The Bible in Spain. Volume 1 of 2. Borrow George

7

Of Mr. Lyon I can learn nothing of any interest.

8

Don Luis de Usoz y Rio was born at Madrid of noble parents in May, 1805. A pupil of the well-known Cardinal Mezzofanti, he was appointed, while yet a very young man, to the Chair of Hebrew at Valladolid. In 1839 he made the acquaintance in England of Benjamin Wiffen, the Quaker, so well known in connexion with Protestant literature and the slavery question in Spain; and after helping Borrow in his endeavour to circulate the Scriptures, and having accumulated an immense library of religious books, some of which were bequeathed to Wiffen, some to the British and Foreign Bible Society, and some to the great library at Madrid, he died in August, 1865. See the works of Wiffen and Boehmer; Menendez Pelayo, Heterodoxos Españoles, lib. viii. cap. 2; and finally Mayor, Spain, Portugal, and the Bible (London, 1892).

9

Chili in 1810–1818; Paraguay in 1811–1814; La Plata in 1810–1816; Mexico in 1810–1821; Peru and Bolivia not until 1824.

10

The Duc de Berri was the second son of the Comte d’Artois, and as his elder brother, the Duc d’Angoulême, was childless, he was practically heir to the crown of France, and his assassination in 1820 had a most disastrous effect upon the royalist fortunes in that country. The son that was born to his wife some months after his death was the Duc de Bordeaux, better known in our own times as the Comte de Chambord, “Henri V.”

11

She was proclaimed in 1833; again on attaining her majority in 1843; and was formally deposed in 1868. She still (1895) lives in Paris.

12

Queen Christina soon afterwards married her paramour, Ferdinand Muñoz, created Duke of Rianzares.

13

It was a curious coincidence that Don Carlos, Pretender in Spain, and Dom Miguel, Pretender in Portugal, should have left Lisbon on the same day in an English ship.

14

See Duncan, The English in Spain, p. 26.

15

In the words of an ancient chronicler, “Tuvose por muy cierto, que le fueron dadas yerbas” (Zurita, Anales de Aragon, lib. xviii. cap. 7).

16

Villages between Madrid and Toledo.

17

Mendizabal had become Premier and Minister of Finance in September, and the new Cortes was opened at Madrid by a speech from the throne on November 16.

18

Bethlehem. The church was founded on the spot where Vasco da Gama embarked for his memorable voyage, July 8, 1497.

19

More correctly Caes do Sodré, now the Praça dos Romulares.

20

Sir Charles Napier (1786–1860) defeated and destroyed the Miguelite squadron off Cape St. Vincent on July 3, 1833.

21

One of the peculiarities of Lisbon is the number and variety of the names borne by the same street or square. This noble square, nearly 600 feet long by 500 wide, is, as may be supposed, no longer known by the name of the detested Inquisition, but is officially designated Praça do Commercio; it is invariably spoken of by the Portuguese inhabitants as the Terreiro do Paço, and by the English as Blackhorse Square, from the fine equestrian statue of King José I., erected in 1775.

22

Henry Fielding, born 1707, died at Lisbon, 1754.

23

Dr. Philip Doddridge, born 1702, died at Lisbon, 1751.

24

Cintra is an agglomeration of beauties, natural and architectural, and is full of historic and antiquarian interest. The greater part of the buildings are Moorish; but, unlike the Alhambra in Spain, it has been the abode of Christian kings ever since the expulsion of the Moslems in the twelfth century, and the palace especially is to-day a singular and most beautiful mixture of Moorish and Christian architecture.

25

Tivoli (Tibur) is eighteen miles north-east of Rome.

26

Born 1554, succeeded to the throne 1557, killed in battle in Africa in 1578.

27

Alcazar-Kebir al-Araish, near Tangier or Larache, in Morocco.

28

João or John de Castro, the Castro forte of Camoens, second only to Vasco da Gama, among the great Portuguese discoverers and warriors of the sixteenth century, was born in 1500, appointed governor-general of the Portuguese Indies in 1546, and died in 1548. After a deadly battle with the Moslems near Goa, in which his son Ferdinand was killed, he pledged the hairs of the moustache and beard of his dead son to provide funds, not to defend, but to re-fortify the city of Goa. The money was cheerfully provided on this slender security, and punctually repaid by the borrower.

29

William Beckford of Fonthill, the author of Vathek. His Quinta de Montserrat, with perhaps the most beautiful gardens in Europe, lies about three miles from the palace at Cintra, and is now in the possession of Sir Francis Cook, Bart., better known by his Portuguese title of Visconde de Montserrat.

30

A version of the entire Scriptures from the Vulgate was published in twenty-three volumes 12mo at Lisbon, 1781–83 by Dr. Antonio Pereira de Figueiredo. This was re-edited and published at Lisbon, 1794–1819. An earlier version was that of Almeida, a Portuguese missionary in Ceylon, who became a convert to Protestantism at the close of the seventeenth century. (See note on p. 98.)

31

If Cintra is the Alhambra of Portugal, Mafra is the Escurial. The famous convent was, moreover, founded by John V. in fulfilment of a vow. The building was commenced in 1717, and the church consecrated only in 1730.

32

He was killed in June, 1835. (See Introduction.)

33

Alem, “beyond;” Tejo, the river Tagus.

34

“I, who am a smuggler.” The Spanish version, “Yo que soy,” etc., is more familiar, and more harmonious.

35

“When the king arrived.”

36

So spelt by Borrow, but the correct Portuguese form is Dom.

37

Rabbits were so numerous in the south of the Peninsula in Carthaginian and Roman times, that they are even said to have given their name (Phœn. “Pahan”) to Hispania. Strabo certainly speaks of their number, and of the mode of destroying them with ferrets, and the rabbit is one of the commonest of the early devices of Spain (see Burke’s History of Spain, chap. ii.).

38

May 26, 1834.

39

The ballad of Svend Vonved, translated from the original Danish, was included by Borrow in his collection of Romantic Ballads, a thin demy 8vo volume of 187 pages – now very rare – published by John Taylor in 1826. The lines there read as follows: —

The original ballad may be found in the Kjæmpe Viser, and was translated into German by Grimm, who expressed the greatest admiration for the poem. Svend in Danish means “swain” or “youth,” and it is characteristic of Borrow’s mystification of proper names that he should, by a quasi-translation and archaic spelling, give the title of the Danish ballad the appearance of an actual English surname.

40

The Spanish Seo = a cathedral.

41

Serra is the Portuguese form of the Spanish Sierra = a saw.

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