06 - Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon by Henry Fielding

Embark on a memorable sailing voyage from England to Portugal in the mid-eighteenth century, as narrated by one of the eras leading humorists, satirists, novelists, and playwrights. This poignant work, recorded during the final chapter of his life, interweaves the authors declining health with the captivating details of his journey.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Section five of Journal of a Voyage to Lisbon by
Henry Fielding. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain
recording by James Carson. If it should be doubted whether
we can bring this case within the letter of any
capital law now subsisting, I am ashamed to own it cannot.

(00:21):
For surely no crime better deserves such punishment. But the
remedy may nevertheless be immediate. And if a law was
made at the beginning of next session to take place immediately,
by which the starving thousands of poor was declared to
be felony without benefit of clergy, the fishmongers would be

(00:42):
hanged before the end of the session. A second method
of filling the mouths of the poor, if not with loaves,
at least with fishes, is to desire the magistrates to
carry into execution one at least out of near a
hundred acts of Parliament, for presume serving the small fry
of the River of Thames, by which means as few

(01:04):
fish would satisfy thousands as may now be devoured by
a small number of individuals. But while a fisherman can
break through the strongest meshes of an Act of Parliament,
we may be assured he will learn so to contrive
his own meshes, that the smallest fry will not be
able to swim through them. Other methods, may we doubt not,

(01:28):
he suggested by those who shall attentively consider the evil
here hinted at. But we have dwelt too long on
it already, and shall conclude with observing that it is
difficult to affirm whether the atrocity of the evil itself,
the facility of curing it, or the shameful neglect of
the cure be the more scandalous or more astonishing. After having, however,

(01:53):
gloriously regaled myself with this food, I was washing it
down with some good clarity with my wife and her
friend in the cabin when the captain's valet de chambre, head,
cook house and ship steward, footmen in livery and aut aunt,
secretary and foremast man all burst into the cabin at once,

(02:17):
being indeed all but one person, and without saying by
your leave, began to pack half a hogshead of small
beer and bottles, the necessary consequence of which must have
been either a total stopped conversation at that cheerful season
when it is most agreeable, or admitting that polyonymous officer

(02:39):
aforesaid to the participation of it. I desired him therefore
to delay his purpose a little longer. But he refused
to grant my request, nor was he prevailed on to
quit the room, until he was threatened with having one
bottle to pack more than his dumber, which then happened
to stand empty within my reach. With these menaces, he

(03:02):
retired at last, but not without muttering some menaces on
his side, and which, to our great terror, he failed
not to put into immediate execution. Our captain was gone
to dinner this day with his Swiss brother, and though
he was a very sober man, was a little elevated
with some champagne, which, as it cost the Swiss little

(03:26):
or nothing, he dispensed at his table more liberally than
our hospitable English noblemen. Put about those bottles which the
ingenious Peter Taylor teaches a lead captain to avoid by
distinguishing by the name of that generous liquor, which all
humble companions are taught to postpone to the flavor of

(03:48):
methuin or honest port. While our two captains were thus
regaling themselves and celebrating their own heroic exploits with all
the inspiration which the liquor, at least of wit, could
afford them. The polyonymous officer arrived, and, being saluted by
the name of Honest Tom, was ordered to sit down

(04:11):
and take his glass before he delivered his message. For
every sailor is by turns his captain's mate over a can,
except only that Captain Boushaw, who presides in a man
of war, and who upon Earth has no other mate,
unless it be another of the same Beshaws. Tom had

(04:32):
no sooner swallowed his draft than he hastily began his
narrative and faithfully related what had happened on board our ship.
We say faithfully, though from what happened it may be
suspected that Tom chose to add perhaps only five or
six immaterial circumstances, as is always I believe the case,

(04:54):
and may possibly have been done by me in relating
this very story, Though so it happened not many hours ago.
No sooner was the captain informed of the interruption which
had been given to his officer, and indeed to his orders,
for he thought no time so convenient as that of
his absence, for causing any confusion in the cabin than

(05:17):
he leaped with such haste from his chair that he
had liked to have broke his sword with which he
always begirt himself when he walked out of his ship,
or sometimes when he walked about in it. At the
same time, grasping eagerly that other implement called a cockade,
which modern soldiers wear on their helmets with the same

(05:40):
view as the ancients did their crests. To terrify the enemy,
he muttered something, but so inarticulately that the word dam
was only intelligible. He then hastily took leave of the
Swiss captain, who was too well bred to press his
stay on such an occasion, and leaped first from the

(06:00):
ship to his boat, and then from his boat to
his own ship, with as much fierceness in his looks
as he had ever expressed on boarding his defenseless prey
in the honorable calling of a privateer. Having regained the
middle deck, he paused a moment while Tom and others
loaded themselves with bottles, and, then, descending into the cabin,

(06:23):
exclaimed with a thundering voice, damn me, why aren't the
bottles stowed in according to my orders? I answered, him
very mildly, that I had prevented his man from doing it,
as it was at an inconvenient time to me, and
as in his absence at least I esteemed the cabin

(06:43):
to be my own. Your cabin, repeated he many times. No,
damn me, tis my cabin, your cabin. Damn me, I
have brought my hogs to a fair market. I suppose
indeed you think it your cabin and your ship by
your commanding in it. But I will command in it.

(07:04):
Damn me. I will show the world I am the
commander and nobody. But I did you think I sold
you the command of my ship for that pitiful thirty pounds?
I wish I had not seen you nor your thirty
pounds a board of her. He then repeated the words
thirty pounds, often with great disdain and with a contempt

(07:27):
which I owned. The sum did not seem to deserve
in my eye, either in itself or on the present occasion,
being indeed paid for the freight of blank weight of
human flesh, which is above fifty percent dearer than the
freight of any other luggage, whilst in reality it takes
up less room, in fact, no room at all, in truth,

(07:50):
the sum was paid for nothing more than for a
liberty to six persons, two of them servants, to stay
on board a ship while she sails from one port
to another, every shilling of which comes clear into the
captain's pocket. Ignorant people may perhaps imagine, especially when they
are told that the captain is obliged to sustain them,

(08:13):
that their diet at least is worth something which may
probably be now and then so far the case as
to deduct a tenth part from the net profits on
this account. But it was otherwise at present, For when
I had contracted with the captain at a price which I,
by no means thought moderate, I had some content in

(08:33):
thinking I should have no more to pay for my voyage.
But I was whispered that it was expected the passengers
should find themselves in several things, such as tea, wine,
and such like, and particularly that a gentleman should stow
of the latter a much larger quantity than they could use,

(08:55):
in order to leave the remainder as a present to
the captain at the end of the voyage. And it
was expected likewise that gentlemen should put aboard some fresh stores,
and the more of such things were put aboard the welcomer,
they would be to the captain. I was prevailed with
by these hints to follow the advice proposed, and accordingly,

(09:19):
besides tea and a large hamper of wine, with several
hams and tongues, I caused the number of live chickens
and sheep to be conveyed aboard. In truth trouble the
quantity of provisions which would have supported the persons I
took with me. Had the voyage continued three weeks, as

(09:39):
it was supposed, with a bare possibility, it might indeed
it continued much longer, But as this was occasioned by
our being wind bound in our own ports, it was
by no means of any ill consequence to the captain,
as the additional stores of fish, fresh meat, but bread,

(10:00):
et cetera, which I constantly laid in greatly exceeded the
consumption and went some way in maintaining the ship's crew.
It is true I was not obliged to do this,
but it seemed to be expected, for the captain did
not think himself obliged to do it, and I can
truly say I soon ceased to expect it of him.

(10:24):
He had I confess on board a number of fowls
and ducks sufficient for a West India voyage, all of them,
as he often said, very fine birds, and of the
largest breed. This I believe was really the fact, and
I can add that they were all arrived at the
full perfection of their size. Nor was there I am

(10:47):
convinced any want of provisions of a more substantial kind,
such as dried beef, pork and fish, so that the
captain seemed ready to perform his contract and amply to
provide for his passengers. What I did then was not
from necessity, but perhaps from a less excusable motive, and

(11:09):
was by no means chargeable to the account of the captain.
But let of the motive have been what it would,
the consequence was still the same, and this was such
that I am firmly persuaded the whole pitiful thirty pounds
came pure and neat into the Captain's pocket, and not
only so, but attended with the value of ten pound

(11:32):
more in sundrys into the bargain. I must confess myself
therefore at a loss how the epithet pitiful came to
be annexed to the above sum. For not being a
pitiful price for what it was given. I cannot conceive
it to be pitiful in itself, nor do I believe
it is thought by the greatest men in the kingdom,

(11:54):
none of whom would scruple to search for it in
the dirtiest kennel, where they had owned only a reasonable
hope of success. How therefore such a sum should acquire
The idea of pitiful in the eyes of the master
of a ship seems not easy to be accounted for,
since it appears more likely to produce in him ideas

(12:16):
of a different kind. Some men, perhaps are no more
sincere in the contempt for it which they express than
others in their contempt of money in general. And I
am the rather inclined to this persuasion, as I have
seldom heard of either who have refused or refunded this
their despised object. Besides, it is sometimes impossible to believe

(12:42):
these professions, as every action of the man's life is
a contradiction to it. Who can believe a tradesman who
says he would not tell his name for the prophet
he gets by the selling of such a parcel of
goods when he hath told a thousand lies in order
to get it. Pitiful indeed, is often replied to an object,

(13:04):
not absolutely but comparatively with our expectations, or with a
greater object, in which sense it is not easy to
set any bounds to the use of the word. Thus
a handful of halfpence daily appear pitiful to a porter,
and a handful of silver to a drawer. The latter,

(13:26):
I am convinced at a polite tavern will not tell
his name, for he will not give you any answer
under the price of gold. And in this sense thirty
pounds may be accounted pitiful by the lowest mechanic. One
difficulty only seems to occur, and that is this, How

(13:46):
comes it that, if the profits of the meanest arts
are so considerable, the professors of them are not richer
than we generally see them. One answer to this shall suffice.
Men do not become rich by what they get, but
by what they keep. Hugh is worth no more than
his annual wages or salary spends the whole he will

(14:09):
be always a beggar. Let his income be what it will,
and so will be his family when he dies. This
we see daily to be the case of ecclesiastics, who
during their lives are extremely well provided for, only because
they desire to maintain the honor of the cloth by
living like gentlemen, which would perhaps be better maintained by

(14:34):
living unlike them. But to return from so long a
digression to which the use of so improper an epithet
gave occasion, and to which the novelty of the subject allured,
I will make the reader amends by concisely telling him
that the captain poured forth such a torrent of abuse

(14:54):
that I very hastily and very foolishly resolved to quit
the ship. I gave immediate orders to summon a hoy
to carry me that evening to Dartmouth, without considering any consequence.
Those orders I gave in no very low voice, so
that those above stairs might possibly conceive there was more

(15:16):
than one master in the cabin. In the same tone,
I likewise threatened the captain with that which he afterwards
said he feared more than any rock or Quicksand nor
can we wonder at this, when we are told he
had been twice obliged to bring to and cast anchor
there before, and had neither time escaped without the loss

(15:39):
of almost his whole cargo. The most distant sound of
law thus frightened a man who had, often, I am convinced,
heard numbers of cannon roar around him with intrepidy. Nor
did he sooner see the hoy approaching the vessel than
he ran down again into the cabin, and his rage

(15:59):
being perfectly subsided, he tumbled on his knees and a
little too abjectly implored for mercy. I did not suffer
a brave man and an old man to remain a
moment in this posture. But I immediately forgave him, and
here that I may not be thought the sly trumpeter

(16:20):
of my own praises, I do utterly disclaim all praise
on the occasion. Neither did the greatness of my mind dictate,
nor the force of my Christianity exact this forgiveness. To
speak truth, I forgave him from a motive which would
make men much more forgiving if they were much wiser

(16:41):
than they are, because it was convenient for me to
do so. Wednesday this morning, the captain dressed himself in
scarlet in order to pay a visit to a Devonshire schoir,
to whom a captain of a ship is a guest
of no ordinary consequence, as he is a stranger and
a gentleman, who hath seen a great deal of the

(17:03):
world in foreign parts, and knows all the news of
the times. The squire therefore was to send his boat
for the captain. But a most unfortunate accident happened, for
as the wind was extremely rough and against the hoy,
while this was endeavoring to avail itself of great seamanship

(17:26):
in hauling up against the wind, a sudden squall carried
off sail and yard, or at least so disabled them
that they were no longer of any use and unable
to reach the ship. But the captain from the deck
saw his hopes of venison disappointed, and was forced either
to stay on board his ship or to hoist forth

(17:49):
his own long boat, which he could not prevail with himself.
To think of, though the smell of venison had had
twenty times its attraction, He did indeed of his ship
as his wife and his boats as children, and never
willingly trusted the latter poor things to the dangers of

(18:09):
the sea. To say truth, notwithstanding the strict rigor with
which he preserved the dignity of his stations, and the
hasty impatience with which he resented any affront to his
person or orders, disobedience to which he could in no
instance brook in any person on board. He was one

(18:32):
of the best natured fellows alive. He acted the part
of a father to his sailors. He expressed great tenderness
for any of them when ill, and never suffered any
the least work of superaurogation to go unrewarded by a
glass of gin. He even extended his humanity, if I

(18:56):
may so call it, to animals, and even his cat
and kittens had large shares in his affections, an instance
of which we saw this evening, when the cat, which
had shown it could not be drowned, was found suffocated
under a feather bed in the cabin. I will not

(19:17):
endeavor to describe his lamentations with more perlixity than barely
by saying they were grievous and seemed to have some
mixture of the Irish howl in them. Nay, he carried
his fondness even to inanimate objects, of which we have
above set down a pregnant example in his demonstration of

(19:38):
love and tenderness towards his boats and the ship. He
spoke of a ship which he had commanded formerly, and
which was long since no more, which he had called
the Princess of Brazil as a widower of a deceased wife.
This ship, after having followed the honest business of Carria

(20:00):
in goods and passengers for higher many years, did at
last take to evil courses and turn privateer, in which service,
to use his own words, she received many dreadful wounds,
which he himself had felt as if they had been
his own. Thursday, as the wind did not yesterday discover

(20:23):
any purpose of shifting, and the water in my belly
grew troublesome and rendered me short breathed, I began a
second time to have apprehensions of wanting the assistance of
a trochar, when none was to be found. I therefore
concluded to be tapped again by way of precaution, And

(20:44):
accordingly I this morning summoned on board a surgeon from
a neighboring parish, one whom the captain greatly recommended, and
who did indeed perform his office with much dexterity. He was,
a belief, likewise, a man great judgment and knowledge in
the profession, but of this I cannot speak with perfect certainty,

(21:06):
for when he was going to open on the dropsy
at large, and on the particular degree of the distemper
under which I labored, I was obliged to stop him short,
for the wind was changed, and the captain in the
utmost hurry to depart, and to desire him instead of
his opinion, to assist me with his execution. I was

(21:29):
now once more delivered from my burden, which was not
indeed so great as I had apprehended, wanting two quarts
of what was let out at the last operation. While
the surgeon was drawing away my water, the sailors were
drawing up the anchor. Both were finished at the same time.

(21:50):
We unfurled our sails, and soon passed the bury head,
which forms the mouth of the bay. We had not, however,
sailed far, when the wind, which had, though with a
slow pace, kept us company about six miles, suddenly turned
about and offered to conduct us back again, a favor which,

(22:13):
though sorely against the grain, we were obliged to accept.
Nothing remarkable happened this day, for as to the firm
persuasion of the captain that he was under the spell
of witchcraft, I would not repeat it too often, though
indeed he repeated it an hundred times a day. In truth,
he talked of nothing else, and seemed not only to

(22:36):
be satisfied in general of his being bewitched, but actually
to have fixed with good certainty on the person of
the witch, whom, had he lived in the days of
Sir Matthew Hale, he would have infallibly indicted, and very
possibly have hanged for the detestable sin of witchcraft. But

(22:57):
that law and the whole doctrine that supported it, are
now out of fashion, and witches, as a learned divine
once chose to express himself, are put down by act
of Parliament. This which, in the Captain's opinion, was no
other than Missus Francis of Ride, who, as he insinuated,

(23:20):
out of anger to me for not spending more money
in her house than she could produce anything to exchange
for or ally pretense to charge for, had laid the
spell on his ship. Though we were again got near
our harbor by three in the afternoon, yet it seemed

(23:40):
to require a full hour or more before we could
come to our former place of anchoring, or birth, as
the captain called it. On this occasion we exemplified one
of the few advantages which the travelers by water have
over the travelers by land. What would the latter often
give for the sight of one of those hospitable mansions

(24:03):
where he is assured that there is good entertainment for
man and horse, and where both may consequently promise themselves
to assouise that hunger which exercise is so sure to
raise in a healthy constitution at their arrival at this mansion.

(24:25):
How much happier is the state of the horse than
that of the master. The former is immediately led to
his repast, such as it is, and whatever it is,
he falls to it with appetite. But the latter is
in a much worse situation. His hunger, however, violent, is

(24:45):
always in some degree delicate, and his food must have
some kind of ornament, or, as the more usual phrase is,
of dressing, to recommend it. Now, all dressing requires time.
And therefore, though perhaps the sheep might be just killed
before you came to the inn, yet in cutting him up,

(25:08):
fetching the joint which the landlord, by mistake said he
had in the house from the butcher at two miles distance,
and afterwards warming it a little by the fire two
hours at least must be consumed, while hunger for want
of better food praise all the time on the vitals
of the man. How different was the case with us.

(25:31):
We carried our provision, our kitchen, and our cook with us,
and we were at one and the same time traveling
on our road and sitting down to a repast of fish,
with which the greatest table in London can scarce at
any rate be supplied. Friday, as we were disappointed of

(25:52):
our wind and obliged to return back the preceding evening,
we resolved to extract all the good we could out
of our misfortune, and to add considerably to our fresh
stores of meat and bread, with which we were very
indifferently provided when we hurried away yesterday. By the Captain's advice,

(26:15):
we likewise laid in some stores of butter, which we
salted and potted ourselves for our use at Lisbon, and
we had great reason afterwards to thank him for his advice.
In the afternoon, I persuaded my wife, whom it was
no easy matter for me to force from my side,

(26:37):
to take a walk on shore, whither the gallant captain
declared he was ready to attend her. Accordingly, the ladies
set out and left me to enjoy a sweet and
comfortable nap after the operation of the preceding day. Thus
we enjoyed our separate pleasures full three hours when we

(26:59):
met again, and my wife gave the foregoing account of
the gentleman whom I have before compared to Axelous, and
his habitation to both which she had been introduced by
the captain in the style of an old friend and acquaintance.
Though this foundation of intimacy seemed to her to be

(27:20):
no deeper laid than in an accidental dinner eaten many
years before at this temple of hospitality. When the captain
lay wind bound in the same bay Saturday early this morning,
the wind seemed inclined to change in our favor. Our
alert captain snatched its very first motion and got her

(27:44):
to sail with so very gentle a breeze, that, as
the tide was against him, he recommended to a fishing
boy to bring after him a vast salmon and some
other provisions, which lay ready for him on shore. Our
anchor was up at Sex, and before nine in the
morning we had doubled the berry head and were arrived

(28:05):
off Dartmouth, having gone full three miles in as many hours,
in direct opposition to the tide, which only befriended us
out of our harbor. And though the wind was perhaps
our friend, it was so very silent and exerted itself
so little in our favor, that, like some cool partisans,

(28:27):
it was difficult to say whether it was with us
or against us. The captain, however, declared the former to
be the case during the whole three hours. But at
last he perceived his error, or rather, perhaps this friend,
which had hitherto wavered in choosing his side, became now
more determined. The captain then suddenly tacked about, and, asserting

(28:52):
that he was bewitched, submitted to return to the place
from whence he came. Now, though I am as free
from superstition as any man breathing, and never did believe
in witches, notwithstanding all the excellent arguments of my Lord
Chief Justice hail in their favor, and long before they

(29:13):
were put down by act of Parliament. Yet by what
power a ship of burden should sail three miles against
both wind and tide, I cannot conceive, unless there was
some supernatural interposition in the case nay, could we admit
that the wind stood neuter, the difficulty would still remain,

(29:36):
so that we must, of necessity conclude that the ship
was either bewinded or bewitched. The captain perhaps had another meaning,
he imagined himself. I believe bewitched because the wind, instead
of persevering in its change in his favor for change
it certainly did that morning, should suddenly return to its

(29:59):
favor at station and blow him back towards the bay.
But if this was his opinion, he soon saw cause
to alter, for he had not measured half the way back.
When the wind again declared in his favor, and so
loudly that there was no possibility of being mistaken. The

(30:20):
orders for the second tack were given and obeyed with
much more alacrity than those had been for the first.
We were all of us indeed in high spirits on
the occasion, though some of us a little regretted the
good things we were likely to leave behind us by
the fisherman's neglect, I might give it a worse name,

(30:42):
for he faithfully promised to execute the commission, which he
had had abundant opportunity to do, but nought coffides deserves
as much to be proverbial as ever punica Fides could
formerly have done. Nay, when we consider that the Carthaginians
came from the Phoenicians, who are supposed to have produced

(31:06):
the first mariners, we may probably see the true reason
of the adage, and it may open a field of
very curious discoveries to the antiquarian. We were, however, too
eager to pursue our voyage to suffer anything we left
behind us to interrupt our happiness, which indeed many agreeable

(31:27):
circumstances conspired to advance. The weather was inexpressibly pleasant, and
we were all seated on the deck when our canvas
began to swell with the wind. We had, likewise in
our view above thirty other sail around us, all in
the same situation. Here an observation occurred to me, which, perhaps,

(31:51):
though extremely obvious, did not offer itself to every individual
in our little fleet, when I perceived with what different
success we proceeded under the influence of a superior power, which,
while we lay almost idle ourselves, pushed us forward on
our intended voyage. And compared this with the slow progress

(32:15):
which we had made in the morning of ourselves, and
without any such assistance. I could not help reflecting how
often the greatest abilities lie wind bound, as it were
in life. Or if they venture out and attempt to
beat the seas, they struggle in vain against wind and tide,

(32:36):
and if they have not sufficient prudence to put back,
or most probably cast away on the rocks and quick
sands which are every day ready to devour them. It
was now our fortune to set out melioribus avibus. The
wind freshened so briskly in our poop that the shore

(32:58):
appeared to move from us us as fast as we
did from the shore. The captain declared he was sure
of a wind, meaning its continuance, but he had disappointed
us so often that he had lost all credit. However,
he kept his word a little better now, and we
lost sight of our native land as joyfully at least

(33:21):
as it is usual to regain it. Sunday the next morning,
the captain told me he thought himself thirty miles to
the westward of Plymouth, and before evening declared that the
Lizard Point, which is the extremity of Cornwall, bore several
leagues to leeward. Nothing remarkable past this day except the

(33:44):
captain's devotion, who, in his own phrase, summoned all the
hands to prayers which were read by a common sailor
upon deck with more devout force and address than they
are commonly read by a country curate, and received with
more decency and attention by the sailors than are usually

(34:06):
preserved in city congregations. I am indeed assured that if
any such affected disregard of the solemn office in which
they were engaged, as I have seen practiced by fine
gentlemen ladies expressing a kind of apprehension lest they should
be suspected of being really in earnest in their devotion,

(34:30):
had been shown here, they would have contracted the contempt
of the whole audience. To say the truth, From what
I observed in the behavior of the sailors in this voyage,
and on comparing it with what I have formerly seen
of them at sea and on shore, I am convinced

(34:50):
that on land there is nothing more idle and dissolute
in their own element. There are no persons near the
level of their des who live in the constant practice
of half so many good qualities. They are, for much
the greater part perfect masters of their business, and always

(35:11):
extremely alert and ready in executing it, without any regard
to fatigue or hazard. The soldiers themselves are not better disciplined,
nor more obedient to orders than these. Whilst aboard, they
submit to every difficulty which attends their calling with cheerfulness,
and no less virtues and patience and fortitude are exercised

(35:36):
by them every day of their lives. All these good qualities, however,
they always leave behind them on shipboard. The sailor out
of water is indeed as wretched an animal as the
fish out of water. For though the former hath, in
common with the amphibious animals, the bare power of existing

(35:57):
on the land, yet if he be kept there any time,
he never fails to become a nuisance. The ship, having
had a good deal of motion since she was last
under sail, our women returned to their sickness, and I
to my solitude, having for twenty four hours together scarce

(36:19):
opened my lips to a single person. This circumstance of
being shut up, within the circumference of a few yards,
with the score of human creatures, with not one of
whom it was possible to converse, was perhaps so rare
as scarce ever to have happened before, nor could it

(36:40):
ever happen to one who disliked it more than myself,
or to myself at a season when I wanted more
food for my social disposition, or could converse less wholesomely
and happily with my own thoughts. To this accident, which
fortune opened to me in the downs was owing the

(37:02):
first serious thought which I have ever entertained of enrolling myself.
Among the voyage writers. Some of the most amusing pages,
if indeed there be any which deserved that name, were
possibly the production of the most disagreeable hours which ever
haunted the author. Monday at noon, the captain took an

(37:25):
observation by which it appeared that Euchant bore some leagues
northward of us, and that we were just entering the
Bay of Biscay. We had advanced very few miles in
this bay before we were entirely becomed. We furled our
sails as being of no use to us. While we

(37:46):
lay in this most disagreeable situation, more detested by the
sailors than the most violent tempest. We were alarmed with
the loss of a fine piece of salt beef which
had been hung in this to freshen it, this being,
it seems, the strange property of salt water. The thief

(38:06):
was immediately suspected, and presently afterwards taken by the sailors.
He was indeed no other than a huge shark, who,
not knowing when he was well off, swallowed another piece
of beef, together with a great iron crook on which
it was hung, and by which he was dragged into

(38:28):
the ship. I should scarce have mentioned the catching this shark,
though so exactly conformable to the rules and practice of
voyage writing, had it not been for a strange circumstance
that attended it. This was the recovery of the stolen
beef out of the sharks maw, where it lay unchewed

(38:49):
and undigested, and, whence being conveyed into the pot, the
flesh and of the thief that had stolen it joined
together in furnishing variety to the ship's crew. During this calm,
we likewise found the mast of a large vessel, which
the captain thought had lain at least three years in

(39:09):
the sea. It was stuck all over with a little
shell fish or reptile called a barnacle, and which probably
are the prey of the rock fish, as our captain
calls it, asserting that it is the finest fish in
the world, for which we are obliged to confide entirely

(39:30):
to his taste. For though he struck the fish with
a kind of harping iron and wounded him, I am
convinced to death. Yet he could not possess himself of
his body, But the poor wretch escaped to linger out
a few hours with probably great torments. In the evening,

(39:51):
our wind returned and so briskly that we ran upwards
of twenty leagues before the next day, Tuesdays Observate, which
brought us to latitude forty seven degrees forty two minutes.
The captain promised us a very speedy passage through the bay,
but he deceived us, or the wind deceived him, for

(40:14):
it so slackened at sunset that it scarce carried us
a mile in an hour. During the whole succeeding night Wednesday,
a gale struck up a little after sun rising, which
carried us between three and four knots or miles an hour.
We were this day at noon about the middle of

(40:35):
the Bay of Biscay, when the wind once more deserted
us and we were so entirely becalmed that we did
not advance a mile in many hours. My fresh water
reader will perhaps conceive no unpleasant idea from this calm,
But it affected us much more than a storm could

(40:56):
have done. For as the irascible passions of men are
apt to swell with indignation long after the injury which
first raised them is over, so fared it with the sea.
It rose mountains high, and lifted our poor ship up
and down, backwards and forwards, with so violent an emotion

(41:18):
that there was scarce a man of the ship better
able to stand than myself. Every utensil in our cabin
rolled up and down, as we should have rolled ourselves,
had not our chairs been fast lashed to the floor
in the situation, with our tables likewise fastened by ropes.

(41:40):
The captain and myself took our meal with some difficulty,
and swallowed a little of our broth, for we spilt
much of the greater part the remainder of our dinner.
Being an old, lean, tame duck roasted, I regretted but
little the loss of my teeth, not being good enough

(42:01):
to have chewed it. Our women, who began to creep
out of their holes in the morning, retired again within
the cabin to their beds, and were no more heard
of this day, in which my whole comfort was to find,
by the captain's relation, that the swelling was sometimes much worse.

(42:23):
He did, indeed take this occasion to be more communicative
than ever, and informed me of such misadventures that had
befallen him within forty six years at sea, as might
frighten a very bold spirit from undertaking even the shortest voyage.
Were these indeed but universally known, our matrons of quality

(42:49):
would possibly be deterred from venturing their tender offspring at sea,
by which means our navy would lose the honor of
many a young commodore, who at twenty two is better
versed in maritime affairs than real seamen are made by
the experience at sixty. And this may perhaps appear the

(43:12):
more extraordinary, as the education of both seemed to be
pretty much the same, neither of them having had their
courage tried by Virgil's description of a storm in which
inspired as he was, I doubt whether our captain doth
not exceed him. In the evening, the wind which continued

(43:34):
in the northwest again freshened, and that so briskly that
Cape Finisterre appeared, by this day's observation to bear a
few miles to the southward. We now indeed sailed, or
rather flew near ten knots an hour, and the captain,
in redundancy of his good humor, declared he would go

(43:57):
to church at Lisbon on Sunday neckxt for that he
was sure of a wind, and indeed we all firmly
believed him. But the event again contradicted him, for we
were again visited by a calm in the evening. But here,
though our voyage was retarded, we were entertained with a

(44:18):
scene which, as no one can behold without going to see,
so no one can form an idea of anything equal
to it. On shore, we were seated on the deck,
women and all, in the serenest evening that can be imagined.
Not a single cloud presented itself to our view, and

(44:39):
the sun himself was the only object which engrossed our
whole attention. He did, indeed, set with a majesty which
is incapable of description, with which, while the horizon was
yet blazing with glory, our eyes were called off to
the opposite part to survey the moon, which was then

(45:00):
at full and which in rising presented us with the
second object that this world hath offered to our vision.
Compared to these the pageantry of theaters or splendor of courts,
our sights almost below the regard of children. We did
not return from the deck till late in the evening,

(45:24):
the weather being inexpressibly pleasant and so warm that even
my old distemper perceived the alteration of the climate. There
was indeed a swell, but nothing comparable to what we
had felt before, and it affected us on the deck
much less than in the cabin. Friday, the calm continued

(45:46):
till sun rising, when the wind likewise arose, but unluckily
for us, it came from the wrong quarter. It was
south southeast, which is that very wind which Juno would
have solicited of Aeolus had Neus been in our latitude
bound for Lisbon. The captain now put on his most

(46:09):
melancholy aspect and resumed his former opinion that he was bewitched.
He declared with great solemnity that this was worse and worse,
for that a wind directly in his teeth was worse
than no wind. At all. Had we pursued the course
which the wind persuaded us to take, we had gone

(46:31):
directly for Newfoundland, if we had not fallen in with
Ireland in our way. Two ways remained to avoid this.
One was to put into port of Galicia, the other
to beat to the westward with as little sail as possible,
And this was our captain's election. As for us poor passengers,

(46:56):
any port would have been welcome to us, especially as
not only our fresh provisions, except a great number of
old ducks and fowls, but even our bread was come
to an end, and nothing but sea biscuit remained, which
I could not chew, so that now, for the first
time in my life, I saw what it was to

(47:16):
want a bit of bread. The wind, however, was not
so unkind as we had apprehended, but having declined with
the sun, it changed at the approach of the moon
and became again favorable to us, though so gentle that
the next day's observation carried us very little to the
southward of Cape Finisterre. This evening, at six, the wind,

(47:41):
which had been very quiet all day, rose very high, and,
continuing in our favor, drove us. At seven knots an hour.
This day we saw a sail, the only one as
I heard of we had seen in our whole passage
through the bay. I mentioned this on account of what
appeared to me somewhat extraordinary, though she was at such

(48:04):
a distance that I could only perceive she was a ship.
The sailors discovered that she was a snow bound to
a port in Galicia. Sunday, after prayers, which our good
captain read on the deck with an audible voice, and
with but one mistake of Lion of Elias in the

(48:27):
second lesson for this day, we found ourselves far advanced
in forty two degrees, and the captain declared we should
sup off Portee. We had not much wind this day,
but as this was directly in our favor, we made
it up with sail, of which we crowded all we had.

(48:49):
We went only at the rate of four miles an hour,
but with so uneasy a motion continuing rolling from side
to side, that I suffered more than I had done
in our whole voyage, my bowels being almost twisted out
of my belling. However, the day was very serene and bright,

(49:11):
and the captain, who was in high spirits, affirmed he
had never passed a pleasanter at sea. The wind continued
so brisk that we ran upward of six knots an
hour the whole night Monday. In the morning, our captain
concluded that he was got into latitude forty degrees and

(49:32):
was very little short of the Burlings, as they are
called in the charts. We came up with them at
five in the afternoon, being the first land we had
distinctly seen since we left Devonshire. They consist of abundance
of little rocky islands a little distant from the shore,
three of them only showing themselves above the water. Here

(49:55):
the Portuguese maintain a kind of garrison, if we may
allow that name. It consists of malefactors who are banished
hither for a term for diverse small offenses, a policy
which they may have copied from the Egyptians, as we
may read in Diodorus Siculus. These wise people, to prevent

(50:18):
the corruption of good manners by evil communication, built a
town on the Red Sea, whither they transported a great
number of their criminals, having first set an indelible mark
on them, to prevent their returning and mixing with the
sober part of their citizens. These rocks lie about fifteen

(50:41):
leagues northwest of Cape roxentt Or, as it is commonly
called the Rock of Lisbon, which we passed early the
next morning. The wind indeed would have carried us thither sooner,
but the captain was not in a hurry, as he
was to lose nothing by his delay. Tuesday. This is

(51:02):
a very high mountain situated on the northern side of
the mouth of the river Tajo, which rising about Madrid
in Spain, and soon becoming navigable for small craft empties
itself after a long course into the sea. About four
leagues below Lisbon, on the summit of the rock stands

(51:23):
a hermitage which is now in the possession of an
Englishman who was formerly master of a vessel trading to Lisbon,
and having changed his religion and his manners, the latter
of which at least were none of the best, betook
himself to this place in order to do penance for
his sins. He is now very old and hath inhabited

(51:46):
this hermitage for a great number of years, during which
he hath received some countenance from the royal family, and
particularly from the present Queen dowager whose piety refuses no
trouble or expense by which she may make, a proselytite
being used to say that the saving one soul would

(52:08):
repay all the endeavors of her life. Here we waited
for the tide and had the pleasure of surveying the
face of the country, the soil of which, at this
season exactly resembles an old brick kiln, or a field
where the green sward is pared up and set a burning,

(52:28):
or rather a smoking in little heaps to manure the land.
This sight will, perhaps of all others, make an Englishman
proud of and pleased with his own country, which in
Verde excels I believe every other country. Another deficiency here
is the want of large trees, nothing above a shrub,

(52:51):
being here to be discovered in the circumference of many miles.
At this place we took a pilot on board, who,
being the first Portuguese we spoke to, gave us an
instance of that religious observance which is paid by all
nations to their laws. For whereas it is here a
capital offense to assist any person in going on shore

(53:16):
from a foreign vessel, before it hath been examined, and
every person in it viewed by the magistrates of health,
as they are called. This worthy pilot, for a small reward,
rode the Portuguese priest to shore at this place, beyond
which he did not dare to advance, and in venturing

(53:36):
whither he had given sufficient testimony of love for his
native country. We did not enter the Tajo till noon, when,
after passing several old castles and other buildings which had
greatly the aspect of ruins, we came to the castle
of Billile, where we had a full prospect of Lisbon,

(53:57):
and were indeed within three miles of it. Here we
were saluted with a gun, which was a signal to
pass no further till we had complied with certain ceremonies
which the laws of this country require to be observed
by all ships which arrive in this port. We were
obliged then to cast anchor and expect the arrival of

(54:20):
the Officers of the Customs, without whose passport no ship
must proceed further than this place. Here. Likewise, we received
a visit from one of those magistrates of health before mentioned.
He refused to come on board the ship till every
person in her had been drawn up on deck and

(54:40):
personally viewed by him. This occasioned some delay on my part,
as it was not the work of a minute to
lift me from the cabin to the deck. The captain
thought my particular case might have been excused from this ceremony,
and that it would be abundantly sufficient of the magistrate,
who was obliged afterwards to visit the cabin, surveyed me there.

(55:04):
But this did not satisfy the magistrate's strict regard to
his duty. When he was told of my lameness, he
called out with a voice of authority, let him be
brought up, and his orders were presently complied with. He was,
indeed a person of great dignity, as well as of
the most exact fidelity in the discharge of his trust,

(55:27):
both of which are the more admirable, as his salary
is less than thirty pounds English per annum. Before a
ship hath been visited by one of those magistrates, no
person can lawfully go on board her, nor can any
on board depart from her. This I saw exemplified in
a remarkable instance. The young lad whom I have mentioned

(55:51):
as one of our passengers, was here met by his father, who,
on the first news of the captain's arrival, came from
Lisbon to Bellisle in a bout, being eager to embrace
a son whom he had not seen for many years.
But when he came alongside our ship, neither did the
father dare ascend, nor the son descend, as the Magistrate

(56:15):
of Health had not yet been on board. Some of
our readers will perhaps admire the great caution of this policy,
so nicely calculated for the preservation of this country from
all pestilential distempers. Others will as probably regard it as
too exact and formal to be constantly persisted in in

(56:38):
seasons of the utmost safety, as well as in times
of danger. I will not decide either way, but will
content myself with observing that I never yet saw or
heard of a place where a traveler had so much
trouble given him at his landing as here. The only
use of which, as all such matters begin and end

(57:01):
in form only, is to put it into the power
of low and mean fellows, to be either rudely officious
or grossly corrupt, as they shall see occasion, to prefer
the gratification of their pride or of their avarice of
this kind. Likewise is that hour which is lodged with

(57:23):
other officers here, of taking away every grain of snuff
and every leaf of tobacco brought hither from other countries,
though only for the temporary use of the person during
his residence here. This is executed with great insolence, and
as it is in the hands of the dregs of

(57:43):
the people, very scandalously, for under the pretense of searching
for tobacco and snuff, they are sure to steal whatever
they can find, insomuch that when they came on board,
our sailors addressed us in the covent garden and language, pray,
gentlemen and ladies, take care of your swords and watches. Indeed,

(58:06):
I never yet saw anything equal to the contempt and
hatred which our honest tours every moment expressed for these
Portuguese officers. At Bellisle lies buried Catharine of Aragon, widow
of Prince Arthur, eldest son of our Henry the seventh,
afterwards married to and divorced from Henry the eighth, close

(58:30):
by the church, where her remains are deposited in a
large convent of Geronomites, one of the most beautiful piles
of buildings in all Portugal. In the evening at twelve
our ship, having received previous visits from all the necessary parties,
took the advantage of the tide, and having sailed up

(58:51):
to Lisbon cast Anchor, there in a calm and moonshiny night,
which made the passage incredibly pleasant to the women, who
remained three hours enjoying it, whilst I was left to
the cooler transports of enjoying their pleasures at second hand.
And yet cooler as they may be, whoever is totally

(59:13):
ignorant of such sensation, is at the same time void
of all ideas of friendship. Wednesday, Lisbon, before which we
now lay at Anchor, is said to be built on
the same number of hills with old Rome, but these
do not all appear to the water. On the contrary,

(59:37):
one sees from thence one vast high hill and rock,
with buildings arising above one another, and that in so
steep and almost perpendicular a manner that they all seem
to have but one foundation. As the houses, convents, churches,
et cetera, a large, and all built with white stone,

(01:00:01):
they look very beautiful at a distance. But as you
approach nearer, and to find them to want every kind
of ornament, all idea of beauty vanishes at once. While
I was surveying the prospect of this city, which bears
so little resemblance to any other that I have seen,
a reflection occurred to me that if a man was

(01:00:23):
suddenly to be removed from Palmyra hither and should take
a view of no other city, in how glorious a
light would the ancient architecture appear to him, And what
desolation and destruction of arts and sciences would he conclude
had happened between the several eras of these cities. I

(01:00:46):
had now waited full three hours upon deck for the
return of my man, whom I had sent to bespeak
a good dinner, a thing which had been long unknown
to me on shore, and then to bring a Lisbon
chase with him to the sea shore. But it seems
the impertinence of the provodor was not yet brought to

(01:01:08):
a conclusion. At three o'clock, when I was from emptiness
rather faint than hungry, my man returned and told me
there was a new law lately made that no passenger
should set his foot on shore without a special order
from the Provodor, and that he himself would have been

(01:01:29):
sent to prison for disobeying it had he not been
protected as the servant of the captain. He informed me
likewise that the captain had been very industrious to get
this order, but that it was then the Provodor's hour
of sleep, a time when no man except the King
himself dust disturb him to avoid prolxity. Though in part

(01:01:55):
of my narrative, which may be more agreeable to my
reader than it was to me, the Provador, having at
last finished his nap, dispatched this absurd matter of form,
and gave me leave to come, or rather to be
carried on shore. What it was that gave the first
hint of this strange laws not easy to guess. Possibly,

(01:02:16):
in the infancy of their defection, and before their government
could be well established, they were willing to guard against
the bare possibility of surprise, of the success of which
bare possibility the Trojan Horse will remain for ever on
record as a great and memorable example. Now the Portuguese
have no walls to secure them, and a vessel of

(01:02:39):
two or three hundred tons will contain a much larger
body of troops than could be concealed in that famous machine,
though Virgil tells us somewhat hyperbolically, I believe that it
was as big as a mountain. About seven in the
evening I got into a chaise on shore and was
driven through the nastiest city in the world, though at

(01:03:03):
the same time one of the most populous, to a
kind of coffee house, which is very pleasantly situated on
the brow of a hill about a mile from the city,
and hath a very fine prospect of the river Tajo
from Lisbon to the sea. Here we regaled ourselves with
a good supper, for which we were as well charged

(01:03:26):
as if the bill had been made on the Bath
road between Newbury and London. And now we could joyfully
say aggresse ptata troes po tiuntur arena. Therefore, on the
words of Horace, he a phenis chartaeque vie quei. End
of section five Recording by James Carson and of Journal

(01:03:52):
of a Voyage to Lisbon by Henry Fielding