The Bible in Spain Volume II Part 7

"How strangely times alter," said I, the second day subsequent to the opening of my establishment, as I stood on the opposite side of the street, leaning against the wall with folded arms, surveying my shop, on the windows of which were painted in large yellow characters, _Des.p.a.cho de la Sociedad Biblica y Estrangera_; {101} "how strangely times alter!

Here have I been during the last eight months running about old Popish Spain, distributing Testaments, as agent of what the Papists call an heretical society, and have neither been stoned nor burnt; and here am I now in the capital, doing that which one would think were enough to cause all the dead inquisitors and officials buried within the circuit of the walls to rise from their graves and cry abomination; and yet no one interferes with me. Pope of Rome! Pope of Rome! look to thyself. That shop may be closed; but oh! what a sign of the times, that it has been permitted to exist for one day. It appears to me, my Father, that the days of your sway are numbered in Spain; that you will not be permitted much longer to plunder her, to scoff at her, and to scourge her with scorpions, as in bygone periods. See I not the hand on the wall? See I not in yonder letters a '_Mene_, _Mene_, _Tekel_, _Upharsin_'? Look to thyself, _Batuschca_."

And I remained for two hours, leaning against the wall, staring at the shop.

A short time after the establishment of the _des.p.a.cho_ at Madrid, I once more mounted the saddle, and, attended by Antonio, rode over to Toledo, for the purpose of circulating the Scriptures, sending beforehand by a muleteer a cargo of one hundred Testaments. I instantly addressed myself to the princ.i.p.al bookseller of the place, whom, from the circ.u.mstance of his living in a town so abounding with canons, priests, and ex-friars as Toledo, I expected to find a Carlist, or a _servil_ at least. I was never more mistaken in my life: on entering the shop, which was very large and commodious, I beheld a stout athletic man, dressed in a kind of cavalry uniform, with a helmet on his head, and an immense sabre in his hand. This was the bookseller himself, who, I soon found, was an officer in the national cavalry. Upon learning who I was, he shook me heartily by the hand, and said that nothing would give him greater pleasure than taking charge of the books, which he would endeavour to circulate to the utmost of his ability.

"Will not your doing so bring you into odium with the clergy?"

"_Ca_!" {103a} said he; "who cares? I am rich, and so was my father before me. I do not depend on them; they cannot hate me more than they do already, for I make no secret of my opinions. I have just returned from an expedition," said he; "my brother nationals and myself have, for the last three days, been occupied in hunting down the factious and thieves of the neighbourhood; we have killed three and brought in several prisoners. Who cares for the cowardly priests? I am a liberal, _Don Jorge_, and a friend of your countryman, Flinter. Many is the Carlist guerilla-curate and robber-friar whom I have a.s.sisted him to catch. I am rejoiced to hear that he has just been appointed captain-general of Toledo; there will be fine doings here when he arrives, _Don Jorge_. We will make the clergy shake between us, I a.s.sure you."

Toledo was formerly the capital of Spain. Its population at present is barely fifteen thousand souls, though, in the time of the Romans, and also during the Middle Ages, it is said to have amounted to between two and three hundred thousand. It is situated about twelve leagues, or forty miles, westward {103b} of Madrid, and is built upon a steep rocky hill, round which flows the Tagus, on all sides but the north. It still possesses a great many remarkable edifices, notwithstanding that it has long since fallen into decay. Its cathedral is the most magnificent of Spain, and is the see of the primate. In the tower of this cathedral is the famous bell of Toledo, the largest in the world with the exception of the monster bell of Moscow, which I have also seen. It weighs 1543 _arrobas_, or 37,032 pounds. It has, however, a disagreeable sound, owing to a cleft in its side. Toledo could once boast the finest pictures in Spain, but many were stolen or destroyed by the French during the Peninsular war, and still more have lately been removed by order of the government. Perhaps the most remarkable one still remains; I allude to that which represents the burial of the Count of Orgas, the masterpiece of Domenico, {104} the Greek, a most extraordinary genius, some of whose productions possess merit of a very high order. The picture in question is in the little parish church of San Tome, at the bottom of the aisle, on the left side of the altar. Could it be purchased, I should say it would be cheap at five thousand pounds.

Amongst the many remarkable things which meet the eye of the curious observer at Toledo, is the manufactory of arms, where are wrought the swords, spears, and other weapons intended for the army, with the exception of firearms, which mostly come from abroad.

In old times, as is well known, the sword-blades of Toledo were held in great estimation, and were transmitted as merchandise throughout Christendom. The present manufactory, or _fabrica_, as it is called, is a handsome modern edifice, situated without the wall of the city, on a plain contiguous to the river, with which it communicates by a small ca.n.a.l. It is said that the water and the sand of the Tagus are essential for the proper tempering of the swords. I asked some of the princ.i.p.al workmen whether, at the present day, they could manufacture weapons of equal value to those of former days, and whether the secret had been lost.

"_Ca_!" said they, "the swords of Toledo were never so good as those which we are daily making. It is ridiculous enough to see strangers coming here to purchase old swords, the greater part of which are mere rubbish, and never made at Toledo, yet for such they will give a large price, whilst they would grudge two dollars for this jewel, which was made but yesterday;" thereupon putting into my hand a middle-sized rapier. "Your wors.h.i.+p," said they, "seems to have a strong arm; prove its temper against the stone wall-thrust boldly and fear not."

I _have_ a strong arm, and dashed the point with my utmost force against the solid granite: my arm was numbed to the shoulder from the violence of the concussion, and continued so for nearly a week, but the sword appeared not to be at all blunted, or to have suffered in any respect.

"A better sword than that," said an ancient workman, a native of Old Castile, "never transfixed Moor out yonder on the _sagra_."

During my stay at Toledo, I lodged at the Posada de los Caballeros, which signifies the inn of the gentlemen, which name, in some respects, it certainly well deserved, for there are many palaces far less magnificent than this inn of Toledo. By magnificence it must not be supposed, however, that I allude to costliness of furniture or any kind of luxury which pervaded the culinary department. The rooms were as empty as those of Spanish inns generally are, and the fare, though good in its kind, was plain and homely; but I have seldom seen a more imposing edifice. It was of immense size, consisting of several stories, and was built something in the Moorish taste, with a quadrangular court in the centre, beneath which was an immense _algibe_ or tank, serving as a reservoir for rain-water. All the houses in Toledo are supplied with tanks of this description, into which the waters in the rainy season flow from the roofs through pipes. No other water is used for drinking; that of the Tagus, not being considered salubrious, is only used for purposes of cleanliness, being conveyed up the steep narrow streets on donkeys, in large stone jars. The city, standing on a rocky mountain, has no wells.

As for the rain-water, it deposits a sediment in the tank, and becomes very sweet and potable: these tanks are cleaned out twice every year.

During the summer, at which time the heat in this part of Spain is intense, the families spend the greater part of the day in the courts, which are overhung with a linen awning, the heat of the atmosphere being tempered by the coolness arising from the tank below, which answers the same purpose as the fountain in the southern provinces of Spain.

I spent about a week at Toledo, during which time several copies of the Testament were disposed of in the shop of my friend the bookseller.

Several priests took it up from the _mostrador_ on which it lay, examined it, but made no remarks; none of them purchased it. My friend showed me through his house, almost every apartment of which was lined from roof to floor with books, many of which were highly valuable. He told me that he possessed the best collection in Spain of the ancient literature of the country. He was, however, less proud of his library than his stud; finding that I had some acquaintance with horses, his liking for me and also his respect considerably increased. "All I have," said he, "is at your service; I see you are a man after my own heart. When you are disposed to ride out upon the _sagra_, you have only to apply to my groom, who will forthwith saddle you my famed Cordovese _entero_; I purchased him from the stables at Aranjuez, when the royal stud was broken up. There is but one other man to whom I would lend him, and that man is Flinter."

At Toledo I met with a forlorn gypsy woman and her son, a lad of about fourteen years of age; she was not a native of the place, but had come from La Mancha, her husband having been cast into the prison of Toledo on a charge of mule-stealing: the crime had been proved against him, and in a few days he was to depart for Malaga, with the chain of galley-slaves.

He was quite dest.i.tute of money, and his wife was now in Toledo, earning a few _cuartos_ by telling fortunes about the streets, to support him in prison. She told me that it was her intention to follow him to Malaga, where she hoped to be able to effect his escape. What an instance of conjugal affection! and yet the affection here was all on one side, as is too frequently the case. Her husband was a worthless scoundrel, who had previously abandoned her and betaken himself to Madrid, where he had long lived in concubinage with the notorious she-thug Aurora, {107} at whose instigation he had committed the robbery for which he was now held in durance. "Should your husband escape from Malaga, in what direction will he fly?" I demanded.

"To the _chim_ of the _Corahai_, my son; to the land of the Moors, to be a soldier of the Moorish king."

"And what will become of yourself?" I inquired; "think you that he will take you with him?"

"He will leave me on the sh.o.r.e, my son; and as soon as he has crossed the black _p.a.w.nee_, he will forget me and never think of me more."

"And knowing his ingrat.i.tude, why should you give yourself so much trouble about him?"

"Am I not his _romi_, my son; and am I not bound by the law of the _Cales_ to a.s.sist him to the last? Should he return from the land of the _Corahai_ at the end of a hundred years, and should find me alive, and should say, 'I am hungry, little wife; go forth and steal or tell _baji_,' I must do it, for he is the _rom_ and I the _romi_."

On my return to Madrid, I found the _des.p.a.cho_ still open. Various Testaments had been sold, though the number was by no means considerable: the work had to labour under great disadvantage, from the ignorance of the people at large with respect to its tenor and contents. It was no wonder, then, that little interest was felt respecting it. To call, however, public attention to the _des.p.a.cho_, I printed three thousand advertis.e.m.e.nts on paper, yellow, blue, and crimson, with which I almost covered the sides of the streets, and, besides this, inserted an account of it in all the journals and periodicals: the consequence was, that in a short time almost every person in Madrid was aware of its existence.

Such exertions in London or Paris would probably have ensured the sale of the entire edition of the New Testament within a few days. In Madrid, however, the result was not quite so flattering; for after the establishment had been open an entire month, the copies disposed of barely amounted to one hundred.

These proceedings of mine did not fail to cause a great sensation: the priests and their partisans were teeming with malice and fury, which, for some time, however, they thought proper to exhibit only in words; it being their opinion that I was favoured by the amba.s.sador and by the British government; but there was no attempt, however atrocious, that might not be expected from their malignity; and were it right and seemly for me, the most insignificant of worms, to make such a comparison, I might say, like Paul at Ephesus, I was fighting with wild beasts.

On the last day of the year 1837, my servant Antonio thus addressed me: "_Mon maitre_, it is necessary that I leave you for a time. Ever since we have returned from our journeys, I have become unsettled and dissatisfied with the house, the furniture, and with Dona Marequita. I have therefore engaged myself as cook in the house of the Count of ---, where I am to receive four dollars per month less than what your wors.h.i.+p gives me. I am fond of change, though it be for the worse. _Adieu_, _mon maitre_; may you be as well served as you deserve. Should you chance, however, to have any pressing need _de mes soins_, send for me without hesitation, and I will at once give my new master warning, if I am still with him, and come to you."

Thus I was deprived for a time of the services of Antonio. I continued for a few days without a domestic, at the end of which time I hired a certain Cantabrian or Basque, a native of the village of Hernani, in Guipuzcoa, who was strongly recommended to me.

CHAPTER x.x.xVII.

Euscarra-Basque not Irish-Sanscrit and Tartar Dialects-A Vowel Language-Popular Poetry-The Basques-Their Persons-Basque Women.

I now entered upon the year 1838, perhaps the most eventful of all those which I pa.s.sed in Spain. The _des.p.a.cho_ still continued open, with a somewhat increasing sale. Having at this time little of particular moment with which to occupy myself, I committed to the press two works, which for some time past had been in the course of preparation. These were the Gospel of St. Luke in the Spanish gypsy and the Euscarra languages. {111a}

With respect to the gypsy Gospel, I have little to say, having already spoken of it in a former work; {111b} it was translated by myself, together with the greater part of the New Testament, during my long intercourse with the Spanish gypsies. Concerning the Luke in Euscarra, however, it will be as well to be more particular, and to avail myself of the present opportunity to say a few words concerning the language in which it was written, and the people for whom it was intended.

The Euscarra, then, is the proper term for a certain speech or language, supposed to have been at one time prevalent throughout Spain, but which is at present confined to certain districts, both on the French and Spanish side of the Pyrenees, which are laved by the waters of the Cantabrian Gulf, or Bay of Biscay. This language is commonly known as the Basque, or Biscayan, which words are mere modifications of the word Euscarra, the consonant B having been prefixed for the sake of euphony.

Much that is vague, erroneous, and hypothetical has been said and written concerning this tongue. The Basques a.s.sert that it was not only the original language of Spain, but also of the world, and that from it all other languages are derived; but the Basques are a very ignorant people, and know nothing of the philosophy of language. Very little importance, therefore, need be attached to any opinion of theirs on such a subject.

A few amongst them, however, who affect some degree of learning, contend that it is neither more nor less than a dialect of the Phnician, and that the Basques are the descendants of a Phnician colony, established at the foot of the Pyrenees at a very remote period. Of this theory, or rather conjecture, as it is unsubstantiated by the slightest proof, it is needless to take further notice than to observe that, provided the Phnician language, as many of the _truly learned_ have supposed, and almost proved, was a dialect of the Hebrew, or closely allied to it, it were as unreasonable to suppose that the Basque is derived from it as that the Kamschatkan and Cherokee are dialects of the Greek and Latin.

There is, however, another opinion with respect to the Basque which deserves more especial notice, from the circ.u.mstance of its being extensively entertained amongst the _literati_ of various countries of Europe, more especially England. I allude to the Celtic origin of this tongue, and its close connexion with the most cultivated of all the Celtic dialects-the Irish. People who pretend to be well conversant with the subject, have even gone so far as to a.s.sert, that so little difference exists between the Basque and Irish tongues, that individuals of the two nations, when they meet together, find no difficulty in understanding each other, with no other means of communication than their respective languages; in a word, that there is scarcely a greater difference between the two than between the French and the Spanish Basque. Such similarity, however, though so strongly insisted upon, by no means exists in fact; and perhaps in the whole of Europe it would be difficult to discover two languages which exhibit fewer points of mutual resemblance than the Basque and Irish.

The Irish, like most other European languages, is a dialect of the Sanscrit, a _remote_ one, as may well be supposed; the corner of the western world in which it is still preserved being, of all countries in Europe, the most distant from the proper home of the parent tongue. It is still, however, a dialect of that venerable and most original speech, not so closely resembling it, it is true, as the English, Danish, and those which belong to what is called the Gothic family, and far less than those of the Sclavonian; for the nearer we approach to the East, in equal degree the a.s.similation of languages to this parent stock becomes more clear and distinct; but still a dialect, agreeing with the Sanscrit in structure, in the arrangement of words, and in many instances in the words themselves, which, however modified, may still be recognized as Sanscrit. But what is the Basque, and to what family does it properly pertain?

To two great Asiatic languages all the dialects spoken at present in Europe may be traced. These two, if not now spoken, still exist in books, and are, moreover, the languages of two of the princ.i.p.al religions of the East. I allude to the Tibetian and Sanscrit-the sacred languages of the followers of Buddh and Bramah. These tongues, though they possess many words in common, which is easily to be accounted for by their close proximity, are properly distinct, being widely different in structure.

In what this difference consists, I have neither time nor inclination to state; suffice it to say, that the Celtic, Gothic, and Sclavonian dialects in Europe belong to the Sanscrit family, even as in the East the Persian, and to a less degree the Arabic, Hebrew, etc.; {114} whilst to the Tibetian or Tartar family in Asia pertain the Mandchou and Mongolian, the Calmuc and the Turkish of the Caspian sea; and in Europe, the Hungarian and the Basque _partially_.

Indeed, this latter language is a strange anomaly, so that upon the whole it is less difficult to say what it is not, than what it is. It abounds with Sanscrit words to such a degree that its surface seems strewn with them. Yet would it be wrong to term it a Sanscrit dialect, for in the collocation of these words the Tartar form is most decidedly observable.

A considerable proportion of Tartar words is likewise to be found in this language, though perhaps not in equal numbers to the terms derived from the Sanscrit. Of these Tartar etymons I shall at present content myself with citing one, though, if necessary, it were easy to adduce hundreds.

This word is _Jauna_, or, as it is p.r.o.nounced, _Khauna_-a word in constant use amongst the Basques, and which is the _Khan_ of the Mongols and Mandchous, and of the same signification-_Lord_.

Having closely examined the subject in all its various bearings, and having weighed what is to be said on one side against what is to be advanced on the other, I am inclined to rank the Basque rather amongst the Tartar than the Sanscrit dialects. Whoever should have an opportunity of comparing the enunciation of the Basques and Tartars would, from that alone, even if he understood them not, come to the conclusion that their respective languages were formed on the same principles. In both occur periods seemingly interminable, during which the voice gradually ascends to a climax, and then gradually sinks down.

I have spoken of the surprising number of Sanscrit words contained in the Basque language, specimens of some of which will be found below. It is remarkable enough, that in the greater part of the derivatives from the Sanscrit, the Basque has dropped the initial consonant, so that the word commences with a vowel. The Basque, indeed, may be said to be almost a vowel language, the number of consonants employed being comparatively few; perhaps eight words out of ten commence and terminate with a vowel, owing to which it is a language to the highest degree soft and melodious, far excelling in this respect any other language in Europe, not even excepting the Italian. Here follow a few specimens of Basque words with the Sanscrit roots in juxtaposition:-

BASQUE. SANSCRIT.

Ardoa {116a} Sandhana _Wine_.

Arratsa Ratri _Night_.

Beguia Aks.h.i.+ _Eye_.

Choria Chiria {116a} _Bird_.

Chacurra Cucura _Dog_.

Erreguina Rani _Queen_.

{116a} Icusi Iksha _To see_.

Iru Treya _Three_.

Jan (Khan) Khana _To eat_.

Uria {116a} Puri _City_.

Urruti Dura _Far_.

Such is the tongue in which I brought out Saint Luke's Gospel at Madrid.