COIMBRA. 105 



true home of the bargain, and in which all Orientals are 

 finished adepts. 



The drive from Leiria to Pombal was through a country 

 still wilder and more desolate than that we had hitherto 

 crossed. The forest stretched away to the horizon on 

 either hand; the sand was more continuous and unpro- 

 ductive ; the hills were more barren and bleak ; and the 

 few villages we passed at long intervals were but wretched 

 hamlets, formed of mud houses of unprepossessing ex- 

 terior, and where the struggle for existence must have 

 appeared so hopeless to the forlorn inhabitants — if, at least, 

 they had become converts to the Darwinian theory — that 

 they must have given up the attempt in despair. Let us 

 hope, however, that they did not hold with those terrible 

 views : and, indeed, I must do the Portuguese peasant the 

 justice to say, that he is not one easily depressed ; but, 

 under apparently the most adverse outward circumstances, 

 bears himself with a freedom from care and a hilarity that 

 would have drawn down the approbation of the renowned 

 Mark Tapley. 



At length we reached the straggling town of Pombal, 

 also crowned with a ruined castle, but otherwise of no 

 pretensions architecturally ; though the name has derived 

 great notoriety from the title which the town bestowed on 

 the famous Marquis who was born there, and who during 

 the middle of the eighteenth century played so conspi- 

 cuous a part in his country's annals as statesman, re- 

 former, and absolute minister. I have already said that 

 great difference of opinion exists with respect to the 

 merits of this powerful nobleman ; and it can scarcely be 

 denied that his means were oftentimes unjustifiable, and 

 his actions unscrupulous and unjust towards individuals: 

 but it is equally certain, that the results of his energetic 

 measures were, that the commerce of the country was 

 restored, the finauces were re-organised, the frontiers were 



