Embark on the Tagus.--Aldea Gallega.--A poetical postmaster.--The
church.--Leave Aldea Gallega.--Scenery on the road.--Palace built
by John the Fifth.--Ruins at Montemor.--Reach Arroyolos.
Wednesday, Nov. 28th, 1787.
The winds are reposing themselves, and the surface of the Tagus has all
the smoothness of a mirror. The clouds are dispersing, for it rained
heavily in the night, and the sun tinging the distant mountains of
Palmella. Charming weather for crossing to Aldea Gallega, that self-same
village in whose praises Baretti launches out with so much luxuriance.
Horne and his nephew accompanied me to the stairs of Pampulha, where the
old marquis’s scalera was waiting for me, with eight-and-twenty rowers
in their bright scarlet accoutrements.
Beggars innumerable, blind, dumb, and scabby, followed me almost into
the water. No beggars equal those of Portugal for strength of lungs,
luxuriance of sores, profusion of vermin, variety and arrangement of
tatters, and dauntless perseverance. Several clocks were striking one
when we pushed off from the shore, and in a few minutes less than two
hours we found ourselves at Aldea Gallega, four leagues from Lisbon.
Vast numbers of boats and skiffs passed us in the course of our
navigation, which I should have thought highly agreeable in other
circumstances; but I felt oppressed and melancholy; the thoughts of my
separation from the Marialvas bearing heavily on my mind. Nor could the
grand prospects of the river, and its shores, crowded with convents,
towers, and palaces, remove this dead cold weight a single instant.
The sun having sunk into watery clouds, the expanse of the Tagus wore a
dismal, leaden-coloured aspect. Lisbon was cast into shade, and the huge
mass of the convent of San Vicente, crowning an eminence, looked dark
and solemn. The low shores of Aldea Gallega are pleasant and woody;
many varieties of the tulip, the iris, and other bulbous roots, already
springing up under the protection of spreading pines.
Instead of going to a swinish, stinking estellagem, my courier, Martinho
de mello’s prime favourite, and the one he employs upon the most
confidential negociations, conducted me to the postmaster’s; a neat,
snug habitation, where I found very tolerable accommodations, and dined
in the midst of a vapour of burnt lavender, that was near depriving us
of all appetite.
Before I sat down to table, I wrote to M----, and sent my letter by the
return of the scalera. It was not without difficulty I wrote then, or
write at present, for my kind host, the postmaster, has not only the
same age, but equal glibness of tongue as the abade. They were
cotemporary at Coimbra, and their tongues have kept pace with each other
these eighty years. The postmaster is blessed with a most tenacious
memory, and having been a mighty reader of operas, serenatas, sonnets,
and romances, seemed to sweat verses at every pore. For three hours he
gave neither himself nor us any respite, but spouted whole volleys of
Metastasio, till he was black in the face. Having washed down the heroic
sentiments of Megacle, Artaserse, and Demetrio with a dish of tea, he
fell to quoting Spanish and Latin authors, Ovid, Seneca, Lopez de Vega,
Calderon, with the same volubility.
As millers sleep sound to the click of their mill, so I, at the end of
the two hours’ gabbling, was perfectly well-seasoned, and let him run on
with the most resigned composure, writing and reading as unconcernedly
as if in a convent of Carthusians.
Thursday, November 29th.
There was a continual racket in the house and about the street-door all
night. At four o’clock the baggage-carts set forth, with a tremendous
jingling of bells. The morning was so soft and vernal, that we drank our
chocolate on the veranda, which commands a wild rural view of shrubby
fields and scattered pines, terminated by a long range of blue hills,
most picturesquely varied in form, if not in colour.
After breakfast I went to the church, which Colmenar pretends is
magnificently gilt and ornamented; but which, in fact, can boast no
other decoration than a few shabby altars, displaying the images of
Nossa Senhora, and the patron saint, in tinselled garments of faded
taffeta. I knelt on a mouldy pavement, and felt a chill wind issuing
from between the crevices of loose grave-stones, that returned a hollow
sound when I rose up and walked over them. A priest, who was saying
mass, officiated with uncommon slowness and solemnity. It was hardly
light in the recesses of the chapels.
Soon after eight o’clock we left Aldea Gallega, and ploughed through
deep furrows of sand at the sober rate of two miles and a half in an
hour. On both sides of the heavy road the eye ranges uninterrupted,
except by the stems of starveling pines, through a boundless extent of
barren country, overgrown with stunted ilex and gum-cistus. The same
scenery lasted without any variation full five leagues, to the venta de
Pegoens, where I am now writing, in a long dismal room, with plastered
walls, a damp brick-floor, and cracked window-shutters. A pack of
half-famished dogs are leaping around me, their eyes ready to start out
of their sockets and their ribs out of their skin.
After dining upon the provisions we brought with us, of which the
yelping generation enjoyed no inconsiderable share, we proceeded through
sandy wilds diversified alone by pines. Not a single habitation
occurred, till by a glimmering dubious starlight, for it was now
half-past seven, we discovered the extensive front of a palace, built in
the year 1729, by John the fifth, for the accommodation of the infanta
of Spain, who married his son, the late king D. Josè. Here we were to
lodge, and I was rather surprised, upon entering a long suite of
well-proportioned apartments, to find doors and windows still capable of
being shut and opened, large chimneys guiltless of smoking out of their
right channel, and painted ceilings without cracks or crevices.
A young priest, neither deficient in manners nor erudition, the keeper
of this solitary palace, did his utmost to make our stay in it
agreeable. By his attention, we had some chairs and tables placed by a
blazing fire, which I worshipped with all the fervour of an ancient
Persian. I had need of this consolation, being much disordered by the
tiresome dragging of our heavy coach through heaps of sand, and
depressed with feverish shiverings.
Friday, November 30th.
It was a long while last night before I composed myself to sleep, and
being called at the first dawn, I rose, if possible, more indisposed
than when I lay down; I could scarcely swallow any refreshment, and kept
walking disconsolately through the vast range of naked apartments, till
the rays of the rising sun entered the windows. The horizon glowed with
ruddy clouds. The vast desert levels, discovered from the balconies of
the palace, gleamed with dewy verdure. I hastened out to breathe the
fresh morning air, impregnated with the perfume of a thousand aromatic
shrubs and opening flowers. I could not believe it was the last day of
November, but fancied I had slept away the winter, and was just awakened
in the month of May.
To enjoy these fragrant breezes in full liberty, I left our carriage to
drag along as slowly as the mules pleased, and the muleteers to smoke
their cigarros as deliberately as they thought proper; and mounting my
horse, rode the best part of the way to Montemor; which is built on the
acclivity of a mountain, and surrounded on every side by groves of
olives. The whole face of the country is covered by the same
vegetation, and, of course, presents no very cheerful appearance.
About a mile from Montemor we crossed a clear river, whose banks are
thick-set with poplars, and a light, airy species of broom, intermixed
with indian-fig, and laurustine in full blossom. The bees were swarming
amongst the flowers, and filling the air with their hum.
Whilst our dinner was preparing we climbed up the green slopes of a
lofty hill, to some ruins on its summit; and passing under a narrow arch
discovered a broad flight of steps, which lead to a very ancient church
of gothic uncouth architecture: the pavement almost entirely composed of
sepulchral slabs and brasses. As we walked on a platform before the
entrance, the sun shone so fiercely that we were glad to descend the
eminence on its shadiest side, and take refuge in a cavern-like
apartment of the estallagem, very damp and dingy; but in which, however,
an excellent dinner awaited our arrival.
We set out at two in a blaze of sunshine, so cheerful and reviving, that
I got once more on horseback, and never dismounted till I reached
Arroyolos. Just as we came in sight of this ugly old town, which, like
Montemor, crowns the summit of a rocky eminence, it fell totally dark;
but the postmaster coming forth with torches, lighted us through several
winding alleys to his house. I found some pleasant apartments amply
furnished, and richly carpeted, and had the comfort of settling myself
by a crackling fire, writing to the whole circle of the Marialvas, and
drinking tea without being attacked by quotations of Virgil and
Metastasio.