A number of what I imagineu to be decayed gentry, whose
daily routine seemed to be to do nothing all the morning, and to
rest themselves in the evening, were lounging before the principal
church, or along the torrent wall, in rusty black coats and washed-
out nankeens, set off by a large cane. These I was told were
Morgados or Proprietors, to whom industry of any kind would be
a stain, and who can only condescend to superintend their own
properties, that is, to watch how many eggs the hens of their hardworking
tenants lay, in order that they may exact the rigorous
half of every thing produced, not only by, but upon their estates.
I called upon one of these grandees a little after eight o’clock in the
morning, to inquire about a chalybeate spring which was described
to be in his ground, and such a scene I never before witnessed.
The house seemed as if it would fall about our ears every, moment,
many of the stairs were broken in, and there was no door to the
chamber in which I discovered the taper figure of the proprietor,
floating about in a ragged dressing gown, whilst his lady (a huge
deformed woman, her yellow visage begrimed with dirt, her neck
uncovered, and her why black hair likening her to a Medusa) was
attempting to draw her unwholesome fingers, instead of a comb
(occasionally using her nails), through the thick, matted, uncut
locks of four squalid, unwashed, and almost naked children, who
slipped away to take , another roll on one of the two filthy
mattresses, which still lay on the rat-eaten floor of this family sty.
A pen and ink, and a few papers in the window-seat, gave my
friend the Genoese occasion to whisper, that this Morgado gained
a few pistrines occasionally as a lawyer; be that as it may, he
almost overwhelmed me with his sweeping bows, which I was
compelled to return with a liberal discount, and stiff circumspection,
lest I should slip a leg through one of the gaps, which
threatened me with a sort of infernal region below. What a
delight it was to breathe the fresh air again, and to sit down to
our breakfast in the well-swept cabin of our boat-master, who
waited on us in a snow-white shirt and trowsers, and directed my
attention, as if by way of antidote, to the clean, pretty little
peasant girls who were offering chestnuts at the door. If the
unfortunate man we had just visited, thought I, were wise, he
might make himself rich and respectable at once, by descending,
or rather raising himself to that class which .Providence has made
superior in this island, although man may call it otherwise, and
by cultivating his own vineyard, half the profits of which, less the
tax to the crown, support with some degree of comfort, a labourious
family, perhaps larger than his own, which lingers through a bare existence,
in filth and wretchedness, on the remainder. But, probably,
this poor man could not, even if he would, take his property into
his own hands. The law which permitted the proprietor to enjoy,
not only half the profits of the labours of the tenant, but half of
every thing that springs up, or is reared about his cabin, warranted
the latter to take advantage of every means of protecting himself
against the non-renewal of a lease, from caprice or any more
interested feeling, which might dispossess him of what his own
exertions had improved, perhaps created. He was enjoined to
build walls to keep up the soil, spread over declivities, and to
defend it from the torrent; which walls he was to be paid for at
the valuation of any other tenant, sworn by the camera, when
compelled to quit the property. Stone abounded”, and he devoted
the leisure of particular seasons, to multiplying these loose walls
as much as possible! whether useful or not. The quarrels with
the proprietor, and all these accumulated walls, are estimated, not
only far above their value in point of usefulness, but far above
the value of the labour and materials expended. The proprietor,
* To split the compact basalt, they make a strong fire on the mass, and then throw
water on it. Thete' rude walls are valued at from six to ten dollars the bragsa (about
7 feet 3£ inches); torrent, or river walls at forty.