The Cruise of the Frolic

by William Henry Giles Kingston

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

  CORUNNA--OPORTO--PULL UP THE DOURO--NOTICE OF THE SIEGE OF OPORTO--LINE-OF-BATTLE SHIP.

  Porpoise's story lasted out the gale. We were not sorry to see theconclusion of the latter, though it left old ocean in a veryuncomfortable state for some time. A downright heavy gale isundoubtedly a very fine thing to witness--at least the effects are--andevery man would wish to see one once in his life; but having experiencedwhat it can do, and how it makes the ocean look and human beings feel, awise man will be satisfied, at all events if he is to fall in with it ina small cutter in the Bay of Biscay when that once is over. I've had togo through a good many in the course of my nautical career; and thoughI've often heard sung with much gusto--

  "One night it blew a hurricane, The sea was mountains rolling, When Barney Buntline turned his quid, And cried to Billy Bowline:

  "`Here's a south-wester coming, Billy; Don't you hear it roar now? Lord help 'em, how I pities those Unhappy folks ashore now!

  "`While you and I upon the deck Are comfortably lying, My eyes! what tiles and chimney-tops About their heads are flying!'"

  I mustn't quote more of the old song; for my own part I like a steadybreeze and a smooth sea, when plates and dishes will stay quietly on thetable, and a person may walk the deck without any undue exertion of themuscles of the leg.

  The gale had driven us somewhat into the bay, and finding it would causeus little delay to look into Corunna, we determined to go there. Theentrance to the harbour is very easy--a fine tall lighthouse on thesouth clearly making it. We brought up off the town, which is situatedalong the circular shore of a bay something like Weymouth. After payingour respects to the consul, we mounted a troop of steeds offered us forhire, and galloped off to inspect the chief scenes of the engagementbetween the English and the French, when the former retreated under SirJohn Moore. On our return we visited his tomb, situated on the rampartson the sea side of the town; the tomb is surrounded with cannon, withtheir muzzles downward--a fit monument to the hero who sleeps beneath.Carstairs did not fail to repeat with due effect--

  "Not a sound was heard; not a funeral note."

  They are truly magnificent lines, rarely equalled. Some, however, of alike character appeared lately on Havelock, which are very much to mytaste.

  But where am I driving to with my poetry and criticism? We got on boardthe same night, and made sail by daybreak the next morning. We lookedinto the deep and picturesque Gulf of Vigo, and thought the town a verynasty one, in spite of its imposing castle on the top of a hill. Had wecome from the south we might have formed a different opinion of theplace. We hove-to off Oporto, and should have gone in, but thoughexempt from harbour-dues, we found that the pilotage would be heavy, andthat we might have some difficulty in getting out again over the barwhich has formed across the mouth of the Douro. The city stands on agranite hill on the north side of the river, and about three miles fromthe sea. Fortunately for us, while we were hove-to there, the steamerfrom England came in sight, and we were able to obtain a passage onshore in the boats which brought off the mail bags. Hearty, Bubble, andI formed the party; Carstairs and Porpoise remained to take care of theship. Away we pulled with the glee of schoolboys on a holidayexcursion; the boat was large, but of the roughest description--with thestem and stern alike--probably not changed since the earliest days ofthe Portuguese monarchy; she was double-banked, pulling twelve oars atleast. The men mostly wore red caps, with a coloured sash round theirwaists, and had shoeless feet; some had huge wooden slippers, almost bigenough to go to sea in. Many of them were fine-looking fellows, butthey were very unlike English sailors, and oh! how they did jabber. Tothose who understood them their observations might have been verysensible, but to our ears their voices sounded like the chattering of ahuge family of monkeys in their native woods. The view before usconsisted of the blue shining sea, a large whitewashed and yellow-washedvillage to the north, called St. Joao da Foz, with a lighthouse on ahill at one end of it, a line of black rocks and white breakers beforeus, and to the south a yellow beach with cliffs and pine-trees beyond,and a convent, and a few of the higher standing houses and churches ofOporto in the distance. When we got near the white foam-topped rollers,all the jabbering ceased, our crew bent to their oars like men worthy ofdescendants of Albuquerque's gallant crew; and the boat now backed foran instant, now dashing on, we were in smooth water close under thewalls of a no very formidable-looking fortress. A little farther on welanded at a stone slip, at the before-mentioned village, amongfishwomen, and porters, and boatmen, and soldiers, and custom-houseguards, and boys, all talking away most vociferously. As we had noluggage to carry, we were allowed to look about us. What we should havedone I scarcely know, had not Bubble, who never failed to findacquaintance in every place, recognised an English gentleman who hadcome down to the river to embark for the city. Bubble's friend wasinvaluable to us; he first invited us to go up the river in his boat,and pointed out numerous spots of interest on the way. The boat was acurious affair; it had a flat bottom and sides, and narrowed to a risingpoint forward. The greater part was covered with a wooden awningpainted green, and supported by wooden stanchions; and the seats runfore and aft round the sides; it had yellow curtains to keep out the sunor rain; the crew, three in number, stood up with their faces to thebow, pressing against the oars; two stood on a deck forward, and one,who occasionally brought his oar in a line with the keel, rowed aft.Dressed in red caps with red sashes, and mostly in white or blue-stripedgarments, they had a picturesque appearance.

  Although the civil war which overthrew despotism, and planted thepresent line on the throne, had occurred so long before, our new friendspoke of it with as much interest as if it had but lately beenconcluded. Such an occurrence, indeed, was the great event in the livesof a generation.

  On the south side of the entrance of the river is a long sandbank; onthe north side is the castle of Foz, or the mouth. This castle wasbuilt by the Pedroites, and it was literally the key on which dependedthe success of the enterprise. Had it been taken, the communicationwith the sea and Oporto would have been cut off, and the Liberals wouldhave been starved out. For the greater portion of the time occupied bythe struggle, Dom Pedro's followers held little more than the city ofOporto and a line of country on the north bank of the Douro scarcely amile wide, leading from the city to the sea. They held the lighthouseat the north point of the village; but a few hundred yards beyond was amound on which the Miguelites erected a strong battery. Not a spotalong the whole line but what was the scene of some desperate encounter;and most certainly the Portuguese Constitutionalists of all ranks, fromthe highest to the lowest, fought as bravely as men could fight in thenoblest of causes. Heaven favoured the right, and in spite ofapparently overwhelming hosts opposed to them, of disease and gauntfamine, they won their cause, and the mother of the present enlightenedKing of Portugal ascended the throne.

  But I am writing the cruise of the "Frolic," and not a history ofPortugal. Still I must dot down a few of our friend's anecdotes. Whilethe north side of the river was held by the Constitutionalists, thesouth was in the hands of the Miguelites, and the two parties used toamuse themselves by firing at each other across the stream, so that itwas dangerous to pass along the lower road by daylight.

  On one occasion, the Miguelites, wishing to attack the castle, brought anumber of casks to the end of the spit of sand at the entrance of theriver, and erected a battery on it, but they forgot to fill the caskswith sand or earth; when morning broke there was a formidable batterydirectly under the walls of the castle. Some unfortunate troops wereplaced in it to work the guns; all went very well till the guns of thecastle began to play on it, and then a few shots sent the entire fabricto the four winds of heaven, and either killed the soldiers placed init, or drove them flying hurry-skurry across the sand, where many morewere picked off by the rifles of the Constitutionalists.

  What could be more unpleasant than having on a hot day to run alon
g aheavy shingly beach, with a number of sharpshooters taking deliberateaim at one's corpus? Happy would he be who could find a deep hole intowhich to roll himself out of harm's way.

  The banks of the Douro are picturesque from the very entrance. Oneither side are broken cliffs; on the south covered with pine-groves, onthe north with yellow, white, and pick houses and churches, andorange-groves. On the south we passed the remains of the old convent ofSt. Antonio, where once the jovial monks feasted and sang and prayed,well supplied with the spoils of the sea. Here pious fishermen used tostop and ask a blessing on their labours, on their way down the river,and on their return they failed not to offer the choice of their spoilto the worthy friars. The gardens of the convent were profuselyornamented with statues of curious device, and flowers, and vases, andorange-trees, and grottoes, and temples; all now swept away by thescythe of war--the convent walls now forming part of a manufactory. Themonks have disappeared from Portugal, and few people regret them lessthan the Portuguese. At best they were drones; and, if we are to creditone-quarter of the tales told of them, they continued to do no littleamount of evil in their generation. On the same side of the river, butmuch higher up, where the Douro forces its way between two lofty cliffs,on the summit of the southern one, stands the once very celebratedconvent of the Sierra. From beneath its walls the Duke of Wellingtonled his army across the river into Oporto, and drove Marshal Soult outof the city. This convent, and its surrounding garden, was the onlyspot held by the Pedroites, and most heroically held it was, against thewhole army of the usurper Miguel, led by his best generals. Day afterday, and night after night, were his legions led to the attack, and asoften were they repulsed by the half-starved defenders of itsearth-formed ramparts. We may speak with pride of the siege of Kars andof Lucknow, and of many another event in the late war; but I hold thatthey do not eclipse the gallant defence of the PortugueseConstitutionalists of the Sierra convent. Below the convent the twobanks of the river are now joined by a handsome iron suspension-bridge,which superseded one long existing formed of boats. The city standsbelow this point, rising on the converse steep sides of a granite hill,and with its numerous church-steeples, its tinted-walled houses, itsbright red roofs interspersed with the polished green of orange-trees inits gardens, is a very picturesque city. Along its quays are arrangedvessels of various sizes, chiefly Portuguese or Brazilians, those ofother nations anchoring on the other side, in the stream, to be awayfrom the temptations of the wine-shops. On the south side is a bay withgently sloping shores; and here are found the long, low, narrow lodgesin which are stowed the casks of Port wine, which has perhaps madePortugal and the Portuguese more generally known to Englishmen of allclasses than would have been done by the historical associationsconnected with that beautiful country.

  As Bubble's friend was on his way to visit his wine-pipes, he took usfirst to Villa Nova, the place I have been speaking of. One lodge heshowed us contained three thousand pipes, ranged in long lines, two andthree pipes one above another, which, at fifty pounds a pipe, representsa capital of one hundred and fifty thousand pounds. Some of the Englishhouses are said to have two or three times that quantity; but of coursethe young wine is not of the value I have mentioned. The Port wine isgrown on the banks of the Douro, in a district commencing about fiftymiles above the city. It is made in the autumn, and remains in largevats on the farms till the spring, when it is put into casks, andbrought down in flat-bottomed boats to the lodges at Villa Nova. Hereit is racked and lotted to get rid of impurities, and has brandy put toit to keep it. Our friend assured us that Port wine will not keep forany length of time without brandy; the experiment has been tried overand over again. The only way to make it keep for a short time is torack it constantly; but then it becomes spiritless, vapid, andcolourless. To one conclusion we came, that Port wine in the lodge atVilla Nova and Port wine out of decanter at an English dinner-table arevery different things; for Port wine racked and lotted for the Englishmarket, and kept some years In a temperate cellar, is undoubtedly vastlysuperior to the juice of the grape before it is so prepared.

  Having satisfied our curiosity, with our friend as guide, we crossed theriver to Oporto. We landed at a gateway in the brown old wall of thecity, which runs along the river and up the hill to the east and west,surmounted by high, pointed battlements of a very Moorish appearance,though the Moors did not plant their conquering standard so far north asOporto. Passing along a very narrow, cool, dirty, and somewhatodoriferous street, we entered a wide, well-paved one, called the RuaNova. In the middle of it congregate the merchants every afternoon, atthe exchange hour, to transact their public business. At the end of thestreet is a fine stone building, called the Factory House, a sort ofclub belonging to the English, who become members by election. Highabove the end of the street, on a hill covered with houses, rises theold cathedral of Oporto. We found our way to it along some narrow,twisting streets, with oriental-looking shops on either side--tinmen andgoldsmiths and shoemakers and stationers--a line of each sort together.The cathedral, as well as all the churches we saw at Oporto, were rathercurious than elegant.

  For the greater part of our walk we were continually ascending alongtolerably well-paved and clean streets, with stone houses and wide,projecting balconies, some with stone, others with iron balustrades. Wepassed through a street called the Street of Flowers; the chief shops init were those of jewellers, who showed us some very beautiful filigreework in gold--brooches and ear-rings and rings. We next found ourselvesin a square at the bottom of two hills, with wide streets running upeach of them, and a church at their higher ends. One has a curiousarabesque tower, of great height, which we saw a long way out at sea,called the Torre dos Clerigos. Going up still higher we reached a largeparade ground, with barracks at one end, and near them a granite-frontedchurch, called the Lappa, where, in an urn, is preserved the heart ofthe heroic Dom Pedro--the grandfather of the present King of Portugal.Oporto is full of gardens, which make the city spread over a wide extentof ground. We were agreeably surprised with its bright, clean, cheerfullook. Built on a succession of granite hills, which afford admirablematerials for the construction of its edifices, it has a substantialcomfortable look. It is also tolerably well drained, and wayfarers arenot much offended with either bad sights or smells. The variety of thecostume of the inhabitants gives it a lively look; for althoughgentlemen and ladies have taken to French fashions, the townspeoplestill generally wear the graceful black mantilla, or coloured or whitehandkerchief over their heads, while the peasantry appear withbroad-brimmed hats and cloth jackets, gay-coloured petticoats, and aprofusion of gold ear-rings and chains. There are beggars, but they arenot very importunate, and the smallest copper coin seemed to satisfythem. Our friend told us that he has seen a Portuguese gentleman,wanting a copper, take his snuff-box and present it to a beggar, whowould take a pinch with the air of a noble, and shower a thousandblessings on the head of the donor in return. "The truth is, that thePortuguese as a nation are the kindest people I have ever met," observedour friend. "They think charitably and act charitably, and do notdespise each other; they are kindly affectionate one to another. A goodgovernment and a reformed church would make them a very happy people."

  Our walk through the city was a hurried one, as we wished to be on boardagain before dark. We passed near a large palace, with some uglyvisages garnishing the front. Here Dom Pedro lived, and here MarshalSoult's dinner had been prepared, when the Duke of Wellington enteredthe city and ate it up. We found a boat ready to carry us down theriver, which we reached by a steep, winding road. Our friend kindlyinsisted on accompanying us.

  At Foz a catria was prepared by our friend's directions to put us onboard the yacht. Oh, how refreshing to our olfactory senses, after thehot air of the streets, was the fresh sea-breeze as we reached the mouthof the river, and once more floated on the blue Atlantic! The sundescended beneath the far western wave in a blaze of glory, such as Ihave seldom seen equalled in any latitude; the glow
lit up the Lappachurch, the Clerigos tower, and the Sierra convent in the distance,suffusing a rich glow over the whole landscape. All sail was set, butwe made little way through the water; a calm succeeded, and then the hotnight-wind came off the land in fitful gusts, smelling of parched earthand dry leaves. Having stood off the land sufficiently to clear everydanger, we kept our course. The night was somewhat dark, and we had allturned in, leaving the mate in charge of the watch.

  I know not what it was made me restless and inclined to turn out, andbreathe the fresher air on deck; probably I was heated with the long andexciting excursion of the day. As I put my head up the companion-hatch,sailor-fashion, I turned my eyes towards every point of the compass.Did they deceive me? "Hallo, Sleet, what's that?" I exclaimed. "Portthe helm; hard aport, or we shall be run into." What was the look-outabout? Where were Sleet's eyes? All, I suspect, were asleep. There,directly ahead of us, like some huge phantom of a disordered dream, camegliding on a line-of-battle ship, her tall masts and wide-spreadingcanvas towering up into the sky--a dark pyramid high above our heads;our destruction seemed inevitable. With a hail which horror made soundmore like a shriek of despair, I summoned all hands on deck. Happily,the man at the helm of the yacht obeyed my orders at the moment, and theagile little craft slipped out of the way as the huge monster glided by,her side almost touching our taffrail, and her lower studding-sail boomsjust passing over our peak--so it seemed; our topmast, I know, had anarrow squeak for it.

  "What ship's that?" shouted Porpoise, springing on deck.

  "Her Britannic Majesty's ship `Megatherium,'" so the name sounded.

  "Then let a better lookout be kept aboard her Britannic Majesty's ship`megatherium' in future, or the Duke of Blow-you-up will have to reportto the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty," replied Porpoise, throughthe speaking-trumpet. "I hauled in the duke just to frighten them abit," he added; "they wouldn't care for the plain mister. The chancesare that some of the lookouts had their eyes shut, and the officer ofthe watch had gone to freshen his nip a bit. No one dreams of danger ona fine night like this, and if a few small fishing-boats had been rundown, no one would have heard any thing about it; there would be just acry and a shriek from the drowning people, and all would be over.There's more danger of being run down on a calm night like this than ina gale of wind, when everybody has his eyes open."

  "What cutter is that?" hailed some on board the ship, through aspeaking-trumpet, before Porpoise had done speaking.

  "Bow-wow-wow! I leave you to guess," he answered.

  By this time the vessels were so far apart that a hail could scarcely bedistinguished, and so we separated. I only hope those who deserved areprimand got it, and that any of my brother-officers, or othersea-going men who read these pages, will take the hint, and have asbright a lookout kept in fine weather as in foul.