1828.] [ 165 J 
PORTUGAL ILLUSTRATED.* 
Tur author of the work before us, sets out in his labours with an 
intimation, that his design in visiting Portugal was “ to bring back remi- 
niscences of the feelings, manners, and customs of its inhabitants, which 
might make the people of England better acquainted with the peculiar 
features of Portugal, than are even the inhabitants themselves.” Our 
readers in general will agree that this is a somewhat hardy (however 
highly laudable) proposition; and we are afraid it would be little 
better than flattery if we were to encourage the writer to believe 
that he has succeeded to any thing like the full extent of it. Indeed, 
however little—as it seems to be agreed by travellers generally—the 
natives of countries are in the habit of being acquainted with their own 
affairs, we are sometimes, on reading continental tours, visited with a 
suspicion, that the foreigners who speak upon a six weeks’ residence, 
know still less about them. A gentleman, for instance, perhaps, but 
superficially informed, even as far as the intelligence of previous voyagers 
can go, of the condition of a country like Spain or Portugal ; wholly 
ignorant of its laws, its home resources, and civil institutions ; acquainted 
with its foreign and commercial interests and relations, only just in such 
a degree as qualifies him to make mistakes about them; and totally 
unacquainted—for this is the case three times out of four—even with the 
language of the people upon whom he is to observe, and among whom 
he is moving ; such an individual, necessarily incompetent, upon forty- 
nine points out of fifty that come before him, even to distinguish between 
cause and effect; with no test to decide by between right and wrong, 
but that which has been formed for another state of existence and almost 
in another hemisphere ;—such an individual goes forth, and after a term 
of six months travel, which may perhaps have afforded him a week in 
each considerable city, and a fortnight in the capital, returns ready to 
pronounce a full and dispassionate opinion upon the general statistics, 
the military and political strength, the morals, prospects, arts, religion, 
literature, and general cultivation of the country which he has visited ! 
Now let any reasonable person take the trouble to consider what would 
be the condition of an Italian or Frenchman, who should attempt to 
perform this sort of exploit in England? who should propose, after 
travelling by stage-coach from Essex to Anglesea one way, and from 
Kent to Northumberland the other, to give his countrymen a “ better 
notion” of England than the English have themselves—or even any notion 
of England at all? And yet this work would be a trifle—e mere juggler’s 
trick—compared with the performance of a similar task in Spain or 
Portugal ; where, it is true, the field for inquiry would be less varied, but 
where no sources of information—no aids for satisfying inquiry—exist 
at all. In England, let a stranger but have the power to read, and 
knowledge forces itself upon him on every side. There is scarcely a 
subject or a question of any general, or even temporary importance, to 
which he may not find a manual in almost every shop window. Our 
climate, geology, topography, is all measured, and set down; we have 
a survey of our land almost by inches, in the very road books, and the 
children’s primers. Our books of science, law, statistics, in three years 
are useless and gone by ; new interests have arisen; new changes have 
* Portugal IMlustrated ; By the Rev. W. M. Kinsey, of Trinity College, Oxford, B.D., 
with a Map, Plates, Vignettes, &c. &c., Treuttel and Wiirtz, London. 
