This has ever been the result of priestly rule.  One can understand the feeling of the liberal-minded Spaniard of to-day that, without wishing to interfere with the charitable works inaugurated by the clergy, nor desiring in any way to show disrespect to the Church, or the religion which is dear to the hearts of the people, a serious danger lies, as the Press is daily pointing out, in the religious orders, more especially the Jesuits, obtaining a pernicious influence over the young, undermining by a system of secret inquisition the teachings of science, gaining power over the minds of the officers in the army, and establishing a press agency which shall become a danger to the constitution.

Spain’s outlook seems brighter to-day than it has ever been since her Golden Age of Isabella and Ferdinand; and it is the people who have awakened, a people who have shown what power lies in them to raise their beloved country to the position which is her right among the nations of the world.  But prophecy is vain in a country of which it has been said “that two and two never make four.”  This year, if all go well meantime, Alfonso XIII. will take the reins in his own hands—­a mere boy, even younger than his father was when called to the throne; than whom, however, Spain has never had a more worthy ruler.  But Alfonso XII. had been schooled by adversity—­he had to some extent roughed it amongst Austrian and English boys.  He came fresh from Sandhurst and from the study of countries other than his own.  To a naturally clever mind he had added the invaluable lesson of a knowledge of the world as seen by one of the crowd, not from the close precincts of a court and the elevation of a throne.

For his son it may be said that he has been born and carefully educated in a country where absolutism is dead, and by a mother who, as Regent, has scrupulously observed the laws of the constitution.  He will come, as King, to a country which has known the precious boon of liberty too long to part with it lightly; to a kingdom now, for the first time in history, united as one people; where commerce and mutual interests have taken the place of internecine distrust and hatred.  It is only at the present moment that this happy condition of things is spreading over the country; each month, each week, giving fresh evidence of new industries arising, of fresh capital invested in the development of the country.  It is in the sums so invested by the mass of the people that those who believe in a bright future for Spain place their hopes; but we may all of us wish the young monarch for whom his country is longing, “God-speed.”

PORTUGUESE LIFE IN TOWN AND COUNTRY

CHAPTER XVIII

LAND AND PEOPLE

It has been said, and it is often repeated, that if you strip a Spaniard of his virtues, the residuum will be a Portuguese.  This cruel statement is rather the result of prejudice than arising from any foundation in fact.  It has a superficial cleverness which attracts some people, and especially those who have but an imperfect knowledge of the true life and character of the people thus stigmatised.