Lisbon Pombal Travel

Lisbon Pombal Travel. Information on Pombal and the Avenida.

Lisbon Pombal Travel

Pombal and the streets The Avenida Its history and present aspects New quarters Growth of the town Humble restaurants Lisbon mansions The port Beauties of the Tagus Its tide and shipping The native craft The curse of the siren Some street noises The Tagus longshoreman Southern crayfish The markets.

When Pombal, single-hearted and undismayed even by the ghastly havoc of the earthquake of 1755, was causing a new Lisbon to rise from the charred and bloodstained ruins of the old, his plans were subjected to no little criticism. Men pointed in amazement to the Aurea. The Augusta, and the other thoroughfares that were being constructed, and wondered what madness had inflated the minister's mind. What did they want, they demanded, with streets of a breadth that made the very crossing of them tedious, to say nothing of the hardship of carrying on a conversation from one side to the other ? But Pombal, with his eyes set beyond the limited horizon of his contemporaries, remained firm. The streets rose up according to his pattern, straight and well planned, even if anachronistically broad.

How much the capital owes to the great minister of King Joao v. in its architectural features as well as in other respects has now long been recognised. The portions of the town with which he dealt are easily recognisable by the similar features that stamp the buildings, and by the uniform and very effective style of dormer window that embellishes the roofs. In these days there are no complaints concerning the undue width of his streets. Thoroughfares have a way of following in the lines of ocean steamers at an infinitely lesser ratio of speed, it is true. The giants of Pombal's day are too narrow now, imposing enough and symmetrical as they are. The great avenue beyond has come into being to dwarf the older streets, and the boulevards of many another capital as well.

Avenida da Liberdade

The Avenida da Liberdade, the chief pride of all the Lisbon highways, was, at its inception, received with little more favour than the streets of Pombal. Indeed, the history of the two schemes is similar insomuch as the true benefit con ferred was only realised little by little. The site of the Avenida was originally a promenade, select to a degree, shut off by high walls from the rest of the city. The object of the place even then was a progressive one, up to a certain point. Instituted in order to encourage the Lisbon ladies to sally out more frequently from the coy seclusion of their homes, it was already serving its purpose well enough, and was indeed considered a daring step in advance of the times.

When at the instigation of the mayor, a pastrycook, I believe, with a certain genius of his own, and a most praise worthy official it was proposed to raze the protecting walls, to make an open boulevard of the secluded spot in which, notwithstanding its publicity, the ladies should continue to stroll, a storm of protest arose. Charges of vandalism and desecration were flung wholesale at the head of the bold author of the innovation. Nevertheless, the Avenida was built, and the present-day lady of fashion, in all the glory of her Parisian costumes, adorns the thoroughfare very willingly and without stint. From which it will be seen that progress advances with ever-increasing ratio, since the Avenida is only twenty years old.

As it is, ng true Lisbon man or woman could conceive the city without its avenue. A mile in length and a hundred yards in breadth, it is a triple thoroughfare, divided into three by rows of plane-tees, elms, Judastrees, and others, as well as the more exotic palms. It is a boulevard in which the city may well take pride. In. The centre are some small ponds and flowing streams that have for their source two water gods that stand respectively ^or the Tagus and the Douro. Little wonder that both elite and bourgeois throfig the place, as pleasant as it is imposing.

A very short while ago the end of the Avenida da Liberdade marked the boundary of Lisbon proper. Now the Parque Eduardo vn. Is already developing beyond it, and there are other avenues, broad, straight, and tree-planted, that run to the side and further yet. The avenues of Antonio Augusto de Aguiar, Fontes Perreira de Mello, and Ressano Garcia all these stretch themselves proudly to the north. Indeed, so rapid has been the growth of the town that much that was planned to remain without its boundaries has now been drawn within them. The public slaughter-house, a great red-brick building that only a few years ago was constructed beyond the outskirts, has now been overlapped and enveloped by the new avenues and Praas. The new cemetery is in similar case. That, too, has been swallowed up by the spreading town. But the cemetery can hold its own in an unpleasant fashion, and, when the time comes, will doubtless swallow each inhabitant in revenge.

As is natural enough, the commercial quarters of the town are in the low-lying central district ; the fashionable quarters with the exception of some stretches along the Avenida upon the hills. Although in a far lesser degree than is the case in Oporto, it is noticeable that the various industries, as represented by the shops, are curiously gregarious. Jewellers, stationers, upholsterers, and other shops, are frequently to be met with in groups and clusters, each one of which is of the same kidney as the rest.

This is, perhaps, nowhere more marked than in the sailors' quarter by the Tagus to the west of the Arsenal. Here the humblest eating-shops of the city are grouped together in one long unbroken line. Within them are barefooted folk, sailors, fishermen, coalheavers, male and female for the gentler sex labours here at the more strenuous tasks in com petition with the men as well as porters, market-women, and a host of casual riverside labourers. A genial company, revelling in the sources of the strong odours that come wafting out into the street from the dark interiors. Honest, too, or, at all events, as honest as can be expected, and addicted to none of those petty peculations from which suffers another humble restaurant, the poorest in the old eastern quarter of the town. Here the knives and forks are secured by chains to the table an insurance against dishonesty, but something of a poor compliment to the patrons of the place !

To turn from these haunts of lowly life to the opposite social pole, some of the most imposing of all the private houses are to be found upon the elevations to the east of the Avenida, establishments with large and very entrancing gardens that slope downwards towards the centre of the town. In the neighbourhood of the Praa do Principe Real are other very fine specimens of the private mansion, and the district to the west and south of this includes the most extensive and popular residential quarters of the town. There are, moreover, some palatial buildings along the newer and remoter avenues, although it must be frankly admitted that a certain number of these exhibit a scheme of architecture that even the blue sky and the trees and flowers can merely palliate, not altogether condone.

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