The Bible in Spain: Or, the Journeys, Adventures, and Imprisonments of an Englishman, in an Attempt to Circulate the Scriptures in the PeninsulaBorrow, George
Religion
The Bible in Spain: Or, the Journeys, Adventures, and Imprisonments of an Englishman, in an Attempt to Circulate the Scriptures in the Peninsula
Borrow, George
Borrow, George, 1803-1881 -- Travel -- Spain; Spain -- Description and travel; Spain -- History -- 19th century
_Myself_.—I will say nothing with respect to the doctrine of the Jesuits,
for, as you have observed, I am a Protestant: but I am ready to assert
that there are no people in the world better qualified, upon the whole,
to be intrusted with the education of youth. Their moral system and
discipline are truly admirable. Their pupils, in after life, are seldom
vicious and licentious characters, and are in general men of learning,
science, and possessed of every elegant accomplishment. I execrate the
conduct of the liberals of Madrid in murdering last year the helpless
fathers, by whose care and instruction two of the finest minds of Spain
have been evolved—the two ornaments of the liberal cause and modern
literature of Spain, for such are Toreno and Martinez de la Rosa. . . .
* * * * *
Gathered in small clusters about the pillars at the lower extremities of
the gold and silver streets in Lisbon, may be observed, about noon in
every day, certain strange looking men, whose appearance is neither
Portuguese nor European. Their dress generally consists of a red cap,
with a blue silken tassel at the top of it, a blue tunic girded at the
waist with a red sash, and wide linen pantaloons or trousers. He who
passes by these groups generally hears them conversing in broken Spanish
or Portuguese, and occasionally in a harsh guttural language, which the
oriental traveller knows to be the Arabic, or a dialect thereof. These
people are the Jews of Lisbon. Into the midst of one of these groups I
one day introduced myself, and pronounced a beraka, or blessing. I have
lived in different parts of the world, much amongst the Hebrew race, and
am well acquainted with their ways and phraseology. I was rather anxious
to become acquainted with the state of the Portuguese Jews, and I had now
an opportunity. “The man is a powerful rabbi,” said a voice in Arabic;
“it behoves us to treat him kindly.” They welcomed me. I favoured their
mistake, and in a few days I knew all that related to them and their
traffic in Lisbon.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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