[CHAP. VIII.]
National Characters. Adventures of a pair of leather Breeches. Ditto of a pound of Beef. Shewing what the French General did not do, and a Prayer which he did not pray; with a few random Shots.
Fuentes, which was our first resting place, was a very handsome village, and every family so well known to the light division, that no matter into which quarter the billet fell, the individual was received as an old and approved friend.
The change from Portugal into Spain, as alluded to in my first work, was very striking. In the former the monkish cowl seemed even on ordinary occasions to be drawn over the face of nature; for though their sun was a heavenly one, it shone over a dark and bigotted race; and though they were as ripe for mischief as those of more enlightened nations, yet even in that they were woefully defective, and their joys seemed often sadly miscalled. But at the time I speak of, as if to shroud every thing in unfathomable gloom, the ravages of the enemy had turned thousands of what (to them) were happy homes, into as many hells—their domestic peace ruined—their houses and furniture fired, and every countenance bearing the picture of melancholy and wan despair.
Their damsels' cheeks wore no roses, yet did they wear soil enough on which to rear them. But at the same time be it remarked that I quarrel not with the countenance but with the soil, for I am a pale lover myself.
In Spain, on the contrary, health and joy seemed to beam on every countenance, and comfort in every dwelling. I have observed some writers quarrel with my former statement on this subject, and maintain that though the difference in appearance was remarkable, that so far as regards the article of cleanliness, the facts were not so. With these, however, I must still differ after giving every thing due consideration. The Portuguese did not assume to be a cleanly race, and they were a filthy one in reality. The Spaniards did affect to be the former, and I do think that they approached it as nearly as may be. I allude to the peasantry, for the upper and middling classes sink into immeasurable contempt in the comparison, but their peasantry I still maintain are as fine and as cleanly a class as I ever saw. Their dress is remarkably handsome, and though I can give no opinion as to the weekly value of soap expended on their manly countenances, yet in regard to the shirt, which is their greatest pride, and neatly embroidered in the bosom according to the position of the wearer in the minds of those on whom that portion of the ornamental devolves, I can vouch for their having shewn a clean one as often as need be. And though I do not feel myself at liberty to enter into the details of the dress of their lovely black-eyed damsels, I may be permitted to say that it is highly becoming to them; and, in short, I should have some dread of staking our national credit by parading the inmates of any chance village of our own against a similar one of theirs.
Their houses too are remarkably neat and cleanly, and would be comfortable were it not for those indefatigable villainous insects that play at a perpetual hop, skip, and jump, giving occasional pinches to the exposed parts of the inmate; and yet what warm country is exempt from them or something worse. Go into boasted America, and so great is the liberty of all classes there, that what with the hum of the musquitto above, and the bug below the blanket, the unfortunate wight, as I can testify, is regularly hum-bugged out of his natural repose. As I have taken a trip across the Atlantic for the foregoing example, I cannot resist giving an anecdote to shew that our brethren on that side of the water sometimes have a night's rest sacrificed to inexpressible causes as well as natural ones.
A gentleman at the head of the law there, (not the hangman,) told me that in his early days while the roads were yet in their infancy, he was in the habit of going his circuit on horseback, with nothing but a change of linen tacked to his crupper—that one day he had been overtaken by a shower of rain before he could reach the lonely cottage, which he had destined for his night's repose—and that it interfered materially with the harmony which had hitherto existed between him and his leather breeches, for he felt uncomfortable in them, and he felt uncomfortable out of them, arising from the dread that he might never be able to get into them again. His landlady, however, succeeded in allaying his fears for the moment, and having lent him one of her nether garments for present use, she finally consigned him to bed, with injunctions to sleep undisturbed, for that she would take especial care, while they underwent the necessary fiery ordeal, that she would put that within which should preserve their capacities undiminished.