Character of the Spaniards. a mixture of the Caftillians and Catalonians, rather inclining to the former. The Bifcayners are acute and diligent, fiery, and impatient of control; more refembling a colony of republicans, than a province of an abfolute monarchy. The Galicians are a plodding, pains-taking race of mortals, that roam over Spain in search of an hardly-earned fubfift ence. The liftless indolence equally dear to the uncivilized favage, and to the degenerate flave of defpotifm, is no where more indulged than in Spain; thousands of men in all parts of the realm are feen to pass their whole day, wrapped up in a cloak, ftanding in rows against a wall, or dofing under a tree. In total want of every excitement to action, the springs of their intellectual faculties forget to play, their views grow confined within the wretched fphere of mere existence, and they fcarce feem to hope or foresee any thing better than their prefent ftate of vegetation; they feel little or no concern for the welfare or glory of a country, where the furface of the earth is engroffed by a few over-grown families, who feldom bestow a thought on the condition of their vaffals. The poor Spaniard does not work, unless urged by irresistible want, because he perceives no advantage accrue from induftry. As his food and raiment are purchased at a small expence, he fpends no more time in labour, than is abfolutely neceffary for procuring the fcanty provifion his abstemiousness requires. I have heard a peasant refufe to run an errand, because he had that morning earned as much already as would last him the day, without putting himself to any further trouble. 87 ceive with what eagerness they pursue any favourite scheme, with what violence their paffions work upon them, and what vigour and exertion of powers they difplay when awakened by a bull-feaft, or the more conflant agitation of gaming, a vice to which they are fuperlatively addicted. Were it again poffible, by an intelligent, fpirited adminiftration, to fet before their eyes, in a clear and forcible manner, proper incitements to activity and industry, the Spaniards might yet be roufed from their lethargy, and led to riches and reputation; but I confefs the tafk is fo difficult, that I look upon it rather as an Utopian' idea, than as a revolution likely ever to take place. Yet I am convinced that this lazinefs is not effentially inherent in the Spanish compofition; for it is impoffible, without feeing them, to con Their foldiers are brave, and patient of hard fhips: wherever their officers lead them they will follow without flinching, though it be up to the mouth of a battery of cannon; but unless the example be given them by their commander, not a step will they advance. Moft of the Spaniards are hardy; and, when once engaged, go through difficulties without murmuring, bear the inclemencies of the feafons with firmness, and fupport fatigue with amazing perfeverance. They fleep every night in their cloaks on the ground; are fparing in diet, perhaps more from a fenfe of habitual indigence, than from any averfion to gluttony; whenever they can riot in the plenty of another man's table, they will gormandize to excefs, and, not content with eating their fill, will their pockets. I have more than once carry off whatever they can ftuff into been a witness to the pillage of a fupper, by the numerous beaux and admirers which the ladies lead after invited. They are fond of fpices, them in triumph, wherever they are and fcarce eat any thing without faffron, pimento, or garlic; they delight in wine that tastes ftrong of the pitch ed ed skin, and of oil that has a rank fmell and taste; indeed, the fame oil feeds their lamp, fwims in their pottage, and dreffes their fallad: in inns the lighted lamp is frequently handed down to the table, that each man may take the quantity he chooses. Much tobacco is ufed by them in fmoking and chewing. All thefe hot, drying kinds of food, co-operating with the parching qualities of the atmofphere, are affigned as caufes of the fpare make of the common people in Spain, where the priests and the inn-keepers are almost the only well-fed, portly figures to be met with. The Spanish is by no means naturally a ferious, melancholy nation: mifery and difcontent have caft a gloom over them, increated, no doubt, by the long habit of diftruft and terror infpired by the inquifition; yet every village ftill refounds with the mufic of voices and guitars; and their fairs and Sunday wakes are remarkably noisy and riotous. They talk louder, and argue with more vehemence than even the French or Italians, and gefticulate with equal, if not fuperior eagerness. In Catalonia the young men are expert at ball and every village has its Pelota, or ground for playing at fives; but in the fouth of Spain, I never perceived that the inhabitants ufed any particular exercife. I am told, that in the island of Majorca they still wield the fling, for which their ancestors, the Baleares, were fo much renowned. Like most people of fouthern climates, they are dirty in their perfons, and over-run with vermin. The very mention of horns is an infult, and the fight of them makes their blood boil.* As their conftitution may be faid to be made up of the most combuftible ingredients, and prone to love in a degree that natives of more northern latitudes can have no idea of, the custom of embracing perfons of the other fex, which is ufed on many occafions by foreigners, fets the Spaniards all on fire. They would as foon allow a man to pass the night in bed with their wives or daughters, as fuffer him to give them a kifs; and indeed, I believe the ladies themfelves would look upon that favour as a certain prelude to others of greater confequence. Next to accufing a Spaniard of wearing horns, nothing can give him fuch offence as to fufpect him of having an iffue. I was surprised to find them fo much more lukewarm in their devotion than I expected; but I will not take upon me to affert, though I have great reafon to believe it, that there is in Spain as little true moral religion as in any country I ever travelled through, altho' none abounds more with provincial protectors, local Madonnas, and altars celebrated for particular cures and indulgencies: Religion is a topic not to be touched, much lefs handled with any degree of curiofity, in the dominions of fo tremendous a tribunal as the Inquifi tion. From what little I faw, I am apt to fufpect, that the people here trouble themselves with very few ferious thoughts on the fubject; and that, provided they can bring themfelves to believe that their favourite Saint looks upon them with an eye of affection, they take it for granted, that, under his benign influence, they are freed from all apprehenfions of damnation in a future ftate; and indeed, from any great concern about the moral duties of this life. burning zeal, which diftinguished their ancestors above the rest of the Catholic world, appears to have loft much of its activity, and really seems nearly extinguished. It is hard to afcribe The *For this reafon the Spaniards turn their hand downwards when they beckon to any one. ascribe bounds to the changes a craftý, fteady and popular monarch might make in ecclefiaftical matters. The unconcern betrayed by the whole nation at the fall of the Jefuits, is a strong proof of their prefent indifference. Those fathers, the moft powerful body politic in the kingdom, the rulers of the palace, and the def. pots of the cottage, the directors of the confcience, and difpofers of the fortune of every rank of men, were all feized in one night, by detach, ments of foldiers, hurried like malefactors to the fea-ports, and banished for ever from the realm, without the leaft refistance to the royal mandate being made, or even threatened. Their very memory feems to be annihilated with their power. We found the common people inoffenfive, if not civil; and having never had an opportunity of being witneffes to any of their exceffes, can fay nothing of their violent jealoufy or revenge, which are points molt writers on Spain have expatiated upon with great pleasure. I believe in this line, as well as in many others, their bad as well as good qualities have been magnified many degrees above the truth. The most furious example of paffion and cruelty that I heard of, happened a few years ago at San Lucar. A Carmelite friar fell defperately in love with a young woman, to whom he was confeffor. He tried every art of feduction his defires could fuggeft to him; but, to his unspeakable vexation, found her virtue or indifference proof against all his machinations. His defpair was heightened to a pitch of madness, upon hearing that he was foon to be married to a person of her own rank in life. The furies of jealoufy feized his foul, and VOL. III. No. 2. worked him up to the most barbarous of all determinations, that of depriv ing his rival of the prize, by putting an end to her exiftence. He chofe Eafter week for the perpetration cf his crime. The unfufpecting girl came to the confeffional, and poured out her foul at his feet; her innocence ferved only to inflame his rage the more, and to confirm him in his bloody purpose. He gave her abfolution and the facrament with his own hands, as his love deterred him from murdering her, before he thought she was purified from all ftain of fin, and her foul fit to take its flight to the tribunal of its Creator; but his jealoufy and revenge urged him to purfue her down the church, and plunge his dagger in her heart, as fhe turned round to make a genu-flection to the altar. He was immediately feized, and foon condemned to die; but left his ignominious execution fhould reflect difhonour on a religious order, which boasts of having an aunt of the king of France among its members, his fentence was changed into perpetual labour among the galley-flaves of Portorico. The national qualities, good and bad, confpicuous in the lower claffes of men, are eafily traced, and very difcernible in those of higher rank; for their education is too much neglected, their minds too little enlightened by study or communication with other nations, to rub off the general ruft, with which the Spanish. genius has, for above an age, been, as it were, incruftated. The public fchools and univerfities are in a defpicable state of ignorance and irregularity. Some feeble hope of future reformation is indulged by patriots; but time muft fhew what probabilities they are grounded upon.* D The • Since I left Spain, a reform has taken place in the great colleges, notwithflanding a frenuous oppofition. In 1771, Cedulas had already been issued out for vifiting and examining the great foundations; as his majefty had been izformed of the decline of the Universities for above a century, of the great dif The common education of an Englifh gentleman would conftitute a man of learning here; and fhould he understand Greek, he would be quite a phænomenon. As to the nobility, I wonder how they ever learned to read or write; or having once attained fo much, how they contrive not to forget it. It is difficult to fay what they pafs their time in; or what means, befides inattention to bufinefs, they employ in running through their immenfe incomes. In the great houfes one cuftom may contribute to extravagance; a fervant once eftablished is never difcharged, unlefs for fome very enormous offence; he and his family remain penfioners as long as they live: the Duke of I. pays near ten thousand pounds fterling a year in wages and annuities to fervants. The Grandees, one or two excepted, are diminished by a series of diftempered progenitors to a race of pigmies, which dwindles away for lack of heirs, and tends gradually to an union of all the titles and eftates upon the heads of one or two families. I think the Conde de Altamira has no less than nineteen Grandeefhips centered in his perfon. Though they all ftile themfelves de primera claffe, as it were, by way of diftinctive pre-eminence over others of a lower degree; yet I believe no fecond or third clafs exists, and it would be a very grofs infult to fuppofe any of them were of an inferior rank to the rest of the corps: fome difference may perhaps be made in the degrees of popular refpect paid to the defcendants of the heroes that make a figure in the Spanish annals, and fuch Grandees as have been honoured with the dignity in latter times. A Grandee can marry none but his equal. They all thou each other, and affect to appear backward in mixing in other company. The orders that had crept into their conflitutions, and of the contagion which had Spread among other literary bodies, to the great prejudice of public education, and of the ftate. The Cedula for the reformation is figned in April, 1777The colleges to be reformed are, Santa Cruz in Valladolid, Saint Ildefonso in Alcala, Saint Bartholomé, San Salvador de Oviedo, Santiago de Cuenca, and Santiago del Arzobispo, in Salamanca. Thefe fix colleges were linked together in a ftrict union, and formed a more powerful and compact body than the Fefuits: They had fufficient intereft to procure for their own members most of the good things in church and flate, and had a majority in every council and tribunal of Spain. Infiead of maintaining poor fcholars and profeffors, their immense rents, tythes, and dues, were portioned out among themselves. They are reduced to their original inflitutions: their old ftatutes are confirmed, or new-modelled to the times; and poverty, which for many years had been a fure plea for exclufion, is reflored to its primitive claim. Though I make no doubt but the nation is much improved fince 1722, yet I don't think it will be improper to transcribe fome of the Dean of Alicant's firictures upon his countrymen at that period, as a Spaniard is very good authority when he finds fault with Spaniards. Thefe are his words, in a letter to Count Scipio Maffei of Verona: No country, except Italy, abounds more with ancient monuments than Spain: in every province you meet with remnants of bridges, aqueducts, temples, theatres, circuffes, amphitheatres, and other public edifices; most of which have been reduced to their prefent deplorable condition by the outrages of the inhabitants, rather than by the injuries of time: Such is the nature and fpirit of the Spaniards, that to overthrow the monuments of the Pagans or Romans, is accounted among them one of the most meritorious acts of piety, and most efficacious in drawing down upon them the bleffing of the Almighty. Alas! fuch prepofterous devotion! But how can it be otherwife in The Spanish women are in general little and thin; few are ftrikingly beautiful, but almost all have fparkling black eyes, full of expreffion. It is not the fashion here, as in France, to heighten their eclat with paint. They are endowed by nature with a great deal of wit and lively repartee, but for want of the polish and fuccours of education, their wit remains obfcured by the rudeft ignorance, and the most ridiculous prejudices. Their tempers having never been fashioned by polite intercourfe, nor foftened by neceffary contradiction, are extremely pettish and violent. They are continually pouting for fomething or other, and put out of humour by the merelt trifles. Moft of the ladies about court are the reverfe of handfome, and do not feem to have any ambition of paffing for clever or accomplished; not one talent do they poffefs; nor do they ever work, read, write, or touch any mufical inftrument: their Cortejo, or gallant, feems their only play-thing. I believe no country exhibits more bare-faced amours, and fuch an appearance of indelicate debauchery as this. The The For a kingdom which is ruled by the fiupid, idle, monkish tribe; where it is thought a crime to deviate an inch from the rules laid down by the hooded blockheads ? Whatever they sputter out, is revered as oracles of old, iffuing from the Delphic tripod. The fluggards, puffed up with this naufeous adoration, thunder out the pains of bell against all fuch as fo much as look with attention on an ancient ftatue. When any thing of the kind is dug up, their barbarous hands feize, break, deface it; and, left the pure light of the fun should be defiled by the fight of fuch an abomination, it is burnt to lime, or buried again in the ground. If the buft of an emperor, a philofopher, or an orator, fhould happen to be difcovered, they cry out, "'tis an idol! away with it! deftroy it!" and inftantly it undergoes the fate of Dagon. The vulgar demolish all inscriptions, as they believe their characters are defigned to confine fome unclean fpirits as guardians over hidden treasures. Immenfe are the quantities of infcriptions that have been defaced, or thrown back into the holes where they had lain hidden for fo many ages. Superfition and ignorance combine to demolish every thing of the kind. Many were fent to France; and during the late war of the Succeffion, two English travellers freighted two ships with ancient monumental and historical infcriptions, which they had collected near Terragona." Since the time of Dean Marti, Don John Celaya, rector of the university of Valencia, directed a number of Roman infcriptions to be buried in the foundations of the bridge of Serranos; and a much later inftance of barbarifm of the fame kind, was exhibited by the Francifcan friars of S. Maria de pina, at Oliva, |