SOME TRUTHS ABOUT THE REPUBLIC

1873–1874

We have an interregnum in the history of the Court of Spain during the republic which held rule from February 11, 1873, until the restoration of the monarchy on December 30, 1874; but those readers, who like to have some idea of what was passing in Spain whilst the palace was empty, may be interested in the following particulars, drawn from a book entitled “Contemporaneous Truths,” by His Excellency Vicente Lafuente. These truths were republished by Colonel Figuerola Ferretti[19] in 1898, with an able prologue from the officer’s pen, to show those malcontents who wished to return to this form of government how baneful it was for the welfare of the land.

Queen Maria Cristina graciously accepted the book from the Colonel, who was then a Chamberlain at her Court, and it doubtless served to disperse the false ideas as to the nature of a Spanish republic which had arisen in the minds of those who were absent from the country whilst it held sway.

Twenty-five years had elapsed since Spain adopted the republic, but, as Figuerola Ferretti reminds his readers, that time had not obliterated the horrors of that period from those who belonged to that time.

Those who were inclined to regard a republic as an ideal form of government were reminded that the fatal night of February 11, 1873, saw the opening of the Pandora box, whence issued all sorts of moral and political calamities, which spread like a black cloud over the Spanish nation in both worlds. With the enthronement of moral and material disorder, licence and anarchy came from all sides, to the increase of impiety and corruption of customs, the ruin of families, the debasement of the public credit, the demoralization of the forces on sea and land, the loss of honour and national dignity, and the peril of the independence and integrity of the country both in the Peninsula and in America.

Such is the picture of the republic from the night of February 11, 1873, until the morning of January 3, 1874, when it was dissolved by the coup of General Pavia. This opinion is no mere expression of party rancour, for, as it is founded on the facts and events recorded in the Gazette and the Journal of the Sessions of the Cortes, which were noted day by day, they became, under the pen of the historian Lafuente, the true history which, according to Cicero, is “the light of truth and the master of life.”

A few quotations from this diary of facts, which Ferretti republished as an antidote to the anti-dynastic feelings which were aroused by the loss of Cuba, give some idea of the effect of the republic on Spain:

“February 16, 1873.—Assassinations in Montilla under shocking circumstances. Eight houses sacked and burnt; Señor Robobo assassinated and quartered. Abolition of the oath of loyalty in the army.

“February 20 and 21.—During these days the theatre of Barcelona was the scene of dreadful military orgies and acts of immorality and barbarism. The column of Cabrinati rebelled in Santa Coloma de Farnés, at the instigation of the republicans, and the cry of ‘Down with the officers!’ was heard all over Catalonia.

“February 24.—There was a general Carlist rising in Navarre, and a call to arms of all men between twenty and forty years of age.

“February 28.—The neighbourhood of Madrid, in view of the prevailing want of discipline and the ease with which dwellings could be invaded, began organizing armed bands.

“March 15.—The battalion of ‘the Cazadores of Madrid’ committed unspeakable horrors in Falset, and several companies of Catalonia began a course of pillage and immorality.

“March 17.—General Hidalgo harangued the savage soldiers of Falset, but he was so hissed that he was obliged to retire, like almost all the other officers.

“March 18.—A great meeting was held at San Isidro, where the public commemorated what they called ‘the glories of the Commune of Paris,’ which they were evidently seeking to imitate.”

The record of March closes with the mention of the occupation of the churches of Barcelona as barracks and theatres.

April 3 we read: “The republicans of Manresa invade and profane a church, take possession of the library and rooms of the seminary, and the town-hall of Tarragona.

“May 13.—An electoral meeting in Barcelona; the popular Mayor Buxó is wounded by a stone. The voluntary troops of Madrid knock down and wound the chaplain of the hospital, insult the officials who seek to release him, and commit various robberies and assassinations, so that the troops have to be called out against them.

“June 3.—In Madrid and other places the procession of the Corpus Christi could not take place on account of the uproars in the streets. Orgies in the churches of Belen and San José at Barcelona, and indecent balls, in which the mysteries of our redemption were mocked at.

“June 16.—Horrible assassinations at Bande (Orense). Sixty unhappy beings of all ages and both sexes fell victims to this savagery.”

After three days’ fighting the international incendiaries and assassins were expelled from Seville, leaving the city stained with blood and injured by fire.

“September 23.—General Don Manuel Pavia was appointed Governor of Madrid.”

Carlism was rapidly gaining ground during these months. There were 8,000 Carlists in Aragon and Valencia, and as many more in Catalonia, 12,000 in Navarre, and more than that number in the Basque provinces, thus making more than 40,000 Carlists in all Spain.

“November 7.—Señor Castelar, the President of the Republic, was daily losing power in the Congress, where neither eloquence nor good sense seemed to have any sway over the turbulent spirits.”

When the Corporation of the city became disaffected from the Government, it seemed to the Governor of Madrid that it was time for him to assert the power of military rule.

So on December 2, when the chamber of the Congress was nothing but a scene of riot and disorder, each deputy striving by his loud voice and violent actions to overpower his fellow, the cultured Castelar, the head of the republic, whose orations would have reflected honour on the Areopagus of old, was met by a vote of want of confidence.

Then was the time for General Pavia’s action. Arthur Houghton, correspondent to The Times at Madrid, gives, in his “French History of the Restoration of the Bourbons,” the account of this coup in the General’s own words; for, favoured by the soldiers’ friendship, Mr. Houghton had the opportunity of hearing the story first-hand, and the smart General, looking spruce and trim in his well-cut black frock, would often talk to the Englishman, when he met him in the salons of Madrid, of the way he took matters into his own hand when the republican Parliament could not manage the Congress.

“No, no,” said the former Governor of Madrid, “I admitted nobody into my counsel, but, under the stress of circumstances, I took all the responsibility upon myself. When I heard how the Assembly had given voice to a vote of want of confidence in Castelar, I thought the hour had come; and as the session the next day increased in force and disorder, whilst the hours of early dawn succeeded those of the evening and the night in fruitless and violent discussion, I called a company of the Civil Guard, and another of the Cazadores, and, to their surprise, I led them to the square in front of the Congress, and stationed them all round the building. Then, entering the Parliament with a few picked men, I surprised the deputies by ordering them to leave the House. A few shots were fired in the corridor on those who sought to defy the military order, so the members did not long resist, and by four o’clock in the morning I found myself in complete command of the House. I called a Committee, with the power to form a Ministry, of which General Serrano was once more elected President, and thus ensued the second period of the republic.”

This brilliant and successful coup reminds one of that of our Oliver Cromwell when he freed the country of a particular Government; but in this case of military sway in Spain General Pavia acted from no aims of self-interest, but only for the restoration of order, which it was his duty as Governor of the city to preserve.

During the second period of the republic, which lasted from January 4, 1874, till December 30 of the same year, Serrano had his hands weighted with two civil wars—the never-ceasing one of Carlism in the Peninsula, as well as that of Cuba—and, as Francisco Paréja de Alarcon says, in the criticism which he publishes in the above-mentioned work on this period, the Government formed under Serrano proved unable to restore order and save Spain from the dishonour which was threatening it.

So when the Ministers heard of the rising at Sagunto, on December 29, 1874, for the restoration of the monarchy, they knew that the movement was really supported by leading military men, who had been inspired thereto by the ladies of the land, who resented the irreligion and disorder of the republic; and, as they saw that resistance would only lead to another disastrous civil war, they resigned their posts peacefully.

It was thus that the son of Isabella II. was raised to the throne. And Alarcon says: “The hypocritical banner of ‘the country’s honour’ was set aside; for had it not meant the support of a foreign monarchy, destitute of prestige; and then an unbridled, antisocial, impious, and anarchical republic, which was a blot on the history of our unhappy Spain in these latter days, which have been so full of misfortunes under the government of the ambitious parties which harrowed and exploited under different names and banners?”

The Circulo Hispano Ultramarino in Barcelona, agitating continually for the restoration of Alfonso XII., was a strong agent in the monarchical movement. Figuerola Ferretti worked strenuously as secretary of the society, and this officer is the possessor of the only escutcheon signed by Alfonso XII., in which he paid tribute to the Colonel’s valiant conduct in the Cuban War of 1872.

It is interesting to see that the opinion of the republic published in “Contemporaneous Truths” by this Ferretti was echoed by the great leader of the party himself, for Señor Castelar writes: “There were days during that summer of 1874 in which our Spain seemed completely ruined. The idea of legality was so lost that anybody could assume power, and notify the fact to the Cortes, and those whose office it was to make and keep the laws were in a perpetual ferment against them.

“It was no question then, as before, of one Ministry replacing another, nor one form of government substituting another; but a country was divided into a thousand parts, like the Kalifat of Cordova after its fall, and the provinces were inundated by the most out-of-the-way ideas and principles.”

When the great republican speaks in such a derogatory way of the republic of which he was the leader, it is not strange that public opinion turned to the restoration of the Bourbons as the salvation of the country. Society clamoured for such balls and entertainments as had formerly taken place at Court, or which had been patronized by the palace, and the dreary disorder wearied both politicians and patriots.

The house of the Dukes of Heredia-Spinola never ceased to be the scene of the reunion of Alfonsists, and as General Martinez Campos played his daily game of tresillo at their table, many expressions of hope for the return of the ex-Queen’s son fell upon his ears; whilst the Countess of Tacon, who had been Lady-in-Waiting to the little Prince of Asturias as a child, was loud in her opinions. It is interesting to note that this lady subsequently filled the same office for the restored King’s little daughter, the Princess of Asturias, Doña Maria de las Mercedes.

From a social point of view the salon of the old Countess of Montijo ranked foremost in Madrid, and it assembled within its walls the frequenters of Court society in the reign of Isabella. Scenes from “Don Quixote” were given with great success at the Countess’s little theatre; and the year of the restoration was marked by a very successful dramatic representation, in which some of the members of the old nobility took part.

Moreover, the services held every Friday in the private chapel of the mansion, where great preachers made remarkable orations, were a protest against the irreligion of the period. On these occasions ladies of Court society, among whom may be noted Clara Hunt, wife of one of the diplomats of the English Embassy—who was quite a notable singer—gave proofs of their talent.

The niece of the Count of Nava de Tajo was another of the distinguished ladies who frequented the salon of the Countess of Montijo. The Count was varied in his interests. One afternoon he paid a series of visits, beginning with the Pope’s Nuncio, going on to the house of Canovas, then to Roque Barcia, who was asking for subscriptions for his famous dictionary, and ending with the unhappy Lopez Bago, who was seeking support for his Review of the Salons, of which only three or four numbers were ever published.