Lisbon, on its seven hills, has so few level spaces that people naturally congregate, as water runs down from a mountain-side, in the district between the Rocio and the river, appropriately called the Baixa, the Low Quarter, and meeting between acquaintances is more frequent than in any other capital city. The splendid Avenida da Liberdade has never become popular, and is apt to be deserted except on special occasions, a great review or some Republican anniversary. It seems to be too far from the centres of gossip: before you had walked from the Praça dos Restauradores (i.e., the liberators of Portugal from Spain in 1640) to the Praça do Marquez de Pombal and back a ministry might have fallen. Best keep on the safe side and miss nothing of the human comedy which in Lisbon has centred in the Rocio throughout the centuries. Here there is continual movement by day and night. Lisbon sits up late and is an extremely late riser. Three o’clock on a June morning sees the last revellers in the streets, and, later, at an hour when other cities have put on their best clothes, dust-bins still line the pavements, and the rag-pickers are at their work.
Singed Pigs.
Lisbon’s streets, spick and span, at least all those that the passing tourist will see, give no idea of the accounts of all writers a century ago, who in prose and verse agreed about the dirt and nastiness of the town. Indeed, so late as 1835 the suggestions of a Portuguese writer for the improvement of the city give some idea of its condition. It will be forbidden, said he, to break in horses in the streets. It will be forbidden to kill or singe pigs in the streets, or keep them alive in the streets, or tied to the doors, “for all these things annoy the inhabitants.” Dead animals were not to be left lying in the streets. He noted, too, the number of stray dogs, the beggars at every step, the filthiness of the outer staircases of the houses.[25] Some of the staircases had deep wells beneath them—there was one at No. 17 rua da Prata, 19 palmos deep.[26] The great houses had several, as also the convents; indeed, there is a doleful history of how the Prioress fell into one of these on a moonless night; however, she was fished out next morning, and it was regarded as a miracle that her clothes were perfectly dry, not even the sabots which she was wearing showing any sign of water.
TERREIRO DO PAÇO, LISBON
The “Aguadeiros.”
But the wisest inhabitants of Lisbon sent and send their servants and negro slaves to the public fountains or buy the water brought thence by the aguadeiros who may be seen barrel on shoulder in all the narrow streets of the high-lying districts. The water of many of these fountains is reputed to have special virtues, as formerly the “fountain of the horses of New Street,” taken before sunrise, miraculously healed diseases of the eyes, and the same water “has the secret property of speedily fattening the horses that drink of it, and it would do the same to men if they went to drink of it at the fountain.” Carrying heavy bilhas of water up Lisbon’s steep and narrow streets is so arduous a business that the poorest inhabitants prefer to pay a tiny sum to the aguadeiro, and in a country where wine is often almost as common as water the qualities of the various waters are discussed with perhaps greater keenness than those of wines. In the sixteenth century the number of water-sellers is given as twenty-six.
Lisbon Streets and Houses.
Many houses, chiefly in the newer parts of the city, are entirely covered outside with azulejos, mostly green or blue, which give them a cool and cleanly appearance. The rooms inside, too, often have a pattern of azulejos several feet high round the walls, and their use should be more common in all hot countries. The low-lying part of Lisbon between the Rocio (sometimes called Rolling Motion Square or Turkey Square) and the Terreiro do Paço or Praça do Commercio (Black Horse Square) was rebuilt in parallel straight streets after the earthquake of 1755. These streets seem narrow enough now, and the united breadth of them would fit into the Avenida da Liberdade, but for the days of the Marquez de Pombal their plan had a certain grandeur. They still keep in some measure their distinctive characters, the Rua da Prata abounding in the shops of silversmiths, the Rua Augusta in tailors and linendrapers. From the Rocio, besides these links with Black Horse Square, goes the steep Rua do Carmo, with more fashionable shops, leading to the Chiado, and on the opposite side is the great market-place of the Praça da Figueira.
The Market.