More fortunate were the exiles that landed upon the shores of Naples. Its king, Ferdinand I., was a prudent sovereign, a distinguished scholar, and, unlike the other rulers of Europe, he had succeeded in keeping his power above that of the Church, and his heart free from the inhumanity and bigotry of the clergy. He opened his kingdom to the Jews, made the great Abarbanel, formerly in the service of Isabella, of Castile, one of his cabinet officers, and personally defended the Jews from an attack of the clergy and of the populace, who held the presence of the Jews accountable for the plague which was then raging, as elsewhere in Europe, in Naples.
Equally as fortunate were those who landed upon the coasts where the Turks held dominion. Sultan Bajazet received them cheerfully, provided for them humanely, and directed their intellect and industry into useful channels. "Do they call this Ferdinand, of Spain, a prudent prince," asks the Sultan, "who can thus impoverish his own kingdom and enrich ours?"
Nearly 150,000 souls made their way, by land, to Portugal, whose king, John II., dispensed with his scruples of conscience so far as to allow his greed to triumph over his creed. He granted them a passage through his dominion on their way to Africa, and the permission of an eight months' stay in his realm, in consideration of a tax of eight dollars a head, which immense sum he levied from the native Portuguese Jews. Ferdinand and Isabella threatened, and Torquemada incited the Portuguese clergy, but John II. had over a million of dollars to quicken his conscience and to wage war if necessary, and expecting it, he instantly put such of the Jewish exiles who were manufacturers of arms and miners to work. But his clemency was of short duration. It soon gave away to the most frightful era of the exiles' sufferings. When the news reached the homeless exiles of the atrocious crimes inflicted upon their brethren on their way to the African coasts, by inhuman captains and heartless crews, seeing nothing but cruel death before them, whether going or whether remaining, they preferred meeting death in Portugal, to exposing themselves to the inhumanity and beastly lusts and tortures of barbarous pirate sailors and African savages, and listlessly awaiting death, and praying for it, they remained after the time purchased for their stay had passed away. To their misfortune the plague broke out in Portugal and raged with deathly fury. Immediately the church arose, held the Jews responsible for the visitation of the plague, and lashed the populace into a relentless fury, because of the visitation of the plague, and the breach of contract on the part of the Jews. The king's creed awoke again simultaneously with the re-awakening of his greed. He issued an edict which threw even that of Torquemada into the shade. All Jewish children below fourteen years of age were torn from their parents' arms, dragged into the church, baptized; those under three years of age were given to Christians, to receive a Christian education, or in other words to be raised as slaves; those between three and ten years of age, were put on board of a ship and conveyed to the newly discovered, unwholesome island of St. Thomas, called "Ilhas perdidas," "the isles of perdition," which was colonized by Portuguese condemned criminals, to fare there as best they could. Those between ten and fourteen years were sold as slaves. Then, indeed, the cup of the their affliction was full to the brim. It was a stern truth which Lenau uttered, when he said:
"Die Kirche weiss die Schmerzen zu verwalten
Das Herz bis in die Wurzel aufzuspalten."
The Jews have experienced fully the unequaled skill of the Church in administering pain. Mothers cast themselves at the feet of the tyrants and pitifully begged to be taken with their babes; they were heartlessly thrust aside. Hundreds of mothers mad with despair, ran behind the ships as they carried off the idols of their heart, and perished in the waves. The serene fortitude, with which the exile people had borne so many and such grievous calamities, gave way at last, and was replaced by the wildest paroxysms of despair. Piercing shrieks of anguish filled the land. Childless and broken-hearted they now sought to leave the land, but they were told that they had forfeited their right, and they were given the choice between baptism and slavery. Thousands, after enduring all they did, after leaving their beloved Spain and all their wealth and ease, submitted to baptism now, in the hope of being reunited with their children. Thousands were sold as slaves, yet prior to their being sold, they were submitted to tortures, cruelties, outrages too revolting, too repulsive, too heart-rending to be here narrated.
Terror seized upon the native Portuguese Jews, when they helplessly beheld the cruelties to which their Spanish brethren were subjected. They knew they, themselves, could not escape the wrath of the Church much longer, and they thought of flight, and well had it been for them had they made their escape then. While they were making secret preparations, John II. died, 1495. He had been afflicted, on the very day when the ships, laden with the Jewish exile children, set sail for the isle of the condemned criminals, with a strange, painful malady, and had lingered ever since.
His own promising son and successor preceded him into the grave. His cousin Manoel ascended the throne. He was the counterpart of his predecessor, kind hearted, a promoter of learning, eager to further the interests of his country by discoveries abroad and by commerce at home. Immediately he disfranchised the Jewish exiles sold into slavery, promised to recall the condemned children, and issued an edict, in which he commanded kind treatment to the Jews, and prohibited accusations against them. In their great joy the native Portuguese Jews sent an embassy to him, offering him large sums of money, voluntarily as a token of their gratitude. The king thanked them, reassured them of his good will, but refused to be paid for human kindness.
But, again had destiny decreed that a woman was to play an ignoble part in the tragic history of the Jews. A marriage was proposed between Manoel of Portugal, and the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, of Spain. Manoel was rejoiced with the proposal. Already he saw himself in the near future King of United Spain and Portugal, and of the entire New World. But Satan stepped between, dipped his pen in gall, and writing the marriage contract, demanded as one of the conditions, the immediate expulsion from Portugal of all the Jews, both natives and exiles.
The king hesitated. The fanatical daughter of fanatical parents persisted, argument made her more vehement. Torquemada might well be proud of his pupil—the possession of vast empires, and of the most powerful crown of Europe tempted, and the tempter conquered. He had purchased his right to the princess of Spain at a sacrifice of thousands and thousands of lives, and with the destruction of the very pillars of his nation's prosperity.