DON Fernando Septimo, por la gracia de Dios, rey de Castilla, de Leon, de Aragon, de las dos Sicilias, de Jerusalem, de Navarra, de Granada, de Toledo, de Valencia, de Galicia, de Mallorca, de Sevilla, de Cerdeña, de Cordoba, de Corcega, de Murcia, de Jaen, de los Algarbes, de Algeciras, de Gibraltar, de las islas de Canaria, de las Indias Orientales y Occidentales, islas y tierra ferme del Mar Oceano; archiduque de Austria; duque de Borgoña, de Brabante y de Milan; conde de Absparg, Flandes, Tirol y Barcelona; señor de Viscaya y de Molina,[192] &c.
Such was the heading of the document which conferred the honour of knighthood (silver cross of the first class of the royal and military order of St. Ferdinand), upon Don Antonio Condé, a soldier of the light company (cazadores) of the Queen’s, or second regiment of the line, in acknowledgment of his distinguished services against the revolutionarios of the isla de Leon, who surrendered at Bejer on the 8th March, 1831.
The bearer of this certificate of gallant conduct—for the gratification that its possession afforded his vanity was the only sense in which it could be considered a reward—was in person rather below the usual stature of the Andalusian peasantry; but his square shoulders, open chest, and muscular limbs, bespoke him to be possessed of more than their wonted strength and activity.
In other respects too he differed somewhat from his countrymen, his hair being light, even lighter than what they call castaños, or chestnut, his chin beardless, and his eyes hazel. His manners were those of a frank young soldier, rather, perhaps, of the French school, with a dash of the beau garçon about him, but, on the whole, very prepossessing. In his carriage to us, though rather inquisitive, he was at all times respectful; but towards his fellow countrymen, not of the cloth, a certain hauteur was observable in his deportment, which clearly showed that he prided himself on the “Don.”
The document, encased with the brevet of knighthood, of which mention has before been made, briefly, but in very honourable terms, described the gallant conduct of the young soldier, and forms the groundwork of the following memoir; a circumstance I feel called upon to mention, lest my hero should be wrongfully accused of vain-gloriously boasting of his achievements; and this also will explain why his story is not, throughout, told in the first person.
The secluded little village of Guarda, which has been noticed in the course of my peregrinations, as lying to the right of the high road from Jaen to Granada (about five miles from the former city), was the birth-place of Antonio Condé. His parents, though in a humble station of life, were of sangre limpio;[193] and never having heard of Malthus, had married early, and most unphilosophically added a family of seven human beings to the already overstocked population of this wisdom-getting world.
Five of these unfortunate mortals were daughters, and our hero was the younger of the two masculine lumps of animated clay. His brother, who was many years his senior, had joined the army at an early age, and at the conclusion of the war had proceeded with his regiment to the Habana, where he still remained; their parents, therefore, now declining in years, were anxious to keep their remaining son at home, to assist in supporting the family. Such, however, was not to be the case, for, on the quintos being called out in 1830, it fell to Antonio’s lot to be one of the quota furnished by the district that included his native village.
To purchase a substitute was out of the question—the price was quite beyond his parents’ means; and though his brother had, at various times, transmitted money home, which, with praiseworthy foresight, had been hoarded up to make some little provision for his sisters, but was now urgently offered to buy him off, yet Antonio would not listen to its being so applied. To confess the truth, indeed, he secretly rejoiced at his lot, having always wished to be a soldier, though he could never bring himself voluntarily to quit his aged parents. Now, he maintained, there was no alternative; and accordingly, with the brilliant prospect of making a fortune, which the military life opened to him, he marched from his native village, and joined the Queen’s regiment, then quartered at Seville, to the cazador company of which he was shortly afterwards posted.
Antonio’s zeal, and assiduous attention to his duties, as well as his general good conduct and intelligence, made him a great favourite with his officers; whilst his youth, good humour, and gay disposition, endeared him equally to his comrades, in whose amusements he generally took the lead. In fact, he soon became the pattern man of the pattern company, and attained the rank of corporal.
Early in the month of March, 1831, the Queen’s regiment received orders to proceed by forced marches to Cadiz, where the soi-disant “liberals,” having again raised the standard of revolt, commenced the work of regeneration by murdering the governor of the city in the streets at noon day. The cold-blooded, calculating miscreants, who committed this act, excused themselves for the premeditated murder of a man universally beloved and respected, by saying it was necessary for the success of their plans to commence with a blow that should strike terror into the hearts of their opponents. They killed, therefore, the most virtuous man they could select, to show that no one would be spared who thenceforth ventured to entertain a doubt, that the constitution they upheld was the beau idéal of liberal government; and, I regret to say, Englishmen were found who applauded this atrocious doctrine, and considered the subsequent punishment inflicted on Torrijos, and the other abettors and instigators of this barbarity, as an act of unprecedented cruelty on the part of the “tyrant Ferdinand” and his “servile” ministers.