You must not wonder then, that I was haunted the whole way home by these mysterious whisperings, nor that, in such a tone of mind, I saw with no great pleasure a procession of two-wheeled chaises, the lord knows how many out-riders, and a caravan of bouras, marching up to the gate of my villa. I had, indeed, been prepared to expect a very considerable influx of visiters; but this was a deluge.
Do not let me send you a catalogue of the company, lest you should be as much annoyed with the detail, as I was with such a formidable arrival en masse. Let it suffice to name two of the principal characters, the old pious Conde de San Lorenzo, and the prior of San Juliaô, one of the archbishop’s prime favourites, and a person of great worship. Mortier’s Dutch bible happening to lie upon the table, they began tumbling over the leaves in an egregiously awkward manner. I, who abhor seeing books thumbed, and prints demonstrated by the close application of a greasy fore-finger, snapped at the old Conde, and cast an evil look at the prior, who was leaning his whole priestly weight on the volume, and creasing its corners.
My musicians were in full song, and Pedro Grua, a capital violoncello, exerted his abilities in his best style; but San Lorenzo was too pathetically engaged in deploring the massacre of the Innocents to pay him any attention, and his reverend companion had entered into a long-winded dissertation upon parables, miracles, and martyrdom, from which I prayed in vain the Lord to deliver me. Verdeil, scenting from afar the saintly flavour of the discourse, stole off.
I cannot say much in praise of the prior’s erudition, even in holy matters, for he positively affirmed that it was Henry the Eighth himself, who knocked St. Thomas à Becket’s brains out, and that by the beast in the Apocalypse, Luther was positively indicated. I hate wrangles, and had it not been for the soiling of my prints, should never have contradicted his reverence; but as I was a little out of humour, I lowered him somewhat in the Conde’s opinion, by stating the real period of St. Thomas’s murder, and by tolerably specious arguments, shoving the beast’s horns off Luther, and clapping them tight upon—whom do you think?—Œcolampadius! So grand a name, which very probably they had never heard pronounced in their lives, carried all before it, (adding another instance of the triumph of sound over sense,) and settled our bickerings.
We sat down, I believe, full thirty to dinner, and had hardly got through the dessert, when Berti came in to tell me that Madame Ariaga, and a bevy of the palace damsels, were prancing about the quinta on palfreys and bouras. I hastened to join them. There was Donna Maria do Carmo, and Donna Maria da Penha, with her hair flowing about her shoulders, and her large beautiful eyes looking as wild and roving as those of an antelope. I called for my horse, and galloped through alleys and citron bushes, brushing off leaves, fruit, and blossoms. Every breeze wafted to us the sound of French horns and oboes. The ladies seemed to enjoy the freedom and novelty of this scamper prodigiously, and to regret the short time it was doomed to last; for at seven they are obliged to return to strict attendance on the Queen, and had some strange fairy-tale metamorphosis into a pumpkin or a cucumber been the penalty of disobedience, they could not have shown more alarm or anxiety when the fatal hour of seven drew near. Luckily, they had not far to go, for her Majesty and the Royal Family were all assembled at the Marialva villa, to partake of a splendid merenda and see fireworks.
As soon as it fell dark Verdeil and I set forth to catch a glimpse of the royal party. The Grand Prior and Don Pedro conducted us mysteriously into a snug boudoir which looks into the great pavilion, whose gay, fantastic scenery appeared to infinite advantage by the light of innumerable tapers reflected on all sides from lustres of glittering crystal. The little Infanta Donna Carlotta was perched on a sofa in conversation with the Marchioness and Donna Henriquetta, who, in the true oriental fashion, had placed themselves cross-legged on the floor. A troop of maids of honour, commanded by the Countess of Lumieres, sat in the same posture at a little distance. Donna Rosa, the favourite dwarf negress, dressed out in a flaming scarlet riding-habit, not so frolicsome as the last time I had the pleasure of seeing her in this fairy bower, was more sentimental, and leaned against the door, ogling and flirting with a handsome Moor belonging to the Marquis.
Presently the Queen, followed by her sister and daughter-in-law, the Princess of Brazil, came forth from her merenda, and seated herself in front of the latticed-window, behind which I was placed. Her manner struck me as being peculiarly dignified and conciliating. She looks born to command; but at the same time to make that high authority as much beloved as respected. Justice and clemency, the motto so glaringly misapplied on the banner of the abhorred Inquisition, might be transferred with the strictest truth to this good princess. During the fatal contest betwixt England and its colonies, the wise neutrality she persevered in maintaining was of the most vital benefit to her dominions, and hitherto, the native commerce of Portugal has attained under her mild auspices an unprecedented degree of prosperity.
Nothing could exceed the profound respect, the courtly decorum her presence appeared to inspire. The Conde de Sampayo and the Viscount Ponte de Lima knelt by the august personages with not much less veneration, I should be tempted to imagine, than Moslems before the tomb of their prophet, or Tartars in the presence of the Dalai Lama. Marialva alone, who took his station opposite her Majesty, seemed to preserve his ease and cheerfulness. The Prince of Brazil and Don Joaô looked not a little ennuied; for they kept stalking about with their hands in their pockets, their mouths in a perpetual yawn, and their eyes wandering from object to object, with a stare of royal vacancy.
A most rigorous etiquette confining the Infants of Portugal within their palaces, they are seldom known to mix even incognito with the crowd; so that their flattering smiles or confidential yawns are not lavished upon common observers. This sort of embalming princes alive, after all, is no bad policy; it keeps them sacred; it concentrates their royal essence, too apt, alas! to evaporate by exposure. What is so liberally paid for by the willing tribute of the people as a rarity of exquisite relish, should not be suffered to turn mundungus. However the individual may dislike this severe regimen, state pageants might have the goodness to recollect for what purpose they are bedecked and beworshipped.
The Conde de Sampayo, lord in waiting, handed the tea to the Queen, and fell down on both knees to present it. This ceremony over, for every thing is ceremony at this stately court, the fireworks were announced, and the royal sufferers, followed by their sufferees, adjourned to a neighbouring apartment. The Marchioness, her daughters, and the Countess of Lumieres, mounted up to the boudoir where I was sitting, and took possession of the windows. Seven or eight wheels, and as many tourbillons began whirling and whizzing, whilst a profusion of admirable line-rockets darted along in various directions, to the infinite delight of the Countess of Lumieres, who, though hardly sixteen, has been married four years. Her youthful cheerfulness, light hair, and fair complexion, put me so much in mind of my Margaret, that I could not help looking at her with a melancholy tenderness: her being with child increased the resemblance, and as she sat in the recess of the window, discovered at intervals by the blue light of rockets bursting high in the air, I felt my blood thrill as if I beheld a phantom, and my eyes were filled with tears.