Joseph White - Letters from Spain

As the Hidalguia branches out through every male whose father enjoys that privilege, Spain is overrun with gentry , who earn their living in the meanest employments. The province of Asturias having afforded shelter to that small portion of the nation which preserved the Spanish name and throne against the efforts of the conquering Arabs; there is hardly a native of that mountainous tract, who, even at this day, cannot shew a legal title to honours and immunities gained by his ancestors, at a time when every soldier had either a share in the territory recovered from the invaders, or was rewarded with a perpetual exemption from such taxes and services as fell exclusively upon the simple 6 6 Gentle and simple , as I find in those inexhaustible sources of intellectual delight, the Novels by the author of “Waverley,” are used by the Scottish peasants in the same manner as Noble , and Llano , (plain, simple) by the Spaniards. peasantry. The numerous assertors of these privileges among the Asturians of the present day, lead me to think that in the earliest times of the Spanish monarchy every soldier was raised to the rank of a Franklin. But circumstances are strangely altered. Asturias is one of the poorest provinces of Spain, and the noble inhabitants having, for the most part, inherited no other patrimony from their ancestors than a strong muscular frame, are compelled to make the best of it among the more feeble tribes of the south. In this capital of Andalusia they have engrossed the employments of watermen, porters, and footmen. Those belonging to the two first classes are formed into a fraternity , whose members have a right to the exclusive use of a chapel in the cathedral. The privilege which they value most, however, is that of affording the twenty stoutest men to convey the moveable stage on which the consecrated host is paraded in public, on Corpus Christi day, enshrined in a small temple of massive silver. The bearers are concealed behind rich gold-cloth hangings, which reach the ground on the four sides of the stage. The weight of the whole machine is enormous; yet these twenty men bear it on the hind part of the head and neck, moving with such astonishing ease and regularity, as if the motion arose from the impulse of steam, or some steady mechanical power.

While these Gentlemen Hidalgos are employed in such ungentle services, though the law allows them the exemptions of their class, public opinion confines them to their natural level. The only chance for any of these disguised noblemen to be publicly treated with due honour and deference is, unfortunately, one for which they feel an unconquerable aversion—that of being delivered into the rude hands of a Spanish Jack Ketch . We had here, two years ago, an instance of this, which I shall relate, as being highly characteristic of our national prejudices about blood.

A gang of five banditti was taken within the jurisdiction of this Audiencia , or chief court of justice, one of whom, though born and brought up among the lowest ranks of society, was, by family, an Hidalgo , and had some relations among the better class of gentlemen. I believe the name of the unfortunate man was Herrera , and that he was a native of a town about thirty English miles from Seville, called el Arahal . But I have not, at present, the means of ascertaining the accuracy of these particulars. After lingering, as usual, four or five years in prison, these unfortunate men were found guilty of several murders and highway robberies, and sentenced to suffer death. The relations of the Hidalgo , who, foreseeing this fatal event, had been watching the progress of the trial, in order to step forward just in time to avert the stain which a cousin, in the second or third remove, would cast upon their family, if he died in mid-air like a villain; presented a petition to the judges, accompanied with the requisite documents, claiming for their relative the honours of his rank, and engaging to pay the expenses attending the execution of a nobleman . The petition being granted as a matter of course, the following scene took place. At a short distance from the gallows on which the four simple robbers were to be hanged in a cluster, from the central point of the cross beam, all dressed in white shrouds, with their hands tied before them, that the hangman, who actually rides upon the shoulders of the criminal, may place his foot as in a stirrup, 7 7 The Cortes have abolished this barbarous method of inflicting death. —was raised a scaffold about ten feet high, on an area of about fifteen by twenty, the whole of which and down to the ground, on all sides, was covered with black baize. In the centre of the scaffold was erected a sort of arm-chair, with a stake for its back, against which, by means of an iron collar attached to a screw, the neck is crushed by one turn of the handle. This machine is called Garrote —“a stick”—from the old-fashioned method of strangling, by twisting the fatal cord with a stick. Two flights of steps on opposite sides of the stage, afforded a separate access, one for the criminal and the priest, the other for the executioner and his attendant.

The convict, dressed in a loose gown of black baize, rode on a horse, a mark of distinction peculiar to his class, (plebeians riding on an ass, or being dragged on a hurdle,) attended by a priest, and a notary, and surrounded by soldiers. Black silk cords were prepared to bind him to the arms of the seat; for ropes are thought dishonourable. After kneeling to receive the last absolution from the priest, he took off a ring, with which the unfortunate man had been provided for that melancholy occasion. According to etiquette he should have disdainfully thrown it down for the executioner; but, as a mark of Christian humility, he put it into his hand. The sentence being executed, four silver candlesticks, five feet high, with burning wax-candles of a proportionate length and thickness, were placed at the corners of the scaffold; and in about three hours, a suitable funeral was conducted by the posthumous friends of the noble robber, who, had they assisted him to settle in life with half of what they spent in this absurd and disgusting show, might, perhaps have saved him from his fatal end. But these honours being what is called a positive act of noblesse , of which a due certificate is given to the surviving parties, to be recorded among the legal proofs of their rank; they may have acted under the idea that their relative was fit only to add lustre to the family by the close of his career.

The innumerable and fanciful gradations of family rank which the Spaniards have formed to themselves, without the least foundation in the laws of the country, are difficult to describe. Though the Hidalguia is a necessary qualification, especially in country towns, to be admitted into the best society, it is by no means sufficient, by itself, to raise the views of every Hidalgo to a family connexion with the “blue blood”— sangre azul of the country. The shades by which the vital fluid approaches this privileged hue, would perplex the best colourist. These prejudices, however, have lost much of their force at Madrid, except among the grandees, and in such maritime towns as Malaga and Cadiz, where commerce has raised many new, and some foreign families into consequence. But there is a pervading spirit of vanity in the nation, which actuates even the lowest classes, and may be discovered in the evident mortification which menials and mechanics are apt to feel, on the omission of some modes of address intended, as it were, to cast a veil on the humbleness of their condition. To call a man by the name of blacksmith , butcher , coachman , would be considered an insult. They all expect to be called either by their Christian name, or by the general appellation Maestro and in both cases with the prefixed Señor ; unless the word expressing the employment should imply superiority: as Mayoral , chief coachman— Rabadán , chief shepherd— Aperador , bailiff. These, and similar names, are used without an addition, and sound well in the ears of the natives. But no female would suffer herself to be addressed cook , washer-woman , &c.; they all feel and act as if, having a natural claim to a higher rank, misfortune alone had degraded them. Poverty, unless it be extreme, does not disqualify a man of family for the society of his equals. Secular clergymen, though plebeians, are, generally, well received; but the same indulgence is not readily extended to monks and friars, whose unpolished manners betray too openly the meanness of their birth. Wholesale merchants, if they belong to the class of Hidalgos , are not avoided by the great gentry. In the law, attorneys and notaries are considered to be under the line of Caballeros , though their rank, as in England, depends a great deal on their wealth and personal respectability. Physicians are nearly in the same case.