Portuguese Agriculture

( Originally Published 1891 )

I have entered upon an agricultural investigation, and propose to record a view of the only industry for which Portugal is distinguished.

It is natural that I, who have been so long interested in the agriculture of my own country, should be curious to know about the farming of this country, which was ancient before ours began, and whose power was fully developed before the shores of America were known. Portugal, which covers an area a little more than four times the size of Massachusetts, is devoted almost entirely to agriculture in one form or another. More than fifty per cent. of its soil is productive, and the remainder is for grazing and forest. In depth of ravines, and in lofty piles of high and startling boulders, Portugal stands foremost among the nations of the earth. She does not raise grain enough, it is true, for home consumption,—but she produces nearly $30,000,000 worth of wine to quench the thirst of home and foreign multitudes. The cultivation of her productive lands is almost universal,—but few acres lying idle. Her market-gardens are models of neatness and careful management. The capital invested in manufactures is about $13,000,000, and the annual production is estimated at about $18,000,000 ; while the cereal productions of the kingdom amount annually to $3,087,000. She imports cotton to the amount of $4,132,700, raw and manufactured; farinaceous articles amounting to $8,203,633 ; animals and animal productions, $3,165,000. Her exports, consisting largely of cork-bark and wine, amount to $24,8o1,761. Mean-while, she produces of Indian corn $20,477,300 ; of wheat, $13,365,000 ; of rye, $3,941,410 ; of barley, $1,406,160.

The crops vary largely in amount,—ranging from 5 bushels of wheat to 10 bushels to the acre ; and rye in about the same proportion. According to careful official estimates contained in the report of the Director-General of Agriculture, land fertilized with $5.25 worth of manure or other fertilizer, will produce 27 bushels of wheat on 2 1/2 acres ; the value of the wheat and straw being $30, and costing $30.01. This is a wheat crop following rye ; of wheat after potatoes the amount raised was 31 1/2 bushels on 2 1/2 acres, valued at $31.50, with the straw at $4.50 ; the crop costing $33.00.

Potatoes, according to the estimate, yield 365 1/2 bushels on 2 1/2 acres, and are valued at $75.60, costing $66.46. The market-price of wheat is about $1.00 per bushel ; Indian corn, $1.00; rye, 75 cts. ; barley, 70 cts. ; oats, 35 cts ; white beans, $1.08 ; potatoes, 6o cts. Beef brings 11 cts. per pound ; veal, 10 cts. ; mutton, 7 cts. ; pork, 10 cts. The wages of farm-hands is about 25 cts. per day for men, and 12 cts. for women.

The price of wine in Portugal, according to official reports, varies from 55 cts. to $1.10 per gallon. The yield per acre varies as largely as the cereal crops to which I have alluded. The ravages of the phyloxera have been great in some sections of the country ; and the introduction of American vines, which are free from these pests, has not resulted as favorably as was hoped. The wine product in 1882 was 125,000,000 gallons, valued at £5,700,000.

A wide landscape in Portugal presents to view a great number of farms, and constant succession of cultivated fields devoted to grain crops, the weight of which varies most remarkably. The agricultural condition of the sections varies greatly also. The Director-General finds on investigation that the increase or diminution of population depends on the condition of agriculture; and not as in New England on the growth or decline of manufactures. The prosperity of the country depends on the fertility of the soil and the skill displayed in its cultivation ; and where the ancient methods remain, the population seems to grow fewer, and the soil poorer. In addition to this, the ten years from 1878 to 1888 were attended with great disasters. Oil has found a poor market, cattle have been low, and the vines have failed. The production of silk has not been profitable.

A large portion of the land came under mortgage, when held by the people in small farms. The pastures of Portugal, except in the Douro district at the north, are poor ; and the hay crop is universally light. The food of horses and cattle consists entirely of straw and grain. The land is mainly held in large estates, and is managed by tenants who either rent the farms at a fixed price or carry them on shares. Horses, sheep, goats, cattle, swine, and donkeys abound. The sheep have lost much of their quality as merinos, for which they were formerly distinguished. The cattle are very fine. I have never seen in any country so many admirable oxen as I have seen in and around Lisbon. They are large, measuring often seven feet and three or four inches, of a uniform dun color, with stately, well-formed limbs, straight bodies, wide hips, and delicate and at the same time firm heads. They work in pairs or singly, and are trained to perfection. They are evidently a breed of the country,—carefully preserved, as will be seen by the rules adopted by the managers of the agricultural exhibitions. The implements of husbandry are a one-handled plough, a long-handled spade, and " the ox that treadeth out the corn."

In Lisbon there are vaccarias, or milk-stores, in which are kept from six to twenty cows, provided with elegantly furnished stalls, kept perfectly clean, and used to supply fresh milk to customers. The cows and the counter are in the same apartment. They are among the finest specimens of dairy cows I have ever seen, being Holsteins of moderate size and admirable shape, and well-developed grade Jerseys. They are fed on all they can eat of wheat straw, carelessly threshed by treading and coarsely chopped ; to which are added twice a day about ten quarts of a mixture of large beans soaked and coarse wheat-bran—three quarts of beans and seven of wheat-bran,—evidently a most nutritious food.

Great rare has been taking in breeding horses, and the government has established sixty-five breeding studs, thirty-one in the north, and thirty-four at the south, in which may be found the Thoroughbred the cross of Arab and Portuguese, the Anglo-Norman, the Cleveland bay, the Hackney, the Anglo-Arab, the cross of Portuguese and Morocco. They breed especially for the saddle throughout the kingdom, and sure-footed, elastic, well-made horses for this purpose can be found everywhere.

In 1888 the Department of Agriculture organized a most interesting exhibition in the city of Lisbon. The directors, in organizing the show, presented with great force the character of the display they desired, and the advantages to be derived from it. They urged the judges to consider carefully the fitness of various animals for the service required of them and for the demands of the market. Especial attention was called to the breeds of animals already existing in Portugal, which, being accustomed to the climate and food, thrive well and fatten early ; and great care in the selection of animals for crossing was urged. Great satisfaction was expressed with the native bulls, while the necessity for using better stallions was strongly laid down. They encouraged Portuguese and not foreign breeds of cattle therefore ; in fact, they especially objected to the introduction of foreign breeds if they tend to weaken the native stock. The premiums offered under these rules were very liberal and significant. For the best stallion $200 ; for the best lot of mares $80 ; for the best lot of colts $60 ; for the best gelding $200 ; for the best saddle horse $100. For the best bull the premium offered was $60 ; for the best lot of 3-rams $18 ; for the best boar $20. No premium was offered for specific breeds.

The exhibition created great interest and was largely attended.

Portugal has for a long time encouraged agricultural education. For many years the government supported a school, not far from Cintra, at an annual expense of $23,284.. The students received free tuition, and the remainder numbering about fifty, paid $8. lo a month each for the service. The best agricultural implements were provided for preparing the land, seeding and harvesting. The cultivation of market-gardening and field crops was carefully attended to. Vines of the best varieties were introduced. The dairy was managed according to the most approved system. The care of swine, poultry, and bees was especially taught. The graduates of this institution, now established near Coimbra, are in constant demand as superintendents of estates ; and the applications for admission into the college far exceed its accommodations. The college can hardly be called classical or purely scientific. Of the school and its effort it has been said : " There are great difficulties to be overcome in displacing the old to make room for the new, however great the improvements of the latter in a country whose peasantry have been bred to ancient ways, and who fear the innovation of new ideas and labor-saving appliances may deprive them of the opportunity to earn a living by work and so condemn them to a greater poverty than they now endure. But gradually the little leaven of the institution is leavening the mass." In addition to this institution, Portugal has now a well-endowed system of education.

The characteristics of this industrial organization which I have briefly described are simplicity and economy. The investments are not large nor are the profits. The amount of money involved is comparatively small. The wages of labor, as I have pointed out, are very low ; and steady, long-continued toil is the law of life. I have seen laborers going to the field before sunrise on long summer days, and I have seen them returning at twilight in the evening. Their repose they take at midday. I have seen twenty reapers at work in a wheat-field which a reaper and binder would have cut in a few morning hours, and the field was not half reaped towards the close of the forenoon. In it all I saw no recognized personal poverty nor did I see much wealth or energy or ambition. The people were well-fed if we may judge by strength and form and muscle. In fact, the Portuguese are a well-made people. The strength of the porters is amazing. The longshoremen are vigorous and strong. The soldiers have sturdy habits and a great stride. The young men who go forth to their business in Lisbon have athletic frames. The pedestrians in Cintra possess great muscular power —else the hills would kill them. There is apparently no haste here. The climate is delightful. The soil is easily cultivated. Summer in different degrees is perpetual.

An excursion among the farms around Cintra is most delightful. Apple Bay lies along the sea about five miles away, and in reaching it you drive up and down the steep hills for which Cintra is famous, between the high, thick-plastered stone-walls, hung with vines and ferns and geraniums, which bound the road on either hand, out into an open country with a sandy way, and along the foot of a high range of hills, until you reach the sea. These hills are literally covered with vineyards from which the famous Collares wine is made,—Collares being a small village through which you drive on your way to Apple Bay. The sea view here is as fine as any you get at Marblehead or Cape Ann or Cape Cod or the shores of Maine, —in some respects finer. Apple Bay has a short beach between two high promontories, at the foot and up the sides of which are piled great blocks of a black, rough, seamed rock, indented as if it had been pelted with eternal hailstones. The breakers against these rocks are sublime, and the surf of the beach, stretching from one breaker to the other, is a great silver-bond to complete the picture. I have never seen on our coast, even after a storm, such activity of the sea. The ocean beyond gave no evidence of a gale, but the surf rolled up three high waves deep with great white crests and a roar as if they were enraged by their limited sphere of action. The ocean here is most " beautifully blue," and sparkles over its entire surface. The sky above is bluer, if possible, and you feel as if all nature realized the phenomena of this volcanic country.

I have been received by the King at the old palace at Cintra,—quite out of the usual course,—this being the first time in modern days that a foreign minister has had an audience outside of Lisbon and the Ajùda Palace. The extreme illness of the King rendered this necessary. The ceremony took place at two o'clock. I drove to the palace, which is about three minutes' walk from the hotel, armed with the President's letter accrediting me, and a copy of my address to the King. When I reached the wide marble steps leading to the broad landing, I was taken in hand by attendants in gorgeous livery and escorted to the anteroom of the reception salon of the palace in which was given the birthday ball I have already described. There I was met by his Excellency Senhor Barros Gomes, the Minister for Foreign Affairs, who left me with the Marchesa de Funchal and Mademoiselle Nitza de Gama, Ladies-in-waiting. Ere long the doors of the great salon were thrown open and a group of gentlemen, brilliant in uniform and decorations, passed on—the cabinet ministers, as we should call them. The Grand Chamberlain led the way. The procession filed across the great landing and left me with the ladies,—and I also was in waiting. In a few minutes my companions were summoned, and I was in waiting alone. At last my signal came, and I passed across the open space into a small red room containing the King, the Queen, and Prince Affonso, the ladies-in-waiting, and the cabinet. The King sat opposite the entrance in a handsome arm-chair upholstered with brocade. He looked feeble and sick, and with his decorations and neatly fitting dress-suit, he most appropriately represented his aged kingdom. He received the President's letter, which I presented, and I proceeded to deliver my speech as follows :

" Your Majesty : I have the honor to be charged by the President of the United States with the pleasing and honorable duty of presenting to Your Most Faithful Majesty a letter accrediting me as Minister Resident to your Majesty's government.

" I bring with me from the government and people of the United States the most cordial feelings of friendship and good-will. The amicable relations which have so long existed between Portugal and the United States have been continued without break or intermission from the time when Washington sent his favorite general and friend, the poet of the American revolution, to represent, as its first minister, the young republic at this court of renown and achievement. The founders of American commerce were intimate with the merchants and captains of Lisbon, whose name is still cherished in our maritime communities.

" It is a source of great gratification that in all vicissitudes these relations have never been broken.

" In his communication to my faithful and distinguished predecessor, announcing my appointment to the post he so honorably filled, the Secretary of State in-formed him that I have held an important official relation to the agriculture of the United States as commissioner. In this service I have learned the value of national industries to the welfare of the state, and I trust I may be allowed to observe and investigate the method by which Your Majesty's people preserve and develop that occupation which is the fundamental calling of all nations, the central pillar in that social system of which commerce and manufactures are the associates, and which binds all peoples together in a common brotherhood.

" On my journey hither, I took occasion to visit and examine the specimens of her various industries which Portugal had sent to the great exhibition at Paris ; and am happy in having this opportunity to express to Your Majesty my admiration of the collection, as illustrating the taste and skill of Your Majesty's people.

" While extending to Your Majesty's government these assurances of the sincere friendship entertained by the government and people of the United States, I express also their deep interest in Your Majesty's personal welfare and happiness, and their hope that Your Majesty may enjoy a long and prosperous reign."

To which His Majesty made the following reply :

" Mr. Minister : I receive with much pleasure the letter by which you are accredited as Minister Resident near me, and am gratified to hear the expressions of cordiality which you communicate to me from the President and the noble people of the United States of America.

" The political and commercial relations between the two nations, so auspiciously maintained without interruption during nearly a century, tend not only to pre-serve their friendship but to increase more and more by the simultaneous development of the two peoples as exhibited in their industrial progress and agricultural productions.

" The eminent qualities with which you are endowed, and their recognition by a previous appointment to an important commission which you lately discharged, will greatly strengthen and contribute to these relations.

" The knowledge of mutual interests acquired by the observation which the exercise of that charge gave you, is a guaranty that your mission will have a beneficial influence on the increase of commercial transactions and of communication between the two countries, and in strengthening the bonds of friendship between the two nations.

"For that purpose you may count upon the assiduous cooperation of my government and my good will."

At the conclusion of the King's speech we parted, and I turned to the Queen, who was laden with pearls and jewels adorning a white satin dress, and expressed to her the respect my government has for her Majesty. I then paid my respects to the Prince who stood near, and on a signal from the Minister for Foreign Affairs I departed.

A Portuguese Sunday is the usual European mixture of Sunday and holiday. I had a full experience of one yesterday—at a rude marketplace in Cintra, where, I was told, I could see the people and the products of their industry. Both are unpolished, and I looked about the rough crowd to find the finely shaped pottery which the peasantry of Southern Europe claim as their specialty. The scene was primitive and quaint ; the people were coarsely clad ; the wares exposed for sale were common ; the animals were wretched ; and the " articles manufactured from leather " were most ordinary. When we reached the fair ground,—a rough valley in a rougher village, shaded by a few shadowy trees, and adorned with a very dilapidated stone bandstand,--we found a vast collection of coarse pottery, jars and jugs unglazed, and milk-pans glazed, with no beauty whatever. The utile completely displaced the dulci, and we wandered on disappointed, to fall in with a large table of cheap trinkets and gewgaws, at which Loring lingered and bought only a huge clasp-knife. Thence we proceeded through a collection of saddlery—cheap bridles and straps tan-colored—and enormous pack-saddles. Beyond these was a large herd of swine—old and young, black and white—lying lazily about and attracting great attention from the crowd who evidently never heard of the morale of a Jew or the danger of trichina. The people at the fair were evidently of the lowest order. We made our visit short and returned to the quiet of our hotel and the delights of our books.

At noon we were suddenly informed that the day was the Queen's name-day and her majesty was receiving. It was St. Maria's day. When we reached the palace we found the court and the diplomatic corps assembled in the anteroom of the great salon. The pretty Princess Amélie greeted us very cordially and we were at once presented to the Queen by the Grand Chamber-lain. The interview was short. The condition of the King's health cast a shadow over the occasion, and created in the Queen an air of sadness and nervousness which it was touching to contemplate. She was at-tended by her younger son, Dom Affonso.

October 4th.—It is a rainy day—the first we have had in Cintra, and I suppose what is called here the rainy season has begun. After days and weeks of bright sun the fogs began to gather over the western sea, towards the approach of evening, and at last they rolled over the land in great masses and took possession of hill and valley. And now they have made up a good vigorous rain-storm, not rising, as in New England, against the wind, and showing their cloudy signs in the west preparatory to a northeaster,—but gathering on the seaboard as the troops of the Duke of Wellington gathered and marching inland with favoring gales, conquering and to conquer. I like the day. Perpetual sunshine or " eternal sunshine," as the poet has it, is tiresome. A. rainy day is good for contemplation. While the earth and sky are performing their toilet and preparing for the gay season of bright weather, one can withdraw from them and turn to his own seclusion. The scenes of Cintra are indeed fascinating—and you never tire of contemplating the great rocky hills and the deep verdant ravines—peopled with such heroic names as John de Castro and St. Francis Xavier and Vasco de Gama and Dom Manuel, —and looking down upon the great theatre of Welling-ton's martial exploits ; the chosen abodes of historic Moors and Christians ; the heights where castles perch, and the valleys where convents and monasteries hide ; the region of luxuriant gardens and sterile hills ; —you do not easily tire of this scene with all its associations. There is nothing here after the usual order. The storms, as I have said, come up with the wind and make arrangements for a regular incursion.

I went yesterday to see the model farm of the region. Instead of a cheerful farm-steading with broad fertile fields and a pleasant outlook, betokening thrift, for man and beast, I found a huge monastery occupying a small plateau surrounded by the most stupendous and gigantic construction of cliff and hill and boulder I have yet seen even in this region of rocky greatness. The approach was through a long avenue lined with trees whose heads were tied together to make an arch. The entrance to the mansion, now reduced from ecclesiastical to secular purposes, was through the stable-yard, where we stopped to contemplate the horses and their stalls before we were received by the master in his drawing-room. As he was dining we passed on to an imposing stone stable for the cows, forty in number, a building with picturesque walls made of irregular stones of various colors and joined by pink mortar, whose wide-raised seams looked like great veins and tendons, with an interior filled with stylish stalls and floored with stone. Then we visited an imposing piggery, also floored with stone, with paved yards where a multitude of swine grumbled over their cleanliness and were pining for a good dig in the soil. From this we mounted a little stony height to a columbarium which rose like a tower out of a rabbit hutch, where numerous unhappy rabbits were confined in little wire cages, one for each rabbit ; accommodations which neither pigs nor rabbits seemed to enjoy. All this led to the kitchen garden whose little crops of cabbages and carrots and melons and grapes and lettuce I will not describe. We passed through a series of poultry yards in which hens, turkeys, geese, and ducks were enjoying their confinement ; and we were then guided into a dairy whose architectural beauty and marble tables and porcelain pans and tessellated floor occupied so much of our attention, that we forgot the emptiness of the pans and the small supply of butter. No dairy machinery was visible—the season however was adverse and the pasture feed short. By this time the dinner was over and we were most kindly received by Count Pena Longa, an old gentleman, with a silk cap on his head and attended by a huge stately Danish bloodhound, of a rich slaty color, related to the famous dogs of Bismarck. The old gentleman ushered us into a handsome salon through which was scattered a small supply of rich furniture ; thence into a beautiful chapel with an imposing altar and a lofty pew in the wall for royalty ; thence through charming cloisters into a fine dining-room where sat a long table with a great array of empty chairs and a little table where the host took his solitary meal—for he is a lonely old man of simple ways, without servants in livery or even a stylish butler. He was very hospitable and presented us with a large basket of fruit when we left. He boasted of his butter—I boasted of my milk. He said he laid out his farm with five hundred men, and now with a much reduced force was trying to make it support itself by furnishing butter to the King and some of his fortunate subjects. I told him I had been nearly thirty years trying the same experiment in vain —barring the royal customers. This is the model farm of Cintra, perhaps of this part of Portugal. And this is the fate of one of the suppressed monasteries of Portugal. The scenery around this farm is extremely desolate, the rocky peaks rising high above the sterile plains, if plains they can be called. The plain is named Pena Longa—so named on account of an enormous boulder which stands on end at the very peak of a high cluster of rocks as if planted there by the hand of man.

O Senhor Dom Augusto Maria Fernandez Carlos Miguel Gabriel Raphael Agricola Francisco de Assis Gonzaga Pedro d'Alcantara Loyola de Braganza Bourbon Saxe Coburg Gotha, Duque de Coimbra, is dead. He departed this life September 26th at the age of forty-two, having been born November 4, 1847. His father was Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg, one of those German princes who have succeeded in marrying into royal families, I suppose, on account of their political neutrality. Ferdinand, or Dom Fernando, as he became in Portugal, was a cousin of Albert, the Prince Consort, and he possessed the admirable qualities which made the prince so beloved in England. The mother of Dom Augusto was Queen Maria II., known as Maria Gloria, who was the daughter of Pedro IV., the first Emperor of Brazil, and who, as of the Braganza line, the emancipators of Portugal from the rule of Spain in 1640, received the crown from her father in 1826, married the Prince of Leuchtenberg in 1835, was a widow in two months, and in 1836 married Dom Fernando, and died in 1853, leaving five sons, of whom Dom Augusto was one. These sons were Dom Pedro V., Dom John, Dom Fernando, Dom Augusto, and Dom Luis. On the death of the Queen in 1853 the King Consort, Dom Fernando, became regent and remained in power until 1855, when Dom Pedro V. came to the throne. He married in 1859 " Madame Hensler Condessa d'Edla." He died in 1883.

The Braganza family, from the time of John IV., in 1640, named " the Restorer," has had a most varied career. A hundred years before John IV. liberated Portugal she had attained the height of her glory and greatness and ruled the great colonies and the commerce of the world. In the year that followed she had seen her army, composed of sixteen thousand men, including the flower of the Portuguese aristocracy, utterly destroyed in Africa, and her King, Sebastian, the commander, wiped out of sight forever. Philip II. of Spain had succeeded in seizing her throne. She had endured the Castilian usurpation, a captivity of sixty years. She had lost her empire in Asia and nearly the whole of Brazil, and in a single century had performed the great tragedy among the nations of the earth. When John IV. of Braganza fought his way into power his country was prostrate. He proceeded to defeat the Spaniards at home, and the Dutch in the islands in the Atlantic, Angola, Maranham, and Pernambuco. His son, Affonso VI., drove the Dutch from Brazil, was declared insane, and banished to the island of Terceira, where he remained six years ; was afterwards confined in the palace at Cintra, where he died at the early age of forty. Meanwhile Portugal had risen, and John V., known as the Magnanimous, built Mafra, constructed great aqueducts, spent the enormous wealth which had flowed in from the colonies, died, and left the treasury empty. An earthquake destroyed in this period a great part of Lisbon, and added a ghastly horror to the tragic era. The Queen, Maria I., became insane, and Napoleon declared the House of Braganza had ceased to exist. :But the strange career did not end here. In 1807 the armies of France, under Junot, invaded Portugal, and the Braganzas, the royal family, sought refuge in Brazil, while the English, led by Sir Arthur Wellesley, laid the great military lines of Tones Vedras and drove the French from the Iberian Peninsula. The insane queen died in Rio ; her son, John VI., succeeded to the throne and returned to Lisbon, having surrendered Brazil to his son Dom Pedro in 182o. And then a family fight commenced. Dom Miguel, the King's second son, raised a revolt against the constitution which had been proclaimed and accepted by the King ; and he continued his warfare for more than ten years. He fought his father until he was banished to Vienna in 1824 ; saw the Brazils acknowledged independent ; learned the death of his father in 1826 ; and saw his brother, Pedro IV., elevated to the throne, signing the constitutional charter, abdicating in favor of his daughter, Dona Maria Gloria, on condition that she observe the constitution and " marry her uncle, Dom Miguel." This arrangement, however, did not seem to work. This charming uncle, Dom Miguel, managed to be proclaimed king and to secure the support of Austria, Russia, and all the opponents of the liberal cause in Europe. Upon this Pedro IV. landed in Portugal with an army of seven thousand five hundred men, and together with the Duke of Terceira, with his expedition from the Azores, and Sir Charles Napier's performances on the high seas, crushed Dom Miguel and drove him from the throne. And now Maria II. was proclaimed queen in 1836, married Dom Fernando the same year, and left the five sons to whom I have already referred.

But the Braganza tragedy did not end here. Dom Pedro V. commenced his reign in 1855. His father had given him a fine education. Dom Fernando had graceful talent and a good deal of aesthetic culture. He was a good musician, fond of art and architecture, devoted himself to the restoration and adornment of the old convent at Pena, and was an elegant and perhaps somewhat voluptuous gentleman, who gave garden parties, and sang sweetly with his friends in the grounds. Dom Pedro V., the son, was a most amiable and accomplished king. The people were extravagantly fond of him, and under his reign Portugal seemed to be rising into the culture and prosperity of well-ordered peace.

In November, 1861, the royal family were residing at the Palacio das Necessidades, a magnificent structure in Lisbon, built by Dom John V., at whose touch the great treasures of Portugal melted away. In that month a strange and fatal disease, supposed by some to have been contracted in the marshes toward the north, and believed by many to have been the result of poison, carried off the King and two of his brothers, to the dismay and horror of the community. Two only were left, Dom Luis, the present king, who was heir to the throne, who arrived in the Tagus three days after the death of his brother, and who when informed of the death of the King said : " I have lost by one stroke the two things I most prized in the world : my brother and my liberty " ; and Dom Augusto, who died September 26th and was buried October 1st, 1889. Dom Luis still reigns, a scholarly, accomplished, judicious gentleman, broken in health at fifty-one, unable to walk, and evidently suffering from mortal disease. His death may be expected at any time.

Dom Augusto has dragged on a feeble existence, broken down, as it is said, by the disease which attacked him more than a quarter of a century ago. I met him at the reception given at the palace in Cintra on the birthday of Dom Affonso the Prince Royal, and had a short conversation with him. He was very tall, and stooping. He bore himself like a feeble man and walked with difficulty, as he had done since his illness. He was a faithful friend, an affectionate brother, and an amiable member of society. I often met him on the road in Cintra in his barouche, drawn by four good-looking mules. His last hours were soothed by the Condessa d'Edla in the Palacio das Necessidades, to which he was carried but a few days before his death. His funeral was a Portuguese pageant. A long line of very ordinary hackney coupés in which were a few private carriages scattered and containing army and navy and civil officials, led the procession. These were followed by the hearse, a huge structure entirely covered by a heavy black cloth and drawn by six horses, also clothed in black, from their ears to their heels. Then came a succession of heavy, elaborate, huge, gilded, deeply carved, richly upholstered, massively adorned carriages of state, some one hundred, some three hundred years old, remarkable for the great ornamental excrescences, which were piled on the two ends of the carriage while the body of the vehicle swung on huge thorough-braces, mounted with heavy gold buckles. The gold-mounted harnesses almost obscured the horses that wore them. The procession wound its way through the narrow streets of the hilly town to the Church of St. Vincent, the patron saint of Lisbon, and which is the last resting-place of the dynasty of Braganza. For the first time I saw a royal funeral with the ceremony of the church. I found a seat provided for me in the diplomatic tribune, a high raised and draped enclosure, where sat the diplomatic corps in uniform of various grades and every degree of glitter. I sat at one end of the front seat, while the Pope's Nuncio, Monsigneur Vannutelli, a most delightful person, who gives you a warm greeting with his sensible face and his good grip, sat at the other end—he in his robes, I in my republican dress-coat and white cravat. The scene I looked down upon was most striking. I was near one corner of the chancel and could see the whole church. The huge coffin was borne into the chancel and placed on an elevated dais. All about the church sat fraternities in every variety of costume—long gray surplices, ornamental uniforms, solemn sashes, fine trimmings. In an enclosure in front of us was a group of decorated senators. Below them a body of generals of the army—a good-looking manly body of peaceful warriors. Inside the chancel were the ministers of state in brilliant array, and at the altar the archbishop and bishop with a mysterious body of attendants, which resembled on a very large scale the group I have often admired.

The ceremony was long and very impressive, and was thoroughly appreciated by the congregation. On the coffin rested the sword and cap of the deceased—for he was a captain of artillery, whose duty in times of peace was to attend with his troops on funerals and royal processions.