SCENES AND SKETCHES IN PORTUGAL

N.° 1.

The province of the Minho abounds, particularly in the north-eastern part, with wild and romantic scenery. It is now some years since, in company with a few friends, we traversed this section of the province, and our excursion gave all the party so much pleasure, that we will endeavour to describe some of the beautiful scenery we met with, for the benefit of future tourists in that part of Portugal.

It was just at daybreak of a beautiful September morning that we left Braga, and its latticed windows (Gelosias' as they are called) behind us, and began to ascend a narrow and winding road, having on our right the famous sanctuary of Nosso Senhor do Monte, with its apparently endless flights of steps, and innumerable little chapels, or shrines, crowned by the magnificient church itself. This temple is an object of great veneration, and is much visited by devotees, particularly at the « Espirito Santo (or whitsuntide) when a great fair is held at Braga, and the whole city is crowded with strangers," principally from the northern provin

ces, who flock at this time, to pay their devotions at the shrine of the Bom Jesus do Monte.

Near the top of the hill, the road suddenly inclines to the north, and from this spot we had a splendid view of the low country. Braga with its numerous convents and churches, and its venerable cathedral, lay at our feet; the vast Campo de S. Anna (not unaptly compared to a « bacalhao ») occupying the foreground, while beyond, the sight stretched away, over a richly cultivated country studded with villages, till at last it rested on the Atlantic ocean, on the waves of which, the rays of the rising sun were just beginning to glitter. Shortly after, we emerged upon the elevated plain of Carvalho d'Este. On our left was a deep and romantic valley, or rather ravine, hedged in by steep and beautifully wooded banks, through which the river Cavado finds its way to the low country. A heavy mist, which the sun was just beginning to dissipate, came rolling up in volumes from the river, giving a most picturesque appearance to the whole scene, nor did it require a very fertile imagination to picture out battlemented castles, and lofty spires from the shapes assumed by the fog-clouds as they rested for a few moments on the uplands.

In front of us the plain was bounded by some low hills, behind which we could discover the heads of the Serra de Vieira; and the lofty and vast Gerez towered in the distance, covered with vegetation, and looking like some sylvan giant stationed

there by nature to guard her secrets from intrusion. On the right the plain extends for a considerable distance, and our eyes were at once struck by a lofty conical rock, which arose alone, and perfectly isolated, from the plain. Its top was crowned with ruins, which on enquiry we found to be those of the ancient castle of Povoa de Lanhoso, in which D. Affonso Henriques, the first king of Portugal so long confined his mother, the countess Tareja. Struck with its appearance, we turned off the road to examine it nearer, and an hour's ride brought us to the pretty village at the base of the rock, on which the castle stands, and from which it takes its name. Having left our horses at the clean little inn, we ascended the rock, a work of some trouble from its steepness, notwithstanding a winding road is cut up to the top.

Of the castle, to our disappointment, little more than the keep now remains, but a resident of Povoa de Lanhoso who accompanied us, told us that till about twenty years before our visit, the walls had been entire, but had been then demolished, with that disregard of monuments of antiquity too common in Portugal, to erect with the materials, the chapel of Nossa Senhora do Pilar, which now occupies part of the site. It must have been a place of great strength before the invention of artillery, and was admirably situated, for the rock on which it stands commands most extensive views on all sides.

When D. Affonso Henriques, who usually kept

his court at Guimarães', went on his expedition against the king, of Leon and Castile, who had taken up arms in his mother's cause, he slept one night at this castle, and as his troops were filing out next morning to continue their march, his mother stood at a window to see them: as her son passed through the gateway, he saluted her, to which she replied by a malediction on him and his enterprise. As D. Affonso who had hitherto been uniformly successful, was shortly after this severely wounded, and made prisoner in a sortie from the town of Badajoz, his defeat was ascribed to the effects of his mother's curse and the window at which she stood, and which still exists, is called by the surrounding peasantry a a janella da maldição. » To this circumstance it is that the tower owes its existence, as it was not thought right to employ any of the materials, of that part of the building from which the malediction was given, sin the erection of a holy tem ple. Pity that it could not save the whole of the venerable edifice from destruction!

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We returned to the village, and having breakfasted, resumed our route, in a North-easterly direction, and passing over a beautiful country, and through two or three small hamlets, (one of them bearing the enphonious name of the Val da Luz) in about two hours and a half, reached Posadouro, a large straggling village. Sending on our horses by the main road we here

turned from it, under the

guidance of a friend who knew the country, with

the intention of descending the steep sides of the ravine on foot, at a place impracticable for quadrupeds. A quarter of an hour's walk brought us to the brink of the precipice, and we began our descent, which we found difficult enough, owing to the tangled underwood, and massive blocks of stone piled up in the rudest magnificence. A small stream dashed down the side, hastening to mingle its waters with those of the roaring Cavado below. As we descended the partridge frequently started from his cover, and now and then a stray plover, startled by the sound of our voices in that unfrequented spot, whirred past us. The trees far above, on the edge of the encircling and overhanging heights, were reduced by distance to the slight proportions of the shrubbery around us and the trailing beech with its trunk clothed in a tich drapery of moss, hang its silver tassels over our heads. When after a sinuous course we reached the bottom, we found ourselves in a beautiful, and thickly wooded dell, with the Cavado flowing swiftly at our feet. Ascending the stream in five minutes more, we came to a pretty waterfall, a miniature Niagara, where the river has apparently found its way over a wall of rock, which stretching from side to side, seems formerly to have dammed up the waters, which now furiously precipitate themselves over the craggy barrier. Near this waterfall, a natural grotto of square dimensions, and large enough for two persons abreast, penetrates about fifteen or sixteen feet into

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