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AND PORTUGAL (lf88-1898) G -F-WHITE DP W5^ CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND GIVEN IN 1891 BY HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE Library Cornell University DP 203.W58 Cen.«-^Pt..SEaln.and.r,Sa?l,,tflLaia 405 3 1924 028 539 The original of tiiis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924028539405 A CENTURY OF SPAIN AND PORTUGAL '* i1 A CENTURY OF SPAIN AND PORTUGAL (1788-1898) BY LIEUT.-COLONEL G. F. WHITE METHUEN & CO. 36 ESSEX STREET W.C. LONDON First Published in igog PREFACE THIS book originated in my wishing to make myself con- versant with the modern history of the two Peninsular Kingdoms. I found, however, that it was impossible to do so without resorting largely to Spanish, Portuguese, French and German authors. In these circumstances, it appeared to me that there ought to be some demand for a work, in English, deaUng with the period under reference. I now submit to the public the result of my reading and researches. GEO. F. WHITE Durham October, igog CONTENTS CHAPTER P4QJ, I. Introductory ....... i 11. The French Revolution .... 27 III. The . Peninsular War . .50 IV. Spanish America ...... 64 V. Portugal and Brazil . .92 VI. Ferdinand VII. ...... 102 VII. DoM Miguel . .128 VIII. The First Carlist War ..... 150 IX. Donna Maria II. da Gloria . .185 X. Isabella II. ..... 218 XI. The Interregnum and Amadeus I. 259 XII. The Republic ...... 276 XIII. Alfonso XII. and Queen Christina's Regency . 304 XIV. Portugal. Conclusion : 1853-1908 . 324 XV. The Spanish-American War . -355 Genealogical Table. Spain .... 385 Genealogical Table. Portugal .... 386 Bibliography ...... 387 Index . .401 A CENTURY OF SPAIN AND PORTUGAL CHAPTER I INTRODUCTORY THAT westward rolled the great tides of immigration which mainly peopled Europe is usually admitted. Concerning, however, these earlier dispersions, move- ments, and settlements of the races, most historians limit themselves to generalities and speculation. Not so those of Spain. They maintain perseveringly that Tubal was the ancestor of their nation, and many of them that his grand- father, the patriarchal Noah, visited the country in person and sojourned awhile in the midst of his descendants. For the pur- poses of this opening chapter there is no intention of investi- history so ancient yet, as the gating ; connected with subject, it may here be touched upon that, occupying a corner in the north-west of Spain, in the district known as the Basque Provinces, there exists a people distinct altogether in their mysterious speech from the rest of the Peninsula—a people in the midst of whom were fought out the two long Carlist wars of the nineteenth century. The Phoenicians, the earliest maritime nation of whom we have any accurate knowledge—adventurous seamen, enter- prising traders—attracted seemingly in chief by the mineral wealth of Spain, circled its coasts, maintained extensive deal- ings with its inhabitants, formed permanent settlements on its shores, and visited the interior. At a later period sprang up some Greek colonies upon the eastern seaboard. Carthage, rising from a city originally Phoenician and expanding to dominant power in Africa, had also a considerable governing 2 A CENTURY OF SPAIN AND PORTUGAL Cadiz and trading connection with the country. She numbered amongst her subject cities. Then Rome commenced to assert her sway in the Mediter- ranean, thus leading to her long drawn-out struggle against Carthage. With the first of these Punic wars Spain was not conceived and concerned : before the second Hamilcar had carried into execution a design of extension of Carthaginian dominion whereby, at the time of his death, he ruled over what may be described roughly as the south-eastern half of the peninsula. Under his son-in-law, Hasdrubal, and his son, the renowned Hannibal, this occupation was pushed north- wards to the Ebro. Hannibal then made his memorable march through Gaul into Italy, which became the chief scene of military operations. While the war was in progress a Roman army penetrated into Spain from the north. Successful at first, it was afterwards nearly annihilated. Carthaginian ascendancy was again re-established, and now nearly throughout the whole country. Such, however, was the undauntedness and perse- verance of the Romans that, notwithstanding the appalling dangers which threatened their very existence in Italy, they succeeded so effectively in succouring the remnants of this force that it became the vanguard of those legions which disappeared from Spain only with the dissolution of the Roman Empire. This occupation, commencing some two hundred years before the Christian era, lasted through the first four cen- turies of it. A country so vast, inhabited by hardy warhke tribes, crossed by many elevated mountain ranges, traversed by innumerable rivers, and subject, according to locality, to the extremes of climate, was of necessity not brought to the condi- tion of a Roman province until after much long, arduous cam- paigning and many revolts against the conquerors. Some parts of the inclement mountainous north, included in the already spoken of Basque Provinces, the invaders seem never to have penetrated into, at all events to have never quite subdued. Each chapter in the story has, however, the same ending. A Viriatus might now and again arise and show what a deter- mined people may achieve in defence of their land, a Numantia might presage a Saragossa, yet sooner or later victory rested with the legions. Submission, annihilation, slavery, to be led captive through the streets of Rome, confronted here as else- where the " barbarian." Here, too, as in other provinces, the vanquished were enrolled under the standards of the victors, ; INTRODUCTORY 3 and natives of the land marched with the eagles to the further- most quarters of the known world. Meanwhile the Preetor, the tax-gatherer, the builder had followed close upon the invaders. No idea of retrocession was for a moment entertained. The conquerors were there as settlers. The river was bridged per- manently ; the mountain pass was widened' to a campaigning road ; the aqueduct spanned the valley ; baths and amphi- theatres appeared. In no respect is this thorough Romanising of the Peninsula more evident to this day than in the language now spoken. The student who turns from a Latin to a Spanish Grammar finds at once familiar friends in arno, amas ; amaba, amabas in el rey, the king ; ejercito, an army ; ala, a wing ; campo, a field. With the construction of the complete sentence he is already familiar. Notwithstanding the three hundred years of the Goth and the seven hundred years of the Arab, the language of Spain, as well as of the sister kingdom Portugal, remains essentially Romanic. During these early centuries nearly every Roman who rose to eminence had a hand in shaping the course of history within the Peninsula. Two Scipios fell there during the Second Punic War. It was by another, Africanus, afterwards victor at Zama, that the Carthaginians were driven from the country. A fourth, .(Emilianus, who compassed the fall of the city of Carthage, was entrusted with the conduct of that memorable war which centred in the terrible and heroic siege of Numantia. Under him fought Jugurtha and Marius. The austere Cato Major, sixty years earlier, had been honoured with a triumph at Rome for his suc- cesses in Northern Spain. In the decline of his life, when the not unusual arbitrary and extortionate courses pursued by those in authority had brought an embassy of appeal to the Senate, he successfully advocated the cause of the oppressed Spaniards. Of the Gracchus family several members figure in the affairs of the Peninsula. During the period of the Roman civil wars the area of conflict extended itself to Spanish soil, where Sartorius established for himself an almost independent dominion, despite the efforts against him in the field of such redoubt- able antagonists as Metellus and Pompey. Finally, in the last of the heathen centuries, Julius Cccsar conducted success- fully a series of operations in the westernmost part of the country. He was engaged, too, there in civil conflict with the sons of Pompey, having under him the future ruler of the world, Augustus, who afterwards, when Emperor, undertook 4 A CENTURY OF SPAIN AND PORTUGAL the subjugation of the ever-rebeUing inhabitants of the north- western mountain lands, and spent two years in the country. The Christian era thus dawned upon Spain nearly wholly subdued, and becoming in the south and east thoroughly Latinised. The tide of Roman Empire soon stood at high- attempts to water mark : the wars which were waged in vain prevent it receding had far distant provinces for their scenes : thus the four hundred years which preceded the irruption of the hordes from the north were for Spain centuries of advancing civilisation and increasing population. The richness of the land in minerals, its productiveness in corn, its wine and oil contributed to make it the most thriving and opulent of the provinces. Spanish historians point with pride, if not with strict accuracy in each case, to the Emperors Trajan, Hadrian, and Theodosius, to the writers Lucan and the Senecas, as Spaniards who have added to the worldwide renown of Imperial Rome. This long period of peace was, moreover, favourable to the spread of Christianity. The Romans, we know, were tolerant to the practice of religions other than their own, provided these were not made use of as instruments for undermining the central authority ; a rule of government which might perhaps have been borne in mind, advan- tageously, after the schisms in the Christian Church itself had plainly become permanent, no less than when Spaniards began to carry the Cross to a world and amongst nations whose existence was not even suspected in these early times.

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