The Bible in Spain. Volume 1 of 2. Borrow George
cork-trees, is the third of the chain which skirts the way in the direction of Elvas. It is called Monte Almo; a brook brawls at its base, and as I passed it the sun was shining gloriously on the green herbage, on which flocks of goats were feeding, with their bells ringing merrily, so that the tout ensemble resembled a fairy scene; and that nothing might be wanted to complete the picture, I here met a man, a goatherd, beneath an azinheira, whose appearance recalled to my mind the Brute Carle, mentioned in the Danish ballad of Swayne Vonved: —39
“A wild swine on his shoulders he kept,
And upon his bosom a black bear slept;
And about his fingers, with hair o’erhung,
The squirrel sported, and weasel clung.”
Upon the shoulder of the goatherd was a beast, which he told me was a lontra, or otter, which he had lately caught in the neighbouring brook; it had a string round its neck, which was attached to his arm. At his left side was a bag, from the top of which peered the heads of two or three singular-looking animals; and at his right was squatted the sullen cub of a wolf, which he was endeavouring to tame. His whole appearance was to the last degree savage and wild. After a little conversation, such as those who meet on the road frequently hold, I asked him if he could read, but he made me no answer. I then inquired if he knew anything of God or Jesus Christ; he looked me fixedly in the face for a moment, and then turned his countenance towards the sun, which was beginning to sink in the west, nodded to it, and then again looked fixedly upon me. I believe that I understood the mute reply, which probably was, that it was God who made that glorious light which illumes and gladdens all creation; and, gratified with that belief, I left him and hastened after my companions, who were by this time a considerable way in advance.
I have always found in the disposition of the children of the fields a more determined tendency to religion and piety than amongst the inhabitants of towns and cities, and the reason is obvious – they are less acquainted with the works of man’s hands than with those of God; their occupations, too, which are simple, and requiring less of ingenuity and skill than those which engage the attention of the other portion of their fellow-creatures, are less favourable to the engendering of self-conceit and self-sufficiency, so utterly at variance with that lowliness of spirit which constitutes the best foundation of piety. The sneerers and scoffers at religion do not spring from amongst the simple children of nature, but are the excrescences of over-wrought refinement; and though their baneful influence has indeed penetrated to the country and corrupted man there, the source and fountain-head was amongst crowded houses, where nature is scarcely known. I am not one of those who look for perfection amongst the rural population of any country – perfection is not to be found amongst the children of the fall, wherever their abodes may happen to be; but, until the heart discredits the existence of a God, there is still hope for the soul of the possessor, however stained with crime he may be, for even Simon the magician was converted. But when the heart is once steeled with infidelity, infidelity confirmed by carnal wisdom, an exuberance of the grace of God is required to melt it, which is seldom manifested; for we read in the blessed book that the Pharisee and the wizard became receptacles of grace, but where is there mention made of the conversion of the sneering Sadducee, and is the modern infidel aught but a Sadducee of later date?
It was dark night before we reached Evora, and having taken leave of my friends, who kindly requested me to consider their house my home, I and my servant went to the Largo de San Francisco, in which, the muleteer informed me, was the best hostelry of the town. We rode into the kitchen, at the extreme end of which was the stable, as is customary in Portugal. The house was kept by an aged gypsy-like female and her daughter, a fine blooming girl about eighteen years of age. The house was large. In the upper story was a very long room, like a granary, which extended nearly the whole length of the house; the farther part was partitioned off, and formed a chamber tolerably comfortable, but very cold; and the floor was of tiles, as was also that of the large room, in which the muleteers were accustomed to sleep on the furniture of the mules. After supper I went to bed, and, having offered up my devotions to Him who had protected me through a dangerous journey, I slept soundly till the morning.
CHAPTER III
Shopkeeper at Evora – Spanish Contrabandistas – Lion and Unicorn – The Fountain – Trust in the Almighty – Distribution of Tracts – Library at Evora – Manuscript – The Bible as a Guide – The Infamous Mary – The Man of Palmella – The Charm – The Monkish System – Sunday – Volney – An Auto-da-Fé – Men from Spain – Reading of a Tract – New Arrival – The Herb Rosemary.
Evora is a small city, walled, but not regularly fortified, and could not sustain a siege of a day. It has five gates; before that to the south-west is the principal promenade of its inhabitants; the fair on St. John’s Day is likewise held there; the houses are in general very ancient, and many of them unoccupied. It contains about five thousand inhabitants, though twice that number would be by no means disproportionate to its size. The two principal edifices are the See, or cathedral,40 and the convent of San Francisco, in the square before the latter of which was situated the posada where I had taken up my abode. A large barrack for cavalry stands on the right-hand side on entering the south-west gate. To the southeast, at the distance of six leagues, is to be seen a blue chain of hills, the highest of which is called Serra Dorso;41 it is picturesquely beautiful, and contains within its recesses wolves and wild boars in numbers. About a league and a half on the other side of this hill is Estremoz.
I passed the day succeeding my arrival principally in examining the town and its environs, and, as I strolled about, entered into conversation with various people that I met. Several of these were of the middle class, shopkeepers and professional men; they were all Constitutionalists, or pretended to be so, but had very little to say except a few commonplace remarks on the way of living of the friars, their hypocrisy and laziness. I endeavoured to obtain some information respecting the state of instruction in the place, and from their answers was led to believe that it must be at the lowest ebb, for it seemed that there was neither book-shop nor school. When I spoke of religion, they exhibited the utmost apathy for the subject, and, making their bows, left me as soon as possible.
Having a letter of introduction to a person who kept a shop in the market-place, I went thither and delivered it to him as he stood behind his counter. In the course of conversation I found that he had been much persecuted whilst the old system was in its vigour, and that he entertained a hearty aversion for it. I told him that the ignorance of the people in religious matters had served to nurse that system, and that the surest way to prevent its return was to enlighten their minds. I added that I had brought a small stock of Bibles and Testaments to Evora, which I wished to leave for sale in the hands of some respectable merchant, and that if he were anxious to help to lay the axe to the root of superstition and tyranny, he could not do so more effectually than by undertaking the charge of these books. He declared his willingness to do so, and I went away determined to entrust to him half of my stock. I returned to the hostelry, and sat down on a log of wood on the hearth within the immense chimney in the common apartment; two surly-looking men were on their knees on the stones. Before them was a large heap of pieces of old iron, brass, and copper; they were assorting it, and stowing it away in various bags. They were Spanish contrabandists of the lowest class, and earned a miserable livelihood by smuggling such rubbish from Portugal into Spain. Not a word proceeded from their lips, and when I addressed them in their native language, they returned no other answer than a kind of growl. They looked as dirty and rusty as the iron in which they trafficked; their four miserable donkeys were in the stable in the rear.
The woman of the house and her daughter were exceedingly civil to me, and coming near crouched down, asking various questions about England. A man dressed somewhat like an English sailor, who sat on the other side of the hearth confronting me, said, “I hate the English, for they are not baptized, and have not the law,” meaning the law of God. I laughed, and told him that according to the law of England, no one who was unbaptized could be buried in consecrated ground; whereupon he said, “Then you are stricter than we.” He then said, “What is meant by the lion and the unicorn which I saw the other day
The ballad of Svend Vonved, translated from the original Danish, was included by Borrow in his collection of
The original ballad may be found in the
The Spanish