But the wealth of church and altar plate more than makes up for the shortcomings of the picture galleries. Monstrances in gold of great antiquity and beauty, covered with precious stones, are to be seen literally by the dozen. Silver gilt processional crosses of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, some almost Byzantine, some nearly Mudejar in design, abound; chalices of unimaginable richness in pure Gothic and Manueline styles, reliquaries in gold and gems beyond price, and gold and enamelled crowns and girdles, altar crosses, and candlesticks without number, are displayed in cases in a suite of rooms commanding a fine view over the Tagus. Alcobaça has contributed the lion’s share of these treasures, but Batalha and many other religious houses have been placed under involuntary contribution; and the result is a collection of early ecclesiastical art in gold and silver that I have never seen approached elsewhere. The church vestments, too, are rich and numerous beyond description; and a large series of beautifully embroidered court dresses of the eighteenth century displays the influence exerted by the Portuguese connection with the far East upon artistic embroidery of the period.
The collection of church property contained in the small museum attached to the Jesuit church of São Roque is circumscribed in period to the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries; but as the whole collection is derived from the possessions of a single chapel—that of St. John—in the adjoining church, a vivid idea is gained of the lavishness with which the church in Portugal was endowed in the days of the national prosperity.
The church and district of São Roque have always possessed special interest for me. The monastery, standing upon a bluff overlooking the valley, was the point of attack when the English under Norris and the Earl of Essex tried to capture Lisbon for the Pretender, Dom Antonio, in 1589;[[6]] and, though the monks were in favour of the English protégé, the Spanish musketeers filled the long line of windows commanding the approach from the English camp, on the opposite hill outside the gate of São Antão, and frustrated all attempts to force the position.
Inside the great square church there is an object of interest that first attracted my attention many years ago, and always demands from me a pilgrimage to São Roque, up the hill of the Carmo, as soon as I arrive in Lisbon. Sir Francis Tregian was one of those stout Cornish Catholic recusant gentlemen whose career in the days of Elizabeth I had had occasion to follow in detail; and his persecution and escape were familiar to me, as they are to many students of the religious troubles of the last years of the Tudor queen; but I had never known where he had found a last resting-place. Here in São Roque a large upright slab stands beneath the pulpit on the north side of the church which quaintly tells the story: “Aqui esta, em pé, o corpo de Dom Francisco Tregian, fidalgo inglés mui illustre, o qual depois de confiscados os seus estados, e grandes trabalhos padecidos em 28 annos de prisam, polla defensa da fe catholica em Inglaterra, na persecuçam da Rainha Isabel, no anno 1608 ao 25 Dezembro morreó nesta cidade de Lisboa, com fama de santidade. Avendo 17 annos que estava sepultado nesta igrega de S. Roque da Companhia de Jesus, no anno de 1625 ao 25 Abril, se achouo seu corpo inteiro e incorrupto, e foe collocado neste lugar pelos ingleses catholicos residentes en esta cidade, ao 25 Abril 1626.” “Here upright stands the body of Sir Francis Tregian, a very illustrious English gentleman, who, after his estates were confiscated and he had suffered great tribulation during twenty-eight years of imprisonment for the defence of the Catholic faith in England, in the persecution of Queen Elizabeth, died on the 25th December 1608 in this city of Lisbon, famed for his saintliness. After he had been entombed for seventeen years in this church of São Roque of the Company of Jesus, in the year 1625, on the 25th April, his body was found intact and uncorrupted, and was placed in this position by the English Catholics resident in this city on the 25th April 1626.”
The chapel on the north side of São Roque nearest the altar is the beautifully decorated chapel of St. John. It had been for centuries the poorest chapel in the sanctuary; but with the advent of King John V., at the dawn of the eighteenth century, the new monarch declared his intention of making the shrine of his patron saint the richest altar in Portugal. And he did so, with gifts both lavish and beautiful, an example naturally followed by his courtiers; so that when the Jesuits were expelled, the treasures of St. John, the property thenceforward of the State, formed a museum of their own. The objects exhibited, monstrances, reliquaries, crosses, altar furniture, banners, frontals, and vestments, are of surpassing magnificence; although they often attract more by their intrinsic worth than by the purity of their taste, as, for instance, the silver-gilt altar candlesticks ten feet high, and the great silver repousé altar front: but as specimens of the decorative art—Italian, French, and Portuguese—of their period, they are well worth study.
Lower down the hill stands the beautiful ruined Gothic-Manueline church of the Carmo, now an archæological museum, filled with many fragments of the older buildings of Lisbon saved from the ruin of the earthquake that wrecked the Carmo itself.
Lisbon abounds in public gardens of almost tropical luxuriance. The fine plantations before the big classical church of the Estrella, the park of the Necessidades palace, the square of the Principe Real, the Avenida itself, and the pretty garden of the Gloria already referred to, might for the vegetation in them almost be in the West Indies; whilst the Botanic Gardens, especially, can show palm groves to be matched nowhere in Europe, except at Elche in the east of Spain. And not palms alone grow here in a way wonderful in the midst of a populous city, but cacti, aloes, daturas, and magnolias bloom with great luxuriance, and huge tropical forest trees from South America thrive in the open as if on their native soil.
The climate of Lisbon, indeed, is extraordinarily soft and mild relatively to its latitude, owing to its sheltered position and to the prevalence of westerly sea breezes. As a winter resort it has unaccountably fallen somewhat out of fashion of late years in favour of the Mediterranean Riviera, where the climate is much less equable and more trying to those in delicate health. The latitude of Lisbon is about the same as that of Palermo, three hundred miles south of that of the Mediterranean Riviera, and the mean winter temperature (December, January, and February) in Lisbon is 10.63° Centigrade (51° Fahrenheit), against 7.79° at Biarritz, and 7.91° at Nice. Not only is Lisbon thus much warmer on an average than the winter resorts now most affected by English visitors, but the climate is more uniform, the diurnal fluctuation in winter being considerably less at Lisbon than at Biarritz, Nice, or even at Palermo in the same latitude. The winter atmospheric humidity of Lisbon slightly exceeds that of Biarritz and Nice, though in summer Lisbon is atmospherically much drier than either: but in the matter of the entire winter rainfall the average of Lisbon is considerably higher, and this it is that to some extent has set English physicians against the place as a winter health resort, although the average rainfall for the whole year is much less at Lisbon[[7]] than either at Biarritz or Nice. The rains in Lisbon, however, which fall heavily in the months of November, December, and January (a mean of 277 milimetres, as against 254 milimetres at Biarritz and 167 milimetres at Nice), are usually rapid and torrential, and pass away at once.
Snow is practically unknown at Lisbon, and frost is extremely rare. But, withal, equable and mild as the average hibernal climate of Lisbon is, I do not personally recommend it as a residence for those who are forced in the winter to seek a warm, dry, and bracing atmosphere. The smoke of the numerous factories, and the mist that clings about the river and in the narrow gullies that contain much of the town, make the place somewhat depressing. But within fifteen miles of the city, and free from the objections natural to the valley of the Tagus, there are two resorts which are, in my opinion, and I speak from experience of both of them, ideal places in which the unpleasantness and danger of winter in a northern climate may be escaped. It is, indeed, difficult to overrate the attractions in this respect of Cascaes and Mont’ Estoril, especially the latter. Cascaes stands in a lovely bay surrounded by bold, rocky scenery, and backed by hills which protect it from the north. A fine sheltered promenade facing the sea possesses a grove of palms more luxuriant than any that Nice or Cannes can show, and the walks along the coast are beautiful. Mont’ Estoril, which is within a mile or so of Cascaes, on the point of the Bay, is of more modern reputation, but is in some respects to be preferred to Cascaes as a winter resort. The train from Lisbon, running along the coast for fourteen miles, lands the visitor to Mont’ Estoril in the midst of a beautifully picturesque village of hotels and villas, grouped upon the slope of a hill descending in a semicircle to the sea, with pines and eucalyptus woods above, and palms everywhere below. The high range of Cintra, and the lower hills on the north and east, completely protect the place from inclement winds, whilst the open sea-front on west and south prevents the sweltering stuffiness and relaxing effect of so many shut-in places. There are several excellent hotels specially intended for winter visitors; and for any one to whom a three-days’ voyage at sea in a commodious, well-found steamer has no terrors, this Portuguese Riviera just outside the Tagus forms a winter refuge which it will be difficult to beat in Europe. The climate of Mont’ Estoril is noticeably warmer than Lisbon in the winter, and the diurnal variations of temperature are smaller; whilst the humidity and rainfall, which in Lisbon during the three winter months form its only natural drawback, are very much smaller at Mont’ Estoril. It is, indeed, very rare that mist is seen at the latter place, even when the Tagus valley is full of haze. From personal knowledge of both places I should say that the mean winter rainfall of Mont’ Estoril is much less than that of Biarritz, whilst certainly its temperature is higher and its uniformity greater.
I have dwelt only upon the winter climatic conditions, because it is in this respect that misapprehension usually exists. The spring and autumn climate generally is simply perfect, and from the middle of March onward fine warm weather, with only an occasional heavy shower in April, May, and October, may be counted upon almost with certainty. During the particular tour of which this book is a record, I passed thirty days in Portugal in the month of October. Out of this period I saw rain on four days only—namely, three hours of deluge at Oporto, a portion of the day at Bussaco, and two days at Lisbon; whilst in previous journeys in Portugal I have on more than one occasion seen an even smaller quantity of rain in October, April, and May. November is usually wet, though not so wet as at Biarritz or Nice for the same month (Lisbon, 106 milimetres; Biarritz, 122 milimetres; Nice, 114 milimetres), whilst in December and January Lisbon and Biarritz have about an equal rainfall, Nice being in those months drier than either. From March onward Lisbon has a decided advantage over both places.