SAFFRON PICKERS SORTING THEIR CROP.To face page 285.
SAFFRON PICKERS SORTING THEIR CROP.To face page 285.
SAFFRON PICKERS SORTING THEIR CROP.
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Amongthe sources of the national revenue of Spain there are several which more especially affect the poorer portion of the community, or, by hampering trade and manufactures, put obstacles in the way of the national prosperity. Among these may be especially mentioned the Customs duties, the tax on trades, business, and professions (contribucion industrial) theoctroi, orconsumo, the creation and sale of monopolies, and the national lottery. The total taxation of the country is absolutely crushing, and makes Spain one of the dearest places of residence in Europe.
The Customs are excessively high, especially for a country that has comparatively few manufactures of its own to protect. To take a few instances at random from the Tariff: Straw hats pay about 20 pesetas per kilogramme; preserves, 3 pesetas per kilogramme; typewriters, 8 pesetas per kilogramme; timber in boards, 6 pesetas percubic metre; materials of silk and velvet, from 30 pesetas per kilogramme; woollen materials, from 13 pesetas per kilogramme; drugs at various rates from 36 pesetas per kilogramme downwards, and so forth. The consequence is seen in the prices charged in the shops for ordinary commodities. Thus Danish tinned butter costs pesetas 2.75 per lb.; tapioca, 1 peseta per packet of about ¼ lb.; coffee, pesetas 2.50 to 3 per lb.; Keiller’s marmalade, 3 to 4 pesetas the 1 lb. pot; Burroughs & Welcome’s tabloids, pesetas 2.50 the small bottle of 25; and most other things in about the same proportion.[24]The Customs receipts form, with the exception of the tax on real estate, the largest single item in the Budget. For the year 1909 they were estimated at pesetas 153,600,000 (£6,144,000).
TheContribucion industrialis a tax upon every imaginable trade, profession, and industry that can be exercised: on merchants, manufacturers, shopkeepers, professional men of all sorts, on means of transit, on public entertainments, on schools, newspapers—in short, it is almost impossible to find any kind of business or occupation that is not taxed.
The amount of the tax varies with the population, a scale of ten different rates being drawn up according to the size of the town. Bankers pay from about £300 a year downwards, according to the place of residence; merchants from £200; shopkeepers from £70; hotels from £60; contractors 6 per mil. on their contracts; railways £10 per kilometre constructed, and a tax on their receipts; brokers from £80; newspapers from £35; publishers from £25; private schools from £10; and so on. It is tedious and unnecessary to accumulate instances.[25]
That such a burdensome tax as this necessarily hampers trade and goes to prevent commercial and industrial development needs no demonstration: the thing is self-evident. The compiler of the manual of this law says in his Introduction, with perfect truth, that it has the radical defect of making heavier demands as the trader’s profits fall, and that the framers of the law, so far from attempting to harmonise the interests of the Treasury with those of the taxpayer, thought only how to squeeze him, so that the tax nips in the bud whatever might aid in the increase of prosperity or open new fields for the productiveness of the nation.
This tax immediately affects the professional and commercial classes: the poor, such as street hawkers, journeymen labourers, fishermen, &c., are exempt; but indirectly they too suffer, as naturally it helps to increase the price of necessaries.
The greatest burden on the working classes—and it is a very grievous one—is theoctroi, orconsumo, a heavy tax on nearly every kind of food, drink, and fuel, and on timber, stone, lime, &c.; in short, on nearly everything that is consumed in use. The fisherman has to payconsumoon his catch before he can sell it; the farmer on his dead meat, poultry, and eggs brought to market; the charcoal-burner on his charcoal; and so on. The tax, varying in details, is levied in every town and village, and thus may be, and often is, paid twice over by the same goods, if they happen to be conveyed from one town to another.
It is obvious that such a tax on the necessaries of life presses with exceptional severity on the poor, and it is, moreover, steadily rising, while wages remain stationary. It is usually farmed out to syndicates which are said, and no doubt with truth, to be making enormous profits out of it. These syndicates are believed by the people to consist in many cases of persons who
A SELLER OF PALM-LEAF BRUSHES AND FANS.[To face page289.
A SELLER OF PALM-LEAF BRUSHES AND FANS.[To face page289.
A SELLER OF PALM-LEAF BRUSHES AND FANS.
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represent the Jesuits, and the oppressiveness of the tax and the steady rise in its amount form another count in the heavy indictment of the poor against the Religious Orders. The estimated receipts from this tax in the Budget for 1909 were pesetas 58,000,000 (about £3,520,000).
“Everything in the country is dying of theconsumos,” said a working woman of about sixty years of age, who remembers with regret how much easier the life of the poor was in the days of Isabel II. “Every four years the contract for theconsumosin our province is put up to auction, and every time they are sold the price is raised four or five thousand duros,[26]andwehave to pay the difference. Yesterday Manolo paid four durosconsumofor the fish he sold in the market, and all he had for himself after twenty-four hours’ work was ten reals. The man who rents theconsumosfrom the Government is rotten with money (podrido de dinero): millions and millions of pesetas he has, all wrung from the necessities of the poor. Don Alfonso does not like it; every one knows that. If he had his own way there would be noconsumofor the poor. Already since he came into power wehave been relieved of theconsumoon wine, green vegetables, and potatoes, and they say that two years hence, when the contract runs out, he wishes that it shall not be renewed. But that would not suit the Government nor the Jesuits, who are mixed up in this business. They would lose too much which they now are able to put into their own pockets. So they would like to make another revolution to get rid of Don Alfonso, as they got rid of his grandmother, before their contract comes to an end. In her time bread cost just half what it does now, twenty-five eggs cost five reals (pesetas 1.25) instead of two pesetas a dozen, and for four cuartos we could buy a piece of pork as big as we get now for two reals.[27]Salt was free ofconsumo, so was oil, so was cheese, and shell-fish and chestnuts sold in the street were not taxed, so that they could be bought for much less than now, and the whole reason is because the Government lets the taxes instead of taking the trouble to collect them as was done in the time of Queen Isabella.”
Whether this good lady, whose words I have translated literally from notes made at the time, was right or wrong in her supposition as to the interest of the Jesuits in this tax, and as to the quadrennial increase in the amount paid for itby the syndicate of farmers who exploit it, I cannot say. I quote her words as an instance of what is said on all sides by her class whenever the subject is mentioned, and as far as I can learn she is quite correct in her comparison of the prices of food now with those of forty years or so ago.
Tobacco and sugar are Government monopolies, farmed out to companies, which also are popularly believed to be under the control of the Jesuits. I have never seen any accounts of the profits of the Tobacco Company, but their shares are quoted at about 390 to 400, which speaks for itself. The tobacco they supply is very bad, and outrageously dear. The estimated receipts from this source were pesetas 140,400,000 (£5,616,000).
The sugar trust was created comparatively recently. A short account of the last annual meeting of the shareholders was published by the Press in November, 1909, from which it appears that the trust made a profit in the year, in round figures, of pesetas 8,400,000 on a gross income of pesetas 14,600,000 (say £336,000 on £584,000), and pays a dividend of 8 per cent. And during the past twelve months the price of sugar has been rising, and now stands at about 7d. per lb. Figures like these, relatingto a necessary of life which is the one luxury of the poor, do not require comment, especially in view of the fact that enough cane and beetroot sugar for the entire needs of the population could be produced in the country, where both soil and climate are suitable in a great part of the southern provinces. But one company after another has been crushed out of existence, and only ruined factories remain to remind the traveller of what ought to be prosperous undertakings, beneficial to the whole nation. From this source the State gets pesetas 31,600,000 (£1,264,000).
Matches are another monopoly, also farmed out. They are of course bad and very dear—½d. or 1d. for fifty matches, according to quality. The conditions under which the operatives work are, I am told on good authority, simply deplorable, and growing worse instead of better. The estimated receipts are pesetas 10,000,000 (£400,000).
A tax which combines a maximum of irritation with a minimum of profit is one which is levied on the business books of persons engaged in commerce. Every page of the ledger, cash book, press copy book, &c., has to be officially stamped at a charge of so much per page: the total charge for a complete set of commercial books sometimes amounting to 500 pesetas(£20), and not only so, but the Government—presumably in order to get more out of the tax—prescribes the method by which the merchant must keep his books. I was told by the manager of a large foreign industrial concern that he has to employ twice as many clerks as he needs, solely because the authorities insist on a cumbrous and obsolete system of book-keeping.
The law enacts that pious foundations which offer their manufactures for public sale are liable to taxation. It is currently said that this obligation is evaded. Whether this is the case or not I cannot say from personal knowledge, but certainly any visitor can purchase sweets or needlework made in the convents. Indeed, some of them are celebrated for their confectionery, which is always sold a trifle under the cost of similar goods made by a lay tradesman.
If the taxes were fairly and honestly collected, their amount could be materially reduced. But as a matter of fact many are not collected at all from the persons most able to pay. The tax-collector is usually willing, for a consideration, to play the part of the unjust steward, and take less than the proper amount. It is sometimes said that only fools and foreigners pay the taxes, and cases have occurred in my own knowledge where bribery in the proper quarter has effecteda substantial reduction in the amount accepted. Every resident in Spain knows of such instances: the thing is notorious, is talked of quite openly, and is done with hardly any attempt at concealment. It is impossible to conjecture what proportion of the total taxes due is thus informally remitted, but it must be something considerable.
Complaints about evasions of taxation frequently appear in the papers: thus it was stated as a fact in theLiberalin February, 1910, that about 45 per cent, of those liable forContribution industrialevade payment. In the same newspaper, in the same month, appeared a long statement, signed by the officials of the Guild of Cab Proprietors in one of the large towns, accusing certain owners of livery stables, who let smart carriages for hire, of defrauding the municipality of some 50,000 pesetas (about £2,000) a year by falsifying the declarations on which they take out their licences, and no attempt was made to show that the accusation was unfounded. Complaints about evasion of taxation by large landowners also are of frequent occurrence.
Quite recently the Government has seriously taken up this question of falsified returns, especially in the case of real estate, and is making a systematic inspection of the properties liable for taxation. An immense amountof fraud has already been discovered in the towns, and the case of the rural estates is probably worse. I was lately told of an instance where, to my informant’s knowledge, an estate which adjoins his own has been paying 60 pesetas a year, whereas it should have paid about 2,000. In some parts of the country the large landowners are doing their utmost to oppose the carrying on of the Ordnance Survey, because the effect of it would be to define and make public the extent of their property.
An ingenious mode of defrauding the exchequer of succession duties is practised on a gigantic scale. This consists in depositing personal property in the banks in the joint names of all concerned, actual holders and heirs apparent, to the order of any one of them. Thus on the death of the father, the owner of the personal estate, it passes to his son without any legal intervention, and the Treasury is powerless to collect the succession duties. Under the Spanish law as it now stands, if one of the owners of such a joint deposit dies, the deposit pays a proportion of the duties corresponding to the number of names in which it stands: a half if there are two, a third if there are three, and so on. In January, 1910, there were “undefined deposits” (depósitos indistintos) as they are calledamounting to nearly 519,700,000 pesetas (about £20,788,000) in the Bank of Spain alone, and Alvarado, Moret’s Minister of Finance, obtained a Royal Decree dealing with these deposits. His plan was simple: merely to make the joint deposit liable for the whole duty on the death of any one of those interested. As this would oblige the owner to pay if the heir died first, it is obvious that the practice of depositing in joint names would at once come to an end. But Cobian, Alvarado’s successor in Canalejas’ Ministry, suspended the decree, a proceeding inexplicable in a Minister whose Chief loudly proclaims his democratic principles. Meanwhile the depositors took immediate advantage of the respite afforded them by the suspension of the decree to transfer some 200,000,000 pesetas (about £8,000,000) to banks abroad, and most probably a good deal more will go the same way. The Religious Orders are fighting the decree tooth and nail, because while legally formed associations, who do not desire to conceal their capital, do not object to the decree, illegal associations, who have reasons for secrecy as to their affairs, find in the system of joint deposits an easy way of escaping their liabilities. It must be remembered that most of the Religious Orders now established in Spain are illegal, theConcordat only allowing of two, together with a third not yet named.
It is always assumed, as a matter of course, that the whole administration of the country is corrupt. When an unexpected deficit appears in public accounts, governmental or municipal, when a sum of money voted for a certain purpose has evidently not been spent as intended, when, as frequently happens, money owing by the State or the Municipality is not paid—in short, whenever there is anything in the national or local administration of the public funds which calls for explanation, it is taken for granted that some one in office has been stealing. Whether this assumption is justified or not I do not pretend to say. All I know is that it is universally made.
I asked a Spaniard on one occasion why a certain public building had never been finished. “No doubt the Alcalde uses the money to keep up his carriage,” was the reply. The man certainly did not know the facts, but this was to him the most plausible explanation. When a few years ago Admiral Cervera was ordered to fight the United States with ships armed with obsolete guns and shells that did not fit them, every one said, and still says, if the subject is spoken of, that officials in the Government stolethe money that ought to have been spent on the Navy. The system extends, or is said to extend, from the highest ranks of officialdom downwards, and if this is true, it must necessarily operate in substantially reducing the total funds available for the Treasury.
A minor matter, which I only mention because, it goes to illustrate once more the system of over-taxation with no adequate result, is the postal service. A letter in Spain does not cost a penny, as it does everywhere else; it costs twopence: of this three-halfpence are paid by the sender and a halfpenny by the receiver. In exchange for this, the Government gives a service which is indifferent in the large towns, and infamously bad in the smaller towns and the rural districts, where there is no security whatever that any given letter will reach sender or receiver, and where, to my own knowledge, a very large number are lost.
Gambling in the national lottery, which is drawn about three times a month, is almost universal, and an immense amount of money must be wasted on it. I remember seeing a man in a second-class railway carriage, after borrowing my newspaper to see the result of a drawing, throw away at least a dozen tickets, representing a cost of either three or five pesetaseach. The lottery is conducted with absolute fairness, and it might be argued that, as people will gamble, it is better that they should do so on a straightforward lottery than,e.g., on horse-racing or some other sport of doubtful honesty. On the other hand, there is no doubt that the fact of these lottery tickets being thrust under the noses of the public all day long, coupled with the reports current in conversation and the particulars given in the Press of the sudden wealth which has accrued to this and the other working man through a lucky number, must foment the gambling spirit, which is sufficiently rife in Spain without any such official encouragement. The estimated net receipts from the lottery for 1909 were pesetas 35,250,000 (£1,410,000).
It must be borne in mind, in connection with the universal venality of the lower grades of the bureaucracy, that a certain amount of excuse is to be found in the salaries they receive, which are miserably small in amount and often in arrears. When a man has to keep himself and his family on two pesetas a day, it is not surprising that he takes advantage of the opportunities which his official position gives him to increase by illicit means a wage on which it is quite impossible that he should live decently and honestly.
Theregeneration of Spain must necessarily be a slow process, for the causes of her degradation are deep-seated, and are not to be removed by mere legislative enactments or alteration of the machinery of government. One of the principal difficulties with which the country has to contend is the dishonesty of the bureaucracy, which paralyses any reform that may be attempted. Of what use is legislation, when the laws are not honestly administered? If what is the common talk of all classes has any foundation whatever in fact, the whole of the bureaucracy, from top to bottom, not excluding the inferior judiciary, is venal and corrupt, and until a tradition of honest administration is established amendment will be difficult, if not impossible.
The history of Spain for the last three hundred years affords an illustration of the proposition established by Lecky[28]that “the periodof Catholic ascendancy was on the whole one of the most deplorable in the history of the human mind.” In no country in Western Europe has the Church of Rome been so entirely absolute and dominant, since the Reformation, as in Spain, where the Inquisition instantly and finally crushed out all freedom of thought and all opposition to theological orthodoxy. The Church in Spain to-day enjoys the unique position of holding a monopoly of the spiritual direction of the nation. Although other creeds and forms of worship are tolerated, there is no religious liberty. Everywhere else, even in Catholic countries, there is a vigilant and hostile body of opinion, of more or less weight, which necessarily contributes by its very existence to moralise the Church and to enforce on the priesthood a certain standard of duty. In Spain this check is absent. There is no rival Church, for the Spanish Protestants are too few in number and too insignificant in position to make their influence felt, and the working classes, who, as has been shown, are bitterly hostile to the priesthood, are inarticulate, and powerless as an influence corrective of abuses, while the middle classes, who might do something towards enforcing a higher standard, are generally speaking, indifferent.
To what extent the corruption of the spiritualpower in Spain is responsible for the low moral standard of the laity is an exceedingly difficult question, on which I am not capable of pronouncing an opinion. There is no doubt that Spain for the last three hundred years has suffered from a succession of some of the worst, the most incompetent, and the most corrupt rulers known to history. During all this time, except perhaps during the thirty years when Charles III. was on the throne, the Church was supreme. If the clergy, the directors of the conscience of the nation, armed with the power of the confessional and supported if necessary by the secular arm, had deliberately set their faces against the system of public venality and corruption instituted by Lerma and Olivares and continued by their subordinates and successors, it is difficult to believe that the upas-tree would have grown so tall and struck its roots so deeply as it has.
The excessive centralisation of the whole administration in Madrid, coupled with the Spanish habit of writing long letters and reports about every trivial question, which reports are referred for further information from one official to another before the Minister or other authority gives his final decision, paralyses all initiative and causes infinite delays and annoyances overthe simplest matters. On the other hand, if effective local self-government were given under existing conditions, theCaciquewould be even more powerful than he now is, and Spain would be ruled, not by a single bureaucracy, but by a number of irresponsible autocrats.
Thus before Spain can effectually reform herself there is needed a change of heart, a vital conviction that only through honest and fearless administration is redemption possible. An educated Spaniard once observed to me, when discussing this matter: “In England you act on the supposition that a person in office is an honest man, and if you find that he is not, you punish him severely. In Spain we presuppose dishonesty, and do not chastise the rogue when he is found out.” This is perfectly true. There are swarms of official inspectors who are supposed to inspect everything connected with the public administration. But the inspectors themselves are venal, and for a sufficient consideration will report that all is well when it is far from well.Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?It is the rarest thing to hear of any official being punished for peculation or receiving bribes.
Every educated Spaniard is fully aware of this canker, which is rotting the whole body politic: they talk to each other and to foreigners aboutit with the utmost frankness, entirely recognising the greatness of the evil and usually despairing of any amendment.
To turn to another side of the same question. In a different way the bullfight is responsible for an amount of moral degradation that no one but a Spaniard can adequately estimate. It is not only that the spectacle of broken-down horses gored to death and a wild beast worried for half an hour at a stretch is in itself debasing, but the whole atmosphere created by the amusement is thoroughly vicious and degrading. This is not merely my private opinion: I repeat what has been told me by cultured and thoughtful Spaniards, who see in its popularity one of the many obstacles to the growth of a higher standard of morality. Happily there are indications that the taste for the sport is on the wane. I know numerous members of the upper middle class and many working people, both men and women, who object strongly to the institution, and never attend a bullfight, and bullrings have been closed in many of the smaller towns during the last ten years or so, for want of support. But the vested interests—the cattle-breeders who make their living by breeding the bulls, the impresarios who get up the shows, the companies who have invested millions of pesetas in buildingbullring’s, the thousands of men employed in them in various capacities, and the bull-fighters themselves—form together a very powerful combination with a good deal of political influence, and it will be many years yet before this blot on civilisation disappears.[29]
One deplorable fact connected with the bullfights is the extent to which they are patronised by foreign visitors, and of these the English are among the worst offenders. I have been told, though I cannot vouch for the truth of the statement, that one bullring close to Gibraltar is practically kept going by the English spectators, and that but for their support it would be closed. I know that Englishmen and English women, in scores and hundreds, every year, some of them ardent supporters at home of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, make a point, when they come to Spain, of going to see the show. “No, I daresay I shan’t like it,” they will say, “but when one is in Spain it is one of the things one ought to see.” Let us hope that they do not realise that their example goes tomake the task of the Spanish social reformers even more up-hill and heart-breaking than it need be.
I may instance an University professor who was wearing himself out in the endeavour to raise the moral and intellectual standard of his pupils. He himself was educated in England, and had the highest respect for English customs and institutions and for the general code of English honour. He told me that he had lain awake all one night trying to find a reply to his lads when they said: “If the English, whom you hold up to us as an example in so many ways, support the bullfight, there can be no reason why we should condemn it.”
“And meanwhile,” said the professor bitterly, “your English ladies come out of the bullring and tell me that what they have seen there proves us to be a nation of barbarians.”
In this connection it should be remembered that Spaniards of all classes have a great admiration for England and English institutions, which has been recently increased thanks to the popularity of the Queen. One sees this in all directions. English is beginning to replace French as the first foreign language a young Spaniard learns; English games and English fashions are rapidly being introduced; and one of the leadersof the Republican party has proclaimed a democratic Monarchy on English lines to be the best compromise possible under existing conditions in Spain. So that the support which English visitors give to the bullring is probably more influential for harm than that of other foreigners.
Materially, moreover, the bullring operates in a manner prejudicial to the country. All the best land has to be given up to the bulls, which require immense space to keep them from fighting each other. Thus great estates, which, if cultivated, would employ numerous labourers and produce a rich return, are lost to the nation.
In this matter, too, the Church might exercise a good influence and does not. On the contrary, the Clericalist newspapers give at least as much space to reports of the bullfights as do any others, and one of the reproaches levelled against the clergy by the working classes is that they attend these shows disguised in lay dress, and associate with bullfighters, regardless of the prohibition of the Church. In the parish leaflet already quoted, one of the cases of conscience put is “whether it is a sin to attend a bullfight”: to which the answer returned is, “No, it is not.”
Setting aside the question of a moral reform, without which legislative and administrativechanges can produce little or no fruit, it may be useful to consider what measures are urgently needed to contribute to the intellectual and material development of the country.
First and foremost the Church should be confined to its spiritual functions, and restrained from active interference in politics, education, and business.
In a circular issued by the Bishop of Madrid in December, 1909, on the duties of Catholics in the elections, it is laid down that the Catholic voter must not vote for a Liberal as against a Catholic, and that a Liberal is,inter alia, “one who refuses adhesion to the propositions and doctrines laid down by the Apostolic See,principally in reference to the relations of the Church to the State” (italics mine).
The attitude of Rome to what it calls “liberalism” is so well known that there is no need to dilate upon it here. It is quite certain that unless and until the Church can be excluded from intervention in the State, no progress will be possible. The struggle will, no doubt, be severe, for Spain is now the last stronghold of the Roman Church; but once the democracy can make its voice effectively heard, the end will not be doubtful.
In education the dominance of the Church is,if possible, more prejudicial, more of an obstacle to progress of the best kind, than it is in other branches of the work of the State, and the clergy in Spain, as elsewhere, are resisting with might and main every attempt to set up schools which are not under their control. A sufficiency of good and well-conducted schools is one of the crying needs of the country; the Clericalists say they are unable to finance even the Catholic schools which already exist, yet the lay schools supported by the party of progress, although trivial in number, are not only virulently attacked, but are made the basis of a campaign against the Crown and the Constitution, and every nerve is strained to rally “good Catholics” to the fight against the spread of education among the poor.
Decentralisation of the machinery of administration is badly needed, because under the present system vexatious and unnecessary delays must occur, even were there every desire for progress on the part of all concerned. But local government cannot be effective, as has already been said, until theCaciqueis abolished.
Among what may be called the material elements of progress may be briefly mentioned the need of improved means of communication, especially good roads. Most of the roads which do exist in Spain are very bad, and there areofficially stated to be five thousand villages to which there is no road at all—nothing but a track or path, impassable for wheeled vehicles.
Much needs to be done to encourage agriculture, and to introduce improved methods. Systematic irrigation would render fertile hundreds of square miles of land, now sterile for lack of water. Phylloxera is ravaging the vineyards, and a contagious blight is devastating the orange plantations all over the southern provinces. Neither of these plagues can be effectively combated by private enterprise: public aid and public organisation are essential.
The postal service requires to be overhauled, and security taken, which now does not exist, that postal matter shall reach its destination, and that the contents be not stolenen route, as not infrequently happens.
Last, but not least, the conduct of elections must be reformed, so that the working classes may have an effectual, instead of, as now, a merely nominal vote. With a few notable exceptions they distrust their rulers, of whatever party; it should be made possible for them to return to the local councils and to the Cortes men in whom they have confidence, who know what they want, and who will devote themselves with singleness of mind to getting it. The hope for thefuture of Spain lies in the democracy. The peasantry, from whose ranks the whole of the working classes are more or less directly recruited, are sober, honest, and industrious. They work long hours for low wages without complaint, and employers—English, American, and so on—who come into contact with large numbers of them in the numerous industries established by foreign enterprise in the Peninsula, all speak in the highest terms of them as labourers. In America, too, they are highly valued, and it is said that the men who in the long run prove the most satisfactory and the best able to bear the trying conditions of work on the Panama Canal are the Spanish emigrants, of whom thousands cross the Atlantic every year.
As yet practically no member of this class, no matter what his natural gifts may have been, has ever risen to a position in which he could make his voice heard in the counsels of his nation. Many Spanish peasants have, no doubt, succeeded in Spanish South America, and some of them have come home again to spend their money and their declining years in their native land. I am not aware that such men have been encouraged to play a part in the politics of Spain, although their experience of the outside world would be of the greatest value. But thefrequent instances of Spanish peasants rising to affluence abroad show that it is not their own incapacity, but the crushing burdens imposed on them by those in power, which are the cause of the miserable condition of the peasantry at home. When a Spanish peasant gets a chance, he is well able to profit by it.
Spain always seems to me like a great tree which for centuries has been allowed to go unpruned. It is half smothered with branches which bear no fruit, and the top is a mass of decay. Yet the trunk and the roots are sound and strong, so that once the barren wood which saps the life of the tree is cut away, a new and healthy growth will soon replace it. But the longer the difficult and painful process of pruning away the dead wood is delayed, the greater must grow the danger of a storm which will tear up the tree, roots and all.
Still, in spite of all the drags on the wheels of progress, in spite of ignorance, incapacity, and corruption, in spite of all the forces of reaction and all their efforts to keep Spain in the Slough of Despond from which she is struggling to emerge, one may say with Galileo, “e pur si muove.” Some little advance is being made, slight and slow though it be, and among the more thoughtful members of the younger generationone sees signs of a new spirit—an intelligent appreciation of the needs of the country and an honest and sincere resolve to work for their attainment, which cannot fail to spread and to bear fruit in due season. From the older generation nothing is to be hoped, but ere long they will have yielded their places to the young men—university professors, officers in the Army, journalists, and so forth, many of whom have ideas and ideals, and only lack power and opportunity to put them in practice. The little leaven is working, and though as yet it is small in amount and the lump is large, those who wish Spain well need not despair.
“For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,Seem here no painful inch to gain,Far back, through creeks and inlets making,Comes silent, flooding in, the main.And not by eastern windows only,When daylight comes, comes in the light,In front, the sun climbs slow, how slowly!But westward, look! the land is bright.”
“For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,Seem here no painful inch to gain,Far back, through creeks and inlets making,Comes silent, flooding in, the main.And not by eastern windows only,When daylight comes, comes in the light,In front, the sun climbs slow, how slowly!But westward, look! the land is bright.”
“For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,Seem here no painful inch to gain,Far back, through creeks and inlets making,Comes silent, flooding in, the main.
And not by eastern windows only,When daylight comes, comes in the light,In front, the sun climbs slow, how slowly!But westward, look! the land is bright.”
Whilethis book was in the press, the Spanish Government took a step, the ultimate consequences of which may be of the utmost moment for the country. In June, 1910, Señor Canalejas resolved to take definite action in the matter of the Religious Orders.
The immediate cause of his determination appears to have been the general discontent created by the numerous cases of clerical corruption and intimidation alleged to have occurred in the recent elections to the Cortes. A great meeting of protest was held at Madrid, in which both Republicans and Socialists took part, and Señor Melquiades Alvarez, the Republican leader, who not many months before had expressed his willingness to compromise with the Monarchists on the lines of a democratic Monarchy like that of England, deliberately went over to the Socialists. This importantvolte face, coupled with the fact that at the elections Madrid returned an overwhelming majority of Republicans, seems to have spurred Canalejas to action.
This action consisted of a modest Royal Order requiring the fulfilment of an edict of 1902, which compels the registration of all Religious Orders established in the country since that date, and the payment of the industrial tax on the trades they carry on. This was followed by a decree permitting members of other than theState religion to display emblems and notices outside their places of worship, and to hold funeral processions, in accordance with the provision made by the law of the land for liberty of conscience.
These two decrees hardly strike one as revolutionary; but they have been enough to set the whole of the Church party in an uproar; and the Primate, the Archbishop of Toledo, has thrown down the gauntlet, defying the Government to put the decrees in force, on the ground that the Church owes obedience to Rome alone, and that the State has no power to interfere with it. At the moment of writing the Vatican is trying to bully the Government by threatening to break off relations, the Catholic Associations have telegraphed their grief and distress at the outrage inflicted upon the Pope by these Royal Orders, the ladies of the Ultramontane aristocracy have petitioned the Premier to reconsider his determination to destroy the national Church and drag Spain’s religion in the dust, and the whole clerical party are preparing a furious campaign against the Government, which, needless to say, is warmly supported by all the Liberal elements in the country. The working classes are naturally delighted, and several of them have congratulated themselves in my hearing on this excellent result of the King’s marriage.
“He has seen what religious liberty means in England, and that has given him courage to defy the Jesuits. Viva Alfonsito!”
WhenSagasta died three men were proposed as leaders of the Liberal party, Moret, Montero Rios, and Canalejas, Montero Rios gave way in favour of Moret, in order to secure the unity of the party, but Canalejas preferred to lead a group of his own.
Moret.—Was a Republican until Alfonso XII. was proclaimed. He then joined the Monarchical forces, the road being opened to him and many others by the broadly liberal policy of Sagasta. He is English on the mother’s side.
Montero Rios.—Also was a Republican until the Monarchy was re-established. Then he also adhered to Sagasta, bringing in with him his own group, thenceforth to be known as the Radical wing of the Liberal-Monarchists.
Rafael Gasset.—A staunch supporter of Moret’s policy. He is the author of the great irrigation scheme which is one of the most popular features in Moret’s programme. His enthusiasm for this improvement in the conditions of agriculture is so strong that his opponents have nicknamed him “The Duke of the Reservoirs.” He is one of the strongest of the younger Liberals, and his sincerity and devotion to the interest of the working-classes have won him their confidence and respect.
The policy of the Liberal-Monarchist party is supported by theSociedad Editorial de España, which publishes three daily papers, all sold at 5 cmes. per copy, or 1 peseta per month:
El Liberal.—This paper has by far the largest circulation of any in Spain. Its political news is edited in Madrid, and telegraphed thence twice daily, for the morning and evening editions, to branch offices at Bilbao, Murcia, Barcelona, and Seville, where the local notes and news are added. Although conducted on Liberal-Monarchical lines, it is tinged with democratic feeling. The Reactionists profess to consider it a dangerous enemy to religion, and label its readers atheists and anarchists. It is universally popular with the working classes.
El Heraldo de Madrid.—Edited and published in the capital on Radical-Monarchical lines. On sale all over the country, but with a comparatively small circulation among the working men outside of Madrid.
El Imparcial.—Edited on Liberal-Monarchical lines in the interest of the working classes, with full reports and articles on public works of every description, trades unions, schemes for social and industrial reform, &c. It is on sale everywhere, and probably has the largest circulation of any Madrid paper among the working classes in the provinces, but does not come nearEl Liberalin popularity.
The literary style of the writers employed by theSociedad Editorialis cultivated and refined, the flying of political kites is discouraged, and personal abuse of opponents in politics finds no favour with the directors. The Society is abusively called a “Trust” by the Opposition, and reactionary journals daily publish headlines proclaiming that they do not belong to the “Trust.” As a matter of fact theSociedadis an ordinary limited liability company, well managed, and paying a good dividend, and partaking in no respect of the evils of the Trust system.
Canalejas.—Was a Republican, but maintained his independence, although adhering to Sagasta’s party, by proclaiming himself chief of a group of progressive Liberals with Republican sympathies. The main plank in his programme has always been a direct attack upon the Church and Religious Orders. His policy is supported by theDiario Universal, but it has a small sale and is hardly known by working men outside of Madrid.
The three most distinguished men in this party—Melquiades Alvarez,Blasco IbañezandRodrigo Soriano,—are all celebrated for their literary and oratorical gifts, and enjoy the respect and confidence of the veteran Liberal leaders, Moret and Montero Rios. Their policy may be described as Republican in idea, but democratically Monarchical in practice, and their demands for vigorous measures of reform have materially strengthened the hands of the Liberal-Monarchists.
The organ of this party isEl Pais, which, although its sale is very much smaller, has the largest circulation among the working classes afterEl Liberal. The paper, as might be expected from the literary renown of the leaders who direct it, is extremely well written, the staff including some of the most highly educated Progressives in Spain. It is possible, however, that the standard of intellectuality maintained in its leading articles militates against its success with the people. The numerical strength of the Republicans is small. Thus, the circulation ofEl Paisbeing comparatively limited, the Reactionists are not nearly so much afraid of its influence on the country as of that ofEl Liberal, and indeed seem to treat it almost with indifference. It is sold at the same price as the papers of theSociedad Editorial.
Lerroux, Pablo Iglesias, Nakens.—The Socialists in Spain have a very small following, and that confined to a few of the industrial cities, chiefly in the north. They formed a coalition with the Republicans to secure the rout of the Clericalists at the Municipal Elections of 1909, but the party is disunited, Iglesias and Lerroux seldom coming into line with each other, while neither of them goes so far as Nakens, editor of the Socialist organEl Motinand a violentrevolutionary.El Motinhas a very small circulation, and the programme of the Socialists has no serious influence in Spanish politics.
The Separatist, Regionalist, and other groups of Catalans exist solely for the political purposes of that province, and play no part in the programme of either of the national parties.
The so-called Anarchist party, of which so much has been heard abroad, is practically non-existent. Their sporadic publications have no genuine circulation and seldom live for over a month.[30]
The leader of this party,Maura—for many years a Liberal and the intimate friend of Moret—adopted Conservative principles under Silvela, and on his death was chosen to be leader of the Conservative party. His Liberal proclivities at first influenced him in the direction of reform, and gave him a strong and united following among the true Conservatives. But as time passed he developed so much religious fervour that he has now become recognised as the protagonist of the Religious Orders and the hope of the Church in the rapidly approaching final struggle with the State. Down to July, 1909, Maura was able to hold the Conservative party together, notwithstanding the marked development of reaction in his policy. But after the events at Barcelona the Conservatives proper withdrew their support on his programme of repression, and since his Cabinet fell in October of that year, he has been universally regarded more as the tool of the Ultramontanes than the leader of the Conservative party.
The organ of Maura isLa Epoca. It is sold in Madrid at 10 cmes., but is never seen on the bookstalls at any distance from the capital, and can only be obtained in provincial towns by paying three months’ subscription to the Madrid office in advance. Its circulation is exclusively confined to the Clericalist aristocracy and plutocracy, by whom it is subsidised.
This party, which numbers many of the richest men in Spain among its adherents, besides all the Religious Orders, with their enormous wealth and influence, is directed from the Castle of Frohsdorf byDon Jaime, Duke of Madrid, through persons whom he appoints in every province of Spain. The name brought most frequently before the public in connection with the party, after the Pretender’s own, is that ofLlorens, whose work in the Melilla campaign is referred to in Chapter VII. The Pretender has a complete organisation all over Spain, withCaciquesin a large number of provincial towns and villages, and is supported by numerous religious associations, clubs, colleges, &c., of a confessedly militant character, but confined to the upper classes.
The leading organs of the Carlists are theCorreo Españoland theCorreo Catalan, with offices in Madrid, Paris, and Barcelona; but practically all the reactionary Press supports the claims of the Pretender more or less openly. The Carlist papers have no sale among the working classes, and can only be obtained outside of Madrid (likeLa Epoca) by paying three months’ subscriptions in advance.
Among military politicians much in the public eye may be mentioned GeneralsLuque,Weyler, andLopez Dominguez, all on the Liberal side, and all strong men, in whom the people feel confidence.Aguilera, twice Alcalde of Madrid under Moret, who has been referred to in Chapter XIII., is highly popular with the poor of Madrid, owingto his consistent kindness to the children, whom he takes under his special protection.
CountRomanones, who engineered the crisis of February, 1910, is credited by the working classes with having large interests in the mines of Beni-bu-Ifrur, and with having schemed to bring about the war in Morocco, in order to put money into his own pockets. This impression, whether well or ill founded, is sufficient to make him cordially hated by them. He is credited with aspiring to the leadership of the Liberal party, but it is hardly probable that his following would prove strong enough to give him that position.
La Cierva, Minister of the Interior in Maura’s Cabinet, obtained an unenviable reputation in 1909, through his share in administering Maura’s policy of repression. Since his leader went out of office La Cierva’s name has hardly been mentioned among the working classes.
Dato,Sanchez Toca, andGonzalez Besadaare the three leading dissentients from Maura’s policy of reaction, and now stand for the old Conservative-Monarchical programme of peace and conciliation without sensational reforms. Their organ is theCorrespondencia de España, an eight-paged paper, well printed and got up, containing the fullest military intelligence and the best foreign news to be found in the Spanish Press. It has a far larger circulation than any other Conservative or Clericalist paper, and is to be seen on most of the kiosks in large towns. If it were not believed by the people to be subsidised by the party opposed to electoral and social reforms, its influence in the country would doubtless be considerably stronger than it is. At present the working classes do not read it, although no other paper gives nearly as much matter for the price, which is 5 cmes.
A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,J,L,M,N,P,Q,R,S,T,U,V,W,Z.
Aguilera, Señor,240Alcalde, the,265noteAlfonso XII.,112Alfonso XIII.,122-4,182,318All Souls’ Day, observation of,46;scandal connected with Masses on,84-6Ayuntamiento, the,265note;274Baptism,47Barcelona, effect of riots,17;refugees from,90,92;Carlist activities in,134ff.;stories of riots,165-6;bombs in, theory of,181ffBeatas,21“Bull of the Crusade,”64Bullfight, the,307ffBurial,48,50-1Cacique,the230-3Canalejas, Señor,243-6,317-9Carlists, alleged plots of,167,176;army,155-6;party,321“Catholic Associations,”163Church, attitude towards people,31-2;illegal disposal of property,80ff;unique position of,in Spain,304Civil Guard, the,175,218ffClergy, children of,79-80,106-7;arming and drilling of,161,164Clerical Press, the,28,169,235,320-1Confessional, the,43,73ffConscription, consolidates Monarchy,111;conditions of exemption,209;proposals for alteration,210Conservatives, the,251,256,322Consumo, the,15,288Contribucion industrial,286Convent schools,275Correo Catalan, the,151,172,243,321Correo Español, the,163,321Correspondencia de España, the,254,322Crossing, modes of,65-7Cuban War, stories of,200-3Customs’ duties,285Demonstrations, clerical,191-4“ popular,174Education, desire for,15,33Ejercito Español, the,152,238Electoral system,229-33Employers and employed, relations of,23ffEngland, misunderstanding of Spanish politics in,227,257;hopes of people from,277,318;admiration of, in Spain,309Ferrer,147-9,170,325Gasset, Señor,236,317Governments, distrusted by working classes,30Heraldo de Madrid, the,187,229note,257,270,318Honesty,62Hume, Major Martin, quoted,133,228Illiteracy,263,271Images, belief in,52-3,55-8Imparcial, the,114,318Irrigation scheme,237Jaime, Don, of Bourbon,117,153-4,166,170Layschools, the,169;clerical campaign against,190-1,193Liberal, the,35,172,294,317Llorens, Señor,152-3,163,321Lottery, national,298Luque, General,238Madrid, attitude of, towards the South,26-8Marriage among working classes,48-9Matches, monopoly of,292Maura, Señor,35,115,137-8,144,150,203,234,245,251-3,256,280,320Melquiades Alvarez, Señor,259,317,319Monopolies, Government,291-2Montero Rios, Señor,242,317Moret, Señor,137,173,228,234,237,239,241-3,253,258,317Morocco, war in,200ffMorral,144,148Moslems, mixed with Spaniards,28-9;traditional feeling against,207Municipal elections, 1909,237Nuevo Mundo, the,7Pais, the,171,223,319Paz, Infanta Doña,207Penitential dress,64Penitents,53Police, various bodies of,215ffPolitics, difficulties of understanding,228Popular songs,142-3Postal service,298Prayers quoted,67-8Primo de Rivera, General,203Public instruction, system of,264ffPurgatory, popular view of,44Queen, the, animus of clergy against,120;feeling of working people towards,121-2,128;courage shown by,182Queen-Mother, the,113,115ReligiousOrders, the, change of people’s attitude towards,17;positions in Spain illegal,90;relations to working classes,93;underselling of workpeople by,94-5,105;people ruined by,97-102;refusal to help at time of distress,102;evasion of taxation by,295;measures adopted by Government,317-8Republicans, the,239,258-60,317,319Reservists, supposed protest against calling out of,204Romanones, Count,240,322Royal Family, suppression of news about, during the Maurarégime,116,123-6SanchezToca, Señor,254School supply, facts about,270Serenos, the,217Socialists, the,237Sociedad editorial, the,139,171-2,317Squilache, Marquesa de,116-7Sugar monopoly,291Taxation, evasions of,294Tobacco monopoly,291Tradition, influence of,16,145Truth-telling,61Universities, the,268Upper classes, general character of,32; religion of,40Vigilancia, the,217WarFund, initiated by the Queen,117ff,127;contributions of workpeople to,119Working classes, general character of,14,30;what they read,34;religion of,39ffZaragoza, explosion of bombs at,188