I Now First Began To Observe An Alteration In The Language Spoken;
It Had Become Less Sibilant, And More Guttural; And, When
Addressing Each Other, The Speakers Used The Spanish Title Of
Courtesy Usted, Or Your Worthiness, Instead Of The Portuguese High
Flowing Vossem Se, Or Your Lordship.
This is the result of
constant communication with the natives of Spain, who never
condescend to speak Portuguese, even when in Portugal, but persist
in the use of their own beautiful language, which, perhaps, at some
future period, the Portuguese will generally adopt.
This would
greatly facilitate the union of the two countries, hitherto kept
asunder by the natural waywardness of mankind.
I had not been seated long before the blazing pile, when a fellow,
mounted on a fine spirited horse, dashed from the stables through
the passage into the kitchen, where he commenced displaying his
horsemanship, by causing the animal to wheel about with the
velocity of a millstone, to the great danger of everybody in the
apartment. He then galloped out upon the plain, and after half an
hour's absence returned, and having placed his horse once more in
the stable, came and seated himself next to me, to whom he
commenced talking in a gibberish of which I understood very little,
but which he intended for French. He was half intoxicated, and
soon became three parts so, by swallowing glass after glass of
aguardiente. Finding that I made him no answer, he directed his
discourse to one of the contrabandistas, to whom he talked in bad
Spanish. The latter either did not or would not understand him;
but at last, losing patience, called him a drunkard, and told him
to hold his tongue. The fellow, enraged at this contempt, flung
the glass out of which he was drinking at the Spaniard's head, who
sprang up like a tiger, and unsheathing instantly a snick and snee
knife, made an upward cut at the fellow's cheek, and would have
infallibly laid it open, had I not pulled his arm down just in time
to prevent worse effects than a scratch above the lower jawbone,
which, however, drew blood.
The smuggler's companions interfered, and with much difficulty led
him off to a small apartment in the rear of the house, where they
slept, and kept the furniture of their mules. The drunkard then
commenced singing, or rather yelling, the Marseillois hymn; and
after having annoyed every one for nearly an hour, was persuaded to
mount his horse and depart, accompanied by one of his neighbours.
He was a pig merchant of the vicinity, but had formerly been a
trooper in the army of Napoleon, where, I suppose, like the drunken
coachman of Evora, he had picked up his French and his habits of
intoxication.
From Estremoz to Elvas the distance is six leagues. I started at
nine next morning; the first part of the way lay through an
enclosed country, but we soon emerged upon wild bleak downs, over
which the wind, which still pursued us, howled most mournfully. We
met no one on the route; and the scene was desolate in the extreme;
the heaven was of a dark grey, through which no glimpse of the sun
was to be perceived. Before us, at a great distance, on an
elevated ground, rose a tower - the only object which broke the
monotony of the waste. In about two hours from the time when we
first discovered it, we reached a fountain, at the foot of the hill
on which it stood; the water, which gushed into a long stone
trough, was beautifully clear and transparent, and we stopped here
to water the animals.
Having dismounted, I left the guide, and proceeded to ascend the
hill on which the tower stood. Though the ascent was very gentle I
did not accomplish it without difficulty; the ground was covered
with sharp stones, which, in two or three instances, cut through my
boots and wounded my feet; and the distance was much greater than I
had expected. I at last arrived at the ruin, for such it was. I
found it had been one of those watch towers or small fortresses
called in Portuguese atalaias; it was square, and surrounded by a
wall, broken down in many places. The tower itself had no door,
the lower part being of solid stone work; but on one side were
crevices at intervals between the stones, for the purpose of
placing the feet, and up this rude staircase I climbed to a small
apartment, about five feet square, from which the top had fallen.
It commanded an extensive view from all sides, and had evidently
been built for the accommodation of those whose business it was to
keep watch on the frontier, and at the appearance of an enemy to
alarm the country by signals - probably by a fire. Resolute men
might have defended themselves in this little fastness against many
assailants, who must have been completely exposed to their arrows
or musketry in the ascent.
Being about to leave the place, I heard a strange cry behind a part
of the wall which I had not visited, and hastening thither, I found
a miserable object in rags, seated upon a stone. It was a maniac -
a man about thirty years of age, and I believe deaf and dumb; there
he sat, gibbering and mowing, and distorting his wild features into
various dreadful appearances. There wanted nothing but this object
to render the scene complete; banditti amongst such melancholy
desolation would have been by no means so much in keeping. But the
maniac, on his stone, in the rear of the wind-beaten ruin,
overlooking the blasted heath, above which scowled the leaden
heaven, presented such a picture of gloom and misery as I believe
neither painter nor poet ever conceived in the saddest of their
musings. This is not the first instance in which it has been my
lot to verify the wisdom of the saying, that truth is sometimes
wilder than fiction.
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