Portuguese

“ It must always be remembered that the foreigner often views the Portuguese at his worst, in an artificial atmosphere, rarely in his natural life and surroundings. He seldom has occasion to see him in his home life, in which the real affectionateness of his nature is evident, nor to realise the nobility and delicacy of his dreams and ideals which are so often shattered by harsh reality, and the genuine kindliness which proves that his politeness and courtesy are not merely superficial. ”

“ The Portuguese are among the most gifted city builders in the world. They do not plan for efficiency, as the Americans or French would do, but have a gift for tucking a sense of beauty into every little corner of a town. ”

“ Our conversation rolled chiefly on literary and political subjects, and my acquaintance with the writings of the most celebrated authors of Portugal was hailed with surprise and delight; for nothing is more gratifying to a Portuguese than to observe a foreigner taking an interest in the literature of his nation, of which, in many respects, he is justly proud. ”

“ But the same vagueness pervades business. In business the Portuguese appears incurably careless and combines with this fault the most meticulous scruples. The result is too often delay and confusion. There as in other matters the Portuguese shows a genius for setting himself in the wrong, his real ability is eclipsed by superficial errors, the mistakes in estimates or accounts are not always in his favour, and the unscrupulous can easily take advantage of his hesitations and candour. ”

“ In an instant was seen to fall the standard of Portugal which floated before on the loftiest tower of the Castle, while its place was taken in another instant by a foreign flag surmounted by the imperial eagle! To describe the outraged feelings of the Portuguese, to paint their indignation and horror, is impossible. Their loyalty and their national pride are almost the only virtues which they retain. ”

“ The Portuguese have reason to be proud of their literature, which, though it does not abound in masterpieces of the first order, possesses a very large number of works, in verse and prose, of conspicuous merit and deserving to be far better known, both in Portugal and abroad. ”

“ The Portuguese language can be most conveniently described in relation to the other languages of the Peninsula (see Spain: Language) . Portuguese literature is distinguished by the wealth and variety of its lyric poetry, by its primacy in bucolic verse and prose, by the number of its epics and historical books, by the relative slightness of the epistolary element, and by the almost complete absence of the memoir. ”

“ But, as is the case with most Portuguese towns—for the Brazilians are only a better class of Portuguese—the illusion of beauty is dispelled, as soon as you enter its narrow and crooked streets, and get sight of its swarthy population, the chief features of which are sombreros and garlic. ”

“ The Portuguese peasantry, especially, is gifted with a [15] delicacy and intelligence which make life pleasant and poverty no hardship in that climate. The illiterate are often the flower and cream of the nation. They are able to express themselves with fluency and correctness, in fact you will often find a peasant’s speech purer and more refined in accent than that of an educated Portuguese, and will be amazed at the clearness and delicacy of tone and expression coming from a person barefoot and in tatters. ”

“ The community is eminently Portuguese—that is to say, it is slow, poor, shiftless, sleepy, and lazy. ”

“ Foreigners may be inclined to smile when they see foreign customs and institutions (as the English parliamentary system) distorted and misapplied in Portugal, but for all that is genuinely Portuguese they can have nothing but admiration and respect. ”

“ There is a whole literature, often not less attractive in style than in subject, of histories, memoirs, travels, accounts of wrecks and sieges, recording the deeds of the Portuguese on and beyond the seas. ”

“ The Spaniards seem always to have felt convinced that they could not attain the romantic tenderness of the Portuguese.20 A certain simplicity and intensity in the expression of tender sentiments, to which the language of Portugal is particularly favourable, has always been one of the characteristic features of Portuguese poetry, from the fifteenth century down to the present times. ”

“ Now the Portuguese, a people attractive to those who live among them, have also had a striking history. They are a spirited people, an adventurous people, a poetical people. For more than a century, when they were exploring the oceans and founding a dominion in India, they played a great part in the world, and though they have never quite recovered the position, wonderful for so small a country, which they then held, and have produced no later poet equal to Camoens, men of practical force and men of intellectual brilliance have not been wanting. ”

“ The Portuguese people is especially devoted to music, flowers, dance and song. The humblest, most ramshackle cottage will have an old tin of carnations on its window ledge or hanging anyhow from the wall. ”

“ That is a [Pg xi] fact that must uplift and inspire those who study Portugal’s history or consider her future. For the Portuguese of the sixteenth century fought not against or not only against hordes of undisciplined savages, but against Moors and Turks highly civilised and well equipped with artillery.
Perhaps the secret of their success is that their motto was “God, King, and Country,” and that each man among them relied, under Heaven, on himself, not on this or that sect or party or philosophy, election promises or political programmes. ”

“ While the more timid, priding themselves on their European descent, and clinging to a pitiful imitation of European customs, were driven to menial occupations for a livelihood, and, sinking deeper and deeper in the social scale, made the proud Portuguese names they had inherited a byword through the land for all that was vicious, idle, and degraded. ”

“ When the Portuguese suffered under the retreat of the French, every arm was stretched out, every hand was opened, from the rich man's largess to the widow's mite, all was bestowed, to enable them to rebuild their villages and replenish their granaries. ”

“ Not that the ordinary artisan does not turn out much good honest work. Indeed, while the Spanish make things for show rather than for use, and the French for a little of both, the Portuguese agrees with the English in making them with a regard for comfort and a sublime unconcern for the look of them. ”

“ That which confirms me in this opinion is, that amongst the Portuguese, 'tis so much a fashion and emulation amongst their children, to learn to read and write, that they cannot hinder them from it: they will learn it one from another, and are as intent on it, as if it were forbidden them. ”

“ Latin nations give more importance to literature than is perhaps attributed to it in England, and the fact that Portuguese literature and Portuguese history meet with little sympathy or study in England undoubtedly has its effect in Portugal when it is compared with the attitude of Germany. The difference leaps to the eyes of all educated persons in Portugal, and it must not be forgotten that in Portugal the uneducated people—apart from the trained demagogues’ bands in the cities—has no part or parcel in the affairs of the nation. ”

“ That this ancient accentuation, and with it the groundwork of metrical perfectibility, should be preserved in the Portuguese language, is a circumstance rendered the more remarkable by that of a French prince having been the founder of the first dynasty of the kings of Portugal; for from this incidental occurrence, some critics and philologists have endeavoured to explain the similarity between the Portuguese and French pronunciation. ”

“ In about a fortnight I found myself conversing in Portuguese with considerable fluency.
Those who wish to make themselves understood by a foreigner in his own language, should speak with much noise and vociferation, opening their mouths wide. Is it surprising that the English are, in general, the worst linguists in the world, seeing that they pursue a system diametrically opposite? ”

“ It is intensely patriotic, although it is touched by both Greek mythology, and the Italian style, which during this epoch had been slightly blended with the Portuguese. Portugal had little or no influence on the literature of any nation but her own, receiving her strongest impressions from outsiders. In the eighteenth century she was dominated both in taste and manners by the French, and the beginning of the nineteenth century found her a great admirer and imitator of English literature. ”

“ The Portuguese himself is excessively sensitive and he will go out of his way and sacrifice his own comfort and indolence in order not to hurt the feelings of others, perhaps in some trifling matter of which the person thus contemplated, especially if he is a foreigner, remains serenely unaware. The Portuguese do not know how to treat foreigners. This may seem a strange [12] statement to those who have visited Portugal and experienced the kindness and courtesy of high and low on all sides. ”

“ As it is plain the Portuguese, from the beginning, believed their religion could only be established by force, and were persuaded such means were lawful, the blame of so much bloodshed for so many years, and the total miscarriage of the whole scheme at last, lay at the door of their sovereign, the king of Spain and Portugal ”

“ It is too fervent and impassioned, loves and hates too ardently to pause to consider coldly the fairness of a matter. All the more welcome would be some independent organs in the Lisbon Press, some steadying element, some kind of Portuguese Spectator. ”

“ In spite of the enthusiasm which is said to have prescribed to him the daily task of twelve folio pages, death overtook him before he had completed his greatest enterprise, a history of the Portuguese in all parts of the world. ”

“ We arrived here yesterday, safe and well, after a very pleasant voyage of 8 days. The Portuguese are in high spirits, and promise well. They have had some skirmishing on the Minho, and repulsed the French, whose numbers we know nothing certain of. Of course these accounts are much exaggerated, but if they can be made to think they can resist, and stand fire, it is a great point. ”

“ Without enforcing with pedantic rigour the restoration of all the old forms of the sixteenth century, the best Portuguese authors now endeavour to write their mother tongue with purity, and at the same time to satisfy the new wants created by the progress of time and the spirit of the age. ”

“ The praiseworthy diligence which the Portuguese now manifest in collecting scientific knowledge of every kind, and in republishing the works of their early authors, appears, however, to have operated indirectly to the prejudice of eloquence, for among the men of talent, to whom Portugal is indebted for her regeneration, none have yet distinguished themselves in prose composition. ”

“ Along the Sea-coasts the Portuguese have left a Vestige of their Language, tho' much corrupted, yet it is the Language that most Europeans learn first to qualify them for a general Converse with one another, as well as with the different inhabitants of India. ”

“ To causes of a totally different nature and in which political interests were but remotely concerned, must be attributed the zeal with which the Portuguese, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, cultivated the language and literature of Spain, along with their mother tongue and the learning of their own country; while the Spaniards of the same period regarded the Portuguese poetry as a mere scion of the Spanish, and besides, generally speaking, looked down with contempt on the language and literature of Portugal. ”

“ The trouble already is that the Portuguese are too much inclined to be cosmopolitan, and what is required is a development of that part of the Portuguese people still untainted with francezismo along strictly national lines. ”

“ Many of those who have looked at the map of the world are under the impression that Spanish is spoken in Brazil, and are surprised when you tell them that Portuguese happens to be the local [3] language. Others, more enlightened in their geography by that great play Charley's Aunt, imagine it a great forest of nut trees. Others, more enlightened still, believe it to be a land where you are constantly walking in avenues adorned with wonderful orchids, with a sky overhead swarming with birds of beautiful plumage. ”

“ We spoke French mostly, German a good deal, Spanish some and English a very little, while Antonio occasionally burst into Portuguese. Italian was the one thing we kept clear of, so [105] they discussed us freely in it. They placed all our languages except the Portuguese, but what we were they could not make out. It especially worried the nervous little old man who subsequently created some excitement by squeezing the waitress’ hand as she passed him. ”

“ The Portuguese language was given the form in which it was to survive at this time, and it is always when a language is being formed that somehow geniuses come to round out its powers of expression and at the same time give it the form which it is to maintain partly as a consequence of their genius having expressed itself in it in certain enduring modes. ”

“ A fact this which Englishmen dealing with Portuguese have been slower to recognise in the past than other nations. Moreover the Portuguese is harassed out of his wits by the details of business, he likes a good lump sum down rather than much larger but gradual profits, he goes for the pounds and leaves the pennies to look after themselves. If he sees the advantage of an enterprise, he rarely combines with this intelligence the necessary perseverance and force of character to carry it through. ”