"Gibraltar, August 6. 1809.
"I have just arrived at this place after a journey through Portugal,
and a part of Spain, of nearly 500 miles. We left Lisbon and travelled
on horseback[119] to Seville and Cadiz, and thence in the Hyperion
frigate to Gibraltar. The horses are excellent--we rode seventy miles
a day. Eggs and wine, and hard beds, are all the accommodation we
found, and, in such torrid weather, quite enough. My health is better
than in England.
"Seville is a fine town, and the Sierra Morena, part of which we
crossed, a very sufficient mountain; but damn description, it is
always disgusting. Cadiz, sweet Cadiz!--it is the first spot in the
creation. The beauty of its streets and mansions is only excelled by
the loveliness of its inhabitants. For, with all national prejudice, I
must confess the women of Cadiz are as far superior to the English
women in beauty as the Spaniards are inferior to the English in every
quality that dignifies the name of man. Just as I began to know the
principal persons of the city, I was obliged to sail.
"You will not expect a long letter after my riding so far 'on hollow
pampered jades of Asia.' Talking of Asia puts me in mind of Africa,
which is within five miles of my present residence. I am going over
before I go on to Constantinople.
"Cadiz is a complete Cythera. Many of the grandees who have left
Madrid during the troubles reside there, and I do believe it is the
prettiest and cleanest town in Europe. London is filthy in the
comparison. The Spanish women are all alike, their education the same.
The wife of a duke is, in information, as the wife of a peasant,--the
wife of a peasant, in manner, equal to a duchess. Certainly they are
fascinating; but their minds have only one idea, and the business of
their lives is intrigue.
"I have seen Sir John Carr at Seville and Cadiz, and, like Swift's
barber, have been down on my knees to beg he would not put me into
black and white. Pray remember me to the Drurys and the Davies, and
all of that stamp who are yet extant.[120] Send me a letter and news
to Malta. My next epistle shall be from Mount Caucasus or Mount Sion.
I shall return to Spain before I see England, for I am enamoured of
the country.
Adieu, and believe me," &c.
In a letter to Mrs. Byron, dated a few days later, from Gibraltar, he
recapitulates the same account of his progress, only dwelling rather
more diffusely on some of the details. Thus, of Cintra and Mafra:--"To
make amends for this,[121] the village of Cintra, about fifteen miles
from the capital, is, perhaps in every respect, the most delightful in
Europe; it contains beauties of every description, natural and
artificial. Palaces and gardens rising in the midst of rocks,
cataracts, and precipices; convents on stupendous heights--a distant
view of the sea and the Tagus; and, besides (though that is a
secondary consideration), is remarkable as the scene of Sir H.D.'s
Convention.[122] It unites in itself all the wildness of the western
highlands, with the verdure of the south of France. Near this place,
about ten miles to the right, is the palace of Mafra, the boast of
Portugal, as it might be of any other country, in point of
magnificence without elegance. There is a convent annexed; the monks,
who possess large revenues, are courteous enough, and understand
Latin, so that we had a long conversation: they have a large library,
and asked me if the _English_ had _any books_ in their country?"
An adventure which he met with at Seville, characteristic both of the
country and of himself, is thus described in the same letter to Mrs.
Byron:--
"We lodged in the house of two Spanish unmarried ladies, who possess
_six_ houses in Seville, and gave me a curious specimen of Spanish
manners. They are women of character, and the eldest a fine woman, the
youngest pretty, but not so good a figure as Donna Josepha. The
freedom of manner, which is general here, astonished me not a little;
and in the course of further observation, I find that reserve is not
the characteristic of the Spanish belles, who are, in general, very
handsome, with large black eyes, and very fine forms. The eldest
honoured your _unworthy_ son with very particular attention, embracing
him with great tenderness at parting (I was there but three days),
after cutting off a lock of his hair, and presenting him with one of
her own, about three feet in length, which I send, and beg you will
retain till my return. Her last words were, 'Adios, tu hermoso! me
gusto mucho.'--'Adieu, you pretty fellow! you please me much.' She
offered me a share of her apartment, which my _virtue_ induced me to
decline; she laughed, and said I had some English "amante" (lover),
and added that she was going to be married to an officer in the
Spanish army."
Among the beauties of Cadiz, his imagination, dazzled by the
attractions of the many, was on the point, it would appear from the
following, of being fixed by _one_:--
"Cadiz, sweet Cadiz, is the most delightful town I ever beheld, very
different from our English cities in every respect except cleanliness
(and it is as clean as London), but still beautiful and full of the
finest women in Spain, the Cadiz belles being the Lancashire witches
of their land. Just as I was introduced and began to like the
grandees, I was forced to leave it for this cursed place; but before I
return to England I will visit it again.
"The night before I left it, I sat in the box at the opera, with
admiral ----'s family, an aged wife and a fine daughter, Sennorita
----. The girl is very pretty, in the Spanish style; in my opinion, by
no means inferior to the English in charms, and certainly superior in
fascination. Long, black hair, dark languishing eyes, clear olive
complexions, and forms more graceful in motion than can be conceived
by an Englishman used to the drowsy listless air of his countrywomen,
added to the most becoming dress, and, at the same time, the most
decent in the world, render a Spanish beauty irresistible.
"Miss ---- and her little brother understood a little French, and,
after regretting my ignorance of the Spanish, she proposed to become
my preceptress in that language. I could only reply by a low bow, and
express my regret that I quitted Cadiz too soon to permit me to make
the progress which would doubtless attend my studies under so charming
a directress. I was standing at the back of the box, which resembles
our Opera boxes, (the theatre is large and finely decorated, the music
admirable,) in the manner which Englishmen generally adopt, for fear
of incommoding the ladies in front, when this fair Spaniard
dispossessed an old woman (an aunt or a duenna) of her chair, and
commanded me to be seated next herself, at a tolerable distance from
her mamma. At the close of the performance I withdrew, and was
lounging with a party of men in the passage, when, _en passant_, the
lady turned round and called me, and I had the honour of attending her
to the admiral's mansion. I have an invitation on my return to Cadiz,
which I shall accept if I repass through the country on my return from
Asia."
To these adventures, or rather glimpses of adventures, which he met
with in his hasty passage through Spain, he adverted, I recollect,
briefly, in the early part of his "Memoranda;" and it was the younger,
I think, of his fair hostesses at Seville, whom he there described
himself as making earnest love to, with the help of a dictionary.
"For some time," he said, "I went on prosperously both as a linguist
and a lover,[123] till at length, the lady took a fancy to a ring
which I wore, and set her heart on my giving it to her, as a pledge of
my sincerity. This, however, could not be;--anything but the ring, I
declared, was at her service, and much more than its value,--but the
ring itself I had made a vow never to give away." The young Spaniard
grew angry as the contention went on, and it was not long before the
lover became angry also; till, at length, the affair ended by their
separating unsuccessful on both sides. "Soon after this," said he, "I
sailed for Malta, and there parted with both my heart and ring."
In the letter from Gibraltar, just cited, he adds--"I am going over to
Africa to-morrow; it is only six miles from this fortress. My next
stage is Cagliari in Sardinia, where I shall be presented to his
majesty. I have a most superb uniform as a court-dress, indispensable
in travelling." His plan of visiting Africa was, however,
relinquished. After a short stay at Gibraltar, during which he dined
one day with Lady Westmoreland, and another with General Castanos, he,
on the 19th of August, took his departure for Malta, in the packet,
having first sent Joe Murray and young Rushton back to England,--the
latter being unable, from ill health, to accompany him any further.
"Pray," he says to his mother, "show the lad every kindness, as he is
my great favourite."[124]
He also wrote a letter to the father of the boy, which gives so
favourable an impression of his thoughtfulness and kindliness that I
have much pleasure in being enabled to introduce it here.