank it in tipple of their and nature's +brewing, but had latent hopes that Forrest or his colleague would help +us to a bumper of the generous grape-juice for which the district is +famed, when we got down to the pleasant companionship of the English +colony below. + +Nor were our hopes disappointed. There are innumerable bodegas, or +wine-vaults, in the town, in which bottles and barrels of wine are +neatly caged in labelled array, according to age, quality, and kind. +Very clean and roomy these stores of vinous treasure are, with an +indescribable semi-medicinal odour languidly pervading them. We visited +a bodega belonging to an Englishman, who ranks as a grandee of the +first-class, the Duke of Ciudad Rodrigo and eke of Vitoria, but who is +better known as the Duke of Wellington. The natural wine of this +district is too thin for insular palates. They crave something fiery, +and, by my word, they get it. Like that Irish car-driver who rejected my +choicest, oily, mellow "John Jameson," but thanked me after gulping a +hell-glass of new spirit, violent assault liquefied, they want a drink +that will catch them by the throat and assert its prerogative going +down. What a beamy old imposition is that rich brown sherry of city +banquets, over which the idiot of a connoisseur cunningly smacks his +lips and rolls his moist eyes. If he were only told how much of it was +real and how much artificial, would he not gasp and crimson! It would be +unmerciful to inform him that his pet cordial is charged with sulphuric +acid gas, that it is sweetened with cane-sugar, that it is flavoured +with "garnacha dulce," that it is coloured with plastered _must_ and +fortified with brandy, before it is shipped. Let us leave him in +blissful ignorance. We tasted many samples before we left, but I own I +have no liking for sherries, simple or doctored. Among Spanish wines I +far prefer the full-bodied astringent sub-acidity of the common Val de +Penas, beloved of Cervantes. But the Queen of wines is sound Bordeaux. +To that Queen, however, a delicate etherous Amontillado might be +admitted as Spanish maid-of-honour, preceding the royal footsteps, while +the syrupy Malaga from the Doradillo grape might follow as attendant in +her train. + +From wine to women is an easy transition. Both are benedictions from on +high, and I have no patience with the foul churl who cannot enjoy the +one with proper continence, and rise the better and more chivalrous from +the society of the other. Wine well used is a good familiar +creature--kindles, soothes, and inspirits: the cup of wine warmed by the +smile of woman gives courage to the soldier and genius to the minstrel. +With Burns--and he was no ordinary seer--I hold that the sweetest hours +that e'er we spend are spent among the lasses. I will go farther and say +the most profitable hours. And some sweet and profitable hours 'twas +mine to spend among the fawn-orbed lasses of Puerto, with their +childlike gaiety, their desire to please, and their fetching freedom +from affectation. Would that the wines exported from the district were +half as unsophisticated! These lasses were not learned in the "ologies" +or the "isms," but they were sincere; and their locks flowed long and +free, and when they laughed the coral sluices flying open gave scope to +a full silvery music cascading between pales of gleaming pearl. An +admixture of this strain with the fair-skinned men of the North should +produce a magnificent race; and, indeed, if we paid half the attention +to the improvement of the human animal which we do to that of the equine +or the porcine, the experiment would not have been left untried so long. +In-and-in breeding is a mistake, and can only commend itself, and that +for selfish reasons, to the Aztec in physique and the imbecile in mind. +The families which take most pride in their purity are the most +degenerate; the stock which is the most robust and handsome is that +which has in it a liberal infusion of foreign bloods. In my opinion, the +coming man, the highest form of well-balanced qualities--moral, +intellectual, and masculine--the nearest approach to perfection, must +ultimately be developed in the United States. + +Puerto has a wide-spread reputation as the nursery-ground for +bull-fighters. To the arena it is what Newmarket is to the British turf. +Everybody there walks about armed, but murder is not more rife in +proportion than in London. As it happened, a fellow was shot while I was +there, but that would not justify one in coming to the conclusion that +homicide was a flourishing indigenous product. Still, the natives did +not escape the contagion of unrest of their countrymen. For example, the +last news I heard before leaving my English friends was that the men in +the vineyards had struck work. These lazy scoundrels had the impudence +to demand that they should have half an hour after arrival on the +ground, and before beginning work, to smoke cigarettes, the same grace +after the breakfast hour, two hours for a siesta in the middle of the +day, another interval for a bout of smoking in the afternoon, and +finally that each should be entitled to an arroba (more than three and a +half gallons English) of wine per acre at the end of the season. They go +on the same basis as some trades' unions we are acquainted +with--reduction of hours of labour and increase of wages. "Will you give +in to them?" I asked of an English settler, in the wine trade. "Give +in------" but it is unnecessary to repeat the expletive; "I'll quietly +shut up my bodega." + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + The Charms of Cadiz--Seville-by-the-Sea--Cervantes-Daughters of + Eve--The Ladies who Prayed and the Women who Didn't--Fasting + Monks--Notice to Quit on the Nuns--The Rival Processions--Gutting a + Church--A Disorganized Garrison--Taking it Easy--The Mysterious + "Mr. Crabapple"--The Steamer _Murillo_--An Unsentimental + Navvy--Bandaged Justice--Tricky Ship-Owning--Painting Black White. + + +THE man who pitched on Cadiz as the site of a city knew what he was +about. Without exception it is the most charmingly-located place I ever +set foot in. Its white terraces, crowded with white pinnacles, +belvederes, and turrets, glistening ninety-nine days out of the hundred +in clear sunlight, rise gently out of a green sea necked with foam; the +harbour is busy with commerce, crowded with steamers and sailing ships +coming and going from the Mediterranean shores, from France, from +England, or from the distant countries beyond the Atlantic; the waters +around (for Cadiz is built on a peninsula, and peeps of water make the +horizon of almost every street) are dotted with fishing craft or +scudding curlews; the public squares are everlastingly verdant with the +tall fern-palm, the feathery mimosa, the myrtle, and the silvery ash, +which only recalls the summer the better for its suggestive appearance +of having been recently blown over with dust; the gaze inland is repaid +with the sight of hills brown by distance, of sheets of pasture, and +pyramidal salt-mounds of creamy grey; and the gaze upwards--to lend a +glow to the ravishing picture--is delighted by such a cope of dreamy +blue, deep and pure, and unstained by a single cloudlet, as one seldom +has the happiness of looking upon in England outside the doors of an +exhibition of paintings. The climate is dry and genial, and not so hot +as Seville. The Sevillanos know that, and come to Cadiz when the heats +make residence in their own city insupportable. Winter is unknown; +skating has never been witnessed by Gaditanos, except when exhibited by +foreign professors, clad in furs, who glide on rollers over polished +floors; and small British boys who are fond of snowballing when they +come out here are obliged to pelt each other with oranges to keep their +hands in. One enthusiastic traveller compares it to a pearl set in +sapphires and emeralds, but adds--lest we should all be running to hug +the jewel--there is little art here and less society. + +"Letters of exchange are the only belles-lettres." Indeed. Now this is +one of those wiseacres who are _in_ a community, but not _of_ it, who +materially are present, but can never mentally, so to speak, get +themselves inside the skins of the inhabitants. That city cannot be said +to be without letters which has its poetic brotherhood, limited though +it be, and which reveres the memory of Cervantes, as the memory of +Shakespeare is revered in no English seaport. Wiseacre should hie him to +Cadiz on the 23rd of April, when the birth of Cervantes is celebrated, +for in spite of intestine broils, Spaniards are true to the worship of +the author of "Don Quixote," and his no less immortal attendant, whom +Gandalin, friend to Amadis of Gaul, affectionately apostrophizes thus: + + "Salve! Sancho with the paunch, + Thou most famous squire, + Fortune smiled as Escudero she did dub thee + Tho' Fate insisted 'gainst the world to rub thee. + Fortune gave wit and common-sense, + Philosophy, ambition to aspire; + While Chivalry thy wallet stored, + And led thee harmless through the fire." + +With the respect he deserves for this wandering critic and no more, I +will take the liberty of saying that there is art, and a great deal of +art, in the site of the clean town; and that there is society, and good +society, in that forest of spars in the roadstead, and in the fishing +and shooting in the neighbourhood. When the Tauchnitz editions have been +exhausted, and when the stranger has mastered Cervantes and Lope de +Vega, Espronceda, Larra, and Rivas, there is always that book which Dr. +Johnson loved, the street, or that lighter literature which Moore sings, +"woman's looks," to fall back upon. I am afraid some prudes may be +misjudging my character on account of the frequency of my allusions to +the sex lately; but I beg them to recollect that this is Andalusia, and +that woman is a very important element in the population of Cadiz. She +rules the roost, and the courtly Spaniard of the south forgets that +there was ever such an undutiful person as Eve. Woman played a +remarkable part in the events of the couple of months after the Royal +crown was punched out of the middle of the national flag. She is +political here, and is not shy of declaring her opinions. Ladies of the +better classes of Cadiz are attentive to the duties of their religion; +kneeling figures gracefully draped in black may be seen at all hours of +the day in the churches during this Lenten season, telling their beads +or turning over their missals. Those ladies are Carlist to a man, as +Paddy would say; they naturally exert an influence over their husbands, +though the influence falls short of making their husbands accompany them +to church except on great festivals such as Easter Sunday, or on what +may be called occasions of social rendezvous, such as a Requiem service +for a deceased friend. The men seem to be of one mind with the French +freethinker, who abjured religion himself, or put off thoughts of it +till his dying day, but pronounced it necessary for peasants and +wholesome for women and children. But _les femmes du peuple_, the +fishwives, the labourers' daughters, the bouncing young fruit-sellers, +and the like, are not religious in Cadiz. They have been bitten with the +revolutionary mania; they are staunch Red Republicans, and have the bump +of veneration as flat as the furies that went in procession to +Versailles at the period of the Great Revolution, or their great +granddaughters who fought on the barricades of the Commune. The nymphs +of the pavement sympathize strongly with the Republic likewise; but +their ideal of a Republic is not that of Senores Castelar and Figueras. +They want bull-fights and distribution of property, and object to all +religious confraternities unless based on the principles of "the Monks +of the Screw," whose charter-song, written by that wit in wig and gown, +Philpot Curran, was of the least ascetic: + + "My children, be chaste--till you're tempted; + While sober, be wise and discreet, + And humble your bodies with--fasting, + Whene'er you have nothing to eat." + +So long ago as 1834 a sequestration of convents was ordered in Spain, +but the Gaditanos never had the courage to enforce the decree till +after the revolution that sent Queen Isabella into exile. A few years +ago the convent of Barefooted Carmelites on the Plaza de los Descalzados +was pulled down; the decree that legalized the act provided an +indemnity, but the unfortunate monks who were turned bag and baggage out +of their house never got a penny. They have had to humble their bodies +with fasting since. For those amongst them who were old or infirm that +was a grievance; but for the lusty young fellows who could handle a +spade there need not be much pity, for Spain had more of their sort than +was good for her. Even at that date the revolutionists of Cadiz had some +respect left for the nunneries. But they progressed; the example of +Paris was not lost upon them. The ayuntamiento which came into power +with the Republic was Federal. Barcelona and Malaga were stirring; the +ayuntamiento made up its mind that Cadiz should be as good as its +neighbours and show vigour too. The cheapest way to show vigour was to +make war on the weak and defenceless, and that was what this +enlightened and courageous municipality did. The nuns in the convent of +the Candelaria were told that their house and the church adjoining were +in a bad state, that they must clear out, and that both should be razed +in the interests of public safety. It was not that the presence of +ladies devoted to God after their own wishes and the traditions of their +creed was offensive to the Republic; no, not by any means. The nuns +protested that if their convent and church were in a dangerous condition +the proper measure to take was to prop them up, not pull them down. But +the blustering heroes of the municipality would not listen to this +reasoning; they were too careful of the lives of the citizens, the nuns +included; down the edifices must come. The Commune of Paris over again. +The ladies of Cadiz, those who pass to and fro, prayer-book in hand, in +the streets, and startle the flashing sunshine with their solemn +mantillas, were wroth with the municipality. They saw through its +designs, and they resolved to defeat them. To the number of some five +hundred they formed a procession, and marched four deep to the +Town-house to beg of their worships, the civic tyrants, to revoke their +order. If the convent and church were in ruins, the ladies were prepared +to pay out of their own pockets the expense of all repairs. That +procession was a sight to see; there was the beauty, the rank, the +fashion, and the worth of the city, in "linked sweetness long drawn +out," coiling through the thoroughfares on pious errand. The fair +petitioners were dressed as for a _fete_; diamonds sparkled in their +hair, and the potent fan, never deserted by the Andalusians, was +agitated by five hundred of the smallest of hands in the softest of +gloves. But the civic tyrants were more severe than Coriolanus. They +were not to be mollified by woman's entreaties, but rightly fearing her +charms they fled. When the procession arrived at the Town-house, there +was but a solitary intrepid bailie to receive it. They told him their +tale. He paid them the usual compliments, kissed their feet in the grand +Oriental way individually and collectively, said he would lay their +wishes before his colleagues, but that he could give no promise to +recall the mandate of the municipality--it was more than he dare +undertake to do, and so forth. The long and short of it was, he politely +sent them about their business. They came away, working the fans more +pettishly than ever, and liquid voices were heard to hiss scornfully +that the Republic, which proclaimed respect for all religions and +rights, was a lie, for its first thought was to trample on the national +religion, and to dispossess an inoffensive corporation of cloistered +ladies of their right to then property. Here the first act of the drama +ended. + +The second was, if anything, more sensational, though infinitely less +attractive. The Federals bit their thumbs, and cried: + +"Ah, this is the work of the priests!" + +So it was; not a doubt of that. The Federals meditated, and this was the +fruit of their meditations: + +"Let us organize a counter-procession!" + +That counter-procession was a sight to see, too; the feature of elegance +was conspicuous by its absence, but there was more colour in it. +Harridans of seventy crawled after hussies of seventeen; bare arms and +bandannas were more noticeable than black veils and fans; the _improbae +Gaditanae_, known of old to certain lively satirists, Martial and Juvenal +by name, turned out in force. Mayhap it is prejudice, but Republican +females, methinks, are rather muscular than good-looking. Still they +have influence sometimes, and when they said their say at the Town-house +the ladies plainly betrayed how much they dreaded that influence. They +wrote to Madrid praying that the municipality should be arrested in its +course. Senor Castelar did send a remonstrance; some say he ordered the +local authorities not to touch the church or convent, but they laughed +at his letter, and contented themselves by reflecting that he was not in +possession of the facts--that is, if they reflected at all, which is +doubtful. + +Act the third was in representation during my stay. I passed the +Candelaria one morning. Scaffolding poles were erected in the street +alongside in preparation for the demolition of the building, and a party +of workmen in the pay of the municipality were engaged gutting the +church of its contents, and carting them off to a place of deposit, +where they were to be sold by public auction. These workmen looked +cheerful over their sacrilege. A waggon was outside the door laden with +ornaments ripped from the walls, gilt picture-frames, fragments of +altar-rails, and the head of a cherub. Half a dozen rough fellows in +guernseys had their shoulders under a block of painted wood-carving. As +far as I could make out, it was the effigy of one of the Evangelists. I +was refused admittance to the building, but I was told the sacramental +plate had been removed with the same indifference. The nuns escaped +without insult, thanks to the good offices of some friends outside, who +brought up carriages at midnight to the doors of the convent and +conveyed them to secret places of safety put at their disposal by the +bishop. + +The people who committed this mean piece of desecration were all Federal +Republicans. They disobeyed orders from Madrid, and would disobey them +again. They were as deaf to the commands of Senor Castelar as to the +prayers and entreaties of the wives and daughters of respectable +fellow-citizens. And all this time that the central authority were +defied, artillerymen and linesmen were loitering about the streets of +Cadiz. Eventually it was plain they would be disarmed, as they were +disarmed at Malaga; and they would not offer serious opposition to the +process. Their officers were barely tolerated by them. The Guardia Civil +were true to duty, but when the crisis came, what could they do any more +than their comrades at Malaga? They were but as a drop of water in a +well. Disarmament is not liked by the old soldiers who have money to +their credit, but there is a large proportion of mere conscripts in the +ranks, and they are glad to jump at the chance of returning home. + +Troubles worse than any may yet be in store; meanwhile the sun shines, +and Cadiz, like Seville, takes it easy. But there is a bad spirit +abroad, and it is growing. A pack of ruffians forcibly entered a mansion +at San Lucar, and annexed what was in it in the name of Republican +freedom; the "volunteers of liberty" have taken the liberty of breaking +into the houses of the consuls at Malaga in search for arms; an excited +mob attacked the printing-office of _El Oriente_ at Seville after I +left, smashed the type, and threatened to strangle the editor if he +brought out the paper again; and the precious municipality of Cadiz has +nothing better to do than order that no mourners shall be allowed in +future to use religious exercises or emblems, to sing litanies or carry +crosses, at the open graves of relatives in the cemeteries. + +In the merchants' club (of which I was made free) they were saddened at +the disrupted state of society, but took it as kismet, and seemed to +think that all would come right in the end, by the interposition of some +_Deus ex machina_. But who that God was they could not tell: he was +hidden in the womb of Fate. As Cadiz accepted its destiny with +equanimity, I accommodated myself to the situation, and did as the +natives did. I helped to fly kites from the flat housetops--a favourite +pastime of mature manhood here; I opened mild flirtations with the +damsels in cigar-shops, and discovered that they were not slow to meet +advances; I expended hours every day cheapening a treatise on the +mystery of bull-fighting, with accompanying engravings, in vain--its +price was above rubies. But my great distraction was a strange character +I met at dinner at the house of the British Consul. I did not catch his +name at our introduction, so I mentally named him Mr. Crabapple. He was +short and stout, had a round wizened face freckled to the fuscous tint +of a russedon apple, and was endowed with a voice which had all the +husky sonority of a greengrocer's. He was beardless and sandy-haired, +and one of those persons whose age is a puzzle to define; he might have +been anything between fifteen and five-and-thirty. As he talked of +Harrow as if he had left it but yesterday, I was disposed to set him +down as a queer public-school boy on vacation, until I was astounded by +some self-possessed remark on Jamaica dyewoods. We stopped in the same +hotel. One morning he descended the stairs, a sort of dressing-case in +hand, and yelled to an urchin at the door: + +"Here, you son of a sea-calf, take this down to the waterside for me!" + +"Will he understand you?" I said. + +"Bound to," Mr. Crabapple replied; "never talk to them any other way, +anyhow. 'Tis their business to understand. Ta, ta--deuce of a hurry." + +"Where are you going, may I ask?" + +"Read the Church Service--rather a bore--Sunday, you know." + +The nondescript, then, was a chaplain. + +The same evening he returned to the hotel, and on the following morning +I saw him again descending the stairs, the same dressing-case in hand. +He nodded salute, slung his luggage to the same urchin with the cry, +"Hook it, you lubber!" and, turning to me, said, "Ta, ta, sheering off +again." + +"Where to now?" + +"Mediterranean." + +"There's no boat to-day." + +"There is, though--there's mine;" and he was off. + +The supposed chaplain was a stray-away from a novel by Marryat, +commanded her Majesty's gunboat _Catapult_, and was at Cadiz on the duty +of protecting British interests. At the moment his mission was to carry +important despatches to Gibraltar. + +My mission to Cadiz was, partly, to ascertain the progress of the +inquiry into the case of the _Murillo_ steamer, more than suspected of +having run down the _Northfleet_, a vessel laden with railway-iron and +navvies, off Dungeness, on the night of the 22nd of January previous. +Three hundred lives had been lost on the occasion. I knew something of +that wreck, for I had seen and spoken with the survivors in the Sailors' +Home at Dover on the following evening. A dazed, stupid lot they were, +of an exceedingly low standard of intelligence. The sense of their own +rescue had overcome the poignancy of grief. I envied them their +stolidity, which I explained to my own mind by the rush of the engulfing +waters still swirling and singing knell of sudden doom in their ears. + +"Guv'nor," said one clown to me, "I seed my ole 'ooman go down afore my +eyes, and I felt that grieved a'most as if I was agoin' down myself, and +I chewed a bit o' baccer." + +I saw the _Murillo_ lying quietly a little distance off the land--a +handsome, shapely craft, fine in the lines, with a sharp stem fashioned +like that of a ram. She was painted black, with the exception of a band +of pink above the water-line, where she was coated with Peacock's +mixture. The British Consul informed me that he understood the inquiry +into the guilt of the master was to be carried on _secretly_. He would +not be allowed to attend it. Copies of the depositions of the accused, +and permission to see them, had also been denied to the agents of the +British Government, who applied for them for the purposes of the Board +of Trade inquiry. Though Spaniards, in private conversation, own that +the _Murillo_ is the criminal ship, they seem, for some unaccountable +reason, to be anxious that she should escape the penalty of her +wickedness, as if the national honour were concerned, and the national +honour would be served by cloaking an offence cruel and mean in itself, +and awful in its consequences. + +There is a sentence in the Comminations which would keep running in my +mind every time I thought of that emigrant ship sent to the bottom off +Dungeness--"Cursed is he who smiteth his enemy secretly." But if he who +smites his enemy secretly is accursed, what is he who smites his +neighbour and then flees away like a coward in the dark? Is he not twice +and thrice wicked, and to be branded with malediction deeper still? Such +a thing the _Murillo_ steamer did--there could be no manner of doubt +about it; every seafaring man and every Spaniard admits her +blood-guiltiness; yet there she lies off Puntales, near the Trocadero, +calmly expecting soon to be under weigh again with her criminal master +and crew on board, with no punishment registered against her or them. +The Consul-General of Spain in London wrote to the papers after the loss +of the _Northfleet_, saying if this man was the wrongdoer he would be +punished, and sent to Ceuta or Tetuan. But he is the wrongdoer, and he +will never be sent to Ceuta or Tetuan. The master of the _Murillo_ and +the sailors of the watch on the fatal night are in prison, but they will +never be brought to serious account. The figure of Justice in these +latitudes is true to the sculptor's ideal in one sense: the eyes are +bandaged, not that Justice shall be impartial, but that she may not +see. + +This instance of the _Murillo_ is but one of many, and as it illustrates +an artifice of tricky ship-owning, it will be well to state why the +_Murillo_ will go scot-free, and may audaciously turn up again in +British waters disguised by a few coats of paint, exhibiting a fresh +figure-head, and bearing a new name in gilt lettering on her stern. + +In the first place, the _Murillo_ belonged not to Spanish so much as +English owners. The line of steamers of which she was one was the +property of a company of shareholders. The company was anxious that +their vessels should fly the Spanish flag, so they made one Don Miguel +Styles the nominal head of the firm. This individual was a mere clerk in +their office, a man of straw, and at the date of the catastrophe Don +Miguel Styles had no more substantial existence than our old friend John +Styles: he was dead, and in his grave. + +Nextly, Mr. Daniel Macpherson, one of the most eminent merchants in the +port of Cadiz and Lloyd's agent, had been served with an instrument +claiming damages to the amount of 50,000 pesetas (L2,000), because that +he had calumniated the good ship _Murillo_, and caused her prejudice and +injury by detaining her a couple of months in the waters of Cadiz. The +persons who instituted this action forget that the Spanish courts have +no jurisdiction in the matter of libels published in England. And as for +the prejudice caused to the vessel, it is incredible that the British +Government should be so weak as to wait for letters from Lloyd's agent +before opening an inquiry into the deaths of some three hundred of its +subjects and the identity of the dastardly scoundrel who was the cause +of their deaths, who disabled the ship that held them, and then slunk +off, leaving them to the mercy of the midnight sea. That the _Murillo_ +was that vessel, even those who maintain that she cannot be proved +legally guilty do not attempt to deny. It is true, as they say, that +moral certainty is one thing, legal certainty another. But there was +seldom a clearer chain of circumstantial evidence pointing to the +perpetrator of any crime than that which convicted the _Murillo_ of +being the misdemeanant. She was off Dungeness at the hour of the +disaster, and she was in contact with a ship; this the imprisoned master +admitted in his log. But he alleged that the ship could not have been +the _Northfleet_. He said he came into collision with a vessel; that he +stood by her for half an hour; that one of her boats put off with some +persons on board carrying a lantern; that they went round her examining +whether there was anything wrong; and that no call having been made to +him for assistance he steamed away. But there was a discrepancy between +the entry in his log and that in the log of the engineer. The latter, an +Englishman, stated that the engines of the _Murillo_ were backed before +the collision, that she went astern afterwards, and then went on ahead. +The delay altogether was only for a few minutes. No mention of the +half-hour. The engineer had no object in telling a lie. The master of +the _Murillo_ had. No other ship was in collision off Dungeness that +night. Besides, what meant the order to the _Murillo_ to come on at once +to Cadiz if she had been in collision, and not stop at Lisbon, whither +she was bound as port of call, if not to get her into limits where +justice is notoriously blind and halt? Argument is unnecessary and +childish; it was the _Murillo_ which cut down the _Northfleet_. But +Spain will never exact retribution for the destruction of the property +and the sacrifice of the lives of aliens. Cosas de Espana. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + Expansion of Carlism--A Pseudo-Democracy--Historic Land and Water + Marks--An Impudent Stowaway--Spanish Respect for Providence--A + Fatal Signal--Playing with Fire--Across the Bay--Farewell to + Andalusia--British Spain. + + +TOWARDS the close of February, a grave official report was published in +the _Gaceta_ of Madrid, announcing that an engagement had been fought +with the Carlists and a victory scored, _one_ of the enemy having been +killed. We were now in April, some six weeks later, and Carlism still +showed lively signs of existence, notwithstanding the death of that +solitary combatant. The statement of the troops employed against it will +be the best measure of its importance. These consisted of a battalion +and two companies of Engineers, four companies of Foot Artillery, a +battery of Horse and five batteries of Mountain Artillery; eight +squadrons of Cuirassiers, seven of Lancers, four of Hussars, a section +of Mounted Chasseurs (Tiradores), and eighteen battalions of Infantry of +the line, with five of Cazadores, or light infantry. Behind this force +of regulars were the Francos or Free-shooters of Navarre (who were about +as good as their prototypes, the _francs-tireurs_ of France--no better), +some mobilized Volunteers, and the Carabineros, or revenue police. There +were some who imagined that the hosts of Don Carlos might crown the +hills of Vallecas, and present themselves before the gate of Atocha to +the consternation of Madrid, as did those of his predecessor in the +September of 1837. But the Federals of the south did not mind. What did +not touch them, they cared not a jot for. They were of the +pseudo-democracy which wants to live without working, consume without +producing, obtain posts without being trained for them, and arrive at +honours without desert--the selfish and purblind pseudo-democracy of +incapacity and cheek. + +As I had no pecuniary interest in salt, wine, phosphate of soda, hides, +or cork--the chief exports of Cadiz--I left the much-bombarded port on +the _Vinuesa_, one of the boats of the Alcoy line plying to Malaga. My +immediate destination was the Hock, but we went no nearer than +Algeciras, the town on the opposite side of the bay, off which Saumarez +gave such a stern account of the Spanish and French combined on the 12th +of July, 1801. The sea was without a ripple. The bright coasts of two +Continents were in view. On such a day as this the first adventurers +must have crossed from Africa to Europe. Hero might almost have swum +across. Even Mr. Brownsmith of Eastchepe might rig a craft out of an +empty sugar hogshead, set up his walking-stick for mast, tie his +pocket-handkerchief to it for sail, and trust to the waves in +safety--that is, if Mr. Brownsmith of Eastchepe had in him the heart of +Raleigh, not of Bumble. Some men are born to be drivers of tram-cars, +some to be captains of corsairs. The pioneer of navigation must have +been cut out by nature to be a High-Admiral of bold buccaneers. + +We were only five passengers on the steamer, and we amused ourselves +comparing notes. One told of a voyage from Barcelona to Alicante which +he had once undertaken. The first night out they lost a sailor; he was +seized with a fit and died; and then came the poser. When they would +arrive at Alicante and muster the crew for the inspection of the health +officers one would be wanting; suspicions would be aroused that he had +fallen a victim to contagious disease, and they ran the hazard of being +stuck into quarantine unless they could succeed in buying themselves off +with an exorbitant bribe. While they were in a quandary, a white head +popped above a gangway forward and a voice sang out: + +"I'll get you out of the hole for a consideration." + +"Who the deuce are you? Where did you spring from?" cried the skipper. + +"A stowaway,--a flour-barrel. I'll parade as the dead man's substitute +for ten dollars and a square meal." + +In the end they were glad to accept the impudent proposal; the corpse +was flung overboard, and the stowaway entered the port of Alicante an +honest British tar, looking the whole world in the face like +Longfellow's village blacksmith, and jingling ten dollars in his +pocket. + +We passed by Barrosa, where Graham gave the French such a thrashing in +1811, and the 87th Irish Fusiliers earned their glorious surname of the +"Eagle-takers;" and over the waves of Trafalgar where Nelson did his +duty, and was smitten with a bullet in the spine; and passing into the +Straits and rounding the point by Tarifa, stood in for the Bay of +Gibraltar. A spacious swelling spread of live water it is, and safe, +except, as one of my fellow-passengers informed me, for a rock off the +Punta del Carnero, or Mutton Point. The rock is covered when the tide is +high (for there is a tide here), but rears its tortoise-like back over +the surface for some hours at the ebb. The Channel squadron was coming +out of Gib some years before when an ironclad grounded on this rock, but +was got off without more damage than a scraping. As the danger to the +navigation was outside the limits of the fortress, the British +authorities applied to the Spanish for permission to clear away the +obstruction. It was easily to be accomplished. A party of sappers could +set a caisson round it, bore a gallery, insert a charge, and blast the +rock into smithereens with safety and despatch. But the Spaniards would +not consent to such an interference with the designs of Providence; the +poor fishermen on the coast were often dependent for their livelihood on +what they could pick up from wrecks, and if this rock were removed +Nature would be sacrilegiously altered, and the interesting wreckers +deprived of many an honest coin. I tell the tale as it was told to me. I +wonder should it be dedicated to the amphibious corps. + +Another story bearing on the successful revolution inaugurated by Prim +is worth relating, as it deals with an episode of Spanish politics which +is repeated almost every other year with slender variations. The play is +the same; the scene and the _dramatis personae_ are merely shifted. One +of the stereotyped military risings was to be initiated at Algeciras on +the arrival of Prim from England. The intimation that he was at hand was +to be made by the firing of two rockets from the ship which carried him. +On a certain night at the close of August, 1868, two rockets blazed in +the sky, and were noticed by the impatient conspirators at Algeciras, +who flew to arms to cries of "Down with the Queen," and "Live Prim and +Liberty." But no Prim landed. The alarm was premature, the rising a +flash in the pan. What they had taken for the bright herald of the +advent of "El Paladino" was the signal of a Peninsular and Oriental +steamer which had arrived on her passage to Port Said. For the sake of +appearances, a number of unfortunate fools were set up against a wall +and had their brains blown out in tribute to law and order. But the +fruit was ripening. Within little more than a fortnight came the +insurrection of the fleet at Cadiz, upon the appearance in that port of +the popular hero, and before the end of the month Queen Isabella had +fled over the French frontier, never to return to Spain as a sovereign. +Prim's plot was attended with a fortune in excess of his most sanguine +hopes; he entered Madrid in triumph in October, and was created a +Marshal in November. All was joy and enthusiasm, but the hapless tools +of ambition who had helped to prepare the way for him below in Algeciras +were not of the jubilee. + +At first sight the rock looms up large like a frowning inhospitable +islet, the stretch of the Neutral Ground being so low that one cannot +detect it above the sea-level until almost right upon it. We left the +_Vinuesa_ and entered a boat with a couple of sturdy rowers, who offered +to pull us across the Bay for five dollars. As I dipped a hand in the +brine one of them raised a cry of "Take care!" there were "mala pesca" +there. Mr. Shark, who is an ugly customer, had been cruising in the +neighbourhood, and had taken a morsel out of an American swimmer a +little time before. There were three masts protruding over the water at +one spot, the relics of some gallant ship, and index to one of those +godsends which the Spanish Government is solicitous to guarantee to the +distressed and deserving local fishermen. What a pity it was not the +_Murillo_! That would have been poetic retribution. + +No matter: with all thy faults I like thee, Spain, and especially that +brown dusty province of Andalusia, with its oranges and pomegranates; +its dancing fountains splashed with sunshine; its winsome damozels with +such lisping languors of voice; its philosophic waiters upon the morrow, +happy in a cigarette, a melon and a guitar; its muleteers crooning +snatches of lazy song; its peasants with hair tied in beribboned +pigtail; its tawny boys in Manola colours; aye, and its artistic +beggars. + +"Ah! now you see the Neutral Ground; that village to the left is Lineas, +where you can get a glass of Manzanilla cheap," exclaimed a companion. + +I do not set exceeding store by your pale thin Manzanilla, nor do I care +to load my mouth with the flavour of a drug store. + +"There are the sheds we put up the time Prim was expected; they are on +the Neutral Ground, ha, ha! where the soil is supposed to be inviolate; +but we have forgotten to take them down since. We were too many for +them." + +And now we are by the landing-stairs, and the Customs' officer demands +our passport in English. We answer him cheerily that we need none, and +to his smiling welcome we step on the soil of British Spain; but it +would be unpardonable to begin describing it at the tail of a chapter. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + Gabriel Tar--A Hard Nut to Crack--In the Cemetery--An Old Tipperary + Soldier--Marks of the Broad Arrow--The "Scorpions"--The + Jaunting-Cars--Amusements on the Bock--Mrs. Damages' Complaint--The + Bay, the Alameda, and Tarifa--How to Learn Spanish--Types of the + British Officer--The Wily Ben Solomon--A Word for the + Subaltern--Sunset Gun--The Sameness of Sutlersville. + + +WHERE I went to school, we had a droll lad, whose humour developed +itself in mispronunciation. In my nonage I considered that unique. Now I +know it is a rather common order of quaintness. Hugh used to call Sierra +Leone, "Sarah Alone;" Cambodia, "Gamboge;" Stromboli, "Storm-boiler;" +and Gibraltar, "Gabriel Tar." How we used to wrinkle with laughter at +his sallies, launched with an artistically unconscious air, until the +swooping cane came swishing down on our backs! And here I was in Gabriel +Tar. I vow the first inclination I felt was to write to Hugh with the +date engraved on the note-paper, and indeed so I should have done, but +that I had not seen him for nigh twenty years, and when last I heard of +him he was married, and had learned to be serious and to speak with +precision. The fun had been driven out of him by responsibility. +Propriety had come with prosperity. + +Call it by what name you will, Gabriel Tar, or Gibraltar, that +infinitesimal scrap of territory over which the Union Jack floats, is +supremely unpalatable and insolently insulting to the Spaniard. It is a +bitter pill to swallow, an adamantine nut to crack. I suppose he is +welcome to take it--when he can; but he knows better than to try. It is +the gate of the Mediterranean. Logically, it is an injustice that a +stranger should sit in the porter's lodge and swing the key at his +girdle; but it is as well that the porter is one who is too surly to +barter his trust for gold. So Gabriel Tar will remain intact, until the +porter grows feeble or falls asleep. + +British Spain, or "the Rock," or Gib, as it is indifferently termed, or +Sutlersville, as I prefer to name it, can be converted into an island at +the will of its defenders. The sandy spit of Neutral Ground at one side +of which Tommy Atkins, fresh-faced, does his sentry-go in brick-red +tunic and white pith-helmet, and at the other side of which swarthy +Sancho Panza y Toro, in projecting cap and long blue coat, fondles a +rifle in the bend of his arm, can readily be flooded; and the bare, +sheer, lofty north front, with scores of cannon of the deadliest modern +pattern lying in wait behind the irregular embrasures that grimly pit +its surface, hardly invites attack. It frowns a calm but determined +defiance; and even the Cid himself might be excused if he turned on his +heel and puffed a meditative cigarette after he had surveyed it. + +British Spain is small, being but one and seven-eighth square miles +English in area; but it is mighty strong. The population, comprising the +garrison, is less than fifteen thousand; but behind that slender cipher +of souls are the millions of the broadest and biggest of empires. I do +not know what the population of the cemetery is, but it receives rapid +and numerous accessions at each periodical outbreak of cholera. I paid a +visit to it--I have a fondness for sauntering in God's acre--and arrived +in time to witness a funeral. When the coffin was laid in the grave, a +young man, probably the husband of the deceased, threw himself prone on +the turf beside the open burial-trench, and burst into such a passionate +tempest of heart-rending sobs and moans and wailings, that I had to move +away. These Southerners are more demonstrative in their grief than the +men of the North. I question if their sorrows spring from deeper depths, +or are so lasting. The caretaker of the cemetery, an elderly Tipperary +soldier, with a short _dudheen_ in his mouth, was seated smoking on a +head-stone by a goat-willow. We got into conversation. + +"There were worse places than Gib--singing-birds were raysonable here, +and some of them had rayl beautiful plumage." + +My countryman, like the Duke of Argyll, had a weakness for ornithology. + +"That spread of land beyant was where the races were held, and small-arm +parties from the fleet sometimes kem ashore and practised there. They +used to play cricket there, too. The symmetry wasn't a gay place, but +there were worse. There were some beautiful tombs--now _there_ was a +parable ov wan; 'twas put up by their frinds to some officers who were +dhrownded while they were crossing a flooded sthrame on their way back +from a shooting excursion. The car-drivers, who were dhrownded wid them, +had no monument. 'Twas a quare world; a poor man had the chance of dying +wid a rich man, but was not to be berrid in his company. Well, he +supposed it was for the best," and here he hammered the heel-tap out of +his pipe on the side of his shoe; "when the last bugle sounded a +field-officer would feel uncomfortable like if he had to be looking for +his bones in the same plot wid a lance-corporal." + +Truly, a queer world. Death with impartial summons knocks at the cabin +of the poor and the palace of the wealthy; but in the undertaker's +interest the equality of the grave must not be conceded. The plebeian +who commits _felo de se_ is served properly if he is hidden at the +cross-roads by night and a stake driven through his body. The lunatic +King who drowns himself, and drags his doctor to the same fate--who is a +suicide duplicated with the suspicion of murder--is embalmed and laid to +rest in consecrated ground amid incense and music, lights and flowers, +the tolling of bells, and the chanting of dirges. + +The funeral was over; they were just finishing the _De Profundis_. My +countryman had to quit me. "_Oyeh!_ that fellow who was making such a +lamentation might be married agin in a twelvemonth. The army plan was +the best; after the 'Dead March' in _Saul_ came 'Tow-row-row.'--another +so'jer was to be had for a shilling. He did not drink; he thanked me all +the same--had taken the pledge from Father Mathew whin he was a boy, and +meant to stick by it; but he would accept the price of a singing-bird he +had set his mind upon, since it was pressed upon him." + +Gibraltar is but a huge garrison. In the moat by the gate, as I +re-entered, a big drummer and a tiny mannikin-soldier with cymbals were +practising how to lead off a marching-past tune. The "Fortune of War" +tavern elbows "Horse-Barrack Lane;" a print of "The Siege of Kars" is +side by side in a shop-window with Dr. Bennett's "Songs for Soldiers." +The Plazas and Calles of the mainland of Spain have been parted with. +The names of streets, hostelries, and stores are English. Instead of +tiendas and almacenes and fondas, you have fancy repositories, +regimental shoe-shops, and porter-houses. There, for example, is the +celebrated "Cock and Bottle," and farther on "The Calfs Head Hotel." If +you traverse Cathedral Square, no larger than an ordinary-sized +skittle-alley, you arrive by Sunnyside Steps to the Europa Pass. Notices +are posted by the roadside cautioning against plucking flowers or +treading on the beds under pain of prosecution. But the bazaar bewilders +you with its alien figures, its confusion of tongues, and its eccentric +contrasts of dress. In five minutes you meet Spanish officers; nuns in +broad-leaved white bonnets; a bearded sergeant nursing a baby; +bare-legged, sun-burnished Moors; pink-and-white cheeked ladies'-maids +from Kent; local mashers in such outrageously garish tweeds; stiff +brass-buttoned turnkeys; Jews in skull-cap and Moslems in fez; and while +you are lost in admiration of a burly negro, turbaned and in grass-green +robe, with face black and shiny as a newly-polished stove, you are +hustled by a sailor on cordial terms with himself who is vigorously +attempting to whistle "Garry Owen." + +But above and before all, the sights and sounds are military. Sappers +and linesmen and artillerists pullulate at every corner; fatigue-parties +are confronted at every turn; the bayonet of the sentinel flashes in +every angle of the fortress from the minute the sun, bursting into +instantaneous radiance from behind the great barrier of craggy hill, +lights up the town and bastions and moles, until the boom of the +sunset-gun gives signal for the gates to be closed. Every tavern looks +like a canteen; the gossip is of things martial; the music is that of +the reveille or tattoo--the blare of brass, the rub-a-dub of parchment, +or the shrill sound-revel of Highland pipes (for there is usually a +Scotch regiment here). The ladies one meets all have husbands, or +fathers, or uncles in the Service; even the children--those of English +parents well understood--keep step as they walk, and the boys amongst +them compliment any well-dressed stranger with a home face by rendering +him the regulation salute. This is highly gratifying to the civilian +sojourning in the place; for he insensibly succumbs to the _genius +loci_, squares his shoulders, expands his chest, and feels that if he is +not an officer he ought to be one. + +Except the enterprising gentry who devote themselves to cheating the +Spanish excise by smuggling cigars and English goods across the border, +the Scorpions live by and on the garrison, and therefore do I name their +habitat Sutlersville. "Scorpion," I should add, for the benefit of the +uninitiated, is the _sobriquet_ conferred by Tommy Atkins on the natives +of the Rock, as that of "Smiches" is merrily applied by him to the +Maltese, and of "Yamplants" to the denizens of St. Helena. There is a +tolerable infusion of English blood among the Scorpions, but it is +hardly of the healthiest or most respectable. + +Gib is familiar to thousands of Englishmen, but it must be unfamiliar to +many thousands more. This is my excuse for exhuming some notes of my +stay there. Don't be afraid, I am not going to pester you with +guide-book erudition. Let others take you to the galleries and caves, +lead you up the ascent to the Moorish tower, inform you that the one +spot in Europe where there is an indigenous colony of monkeys (the +patriarch of which is styled the "town major") is here, and enlighten +you as to the interesting fact that this is the only locality out of +Ireland where the Irish jaunting-car is to be objurgated. Mine be a +humbler task. + +Society in Gib is select, but limited. It is uniform, like the clothes +of the influential portion of the inhabitants. Gib is the wrong place to +bring out a young lady, though Major Dalrymple's daughters, immortalized +in Lever's novel, could not well have found a better hunting-ground. But +then Major Dalrymple's daughters were regular garrison hacks--so the +irreverent subs of the Rovers used to call them--and never stood a +chance beside the daughters of the county families. There are racing and +chasing at the station, and theatricals and balls. I arrived at the +wrong season. The three days' local racing, for horses of every breed +but English, was over, and most of the men were going to Cadiz by +special boat next day, _en route_ for the Jerez races, which are the +best--indeed, I might almost say the solitary--meeting in Spain. + +"There are only two things in this land worth talking about," said an +English merchant to me at Cadiz; "the steamers of Lopez and the races of +Jerez." + +The hunting (thanks to brave old Admiral Fleming for having started that +diversion) was over too. The meets have to come off, naturally, outside +the frontier of British Spain. The sport is pretty good--one cannot +quite expect the Melton country, of course--the riding hard, and the +horses invariably Spanish; no English horses would do, for no English +horse would be equal to climbing up a perpendicular bank with sixteen +stone on his back, and that is a feat the native steeds, bestridden by +British warriors in pink who follow the Calpe pack, have sometimes to +accomplish. There is a Spanish lyrical and theatrical troop in the town; +but it is Holy Week, and lyricals and theatricals are under taboo. +Occasionally charity concerts are given by amateurs, and plays are even +performed in Lent Champagne, of the Fizzers, has won a reputation by his +success on the boards when he dons the habiliments of lovely woman +beyond a certain age. But, as I told you before, I arrived at the wrong +season. There are no balls at the Convent, which is the Governor's +residence; and, touching these balls, I have a grievance to ventilate, +at the request of Mrs. Quartermaster Damages. She specially imported +frilled petticoats from England to display in the mazy dance, and she +assured me they were turning sere and yellow in her boxes. She never +gets a chance of bringing them out except once in the twelvemonth, when +she is asked to the "Quartermasters' Ball." But there is a reason for +everything, and Mrs. Quartermaster Damages is fat and forty, and not +fair, and--tell it not out of mess--they say she has a tongue. + +At this particular time, you perceive, this fortified fragment of the +empire was dull; but usually it is gay, and the officer quartered there +has always an excellent opportunity of learning his trade and acquiring +skill in the gentlemanly game of billiards. He can make maps and surveys +of the neutral ground, and watch the guard mounting on the Alameda, or +read the account of the siege in Drinkwater's days; and when he tires of +the green cloth and its distractions, and of his own noble profession, +he can throw a sail to the breeze in the unequalled Bay, or take a +flying trip to Tarifa to sketch the beautiful from the living model, or +go to Ceuta to see the Spanish galley-slaves and disciplinary regiments, +forgetful of our own chain-gangs; or steam across to Tangier to riot in +Nature and a day's pig-sticking. + +The Bay, the Alameda, and Tarifa--these are the three delights of +Gibraltar. + +You have heard of the Bay of Naples, and the Bay of Dublin, which equals +it in Paddy Murphy's estimation. I know both; and Gibraltar, the +little-spoken-of, leaves them nowhere. The sky, and the undulating +mirror below that reflects it, are such a blue; the rocks are such an +ashen-grey; the Spanish sierras such a leonine brown, with summits +wrapped in clouds like rolling smoke; and the sun goes down to his bath +in the west 'mid such a vaporous glow of yellowing purple and rosy gold! + +The Alameda is a bower of Venus cinctured by Mars. Here is a gravelled +expanse bounded by hill and sea, with cosy benches under the shade of +palmitos--the civilization of the West in alliance with the rich +vegetation of the East. Sometimes, in the morning, five hundred men or +more--garrison artillery, engineers, and infantry--muster there, +previous to marching to their posts; there is a banging of drums, a +blowing of bugles, a bobbing vision of cocked-hats, and a roar of hoarse +words of command--all the pomp and pride and circumstance of glorious +war before the fighting begins. Sometimes, in the evening, a band plays, +and the Alameda is the resort of fashion and of nursery-maids. + +Tarifa, shining in the sunset across the water, is a tempting morsel for +the landscape-painter, and the dwellers in Tarifa are the best teachers +of Spanish. A British subaltern bent on improving his mind could +encounter an infinitely better preceptor there than "Jingling Johnny," +the self-appointed professor to the garrison, who hires himself on +Monday, makes you a present of a guitar-tutor on Tuesday, and asks you +to favour him with six months' payment in advance on Wednesday. To be +sure, the Spanish those Tarifans speak is slightly Arabified; but their +tones of voice are persuasive, and their methods of teaching agreeable. +The professor taken by the British subaltern is invariably a female, and +the females of Tarifa are not the ugliest in the world. They still +retain many customs peculiar to their Moorish ancestors. They wear a +manta, not a mantilla--a sort of large-hooded mantle, with which they +hide the light of their countenance, except an eye--but that is a +piercer, ye gods I and they keep it open for business. When a stranger +passes, especially if he looks like a sucking lieutenant from the +fortress beyond, the manta falls, disclosing the soft loveliness +beneath, and the wearer affects a pretty confusion, and hastens with +judicious slowness to re-adjust its folds. The British subaltern reels +to his quarters seriously wounded, and may be seen the following +morning, with his hair blown back, spouting poetry to the zephyrs on +Europa Point. Oh no!--that only occurs in romances; but he may be seen +drinking brandy-and-soda moderately in the Club-House. + +Poor British subaltern! How Sutlersville does exploit him! He is a +sheep, and bears his fleecing without a kick. Watch those lazy, +lounging, able-bodied, smoking, and salivating loons who prop up every +street-corner, and monopolize the narrow pathways--these all live by +him; they eat up his substance, and fatten thereupon. These are the +touting and speculating sons of the Rock, the veritable Scorpions, who +are ever ready to find the "cap'n" a dog or a horse or a boat, or +something not so harmless, to help him on the road to ruin, and whisper +in his ear what a fine fellow he is--"As ver fine a fellow--real +gemman--as Lord Tomnoddy, who give me such a many dollars when he go +away." The first word these loons pronounce after coming into the world +must be _baksheesh_. They are born with beggary in their mouths, and the +British subaltern acts as if he were born to be their victim. There he +is below, of every type, lolling outside the hotel-door that looks on +that Commercial Square which is so thorough a barrack-square, with its +romping children, its dogs, its dust, its guard-house with chatting +soldiers on a form in front, and the important sentinel pacing to and +fro, regular and rigid as a pendulum, keeping vigilant watch and ward +over nothing in particular. We have a rare company to-day; besides the +engineers and bombardiers, and the linesmen of the 24th, 31st, 71st, and +81st, the four infantry regiments on the station, we have men on leave +from Malta. They came up to the races, and are waiting for the P. and O. +steamer to take them back. That fat little customer is your sporting +sub. I only wonder he is not in cords, tops, and spurs. What a hearty +voice he talks in! He asks for the _Field_ as if he were giving a +view-halloo. Then there is the moist-eyed, mottle-cheeked, puffy, +convivial sub, who is knowing on the condition of ale, and is too +friendly with Saccone's sherry. The convivial sub, I am happy to say, is +dying out. Then there is the prig, who is "going in" for his profession. +I call him a prig, because when people are going in for anything they +should have the good sense not to blow about it. To hear Mr. Shells and +his prattle about Hamley and Brialmont and Jomini, _kriegspiel_ and the +new drill, you would imagine he was bound to put the extinguisher on +Marlborough, Wellington, Wolseley, and the rest of them; and yet the +chances are, if you meet him twenty years hence, he will be a captain on +the recruiting service, with no forces to marshal but six growing +children. Then there is the sentimental sub, the perfect ladies' man, +who plays croquet and the flute, pleads guilty to having cultivated the +Nine, and affects a simpering pooh-pooh when he is impeached with having +inspired that wicked but so witty bit of scandal in the local paper. By +singularity of pairing, his fast friend is the muscular sub, who walks +against time, and can write his initials with a hundredweight hanging +from his index-finger. + +Happy dogs in the heyday of life, all of them; how I envy them their +buoyant spirits, their rollicking enjoyment of to-day, and their +contempt for the morrow! But the morrow will come nevertheless, and +with it Black Care will come often. Gib is a haunt of the Hebrews; they +or their myrmidons beset the subaltern at genial hours, after luncheon +or after mess, pester him with vamped-up knick-knacks for sale, appeal +to him to patronize a poor man by buying articles he does not and never +by any means can want--"pay me when you likes, Cap'n, one yearsh, two +yearsh." The "cap'n," who may have left Sandhurst but six months, may be +weakly good-natured, and ignore the fact that his income is not elastic; +some day that he thinks of taking a run to England Ben Solomon, who +seems to be able to read the books in the Adjutant-General's Office +through the walls, pounces upon him with his little bill, and he is +arrested if he cannot satisfy his Jewish benefactor. Loans are advanced +at a high rate "per shent" by the harpies, and enable him to stave off +the temporary embarrassment; the "cap'n" is happy for the moment, but +the reckoning is only deferred that it may grow. The arrival of Black +Care is adjourned, not averted. The plain truth of it is, Gibraltar is a +den of thieves, and has been the burial-pit of many a promising young +fellow's hopes. There are two tariffs for everything--one for natives, +the other for the British subaltern and the British tourist; and the +British subaltern and the British tourist are foolish enough to submit +to the extortion in most cases. With some half-dozen honourable +exceptions, the traders are what is popularly known as "Jews" in their +mode of dealing. They cozen on principle, sell articles that will not +last, and charge preposterous prices for them; they impose upon the +young officer's softness or delicate gentlemanly feeling, and consider +themselves smart for so doing. In this manner Gibraltar, with all its +discomforts, is dearer than the most expensive and luxurious quarter in +the British Isles. + +But we have other specimens of the genus officer in the lounging +slaughterers by profession, who are so busy killing time. The lean +bronzed aristocratic major, whose temper long years in India have not +soured; the squat pursy paymaster (why are paymasters so fearfully +inclined to fat?); the raw-boned young surgeon with the Aberdeen accent; +"the ranker," erect and grizzled, and looking ever so little not quite +at his ease, you know, for the languid lad with fawn-coloured moustache +straddling on the chair beside him is an Honourable; the jovial portly +Yorkshireman, who is in the Highland Light Infantry, naturally; and the +lively loud-voiced Irishman, laughing consumedly at his own jokes--all +are here, conversing, smoking, mildly chaffing each other, and +exchanging "tips" as to the next Derby. They make a book in a quiet way, +and occasionally invest in a dozen tickets in a Spanish lottery. What +will you? One cannot perpetually play shop, and the British officer has +a rooted objection to it, although he does his duty like a man when the +tug of war arises. Better that he should join in a regimental +sweepstakes, or lose what he can afford to lose to a comrade, than give +way to the blues. He does not gamble or curse, like his Spanish +_confrere_; his potations are not deep, nor is he quick to quarrel. Then +let him race on the Neutral Ground; let him hunt with the Calpe pack; +and let him back his fancy for the big event at Epsom. Those are his +chief excitements at Gib, and help to give a fillip to life in that +circumscribed microcosm, pending the anxiously expected morn when the +route will come, or, mayhap, the call to active service, in one of those +petty wars which are constantly breaking the monotony of this so-called +pacific reign. + +"Guard, turn out!" cries the Highland Light Infantry sentinel under my +window, and the smart soldier laddies fall in for the inspection of the +officer of the day. What a thoroughly military town it is! By-and-by the +evening gun booms from the heights above, where Sergeant Munro, taking +time from his sun-dial and the town major, notifies the official sunset. +Bang go the gates. We are imprisoned. Anon the streets are traversed by +patrols in Indian file to warn loiterers to return to barracks, the +pipers of the 71st skirl a few wild tunes on Commercial Square, the +buglers sound the last post, the second gun-fire is heard, and a hush +falls over the town, broken only by the challenges of sentries or their +regular echoing footfalls on their weary beats. The thunder of artillery +wakes you in the morning anew, and if you venture out for a walk before +breakfast you thread your way through waggons of the army train or +fatigue-parties in white jackets. You stumble across cannon and +symmetric pyramids of shot where you least expect them; the line of +sea-wall is intersected by figures in brick-red tunic, moving back and +forward on ledges of masonry; the morning air is alive with drum-beats +and bugle and trumpet-calls; everything is of the barrack most +barrack-like; the broad arrow is indented in large deep character on the +Rock. It is impossible to shake off the Ordnance atmosphere. The Irish +jaunting-cars are all driven by the sons of soldiers' wives; the +clergy-men are all military chaplains; those goats are going up to be +milked for the major's delicate daughter; that lady practising horse +exercise in a ring in her garden is wife to Pillicoddy of the Control +Department, and is merely correcting the neglected education of her +youth; the very monkeys--diminishing sadly, it grieves me to say--recall +associations of the mess-room, for you never fail to hear of that +terrible sportsman, "one of Cardwell's gents," who thought it excellent +fun to shoot one some time ago. Luckily, the rules of the service did +not permit him to be tried by court-martial, or the wretched boy might +have been ordered out for instant execution, so great was the +indignation. But if he was not shot he was roasted as fearfully as ever +St. Laurence was; he was reminded a thousand times if once that +fratricide is a fearful crime, and if ever Nemesis visits his pillow it +will be in the shape of a monkey without a tail. + +One wearies of the same scenes of beauty, and would fain barter the Cork +Woods for the chestnuts in Bushy Park; the bright Bay and the watchet +sky pall on the senses, and a dull river and drab clouds would be +welcomed for change. The day rises when the conversation of the same +set, the stories repeated as often as that famous one of grouse in the +gun-room, and the stale jokes anent the Sheeref of Wazan and the rival +innkeepers of Tangier, black Martin and "Lord James," cloy like treacle; +the fiction palmed upon the latest novice that he must go and have a few +shots at the monkeys, if he wishes to curry favour at headquarters, +misses fire; the calls of the P. and O. steamers, and the thought that +their passengers within a week either have seen, or will see, the +little village works its effect; even bull-fighting is adjudged a bore, +and one sighs for Regent Street and the "Rag and Famish," flaxen +ringlets, and roast beeL A twelvemonth might pass pleasantly on the +Rock; but after that the "damnable iteration" of existence must jar on +the nerves like the note of a cuckoo. Still, as my philosopher of the +cemetery remarked, there are worse places--far worse, Assouan and Aden, +for example; so let not the gallant gentleman repine whom Fate has +assigned to a round of duty in Sutlersville. For Tommy Atkins of the +rank and file, it is wearisome when he is young; he should not be asked +to stay there longer than a twelvemonth while he is at the age which +yearns for novelty, and during that twelvemonth he should be drilled as +at the depot. For the old soldier it is a good station, and should be +made a haven of rest. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + From Pillar to Pillar--Historic Souvenirs--Off to Africa--The + Sweetly Pretty Albert--Gibraltar by Moonlight--The + Chain-Gang--Across the Strait--A Difficult Landing--Albert is + Hurt--"Fat Mahomet"--The Calendar of the Centuries Put + Back--Tangier: the People, the Streets, the Bazaar--Our Hotel--A + Coloured Gentleman--Seeing the Sights--Local Memoranda--Jewish + Disabilities--Peep at a Photographic Album--The Writer's Notions on + Harem Life. + + +I WAS gradually getting into the mood of Pistol, and cried a foutra for +the world of business and worldlings base. My soul was longing for +"Africa and golden joys." Here I was at the elbow, so to speak, of the +mysterious Continent, where the geographers set down elephants for want +of towns. Why should I not visit it? I might never have such a chance +again. I stood in the shadow of one Pillar of Hercules. Why not make +pilgrimage to the other? Having notched Calpe on my staff, I resolved to +add Abyla to the record. + +I was the more inclined to this, as I had recollection that Tangier had +been part of the British dominions for one-and-twenty years. In 1662 +Catharine of Braganza, the "olivader-complexioned queen of low stature, +but prettily shaped," whose teeth wronged her mouth by sticking a little +too far out, brought it as portion of her dowry to Charles II. The 2nd, +or Queen's Own Regiment, was raised to garrison the post, and sported +its sea-green facings, the favourite colour of her Majesty, for long in +the teeth of the threatening Moors. The 1st Dragoons still bear the +nickname of "the Tangier Horse," and were originally formed from some +troops of cuirassiers who assisted in the defence of the African +stronghold for seventeen years; and the 1st Foot Regiment owes its title +of "Royal" to the distinction it gained by capturing a flag from the +Moors in 1680. That was the year when old John Evelyn noted in his diary +that Lord Ossorie was deeply touched at having been appointed Governor +and General of the Forces, "to regaine the losses we had lately +sustain'd from the Moors, when Inchqueene was Governor." His lordship +relished the commission so little--indeed, it was a forlorn errand--that +he took a malignant fever after a supper at Fishmongers' Hall, went +home, and died. In 1683 the Merry Monarch caused the works of Tangier to +be blown up, and abandoned the place, declaring it was not worth the +cost of keeping. The Merry Monarch was not prescient. A century +afterwards Gibraltar was indebted for a large proportion of its +supplies, during the great siege, to the dismantled and deserted +British-African fortress. For many reasons Tangier was not to be missed. + +By a happy coincidence a party of three in the Club-House Hotel--a +retired army captain, his wife, and a lady companion--were anxious to +take a trip to Africa. We agreed to go together, and had scarcely made +up our minds, when another retired captain, who habitually resided in +Tangier, gratified us by the information that he was returning there, +and would be happy to give us every assistance in his power. Retired +Captain No. 1 was a jolly fellow, fond of good living and not +overburdened with aestheticism--a capital specimen of a hearty +Yorkshireman. He looked after the provand. His wife, portly and short of +temper, was as good-natured as he. She insisted on discharging the +bills. The lady-companion was thin, accomplished, and melancholy. She +kept us in sentiment. Retired Captain No. 2 was a fellow-countryman of +mine, bright-brained and waggish. He was the walking guide-book, with +philosophy and friendship combined. I was nigh forgetting one, and not +by any means the least important, member of the party--Albert. Mrs. +Captain introduced him to me as a sweetly pretty creature. At her +request I looked after him. Tastes vary as to what constitutes beauty, +but I candidly think a broad thick head, crop ears, a flattish nose, and +heavy jowls could not be called sweetly pretty without straining a +point; and all these Albert possessed. He was a bull-dog (I believe his +real name was Bill, and that he had been brought up in Whitechapel). As +a bull-dog he had excellent points, and might be esteemed a model of +symmetry and breeding by the fancy, or even pronounced a beauty and +exquisitely proportioned by connoisseurs; but sweetly pretty--never! I +could not stomach that, especially when Albert growled and laid bare his +ruthless set of sound white teeth. + +Before leaving Gibraltar I had two novel sensations, nocturnal and +matutinal. The first was a view of the Bay by moonlight, the white +crescent shining clearly down on a portion of the inner waters brinded +by shipping, and on the outer spread of sleepy, cadenced wavelets +rippling phosphorescently under the pallid rays. By the Mole were +visible the outlines of barques, steamers, coal-brigs, and xebecs; away +to the left were the _Catapult_ and a few of her mosquito companions; +and far out rode at anchor a stately frigate of the United States' +fleet. The twinkling lamps of the city afloat sending out reddish lines, +and the fuller, clearer, luminous pencillings of the gas-lamps of the +city ashore, made a not ungrateful contrast to the quivering chart of +poetic moonbeams. Bending over their edge were the deep shadows of the +massive Rock; and bounding them, at the other side, the barren +foot-hills of Algeciras mellowed into a phantom softness by distance and +the night. + +Next morning, as I strolled by the sea-wall towards the Ragged Staff +Battery, I saw a sight that took away my appetite for breakfast. Pacing +slowly to their work to the music of clanking chains was a column of +wretched convicts.[A] What haggard faces, with low foreheads, sunken +eyes, and dogged moody expression or utter blankness of expression! +Purely animal the most of that legion of despair and desperation looked, +and sallow and sickly of complexion. They were a blot on the fresh +sunshine. How hideous their coarse garb of pied jackets branded with the +broad arrow, their knickerbockers and clumsy shoes! Wistfully they moved +along, hardly daring to glance at me, through fear of the turnkeys with +loaded rifles marching at their sides. I almost felt that, if I had the +power, I would demand their release, as did the Knight of La Mancha that +of the criminals on their way to the galleys, although they might have +been as ungrateful as Gines de Passamonte; but those hang-dog +countenances banished impulses of chivalry. + +The little steamer, the _Spahi_, which conveyed us across the Strait, +was seaworthy for all her cranky appearance, and made the passage of +thirty-two miles quickly and comfortably for all her roughness of +accommodation. She was a cargo-boat, but her skipper was English, and +did his best to make the ladies feel at home. Besides, Captain No. 1 had +brought a select basket of provisions and a case of dry, undoctored +champagne. One of our first experiences as we cleared Algeciras, with +turrets like our martello-towers sentinelling the hills, and the +three-masted wreck--"Been twenty-one days there," said the skipper, "and +not an effort has been made to raise it yet, and not even a warning +light is hung over it at night"--was to sight a bottle-nosed whale +puffing and spewing its predatory course. + +"What are those ruins upon the Spanish shore for?" asked the +accomplished lady. + +When she was informed that they were the beacons raised in the days of +old, when the Moorish corsairs haunted that coast, and that the moment +the pirate sail was descried in the offing (I hope this is correctly +nautical) the warning fire blazed by night, or the warning plume of +smoke went up by day, to summon Spain's chivalry to the rescue, she was +enchanted, and recited a passage from Macaulay's "Armada." + +We made the transit in a little over three hours, and, rounding the +Punta de Malabata, cut into the Bay of Tangier, and eased off steam at +some distance from the Atlantic-washed shore. There is no pier, but a +swell and discoloration, projecting in straight line seawards, marks +where a mole had once stood. That was a piece of British handiwork; but +the Moor, who is no more tormented by the demon of progress than the +Turk, had literally let it slide, until it sank under the waters. + +The Sultana of Moorish cities Tangier is sometimes called, and truly she +does wear a regal, sultana-like air as seen from afar, cushioned in +state on the hillside, her white flat roofs rising one above another +like the steps of a marble staircase, the tall minarets of the mosques +piercing the air, and the multitudinous many-coloured flags of all +nations fluttering above the various consulates. But in this, as in so +many other instances, it is distance which lends enchantment to the +view. + +We went as near to the shore as we could in small boats, and when we +grounded, a fellowship of clamouring, unkempt, half-naked Barbary Jews, +skull-capped, with their shirts tied at their waists and short cotton +drawers, rushed forward to meet us, and carry us pickaback to dry land. +The ladies were borne in chairs, slung over the shoulders of two of +these amphibious porters, or on an improvised seat made by their linked +hands, but to preserve their equilibrium the dear creatures had to clasp +their arms tightly round the necks of the natives. This would not look +well in a picture, above all if the lady were a professional beauty. But +there was nothing wrong in it, any more than in Amaryllis clinging to +the embrace of Strephon in the whirling of a waltz. Custom reconciles to +everything. On stepping into the small boat I had my first difficulty +with Albert. I trod on his tail. The dog looked reproachfully, but did +not moan. His mistress scowled, and warned me to take care what I was +about for an awkward fool. Her husband, with a pained look on his face, +mutely apologized for her, and I humbly excused myself and vowed +amendment. I am not revengeful, but I did enjoy it when one of the +porters, tottering under the weight of the fat lady, made a false step +and nearly gave her a sousing. I clambered on my particular Berber's +back, dear Albert in my arms, and we splashed merrily along; but Captain +No. 1, who turned the scales at seventeen stone two pounds, had not so +uneventful a landing. Twice his bearer halted, and the warrior, +abandoning himself to his fate, swore he would make the Berber's nose +probe the sand if he stumbled. + +As I was discharged on the beach, I was confronted by a majestic Moor. +His grave brown face was fringed with a closely-trimmed jet-black beard, +and his upper lip was shaded with a jet-black moustache. He wore a white +turban and a wide-sleeved ample garment of snowy white, flowing in +graceful folds below his knees; and on his feet were loose yellow +slippers, peaked and turned up at the toes. This was Mahomet Lamarty, +better known as "Fat Mahomet," who had acted as interpreter to the +British troops in the Crimea, and who, at this period, was making an +income by supplying subalterns from Gib with masquerade suits to take +home and horses to ride. Mahomet in his sphere was a great man. He was +none of your loquacious _valets de place_, no courier of the +Transcendental school. He had made the pilgrimage to Mecca and was a +Hadji; he was a chieftain of a tribe in the vicinity, and had fought in +the war against the Spanish infidels; he could borrow his purest and +finest Arab from the Kadi; he was free to the sacred garden of the +Shereef, or Pope-Sultan, one of the descendants of the Prophet, Allah be +praised! + +Mahomet, who was known to both the Captains, passed our small +impedimenta through the custom-house--there is an orthodox custom-house, +though there is no proper accommodation for shipping--and we trailed at +his heels up the close, crowded, rough alleys which did duty as streets. +It would be hard to imagine a more thorough-going change than our scurry +across the waves had effected. We were in another world completely. We +had been transported as on the carpet of the magician. It was as if the +calendar had been put back for centuries, and the half-forgotten +personages of the "Thousand-and-One Nights" were revivified and had +their being around us. + +Tangier is a walled and fortified town; but Vauban had no hand in the +fortifications, and it is my private opinion the walls would go down +before a peremptory horn-blast quicker than those of Jericho. It swarms +with a motley population much addicted to differences in shades of +complexion. The Tangerines exhaust the primitive colours and most of the +others in their features. There are lime-white Tangerines, copper and +canary-countenanced Tangerines, olive and beetroot-hued Tangerines, +Tangerines of the tint of the bottom of pots, Tangerines of every--no, I +beg to recall that, there are no well-defined blue or green Tangerines; +at least, none that came under my ken. The town is as old as the hills +and courageously uncivilized. There is no gasholder, no railway-station, +no theatre, no cab-stand, no daily paper, and no drainage board to go +into controversy over. It is unconsciously backward, near as it is to +Europe--a rifle-shot off the track of ships plying from the West to the +ports of the Mediterranean. It preserves its Eastern aroma with a fine +Moslem conservatism. Its ramparts of crumbling masonry are ornamented +with ancient cannon useless for offence, useless for defence. There is +said to be a saluting-battery; but the legend runs that the gunners +require a week's clear notice before firing a salute.[B] There is no +locomotion save in boxes and on the backs of quadrupeds; and quadrupeds +of the inferior order are usually, when overtaken by death, thrown in +the streets to decompose. But if the irregularity of the town would +galvanize the late Monsieur Haussmann in his grave, its situation would +satisfy the most exacting Yankee engineer. It is huddled in a sheltered +nest on the fringe of a land of milk and honey; it has the advantage of +a spread of level beach, and rejoices in the balmiest of climes. + +The streets are so narrow that you could light a cigar from your +neighbour's window on the opposite side; but there is no window, neither +at this side nor the other. A hole with a grating is the only window +that is visible. Moors are jealous, and to be able to appreciate their +household comforts you must first succeed in turning their houses inside +out. Those who have dived into the recesses say the fruit is as savoury +as the husk is repulsive. The windowless houses with their backs +grudgingly turned to the thoroughfares are low for the most part, and +the thoroughfares are--oh! so crooked--zigzag, up and down, staggering +in a drunken way over hard cobble-stones and leading nowhere. There are +mosques and stores entered by horse-shoe arches, a bazaar dotted over +with squatting women, cowled with dirty blankets, selling warm +griddle-cakes; moving here and there are the same spectral figures, +similar dirty blankets veiling them from head to foot; over the way are +cylinders of mat, with nets caging the apertures at each end, to hold +the cocks and hens, rabbits and pigeons, brought for sale by Riffians, +descendants of the corsairs of that ilk, stalwart, brown, and +bare-legged, with heads shaven but for the twisted scalp-lock left for +the convenience of Asrael when he is dragging them up to Paradise. +Hebrews have their standings around, and deal in strips of cotton, brass +dishes, and slippers, or change money, or are ready for anything in the +shape of barter. Seated in the shade of that small niche in the wall, as +on a tailor's shop-board, is an adool, or public notary, selling advice +to a client; in the alcove next him is a worker in beads and filigree; +from a dusty forge beyond comes the clang of anvils, where half-naked +smiths are hammering out bits or fashioning horse-shoes. Mules with +Bedouins perched, chin on shin, amid the bales of merchandise on their +backs, cross the bazaar at every moment; or files of donkeys, stooping +under bundles of faggots, pick their careful way. By-and-by--but this is +not a frequent sight--a Moslem swell ambles past on a barb, gorgeous in +caparisons, the enormous peaked saddle held in its place by girths round +the beast's breast and quarters, and covered with scarlet hammer-cloth. +If we move about and examine the stalls, we see lumps of candied +sweetmeats here; charms, snuff-boxes made of young cocoanuts and beads +there; and jars of milk or baskets of dates elsewhere. At the fountain +yonder, contrived in the wall, mud approached by rugged, sloppy steps, +water-carriers, wide-mouthed negro slaves, male and female, with brass +curtain-rings in their ears, and skins blacker than the moonless +midnight, come and go the whole day long, and gossip or wrangle with +loafers in coarse mantles and burnous of stuff striped like +leopard-skin. Beside the silent, gliding, ghost-like Mahometan women and +the Hottentot Venus, you have Rebecca in gaudy kerchief and Dona Dolores +in silken skirt and lace mantilla from neighbouring Spain. In the +mingling crowd all is novelty, all is noise, all is queer and shifting +and diversified. + +The hotel where we put up was owned by Bruzeaud, formerly a messman of a +British regiment. It was approached by a filthy lane, and commanded a +prospect of a square not much larger than a billiard-table. In the +middle of this square was the limp body of a deceased mongoose. At the +opposite side of it was a Mahometan school, where the children were +instructed in the Koran, and their treble voices as they recited the +inspired verses in unison kept up drone for hours. The build and +surroundings of the hostelry left much opening for improvement, but we +had no valid ground for complaint. The beds were clean, Bruzeaud was a +good cook, the waiter was attentive and smiled perpetually, which made +up for his stupidity; we had a single agreeable fellow-guest in a +Frenchman, who spoke Arabic, and had lived in the city of Morocco as a +pretended follower of the Prophet; and, besides, there was that dry +undoctored champagne, which it is permissible to drink at all meals in +Africa. + +There was another hotel in Tangier, a more pretentious establishment, +owned by one Martin--surname unknown. Martin was a character. He was an +unmitigated coloured gentleman, blubber-lipped and black as the ace of +spades, with saffron-red streaks at the corners of his optics. He was a +native of one of the West India Islands, I believe, but I will not be +positive. Mahomet Lamarty pressed me to tell him in what English county +Englishmen were born black, and when I said in none, he gravely +ejaculated that in that case Martin was a liar, and habitually ate dirt. +To avert possible complications into which I might have been drawn, I +had to hasten to explain that Martin might possibly have been born in a +part of England known as the Black Country. He had served in the +steward's department on the ship of war where the Duke of Edinburgh, +then Prince Alfred and a middy, was picking up seamanship. Hence his +Jove-like hauteur. He had rubbed-skirts with Royalty, and to his +fetter-shadowed soul some of the divinity which hedges kings and their +relatives had adhered to him. I never met a darkey who could put on such +fearful and wonderful airs. Where he did not order he condescended. He +showed me an Irish constabulary revolver which he had received from "his +old friend, Lord Francis Conyngham--'pon honour, he was delighted to +meet him. It was good for sore eyes--who'd a-thought of his turning up +there!" Splendidly inflated Martin was when he spoke of "his servants." +This thing was entertaining until he grew presumptuous. If you are +polite to some people they are familiar, and want to take an ell for +every inch you have conceded. And then you have to tell them to keep +their place. But Martin, with the instincts of his race, saw in time +when it was coming to that. What a misery it must be for a coloured +gentleman of ambition that the tell-tale _odor stirpis_ cannot be +eliminated! Martin spent extraordinary amounts of money on the purchase +of essences, but to no effect; he could not escape from himself; the +scent of the nigger, _che puzzo!_ would hang round him still. He was a +great coward with all his magniloquence, and when cholera attacked +Tangier, left it in craven terror, and sequestered himself in a country +house a few miles off. + +The two captains and I "did" Tangier conscientiously, with the zest of +Bismarck over a yellow-covered novel, and the thoroughness of a Cook's +tourist on his first invasion of Paris. We crawled into a stifling crib +of a dark coffee-house, and sucked thick brown sediment out of +liliputian cups; we smoked hemp from small-bowled pipes until we fell +off into a state of visionary stupor known as "kiff;" we paid our +respects to the Kadi, exchanged our boots for slippers, and settled down +cross-legged on mats as if we were the three tailors of Tooley Street; +we almost consented to have ourselves bled by a Moorish barber--Mahomet +Lamarty's particular, who lanced him in the nape of the neck every +spring--for the Moorish barber still practises the art of Sangrado, and +also extracts teeth. But in my note-taking I was sorely handicapped by +my ignorance of the language. Arabic is spoken in the stretch extending +from Tetuan to Mogador by the coast, and for some distance in the +interior; Chleuh is the dialect of the inhabitants of the Atlas range, +and Guinea of the negroes. Spanish is slightly understood in Tangier and +its vicinity, and is well understood by the Jews. The houses are +generally built of chalk and flint (_tabia_) on the ground-floor, and of +bricks on the upper story. Moorish bricks are good, but rough and +crooked in make. The houses inhabited by Jews are obliged to be coated +with a yellow wash, those of natives are white, those of Christians may +be of any colour. The Jews are made to feel that they are a despised +stock, and yet with Jewish subtlety and perseverance they have managed +to get and keep the trade of the place in their hands. That fact may be +plainly gathered from the absence of business movement in the bazaars +and public resorts of Tangier on the Jewish Sabbath. Your Hebrew does +not poignantly feel or bitterly resent being reviled and spat upon, +provided he hears the broad gold pieces rattling in the courier-bag +slung over his shoulder. He nurses his vengeance, but he has the common +sense to perceive that the readiest and fullest manner of exacting it is +by cozening his neighbour. At this semi-European edge of Africa he +enjoys comparative license, although he is forced to appear in skull-cap +and a long narrow robe of a dark colour something like a priest's +soutane. But the son of Israel when he has a taste for finery (and which +of them has not?) compensates for the gloom of his outer garment by +wearing an embroidered vest, a girdle of some bright hue, and white +drawers. + +The daughters of Israel--but my conscience charges me with want of +gallantry towards them in a previous chapter, and now I can honestly +relieve it and win back their favour. They are the only beautiful women +who mollify the horizon of Tangier: the Mahometan ladies are not +visible, those of Spanish descent are coarse, and of English are +washed-out; while their lips are against the negresses. I have a batch +of photographs of females in an album--aye, of believers in the Prophet +amongst them, for it is a folly to imagine you cannot obtain that which +is forbidden. Hercules, I fancy, must have overcome with a golden sword +the dragon that watched the gardens of the Hesperides--which, by the +way, were in the neighbourhood of Tangier, if Apollodorus is to be +credited. On looking over that album, the majority of the faces are +distinctly those of Aaronites, and most favourable specimens of the +family, too There are melting black orbs curtained with pensive lashes, +luxuriant black hair, regular features, and straight, delicately +chiselled noses. These Jewesses generally wear handkerchiefs disposed +in curving folds over their heads, and are as fond of loudly-tinted +raiment and the gauds of trinketry as their sisters who parade the sands +at Ramsgate during the season. There is a photograph before me, as I +write, of a Jewish matron, fat, dull, double-chinned, and sleepy-eyed, +who must have been a belle before she fell into flesh. She wears massy +filigree ear-rings, two strings of precious stones as necklaces, +ponderous bracelets, edgings of pearls on her bodice, and rings on all +her fingers. Her shoulders are covered with costly lace, and the front +of her skirt is like an altar-cloth heavy with embroidery. I dare say, +if one might peep under it, she has gold bangles on her ankles. It would +surprise me if she had an idea in her head beyond the decoration of her +person. As we turn the leaf, there is a full-blooded negress with a +striped napkin twisted gracefully turban-wise round her hair, and coils +of beads, large and small, sinuously dangling on her breast, like the +chains over the Debtor's Door at Newgate. A very fine animal indeed, +this negress, with power in her strong shiny features; a nose of +courage, thin in the nostrils, and cheek-bones high, but not so high as +those of a Red Indian. If she were white, she might pass for a +Caucasian, but for that gibbous under-lip. She lacks the wide mouth and +the hinted intelligent archness of the Two-Headed Nightingale, and has +not the moody expression and semi-sensuous, semi-ferocious development +of the muscular widows of Cetewayo; but for a negress she is handsome +and well-built, and would fetch a very good price in the market. The +slave-trade still flourishes in Morocco. On the next page we meet two +types of young Moorish females: one a peasant, taken surreptitiously as +she stood in a horse-shoe archway; the other a lady of the harem, +taken--no matter by what artifice. The peasant, swathed from tip to heel +in white like a ghost in a penny booth, and shading her face with a +cart-wheel of a palm-leaf hat looped from brim to crown, and with one +extremity of its great margins curled, is a prematurely worn, +weather-stained, common-looking wench, with a small nose and screwed-up +mouth. She is a free woman, but I would not exchange the dusky +bondswoman for five of her class. Centuries of bad food, much +baby-nursing, and field-labour sink their imprint into a race. The harem +lady, whose likeness was filched as she leaned an elbow against a low +table, is in a state of repose. She squats tailor-fashion, her fingers +are twined one in another in her lap, her eyes are closed, and her +expression is one of drowsy, listless voluptuousness. She is fair, and +her dress (for she is not arrayed for the reception of visitors) is +simple--a peignoir, and a sash, and a fold of silk binding her long rich +tresses. A soft die-away face, with no sentiment more strongly defined +than the abandonment to pleasure and its consequent weariness. By no +means an attractive piece of flesh and blood, and yet a good sample of +the class that go to upholster a seraglio. + +I have never had the slightest anxiety to penetrate the secrets of the +Moslem household, and I consider the man who would wish to poke his nose +into its seclusion no better than Peeping Tom of Coventry--an insolent, +lecherous cad. I would not traverse the street to-morrow to inspect the +champion wives of the Sultan of Turkey and Shah of Persia amalgamated; +and I deserve no credit for it, for I know that they are puppets, and +that more engaging women are to be seen any afternoon shopping in Regent +Street or pirouetting in the ballets of half-a-dozen theatres. + +Your lady of the harem is an insipid, pasty-complexioned doll, nine +times out of ten, and would be vastly improved in looks and temperament +if she were subjected to a course of shower-baths, and compelled to take +horse-exercise regularly and earn her bread before she ate it. + +How do I know this? it may be asked. Who dares to deny it? is my answer. + +But here is a digression from our theme of the condition of the Jews at +Tangier, and all on account of a few poor photographs! In one sentence, +that condition is shameful. It is a reproach to the so-called civilized +Powers that they do not interfere to influence the Emir-al-Mumenin to +behave with more of the spirit of justice towards his Jewish subjects. +In Fez and other cities they have to dwell in a quarter to +themselves--"El Melah" (the dirty spot) it is called in Morocco city; +and when they leave the Melah they have to go bare-footed. They are not +permitted to ride on mules, nor yet to walk on the same side of the +street as Arabs. + +The late Sir Moses Montefiore, a very exemplary old man in some +respects, visited Morocco in his eightieth year to intercede on behalf +of his co-religionists, and promises of better treatment were made; but +promises are not always kept. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + A Pattern Despotism--Some Moorish Peculiarities--A Hell upon + Earth--Fighting for Bread--An Air-Bath--Surprises of Tangier--On + Slavery--The Writer's Idea of a Moorish Squire--The Ladder of + Knowledge--Gulping Forbidden Liquor--Division of Time--Singular + Customs--The Shereef of Wazan--The Christian who Captivated the + Moor--The Interview--Moslem Patronage of Spain--A Slap for + England--A Vision of Beauty--An English Desdemona: Her Plaint--One + for the Newspaper Men--The Ladies' Battle--Farewell--The English + Lady's Maid--Albert is Indisposed--The Writer Sums up on Morocco. + + +THE Government in Morocco would satisfy the most ardent admirer of +force. It is an unbridled despotism. The Sultan is head of the Church as +of the State, and master of the lives and property of his subjects. He +dispenses with ministers, and deliberates only with favourites. When +favourites displease him, he can order their heads to be taken off. +Favourites are careful not to displease him. The land is a _terra +incognita_ to Europeans, and is rich in beans, maize, and wool, which +are exported, and in wheat and barley, which are not always permitted to +be exported. Altogether the form of administration is very primitive and +simple. It is a rare privilege for a European to be admitted into the +Imperial presence, and indeed the only occasions, one might say, when +Europeans have the privilege are those furnished by the visits of +foreign Missions to submit credentials and presents. It is advisable for +a private traveller not to go to the chief city unless attached to one +of these official caravans; but by those who have money a journey to Fez +may be compassed with an escort. This escort consists of the Sultan's +very irregular soldiers, who are armed with very long and very rusty +matchlocks, of a pattern common nowadays in museums and curiosity shops. +Ostensibly the escort is intended to protect the traveller from the +regularly organized bands of robbers which infest the interior; but the +experience of the traveller is that when the robbers swoop down he has +to protect the escort. Christians are looked upon as dogs by all the +self-satisfied natives, and treated so by some of them when they can be +saucy with impunity. It was my lot to be called a dog by a small +fanatic, who hissed at me with the asperity and industry of a disturbed +gander, and pelted me with stones. But two can play at that game, and +that boy will think twice before he lapidates a full-grown Christian +again. But he will hate him for evermore, and when he has reached man's +estate will teach his son to repeat the doggerel: "The Christian to the +hook, the Jew to the spit, and the Moslem to see the sight." + +The Sultan collects his revenue (estimated at half a million pounds +sterling a year, great part of which is derived from the Government +monopoly of the sale of opium) by the aid of his army; but as he never +nears the greater portion of his dominions, there must be some nice +pickings off that revenue by minor satraps before it reaches his sacred +hands. There is quite a phalanx of under-strappers of State in this +despotism. For instance, at Tangier there is a Bacha or Governor, a +Caliph or Vice-Governor, a Nadheer or Administrator of the Mosques, a +Mohtasseb or Administrator of the Markets, and a Moul-el-Dhoor or Chief +of the Night Police. There is a leaven of the guild system, too, as in +more advanced countries. Each trade has its Amin, each quarter its +Mokaderrin. There is a Kadi, or Minister of Worship and Justice, to whom +we paid our respects. Justice is quick in its action, and stern in the +penalties it inflicts. The legs and hands are cut off pilferers, heads +are cut off sometimes and preserved in salt and camphor, and the +bastinado is an ordinary punishment for lesser crimes. But the Moors +must be thick in the soles, nor is it astonishing, as the practice is to +chastise children by beating them on the feet. Mahomet Lamarty +volunteered to procure a criminal who would submit to the bastinado for +a peseta. In the market-place I compassionated an unfortunate thief +minus his right hand and left leg. We took a walk to the prison, which +is on the summit of the hill, Captain No. 1 thoughtfully providing +himself with a basket of bread. What a hell upon earth was that sordid, +stifling, noisome, gloomy keep, with its crowds of starving +sore-covered inmates. In filth it was a pig-sty, in smell a +monkey-house, in ventilation another Black-hole of Calcutta. Turn to the +next page, reader mine, if you are squeamish. Heaven be my witness, I +have no desire to minister to morbid tastes; but I have an object in +describing this dreadful _oubliette_, for it still exists--exists within +thirty-two miles of British territory, and it is a scandal that some +effort is not made to mitigate its horrors. Through the bars of a +padlocked door, from which spurt blasts of mephitic heat, we can descry +amid the steam of foul exhalations, as soon as our eyes become +accustomed to the dimness, a mob of seething, sweating, sweltering +captives, like in aspect as a whole to so many gaunt wild beasts. Some +are gibbering like fiends, others jabbering like idiots. They are there +young and old; a few--the maniacs those--are chained; all are crawled +over by vermin, most are crusted with excretions. The sight made me feel +faint at the time, the very recollection of it to this day makes my +flesh creep. We were fascinated by this peep at the Inferno. The moment +these caged wretches caught a glimpse of us they rushed to the door, +and on bended knees, or with hands uplifted, or with pinched cheeks +pressed against the bars, raised a clamour of entreaty. We drew back as +the rancid plague-current smote our faces, and questioned Mahomet by our +looks as to what all this meant. + +"They want food," he explained. + +These prisoners are allowed two loaves a day out of the revenues of the +Mosques; but two loaves, even if scrupulously given, which I doubt, are +but irritating pittance. They may make cushions or baskets, but their +remuneration is uncertain and slender. Those who are lucky get +sustenance from relatives in the town, but the majority are +half-starving, and are dependent for a full meal on the bounty of chance +visitors. We poked a loaf through the bars. It was ravenously snapped +at, torn into little bits, and devoured amid the howls of those who were +disappointed. Then a loaf was cast over the door. What a savage +scramble! The bread was caught, tossed in the air, jumped at, and +finally the emaciated rivals fell upon one another as in a football +scrimmage, and there was a moving huddle of limbs and a diabolical +chorus of shrieks and yells. That could not be done again; it was too +painful in result Mahomet undertook to distribute the remainder of our +stock through an inlet in the wall, and we drew away sick in head and +heart from that den of repulsive degradation, greed, brutality, cruelty, +selfishness, and all infuriate and debased passion--that damnable +magazine of disease physical and moral. It is undeniable that there were +many there whose faces were passport to the Court of Lucifer--murderers, +and dire malefactors; but better to have decapitated them than to have +committed them to the slow torture of this citadel of woe. There were +inmates who had been immured for years--inmates for debt whose hair had +whitened in the fetid imprisonment, whose laugh had in it a harsh +hollow-sounding jangle, and whose brows had fixed themselves into the +puckers of a sullen, hopeless, apathetic submission to fate. Their lack +of intelligence was a blessing. Had they been more sensitive they would +have been goaded into raging lunacy. + +Let us to the outer freshness and make bold endeavour to fling off this +weight of nightmare which oppresses us. Passing by the ruinous gate +yonder with its wild-looking sentry, we reach the open space where +crouching hill-men are reposing on the stunted grass, and ungainly +camels, kneeling in a circle, are chewing the cud in patience, or +venting that uncanny half-whine, half-bellow, which is their only +attempt at conversation. Let us take a long look at the country beyond +with its gardens teeming with fruit and musical with bird-voices; walk +up to the crown of that slant and survey the valleys, the plateaux, the +brushwood, the flower-patches, spreading away to the hills that swell +afar until the peaks of the Atlas, cool with everlasting snow, close the +view. One is tempted to linger there lovingly, though darkness is +falling. There is a gift of blandness and briskness in the very +breathing of the air. When you have had your fill of the beauties on the +land side, turn to the sea, meet the evening breeze that comes floating +up with a flavour of iodine upon it, range round the sweeping vista, +from giant Calpe away over the Strait flecked with sails on to +Trafalgar, smiling peacefully as if it had never been a bay of blood, +and finish by the vision of the great globe of fire descending into the +Atlantic billows. + +Our stay in Tangier was most gratifying because of its variety and +unending surprises. Existence there was out of the beaten track, and +kept curiosity on the constant alert. It was a treat to pretend to be +Legree, and to negotiate for a strong likely growing nigger-boy. I +discovered I could have bought one for ten pounds sterling, a perfect +bargain, warranted free from vice or blemish; but as I was not prepared +to stop in Africa just then, I did not close with the offer. It may be a +shocking admission to make, but if I were to settle down in Morocco, I +confess, I should most certainly keep slaves. There is a deal of +sentimental drivel spouted about the condition of slaves. Those I have +seen seemed very happy. In Morocco they are well treated; and if +desirous to change masters the law empowers them to make a demand to +that effect. It is true that a slave's oath is not deemed valid, but +Cuffy bears the slight with praiseworthy equanimity. I am sure if Cuffy +were in my service he would never ask to leave it, and I would teach him +to appraise his word as much as any other man's oath (except his +master's), by my patented plan for negro-training, based on Mr. Rarey's +theories. As the land about Tangier was rated at prairie value--an acre +could be had for a dollar--I might have been induced to invest in a +holding of a couple of hundred thousands of acres, but that my ship had +not yet come within hail of the port. What a healthy, free, aristocratic +life, combining feudal dignity with educated zest, a wise man could lead +there--if he had an establishment of, say, three hundred slaves, a +private band, a bevy of dancing girls, Bruzeaud for _chef_, an extensive +library, sixteen saddle-horses, and relays of jolly fellows from +Gibraltar to help him chase the wild boar and tame bores, eat +couscoussu, and drink green-tea well sweetened. He should Moorify +himself, but he need not change his religion, and if he went about it +rightly, I am sure, like the village pastor, he could make himself to +all the country dear. Take the educational question, for example. If he +were diplomatic he would pay the school-fees of the urchins of Tangier. +These are not extravagant--a few heads of barley daily, equivalent to +the sod of turf formerly carried by the pupils to the hedge academies in +dear Ireland, and a halfpenny on Friday. He should affect an interest in +the Koran, and make it a point of applauding the Koran-learned boy when +he is promenaded on horseback and named a bachelor. He might--indeed he +should--follow the career of his _protege_ at the Mhersa, where he +studies the principles of arithmetic, the rudiments of history, the +elements of geometry, and the theology of Sidi-Khalil, until he emerges +in a few years a Thaleb, or lettered man. Perhaps the Thaleb may go +farther, and become an Adoul or notary, a Fekky or doctor, nay--who +knows?--an Alem or sage. Ah! how pleasant that Moorish squire might be +by his own ruddy fire of rushes, palm branches, and sun-dried leaves; +and what a profit he might make by judicious speculation in +jackal-skins, oil, pottery, carpets, and leather stained with the +pomegranate bark! He would have his mills turned by water or by horses; +he would eat his bread with its liberal admixture of bran; he would rear +his storks and rams. The professors who charm snakes and munch +live-coals would all be hangers-on of his house; and he would have +periodical concerts by those five musicians who played such desert +lullabies for us--conspicuously one patriarch whose double-bass was made +from an orange-tree--and would not forget to supplement their honorarium +of five dollars with jorums of white wine. Sly special pleaders! They +argue with the German play-wright: "_Mahomet verbot den Wein, doch vom +Champagner sprach er nicht._" + +From the Frenchman at the hotel, whose knowledge of Morocco was +"extensive and peculiar," I acquired much of my information on the +manners and customs of the people. Watches are only worn and looked at +for amusement. Instead of by hours, time is thus noted: El Adhen, an +hour before sunrise; Fetour (repast) el Hassoua, or sunrise; Dah el Aly, +ten in the morning; El Only, a quarter past twelve; El Dhoor, half-past +one; El Asser, from a quarter past three to a quarter to four; El +Moghreb, sunset; El Acha, half-an-hour after sunset; and El Hameir, +gun-shot. Meals are taken at Dah el Aly, El Asser, and El Moghreb. The +houses are built with elevated lateral chambers, but there is a narrow +staircase leading to the Doeria, a reception-room, where visitors can be +welcomed without passing the ground-floor. The walls are plastered, and +covered with arabesques or verses of the Koran incrusted in colours. The +wells inside the houses are only used for cleansing linen; water for +drinking purposes is sought outside. + +Among many singular customs--singular to us--I noted that a popular +remedy for illness is to play music and to recite prayers to scare away +the devil. An enlightened Moor might think the practices of the Peculiar +People quite as strange, and question the infallibility of cure-all +pills at thirteen-pence-halfpenny the box. The dead in Morocco are +hurried to their graves at a hand-gallop. That, I submit, is no more +unreasonable than many English funeral usages, such as incurring debt +for the pomp of mourning. At Moorish weddings the bride is carried in +procession in a palanquin to her husband's house amid a _fantasia_ of +gunpowder--the reckless rejoicing discharges of ancient muskets in the +streets. Well, white favours, gala coaches, and _feux de joie_ at +marriages of the great are not entirely unknown among us. Nobody sees +the Moorish wife for a year, not even her mother-in-law, which I +consider a not wholly unkind dispensation. The Moorish wife paints her +toe-nails, which, after all, is a harmless vanity, and less obtrusive +than that of the ladies who impart artificial redness to their lips. +And, lastly, the Moorish wife waits on her husband. Personally, I fail +to discover anything blamable in that act, though I must concede that it +is eccentric, very eccentric. These allusions to the Moorish wife in +general lead up naturally to one in particular in whom I took a +professional interest, for she was as remarkable in her way as Lady +Ellenborough or Lady Hester Stanhope, or that strong-minded Irishwoman +who married the Moslem, Prince Izid Aly, and whose son reigned after his +father's death. + +The Shereef has been mentioned. He is the great man of the district, +with an authority only second to that of the Sultan himself. Claiming +to be a lineal descendant of Mahomet, he is entitled to wear the green +turban. His name at full length is long, but not so long as that of most +Spanish Infantes--Abd-es-Selam ben Hach el Arbi. He is a saint and a +miracle-worker. He has been seen simultaneously at Morocco, Wazan, and +Tangier, according to the belief of his co-religionists, wherein he +beats the record of Sir Boyle Roche's bird, which was only in two places +at once. Like Jacob, he has wrestled with angels. He is head of the +Muley-Taib society, a powerful secret organization, which has its +ramifications throughout the Islamitic world. He draws fees from the +mosques, and has gifts bestowed upon him in profusion by his admirers, +who feel honoured when he accepts them. Exalted and wide-spreading is +his repute where the Moslem holds sway, and unassailable is his +orthodoxy, yet he has had the temerity to take to himself a Christian +wife. This lady had been a governess in an American family at Tangier. +There the Shereef made her acquaintance, wooed and won her. They were +married at the residence of the British Minister Plenipotentiary; the +officers of a British man-of-war were present at the ceremony, and +slippers and a shower of rice, as at home, followed the bride on leaving +the building. The Shereef and, if possible, the Shereefa were personages +to be seen, and Mahomet Lamarty was the very man to help us to the +favour. His Highness lived four miles away, and we formed a cavalcade +one afternoon and set off for his garden, the ladies accompanying us. We +passed through cultivated fields of barley and _dra_ (a kind of millet), +crossed the river Wadliahoodi, and ascended a road which faced abruptly +towards the hills. An agreeable road it was, and not lonesome; we had +the carol of birds and the piping of bull-frogs to lighten the way, and +leafy branches made reverence overhead. There were abundance of fruit +and such beautiful shrubs that I rail at myself for not being botanist +enough to be able to enlarge upon them. There were orange-groves, yellow +broom, dog-rose, and apples, pears, peaches, apricots, plums, +pomegranates, figs, and vines. It was such an oasis as a very young +Etonian in the warmth of a midsummer vacation might have likened to +Heaven. The range of hills of El Jebel rose left and right, and at parts +presented a steep cliff to the ocean. This ridge is about twelve miles +in width, and its fertile slopes amply merit to be lauded as the best +fruit-producers in the empire, "as bounteous as Paradise itself." + +Mahomet Lamarty, who was our guide, entered the Shereef's grounds to +prepare for our introduction; and now the ladies, who had insisted on +coming with us, rebelled, and said point-blank they would not salute the +Shereefa as "Your Highness." They were impatient to see her, but they +declined to give countenance to a Christian who had demeaned herself by +wedding a heathen. + +"The visit was of your own seeking, ladies," I said; "if you are not +willing to treat Her Highness with deference, better stay outside." + +They were not equal to that sacrifice after riding four miles. + +"Who'll start the conversation?" said Captain No. 1. "You start it" (to +me) "like a good fellow, and I'll take up the running." + +Captain No. 2 said he would hang about for us outside. + +Mahomet beckoned to us and we ventured into the garden. Coming down a +pathway we saw an austere, swarthy, obese man of the middle height. He +was white-gloved, and wore a red fez, a sort of Zouave upper garment of +blue, with burnous, baggy trousers, white stockings, and Turkish +slippers. It was the Shereef. I had agreed to open the interview, but +when it came to the trial my Arabic (I had been only studying it for two +hours) abandoned me. Mahomet did the needful. I thanked His Highness for +his kindness in admitting us to his demesne, and he smiled a modest, +solemn smile, and looked greeting from his small eyes. When he +discovered that I had been travelling in Spain, he asked me--always +through Mahomet--what they were doing there. On having my reply--that +they were tasting the miseries of civil war--translated to him, he shook +his head, shrugged his shoulders, and slowly ejaculated: + +"Unhappy Spain! Silly, unfortunate people! That is the way with them +always. They are at perpetual strife one with another." + +And then Mahomet interposed with a parenthesis of his own depreciatory +of the Spaniards, whom he loathed and despised. He had fought against +them in the war of 1839-1860, and the Shereef had also headed his +countrymen, and had shown great courage and coolness in action. His +presence had infused a high spirit of enthusiasm into the undisciplined +troops. + +"Bismillah!" grunted Mahomet. "The Spaniard is beneath contempt. He was +almost licked in one battle. He was four months here, and how far did he +get into the interior?" + +Mahomet conveniently forgot the defeat of Guad-el-ras, the occupation of +Tetuan, and the indemnity of four hundred millions of reals which was +exacted as the price of peace; but he was literally correct, the +victorious O'Donnell did not flaunt his flag beyond a very exiguous +strip of the territory of Sidi-Muley-Mahomet. + +We were walking as we talked, and by this time had reached the brow of a +wooded rise which commanded an uninterrupted prospect of the ocean. The +flowery cistus flourished on the eminence, and cork-trees, chestnuts, +and willows shielded us from the fierceness of the sun. Behind and +around were a succession of richly-planted gardens. We halted, and the +Shereef, scanning the horizon in the direction of the Rock, suddenly put +a question to me which almost took my breath away: + +"Do they buy commissions over the way still?" + +"No; that system has been abolished." + +"It is well," he remarked, with a scarcely suppressed sneer. "It was +incredible that a great nation and a fighting nation should make a +traffic of the command of men, as if a clump of spears were a kintal of +maize," and as he relapsed into silence a soldierly fire gleamed in his +irides, his frame seemed to straighten and swell, and the nature of the +prophet retired before that of the warrior. + +From where we stood we could ferret out a house with a veranda in front, +built on a terrace and begirt with trees. That was the residence of His +Highness; but we turned our eyes in another direction, lest we should be +suspected of rude curiosity by this courteous African. I was trying to +divine the tally of years our host had numbered. No Arab knows his own +age, and here it may be useful to tell the reader wherein the +distinction lies between the Moor and the Arab. Virtually they are the +same; but the name of Moor is given to those who dwell in cities, of +Arab to those who roam the plains. Mahomet came to my aid. His Highness +had whiskers when Tangier was bombarded by Prince de Joinville. That was +in August, 1844, a good nine-and-twenty years before, so that +Abd-es-Salam must have long doubled the cape of forty, which would leave +him considerably the senior of his Frankish wife. + +We turned at a noise--the creak of a rustic wooden gate on its hinges; a +figure approached. And then it was given to me to gaze upon Her Highness +the Shereefa of Wazan. She was not called Zuleika, but Emily--her maiden +name had been Keene, and she came not from the rose-bordered bowers of +Bendemeer's stream, nightingale-haunted, but from the prosaic levels of +South London, where her father was governor of a gaol. Truly she was a +vision of gratefulness in that paynim tract--a rich brunette, with +large black eyes, long black ringletted tresses, and a well-filled shape +with goodly bust. Her attire was neat and graceful and not Oriental. She +was clad in a riding-habit of ruby brocaded velvet, with jacket to +match, had a cloud of lace round her throat, and an Alpine hat with +cock's feather poised on her well-set head. She might serve as the model +for a Spanish Ann Chute. Bracelets on her plump wrists and rings on her +taper fingers caught the sunshine as she occasionally twirled her +cutting-whip. Her voice was bell-like and melodious, with the faintest +accent of decision, and her manner, after an opening flush of +embarrassment, was cordial and debonair. The embarrassment was because +of her inability to extend to us the hospitality she desired. She +explained that she had to receive us in the garden as the house was +undergoing repairs. After the customary commonplaces, she freely entered +into conversation, and took opportunity at once to deny that she was a +renegade; she wore European costume, as we saw, and attended the rites +of the English Church, for it was one of the stipulations of the +marriage contract that she should have perfect liberty to follow her own +faith. + +"I wish every English girl were as happily married as I," she said, "and +had as loving a husband." + +It was gratifying, therefore, to note that she found herself as women +wish to be who love their lords. She had been married on the 27th of +January, and as the Shereef had entered into his present residence but +recently, they were still at sixes and sevens. It was his habit to spend +the winter in the country and the summer in town. She had been but two +years in Morocco, and had not yet mastered Arabic. + +"His Highness understands English?" She shook her head, and quickly +interpreting a lifting of my eyelids, she smilingly added, "Spanish was +the medium of our courtship." And then, as we promenaded the garden +path, she became communicative, and dwelt with pardonable expansion on +the virtues of her lord and master, who followed behind side by side +with the portly Yorkshireman. His charity, she said, was unbounded. +Slaves were frequently sent to him as presents, but he kept none. He was +modest on his own merits, and yet he was the most enlightened of Moors. +He had visited Marseilles, a war-ship having been put at his disposal by +the French Government, and was most anxious to take a tour to Paris and +Vienna, and above all to England. It was his desire that railways should +be constructed in Morocco, and he was glad when he was told that there +was some likelihood of a telegraph cable being laid to Tangier. + +"Then," interrupted I, "with your Highness's influence on the tribes +around, exercised through your husband, there should be a fair prospect +of pushing civilization here." + +"Ah, yes!" she exclaimed, with a glow on her cheeks, "that is one of my +dearest hopes, that is my great ambition. I believe that my marriage, +which has been cruelly commented upon in England, may effect good both +for these poor misunderstood Moors and my own country people." + +"Is the Shereef on friendly terms with the Sultan?" + +"No, I am sorry to say there is a feud between them at the moment. The +Sultan objects to my husband for using an English saddle." + +"Hum!" (to myself mentally) "if the august Muley cannot brook an English +saddle, what must he think of an English wife? Or do these Moslems, like +some Christians I know, strain at a gnat and swallow a camel? Mayhap it +is even so. The pigeon-prompted camel-driver, who built up his creed +with plentiful blood-cement, saw fit to add a new chapter to the Koran, +when he fell in love with the Coptic maiden, Mary." + +The Shereefa told me that her father and mother had come out to see her. +They were averse to the alliance at first, but were satisfied that she +had done the right thing when she told them how content she was, and +with what high-bred consideration for her wishes in the matter of +religion her husband had behaved. Their intention was to stop for four +days, but they extended their visit to fourteen. "And now," she +continued, "I can use to my lord the words of Ruth to Naomi, 'Whither +thou goest I will go; and where thou lodgest I will lodge; thy people +shall be my people'"--a pause--"yes, and 'thy God my God,' for there is +but one"--archly--"the matter of the Prophet we shall leave aside." + +I admired the lady's pluck, and if I were that Moorish squire I have +tried to sketch, I should esteem it an honour to have her on my visiting +list. But I am a theological oddity, and my wallet of prejudices, it is +to be feared, is sadly unfurnished. I never could rise to that +sublimated self-sufficiency of intellect that I could consign any +fellow-creature to everlasting pains for the audacity of differing in +dogma with myself. I have met good and bad of every creed, Mahometans I +could respect--whose word was their bond--and so-called Christians and +Christian ministers with a most uncharitable spiritual pride, whom I +could not respect. The liver of the persecutor was denied me. Were the +fires of Smithfield to be rekindled, my prayers would be sent up for the +floods of Heaven to quench them, and for the lightnings of Heaven to +annihilate the fiends who had piled the faggots. + +"By-the-bye," said the Shereefa, "do you know any of those people who +write for the papers in London?" + +I admitted that I had that misfortune. + +"Some of them are fools as well as cowards," she went on. "They have +written articles about me full of ignorance and malice. Have they no +consideration for the feelings of others?" + +"I am afraid, your Highness, some of them are more brilliant than +conscientious; they would rather point an epigram than sacrifice style +to truth or good-nature." + +"One of them in particular," she said, and there was an irritated ring +in her voice, "has singled me out for attack, and given me in derision a +name which he believes to be Mahometan, but which is really Jewish." + +And with her cutting-whip she viciously snapped off the heads of some +poppies. The episode of Tarquin's answer to the emissary of Sextus +occurred to me, and I felt that if my colleague, Horace St. J----, were +there, he would have passed a very bad quarter of an hour. + +The females of our party joined us, and I formally presented them, +taking a malicious pleasure in emphasizing the "your Highness." The +Shereefa received them right graciously, but it was easy to notice that +a chill came over the conversation. They were careful never to use the +title to their English sister. In fact, it was a tacit ladies' battle. + +It was time to leave, and the Shereefa presented her visitors with two +nosegays, gathered by her own hands. The act had in it something very +royal, with the smallest trace of sly condescension. The Shereef +accompanied us to the outer gate. On the way I motioned to Captain No. 1 +to offer him a cigar. He did; his Highness accepted it, bowed, and +gravely put it in his pocket. As we stood on the road at parting, a +peasant was passing with a load of twigs on his shoulders. He cast them +off, threw himself on his knees, kissed the hem of the holy man's +garments, and the back of his proffered hand. + +We were descending the hill when a rustle in the bushes attracted me, +and a white face peeped out and a voice besought me in English to stop. +It was the Shereefa's London lady's-maid. She could not resist the +temptation of enjoying a few sentences with one of her own race. From +her I learned that there were twenty-seven Moorish women in her master's +household; that there was a tank at Wazan large enough to float a ship; +that her master had been married before, and had two sons and a lovely +Mahometan child, a daughter, to whom the Shereefa was teaching English +and the piano; "but remember, please," and here she grew important, and +had all the dignity of a retainer, with a great sense of what was due to +her caste and the proprieties, "that my mistress's children, if she have +any, will be Europeans!" + +As we got back to our hotel the muezzins were summoning the faithful to +their vesper orisons, and Albert was moaning ruefully under the +sideboard. Mrs. Captain had out her sweetly pretty pet at once, and +covered him with caresses and endearments. + +"Somebody has given him something that has disagreed with him. Was it +you?" she said to me, and there was that in her tone which made me quake +in my shoes. + +Meekly and truthfully I protested that I had not; I had fed him in the +morning in her own presence; the darling was in his usual health and +spirits when we left, but--intercede for me, Puck, and you aerial imps +of mischief, for no other spirit will--I could not help murmuring in +audible soliloquy, "The carcase of that mongoose, which was on the +square outside this morning, is no longer there." + +The scene that followed, to borrow the hackneyed phrase, beggars +description. The house was turned upside down; to my mental vision arose +sal volatile and burnt feathers, swoons and hysterics. Mahomet's dove +alone can tell how all might have ended had not the Frenchman suggested +a bolus. Captain No. 1 and I were commissioned to inquire into the +mystery of the disappearance of that baleful mongoose. When we got out +of earshot of the hotel there was the popping of a cork, and we emptied +effervescing beakers to the speedy recovery of Albert the Beloved. +Certes, that bull-dog had a very bad fit of dyspepsia; but the bolus did +him a world of good, and before we retired to rest we had the felicity +to hear him crunching a bone. Peace spread its wings over our pillows. + +The next day we took a trip to the lighthouse on Cape Spartel, the women +labouring in the field making curious inspection of the cavalcade as it +wended by, but quickly turning away their faces as we males tried to +snatch a look at them. The road was no better than a rugged track on a +stony plateau. There was a spacious view from the Phare, which was an +iron and stone building put up at the cost of three or four of the +European Powers (I forget which now), the keepers being chosen from each +of the contributory nations. The Sultan had given the site, but refused +to hand over a blankeel towards the expenses, arguing that as he had no +fleet, he had no personal object in making provision against wrecks. We +were well mounted, but these Barbary cattle have a nasty trick of +lashing out, so that it is prudent to give a wide range to their +hind-hoofs. Mahomet, riding with very short stirrups, led the party. My +saddle was an ancient, rude, and rotten contrivance, and as I loitered +on the road home, giving myself up to idle fantasy, my friends got on +far ahead. Waking from my day-dream I gave the nag the heel, and as it +sprang forward at a canter the girth turned completely round, and I was +pitched over in unpleasant nearness to a hedge of cactus. The ground was +soft, and I was not much bruised; but when I rose the nag had +disappeared round a corner, and I was left alone in the African +twilight. Presently a sinewy fiery-eyed Moor came with panther-step in +sight leading me back the nag. He had a basket of oranges on his back, +and gave me one with a respectful salaam as I vaulted on my Arab steed +and galloped Tangier-ward bareback. + +Judging from the scanty rags upon him, this man was of the poorest, yet +he asked for nothing; there were sympathy, innate politeness and +independence withal in his bearing. To him I abandoned the saddle; it +was the least he might have for his friendly act. Talking over this +incident with the Frenchman at Bruzeaud's, who knew the country, he told +me that the Moor was intelligent, honest, faithful to his engagements, +and had a go in him that, under advantageous circumstances, would +enable him to spring again to his former height of power and riches. But +he struck me as happy, although some of his social customs recalled the +feudal age, and he lived under the always-present contingency of +decapitation. May it be long before speculation rears the horrid front +of a joint-stock hotel in Tangier, or the prospectors go divining for +copper, coal, iron, silver and gold. I could wish the Moorish women, +however, would wash their children's heads occasionally, and not take +them up by the ankles when they spank them. After a sojourn in every way +pleasurable--pshaw! Albert's illness was a trifle, and we soon resigned +ourselves to the miseries of the prisoners on the hill--we ate our last +morsel of the Jewish pasch-bread of flour and juice of orange, cracked +our last bottle of champagne, and took our leave of the Dark Continent +with lightsome heart. The impression this little by-journey left upon me +was so agreeable that I could not avoid the enticement to communicate it +to the reader. If I have wandered from romantic Spain, it was only to +take him to a land more romantic still. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + Back to Gibraltar--The Parting with Albert--The Tongue of + Scandal--Voyage to Malaga--"No Police, no Anything"--Federalism + Triumphant--Madrid _in Statu Quo_--Orense--Progress of the + Royalists--On the Road Home--In the Insurgent Country--Stopped by + the Carlists--An Angry Passenger is Silenced. + + +"How like a boulder tossed by Titans at play!" said the sentimental +lady, as we approached Gibraltar on our return. + +"More like a big-sized molar tooth," broke in Mrs. Captain. + +And, indeed, this latter simile, if less poetic, gave a better idea of +the conformation of the fortified hill, with the gum-coloured outline of +all that was left of a Moorish wall skirting its side. The tooth is +hollow, but the hollow is plugged with the best Woolwich stuffing, and +potentially it can bite and grind and macerate, for all the peaceful +gardens and frescades of the Alameda that circle its base like a belt +of faded embroidery. At Gibraltar our party separated, the Yorkshire +Captain and his friends taking the P. and O. boat to Southampton, my +countryman going back to Tangier after having made some purchases, and I +electing to voyage to Malaga by one of Hall's packets, which was lying +at the mercantile Mole discharging the two hundred tons of Government +material which it is obliged to carry by contract on each fortnightly +voyage. When Albert and I parted no tears were shed; we resigned +ourselves to the decree of destiny with equanimity. But I humbly submit +that Mrs. Captain, when thanking me for my good intentions towards him, +might have spared me the ironical advice not to volunteer for duties in +future which I was not qualified to fulfil. "Volunteer," ye gods! when +she had absolutely entreated me to take him in charge. + +Before leaving the Club-House, I was pressed to relate our adventures in +Africa. I had no pig-sticking exploits to make boast over; but I turned +the deaf side of my head to certain whispers about holy men who +imported wine in casks labelled "Petroleum," who affected to be +delivering the incoherent messages of inspiration when they were merely +trying to pronounce "The scenery is truly rural" in choice Arabic, and +who accounted for the black eye contracted by collision with the kerb by +a highly-coloured narrative of an engagement in mid-air with an emissary +of Sheitan. Neither did I accord any pleased attention to anecdotes of a +"lella," or Arab lady, who tempted the Scorpions to charge ten times its +value for everything she bought by telling them to send them to a +personage whose title was exalted. Gib is a very small place, and, like +most diminutive communities, is a veritable school for scandal. I took +my last walk over the Rock, past the "Esmeralda Confectionery," which +still had up the notice that hot-cross buns were to be had from seven to +ten a.m. on Good Friday, and paced to the light-house on the nose of the +promontory, where the meteor flag, ringed by a bracelet of cannon, flies +in the breeze. And then I meandered back, and began to ask myself, had +Marryat aught to do with the sponsorship of this outpost of the British +Empire? Shingle Point, Blackstrap Bay, the Devil's Tower, O'Hara's +Folly, Bayside Barrier, and Jumper's Bastion--the names were all +redolent of the Portsmouth Hard; and I almost anticipated a familiar +hail at every moment from the open door of "The Nut," and an inquiry as +to what cheer from the fog-Babylon. + +The trip to Malaga on one of the Hall steamers which trade regularly +between London and that port, calling at Cadiz and Gibraltar, was very +agreeable, and the change to such dietary as liver and bacon was a +treat. We were but three passengers--a steeple-chasing sub of the 71st, +Senor Heredia, of Malaga, and myself. And now I have to make an open +confession. I am unable to decipher the log of that passage. I have a +distinct recollection of the liver and bacon, but more important events +have worn away from my mind. There are the traces of pencil-marks before +me; I dare say they were full of meaning when I scrawled them down, but +now I have lost the key. "Jolly captain--left his wife--forty +years--electric light deceives on a low beach--fourteen children--El +Cano--break in the head of wine-casks": there is a literal copy of the +contents of a page, which may mean nothing or anything, frivolity or a +thesaurus of serious information. Memory, what a treacherous jade thou +art! It may be said, why did I not take copious notes in short-hand? I +would have done so were I a stenographer; but I am not. I tried to +acquire the accomplishment once, and ignobly failed. I could write +short-hand slightly quicker than long-hand, but when written, I could +not transcribe my jottings. + +Flanking a beautiful coast, mostly hill-fringed--with hills, too, of +such metallic richness that lead and iron were positively to be quarried +out of their bosoms--we steamed into the harbour of Malaga, and landed +at the Custom-House quay. But there were no Customs' officers to trouble +us with inquiry. A red-bearded, flat-capped, dirty fellow in bare feet, +holding a bayoneted rifle with a jaunty clumsiness, accosted Senor +Heredia with a laughing voice. He was a sentinel of the provisional +government established in Malaga. The nature of that government may be +judged from his frank avowal: "We've no police--no anything." There were +French and German war-vessels at anchor, which was some guarantee of +protection for strangers. A novel tricolour of red, white, and a +washed-out purple had replaced the national flag. The Federal Republic +existed there, and yet the city was quiet; and official bulletins were +extant, recommending the citizens to preserve order. But this quietude +was not to be relied on over-much. One of the magnificoes under the new +_regime_ was a dancing-house keeper, and his principal claim to +administrative ability lay in the ownership of a Phrygian cap. Another, +who styled himself President of the Republic of Alhaurin de la Torre, a +territory more limited than the kingdom of Kippen, had stabbed a lady at +a masked ball a few months previously, for a consideration of sixty-five +duros. Still, it would be unfair to infer from that example that every +Malagueno was a mercenary ruffian, Senor Heredia related to me an +anecdote of a poor man who had found a purse with value in it to the +amount of thirty thousand reals, and had given it up without mention of +recompense. But a city where the wine-shops had nine doors, and +potato-gin was dispensed at a peseta the bottle, and there were "no +police--no anything," was not a desirable residence; and, as I had no +call there, and weeks might elapse before another revolution might be +sprung, I gladly took train to the capital. + +Madrid was tranquil, but with no more confidence in the duration of +tranquillity than when I left it. The army was still in a state akin to +disruption, with this difference--the rascals who had rifled the pockets +of the dead Ibarreta a few weeks before, would sell the bodies of their +slain officers now, if there was any resurrectionist near to make a bid. +Worse; I was given to understand that there were suspicions that the +gallant staff-colonel had been shot by his own men. The dismissed +gunners were still wearily beating the pavements, and a subscription +organized on their behalf among the officers of the other branches of +the service by the _Correo Militar_ was open. What were these gentlemen +to do? There was a rumour that they had been invited to enter the +French service, to which they would have been an undoubted acquisition, +bringing with them skill, scientific knowledge, and experience. But they +were Spaniards, not soldiers of fortune, and would decline to transfer +their allegiance, even if France were disposed to bid for it. Still, what +were they to do? In Spain as in Austria-- + + "Le militaire n'est pas riche, + Chacun salt ca." + +But the _militaire_ must live. Othello's occupation being gone, the +artillery officers had no alternative but to do what Othello would have +done had he been a Spaniard--conspire. + +The usual manoeuvring and manipulations were going on as preparation +for the election of the Constituent Cortes, and the extreme Republicans +were full of faith in their approaching triumph all along the line. They +were awaiting Senor Orense, but if he did not hasten it was thought +events so important would eclipse his arrival that, when he did come, +the Madrilenos would pay as small heed to him as the Parisians did to +Hugo when he surveyed the boulevards anew after years of exile. They +would honour him with a procession, and no more. The venerable +Republican, by the way, is a nobleman, Marquis of Albaida. But he is not +equal to the democratic pride of Mirabeau, marquis, who took a shop and +painted on the signboard, "_Mirabeau, marchand de draps._" + +"If you are a true Republican, why don't you renounce your title?" +somebody asked once of Orense. + +"If it were only myself was concerned I would willingly," responded the +Spaniard; "but I have a son!" Rousseau was a freethinker, but Rousseau +had his daughters baptized all the same. + +Meanwhile the Carlists were making headway. The Vascongadas, Navarre, +and Logrono, with the exception of the larger towns and isolated +fortified posts, were now in their power. Antonio Dorregaray, who was in +supreme command, was reported to have 3,200 men regularly organized, +well clad, and equipped with Remingtons. The Remington had been selected +so that the Royalists might be able to use the ammunition they reckoned +upon helping themselves with from the pouches of the Nationalists. In +addition to this force of 3,200, which might be regarded as the regular +army of Carlism, there were formidable guerrilla bands scattered over +the provinces. Our old acquaintance, Santa Cruz, had 900 followers in +Guipuzcoa. The other cabecillas in that region were Francisco, Macazaga, +Garmendia, Iturbe, and Culetrina, all men with local popularity and +intimate knowledge of the mountains. In Biscay, the commander was +Valesco, and his lieutenants were Belaustegui, del Campo, and the +Marquis de Valdespina, son of the chieftain who raised the standard of +revolution at Vitoria in 1833. Their factions were estimated at 2,500. +After Dorregaray, the most dangerous opponent to the Government troops +was Ollo, an old ex-army officer, who was licking the volunteers into +shape; and after Santa Cruz, the most noted and dreaded chief of +irregulars was Rada, who was also operating in "the kingdom," as their +province is proudly called by the daring Navarrese. The elements in +which the Royalists were wanting were cavalry and artillery; but they +had some money, foreign friends were active, the French frontier was not +too strictly watched nor the Cantabrian coast inaccessible, and Don +Carlos--Pretender or King, as the reader chooses to call him--was biding +his time in a villa not a hundred miles from Bayonne. When the hour was +considered favourable, he was ready to cross the border and take the +field, or rather the hills; and his presence, it was calculated, would +be worth a _corps d'armee_ in the fillip it would give to the enthusiasm +of his adherents. + +And yet the "only court" held its tertulias, and the donas talked +millinery, and bald politicians sighed for a snug post in the +Philippines, and the gambling-tables and the bull-ring retained their +spell upon the community. It was the old story: Rome was on the verge of +ruin, and the senate of Tiberius discussed a new sauce for turbot. + +As I saw no immediate prospect of the outburst of those important +events, which were cloud-gathering over Madrid, and nearly all my +colleagues had departed, I resolved to pursue my journey to London. I +had _carte blanche_ to return when I deemed there was no further scope +for my pen; but there was an obstacle in the way. Miranda was the +terminus of the rail to the north; the track thence to the Bidassoa had +been closed by order of the lieutenants of his Majesty _in nubibus_, +King Charles VII. In other words, 179 kilometres of the main iron line, +the great artery of communication with France, were held by the +insurgents. Obstacles are made to be met, and, if steadily met, to be +overcome. Surely, I reasoned, there must be some intercourse carried on +in these districts. I passed through territory occupied by Carlists +before. Why not again? Besides, I had nothing to fear from the Carlists, +the tramp carols in the presence of the footpad (which, I submit, is a +neat paraphrase of a classic saw); and if I did chance to meet them, +there would be that dear touch of romance for which the lady-reader has +been looking out so long in vain. + +I started. The journey to Miranda I pass by. One is not qualified to +write an essay on a country from inspection through the windows of a +railway-carriage in motion, more particularly at night. As well attempt +to describe a veiled panorama, unrolling itself at a hand-gallop. At +Miranda, which was crowded with soldiers, there was a diligence that +plied to San Sebastian by tacit arrangement with the knights of the +road--that is, the adherents of Don Carlos. As the fares were very +expensive, I suspect the speculator who ran the coach was heavily taxed +for the privilege, and recouped himself by shifting the imposition to +the shoulders of passengers. The day was fine, the roads were good, the +vehicle was well-horsed, and we got away from the boundary of republican +civilization at a rattling pace. My fellow-voyagers were mostly French, +some of them of the gentle sex, and chattered like pies until they fell +asleep. I believe it is admitted by those who know me best that I can do +my own share of sleep. On the slightest provocation--yea, on what might +be condemned as no reasonable provocation--I can drop my head upon my +breast and go off into oblivion. Nor am I particular where I sit or if I +sit at all. Any ordinary person can fall asleep on a sofa or at a +sermon, but it requires a practitioner with an inborn faculty for the +art to achieve the triumphs of somnolence which stand to my credit. I +have taken a nap on horseback; I have marched for miles, a musket on my +shoulder, in complete slumberous unconsciousness; I have nodded while +Phelps was acting, snoozed while Mario was singing, and played the +marmot while Remenyi was fiddling; awful confession, I have dozed +through an important debate in the House of Commons! I am yawning at +present. It is to be hoped the reader is not. And so I burned daylight +the while we drove through a country reputed to be pregnant with +surprises of scenery until, at long last, the diligence drew up in the +straggling street of Tolosa. We halted here for dinner, and resumed our +journey with a fresh team at an enlivening speed, until about two miles +outside the town we came to an abrupt stop. + +"An accident, driver?" + +"No, senor, but the Carlists." + +Some of my fellow-passengers turned pale, the ladies did not know +whether to scream or consult their smelling-bottles; and before they +could decide, a tall, slight, gentlemanly-looking man of some +four-and-twenty years, with a sword by his side, a revolver in his belt, +an opera-glass slung across his shoulder, and a silver tassel depending +from a scarlet boina, the cap of the country, appeared at the hinder +door of the diligence, bowed, and asked for our papers. He glanced at +them much as a railway-guard would at a set of tickets, inquired if we +were carrying any arms or contraband despatches, and being answered in +the negative, gave us a polite "Go you with God," and motioned to the +driver that he might pass on. As we galloped off, all eyes were turned +in the direction of the stranger; he leisurely walked over a field +towards a hill, two peasants equipped with rifles and side-arms +following at his heels. They were young and strong, and wore no nearer +approach to uniform than their officer. + +"This is abominable," cried a French commercial traveller (so I took him +to be), as soon as we had got out of hearing of the trio. "The notion of +these three miscreants stopping a whole coachful of travellers in broad +daylight is atrocious!" + +"They did not detain us long," said I. + +"They did us no harm," said another. + +"And that officer, I am sure, was very polite, and looked quite a +D'Artagnan--so chivalrous and handsome," added one of the ladies. + +"They are no better than bandits," said the commercial traveller. +"Driver, why did you not resist?" + +For reply, the driver pointed with his whip to a wall, under the lee of +which a party of at least fifty armed men, portion of the main body from +which the outpost of three had been detached, were smoking, chatting, or +sleeping. The commercial traveller relapsed into silence. We met with no +further adventure in our ride to the frontier, but experienced much +fatigue. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + On the Wing--Ordered to the Carlist Headquarters--Another _Petit + Paris_--Carlists from Cork--How Leader was Wounded--Beating-up for + an Anglo-Irish Legion--Pontifical Zouaves--A Bad Lot--Oddities of + Carlism--Santa Cruz Again--Running a Cargo--On Board a Carlist + Privateer--A Descendant of Kings--"Oh, for an Armstrong Twenty-Four + Pounder!"--Crossing the Border--A Remarkable Guide--Mountain + Scenery--In Navarre--Challenged at Vera--Our Billet with the Parish + Priest--The Sad Story of an Irish Volunteer--Dialogue with Don + Carlos--The Happy Valley--Bugle-Blasts--The Writer in a + Quandary--The Fifth Battalion of Navarre--The Distribution of + Arms--The Bleeding Heart--Enthusiasm of the Chicos. + + +AFTER a short stay in London I was despatched to Stockholm, to attend +the coronation of Oscar II of Sweden and his spouse, which took place in +the Storkyrkan, on the 12th of May. At the Hotel Rydberg I met my Madrid +acquaintance, Mr. Russell Young, who was a bird of passage like myself, +and had just arrived from Vienna, where he had been detailing the +ceremonial at the opening of the International Exhibition in the Prater. +While enjoying myself at a ball at the Norwegian Minister's, I received +a telegraphic message, ordering me at once to the Austrian capital. I +was very sorry to leave, for I was delighted with peaceful airy +Stockholm and the free-hearted Swedes--it was such a change after Spain; +but I had neither license nor leisure to grumble, and flitted to Vienna +as fast as steam could carry me. The Weltausstellung did not prove to be +a lodestone, although in justice it must be admitted it was one of the +finest shows ever planned, and was fixed in one of the most agreeable of +sites. It was too far away, however, to attract the British public, and +there were rumours of cholera lurking in the Kaiserstadt; so I was +recalled, but to be sent to Spain once more. My mission was to +penetrate, if possible, to the headquarters of the Carlists, with the +view of giving a fair and full report of the strength, peculiarities, +and prospects of their movement. + +At the London office of the sympathizers with the cause I was furnished +with the address of certain Carlists in confidential positions in +France, and letters were sent on in advance, so as to secure me a +favourable reception. Armed with a sheet of flimsy stamped in blue with +the escutcheon of Charles VII., and the legend "Secretaria Militar de +Londres," and with, what was more potent, a big credit on a +banking-house, I started afresh on the now familiar route. + +Before undertaking the journey into the territory in revolt I halted at +Bayonne to procure the necessary passes. These were obtained with ease +from the Junta sitting in the Rue des Ecoles, the members of which +professed that they desired nothing so much as the presence of the +representatives of impartial foreign journals, so that the truth about +the struggle should be made known to the rest of Europe. From Bayonne I +proceeded to Biarritz, where I had a conference with the Duke de La +Union de Cuba, a warm Carlist partisan, to whom I had an introduction, +and thence I went to St. Jean de Luz, a drowsy, quaint, world-forgotten +nook. A _petit Paris_ it was called in a vaunting quatrain by some +minstrel of yore. But Brussels may be comforted. It is nothing of the +kind, but something infinitely better. The breezes from the main and the +mountains, from the Bay of Biscay and the Pyrenees, conspire to supply +it with ozone. There is music in the boom of the surf as it pulsates +regularly on the velvet sands of a semicircular inlet, where dogs frisk +and youngsters gambol in the sunshine. + +In a hotel on the edge of that inlet, the Fonda de la Playa, where I put +up, a young Irish gentleman named Leader was recuperating from a severe +wound in the leg. He had received it in the service of Don Carlos, in a +skirmish near Azpeitia, where he was the only man hit. He was out with a +party of the guerrilleros, and came across a company of the Madrid +troops. To encourage his own people, or rather the people with whom he +had cast in his fortunes, he went well to the front, and mounting on a +bank of earth, hurled defiance at the enemy. He was picked down by a +stray shot, and if he had been taken prisoner it is probable that he +would have paid for his temerity with his life. The Spaniards were not +clement towards foreigners who interposed in their domestic quarrel. +Leader was carried off by his companions and secreted in a peasant's +hut. The troops, swearing vengeance, searched the hut next to it, but, +by some accident, failed to continue the quest to the refuge of the +wounded man. He bled profusely, but the haemorrhage was finally arrested +by some rude bandaging, and at night he was helped astride a donkey, and +conveyed across the frontier into France. He told me he had suffered +excruciating torments at every jolt of the jog-trotting animal on that +mountain journey. Had the bullet struck him an inch higher he would have +had to suffer amputation; but his luck stood to him, and at the time we +met he was getting on fairly towards recovery, thanks to youth, a good +constitution, and the healthy air of St. Jean de Luz. I could not +understand the ardour of Leader's partisanship for the Carlists. He +spoke the merest smattering of Spanish, and had no profound intimacy +with the vexed question of Spanish politics or the rights of the rival +Spanish houses. The ill-natured whispered that he was crying "Viva la +Republica" when he was knocked over. It is possible, for he had fought +for the French Republic with Bourbaki's army, and may, in his +excitement, have forgotten under what flag he was serving. I take it he +was a soldier by instinct, and ranged himself on the side of Don Carlos +more from the love of adventure than from any other motive. He was a +fine athletic young fellow, with a handsome determined cast of features. +He had been an ensign in the 30th Foot, and had resigned his commission +to enjoy a spell of active service when the Franco-German war was +proclaimed. That he had behaved bravely in the campaign which led to +internment in Switzerland was evidenced by the ribbon of the Legion of +Honour which he wore. Leader was very anxious that an Anglo-Irish legion +in aid of Don Carlos should be organized. I felt it my duty to warn +those to whom he appealed to think twice before they embarked on such a +crusade. He was very wroth with me for having thrown cold water on the +project, but that did not affect me. I had more experience of such +follies than he, and my conscience approved me. A man may be justified +in playing with his own life, but he should be slow in playing with the +lives of others. He prepares a vexing responsibility for himself if he +is sensitive. + +In the next room to Leader was a fellow-enthusiast, Mr. Smith Sheehan, +an ex-officer of Pontifical Zouaves, and son of a popular and eccentric +town-councillor of Cork. He was an agile stripling, skilled in all +gymnastic exercises. He had also done some fighting with the Carlists, +and was in France on furlough, which the soldiers in the Royalist force +appeared to have no insuperable difficulty in getting. He told me there +was a large infusion of his old regiment amongst the guerrilleros, and +that they helped to bind the partisan levies in the withes of +discipline. Most of them had smelt gunpowder at Mentana and Patay. The +famous cabecilla, Saballs, had been a captain at Rome, and Captain +Wills, a Dutchman, who had been killed in a brush at Igualada, had been +sergeant-major in Sheehan's company. + +There was another ex-British officer of short service, who had a +remarkably imposing and well-cultivated growth of moustache. He was a +violent doctrinaire Carlist, but suffered from a chronic malady which +prevented him from taking the field; still there was none who could plot +with a more tremendous air of mystery. He was a Carlist because it was +"the correct thing" to be one in the fashionable ring at St. Jean de +Luz, where he had settled, and because he inherited a name associated +with chivalric insurrection. For the sake of his family I shall call him +Barbarossa. He was no honour to his house, for he was an inveterate +gambler, and was not careful in discharging the obligations he wantonly +contracted. He is dead. His death was no loss to society. In fact, if +the whole host of gamblers, lock, stock and barrel, were swept by a +fairy-blast to the regions of thick-ribbed ice, the world would be the +gainer. + +When I left Spain, Carlism was to be put down in a fortnight--in Madrid. +Now it threatened to last as long as a Chinese play. The Royalists--I +suppose they had earned the title to be so named by their +perseverance--had achieved numerous small successes which had raised +their _morale_, and they were being supplied with arms of precision from +abroad, and trained to their use. They had even taken some mountain-guns +from their enemy. Leader made me laugh with his accounts of Lizarraga +shouting "Artilleria al frente!" and a couple of mules, with one +wretched little piece, moving forward; and of the intimidating clatter +made by three shrunk cavaliers in cuirasses a world too wide for them, +and alpargatas, trotting up a village street. The alpargata is the +mountain-shoe of canvas, with a hempen sole, worn by the Basque +peasants. The association of surcoats of mail and rope slippers is +incongruous; but what does that reck? Those cuirasses were _spolia +opima_. + +And Santa Cruz? + +The honest gentleman had retired into private life. His excesses had +raised such a storm of opprobrium against the Carlists that they had to +request him to desist. Lizarraga summoned him to render himself up a +prisoner. "Come and take me," replied Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz had near +two thousand followers; Lizarraga a few hundred. Lizarraga declined the +invitation. But the priest caused seven-and-twenty Carabineros, taken +prisoners at the bridge of Endarlasa, near Irun, to be shot, and this +filled the cup to overflowing. The Carlists averred they would slay him; +the Republicans vowed they would garrote him for a Madrid holiday; the +French Government declared its intention of putting him under lock and +key if it caught him within its jurisdiction. His band was disarmed "by +order of the King," and dispersed, and the Cura himself nebulously +vanished--whither we may see anon. + +There was a large accretion to the population of St. Jean de Luz in +Iberian refugees, and as they sat and conversed under the foliage of the +public promenade, frequent sighs might be overheard, and remarks that if +this sort of thing were to go on, "Spain would soon be in as bad a +condition as France." At all hours there came to the beach poor exiles +of Spain, who turned their eyes sadly to the line where sky met ocean. +Of what were their thoughts--of home and friends, of the flutters of +the casino or the ecstasies of the bull-ring? If they were looking for +the Spanish fleet they did not see it, for a reason as old as the +"Critic." It was not in sight. They came down in numbers in front of my +hotel at nine o'clock on the morning of Monday, July 28th, a few days +after my arrival, when a strange yellow funnel turned the point, and a +long low Red-Roverish three-masted schooner-yacht steamed into Socoa, +the roadstead of St. Jean de Luz. If the exiles were correctly informed, +that was the Spanish fleet in a sense--the notorious Carlist privateer, +the _San Margarita_, which had recently landed arms and ammunition for +the Royalists at Lequeieto and elsewhere. She had been doing a stroke of +business in the same line that morning. In the grey dawn she had dropped +into the embouchure of the Bidassoa, at a few hundred yards from the +town of Fontarabia. The work was well and quickly done. Boats +requisitioned by friends on land put off to her, and returned laden with +bales of merchandise. These artless bales were packages of +breechloaders, with bayonets to match, wrapped in sail-cloth. As soon +as they were received on shore they were distributed amongst some +thousands of Carlists in waiting, who at once proceeded to fix bayonets, +fall into ranks, and with shouts of exultation march off in good order. + +Meanwhile, the "volunteers of liberty," as the Basque Republicans called +themselves, ensconced their persons out of range in a sort of castle +beside the church of Fontarabia's "wooded height," and amused themselves +taking pot-shots at the rising sun. But they did not venture from their +shelter; they knew a large body of armed Royalists were watching their +movements from the summit of Cape Higuer, and only awaited the provoke +to pounce down upon and swallow them. A detachment of Frenchmen from the +frontier hamlet of Hendaye quietly took up ground on the strand to see +that there was no breach of neutrality, and had an uninterrupted view of +the whole operation. As soon as the daring little privateer had done her +work she innocently steamed to Socoa; the Carlists on the hills waved +adieu and disappeared; the French soldiers returned to their quarters; +and the Fontarabian "volunteers of liberty "--well, most probably they +swore terribly, and effected a masterly retrograde movement on the +nearest posada. + +I had a call to board the _San Margarita_. Not a boat could be had in +St. Jean de Luz for love or money; the passage from the sea into the +harbour is narrow, and the fishermen, though hardy navigators, are shy +of facing the current when the sea is rough. Leader and myself walked by +the goat-path on the crags leading to the southern side of the harbour +so as to avoid the bar, and succeeded in chartering a skiff at Socoa. A +quarter of an hour's pull brought us alongside the yacht, and on sending +up our cards we were at once invited on board by the owner. To my +surprise I discovered that the entire crew was British, as reckless a +set of dare-devils as ever cut out a craft from under an enemy's guns. +The skipper, Mr. Travers, was a Cork man, an ex-officer of the Indian +Navy, who had lost a finger during the Mutiny; but the life and soul of +the enterprise was an ex-officer of the Austrian and Mexican armies, +Charles-Edward Stuart, Count d'Albanie, great-grandson of "the Young +Pretender." His uncle, John Sobieski Stuart, had resigned his claim to +the throne of England on his behalf,[C] so that I actually shook the +hand of the man who under other circumstances might be wielding the +sceptre of that empire on which the sun never sets. Instead of a crown +he wore the genuine old Highland bonnet--not that modern innovation, the +military feather-bonnet. In face this descendant of royalty was an +unmistakable Stuart, with the characteristic aquiline nose, and a proud +dignity of expression. He might have sat for the portrait of Charles the +Martyr-King, by Vandyck, in Windsor. He was a convinced and earnest +supporter of the claims of Carlos Septimo, whom he regarded as a cousin, +and a sort of modern counterpart of the young Chevalier, the "darling +Charlie" of Jacobite minstrelsy. He received us with the hospitality of +his nation, and we had a long chat as we paced the deck briskly, the +Count discussing the prospects of the rising, and then verging off into +gay anecdotes of his military career in Austria, and inquiries after +mutual acquaintances in London. By-and-by Captain Travers made his +appearance, a tall weather-beaten navigator in orthodox naval dress, +with a glass in his eye. He bowed severely to the Stuart, who as coldly +returned his salute. It was easy to perceive that there was a restraint +in the demeanour of the men on both sides; but there was a tacit +armistice for the occasion. I heard afterwards that they did not talk to +each other, except on strict matters of duty, and when taking their +short walks on deck, one confined himself religiously to the larboard, +the other to the starboard. Travers took me in tow, while the alert +Count with his quick manner strode to and fro with Leader, and kept up a +jerky fire of conversation nearly all to himself, occasionally twirling +his peaked beard. Travers and I lolled over the bulwarks, and laughed +and sampled the contents of an aqua-vitae bottle, "Special Jury" whisky +from Ireland, and I learned that this ill-assorted pair had been +sharing some close hazards on their audacious cruiser. + +A few days previously they had been chased by _El Aspirante_, a Spanish +gun-boat, which gave them eight shots. One caught them on the port +quarter, and shivered some timbers, but effected no more serious damage. + +"I wish we had only an Armstrong twenty-four pounder close handy," said +the mate, "and we'd have saved them 'ere dons the price of a coffin, I'd +take my davy!" + +From what I saw of the seamen, I think this was no empty boast. Some of +them had served with one Captain Semmes on a certain craft called the +_Alabama_, and had been picked up after the fight with the _Keasarge_, +off Cherbourg, by Mr. John Lancaster's yacht, the _Deerhound_. There is +no need for concealment now, so that I may freely admit that the +_Deerhound_ and the _San Margarita_ were one and the same. Travers, who +was in love with the yacht, told me if he had another blade to the screw +he could give leg-bail to the fastest ship in the Spanish navy. At +leaving, I was asked to take a trip with them; they were about to visit +their floating arsenal in the Bay of Biscay, load, and try to run +another cargo. I respectfully declined--fortunately for myself; my +orders were to get to the Carlist headquarters, not to go playing Paul +Jones. + +Leader and Smith Sheehan were about to cross the border, and readily +acceded to my request to form one of the party. We rose at daybreak next +morning and looked out of window for the _San Margarita_. The roadstead +of Socoa was a blank. She had steamed away during the night. After the +customary chocolate we started blithely, in a light basket-carriage with +a pair of fast-trotting ponies, that whisked us in less than two hours +to the foot of the Pyrenees. Here we had to alight, the road up the +mountain being impracticable for vehicles. A boy guide was in waiting to +show us over the border by the smuggler's path--a wild short-cut through +a labyrinth of brushwood. The guide was a remarkable youth in his way; +he understood not a syllable of French or Spanish, and spoke only Basque +which none of us comprehended, so that our parley with him was somewhat +uninteresting. Yet I was anxious to elicit the opinions of that guide. A +lad who could strike the path up the mountain with such truth might, by +some instinct, have seen his way through Spanish politics. Our walk was +a trial of endurance. I had traversed the Pyrenees in snow, and that was +fatiguing enough in all conscience; but now the sun was beating cruelly +on the parched herbage, and plodding up the ascent was like treading +burning marl. I had to cry halt half-a-dozen times before we reached the +summit; and yet that marvellous guide, with the baggage of all three on +his head, kept on with a springy step and serene smile, like the youth +in "Excelsior." It was an alternation of wheezing and stumbling with me, +with a continuous ooze of perspiration, till I arrived heaving and +panting on the crown of the ridge, and flung myself on the turf beside a +pile of planking fresh from the woodcutter's axe. There was no further +need to be wary, for this was Spain. We were over the border, and now my +companions could breathe freely in every sense. Before they had passed +the imaginary line they were liable to be arrested by the gendarmes, +conducted back and interned, for they had that about their persons which +betrayed that they were no innocent travellers. At every noise ahead, a +scud was made to the cover of the tall ferns and brambles by the +wayside, and an advance party of one was thrown out to reconnoitre. The +precautions were superfluous, if we knew but all. From the 15th of July, +the French patrols had got the hint to be blind. So lax was the cordon +on the day we crossed, that a brigade of Carlists, each man with a +repeating rifle on his shoulder and two revolvers in his belt, might +have gone into Spain and never have had their sight offended by a +solitary French uniform. + +The view from the comb of the hills, as grasped on a sunny day, repays +all the toil and trouble of the ascent; and looking round, one begins to +realize the fascination of mountain-climbing. On one side extend the +plains of France, washed by the greenish-blue waves of the Bay of +Biscay, and studded as with pearls by the coast-towns of Fontarabia, +St. Jean de Luz, Biarritz, Bayonne, and so on northwards till the vision +fails. On the other side rise in convoluting swells the mountains of +Navarre and Guipuzcoa, their slopes dyed in every shade of green from +grass and lichen, shrub and tree, except where the naked rocks, bursting +with ore, expose themselves. Iron, lead, silver, are all to be found in +the bosom of the earth in this richest and most beautiful of lands. +Nature has been lavish beyond measure, and man, instead of using her +gifts, has ungratefully diverted them for generations to the purposes of +guerrilla warfare and cheating the Custom-House officers. But this high +moral tone hardly sits well on a man who was aiding and abetting the +entry of a couple of foreign free-lances, on homicidal thoughts intent, +and perhaps doing a stroke of contraband on his own account. We suffered +no molestation; but others might not have escaped unpleasantness. The +agent of a Hatton Garden jeweller might have had to pay toll, if the +story were true that a few of the dispersed "Black Legion" had got off +with their rifles and started a joint-stock company in the +bush-whacking line, and were doing a pretty fair business. + +The descent on the Spanish side was almost precipitous, and had to be +effected with exceeding care. At times we ran down the track, rugged +with sharp crags, almost head foremost, and only saved ourselves from +falling by clinging to the nearest sapling. But there is an end to +everything, and at last we came on the road that dips into the village +of Echalar, in the district of Pampeluna, province of Navarre. Here we +dismissed our guide, and here I encountered, for the first time, a +regularly organized Carlist company, detached from the fifth battalion +of Navarre, which was in garrison at Vera, some eight miles distant; but +as I shall have opportunity to speak of the entire battalion soon, I +defer comment on its appearance. + +My companions were desirous of pushing forward, and the provisional +alcalde of the village gave us a trap to take us on. There is an +excellent road by the mountain-side, until a tunnel to the right is +reached, when we entered a most picturesque, well-wooded defile, through +which the Bidassoa pours its waters. We dashed along gaily until we +came in sight of the steeple of the church of Vera at twilight. + +A cry of "Who goes there?" from the gloom arrested us at the entrance of +the town. + +Leader sung out, "Espana." + +Again came the sentinel's cry, "What people?" and cheerily ran the +answer, "Voluntarios de Carlos Septimo!" + +"Pass," was the reply; and we took the street at a trot, and pulled up +at the door of the parish priest's dwelling, where the Irish soldiers of +fortune promised me a billet for the night. The kindly pastor was equal +to expectations; we had a cordial welcome, a good dinner, and beds with +clean sheets. + +Sad tidings met my companions--those of the death of a young friend, Mr. +John Scannel Taylor, a native of Cork, in the service of Don Carlos. A +few months previously he had been a promising law student in the Queen's +University of Ireland, with every prospect of a bright career before +him. He arrived from England in the middle of June, and attached +Himself to the partida of General Lizarraga in order to be near his +fellow-countryman, Smith Sheehan. Previous to Mr. Sheehan's returning to +Bayonne with despatches, he tossed up a coin to decide whether he or +Taylor should have the choice of the duty. Poor Taylor won, and elected +to remain with Lizarraga, as there was likelihood of fighting at hand. +The very next day Yvero, where the Republicans held a +strongly-intrenched position, was attacked, and the young Irish +volunteer made himself conspicuous in the onset. While advancing in the +open, setting a pattern of bravery to all by the steady way he delivered +his fire, the gallant fellow was struck by a bullet in the leg. He kept +on limping until he was touched a second time in the arm, but still he +persevered with a dogged courage, when a third bullet struck him in the +forehead, and he dropped with outspread arms, raising a little cloud of +dust. He must have been stone-dead before he reached the ground. His +conduct was "muy valiente," so said his Spanish comrades. He was picked +up after the affair, and decently interred side by side with two +officers who met their deaths in his company. This was the first time he +was under fire, as it was the last; but there is a fatality in those +things. + +This young Irishman, Taylor, was luckier than some of his fellows in one +respect. Short as he had been in the service, he had attracted the +notice of Don Carlos. His comrade Sheehan and he were pointed out to +"the King" by Lizarraga as two modest deserving young soldiers who had +offered to fight in the ranks--a trait of unselfishness that must have +astonished the Carlist leaders, as most of the volunteers they had from +France came out with the full intention of commanding brigades, when +divisions were not to be had. + +"I wish I had a thousand like them," said Lizarraga, who was a genuine +soldier, and one of the few Spaniards not unjust to foreigners. + +Don Carlos shook hands with Mr. Taylor and thanked him. His Majesty +spoke some few minutes in French with Mr. Sheehan, and, as the +conversation gives some insight into Carlism, I may venture to repeat +it. + +Don Carlos.--"You have served before?" + +Irish Soldier.--"Yes, sire, in the Pontifical Zouaves." + +Don Carlos.--"Ha! good. In the same company with my brother, perhaps?" + +Irish Soldier.--"No; but I had the privilege of knowing Don Alfonso." + +Don Carlos.--"He is in Catalonia now, and has many of your old +companions in arms with him. You are serving the same cause here as in +Rome--the cause of religion and of order and of legitimate right." + +Irish Soldier (bowing).--"I should not be here if I did not feel that, +your Majesty." + +Don Carlos (smiling).--"I thank you sincerely. General Lizarraga tells +me you are Irish." + +Irish Soldier.--"I come from the south of Ireland, sire." + +Don Carlos.--"A country I feel much sympathy for. She has been very +unhappy, has she not? Are things better now?" + +Irish Soldier.--"For some years Ireland has been, improving, sire." + +Don Carlos.--"That is well. She deserves better fortune, for she has a +noble, faithful people." + +Don Carlos drew back a pace and made a stiff military nod; the Irishman +brought his rifle to the "present arms," turned on his heel, and marched +back to the ranks, and thus the interview terminated. + +The valley in which the little town of Vera nestles might have been that +where Rasselas was brought up, so secluded, smiling, and peaceful it +looks. The Bidassoa, famous in tales of the Peninsular War, flows +through it, no doubt; but the Bidassoa here is a trout stream winding +through meadows and fields of maize, and thoughts of bloodshed are the +last that would occur to anyone contemplating its mild current. The +mountains walling in the vale are lined with growths of heather, fern, +and blossoming furze to their very crests, and the verdurous picture +they hem is one of poetic calm and plenty. Labourers are digging away in +the fields below, the tinkle of cow-bells is heard from the pastures, +and anon blends with their Arcadian music the soft chiming of +church-bells summoning to prayer; there is a mill with its clacking +wheel, and a foundry with a tuft of smoke curling from its chimney; +orchards and vineyards lie side by side with patches of corn, and along +the high-road peasants pass and repass, shortening their way with song +and laughter, and strings of mules or droves of swine scamper by. +Another Sweet Auburn of Goldsmith, in another Happy Valley of Johnson, +this cosy Vera with its river and trees would seem to any English +tourist ignorant of its history; but how the English tourist would be +misled! Though the peasants laugh and sing, and the labourers dig, and +there are outer tokens of peace, there is no peace in the valley or +town; there are sights and sounds there of war, and that of the worst +kind--civil war. The mill is grinding corn for the commissariat stores, +the foundry turns out shot instead of ploughshares, the boxes on the +mules' backs are packed with ammunition. If you listen, you will hear +the roll of drums and the shrill blowing of bugles more often than the +soothing bells; if you watch, you will notice that not one man in ten is +unprovided with a firearm, for this quiet-looking place is the very +hotbed of Carlism; the insurrectionary headquarters for the province of +Navarre; the arsenal and recruiting depot for all the provinces in +revolt. The disciples of the rod have fled from it, and those of the +musket have come in their stead. + +At half-past four on the morning after our arrival in the mountains, I +was roused from a profound sleep by the sound of the bugle. A solitary +performer was blowing spiritedly into his instrument; what piece of +music he was trying to execute I could not make out, but that his +primary object was to "murder sleep" was evident, and he succeeded. +Losing all note of time and place, I thought for a moment I was in +London, and that this was a visit from the Christmas waits. But there +was a liveliness in the tones incompatible with the season when the +clarionet, trombone, and cornet-a-piston form a syndicate of noise, and +parade the streets for halfpence. The bugle was in a jocular mood. Judge +of my astonishment when I learned that this merry melody was the +Carlist's reveille! The insurgents had got so far with their military +organization that they had actually buglers and bugle-calls. Nay, more, +they had drummers and a brass band! + +Now I think of it, there is an inadvisability in my calling them +insurgents while in their power; but what phrase am I to employ? In the +pass in my pocket I am recommended to "the Chiefs of the Royal Army of +his Catholic Majesty Charles VII.," as an inoffensive "corresponsal +particular," to whom aid and protection may be safely extended. But then +there are the Republicans, and if they catch me giving premature +recognition in pen-and-ink to the Royalist cause, they may rightly +complain that a British subject is flying in the face of the great +British policy of non-intervention. I think I have discovered an escape +from the dilemma. The Carlists speak of themselves as the Chicos, "the +bhoys," so Chicos let them be for the future, and their opponents the +troops--not that it is by any means intended to be conveyed that the +troops so called are much more martial than the Chicos. + +Well, the boys have got buglers who bugle with a will. They blow a blast +to rouse us, another for distribution of rations; they have the +assembly, the retreat, the "lights out," and all the rest, as regular as +the Diddlesex Militia. I got up in the Cora's house, looked at the +Cura's pictures--which were more meritorious as works of piety than as +works of art--and hastened to the Plaza, where I was told there was +about to be a muster of the Chicos, and I would have a leisurely +opportunity of passing them under inspection. The Plaza is a flagged +space enclosed on two sides by houses, some of which are over a couple +of centuries old, with armorial bearings sculptured over the doors; on +the third by the Municipality; and on the fourth by a grey church, lofty +and large, seated on an eminence and approached by a flight of stone +steps. The Municipality is a massive building, level with the street, +with a colonnaded portico, and a front over which some artist in +distemper had passed his brush. This facade is eloquent with mural +painting, if one could only understand it all. There are symbolic +figures of heroic size, coveys of cherubs, hatchments, masonic-looking +emblems, and inscriptions. A Carlist sentry, dandling a naked bayonet in +the hollow of his arm, was pacing to and fro in the portico, and the +remaining warriors of the post were lounging about, cigarette in mouth, +much as our own fellows do outside the guard-house on Commercial Square, +at Gibraltar. I was curious to see the Carlist uniform. Assuredly the +uniform does not make the soldier, but it goes a great way towards it. +Uniformity was the least striking feature in the dress of the men before +me. They were clad in the ordinary garb of the mountain-peasants. Short +coarse jackets and loose trousers, confined at the waist by a faja, or +girdle of bright-coloured woollen stuff, were worn by some; blouses of +serge, knee-breeches, and stockings or gaiters, by others; but all, +without exception, had the boina, or pancake-shaped woollen cap of the +Basque provinces, and the alpargatas, or flat-soled canvas shoes. +By-and-by was heard a bugle-blast and the quick, regular tread of +marching men, and the head of a company came in sight. In perfect time +the company paced, four deep, into the Plaza, halted, and fell into line +in two ranks. Thus, in succession, seven other companies arrived, +forming the fifth, battalion of Navarre, a vigorous, wiry set of men, +impressing the experienced eye as excellent raw material for soldiers, +albeit got up in costume very much resembling that of brigands of the +Comic Opera. Physically, the natives of the hilly northern provinces are +the pick of Spain. The battalion had its flag, white between two stripes +of scarlet, on which was inscribed the name of the corps, and the +legend, "The country for ever, but always in honour." This was, of +course, written in Basque, of which my rendering is rather free, but it +gives exactly the sense of the sentiment. It was soon palpable to +anybody, who knows anything of such matters, that the Chicos were weak +in officers of the proper stamp, and still more so in under-officers. +Smoking was common in the ranks, and when the men stood at ease, they +stood very much at ease indeed. The officers, in some cases, were +distinguished in dress from the privates solely by gold or silver +tassels dependent from their boinas, and their boinas were of blue, +white, brown, or even Republican red, according to the fancy of the +wearer. All the officers had revolvers and swords. The men were armed +somewhat indiscriminately, one company with Chassepots, another with +Remingtons; there were carbines, and percussion rifles, and +smooth-bores, and even a few flint-locks; but I failed to discern a +single specimen of the trabuco, the bell-mouthed blunderbuss we are +accustomed to associate with the Spanish knight of the road. Ammunition +was carried in a waist-belt, with a surrounding row of leather tubes +lined with tin, each of which held a cartridge--in fact, the Circassian +cartouch-case. There were many grizzled weather-stained veterans in the +ranks who had fought with Zumalacarregui and Mina in the Seven Years' +War; but as a rule the Chicos were literally boys in age, and here and +there a child of twelve or fourteen might be seen measuring himself +beside a patriotic musket. In relief to the peasant dresses were to be +noticed frequent attempts at more soldierly costume in the shape of worn +tunics of the French National Guards or Moblots, and some half-dozen +uniforms of the Spanish Line, with the glazed kepi exchanged for the +boina. On the top of many of the boinas, fastening the tassel, was a +huge brass button, with the monogram of the "King," and the inscription, +"Voluntarios, Dios, Patria, y Rey." Another sign particular of this +irregular force that impressed me much was a bleeding heart embroidered +on a small scrap of cloth, and sewn on the left breasts of nearly all on +the ground. This appeared to be worn as a charm against bullets; and +with a strong notion that it would protect them in the hour of danger, I +am convinced nine out of ten of those peasants carried it. It may be as +well to add that inside that embroidered patch were written, in Spanish, +the words, "Stop; the heart of Jesus is here; defend me, Jesus." Many +others of the Carlists carried scapulars, rosary beads, and blessed +medals as pious reminders. The habit of wearing this representation of +the heart of the Saviour over the region of the human heart dates so far +back as the Vendean War, and had been introduced in the present instance +by M. Cathelineau, grandson of the celebrated French Royalist loader. + +The battalion had assembled on the Plaza to give up their old arms, and +to receive a portion of those which had been landed from the _San +Margarita_. They deposited those they had with them by sections in the +Municipality, and emerged with the others, bright, brand-new Berdan +breechloaders. They seemed proud of their weapons; some went so far as +to kiss them; and, if looks were any criterion of feelings, their +glowing faces said, as emphatically as it could be said, "Now that we +have good tools, we shall show what good work we can do." Boxes of +metallic ball-cartridges, centre-primed, were piled on the Plaza, and +were quickly and quietly opened and distributed. Not an accident +occurred in the process. Many a less wonderful phenomenon has been +advertised as a miracle. I fully expected to have my coat spattered with +some warrior's brains every other moment, with such a reckless rashness +were the rifle-muzzles poked about. One shot did go off, while a high +private was trying if his cartridge fitted to the chamber; the charge +singed the hair of a captain, and the bullet lodged in the middle of the +word "Prudencia" on the facade of the Municipality. The captain would +have it that he was killed, spun round on his own centre like a +humming-top, and finally, coming to himself, shook out his clothes in +search of the lead. There was a roar of laughter, and the careless +soldier who had endangered the life of his officer was allowed to pass +without rebuke. That was the worst point in Carlist discipline I had +seen yet. There was too much familiarity towards superiors; the rank and +file lacked that fear and respect for the officers which are the +strongest cement of the military fabric. This was to be explained partly +because the officers were not above the men in social position, and +partly because any enterprising gentleman who bought gold braid and +tassels, sported a sword, and appraised himself an officer, was accepted +at his own valuation. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + The Cura of Vera--Fueros of the Basques--Carlist Discipline--Fate + of the _San Margarita_--The Squadron of Vigilance--How a Capture + was Effected--The Sea-Rovers in the Dungeon--Visit to the + Prisoners--San Sebastian--A Dead Season--The Defences of a + Threatened City--Souvenirs of War--The Miqueletes--In a Fix--A + German Doctor's Warning. + + +THESE horrible and bloodthirsty Carlists turned out to be amiable +individuals on acquaintance. I suppose they could put on a frown for +their enemies, but for my companions and myself they had nothing but +open smiles and hearty hand-grips. One great recommendation was our +being billeted on the parish priest. His reverence had none of the Santa +Cruz in him; he was a gentle, zealous, studious clergyman, yet was +filled with the purest enthusiasm for the cause of what he regarded as +legitimacy. The Don Carlos who raised the standard in 1833, he +maintained, was the rightful heir to the throne of Spain. The law by +which the succession had been changed was an _ex post facto_ law, passed +after his birth, and not promulgated until Ferdinand VII. had a female +child. In May, 1845, that Don Carlos, really Charles V., resigned in +favour of his son, Charles VI., and in September, 1868, he, in his turn, +relinquished his rights to the present claimant to the throne, Charles +VII., whom might God preserve. + +The Cura was unusually civil towards us because we were Irish, and as +Irish were presumably of clean lineage--that is to say, free from +kinship with Jews or infidels. As reputed descendants of settlers from +Bilbao, we were entitled to a full share in all the privileges of the +province of Biscay. This was as well to know. It was a consolation to us +to learn that it was an advantage to be Irish somewhere under the sun. +The King of Spain is but Lord of Biscay, and has to swear under the +oak-tree of Guernica to respect the fueros or customs of the province. +Don Carlos had so done; he was in Spain, it was true, but where he was +at the moment the Cura was unable to say; his court was perambulatory. + +The fueros were abolished by the Cortes in 1841 and but partially +restored in 1844, so that in inscribing them as one of the watchwords on +their banner, the Basques were fighting for something more solid than +glory. They cling to their rights as Britons do to Magna Charta, only +with this difference--they have a clearer conception of what they are. I +had been trying to arrive at some knowledge of the fueros, and obtained +much information from a volume by the late Earl of Carnarvon.[D] +Guipuzcoa, Alava, and Biscay, though an integral part of the Spanish +monarchy, for ages enjoyed their own laws, and a recapitulation of some +which were in force in Biscay will be a fair sample of all. Biscay was +governed by its own national assemblies, arranged its own taxation, +yielded contributions to the Sovereign as a free gift, had no militia +laws, was exempt from naval impressment, provided for its own police in +peace and its own defence in war. No monopoly, public or private, could +be established there. Only Biscayans by birth could be nominated to +ecclesiastical appointments; every Biscayan was noble, and his house was +inviolable; there was perfect equality of civil rights. In short, those +Basques flourished under the amplest measure of Home Rule, and had all +the benefits of the Habeas Corpus Act under another name long before +that Bill was legalized by the Parliament of Charles II. The +liberty-loving Basques were tolerant as well as independent. The +Inquisition was never vouchsafed breathing-room in their midst. When +Protestants escaped from France after the massacre of St. Bartholomew, +they were treated to asylum amongst them.[E] + +We moved about among the guerrilleros. They were mostly light-limbed and +stalwart men, and were none the worse for the sprinkling of seniors of +sixty and lads of sixteen. Many had the bow-legs of the mountaineer, +built like the hinder pair of artillery-horses--the legs that tell of +muscularity and lasting stamina. Their drill was very loose, and skill +in musketry left much to be desired. They had no perception of +distance-judging, and some were so grossly ignorant of the mechanism of +their weapons that they knocked off the back-sights of their rifles, +alleging that they hindered them from taking correct aim. The Marquis de +la Hormazas--a meagre, tall, elderly man--was commandant of the +battalion, and was stern in the exaction of discipline. During the stay +of the Navarrese at Vera, a captain was degraded to the ranks for having +entered the lists of illicit love. The Frenchwoman who was the partner +of his amour was politely shown over the mountain and warned not to +return. + +The battalion left for the interior of the province. Leader was still +too weak to enter on a campaign; Sheehan had to look after the +belongings of his comrade Taylor, and break the news of his death to his +mother; and I saw plainly that it was out of the question attempting to +catch up the flitting headquarters of Don Carlos without a horse. +Besides, I had to complete arrangements for the transmission of letters +and telegraphic messages when I had any to send, and for the reception +of money; in sum, to open up communication with a base. So we returned +to France as we came. + +On arriving at St. Jean de Luz, a startling rumour awaited us. The +steel-built Carlist privateer had been captured at the mouth of the +Adour; she had been taken a prize to San Sebastian; Stuart and Travers +were in close custody; and there were alarmists who whispered that they +would be tried by drum-head as pirates, and hung up in chains in the +cause of humanity. It was well for me I did not accept the invitation to +that water-party. I ran over to Bayonne to ascertain what particulars I +could, saw the Carlist Junta, the British and Spanish Vice-Consuls, and +from their combined and conflicting narratives was able to sift some +grains of the authentic. But the sudden first report was undeniable. The +weasel had been caught asleep. + +The _San Margarita_ was a serious loss to the cause. She had cost +L3,500. She was very fast, being capable of a speed of between ten and +eleven knots an hour, and should be equal to fourteen knots if her +lifting screw had another blade. A three-bladed screw had been provided, +and was to have been fitted to her stern on her return from the +ill-fated expedition which put an end to her roving career. It was true +that the descendant of kings was under bolts and bars. The French +journals described him as a "Monsieur Stuart, a Scotch colonel, +entrusted by the English Catholics with collections for the Carlist +cause." They had never heard of his royal lineage, of his connection +with the Austrian cavalry, or of his exploits by the side of the unhappy +Maximilian in Mexico. He assumed the responsibility of ownership of the +vessel. The hue-and-cry description of him was "a man of forty to +forty-five years of age, over middle height, figure spare, features +thin, and resolute in expression." + +The burly bronzed Corkonian was also in durance, and with the pair of +officers were a picked crew of thirteen Englishmen, including engineers, +steward, stokers, and able-bodied seamen, and one Spanish cabin-boy. A +Basque pilot, an old smuggler, familiar with every nook and crevice of +the Bay of Biscay, had escaped. + +If reports were credible, the _San Margarita_ had already landed two +millions of cartridges, and an immense quantity of arms. Much vexation +was caused to the officers of the Spanish navy in those quarters by the +stories of the daring feats she had achieved, absolutely discharging a +cargo once on the very wharf of Lequeieto, as if she were a peaceful +merchantman, and on another occasion sending off rifles and ammunition +by small boats in the dead of night, a man-of-war lying sleepily +oblivious of what was going on just outside her. It was felt that her +continued impunity was a reproach, and three small vessels of the +Spanish navy were commissioned to cruise between Bilbao and Bayonne on +the look-out for her. This little squadron of vigilance consisted of _El +Aspirante_ and _El Capricho_, gun-boats, and the _Buenaventura_, a +three-gun steam-brig. On Tuesday, August 12th, the _Buenaventura_, +flying a George's Jack at her peak, was off Fontarabia for a portion of +the day, close in shore. At nightfall she disappeared--it is now +supposed into the sheltered and almost invisible inlet of Los Pasages, +between Fontarabia and San Sebastian. Before daybreak on Wednesday, the +Carlists under Dorregaray swarmed down from the hills covering Cape +Higuer. The _San Margarita_ came in sight, and began landing arms in the +same spot where the undisturbed landing of the 28th July had been +effected. Not more than three hundred stand had been put on shore, and +about one hundred thousand cartridges in boxes, labelled in English +"metallic rolled cartridges, centre-primed," when she had to get away, +as the daylight began to play the informer. She dropped down towards +Bayonne, and appears to have reached a point some four miles from the +French shore (the exact distance is a moot question), where she laid to +and allowed her furnaces to cool The men were "dead tired out" after +their night's work, and the captain considered that he was within the +protection of French waters. But there is a very ancient proverb about a +pitcher and a veil, and the period of its realization had been reached +at last Whilst the _San Margarita_ was effecting the landing, a +coastguard's boat had slipped from under the heights of Fontarabia, and +given notice of what was going on to the _Buenaventura_ in Los Pasages, +and the brig steamed out, still with the British colours at her peak +Whilst the Carlist privateer was motionless in fancied security--there +was some want of prudence or vigilance there, surely--the gun-brig crept +down and overhauled her before alarm could be given, and the rakish +schooner-yacht, the skimmer of the seas, had the humiliation of falling +a prey to a wretched slow boat that she could laugh at with steam up in +the open sea. The arrest was made in the usual manner, and the captors +behaved with the customary naval courtesy. They were over-joyed at their +good fortune, and gave their prisoners to eat and to drink--champagne to +the officers and chacoli to the men. They towed their prize into the bay +of St. Sebastian, and there was triumph. The yellow and scarlet flag of +Spain was over the wee _San Margarita_ as she entered, and Colonel +Stuart and Captain Travers and their companions must have felt sore, +for all the good cheer and generous wine. Still there was quite a +courtly scene on board--hand-shakings and reciprocal compliments--as +they were marched off to the dungeon of the Castillo de la Mota on a +hill in the city, where they were incarcerated. There they did not fall +on such pleasant lines as afloat. The Republicans lost no time in +unloading the vessel. They took off her, with a hurry that betrayed +apprehension, 1,545 carbines and six Berdan breech-loaders, with a +number of armourer's tools. It was remarked that the rifles supplied to +the regular troops from Madrid were sighted to eight hundred metres, but +that the range of those seized from the Carlists did not exceed five +hundred. + +I went over to San Sebastian by tug from Socoa on the 16th of August, +and sent up my card to M. de Brunet, the British Vice-Consul. He said he +had called on the prisoners, and that the sailors murmured at their +treatment. If I went to the citadel, after three--as it was Saturday +afternoon, and visiting hours commenced then--I could see them without +difficulty. I did clamber up the hill, and found this was not the case. +On owning that I had no pass from the military governor, I was denied +admittance. Happening to meet the commandant, I represented what I +wanted, and he very civilly granted me leave to visit the prisoners +"para un momento." As the gates were thrown open Stuart advanced and met +me, grasping my hand cordially, and slipping a letter up the sleeve of +my coat. He had caught sight of me labouring up the hill, and had +immediately hastened to scribble a few lines which he trusted to my +sympathy with misfortune to smuggle to their destination for him. He was +not mistaken, and in so doing I had no qualm of conscience. I +accompanied him to his cell, and he told me the story of the capture of +the _San Margarita_. It was substantially as I have related; they +thought they were in a _mare clausum_, at all events they had drifted +out of it on the tide of fate; but there was a nice question of +international law. The _ruse_ of hoisting the British flag was +legitimate if the _Buenaventura_ substituted her own flag before +proceeding to board them. The _San Margarita_ had the flags of more +than one nation in her lockers; but the gun-brig had no power to act the +policeman in neutral waters. There was the point. Travers was in a +separate lodging; they had been accommodated at first in the one cell, +but they could not agree--ashore as afloat the old feud existed. +However, both assented to a truce in order to have a talk with me. They +were cheerful, had cigars _ad libitum_ (at their own expense, of +course), and were permitted to get their rations from the Hotel de +Londres in the city. The cells they occupied were bare, white-washed, +low-ceiled rooms, some eight paces by six. They were not so clean or +well-ventilated as Newgate cells, and the beds were spread on the floor. +The captives had access to newspapers and writing materials, and it is +but the due of the officers in charge to testify that they were +extremely affable and disposed to make their prisoners as comfortable as +possible. Still, in the close, stifling weather, to be locked up within +the narrow circuit of a dungeon was limbo. The pair wore their own +clothes, Travers still retaining a navy-jacket with brass buttons +engraved with the initials of some yacht club, and did not complain of +having been subjected to indignities. While I was with them the shadow +of a face darkened the window; it was a Carlist prisoner who had hoisted +himself up on the shoulders of a comrade from a yard below; he had a +letter in his mouth. I took it, and slipped him a bundle of cigars for +distribution among his fellow cage-birds. From this it may be deduced +that the gaol regulations were not very stringent. The Carlists were +treated as forfeit of war, not felons, and had no honest chance of +illuminating their brows with the martyr halo of Baron von Trenck or +Silvio Pellico. + +San Sebastian is the most modern town in the Peninsula, having been +re-built in 1816, three years after its destruction by the incensed +allied troops. It is a great summer resort of wealthy Spanish idlers--a +sort of Madrid-super-Mare. The attractions of the capital are to be had +there, with the supplementary advantages of pure air, mountain scenery, +and luxurious sea-bathing on a level sandy beach. There is a public +casino, and a score of clandestine hells where a fortune can be lost in +a night at monte--in short, every infernal facility for Satanic +gambling. Cigarettes are cheap, and so are knives. There is an Alameda, +where the band plays, and a passable imitation, of the Puerta del Sol, +less the fountain, in the broad arcaded Plaza de la Constitution. There +is a small theatre, a spacious bull-ring, and several commodious +churches, where Pepita can talk the language of fans to her heart's +content. Every attraction of Madrid which could reasonably be expected +is to be had, I repeat, and hidalgos and sloe-eyed senoras speckle the +promenades in the gloaming, and impart a mingled aroma of garlic and +gentility, pomade and pretentiousness, to the chief town of Guipuzcoa. +San Sebastian would be for Madrilenos what Paris is for Bostonians, if a +few of the attractions of the "only court," which could not reasonably +be expected, were not lacking--say an occasional walk round of the +Intransigentes, to show their political muscles; a grandiloquent, frothy +word-tempest in the Congress, and the Sunday cock-fight. I am speaking, +be it understood, of San Sebastian in ordinary summers. A short +twelvemonth before my visit, a pair of pouting English lips told me it +was "awfully jolly." + +At the date with which I am concerned, it was anything but "awfully +jolly." The fifteen thousand rich visitors who were wont to flock into +the city during the season had gone elsewhere to recruit their health on +the sands and lose their money at the gaming-tables. They had been +frightened to the coasts of France by the apparition of Carlism, and San +Sebastian was plaintive. Her streets and her coffers were empty. The +campamento of bathing-huts was ranged as usual on the velvet rim of the +ear-like bay, but no bathers were there. There were more domestics than +guests in the hotels; and at the _table d'hote_ three sat down in a +saloon designed for a hundred to breakfast in; and we had no butter. The +peasants in the country round were afraid to bring in the produce of +their dairies and barn-yards. The bull-ring was to let; conscientious +barbers shaved each other or dressed the hair on the wax busts in their +windows, in order to keep alive the traditions of their craft; the +fiddlers in the concert-room of the casino scraped lamentations to +imaginary listeners. A Sahara of dust had settled on the curtain of the +theatre, and fleet-footed spiders made forages athwart it from one +cobwebby stronghold to another. The once festive resort had lost its +spirits completely, and all on account of this civil war. It was summer, +but the city was in a state of hibernation. No business was done in the +shops, the cafes were empty, most of the resident population who could +afford it had emigrated, and the public squares were as vacant as if +there were a perpetual siesta. There was no sign of animation, as we +understand it in England. There were but three vessels in the west +bay--the _Buenaventura_, a merchant steamer, and the _San Margarita_, +pinioned at last, her yellow funnel cold. Sojourn in the place was +insupportable. I knew not how to kill the tedious hours. I climbed again +to the Castle of the Mota, inspected some English tombs on the slope of +the acclivity, and noticed that if the citadel is still a position of +strength, nature deserves much of the credit. The defences recently +thrown up had been devised and executed carefully, and if the defenders +were only true to themselves, the Carlists, with no better artillery +than they possessed, might as well think of taking the moon as of +entering San Sebastian. They would have a formidable fire from +well-planted cannon to face; stockades, and strong earthworks, and more +than one blockhouse cunningly pierced with loopholes, to carry. Even if +San Sebastian was entered, the configuration of the streets was such as +to give every aid to disciplined men as opposed to mere guerrilleros. +The city is built in blocks, on the American system; the wide +thoroughfares cross each other at right-angles, and all of them could be +swept as with a besom by a few guns _en barbette_ behind a breastwork at +either end. In this sort of work, accuracy of aim is not called for, as +in that warfare up in the mountains. If it were, not much reliance could +be placed on the Republican artillery. General Hidalgo had well-nigh +nullified that arm of the service. A Carlist leader, in whose +information and whose word confidence could be reposed, assured me that +not a single Carlist had yet been killed or wounded by the Republican +gunners. The estimated lists of the enemy's casualties given by both +parties during the struggle, I may remark _en passant_, were grossly +exaggerated. The butcher's bill was very small in proportion to the +expenditure of gunpowder. Returning to the question of the defence of +San Sebastian--even on the supposition that the main works and town were +to fall into the hands of the Carlists, the citadel still remained, +where a determined leader could hold out till relief came, as long as +his provisions lasted. This lofty citadel is almost impregnable. It was +hither the French retired in 1813, and it took General Graham all that +he knew to dislodge them. If I were asked what were the prospects of the +Carlists getting into the place, I should say there was but one--by +crossing over a golden bridge. But that implied the possession of money, +and money was precisely what the Carlists declared they needed most. + +There was always the remote hazard of a Carlist rising in San Sebastian, +for there were in the city the children of settlers from the rural +districts who bit their thumbs at the sight of the muzzled _San +Margarita_, and prayed that Charles VII. might have "his ain again." But +they were in the minority. The Miqueletes, a soldierly body of men in +scarlet Basque scones very like to the Carlist head-gear, and a blue +capote with cape attached, garrisoned the citadel. They were brave and +loyal to the Republic, and the object of deep grudge to the Chicos, for +they were Basques of the towns. Many of these provincial militiamen had +come in from the small pueblos in the neighbourhood, where they ran the +risk of being eaten up by "the bhoys;" and this was the only accession +to the population which redeemed the dismal, tradeless port from the +appearance of having been stricken by plague and abandoned, and lent it +at intervals an artificial bustle. + +I sickened of San Sebastian, with its angular propriety; its high, +haughty houses, holding up their heads in architectural primness; its +wide geometrical streets, where there is no shade in the sun, no shelter +in the wind. I began to hate it for its rectilinearity, and dub it a +priggish, stuck-up, arrogant upstart among cities. What business had it +to be so straight and clean and airy? Fain would I shake the dust off my +feet in testimony against it; but here was the trouble. How to get +away--that was a knotty problem. The railway had been torn up for +months, and the armour-vested locomotives were rusting on the sidings at +Hendaye. The dirty hot little tug, the _Alcorta_, that plies between the +quay and Socoa, had left; and I grieved not, for the thought of a +passage by her was nausea. Three more torturing hours never dragged +their slow length along for me than those I spent on board her coming +over. Try and call up to yourself three hours in a low-class cook-shop, +coated an inch thick with filth, and fitted over the boiler of a penny +steamer dancing a marine break-down on the Thames, opposite the outlet +of the main-drainage pipes. That, intensified by strange oaths and +slop-basins, was the passage by the _Alcorta_. But dreary, lonely San +Sebastian was not to be endured. Those poor fellows above, accustomed to +the wild freshness and freedom of the sea, how they must mourn and +repine! By some means or other I must get back to the world that is not +petrified. No diligences dare to affront the dangers of the short +journey to the Irun railway-station, since three were stopped some days +before, the traces cut, the horses stolen, the windows shattered, the +woodwork burned, and the charred wreck left on the roadside, a terror to +those who neglect to obey the commands of the Royalist leaders. + +"Royalist prigants, serr!" shouted a corpulent German doctor, connected +with mines in the neighbourhood, who retained fierce recollections of +having been robbed of a "boney, capitalest of boneys for crossing a +mountain." + +I told the doctor I was about to trust to luck, and set out on foot if I +could persuade nobody to provide me with a vehicle. + +"Serr, you air mad, foolish mad," said the doctor. "Those horrid +beebles, I tell you, are worse than prigants; if you hayff money, they +will dake it; if you hayff not money, they will stroke your pack fifty +times, pecause you hayff it not. They will cut your ears off; they will +cut your nose off; they are plack tevils!" + +I determined to trust to luck all the same. The black devils might not +be all out so black as they were painted. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + Belcha's Brigands--Pale-Red Republicans--The Hyena--More about the + _San Margarita_--Arrival of a Republican Column--The Jaunt to Los + Pasages--A Sweet Surprise--"The Prettiest Girl in Spain"--A Madrid + Acquaintance--A Costly Pull--The Diligence at Last--Renteria and + its Defences--A Furious Ride--In France Again--Unearthing Santa + Cruz--The Outlaw in his Lair--Interviewed at Last--The Truth about + the Endarlasa Massacre--A Death-Warrant--The Buried Gun--Fanaticism + of the Partisan-Priest. + + +THERE is fine scope for exaggeration in civil war; but he who wants the +truth about the Montagues does not consult the Capulets. There must be +bad characters amongst the Carlists, I reflected; and when they are on +outpost duty at a distance from officers, and have taken a drop of +aguardiente too much, they may sometimes fail to appreciate the nice +distinction between _meum_ and _tuum_. The band of one Belcha, which was +hovering in the neighbourhood of San Sebastian, had a shady reputation. +It would be unjust to tempt these simple-minded guerrilleros with the +sight of a Derringer, a hunting-watch, a tobacco-pouch, or a +reconnoitring-glass. All these articles are useful on the hills. But +even Belcha's looters had some conscience; they drew the line at money +and wedding-rings. Besides, in cases of robbery restitution was +invariably made when the chiefs of the revolt were appealed to in proper +form, so that on the whole the Carlists did not deserve the name the +German doctor had given them. Regular soldiers do not always carry the +Decalogue in their kit; there was marauding in the Peninsula, +notwithstanding the iron discipline of the Iron Duke; the Summer Palace +at Pekin was despoiled of its treasures by gentlemen in epaulettes, and +the Franco-German War was not entirely unconnected with stories about +vanishing clocks. So I would not be diverted from my purpose. + +Before leaving San Sebastian I tried to obtain permission for a second +visit to the citadel-prison in order to see the crew of the _San +Margarita_, but without avail. Yet the officers in charge (all of the +regular army), and indeed the privates of the local militia, were +anything but truculent gaolers; they seemed willing to strain a point to +oblige. The Republicanism of the officers was of a very pale red; but +there was one hirsute Volunteer of Liberty who acted as chief warder, +and took a delight in the occupation. He rattled his bunch of keys as if +their metallic dissonance were music, grumbled at the urbanity of his +superiors, and bore himself altogether as if their politics were +suspicious; and he, a pure of the pure, were there as warder over that +too. I nicknamed him the hyena in my own mind; but I could not conceive +him laughing anywhere save in front of a garrote with a Royalist neck in +the rundel, and then his laugh at best would be but the inward chuckle +of a Modoc. + +Stuart took the hyena coolly, regarding him as an amusing phenomenon; +Travers surveyed him as he would the portrait of the Nabob on London +hoardings, and pronounced him a whimsical illustration of Republican +sauce. Stuart, I should have stated, was anxious that it should be +known that he had caused the name of the whilom _Deerhound_ to be erased +from the list of yachts, when he chartered her as a merchant-steamer, +renamed her, and went into the contraband-of-war line. It was contrary +to his wish to compromise any club. The confiscated cargo was the last +he had intended delivering, but he told me with a smile that ten +thousand stand of rifles had already found their way to Vera. There was +no legitimate explanation of the capture of the hare by the tortoise, +although Travers was prepared to swear he was in French waters--he +thought he was, no doubt--but he was just on the wrong side of the +limit. There was one comfort. On the way to Bayonne a boat-load of men +had been landed at Socoa on leave, amongst them the Basque pilot, who +might otherwise have been helped to a short shrift, and the dog's death +from a yard-arm. + +Carlist sympathizers endeavoured to procure me a conveyance to Irun, but +nobody cared to affront the loss of horses, for Belcha's band +requisitioned the cattle even of those identical in political +feeling--the good of the cause was their plea--so at last I was forced +to say I should be glad of a trap to Los Pasages, a few miles off, +whence I might be able to go forward on foot. + +While I was waiting for the arrival of the vehicle, and reading _El +Diario_, the local daily paper--a sheet the size of the palm of one's +hand--until I had the contents by rote, an incident occurred to beguile +suspense. The vanguard of the corps of Sanchez Bregua, the commander of +the Republican Army of the North, rode into the city. They had come from +Zarauz, a seaside village four leagues away--a section of mounted +Chasseurs in a uniform like to that of the old British Light Dragoons. +The troopers were in campaign order, with rifled carbines slung over +their backs, pugarees hanging from their shakoes over their necks, and +were dust-covered and sunburnt, but soldierly. They were horsed +unevenly, and for light cavalry carried too great a burden. But that is +not a fault peculiar to Spanish light cavalry. The average weight of the +British Hussar equipped is eighteen stone. A quarter of an hour later +the main body came in sight, a long column of infantry marching by +fours. It was headed by a party of Civil Guards, acting as guides. As +the column reached the open space by the quay, it deployed into line of +companies, a movement capitally executed. The men were bigger and +tougher than those of the French Line. Their uniform was similar, except +that they had wings to their capotes instead of worsted epaulettes. All +wore mountain-shoes, but were not hampered with tenting equipage on +their knapsacks. Each battalion was led by a staff-officer, who was +splendidly, or wretchedly, mounted, as his luck had served him. The +company officers carried alpenstocks, and their orderlies had officers' +cast foraging-caps on top of their glazed shakoes. I noticed a battalion +of Cazadores, distinguished by the emblematic brass horn of chase +wrought on their collars, and two companies of Engineers in uniforms +entirely blue, with towers on their collars. These latter were robust, +sinewy young fellows. After the infantry came a company of the 2nd +Regiment of Mountain Artillery with four small pieces, each drawn by a +single mule, and behind them a squadron of Mounted Chasseurs, and a +long cavalcade of pack-horses and mules. + +After a deal of exploration a driver was dug up, and after a deal of +negotiation he consented to take me to Los Pasages. Thanks to Republican +vigilance, but principally it may have been to the nature of the ground, +the road thither was clear. We started at six o'clock in the evening, +and after a lively spin through sylvan scenery drew up in less than an +hour at the outskirts of a village on the edge of a quiet pool, which we +had bordered for nigh a mile. No papers had been asked for, on leaving, +at the bridge over the Urumea, where a post of volunteers kept guard by +an antique and stumpy bronze howitzer, mounted on a siege-carriage, and +furnished with the dolphin-handles to be seen on some of the +last-century guns in the Tower Arsenal. No papers were asked for either +at the Customs' station, some hundred yards farther on; but the +Carabineros looked upon me as a lunatic, and significantly sibilated. +None were asked for at the approach to the village. Scarcely had I +alighted when a fishwife ran out of a cabin and addressed me in Basque. +I could not understand her, and motioned her away, when a winsome lassie +of some eighteen summers, tripping up the road, came to my aid, and +began speaking in French as if she were anticipating my arrival. + +"Monsieur wants a shallop to go to France?" + +I was taken aback, but answered, "Yes." + +"Monsieur will follow me." + +And she gave me a meaning sign--half a wink, half a monition. I +followed, and examined my volunteer guide more attentively. What a prize +of a girl! Hair black as night, but with a glossy blackness, was parted +on her smooth forehead, and retained behind, after the fashion of the +country, by a coloured snood, but two thick Gretchen plaits escaped, and +hung down to her waist, making one wish that she had let her whole +wealth of tresses wander free. Eyes blue-black, full by turns of soft +love and sparkling mischief; Creole complexion, with blood rich as +marriage-wine coursing in the dimpled cheeks; teeth white as the fox's; +lips of clove-pink. And what a shape had she--ripe, firm, and piquant! +Do you wonder that I followed her with joy? Do you wonder that I began +weaving a romance? If you do, I pity you. Did I want a shallop? Of +course I did; but alas! might I not have echoed Burger's lament: + + "The shallop of my peace is wrecked + On Beauty's shore." + +She was a Carlist, I was sure of that. All the comely maidens were +Carlists. In the service of the King the most successful crimps were +"dashing white sergeants" in garter and girdle. And she took me for an +interesting Carlist fugitive, and she was determined to aid in my +escape. How ravishing! She was a Flora Macdonald, and I--would be a +Pretender. I had fully wound myself up to that as we entered Los +Pasages. + +Los Pasages consists of rows of houses built on either side of a basin +of the sea, entered by a narrow chasm in the high rocky coast. Sailing +by it, one would never imagine that that cleft in the shore-line was a +gate to a natural harbour, locked against every wind, and large enough +to accommodate fleets, and whose waters are generally placid as a lake. +This secure haven, _statio benefida carinis_, is hidden away in the lap +of the timbered hills, and is approached by a passage (from which its +name is borrowed) which can be traversed in fifteen minutes. The change +from the boisterous Bay of Biscay, with its "white horses capering +without, to this Venetian expanse of water in a Swiss valley, dotted +with chalets and cottages, must have the effect of a magic +transformation on the emotional tar who has never been here before, and +whose chance it was to lie below when his ship entered. The refuge is +not unknown to English seamen, for there is a stirring trade in minerals +with Cardiff, in more tranquil times. But now Los Pasages is deserted +from the bar down to the uttermost point of its long river-like stretch +inland, except by the smacks and small boats of the native fishers, a +tiny tug, and a large steamer from Seville which is lying by the wharf. +There is no noise of traffic; the one narrow street echoes to our +tramping feet as I follow my charming cicerone, who has started up for +me like some good spirit of a fairy-tale. She leads me to an inn, bids +me enter, and flies in search of the owner of the shallop. The landlord +comes to greet me, and I recognise in him an acquaintance--Maurice, a +former waiter in the Fonda de Paris, in Madrid. I questioned Maurice as +to my chances of getting across to Irun by land that night; but he +assured me it was too late, and really dangerous; that the road was +infested by gangs of desperadoes; and that it would be safer for me to +travel, even in the day-time, without money or valuables. The owner of +the shallop came, but as he had the audacity to ask eighty francs for +transporting me round to Fontarabia, and as I had found Maurice, I +resolved to stop in Los Pasages for the night. + +"You have only to cross the water to-morrow morning," said Maurice, "and +you are in Kenteria, where you will be sure to get a vehicle." + +The backs of the houses all overlook the port, and all are balconied and +furnished with flowered terraces, from which one can fish, look at his +reflection, or take a header into the water at pleasure. A glorious nook +for a reading-party's holiday, Los Pasages. Not if fair mysteries like +my friend crop up there; but where is she, by-the-way? She does not +re-appear; but Maurice will help me to discover who and what she is. + +"Maurice, are there any pretty girls here?" + +Maurice looks at me reproachfully. + +"Senor, you have been conducted to my house by one who is acknowledged +to be the prettiest in all Spain." + +That night I dreamt of Eugenia, the baker's daughter, the pride of Los +Pasages, who was waiting for a husband, but would have none but one who +helps Charles VII. to the throne. I recorded that dream for the +bachelors of Britain, and conjured them to make haste to propose for +her--not that the Carlist war was hurrying to a close; but I have +remarked that girls inclined to be plump at eighteen sometimes develop +excessive embonpoint about eight-and-twenty. On inquiry, I found a key +to the enigma which had filled me with sweet excitement. Eugenia, who +had been to the citadel-prison to carry provisions to a friend in +trouble, had seen me speaking to Colonel Stuart, and was anxious to +serve me because of my supposed Carlist tincture. My supposed Carlist +tincture did not prevent a lusty Basque boatman from charging five +francs next morning for the five minutes' pull across the water to the +road to Renteria, where I caught a huge yellow diligence, which had +ventured to leave San Sebastian at last with the detained mails of a +week. The machine was horsed in the usual manner--that is, with three +mules and two nags--but how different from usual was the way-bill! With +the exception of the driver and his aide, a youngster who jumped down +from the box every hundred yards, and belaboured the beasts with a +wattle, there was not one passenger fit to carry arms. We had a load of +women and babies, a decrepit patriarch, and two boys under the fighting +age. We halted at Renteria, harnessed a fresh team to our conveniency, +and sent on a messenger to ascertain if the Carlists had been seen on +the road. Everybody in Renteria carried a musket. All the approaches +were defended by loopholed works, roofed with turf, and a perfect +fortress was constructed in the centre of the town by a series of +communications which had been established between the church and a block +of houses in front by _caponnieres_. The church windows were built up +and loopholed, and a semicircular _tambour_, banked with earth to +protect it from artillery, was thrown up against the houses in the +middle of the street, so as to enfilade it at either side in case of +attack. There were troops of the line in Renteria, but no artillerymen, +nor was there artillery to be served. Without artillery, however, the +place, if properly provisioned, could not be taken, if the defending +force was worth its salt. + +The messenger having returned with word that all was right, we went +ahead at a fearful pace on a very good road, lined with poplars, and +running through a neat park-like country. Over to the right we could see +the church-spire of Oyarzun, and the smoke curling from the chimneys; a +little farther on we passed the debris of a diligence on the wayside; +the telegraph wires along the route were broken down, and the poles +taken away for firewood; we dived under a railway bridge, but never a +Carlist saw we during the continuous brief mad progress over the eight +miles from Renteria to the rise into Irun. + +We clattered up to the rail way-station at a hand-gallop, the people +rushing to the doors of the houses, and beaming welcome from smiling +countenances. There was a faint attempt to cheer us. At the station a +number of officials, a couple of Carabineros, and a knot of idlers were +gathered. The driver descended with the gait of a conquering hero, and +turned his glances in the direction of a cottage close by. An old man on +crutches, a blooming matron with rosary beads at her waist, and a +nut-brown maid with laughing eyes stood under the porch, embowered in +tamarisk and laurel-rose. The driver strode over to them, crying out +triumphantly: + +"El primero! Lo! I am the first." + +"How valiant you are, Pedro!" said the nut-brown maid, advancing to meet +him. + +"How lucky you are!" said the matron, with a grave shake of the head. + +"How rash you are!" mumbled the grandfather; "you were always so." + +I envied that driver, for the nut-brown maid kissed him, as she had the +right to do, for she was his affianced, and had not seen him for five +days. + +From the Irun station to Hendaye was free from danger. I walked down +through a field of maize to the Bidassoa, crossed by a ferry-boat to the +other side, where a post of the 49th of the French Line were peacefully +playing cards for buttons in the shade of a chestnut, and a few minutes +afterwards was seated in front of a bottle of Dublin stout with the +countryman who forwarded my letters and telegrams from over the border. + +Naturally I had a desire to ascertain the whereabouts of Santa Cruz. The +man had almost grown mythical with me. I had heard at San Sebastian that +ten thousand crowns had been offered for his scalp at Tolosa, and the +fondest yearning--the one satisfying aspiration of the hyena--was to +tear him into shreds, chop him into sausage-meat, gouge out his eyes, or +roast him before a slow fire. Which form of torment he would prefer, he +had not quite settled. A sort of intuitive faculty, which has seldom +led me astray, said to me that Santa Cruz was somewhere near. I revolved +the matter in my mind, and fixed upon the man under whose roof he was +most likely to be concealed. I went to that man and requested him +bluntly to take me to the outlawed priest--I wished very much to speak +to him. + +He smiled and answered, "He is not here." + +"The bird is flown," I said, "but the nest is warm. He is not far away." + +"True," he said, "come with me." + +We drove some miles--I will not say how many--and drew up at an enclosed +villa, which may have been in France, but was not of it. To be plain, it +was neutral territory, and my host, who knew me thoroughly, disappeared +for a few moments, and said Santa Cruz was sleeping, but that he had +roused him, and that he would be with us presently. + +I was sitting on a garden-seat in front of the house where he was +stopping, when he presented himself on the threshold, bareheaded, and in +his shirt-sleeves. The outlaw priest was no slave to the +conventionalities of society. He did not adjust his necktie before +receiving visitors. I am not sure that he wore a necktie at all. Let me +try and draw his portrait as he stood there in the doorway, in +questioning attitude. A thick, burly man under thirty years of age, some +five feet five in height, with broad sallow face, brawny bull-neck, and +wide square-set shoulders--a squat Hercules; dark-brown hair, cut short, +lies close to his head; he is bearded, and has a dark-brown pointed +moustache; shaggy brows overhang his small steel-gray eyes; his nose is +coarse and devoid of character; but his jaws are massive, his lips firm, +and his chin determined. He is dressed like the better class of peasant, +wears sandals, canvas trousers, a light brownish-gray waistcoat, and has +a large leathern belt, like a horse's girth, round his waist. His +expression is severe, as of one immersed in thought; with an occasional +frown, as if the thought were disagreeable. His brows knit, and a shadow +passes over his features when anything is mentioned that displeases him; +but I was told when he smiled, the smile was of the sweetest and most +amiable. I cannot say I saw him in smiling mood, but I saw him frown, +and never did anyone so truly translate to me the figure of speech of +"looking black." He advanced with self-possession, returned my salute +without coldness or _empressement_, as if it were a mere matter of form, +and sat down beside me. We had a long chat. Santa Cruz did not take much +active part in it, but listened as his host spoke, punctuating what was +said with nods of assent, and now and again dropping a guttural +sentence. His maxim was that deeds were of more value than words, and he +adhered to it. His host, I may interpose, was the most devoted of +Carlists, and had given largely of his means to aid the cause. He had +great faith in Santa Cruz, and told me in his presence (but in French, +which the Cura understood but slightly) that while Santa Cruz was in the +northern provinces, the King had half-a-man in his service, and that if +he would now call on Cabrera he would have a man and a half, for that +Santa Cruz would act with Cabrera. + +"If Don Carlos does not consent to that," said my host, "you will see +that he will have to return into France, and live in ignominy for the +rest of his days!" + +This Cura, represented in the Madrid play-house as half-drunk and +dancing lewdly, was the most abstemious and chastest of men, and neither +smoked nor drank wine. His fame went on increasing, as did the number of +his followers. He effected prodigies with the means at his command. His +friends in France supplied him with two cannon, which were smuggled +across the border. He turned the foundry at Vera into a munition +factory; employed women to make uniforms for his men; and insisted that +the intervals between his expeditions should be given up to drill. He +was dreaded, respected, admired by his band; he was strong and hardy; +faced perils and privations in common with the lowest, but used no +weapon but his walking-stick The priest, the anointed of God, may not +shed blood. The affair of Endarlasa was the coping-stone of his career. +Various accounts were related of that event; it is only fair to let +Santa Cruz himself speak. This is what he told me: + +At three one morning he opened fire on the guard-house occupied by the +Carabineros, at the bridge over the Bidassoa, between Vera and Irun. A +white flag was hoisted on the guard-house. He ordered the fire to cease, +and advanced to negotiate the conditions of surrender. The enemy, who +had invited him to approach, by the white flag, fired and wounded one of +his men. He issued directions to take the place, and spare nobody. The +place was taken, and nobody was spared. Twenty-seven dead bodies +littered the Vera road that morning. + +"Is it true that you pardoned two?" I asked the priest. + +"No, ninguno! Porque?" he answered with astonishment. "Not one. Why +should I?" + +The reason I had asked was that I had been told that a couple of the +Carabineros had plunged into the Bidassoa and tried to swim to the other +side; but the Cura, on his own avowal, with Rhadamanthine justice had +commanded them to be shot as they breasted the current, and they were +shot. He was no believer in half-measures. + +A lady partisan of his, who had dined with him the day before, told me +he never breathed a syllable of the attack he meditated, to her or any +of his band. An English gentleman, who visited the ground while the +corpses were still upon it, assured me that the sight was horrifying, +and, such was the panic in Irun, that he verily believed Santa Cruz +might have taken the town the same afternoon, had he appeared before it +with four men. + +To pursue the story of the redoubtable Cura. The bruit of his exploits +had gone abroad, and among certain Carlists it seemed to be the opinion, +as one of them remarked to me, that "_Il a fait de grandes choses, mais +de grandes betises aussi._" He was making war altogether too seriously +for their tastes. Antonio Lizarraga was appointed Commandant-General of +Guipuzcoa about that period, and ordered Santa Cruz to report to him. +Santa Cruz, who was in the field before him, and had five times as many +men under his control, paid no heed to his orders. Lizarraga then sent +him a death-warrant, which is so curious a document that I make no +apology for appending it in full: + + TRANSLATION. + + (A seal on which is inscribed "Royal Army of the North, General + Command of Guipuzcoa.") + + "The sixteenth day of the present month, I gave orders to all the + forces under my command, that they should proceed to capture you, + and that immediately after you had received the benefit of clergy + they should execute you. + + "This sentence I pronounced on account of your insubordination + towards me, you having disobeyed me several times, and having taken + no notice of the repeated commands I sent you to present yourself + before me to declare what you had to say in your own defence in the + inquiry instituted against you by my directions. + + "For the last time I ask of you to present yourself to me, the + instant this communication is received; in default of which I + notify to you that every means will be used to effect your arrest; + that your disobedience and the unqualifiable acts laid to your + charge will be published in all the newspapers; and that the + condign punishment they deserve will be duly exacted. + + "God grant you many years. + + "The Brigadier-General Commanding. + + (Signed) "ANTONIO LIZARRAGA. + + "Campo Del Honor, 28th of March, 1873. + + "Senor Don Manuel Santa Cruz." + + "Note.--Have the goodness to acknowledge this, my + communication." + + +This missive was received by Santa Cruz, but he never acknowledged it. +His host permitted me to read and copy the original. + +"Is not that arbitrary?" he said to me in English; "very much like what +you call Jedburgh justice; hanging a man first and trying him +afterwards. Lizarraga says, 'This sentence I pronounced'--all is +finished apparently there; and yet he cites the man whom he has ordered +to be immediately executed to appear before him to declare what he has +to say!" + +Another phrase in this death-warrant, which escaped the host, impressed +me with its naivete: + +"_God grant you many years._" + +But Lizarraga, in this politeness of custom, meant no more, it is to be +presumed, than did the Irish hangman who expostulated with his client in +the condemned cell: + +"Long life to ye, Mr. Hinery! and make haste, the people are getting +onpatient." + +Santa Cruz bit his way out of the toils, however, but not so his band. +They were surrounded at Vera, caught, with a few exceptions, disarmed, +assembled and addressed in Spanish by the Marquis de Valdespina, whose +remarks were translated to them into Basque by the Cura of Ollo. They +cried "Viva el Rey!" Their arms were subsequently restored to them, and +the men were distributed among other battalions. But they still regret +their old leader, and Santa Cruz is popular by the firesides of the +mountaineers of Guipuzcoa. One of his mountain guns fell into the hands +of Lizarraga, but the other was buried in some spot only known to +himself and a few trusted companions. + +During my interview I made it my business to study the priest +attentively, and this is what I honestly thought of him. He was a +fanatic, a sullen self-willed man with but one idea--the success of the +cause; and but one ambition--that it should be said of him that it was +he, Santa Cruz, who put Don Carlos on the throne of his ancestors. The +globe for him was bounded by the Pyrenees and the sea; he had but one +antipathy after the heretics (all who did not worship God as he did) and +the Liberals, and that was Lizarraga. I considered it a mistake that +Lizarraga was not the Cura of Hernialde, and Santa Cruz the +Commandant-General of Guipuzcoa. The priest had a natural military +instinct--I would almost go so far as to say a spice of military +genius; and had he had a knowledge of the profession of arms would +probably have developed into a great general of the Cossack type. His +hatred to Lizarraga led him into littleness and injustice. He chuckled +at the idea of Lizarraga not being able to find the buried gun, as if +that were any great triumph over him; and he sneered at the idea of +Lizarraga, who was not able to take Oyarzun, meditating an attempt on +Tolosa. I could thoroughly understand that the Carlist priest bore +malice to the officer who supplanted him and condemned him to death. But +what Lizarraga did was done in compliance with the King's will. At the +same time there could be no doubt that Santa Cruz was treated with scant +courtesy after all he had accomplished, and had a right to feel himself +ill-used, and the victim of jealous rivalry. He said that he was +prepared, any day the King permitted him, to traverse the four +provinces, and hold his enemies _in terrorem_ with five hundred men. And +he was the very worthy to do it. He complained bitterly that three of +his followers had been shot by Lizarraga. One story relates that they +stole into Guipuzcoa to levy blackmail, another that they merely went to +dig up some money that was interred when the legion was disbanded. In +any case they appeared in arms in a forbidden district, and incurred the +capital penalty. Santa Cruz went to Bordeaux to beg for their lives at +the feet of Dona Margarita. She received him most graciously, and +promised to send a special courier to her husband to intercede in their +behalf. Before the King's reprieve could possibly have arrived the three +were executed. + +As we were about to leave, a colleague who was with me asked the Cura if +he would permit him to visit his camp, if it came to pass that he took +up arms again in Spain. + +"We shall see," said Santa Cruz; "wait till I am there." + +My own conviction is that the priest held correspondents in abhorrence, +and that his first impulse would have been to tie a zealous one up to a +tree, and have thirty-nine blows given him with a stick. Perhaps I did +him wrong, but if ever he did take up arms again, it was my firm +intention to be south when he was north, for he was about the last +person in creation to whose tender mercies I should care to entrust +myself. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + An Audible Battle--"Great Cry and Little Wool"--A Carlist Court + Newsman--A Religious War--The Siege of Oyarzun--Madrid Rebels--"The + Money of Judas"--A Manifesto from Don Carlos--An Ideal + Monarch--Necessity of Social and Political Reconstruction + Proclaimed--A Free Church--A Broad Policy--The King for the + People--The Theological Question--Austerity in Alava--Clerical and + Non-Clerical Carlists--Disavowal of Bigotry--A Republican Editor on + the Carlist Creed--Character of the Basques--Drill and + Discipline--Guerilleros _versus_ Regulars. + + +WHEN a man's office is to chronicle war and he is within hearing of the +echoes of battle, but cannot reach a spot from which the scene of action +might be commanded, it is annoying in the extreme. Such was my strait on +the 21st of August, a few days after my arrival from San Sebastian. I +was at Hendaye, the border-town of France. From the Spanish frontier the +report of heavy firing was audible for hours, apparently coming from a +point between Oyarzun and Renteria. First one could distinguish the +faint spatter of musketry, and afterwards the undeniable muffled roar of +artillery. Then came a succession of sustained rolls as of +volley-firing. About noon the action must have been at its height. The +distant din was subsequently to be caught only at long intervals, as if +changes of position were in course of being effected; but at three +o'clock it regained force, and raged with fury until five, when it +suddenly died away. + +I was burning with impatience, and made several unavailing attempts to +cross the Bidassoa. The ferryman, acting under instructions from the +gendarmes, refused to take passengers. By the evening train a delegate +from the Paris Society for the Succour of the Wounded arrived from +Bayonne with a box of medicine and surgical appliances. He, too, was +unable to pass into Spain. Meantime, rumour ran riot. Stories were +current that there had been fearful losses. + +"At eleven o'clock men were falling like flies," said one eye-witness, +who succeeded in running away from the field before he fell. + +Not a single medical man would leave France in response to the call of +the Paris delegate for volunteers to accompany him. Were they all +Republicans? Did they fear that Belcha might take a fancy to their +probes and forcipes? Or did they look upon the big battles and +tremendous lists of casualties in this most uncivil of civil wars as +illustrations of a great cry and little wool? If the latter was their +notion, they were right. Three days after this serious engagement, I +learned the particulars of what had taken place. General Loma, a +brigadier under Sanchez Bregua, with a column of 1,500 men, came out +from San Sebastian to cover a working-party while they were endeavouring +to throw up a redoubt for his guns on an eminence between Irun and +Oyarzun, so as to put an end to the tussle over the possession of the +latter hamlet, which was a perpetual bone of contention. The Carlists +fired upon him from behind the rocks in a gorge to which he had +committed himself, but were outnumbered. Word was sent to the cabecilla, +Martinez, at Lesaca, and he arrived with reinforcements at the double, +and encompassed Loma with such a cloud of sulphurous smoke that the +Republicans had to fall back upon San Sebastian. The casualties in this +Homeric combat were not appalling; there was more gunpowder than blood +expended. The losses on the Republican side were one killed and fifteen +wounded. On the Carlist side they were less, for the Carlists kept under +cover of the fern and furze. But then it must be considered that the +firing only lasted nine hours! + +Don Carlos was not slow in calling the printing-press to his aid. One of +his first acts after his entry into his dominions was to start an +official gazette, _El Cuartel Real_, the first number of which is before +me as I write. I have seen queer papers in my travels, from the +_Bugler_, a regimental record brought out by the 68th Light Infantry in +Burmah, to the _Fiji Times_, and the _Epitaph_, the leading organ of +Tombstone City, in the territory of Arizona; but this assuredly was the +queerest. It was published by Cristobal Perez, on the summit of Pena de +la Plata, a Pyrenean peak. There might be less acceptable reading than a +_resume_ of its contents. + +_El Cuartel Real_ does not impose by its magnitude. It is about +one-eighth the size of a London daily journal; but if it is not great by +quantity it is by quality. Over the three columns of the opening page +figure the three watchwords of the Royal cause, "God, Country, King." +The paragraph which has the post of honour is headed "Oficial," and has +in it a flavour of the _Court Newsman_. Here it is as it appears in the +original, boldly imprinted in black type: + +"S. M. el Rey (q.D.g.) continua sin novedad al frente de su leal y +valiente ejercito. + +"S. M. la Reina y sus augustos hijos continuan tambien sin novedad en su +importante salud." + +As it is not vouchsafed to everyone to understand Castilian, I may as +well give a rough translation, which read herewith: + +"His Majesty the King (whom God guard) continues without change at the +front of his loyal and valiant army. + +"Her Majesty the Queen and her august children also continue without +alteration in their precious health." + +Then _El Cuartel Real_ appends what takes the place of its leading +article--a reproduction of a letter from Don Carlos to his "august +brother," Don Alfonso, setting forth the principles on which he appeals +for Spanish support. This document is so important that I must return to +it anon. Then comes a circular from the "Real Junta Gubernativa del +Reino de Navarra," in session at Vera. The purport of this, epitomized +in a sentence, is to raise money. Next, we arrive at the "Seccion +Oficial," the most important paragraph of which announces that the +Chief, Merendon, has inaugurated a Carlist movement in Toledo, with a +well-armed force, exceeding 280 men--to wit, 150 horsemen and 130 +infantry--and that he hopes shortly to gather numerous recruits. The +"Seccion de Noticias" makes up the body of the paper, and is richer in +information. We are told that the most excellent and illustrious Bishop +of Urgel, accompanied by several sacerdotal and other dignitaries, +arrived in the town of Urdaniz, at half-past seven on the previous +Wednesday evening. His Lordship rested a night in the house of the +Vicar, and left the following morning, escorted by his friend and host, +the said Vicar, Brigadier Gamundi, and Colonel D. Fermin Irribarren, +veterans of the Carlist army, for Elisondo. From that the prelate was +reported to have started to headquarters, "to salute the King of Spain, +august representative of the Christian monarchy, which is the only plank +of safety in the shipwreck of the country." + +The _Cuartel Real_ warmly congratulates the Bishop on the fact of his +having come to the conviction that "the present war is a religious war, +and on that account eminently social"--(social in Spanish must have some +peculiar shade of meaning unknown to strangers, for otherwise there is +no sequence here)--and proceeds to speak with an eloquence that recalls +that wretched Republican, Castelar, of the standard of faith in which +resides Spanish honour and--here come two words that puzzle me, _la +hidalguia y la caballerosidad_; but I suppose they mean nobility and +chivalry, and everything of that kind. The next notice in the royal +gazette is purely military, and makes known that the siege of the +important town of Oyarzun has begun. "On the 20th the batteries opened +fire, and, according to report, the enemy had one hundred men _hors de +combat_." The batteries! There is a touch of genius in that phrase. +Reading it, one would imagine that the Royalists had a royal regiment of +artillery, and that eight pieces of cannon, at the very least, played +upon the unfortunate Oyarzun. A jennet with a 4-pounder at its heels +would be a more correct representation of the strength of the Carlist +ordnance. + +To resume the story of the siege of Oyarzun. "On the 21st," adds _El +Cuartel Real_, "there was talk of a capitulation, and it is possible +that the place has surrendered at this hour." The paragraph that +succeeds it is a gem: "Of the 1,010 armed rebels in Eibar (Guipuzcoa), +210 betook themselves to San Sebastian, when they suspected the approach +of the Royal forces, and the 800 remaining gave up to General Lizarraga +their rifles, all of the Remington system." There is no quibble about +the latter statement. The Carlists had easier ways of procuring arms +than by running cargoes from England. But is there not something +inimitable in the epithet "rebels"? There can be no question but that +everyone is a rebel in romantic Spain--in the opinion of somebody else. +The only question is, Who are the constituted authorities? Until that is +settled the editor of _El Cuartel Real_ is perfectly justified in +treating the volunteers of liberty, in those districts where Charles +VII. virtually reigns, as armed rebels. Although this town of Eibar had +frequently risen up against the legitimate authorities named by his +Majesty, it is pleasant to learn that General Lizarraga did not impose +the slightest chastisement on the population, thus giving a lesson of +forbearance to the "factious generals." Next we are informed that on the +day the Royal forces entered Vergara, the ignominious monument erected +by the Liberals in record of the greatest of treasons (the treaty +between the treacherous Maroto and Espartero in 1839) was destroyed +amidst enthusiasm, and the parchment in the municipal archives +commemorating its erection was taken out and burned in the public +square. I may add (but this I had from private sources) that the coin +dug up from under the monument was cast to the wind as the money of +Judas. Navarre, continues _El Cuartel Real_, is dominated by our valiant +soldiers under the skilful direction of his Majesty; Lizarraga has +occupied in a few days Mondragon, Eibar, Plasencia, Azpeitia, Vergara, +and other important places in Guipuzcoa, and obtained "considerable +booty of war;" the standard of legitimacy is waving triumphantly in +Biscay, and Bilbao is blockaded. There the tale of victory ends; but we +arrive at matters not less gratifying in another sense. The +distinguished engineer, Don Mariano Lana y Sarto, has been appointed to +look after the repair of the bridges destroyed by Nouvilas. Don Matias +Schaso Gomez, a member of the press militant, has been promoted to be a +commandant for his valour at Astigarraga, and is nominated for the +laurelled cross of San Fernando; and the illustrious doctor, Senor Don +Alejandro Rodriguez Hidalgo, has been named chief of the sanitary staff, +and entrusted with the establishment of military hospitals. + +The last paragraph in this curious little gazette, printed up amid the +clouds on the summit of the Silver Hill, states that the Royal quarters +were at Abarzuzu on the 17th instant, and that Estella, close by, was +stubbornly resisting, but would soon be in the power of the Royalists. A +column which had attempted to relieve the garrison was energetically +driven back towards Lerin by two battalions commanded by his Majesty in +person. But by the time _El Cuartel Real_ came under my notice Estella +had fallen, and the Carlists had put to their credit a genuine success. + +As the question of Carlism is still one of prominent interest--is, +indeed, what the French term an "actuality," and may crop up again any +day, the letter of the claimant to the throne to Don Alfonso (alluded to +some sentences above) is worth translating. It is the authoritative +exposition of the aims of the would-be monarch, and of the line of +policy he intended to pursue should he ever take up his residence in +that coveted palace at Madrid. Its date is August 23rd, 1873, and the +contents are these: + + * * * * * + +"MY DEAR BROTHER, + +"Spain has already had opportunities enough to ascertain my ideas +and sentiments as man and King in various periodicals and +newspapers. Yielding, nevertheless, to a general and anxiously +expressed desire which has reached me from all parts of the +Peninsula, I write this letter, in which I address myself, not +merely to the brother of my heart, but without exception to all +Spaniards, for they are my brothers as well. + +"I cannot, my dear Alfonso, present myself to Spain as a Pretender +to the Crown. It is my duty to believe, and I do believe, that the +Crown of Spain is already placed on my forehead by the consecrated +hand of the law. With this right I was born, a right which has +grown, now that the fitting time has come, to a sacred obligation; +but I desire that the right shall be confirmed to me by the love of +my people. My business, henceforth, is to devote to the service of +that people all my thoughts and powers--to die for it, or save it. + +"To say that I aspire to be King of Spain, and not of a party, is +superfluous, for what man worthy to be a king would be satisfied to +reign over a party? In such a case he would degrade himself in his +own person, descending from the high and serene region where +majesty dwells, and which is beyond the reach of mean and pitiful +triflings. + +"I ought not to be, and I do not desire to be, King, except of all +Spaniards; I exclude nobody, not even those who call themselves my +enemies, for a king can have no enemies. I appeal affectionately to +all, in the name of the country, even to those who appear the most +estranged; and if I do not need the help of all to arrive at the +throne of my ancestors, I do perhaps need their help to establish +on solid and immovable bases the government of the State, and to +give prosperous peace and true liberty to my beloved Spain. + +"When I reflect how weighty a task it is to compass those great +ends, the magnitude of the undertaking almost oppresses me with +fear. True, I am filled with the most fervent desire to begin, and +the resolute will to carry out, the enterprise; but I cannot hide +from myself that the difficulties are immense, and that they can +only be overcome by the co-operation of the men of notability, the +most impartial and honest in the kingdom; and, above all, by the +co-operation of the kingdom itself, gathered together in the +Cortes which would truly represent the living forces and +Conservative elements of Spain. + +"I am prepared with such Cortes to give to Spain, as I said in my +letter to the Sovereigns of Europe, a fundamental code which would +prove, I trust, definitive and Spanish. + +"Side by side, my brother, we have studied modern history, +meditating over those great catastrophes which are at once lessons +to rulers and a warning to the people. Side by side, we have also +thought over and formed a common judgment that every century ought +to have, and actually has, its legitimate necessities and natural +aspirations. + +"Old Spain stood in need of great reforms; in modern Spain we have +had simply immense convulsions of overthrow. Much has been +destroyed; little has been reformed. Ancient institutions, some of +which cannot be revivified, have died out. An attempt has been made +to create others in their place, but scarcely had they seen the +light when symptoms of death set in. So much has been done, and no +more. I have before me a stupendous labour, an immense social and +political reconstruction. I have to set myself to building up, in +this desolated country, on bases whose solidity is guaranteed by +experience, a grand edifice, where every legitimate interest and +every reasonable personality can find admittance. + +"I do not deceive myself, my brother, when I feel confident that +Spain is hungry and thirsty for justice; that she feels the urgent +and imperious necessity of a government, worthy and energetic, +severe and respected; and that she anxiously wishes that the law to +which we all, great and small, should be subject, should reign with +undisputed sway. + +"Spain is not willing that outrage or offence should be offered to +the faith of her fathers, believing that in Catholicity reposes the +truth she understands, and that to accomplish to the full its +divine mission, the Church must be free. + +"Whilst knowing and not forgetting that the nineteenth century is +not the sixteenth, Spain is resolved to preserve from every danger +Catholic unity--the symbol of our glories, the essence of our +laws, and the holy bond of concord between all Spaniards. + +"The Spanish people, taught by a painful experience, desires the +truth in everything, and that the King should be a king in reality, +and not the shadow of a king; and that its Cortes should be the +regularly appointed and peaceful gathering of the independent and +incorruptible elect of the constituencies, and not tumultuous and +barren assemblies of office-holders and office-seekers, servile +majorities and seditious minorities. + +"The Spanish people is favourable to decentralisation, and will +always be so; and you know well, my dear Alfonso, that should my +desires be carried out, instead of assimilating the Basque +provinces to the rest of Spain, which the revolutionary spirit +would fain bring to pass, the rest of Spain would be lifted to an +equality in internal administration with those fortunate and noble +provinces. + +"It is my wish that the municipality should retain its separate +existence, and the provinces likewise, proper precautions being +employed to prevent possible abuses. + +"My cherished thought as constant desire is to give to Spain +exactly that which she does not possess, in spite of the lying +clamour of some deluded people--that liberty which she only knows +by name; liberty, which is the daughter of the gospel, not +liberalism, which is the son of disbelief (_de la protesta_); +liberty, in fine, which is the supremacy of the laws when the laws +are just--that is to say, conformable to the designs of nature and +of God. + +"We, descendants of kings, admit that the people should not exist +for the King so much as the King for the people; that a king should +be the most honoured man amongst his people, as he is the first +caballero; and that a king for the future should glory in the +special title of 'father of the poor' and 'guardian of the weak.' + +"At present, my dear brother, there is a very formidable question +in our Spain, that of the finances. The Spanish debt is something +frightful to think of; the productive forces of the country are not +enough to cover it--bankruptcy is imminent. I do not know if I can +save Spain from that calamity; but, if it be possible, a +legitimate sovereign alone can do it. An unshakable will works +wonders. If the country is poor, let all live frugally, even to the +ministers; nay, even to the King himself, who should be one in +feeling with Don Enrique El Doliente. If the King is foremost in +setting the example, all will be easy. Let ministries be +suppressed, provincial governments be reduced, offices be +diminished, and the administration economized at the same time that +agriculture is encouraged, industry protected, and commerce +assisted. To put the finances and credit of Spain on a proper +footing is a Titanic enterprise to which all governments and +peoples should lend aid." + + * * * * * + +Here follow a repudiation of free trade as applied to Spain, and a few +well-turned periods dealing in the usual Spanish manner with the duties +of the ruler, laying down, among other axioms, that "virtue and +knowledge are the chiefest nobility," and that the person of the +mendicant should be as sacred as that of the patrician. + +At the close there is a very sensible sentence, affirming that one +Christian monarch in Spain would be better than three hundred petty +kings disputing in a noisy assembly. "The chiefs of parties," continues +the letter, "naturally yearn for honours or riches or place; but what in +the world can a Christian king desire but the good of his people? What +could he want to be happy but the love of his people?" + +The letter winds up by the affirmation that Don Carlos is faithful to +the good traditions of the old and glorious Spanish monarchy, and that +he believed he would be found to act also as "a man of the present age." +The last sentence is a prayer to his brother, "who had the enviable +privilege of serving in the Papal army," to ask their spiritual king at +Rome for his apostolic benediction for Spain and the writer. + +If this document was written _propria manu_, by Don Carlos, he must be +endowed with higher intellectual faculties than most Kings or Pretenders +possess. It is undeniably clever, and is more progressive than one would +expect from an upholder of the doctrine of Divine right. It may be, as +Tennyson sings, that the thoughts of men (even when they are Bourbons) +are widened with the process of the suns. But I protest that there is +such a masterly mistiness in it here and there, such a careful elusion +of rocks and ruggednesses political, and such a fine wind-beating +flourish of the banner of glittering generality, that I think there were +more heads than one engaged in the concoction of the manifesto. I have +studiously refrained from the introduction of the religious topic as far +as I could in this work--it is outside my sphere; but I should be unjust +to the reader did I not give him some information (not from the +controversial standpoint) on a subject which will obtrude itself in any +discussion on the merits of the conflict which has twice distracted +Spain and may divide the country again. It is unfortunately indisputable +that religion was poked into the quarrel. The struggle was described in +_El Cuartel Real_ as a religious war; the theological allegiance of the +partisans of Don Carlos was appealed to, and their ardent attachment to +the Papacy was worked upon, as in the concluding sentence of the +proclamation of Don Carlos. In those portions of the north where Carlism +was all-powerful, the authorities were emphatically showing that those +who served under them must be practical Roman Catholics _nolentes +volentes_. An austere placard, signed by Barona, member of the Carlist +war committee, was posted in the province of Alava, and ordained among +other articles: Firstly, that the town councillors of every municipality +should assist in a body at High Mass; secondly, that the mayors should +interdict, under the most severe penalties, all games and public +diversions, and the opening of all public establishments during Divine +service; and thirdly, that all blasphemers, and all who worked on a +holiday, who gave scandal, or who danced indecently, should be +_scourged_. The first of these articles is lawful enough in a country +which is almost exclusively Roman Catholic. In England nothing can be +said against it, seeing that British soldiers of all denominations are +compelled to attend Church parade, and the prisoners in all gaols have +to register themselves as belonging to some religion. There is just +this theoretical objection, however--the article implies that municipal +honours are to be limited to members of one creed, which is intolerant. +That which underlay the antipathy of numerous Conservatives outside +Spain to the Royalist cause, was the belief entertained that the success +of Don Carlos would lead to the re-assertion of clerical preponderance, +would destroy liberty of conscience as understood in most European +nations, and would set up a political priesthood. The manifesto of Don +Carlos does not deal with those points in the full and categorical +manner desirable. I was told there were two parties in the Carlist camp, +the clerical and--for want of a better name, let it be called--the +non-clerical The former, the Basques, and those who gave Carlism its +great primary impulsion, were as zealously Roman Catholic as ever Manuel +Santa Cruz was. They looked forward to the re-acquisition of the +ecclesiastical domains and the re-establishment of the Catholic Church +in all its ancient supremacy of wealth and power. The non-clericals knew +that the Basques, even assuming them all to be Carlists, were but +660,000 in number, a small minority of the population, and that the +existence of a State unduly influenced by a Church--things temporal +controlled by personages bound to things spiritual--was antagonistic to +the feelings of the majority of Spaniards. + +Having met a nobleman distinguished for his services to Carlism, I put +it to him bluntly, "Would Don Carlos on the throne mean a relapse into +religious bigotry?" + +He answered me with candour, "I am a Roman Catholic, and if I thought so +I should be the last man to lend a penny to his cause." + +"But," I urged, "that is the general impression in England, where he is +trying to negotiate a loan, and if it is left uncorrected it does him +injury. Why does he not repel the impeachment?" + +"The truth is," he said, "Don Carlos has made too many public +explanations." + +I returned to the charge, challenging my acquaintance to deny that many +of the supporters of Don Carlos would fall away if they had not the +thorough belief that his cause was as much identified with the triumph +of Roman Catholicism as with that of legitimacy. His reply was not a +denial, but an admission of the fact, with the addition that in war one +must not be too particular as to the means of enlisting aid, and +stimulating the enthusiasm of supporters, which is an argument as true +as it is old. Don Carlos, in his manifesto, goes on the assumption that +the Republicans are all atheists, or something very like it. It is only +fair to let the Republicans speak for themselves, and explain what is +the Republican estimate of the Carlist religion. The San Sebastian +newspaper, _El Diario_, may be assumed to be a fair exponent of the +sentiments of the anti-Carlists, and thus emphatically, and not without +a spice of antithesis, it delivers itself: + +"The religion which has the commandment, 'Thou shalt not kill,' forbids +murder. + +"The religion which has the commandment, 'Thou shalt not steal,' forbids +robbery. + +"The religion which is peace, obedience, and love, is no friend of war, +rebellion, and massacre. + +"Resigned and joyous in other days, its martyrs went to death in the +amphitheatre of Rome, and on the plains of Saragossa, pardon in their +souls and prayer on their lips; to-day pardon is exchanged for wrath, +and prayer for reproach. Instead of the martyr's palm, we have the +Berdan breech-loader and the flash of petroleum. + +"Anointed of the Lord, ministers of Him who died invoking blessings on +His enemies, kindle the fires of fratricidal strife, which they call a +sacred war, and lead on and inflame their dupes by the pretence that the +gates of Paradise are to be forced open by gunshot. + +"Meanwhile the bishops are silent, Rome is dumb, the moral law sleeps, +the canon law is forgotten; and these pastors, transforming their flocks +into packs of wolves, scour the plains, blessing murder and sanctifying +conflagration. + +"'King by Divine right,' they cry, like the legists of the Lower Empire; +'Die or believe,' like the sons of the Prophet. Apostles without knowing +it, they seek to achieve the triumph of a Pagan principle by a Saracenic +process. + +"They say that religion is lost, because it is shorn of the honour and +power their kings gave it; that the portals of heaven are barred, +because they have forfeited their tithes and first-fruits, their rents +and fat benefices; and they try to convince us by discharges of musketry +that our whole future life depends, on the one hand, on a question of +vanity, and on the other, on a question of stomach. + +"Holy Apostles, disciples of Him who had not a stone whereon to lay His +head, you who conquered the earth with no arms but those of word and +example, oh! would you not say if you returned here below, 'Those who +preach by the voice of platoons; those who evangelize from the mouth of +cannon; those are not, cannot be, our disciples and successors, for they +are not fishers of souls, but fishers of snug posts under government'? + +"And you, glorious martyrs of the Roman circus and Saragossan fields, +oh! would you not say, 'No, this Christianity, which goes about sowing +battle; desolation, tears, and blood wherever it passes, is not +ours--no, this Christianity at the bottom of the slaughter of Endarlasa, +of the hecatomb of Cirauqui, of the sack of Igualada, and of a hundred +other cruelties, is not ours. Our religion says "Kill not," and this +murders; says "Steal not," and this robs. No, this is not the +Christian, but the Carlist religion'?" + +That is a good specimen of the rhetorical school of writing popular in +Spanish newspapers; but all that is written is not gospel. From personal +observation it was evident to me that these Republicans of the Spanish +towns of the north were not so scrupulous in the outward observances of +religion as the tone of this indignant Christian leading article would +convey; neither were the Carlists the "packs of wolves" they were +represented to be. + +Let us see how this inflamed sense of so-called religion affected the +rank and file among the adherents of Don Carlos. + +Indubitably the Royalists, with a very few exceptions, were more than +moral--they were sincerely pious, and esteemed it a grateful incense to +the Most High to kill as many of their Republican countrymen as they +could without over-exertion. They bowed their heads and repeated prayers +with the chaplains who accompanied them; as the echoes of the Angelus +bell were heard they were marched to Divine worship every evening, when +they were in the neighbourhood of a church; they were palpably impressed +with deep devotional convictions, and yet they were not sour-faced like +the grim Covenanters of Argyle, nor puritanically uncharitable like the +stern propounders of the Blue Laws of Connecticut. Their beads returned +to the pocket or the prayers finished, they laughed and jested, were +frolicsome as schoolboys in their playhour, and the slightest tinkle of +music set them dancing. Hospitable and fanatic, faithful and ignorant, +temperate and dirty--such are some prominent traits in the character of +the brave Basque people of the rural districts who wished to govern +Spain, but who were Spaniards neither by race, nor language, nor +temperament, nor feeling. + +Taken all in all, they are a right manly breed, and, with education to +correct inevitable prejudices, would be capable of great things. But +before they could become efficient soldiers, they needed a severe course +of training. In the flat country, south of the Ebro, it would be cruel +and foolish to oppose them to regular troops. As guerrilleros, they +were without parallel, being content with short commons, and ever ready +to play ball after the longest march; but they were ignorant of +soldiering as technically understood. In the copses and crags of their +own provinces they were invincible, and could carry on the struggle +while there was a cartridge or an onion left in the land. But where the +tactics of the "contrabandista" no longer availed, where surprises were +impossible and mysterious disappearances not easy, and where the bulk of +the people were not willing spies, the aspect of affairs was different. +They were mediocre marksmen with long-range arms of precision, and had +no proper conception of allowances for wind or sun. Target-practice was +not encouraged, and yet it was not through thrift of ammunition, for the +waste of powder in every skirmish was extravagant, and one could not +rest a night in a village held by the Carlists without being disturbed +by frequent careless discharges. + +With the bayonet, as far as I could learn, they were impetuous in the +onset, and stubborn, especially the Navarrese. But bayonet-charges +cannot carry stone walls or mud-banks; and in the face of the almost +incessant peppering of breech-loaders, rushes of the kind have become +slightly old-fashioned. To the Carlists, in any case, was due the credit +of readiness to have recourse to the steel whenever there was a rift for +hand-to-hand fighting. Their military education unfortunately confined +itself to the rudiments of the drill-book. They fell in, dressed up, +formed fours by the right, extended into sections on column of march and +went through the like movements very well--so well that it was a pity +they had not an opportunity of adding to their stock of knowledge. They +had an instinctive aptitude for skirmishing, and were expert at forming +square, the utility of which, by the way, is as questionable nowadays as +that of charging. + +More attention was paid to discipline than to drill. Pickets patrolled +the towns into which they entered, and repressed all disorder after +nightfall; outpost duty was strictly enforced; "larking" was not +tolerated, and punishments were always inflicted for known and grave +breaches of order. + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + Barbarossa--Royalist-Republicans--Squaring a Girl--At Iron--"Your + Papers?"--The Barber's Shop--A Carlist Spy--An Old Chum--The + Alarm--A Breach of Neutrality--Under Fire--Caught in the Toils--The + Heroic Tomas--We Slope--A Colleague Advises Me--"A Horse! a + Horse!"--State of Bilbao--Don Carlos at Estella--Sanchez Bregua + Recalled--Tolosa Invites--Republican Ineptitude--Do not Spur a Free + Horse--Very Ancient Boys--Meditations in Bed--A Biscay Storm. + + +BARBAROSSA, who had never been over the border, suggested to me that I +should take a trip to Irun, which was held by the anti-Carlists. It +would be incorrect to write them down as Republicans; they were sprung +from the Cristinos of the previous generation, and as such were opposed +to any scion of the house against which their fathers had fought for +years. All of them were _de facto_ Republicans, and had more knowledge +and enjoyment of Republican freedom than those who prattled and raved +of Republicanism in Madrid and the south; but they did not take kindly +to the name. As my friend the late J. A. MacGahan wittily said of +them--"They were the Royalist-Republicans of Spain." They were as fond +of their fueros as any Carlist in the crowd, but they stood up for +Madrid less that they cared for the policy or personages of the central +government, than that they had a deep-seated hereditary hatred of their +neighbours of the rural districts. At heart they were in favour of a +restoration of the throne, and on that throne they would fain seat the +young Prince of the Asturias. In those latitudes the lines of John Byrom +a century before would well apply: + + "God bless the King, I mean the faith's defender; + God bless--no harm in blessing--the Pretender; + But who Pretender is, or who is King, + God bless us all--that's quite another thing!" + +"If you go to Irun," said Barbarossa, stroking his moustache, "I am game +to go with you." + +"I am satisfied," said I; "but recollect, you undertake the job at your +own risk. You are known as an associate of Carlists, and suspected to +be a Carlist agent. I am a stranger and comparatively safe." + +He had weighed all that, and was ready to face possible perils. But he +was not fit to undergo probable fatigues. He could sit at a green table +in an ill-ventilated atmosphere the night long, but he could not walk +three miles at a stretch. Neither could he (on account of his illness) +venture on horseback. To effect a crossing by the railway bridge from +Hendaye to Irun was out of the question; it was barrier impenetrable. +The Frenchman would not allow you to pass in your own interest; the +Spaniard declined to admit you in his so-considered interest. To take +the mountain-route was tedious, and in the case of Barbarossa not to be +thought of; the bridge of Endarlasa was broken--a most contorted +specimen of artistic dilapidation. To be sure, one could manage to creep +to the other side by the submerged coping of the parapet, if endowed +with the balancing powers of a rope-walker and the lustihood of the +navvy. But Barbarossa was not a Blondin, and had not a physical +constitution proof against a wetting. I had got across that bridge +once, holding on by my teeth and nails, and retained recollection of it +in a fit of the cold shivers; but I did not care to repeat the +operation. In our dilemma, Barbarossa, who was a plucky knave, hit upon +the plan which ought to have commended itself to us at first. + +"Let us stray up the river-bank a few hundred yards," he said, "seize a +boat, and row ourselves across." + +No sooner was the proposition made than it was adopted; but we were +saved from the ephemeral disgrace of posing as petty amphibious pirates, +degenerate Schinderhannes of the Bidassoa. We saw a boat; a girl was +near. The boat was her father's; she engaged to take us over for a +consideration--I am certain she had set her heart on a string of +straw-coloured ribbons and a sky-blue feather in a shop-window in +Hendaye--and to await our return at nightfall. We arranged the signal, +and stealthily stole across, drifting diagonally most of the way; and I +entrusted the speculative French damsel with my revolver and my Carlist +pass, and paid her a farewell compliment on her face and figure as I +stepped ashore. Giving her the revolver and pass enlisted her +confidence. We strolled along with apparent carelessness, entered a +posada on the road by the waterside and had refreshments. I said I +should feel much obliged if they could let us have a trap to Irun and +back, as we had business there, and my friend was tired and not much of +a pedestrian. An open carriage was provided, and off we drove by the +skirt of the hill of St. Marcial, where the Spaniards gave Soult such a +dressing in 1813, passed a series of outer defences with their covering +and working parties, and entered one of the gates of the town, and never +a question was asked. Ditches had been dug round the place and +earthworks thrown up; but the principal reliance of the garrison seemed +to be in loophooled breastworks made of sand-bags superimposed. Here and +there were walls of loose stones--more of a danger than a +protection--rude shelter-trenches, and mud-built, wattle-knitted +refuges, round-topped, and disguised with branches. They had made the +position strong; but they should have gone in for more spade and less +stones, more mole and less beaver. + +We trotted over the narrow paved street, with its flagged sidepaths, and +drew up on the Plaza, overlooked by the solid square-stone mansion of +the Ayuntamiento. The windows were screened with planks, and armed +groups lounged in front; there were barrels of water and heaps of gravel +at intervals upon the ground; memories of Paris rose to my mind--Irun +was preparing for bombardment. If the Carlists had no serious artillery +in fact, they had a powerful ordnance in the apprehensions of their +adversaries. Perhaps this was the explanation of the rhodomontade about +the batteries in _El Cuartel Real_. We were congratulating ourselves on +the ease with which we had run the blockade, when an officer of the +Miqueletes approached our carriage and demanded our papers. I showed my +Foreign Office passport, with the visa of the Spanish Consulate at +London upon it. He gave a cursory look at it, bowed, and returned it to +me. Then came the turn of Barbarossa, and there was a flash of shrewd +spitefulness in his eyes. + +"Your papers, senor?" + +"I have none. I didn't think any were required." + +"Ah! doubtless you thought Irun was in Carlist occupation. You are +wrong." + +"No; I knew it was not in Carlist occupation. What has that to do with +me? I am an Englishman," producing a packet of letters. + +"I don't want to see them. I know you. What do you want here?" + +"To see a friend." + +"Who is your friend?" + +Barbarossa was not in the least nonplussed. He said he had heard a +fellow-countryman, a comrade of his, was in the town. + +"You will have to turn back the way you came, and thank your stars you +are permitted." + +"But I am hungry." + +"And the horse wants a feed," interposed the driver, who no doubt had +his own object to serve. + +"Well, you may stay here for refreshment, but you must get outside our +gates before dark." + +We drove to the principal inn, where we alighted and ordered dinner. +Barbarossa sat down, and I went out to look at the place and search for +a barber's shop, for I sorely needed a shave. Irun is a well-constructed +town on the shelving slope of a smaller rise between Mounts Jaizquivel +and Aya, not far from the coast. It has a population of some 5,000, and +in ordinary years does a good trade in tiles and bricks, tanned leather, +and smith's work, besides sending wood to Los Pasages for the purposes +of the boat-builders. The Bidassoa at its base branches, and thus forms +the islet of Faisanes, off which the prosperous fisherman can fill his +basket with trout, salmon, and mullet, aye, and lumpish eels, if his +predilections so tend. + +But I have no intention to describe Irun. Theophile Gautier has done +that before me, and I am not sacrilegious. There was another customer in +the barber's shop. As I left after the shave he followed, and accosted +me on the flagway confidentially. + +"How are you, captain?" + +"You are in error," I answered. "I am no captain." + +"What! Did I not see you take a boat for the _San Margarita_ at Socoa?" + +"That may be; but I only boarded her through curiosity." + +"Do not be afraid," he whispered. "How is Don Guillermo?" + +"What Don Guillermo?" + +"Senor Leader. I was with him when he was wounded; I am a Carlist. I am +here on the same mission as yourself; to spy what the vermin are doing." + +"Ha! good; ramble on, and don't notice me. It is dangerous." + +He sauntered along the causeway, hands in pockets and whistling, and +presently popped into a tavern, and I re-entered the fonda. Hardly had I +set foot over the threshold when I was stupefied by a welcome in a +familiar voice, none other than that of Mr. William O'Donovan, who had +been my comrade and amanuensis throughout the irksome beleaguerment of +Paris.[F] We did not throw our arms round our respective necks, hug and +kiss each other--I reserve my kisses for pretty girls, newly-washed +babes, and dead male friends, and then kiss only the brow--but we did +join hands cordially and long. In answer to my query as to what had +brought him to this queer corner at the back of God-speed, he explained +that he was acting as correspondent of a Dublin paper; for, it appeared, +the people of Ireland were consumed with anxiety as to the progress of +the Carlist rising--details of which, of course, they could not obtain +in the mere London papers--and were particularly desirous to have record +of the doings of the Foreign Legion, a great majority of whom were sons +of the Emerald Isle. His younger brother, a medical student, was likely +to come out to join that Legion, and as for Kaspar (a name by which we +knew his brother Edmond, afterwards triumvir at Merv), he was sure to +turn up. Mother Carey's chicken hovers near when the elements are at +strife. He was immensely satisfied with his diggings, he said, liked +the natives, and considered this a splendid chance for improving his +Spanish. He was reading "Don Quixote" in the vernacular. In a sense, I +looked upon his presence as a perfect godsend to us, as he came in most +appropriately as a _Deus ex machina_ to create the character of +Barbarossa's invented friend. O'Donovan was in good standing with the +Republicans of the town, as he was a staunch Republican himself, and +could spin yarns of the Republics of antiquity, and of the greatness of +Paris, and the glories of the United States. He was getting on famously +with Castilian, and was charmed with the redundancy of its vocabulary of +vituperation, which was only to be equalled by the Irish, of which his +father had been such a master. I made Barbarossa and my old chum known +to one another, and we dined together, pledging the past in a cup of +wine tempered with the living waters which bubbled up in the sacristy of +the parish church, and were distributed in bronze conduits through Irun. +After the meal and the meditative smoke of custom, O'Donovan sat down to +write a letter, which I guaranteed to post for him in France, and +Barbarossa and I sallied forth for a walk. + +We were lounging about the Calle Mayor gazing at the escutcheons over +every hall-door--your bellows-mender and cobbler in this democratic town +were invariably of the seed of Noah in right line--when the alarm was +raised that fifty horses had been carried off by the Carlists almost at +the gates, and that two shots had been heard. The bugler sounded the +call "To arms," and forthwith a little company consisting of thirty-two +men, the bugler aforesaid, and a captain, set out at a quick step for a +high ground beside a signal-tower at one end of the town. We hurried +forward with them, and passed out through one of the four gates, on the +side next the mountains. The soldiers took a position on the slope of a +hill a couple of hundred yards from the gate, and Barbarossa and I +sheltered ourselves behind an orchard-wall, from which there was an +uninterrupted view of the billowy tract of meadow and pasture land +beneath, cut into patches by thick hedges. Quick on our heels emerged +from the town some half-dozen intrepid "volunteers of liberty," and the +inevitable small boy, a red cap stuck jauntily on three hairs of his +head and a large cigarette in his mouth. One of the volunteers--he who +had demanded our papers on the Plaza--looked viciously at Barbarossa, +who assumed a most artistic pretence of stolidity. + +"Come here, senor, and you will have a better vision of your friends," +he said with mock suavity. + +Barbarossa smiled, thanked him, and walked quietly to the place +indicated, an exposed opening beside the wall. + +"I can see nothing," he said. + +I adjusted my long-distance glass, and ranged over the wide stretch of +landscape, but could see nothing either. As I shut it up and returned it +to the case, a sergeant advanced from the party of soldiers on the slope +and marched directly towards me. I was puzzled and, I own, a trifle +unnerved. + +"Senor," he said to me, "I carry the compliments of my captain, and his +request that you would lend him your glass, as he has forgotten his +own." + +"With pleasure," I answered readily, much relieved. "I will take it to +him myself, as it is London-made, and he may not understand how it is +sighted." + +This may have been a breach of neutrality, but what was I to do? If I +refused, the glass would have been taken from me, and I should have been +compromised. I handed it to the officer with my best bow, explained its +mechanism to him; he bowed to me, and from that moment I felt that I was +under his wing. I may be wrong, but I have a notion that in a skirmish +it is much better to be near regulars than volunteers, and I stood in a +line with the military a few paces away. + +Suddenly there was a spark and a report away down in a field of maize, +some six hundred yards below us, and the whizz of a bullet was heard. + +"Steady, men!" said the captain; "don't discharge your rifles." + +The sight was very pretty as they stood in a group on the green hillside +in attitude of suspense, their weapons held at the ready, and all eyes +fixed on the front, from which the smoke was rising. It was very like +to the celebrated picture by Protais, familiar in every cabaret in +France, "_Avant le Combat;_" but even more picturesque than that, for +these soldiers were dressed most irregularly--some in tattered capote, +others in shirt-sleeves, some in shako, others in _bonnet de police_. A +few civilians had crept out of the town by this time, and the chief of +the Miqueletes roared peremptorily to have that gate shut. This was not +an agreeable position for Barbarossa and myself. Our retreat was cut +off. We were unarmed. If one of those amateur warriors were killed, we +ran the imminent hazard of being massacred by his comrades. On the other +hand, there was the liability of being ourselves shot by the Carlists. +How were they to distinguish a neutral or a sympathizer from their foes? +I confess I could not help smiling as the thought occurred to me what a +piece of irony in action it would be if Barbarossa were to be helped to +a morsel of lead by his friends, the enemy. With a cheerful equanimity I +contemplated the prospect of his receiving a very slight contusion from +a spent bullet on a soft part of his frame. + +Ping, ping, came a few reports, but evidently out of range. Each +smoke-wreath was in a different direction. + +"This may get hot," I said to myself; "the Carlists may not be +sharpshooters, but this clump of uniforms in relief on the grass must +present a blur that will be an enticing target for them. I dare not go +back to the wall, but it might be discreet to lie down. There is no +disgrace in offering them a small elevation of corpus." I stretched +myself on the sward, acted nonchalance, and lit a cigar. + +The volunteers could no longer be held in control. They opened action on +their own account, one fellow distinguishing himself by the rapidity of +his fire, and the intensity with which he aimed at something--or +nothing. + +"Ah, that's Tomas!" said a portly civilian connoisseur, with his hands +in his pockets. "We know him, he is making music; he wants to get +himself remarked." + +The soldiers did not deliver a shot, but the volunteers kept cracking +away, and the invisible Carlists replied. Nobody was hit, though +bullets could be heard whizzing overhead for twenty minutes, and one +did actually knock a chip off a wall. That was the sole damage done to +the Republican position; the damage to the Carlist must have been less. +Two of the Miqueletes ventured stealthily down a road leading towards +the point from which the nearest jets of smoke curled, following the +ditch by the side, stooping and peering through the bushes. There was a +volley from afar. They hesitated and stood, as if undecided whether to +advance. + +"Sound the retire for those men," said the captain; and as the call rang +out they returned. + +That volley was the last sign the Carlists gave; and after waiting ten +minutes, the captain shut up my glass, returned it to me, and remarked +that the attack was a feint, and had no object beyond worrying his men. +He gave the order "March," the gate was opened, Barbarossa rejoined me, +and we returned to Irun, taking care to keep as near the regulars as we +could. "Nada--nothing," cried the captain to an inquiring lady on a +balcony, and the town-gates were closed after the volunteers had +returned and tramped to the Plaza with the proud bearing of citizens who +had done their duty. + +How that heroic Tomas did strut! A fighter he of the choicest brand, one +not to stop at trifles; there was martial ire in his flaming glance; +defiance breathed from his nostrils; triumph sat on his lips; he swung +his arms like destructive flails; and as he entered a tavern one could +only fancy him calling in a voice of Stentor for a jug of rum and blood +plentifully besprinkled with gunpowder and cayenne pepper to assuage the +thirst of combat. + +O'Donovan gave me his letter. Barbarossa hinted that it was our best +course to slope, and slope we did, as soon as the horse was harnessed. +As we passed down the street a grinning face saluted me from a doorway. +It was that of my acquaintance from the barber's shop. He gave me a +meaning wink. The artful Carlists had evidently succeeded in their +object, whatever it might have been. On the river-bank our fair and +faithful ferry-maid awaited us. We were conveyed over in safety, and at +the hotel of Hendaye soon forgot the perils we had encountered. + +Barbarossa was dead-beat, and threw himself on a sofa, where he sank +back heavy-eyed and exhausted; and I, almost feared that he would drop +into a coma, as the penalty of overstraining nature, until the sight of +a pack of cards restored him as if by a spell to his normal wakefulness. + +Even in a disturbed region it is needful to have a change of linen, so +we got back next morning to St. Jean de Luz, where I had left my +baggage. There I met M. Thieblin, a colleague, whom I had seen last at +Metz, previous to the siege of that fortress in the Franco-German war. +He was now representing the _New York Herald_, and had just returned +from Estella, at the taking of which place, the most important the +Carlists had yet seized, he had the luck to be present. He assured me +that it was utter fatuity to dream of following the Carlists, except I +had at least one horse--but that it would be sensible to take two if I +could manage to procure them. It was more than an ordinary man was +qualified to cope with, to make his observations, write his letters, and +look after their transmission, without having to attend to his nag, and +do an odd turn of cooking at a pinch. The riddle was how to get the +horse--a sound hardy animal that would not call for elaborate grooming, +or refuse a feed of barley. Horse-flesh was at a premium, but he thought +I might be able to have what I wanted at Bayonne, on payment of an +extravagant price. A requisition for forage and corn could be had +through the Junta; and I should have no trouble in getting an orderly on +applying with my credentials to the chief of staff of any of the Carlist +columns to which I might attach myself. We had a long conversation, and +Thieblin frankly informed me that in his opinion the Carlists had not +the ghost of a chance outside their own territory. There they were cocks +of the walk. What the end might be he could not pretend to vaticinate, +but "El Pretendiente" would never reign in Madrid. The conflict might +last for months--might last for years; but the Carlists owed the +vitality they had as much to the divisions and inefficiency of their +adversaries as to their own strength. There would be no important +engagements--to dignify them by the epithet--until the organization of +the insurrectionary forces was regularized, and they had a stronger +artillery and an adequate cavalry. M. Thieblin did not stray far from +the bull's-eye in his prophecy. + +I went to bed in the mood of Crookback on Bosworth Field, and felt that +my dream-talk would shape itself into the cry, "A horse! a horse!" + +Until that coveted steed had been lassoed, stolen, or bought, I must +only endeavour to justify my existence--that is to say, render value for +the money expended on me by picking up "copy" anywhere and everywhere. + +I was advised to go to Bilbao by sea, but the advice came too late. The +last steamer from Bayonne had ventured there four-and-twenty hours +before I sought my passage, and even on that last steamer the few +voyagers were unable to insure their lives with the Accidental Company, +although they consented to promise that they would descend into the hold +the instant they heard a shot. It was almost as full of jeopardy to +travel to Bilbao by sea as to sail down the Mississippi with a racing +captain and a lading of rye-whisky on board. One Monsieur Gueno, master +of the barque _Numa_, of Vannes, made moan that he was seriously knocked +about while he lay in the Nervion, off the Luchana bridge, during a +skirmish between the Carlists and the troops. They both fought +vigorously, but they gave him most of the blows. One of his crew, in a +punt behind, was killed, and twenty-five bullets were embedded in a +single mast. He had the tricolour flying all the time. A +fellow-countryman of his, Monsieur Jarmet, of the ship _Pierre-Alcide_, +of Nantes, sent in a claim for an indemnity of L160 for damages +sustained by his vessel much in the like manner. A Spanish war-craft, +moored behind him, began pelting the Carlists with shot; the Carlists +replied, and the _Pierre-Alcide_ came in for the bulk of the favours +distributed. Three bullets penetrated the captain's cabin, and four rent +holes in the French flag. Neither pilots nor tugs were for hire at +Bilbao, and captains of sailing vessels had only to whistle for a +favouring wind and rely on their own good fortune and skill. Bilbao had +to be dismissed on the merits. + +Taking it for granted that I had that evasive horse, I reasoned, as I +tossed on my bed, to the restless whimper of the Bay of Biscay, over +which a storm was brewing, that "el Cuartel Real," the headquarters of +the King, was the natural goal. There first information was to be had, +and it was felt that it was about the safest place to be; but the King +seldom stopped under the same roof two nights successively, and no one +could tell where he would be two days beforehand. If he was at Estella +when one started, he might be at Vera or Durango, or goodness knows +where, when one got to Estella. So far his progress had been a success; +he was present at the taking of Estella, and exercised his Royal +clemency by releasing the captured prisoners. It would have been more +politic to have demanded an exchange, for there were partisans of his +own in Republican dungeons (Englishmen amongst them); but then prisoners +have to be fed and guarded, so on the whole it was as well they were set +free. It was very much the case of the man who won the elephant at a +raffle. If the stories, spread assiduously by the Republicans, of the +massacre and maltreatment of captives by the Carlists were correct, +here was the opportunity for the exercise of wholesale cruelty; but +there was not a particle of truth in such charges, which, by the way, +one hears in every civil war. Where Don Carlos might advance next, or +where severe fighting--not such brushes as that I witnessed at +Irun--might take place, was a mystery. The movements of the Republican +leaders were inexplicable, and conducted in contravention of all known +principles of the art of war. They harassed their men by long and +objectless marches. They ordered towns to be put in a state of defence +at first, and then withdrew the garrisons. They engaged whole columns in +defiles, where a company of invisible guerrilleros could tease them. +They acted, in most instances, as if they had no information or wrong +information. The latter, I believe, was nearer the truth. Their system +of espionage was inefficient, as the information they got was +untrustworthy, and always would be, in the northern provinces, for the +feeling of the masses of the people was against them. Instead of making +headway they were losing ground every day, and would so continue until +they received reinforcements with fibre, and were commanded by officers +who really meant to win, and had the knowledge or the instinct to +conceive a proper plan of campaign. The generals could hardly be +censured, for their hands were tied; they were forbidden to be severe; +they dared not squelch insubordination. Capital punishment, even in the +army, and at such a crisis as this, was abolished. There had been, I +heard, something suspiciously resembling a mutiny in the column of +Sanchez Bregua. A certain Colonel Castanon was put under arrest on a +charge of Alfonsist proclivities; but the Cazadores and Engineers +threatened to rebel unless he was liberated; and Sanchez Bregua, instead +of decimating the Cazadores and Engineers, as Lord Strathnairn would +have done, liberated the Colonel. + +But to that question of my route. Peradventure the presence to my dozing +vision of the General commanding the Republican troops of the north that +had been might help me towards a solution. + +"That had been" is written advisedly, for Sanchez Bregua had been +recalled to Madrid, not a day too soon. He was one of those generals +whose spine had been curved by lengthened bending over a desk. Loma, who +was active and dashing, and had the rare gift of confidence in himself, +had taken his stand at Tolosa, and was awaiting the advent of Lizarraga. +All his men, and every able-bodied male in the town, were diligently +excavating ditches and making entrenchments. Until Tolosa was captured +by the Carlists, no serious attack on Pampeluna was probable; and that +attack was likely to assume the form of an investment. Estella was to +the south of Pampeluna, and all the country round, from which provisions +could be drawn, was in the occupation of the Carlists. Tolosa was the +objective point of the moment, and to Tolosa I determined to go. An +attempt on San Sebastian could not enter into the calculations of the +Carlist leaders at this stage of their revolt. The stronghold was almost +inaccessible on the land side, and men, munitions, and provisions could +be easily thrown into it by water. Irun, Fontarabia, and even Renteria +(were artillery available) could be seized whenever the comparatively +small sacrifice of lives involved would be advisable. But the game was +not worth the candle yet. Were Irun or Fontarabia in the hands of the +Carlists, there was the always-present danger of shells being pitched +into them from a gunboat in the Bidassoa; and Renteria, outside of which +the Republican troops only stirred on sufferance, was to all intents as +serviceable to the Carlists as if it were tenanted by a Carlist +garrison, which would thereby be condemned to idleness. + +That whirlwind ride from Renteria to Irun would come before me as the +storm battalions mustered outside, and the waves began lashing +themselves into violence of temper. What if I had to go to Madrid while +such weather as this was brooding? To get to the capital one is obliged +to embark at Bayonne for Santander, and proceed thence by rail--so long +as no Carlist partidas meddle with the track. Romantic Spain! + +But are not those Republicans who affect that they know how to govern a +country primarily and principally to blame? Only consider the continued +interruption of that short piece of road between San Sebastian and +Irun. Is it not disgraceful to them? One of our old Indian officers, I +dare venture to believe, with eighteen horsemen and a couple of +companies of foot, could hold it open in spite of the Carlists. But such +a simple idea as the establishment of cavalry patrols of three, keeping +vigil backwards and forwards along the line of eighteen miles, with +stout infantry posts always on the alert in blockhouses at intervals, +seems never to have entered into the obtuse heads of those officers +lately promoted from the ranks. Seeing that the intercourse of different +towns with each other and with the coast and abroad has been so long +broken up, I cannot fathom the secret of how the population lives. The +troops arrive in a village one day and levy contributions, the +guerrilleros arrive the next and do the same; the fields must be +neglected, trade must droop, yet nobody apparently wants food. True, the +land is wonderfully fat; but some day the cry of famine will be heard. +No land could bear this perpetual drain on its resources. And then I +thought of Carlists whom I met in France, who had given of their goods +to support the cause. With them I talked on this very subject. They +were respectable and respected men; they prayed for success to Don +Carlos with sincere heart; but they had left Spain, and they complained +that this condition of disturbance was lasting too long. + +"You ask me why I did not remain," said one to me; "wait, and you shall +see." + +He opened a door and pointed to three lovely little girls at play, and +continued, "These are my reasons; I have made more sacrifices than I was +able for the Royal cause, and they asked me at last for another +contribution, which would have ruined me. I love my King; but for no +King, senor, could I afford to make those darlings paupers." + +Had these Carlists any glimmer of the sunshine of a victorious issue to +their uprising? (egad, that was a strong blast, and the waves do swish +as if they were enraged at last!). Thieblin thinks not. And yet they are +active, and, like the storm outside, they are gaining strength. Those of +them under arms are four times as numerous as the Republicans in the +northern provinces. Leader swears to me that everyone who can shoulder a +musket is a Carlist. There are no more Chicos to be had, unless the +volunteers of liberty come over, rifles, accoutrements and all, to +Prince Charlie--a liberty they are volunteering to take somewhat freely. + +I was rash in saying there were no more Chicos. Did not a company of +"bhoys" trudge over to Lesaca to offer their services recently? But they +were very ancient boys. The youngest of them was sixty-five. They were +veterans of the Seven Years' War, and mostly colonels. Their fidelity +was thankfully acknowledged, but their services were not gratefully +accepted. The aged and ferocious fire-eaters were sent back to their +arrowroot and easy-chairs. At all events, they had more of the timber of +heroism in them than those diplomatic Carlists of the _gandin_ order, +who are Carlists because it makes them interesting in the sight of the +ladies, but whose campaigning is confined to an occasional three days' +incursion on Spanish territory, with a cook and a valet, saddle-bags +full of potted lobster and _pate de foie gras_, and a dressing-case +newly packed with _au Botot_ and essence of Jockey Club. There are +personages of this class not unknown to society at Biarritz and +Bayonne, who have been going to the front for the last three months, and +have not got there yet. One would think their game of chivalry ought to +be pretty well "played out;" but to the folly of the vain man, as to the +appetite of the lean pig, there is no limit. + +By Jove! There is a clatter; the casement is blown open, and the light +is blown out, and through the gap whistles the cool, briny breath of the +Atlantic, and I can almost feel the wash of the white spray in my hair. +Better a stable cell in the Castle of the Mota to-night than a tumbling +berth in the _San Margarita_. This was the close of my interview with +myself, and I turned over on my pillow and fell precipitately into a +profound dreamless sleep. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + Nearing the End--Firing on the Red Cross--Perpetuity of + War--Artistic Hypocrites--The Jubilee Year--The Conflicts of a + Peaceful Reign--Major Russell--Quick Promotion--The Foreign + Legion--An Aspiring Adventurer--Leader's Career--A Piratical + Proposal--The "Ojaladeros" of Biarritz--A Friend in Need--Buying a + Horse--Gilpin Outdone--"Fred Burnaby." + + +AND now I take up the last chapter of this book, and I have not half +finished with the subject I had set before myself at starting. By the +figures at the head of the last page I perceive that I have almost +reached the orthodox length of a volume, and perforce must stop. For +some weeks past I have been looking and longing for the end, for I have +been ill, weary and worried, and my labour has become a task. Slowly +toiling day by day, I knew I must be nearing the goal; yet, like the +strenuous Webb on his swim from Dover to Calais, the horizon seemed to +come no closer. The land in sight grew no plainer, although each +breast-stroke--the pleasure of a while agone, but oh! such a tax +now--must have lessened the distance. Even to that excursion there came +an hour of accomplishment and repose; but to this, of pen over paper, I +cannot flatter myself that the hour is yet. I have to abandon the work +incomplete. As it has happened to me before, the theme has expanded +under my hands, and I shall have to rise from my desk before I penetrate +to the Carlist headquarters, of which I had to say much, or have +experiences of that strangest of Communes in Murcia, with its sea and +land skirmishes and its motley rabble of mutineers, convicts, and +nondescripts, of which I had to say much likewise. + +Whether I shall have the privilege of recounting my adventures at the +court and camp of Don Carlos, and by the side of the General directing +the siege of Cartagena, who admitted me as a sort of supernumerary on +his staff, will depend on the reception of this, the first instalment of +my experiences in Spain. + +An act of unjustifiable barbarism or stupidity, or both--for barbarism +is but another form of stupidity--was perpetrated by some Carlists +outside Irun while I was negotiating for that indispensable horse. An +ambulance-waggon, displaying the Red Cross of Geneva, had sallied from +the town, and was fired upon. The Paris delegate I had met at Hendaye +was in charge of it, and averred that it was wantonly and wilfully +attacked. I thought it, singular that nobody was hurt, and reasoned that +the man was excitable, and got into range unconsciously. The duty of the +Geneva Society properly begins after, and not during a combat; and when +gentlemen are busy at the game of professional manslaughter, no +philanthropic outsider has any right to distract them from their +occupation by indiscreet obstruction. The Parisian did not view it in +that light, and downfaced me that these rustics, to whose aid he was +actually going, tried to murder him of malice prepense. It was useless +to represent to him that these rustics may have never heard of the +modern benevolent institution for the softening of strife, and may have +regarded the huge Red Cross as a defiant symbol of Red Republicanism, +and perhaps a parody of what is sacred. So in the estimation of that +citizen of the most enlightened capital in the universe, these Basques +were ruthless boobies with an insatiable passion for lapping blood. But +mistakes and exaggerations will occur in every war. The only way to +obviate them is to put an end to war altogether--_which will never be +done_! When Christ came into the world, peace was proclaimed; when He +left it, peace was bequeathed. War has been the usual condition of +mankind since, as it had been before; and Christians cut each other's +throats with as much alacrity and expertness as Pagans, often in the +name of the religion of peace. + +I heard two eminent war-correspondents lecture recently, and I noticed +that those passages where fights were described were applauded to the +echo. The more ferocious the combat the more vigorous the cheers. The +faces of small boys flushed, and their hands clinched at the vivid +recital. The nature of the savage, which has not been extirpated by +School Boards, was betraying itself in them. Yet these two +war-correspondents thought it an acquittal of conscience after their +kindling periods to dwell on the immorality of war. The one spoke of the +beauty of Bible precepts, the other disburdened himself on the cruelty +and wickedness of a battle. What artistic hypocrisy! It was as if one +were to strike up the "Faerie Voices" waltz, and tell a girl to keep her +feet still; as if one were to lend "Robinson Crusoe" to a boy, and warn +him not to think of running away to sea. Still, I must even add my voice +to the orthodox chorus, and affirm that warfare is bad, brutal, +fraudful, a thing of meretricious gauds, a clay idol, fetish of humbug +and havoc, whose feet are soaking in muddy gore and salt tears; yet in +the privacy of my own study I might sadly admit that the Millennium is +remote, that the Parliament of Nations exists but in the dreams of the +poet, and that Longfellow's forecast of the days down through the dark +future when the holy melodies of love shall oust the clangours of +conflict is a pretty conceit--and no more. + +War is inexcusable, and is foolish and ugly; but, like the poor and the +ailing, we shall have it always with us. It is criminal, except as +protest against intolerable persecution, or in maintenance of national +honour or defence of national territory; and even in these cases it +should be undertaken only when all devices of conciliation have been +tried in vain. Next to the vanquished, it does most harm to the victor. +Yet about it, as about high play, there is a fascination, and I have to +plead guilty to the weak feeling that I would not look with overwhelming +aversion on an order, should it come to me to-morrow, to prepare to +chronicle a new campaign and face the chronicler's risks; and they are +real. But I should not go into it with a light heart, like M. Emile +Ollivier. I might be, in a quiet way, happy as Queen Victoria was +(according to Count Vitzthum) for she danced much the night before the +declaration of hostilities against Russia, but spoke of what was coming +with amiable candour and great regret. + +We are on the eve of a Jubilee Year, when the halcyon shall plume his +wing, and we shall hear much oratorical trash and hebetude about the +peacefulness of this happy reign. + +Does the reader reflect how many wars we have had in the pacific +half-century which is lapsing? The tale will astonish him, and should +silence the thoughtless word-spinners of the platforms. The door of the +temple of Janus has been seldom closed for long. Our campaigns, great +and small, and military enterprises of the lesser sort, could not be +counted on the fingers of both hands. We have had fighting with Afghans +and Burmese (twice); Scinde, Gwalior, and Sikh wars; hostilities with +Kaffirs, Russians, Persians, Chinese, and Maoris (twice), Abyssinians, +Ashantis, Zulus, Boers, and Soudanese, not to mention the repression of +the most stupendous of mutinies, a martial promenade in Egypt, and +expeditions against Jowakis, Bhootanese, Looshais, Red River rebels, and +such pitiful minor fry. + +In St. Jean de Luz, the nearest point to the disputed ground and the +best place from which to transmit information, there was a small and +select British colony, mostly consisting of retired naval and military +officers. A dear friend of mine amongst them was Major Russell, who had +spent a lengthened span of years in the East--an admirable type of the +calm, firm, courteous Anglo-Indian--who had never soured his temper and +spoiled his liver with excessive "pegs," who understood and respected +the natives, who had shown administrative ability, and who, like many +another honest, dutiful officer, had not shaken much fruit off the +pagoda-tree, or even secured the C.B. which is so often given to +tarry-at-home nonentities. Russell used to pay me a regular visit to the +Fonda de la Playa. One morning as we were chatting, Leader strode into +the coffee-room, a vision of splendour. He had got on his uniform as +Commandant of the Foreign Legion--a uniform which did much credit to his +fancy, for he had designed it himself. He wore a white boina with gold +tassel, a blue tunic with black braid, red trousers, and brown gaiters. +He had donned the gala-costume with the object of getting himself +photographed. Commandant is the equivalent of Major in the British +service, so we agreed to dub the young Irishman henceforth and for ever, +until he became colonel or captain-general, Major Leader. + +"Promotion is quick in this army," murmured Russell. "I served all my +active life under the suns of India, and here I am only a major at the +close. Leader joined the Carlists less than three months ago, and he is +already my equal in rank." + +"The fortune of war, Russell," said I; "don't be jealous. I was offered +command of a brigade under the Commune, but I declined the tribute to my +merit, or I would not be here to-day. I met a man in Bayonne yesterday, +and he was ready to assume control of the entire insurrectionary +forces." + +"Who? Cabrera?" + +"No," I answered; "catch Cabrera coming here. He is too much afraid of a +ruler who is no pretender. The renowned Commander-in-Chief of Aragon and +Valencia, Don Ramon the Rough and Ready, is Conde Something-or-other +now, a willing slave to petticoat government. He is to be seen any day +pottering about Windsor." + +"And who is this speculator in bloodshed?" + +"A foreign adventurer," I explained, "who does not know a word of +Spanish, much less Basque, is unacquainted with the topography of the +country, and has not the faintest inkling of the idiosyncrasies of the +lieutenants who would serve under him, or of the mode of humouring the +prejudices of the people of the different provinces in revolt." + +"What answer did they give to his application for employment?" + +"A polite negative. They told him they could not appoint him a leader +without offending the susceptibilities of adherents with claims upon +them men of local influence, and so forth. Behind his back, they laughed +at his entertaining temerity." + +That Foreign Legion never came to maturity. Leader showed me a +commission authorizing him to organize it. Lesaca was to be the depot, +French the language of command, and Smith Sheehan the adjutant. It might +have developed into a very fine Foreign Legion, but no volunteers +presented themselves to join it but two young Englishmen, one of whom +was sick when he was not drunk, and the other of whom felt it to be a +grievance on a campaign that a cup of tea could not be got at regular +hours. How Sheehan did chaff this amiable amateur! + +"You will have nothing to do but draw your pay, my lad," he said. "The +cookery is hardly A 1, but 'twill pass. Think of the beds, pillows of +hops under your head; and every regiment has its own set of +billiard-markers and a select string-band, every performer an artist." + +After an arduous service of one day and a half that gentleman returned +to the maternal apron-strings, laden to the ground with the most +harrowing legends of the horrors of war. Leader was not a warrior of +this stamp--far from it; he had vindicated his manliness at Ladon +outside Orleans, where Ogilvie, of the British Royal Artillery, had met +his fate by his side, and there was something soldierly in the way he +bore himself in his vanity of dress. Not that I think the dandies are +the best soldiers--that is merest popular paradox. To me it is as +ridiculous for a man to array himself in fine clothes when he is going +to kill or be killed, as it would be for him to put on gewgaws when he +was going to be hanged. As Leader disappears from my account of Carlist +doings after this--we were associated with different columns--it may be +of interest to tell of his subsequent career. He served in a cavalry +squadron on the staff of the King, and when the cause collapsed came to +London. His uncle tried to induce him to settle down to some steady +employment in the City. Leader expressed himself satisfied to make an +experiment at desk-work. + +"It was useless," said Leader with a hearty crow as he related the story +to me. "The friend who had promised to create a vacancy for me in his +office ordered his chief clerk to lock the safe and send for the police +when he heard of my antecedents. He invited me to dinner, but candidly +told me that a rifle was more in my line than a quill." + +And yet it was in the service of the quill the young soldier ended his +days. He got an appointment as an auxiliary correspondent to a great +London daily paper during the Russo-Turkish war. He was elate; the road +to fame and fortune now lay open before him. The next I heard of him was +that he had succumbed to typhoid fever at Philippopolis. + +A Scotch _spadassin_ arrived in our midst about this period. He was most +anxious to draw a blade for Don Carlos, but he had a decided objection +to serve in any capacity but that of command. He did not appreciate the +fun of losing the number of his mess as an obscure hero of the rank and +file, though he would not mind sacrificing an arm, I do think, at the +head of a charging column, provided that he had a showy uniform on, and +that the fact of his valour was properly advertised in the despatches. +He had an idea that would commend itself to Belcha's bushwhackers, but +it was not entertained. It was to take passage with a few trusty men on +the tug for San Sebastian when she was reported to be conveying specie +for the payment of the Spanish Republican troops, to drive the voyagers +down the hold, throttle the skipper, intimidate the crew, take the wheel +and turn her head to the coast, seize and land the money under Carlist +protection, and then scuttle her. The least recompense, he calculated, +which could be awarded to him for that exploit by his Majesty Charles +VII. was the Order of the Golden Fleece; and a very appropriate order +too. + +There was a set of Carlist sympathizers known to the fighting-men as +"ojaladeros," or warriors with much decoration in the shape of polished +buttons. Their depot was at Biarritz, an aristocratic watering-place +born under the second French Empire, and not ignorant of some of the +vices of the Byzantine Empire. There are healthful breezes there, but +they do not quite sweep away the scent of frangipani. Warlike, with a +proviso, the Scot might have been designated, but he was not to be +compared with these ojaladeros; he would fight if he had a lime-lit +stage to posture upon; they would not fight at all, but they moved about +mysteriously, as if their bosoms were big with the fate of dynasties, +held hugger-mugger caucus, and were the oracles of boudoirs. + +At Bayonne there was a better class of Carlist sympathizers; such of +them as were of the fighting age were there in the intervals of duty. To +a job-master's in the city by the Adour I was recommended as the most +likely place to procure a steed. At the Hotel St. Etienne, where I +stopped, I was gratified by an unexpected encounter with the genial +captain[G] (Ronald Campbell), who had brought a juicy leg of mutton at +his saddle-skirts to the relief of my household after the siege of +Paris. He went with me to the job-master's--it is as well to have a +friend with you when you do a horse-deal. I had no choice but Hobson's. +The job-master was desolated, but he had sold three animals the day +before to an English milord, a very big gentleman, and his party. He had +just one horse, but it was a beauty. The horse was trotted out. It was +well groomed--they always are, and arsenic does impart a nice gloss to +the hide--and looked imposing, a tall three-quarter-bred bay gelding. + +"You'll have to take it," said the captain, "though I fear it will not +be a great catch for mountain-work. Seems to me that it stumbles--that +lie-back of the ears is vicious--ha! rears too--and by Jove! it has been +fired. No matter. Where needs must, you know, there's no alternative. +Buy it by all means." + +I closed with the bargain, got a loan of a saddle, bought a pair of +jack-boots, and ordered my purchase to be brought round to the door of +the hotel within half-an-hour. I am no rough-rider, and I had not +counted on the high mettle of this, which was literally a "fiery, +untamed steed." It had been fed for the market, and had had no exercise +for two days previous. I meant to try its paces to St. Jean de Luz, and +show off before the damsels of Biarritz; but, lack-a-day! what a +declension was in store for me. It had best be given in the words of a +letter to my kindly compatriot, written while defeat was fresh in my +mind. Thus the epistle runs: + + * * * * * + +"DEAR CAMPBELL, + +"My first essay on my eight hundred francs' worth of horse-power +was a sight to see. + +"_Imprimis_, the stirrup-leathers were long enough for you. + +"_En suite_, I gave the dear gelding his head because he took it, +and he incontinently faced a post of the French army at the Porte +d'Espagne. The sentry came to the charge and cried, _On ne passe +pas ici._ The blood-horse went at him, the sentry funked, and then, +as if satisfied with his demonstration, the blood-horse--the bit +always in his mouth--made a _demi-tour_, and faced a post of +douaniers. This also was sacred ground, it appears, but the +douaniers let the blood-horse pass, not even making the feint to +prod his inside for contraband. The scene now changes to the Place +de la Comedie (there's something in a name), where by virtue of +vigorous tugging at curb and snaffle I just succeeded in keeping my +gallant gelding off the cobble-stones. He went a burster over the +bridge by a short turn down a street and to the door of his stable, +and there he positively stopped, and I swear I felt his sides +shaking with laughter. I called the groom; said I thought it would +rain; besides, I did not know the road. On the whole, I had +reconsidered the matter, and would go to St. Jean de Luz by train. +The groom was awfully polite, pretended to believe me, and provided +a man to take forward my eight--oh, hang it! we shan't think of the +price. + +"Humiliation! you will say. Yes, sir, and I feel it; but that horse +will feel it too. When I get him somewhere that none can see, and +where sentries, douaniers, and stables of refuge don't abound, I +shall ask him to try how long he can keep up a gallop; but, by the +body of the Claimant, I shall have sixteen stone on his back. + +"Yours with knees unwearied and soul unsubdued." + + * * * * * + +At St. Jean de Luz I learned at the principal hotel that the English +milord was Captain Frederick Burnaby of "the Queen of England's Blue +Guards." He was supposed to have some secret official mission to Don +Carlos, to whose headquarters he had directed his steps, and I at once +took measures to follow in his tracks. + + + + +THE END. + + * * * * * + + +BILLING & SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD. + + +_BY THE AUTHOR OF "ROMANTIC SPAIN."_ + + +AN IRON-BOUND CITY; or, Five Months of Peril and Privation. 2 vols. 21s. + + "A story of peril, adventure, privation, + Is told, in two vols., to your great delectation, + With shrewd common sense and uncommon sensation! + Here's the painful account of Parisians defeated: + And Paris besieged is most 'specially' treated: + Like a trusty Tapleyan, bright, hopeful, and witty, + O'Shea tells the tale of 'AN IRON-BOUND CITY.'"--_Punch._ + +"We can listen with unjaded interest to the oft-told tale of the fall of +Paris when it is told by so genial and sunny-minded an +historian."--_Saturday Review._ + + +LEAVES PROM THE LIFE OF A SPECIAL + +CORRESPONDENT. 2 vols. 21s. + +"The great charm of his pages is the entire absence of dulness, and the +evidence they afford of a delicate sense of humour, considerable powers +of observation, a store of apposite and racy anecdote, and a keen +enjoyment of life."--_Standard._ + +"Redolent of stories throughout, told with such a cheery spirit, in so +genial a manner, that even those they sometimes hit hard cannot, when +they read, refrain from laughing, for Mr. O'Shea is a modern Democritus; +and yet there runs a vein of sadness, as if, like Figaro, he made haste +to laugh lest he should have to weep."--_Society._ + +"Delightful reading.... A most enjoyable book.... It is kinder to +readers to leave them to find out the good things for themselves. They +will find material for amusement and instruction on every page; and if +the lesson is sometimes in its way as melancholy as the moral of Firmin +Maillard's 'Les Derniers Bohemes,' it is conveyed after a fashion that +recalls the light-hearted gaiety of Paul de Kock's 'Damoiselle du +Cinquieme' and the varied pathos and humour of Henri +Murger."--_Whitehall Review._ + + +WARD AND DOWNEY, PUBLISHERS, LONDON. + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[A] Gibraltar is no longer a penal settlement. + +[B] That has all been changed since. There are serviceable rifled guns +at Tangier now, and the Sultan has some approach to a regular army, +organized by an ex-English soldier. + +[C] Stuart married Lady Alice Hay, grand-daughter of William IV., in +London, in 1874, and is now dead. He left no heir, so that the House of +Hanover may rest easy. The story that the Cardinal of York ("Henry +IX."), who died in 1807, was the last of the Stuart line, is all bosh. +Charles-Edward had a son by the daughter of Prince Sobieski. + +[D] Review of the social and political state of the Basque Provinces, at +the end of a book on "Portugal and Galicia," published in 1848 by John +Murray. + +[E] It should be noted that in July, 1876, directly after the war was +over, the fueros were entirely done away with by a special law. + +[F] See my last book, "An Iron-Bound City." Poor Willie died in New York +of a complication of diseases on last Easter Sunday--an anniversary of +hopefulness. His path of existence here was thorny. Unsurfeiting +happiness be his portion in the meads of asphodel! + +[G] Now Colonel the Baron Craignish, Equerry to his Royal Highness the +Grand Duke of Saxe-Coburg Gotha. + + * * * * * + +NOTES OF THE TRANSCRIBER OF THIS ETEXT. + +The following typographical errors in the book have been corrected in +making this etext: + +Abd-es-Salem changed to Abd-es-Salam + +Dorregarray changed to Dorregaray + +Ojoladeros changed to Ojaladeros + +Enderlasa changed to Endarlasa + +Enderlaza changed to Endarlasa + +I deserve no creditor changed to I deserve no credit for + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Romantic Spain, by John Augustus O'Shea + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ROMANTIC SPAIN *** + +***** This file should be named 31532.txt or 31532.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/1/5/3/31532/ + +Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was +produced from images generously made available by the +Digital & Multimedia Center, Michigan State University +Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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