Printed by James Ballantyne and Co.
PREFACE
BY THE TRANSLATOR.
The remarks of Foreign Travellers upon our own country have always been so well received by the Public, that no apology can be necessary for offering to it the present Translation, The Author of this work seems to have enjoyed more advantages than most of his predecessors, and to have availed himself of them with remarkable diligence. He boasts also of his impartiality: to this praise, in general, he is entitled; but there are some things which he has seen with a jaundiced eye. It is manifest that he is bigotted to the deplorable superstitions of his country; and we may well suppose that those parts of the work in which this bigotry is most apparent, have not been improved by the aid for which he thanks his Father Confessor. The Translator has seldom thought it necessary to offer any comments upon the palpable errors and mis-statements which this spirit has sometimes occasioned: the few notes which he has annexed are distinguished by the letters Tr.
PREFACE.
A volume of Travels rarely or never, in our days, appears in Spain: in England, on the contrary, scarcely any works are so numerous. If an Englishman spends the summer in any of the mountainous provinces, or runs over to Paris for six weeks, he publishes the history of his travels; and if a work of this kind be announced in France, so great a competition is excited among the London booksellers, that they import it sheet by sheet as it comes from the press, and translate and print it piece-meal. The greater number of such books must necessarily be of little value: all, however, find readers, and the worst of them adds something to the stock of general information.
We seldom travel; and they among us who do, never give their journals to the public. Is it because literature can hardly be said to have become a trade among us, or because vanity is no part of our national character? The present work, therefore, is safe from comparison, and will have the advantage of novelty. If it subject me to the charge of vanity myself, I shall be sorry for the imputation, but not conscious of deserving it. I went to England under circumstances unusually favourable, and remained there eighteen months, during the greater part of which I was domesticated in an English family. They knew that it was my intention to publish an account of what I saw, and aided me in my enquiries with a kindness which I must ever remember. My remarks were communicated, as they occurred, in letters to my own family, and to my Father Confessor; and they from time to time suggested to me such objects of observation as might otherwise perhaps have been overlooked. I have thought it better to revise these letters, inserting such matter as further research and more knowledge enabled me to add, rather than to methodize the whole; having observed in England, that works of this kind wherein the subjects are presented in the order wherein they occurred, are always better received than those of a more systematical arrangement: indeed, they are less likely to be erroneous, and their errors are more excusable, in those letters which relate to the state of religion, I have availed myself of the remarks with which my Father Confessor instructed me in his correspondence. He has forbidden me to mention his name; but it is my duty to state, that the most valuable observations upon this important subject, and, in particular, those passages in which the Fathers are so successfully quoted, would not have enriched these volumes, but for his assistance.