I looked through a window, at a great height, and saw about twenty or thirty fine lads sporting in a court below. “This is as it should be,” said I; “those boys will not make worse priests from a little early devotion to trap-ball and cudgel playing. I dislike a staid, serious, puritanic education, as I firmly believe that it encourages vice and hypocrisy.”
We then went into the Rector’s room, where, above a crucifix, was hanging a small portrait.
Myself.—That was a great and portentous man, honest withal. I believe the body of which he was the founder, and which has been so much decried, has effected infinitely more good than it has caused harm.
Rector.—What do I hear? You, an Englishman, and a Protestant, and yet an admirer of Ignatius Loyola?
Myself.—I will say nothing with respect to the doctrine of the Jesuits, for, as you have observed, I am a Protestant; but I am ready to assert that there are no people in the world better qualified, upon the whole, to be entrusted with the education of youth. Their moral system and discipline are truly admirable. Their pupils, in after-life, are seldom vicious and licentious characters, and are in general men of learning, science, and possessed of every elegant accomplishment. I execrate the conduct of the liberals of Madrid in murdering last year the helpless fathers, by whose care and instruction two of the finest minds of Spain have been evolved—the two ornaments of the liberal cause and modern literature of Spain, for such are Toreno and Martinez de la Rosa. [66] . . .
Gathered in small clusters about the pillars at the lower extremities of the gold and silver streets in Lisbon, may be observed, about noon in every day, certain strange-looking men whose appearance is neither Portuguese nor European. Their dress generally consists of a red cap, with a blue silken tassel at the top of it, a blue tunic girded at the waist with a red sash, and wide linen pantaloons or trousers. He who passes by these groups generally hears them conversing in broken Spanish or Portuguese, and occasionally in a harsh guttural language, which the oriental traveller knows to be the Arabic, or a dialect thereof. These people are the Jews of Lisbon. [67a] Into the midst of one of these groups I one day introduced myself, and pronounced a beraka, or blessing. I have lived in different parts of the world, much amongst the Hebrew race, and am well acquainted with their ways and phraseology. I was rather anxious to become acquainted with the state of the Portuguese Jews, and I had now an opportunity. “The man is a powerful rabbi,” said a voice in Arabic; “it behoves us to treat him kindly.” They welcomed me. I favoured their mistake, and in a few days I knew all that related to them and their traffic in Lisbon. [67b]
The Jews of Europe at the present time are divided into two classes—synagogues, as some call them—the Portuguese and German. Of these the most celebrated is the Portuguese. Jews of this class are generally considered as more polished than the others, better educated, and more deeply versed both in the language of Scripture and the traditions of their forefathers. In London there is a stately edifice which is termed the synagogue of the Portuguese Jews, where the rites of the Hebrew religion are performed with all possible splendour and magnificence. Knowing all this, one would naturally expect, on arriving in Portugal, to find one’s self in the head-quarters of that Judaism with which the mind has been accustomed to associate so much that is respectable and imposing. It was, therefore, with feelings of considerable surprise that I heard from the beings, whom I have attempted to describe above, the following account of themselves:—“We are not of Portugal,” said they; “we come from Barbary, some from Algier, some from the Levant, but mostly from Barbary, yonder-away!” And they pointed to the south-west.
“And where are the Jews of Portugal,” I demanded: “the proper children of the country?”
“We know of none but ourselves,” replied the Barbaresques, “though we have heard say that there are others: if so, they do not come near us, and they do right, for we are an evil people, O thou Tsadik, and thieves to a man. A ship comes every year from Swirah; [68] it brings a cargo of thieves, for it brings Jews.”
“And your wives and families,” said I, “where are they?”