:anoel
 
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 Dom Francisco Manoel 
 de Mello
 
 

 
 THE 
 
 O F A 
 
 WIFE 
 
 OR, 
 
 Wholfom and Pleafairt Advice 
 FOR 
 
 Earned 
 
 In a Letter to a Friend. 
 
 WiitCen-in Fortuguefe, 
 
 By Don Francifco Manuel. 
 
 With fome Additions of the Tranflacor, 
 diftinguifhed from the Tranflatioa. 
 
 There i alfo Added, 
 
 A LETTER upon the fame Subject , 
 written in Spanifoby Don dntonio de Gue~ 
 var^ Biihop of Atoadonedo ^ Preacher , 
 and Hiftoriographer to the Emperour 
 Charles V. 
 
 Tranftated into 
 By Capt. John Stevens. 
 
 London, Printed for Jacob Tonfon at the Judge* 1/e.d 
 in Fleet-ftreet> and R. Knapluct^ at the Angtl and 
 Crown in St Parts Church- Yard, 1697.
 
 Dom Francisco Manoel de Mello 
 
 His Life and Writings with Extracts 
 
 from the " Letter of Guidance to 
 
 Married Men " 
 
 BY 
 
 EDGAR PRESTAGE 
 
 Chevalier of the Order of S. Thiago; Corresponding Member 
 
 of the Lisbon Royal Academy of Sciences, the 
 
 Lisbon Geographical Society, etc.
 
 My dear Batalha Reis, 
 
 I offer you this sketch of the life and writings of 
 your distinguished compatriot as a mark of respect 
 and gratitude. Fourteen years ago I commenced to 
 take an interest in the literature of Portugal and any 
 success that may have rewarded my efforts to make 
 it more widely known and appreciated in England is 
 largely due to your ever ready sympathy and assistance. 
 I may say of the following pages, " non nova sed nove," 
 although the information they contain appears in 
 English for the first time. Some future biographer 
 of Dom Francisco Manoel de Mello will no doubt 
 discover fresh material by a search through the archives 
 of the Torre do Tombo and the Tribunal da Rela^ao 
 in Lisbon and the Public Libraries in Lisbon and 
 Evora. This I have unfortunately been unable to 
 
 undertake. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 EDGAR PRESTAGE.
 
 PREFATORY NOTE. 
 
 The following sketch was hurriedly put together to 
 be read as a " paper" before the Manchester Literary 
 Club during last winter. My object in writing it was 
 firstly to call the attention of the curious to the almost 
 unknown English version of the "Carta de Guia de 
 Casados," and secondly to tell the life-story of "the 
 most gifted man produced by the Peninsula in the 
 i7th century, except Quevedo." 1 Further, I had in view 
 its publication in the " Manchester Quarterly," in the 
 April number of which it actually appeared, and this 
 imposed on me certain limitations, particularly that of 
 space. It is now reprinted with a few corrections. As 
 no authentic portrait of Mello exists, I reproduce the 
 title page of Captain Steven's book by way of frontis- 
 piece, together with a specimen of Mello's handwriting 
 which General Brito Rebello has kindly had photo- 
 graphed for me from the end of a letter in MS. Codex, 
 No. 2121 in the Torre do Tombo. In the course of his 
 preparations for a life of King John IV.'s father, Mello 
 wrote this letter to the Prior of the Convent of St. 
 Vincent, in Lisbon, asking for certain information. The 
 Prior charged one of the friars to look the matter up, and 
 the latter, in his simplicity, wrote his observations in the 
 margin of Mello's letter. In this way, a portion of it, with 
 the signature of the famous encyclopaedist, has been 
 preserved. According to his usual practice, Mello signs 
 it with his Christian names only. 
 
 May, 1905. 
 
 1. v. Menendez y Pelayo, " Historia de las ideas esteticas en Espafia," 
 2nd ed. vol. 3, p. 401. I owe this reference to Mr. Fitzmaurice-Kelly.
 
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 " N'urna mao sempre a espada, n'outra a penna." 
 
 CAMOENS. 
 
 TpORTUGAL had been for thirty-one years united to 
 Spain, when, on the 23rd November, 1611 St.Clement's 
 Day, Dom Francisco Manoel de Mello, Knight Commander 
 of the Military Order of Christ, and one of the most 
 powerful, learned and versatile of Portuguese writers, first 
 saw the light in Lisbon. 1 Through his father, Dom Luiz 
 de Mello, he was related to the House of Braganza, which 
 had sprung from Nuno Alvares Pereira, the hero of 
 Aljubarrota, known to history as the Holy Constable, while 
 his mother, Donna Maria de Toledo de Mazuellos belonged 
 to a Spanish family of note. He studied the Humanities 
 at the College of St. Antonio at Coimbra, under a notable 
 man, Father Balthazar Telles, 2 who abridged Father 
 
 1. His writings apart, the following comprise the chief authorities for 
 a study of the life and works of Manoel de Mello : Innocencio da 
 Silva, "Diccionario Bibliographico Portuguez," Vol. ii. , p. 437 et seq., 
 and Vol. ix., p. 330 et seq. Biography preceding the edition of the "Carta 
 de Guia de Casados," London, 1820. Preface byCamillo Castello Branco 
 to his edition of the " Carta de Guia de Casados," Porto, 1873. Preface 
 by Innocencio da Silva to his edition of the " Feira dos Anexins," 
 Lisbon, 1875. Biography preceding the edition of the " Historia . . . 
 Guerra de Cataluna" in the Biblioteca Clasica, Madrid, 1883. Dr. 
 Theophilo Braga, " Historia do Theatro Portuguez no sec xvii," Porto, 
 1870, pp, 253-273. Camillo is not always accurate, e.g., he says that Mello 
 spent seven years in Rome, and, after his exile, did not return to Portugal 
 until the death of the Count of Villa Nova in 1662, though it is beyond 
 dispute that Mello was in Lisbon in 1659, while as we know he was 
 in Marseilles on his way to Rome in July, 1663, and find him in Lyons 
 on his homeward journey in April, 1665, he cannot have spent two 
 years in the Eternal City. 
 
 2. A descendant of Francisco de Moraes, author of "Palmeirim de 
 Inglaterra." Mr. W. E. Purser, in his recently published " Palmerin of 
 England," a book that does credit to Irish scholarship, conclusively proves 
 that Moraes wrote the famous romance, and disposes of the Spanish 
 claims once and for all.
 
 8 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 Manoel d' Almeida's "History of Ethiopia," 3 compiled the 
 " Chronicle of the Company of Jesus," and afterwards 
 became its Provincial. Mello showed a rare precocity of 
 talent by writing, at the age of fourteen, a poem in ottava 
 rima, in the style of Camoens, to celebrate the recapture of 
 Bahia from the Dutch, while at seventeen he finished a 
 scientific work entitled " Concordancias Mathematicas," 
 and at eighteen produced a novel. The premature death 
 of his father obliged him to choose a career and make his 
 own way in the world, and, as was natural in a youth of his 
 birth and position, he became a soldier. He joined a 
 Portuguese contingent raised for the Flanders War and 
 embarked on the 24th September, 1626, with Dom Manoel 
 de Menezes, General of an Armada of six vessels which 
 had orders to look out for the yearly fleets from India and 
 Brazil, due to arrive at this time, and, after convoying 
 them to Lisbon, it was to carry the expedition to the 
 Low Countries. Having spent some time at sea, the 
 Armada returned to find the fleets already arrived, and 
 sheltering at Corunna, and on Christmas Day it started once 
 more to fulfil its mission. However, it not only 
 encountered bad weather soon after leaving port, but, on the 
 10th January, 1627, there arose a storm so terrible as to have 
 become historic, and, after nineteen days of battling with 
 winds and waves, the General's ship ran ashore, dismasted 
 and helpless, near St. Jean de Luz. A night of horror 
 followed, which was spent by some in making confessions, 
 vows and wills, by others in contriving rafts, while 
 Dom Manoel de Menezes, realising the extremity of the 
 danger, donned his best clothes and many imitated his 
 example, in the hope that, when the expected end came, 
 their rich winding sheets might recommend them for an 
 
 3. This book appeared with a prefatory letter by Mello, which is re- 
 printed in his "Cartas Familiares," pp. 20113, 2nd ed. Lisbon, 1752.
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 9 
 
 honourable burial. In the midst of all the tumult, he 
 took from among his papers a sonnet which his friend 
 Lope de Vega had given him before he left Madrid, 
 and read it there and then to the young Hello, discuss- 
 ing its merits and pointing out its defects with the utmost 
 sang froid, no doubt to distract his hearer's mind from the 
 perils surrounding them. Eventually most of the crew were 
 able to get safely to shore by the aid of small boats dispatched 
 to their succour by the French inhabitants, but the other 
 ships of the Armada, save one, went down with all on 
 board, and Mello had the sorrowful task of supervising 
 the burial of ninety-four cartloads of corpses of those who 
 had perished. A great part of the nobility 4 of the country, 
 the flower of her soldiers and sailors, and some of her 
 stoutest war-vessels were no more, and he reckoned this 
 disaster the worst that Portugal had suffered since the 
 death of King Sebastian, and the destruction of his army 
 in 1578, at the battle of Alcacer Kebir. 5 
 
 This misadventure entirely changed Mello's plans and 
 prospects, and he spent much of the next ten years of his life 
 at the Court of Madrid 6 as a " pretendiente," only paying 
 occasional visits to his own country, and in that splendid 
 centre of a world-empire he contrived to cultivate the 
 acquaintance of the leading men of Spain, soldiers, 
 diplomats and litterati. His friendship and correspondence 
 with the famous writer Francisco de Quevedo certainly 
 dates from this period, and in addition he was fortunate 
 
 4. Until the end of the 16th century, it was the custom for young men 
 of good family to serve in Africa and win their spurs fighting against the 
 Moors. In Mello's time they served on shipboard instead. 
 
 5. He describes it vividly and well in the "Naufragio da Armada 
 Portugueza em Franga," one of the historical essays contained in his 
 ' ' Epanaphoras de Varia Historia Portugueza," Lisbon, 1676. 
 
 6. In his " Aula Politica " lie refers to his long stay at and studious 
 experience of that Court, which he visited on ten different occasions. 
 Ibid. p. 3. Ed. Lisbon, 1720.
 
 10 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 enough to attract the favourable notice of the all-powerful 
 Minister, the Count-Duke of Olivares. 
 
 In 1637 a popular insurrection broke out in the important 
 city of Evora and the neighbouring towns, and spread 
 from there over the Alemtejo and the Algarve, in 
 consequence of the imposition on Portugal of an additional 
 tribute of 500,000 cruzados, whereupon the Duke of 
 Braganza charged Mello to satisfy King Philip that 
 he need feel no apprehensions about the loyalty of 
 his great Portuguese vassal. Having tranquilized the 
 mind of Olivares by his account of the Duke's 
 conduct in the affair, Mello was selected shortly 
 afterwards to accompany the Count of Linhares on a 
 mission to pacify the revolted city, and he also served as 
 an intermediary in the negotiations between the Junta of 
 St. Antonio, which had been formed at Evora, and the 
 Duke. Linhares soon found the task entrusted to him 
 impossible of performance, as had been foreseen, and 
 returned to Lisbon, dispatching Mello to Madrid to 
 report his want of success and inform the King and 
 Ministers of the strength, armament and disposition of 
 the citizens. On his way to the capital, the latter passed 
 through the town of Villa Vicosa, where his ducal relative 
 resided and kept a semi-regal court, acquainted him with 
 the situation in Evora, and received letters for the Spanish 
 monarch. Subsequent events proved that the insurrection 
 was the prelude to a general conflagration which broke 
 out three years later and resulted in the proclamation 
 of the Duke of Braganza as John IV. of Portugal; and 
 when Mello came before Olivares, the latter questioned 
 him strictly on all he had seen and heard, and particularly 
 as to the mind of the future King, but failed to elicit any- 
 thing tending to prove his complicity in the revolt. Now, 
 as often afterwards, Mello put considerations of patriotism
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 11 
 
 before his own advancement and concealed what he may 
 have known of the plans and ambitions which the Duchess 
 cherished for her cultured and easy-going husband. 7 
 Having subdued and punished the revolters in Evora and 
 elsewhere, the Spanish Government ordered, by way of 
 further penalty, the raising of four regiments which were 
 to be maintained at the cost of the Portuguese, as well as 
 of two regiments of volunteer infantry. One of these 
 regiments was given in charge to Mello, who had 
 remained in Madrid without employment, and failing to 
 get the necessary number of men in his own country, he 
 passed over into Castile, in the middle of the year 1638, to 
 fill the files there. It happened that about this time the 
 Cardinal Infant D. Fernando, Governor of Flanders, was 
 pressing the Court of Madrid to send him reinforcements, 
 and, in pursuance of this request, the Council of State 
 decided to collect all the available troops, including the 
 new levies, for embarkation at Carthagena and Corunna, 
 and shortly after his arrival at the latter place, Mello 
 found himself appointed colonel of a mixed regiment of 
 1,170 men, partly Portuguese, partly Spaniards. An 
 opportunity of leading them against the enemy came 
 earlier than he had expected, for on the 16th of June, 1639, 
 a French fleet of sixty sail, under the Archbishop of 
 Bordeaux, made a descent on the town, and the young 
 colonel of twenty-eight and his men had charge of the fort 
 of St. Antonio in the fighting that followed. Though the 
 attempt failed, King Philip determined on a counter attack 
 against both French and Dutch and, before long, Corunna 
 saw a fleet of seventy sail collected in the offing, and ten 
 thousand men went on board under the direction of 
 Mello as Embarkation Officer. On the 27th August the 
 
 7. He gives an account of these happenings in the " Epanaphoras," 
 under the title of " Alteragoens de Evora."
 
 12 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 fleet sailed under its Admiral, Oquendo, and on the 
 16th September met the Dutch in the Channel under 
 Van Tromp, who drew off after a six hour's indecisive 
 conflict, which was renewed for fourteen hours on the 18th, 
 and ended in the Hollanders taking refuge at Calais. The 
 Spaniards thereupon moved off to the Downs to repair and 
 ob'tain a fresh supply of powder from England, but though 
 they paid for it twice over, they could not get delivery 
 until too late, owing to the intrigues of the Dutch, while the 
 latter got all they wanted from the French. The arrival of 
 fresh vessels increased Van Tromp's numbers to one hundred 
 and ten vessels, besides eighteen fireships, and with this 
 overwhelming force he attacked the Spaniards at a time 
 when, owing to the default of the English, they were un- 
 prepared to receive him, and gained a decisive victory, 8 
 which cost Oquendo the loss of 48 ships and 6,000 men. 
 Mello with his regiment had the good fortune to escape 
 from this naval disaster, and he served for some months 
 as a soldier in Flanders, and was about to proceed on a 
 diplomatic mission to Germany when a serious illness 
 supervened. This event probably led to his return to 
 Spain, where he obtained the governorship of Bayona in 
 Galiciu in acknowledgement of the marked military 
 capacity and powers of organisation and command he had 
 displayed. 9 Owing, however, to the outbreak of the great 
 rebellion in Catalonia, he never occupied his post, for the 
 ministers of King Philip specially selected him, though a 
 Portuguese, to send to the new theatre of war as adviser 
 or Chief of the Staff to the Marquis de los Velez, Commander 
 
 8. Mello wrote an account of the conflict by order of the Cardinal 
 Infant, and it is included in the " Epanaphoras." He had Van Tromp's 
 version of the affair from the mouth of the great Admiral himself. 
 
 9. In addition, the Spanish Council of State adjudged him large 
 pecuniary rewards for his services in Flanders, but he never enjoyed 
 them, owing to the delays interposed by the Council of Portugal and 
 to the Revolution of 1640, He gives a list of them in his ' ' Aula 
 Politica." ed. cit. p. 49.
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 13 
 
 of the Royal forces, and so well did lie maintain his reputa- 
 tion that, as long as he remained there and directed the 
 operations, these had a uniformly successful issue. After- 
 wards, when the King ordered the Marquis to employ the 
 most competent man in the army to record the campaign, 
 the latter chose Mello for the task, and he began 
 immediately to collect materials for his "Historia de los 
 Movimientos, Separacion y Guerra de Cataluna," which he 
 finished after his return to Portugal and dedicated to Pope 
 Innocent X. When the book appeared, in 1645, it at once 
 took rank as a classic and a model of historical style. This 
 is what Ticknor says of it : " The accounts of the first 
 outbreak in Barcelona, on the feast of Corpus Christi, when 
 the city was thronged with the bold peasantry of the 
 interior, the subsequent strife of the exasperated factions, 
 the debates in the Junta of Catalonia, and those in the 
 King's Council under the leading of the Count-Duke 
 Olivares, and the closing scene of the whole, the ineffectual 
 storming of the grand fortress of Mont' Juich by the Royal 
 forces, and the disastrous retreat that followed, are all 
 given with a freshness and power that could come only 
 from one who had shared in the feelings he describes, and 
 had witnessed the very movements he sets with such a life- 
 like spirit before us. His style, too, is suited to his vary- 
 ing subjects, sometimes animated and forcible, sometimes 
 quaint and idiomatic, sometimes in its dark hints and 
 abrupt tones reminding us of Tacitus." 10 
 
 When the news reached Madrid that a band of noblemen 
 
 10. "History of Spanish Literature," iii. p. 150. Ed. London, 1855. 
 Mello gives an account of the conditions under which he wrote it and his 
 reason for issuing it under the nom de guerre of Clemente Libertino, in 
 his " Apologos Dialogaes," p. 400, ed. Lisbon, 1721, and in the 
 following pages he replies to the criticisms of contemporaries on this and 
 others of his books. See also pp. 9 and 55 of the " Cartas," and cf. the 
 judgment of Philarete Chasles on the "Guerra de Cataluna," in 
 "Voyages d'un Critique a travers la Vie et les Livres," vol. ii. pp. 283 
 295. Paris, 1868.
 
 14 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 conspirators had on the 1st December, 1640, proclaimed 
 the independence of Portugal, Mello was still serving 
 in Catalonia along with some thousands of his countrymen, 
 and Olivares, feeling that he had been hoodwinked by this 
 friend and relative of the new King three years earlier 
 and instigated by Diego Suarez, who represented the 
 injury a man of such calibre might do to Spain to 
 the profit of his own country, at once ordered his 
 arrest. He was sent in chains to Madrid, where he lay in 
 prison four months, after which, as no proof of his guilt 
 could be found, he obtained his liberty, together with an 
 increased pension and a better post than he previously 
 held, but these bribes failed to effect their purpose, and as 
 soon as the opportunity came, he hastened to offer his 
 sword and experience to his legitimate Monarch and 
 induced others to follow his example. Portugal had need 
 of men and money, but above all of such ripe soldiers as 
 Manoel de Mello had proved himself to be, for she had 
 emerged from her " captivity " poor and weak, 11 having 
 lost many of her most valuable oversea possessions to the 
 English and Dutch, who regarded the Portuguese as 
 Spaniards and therefore as foes. Together they had stripped 
 her of her recognised overlordship and trade monopoly in 
 the East, destroyed her settlements on the African coast, 
 and expelled her from the greater part of the littoral of 
 Brazil. It is not too much to say that Portugal wanted 
 for everything at the commencement of her struggle with 
 Spain, and though the war ended after twenty-eight 
 years in the recognition of her independence, she owed it 
 almost entirely to the disorganisation of her mighty 
 adversary, foreign assistance, and her own good fortune. 
 At the outset, the Catalonian rebellion prevented Philip IV. 
 
 11. It is said that Spain took no less than three thousand pieces of 
 artillery from Portugal during the latter's subjection. This was one of the 
 smallest injuries to which the weaker partner had to submit !
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 15 
 
 from making a serious effort to reconquer Portugal and 
 the new King used the breathing time thus afforded him 
 to strengthen his position by foreign alliances : in pursuance 
 of this policy, Mello went to England in the summer of 1641 
 to assist in negotiating a treaty between the two countries 
 and spent three months at the Court of "that tragic 
 King Charles." He describes his journey in one of his 
 epistles in verse, 12 and seems to have been particularly 
 impressed by what he calls "the beauteous verdure of 
 England." His "Aula Politica" 13 contains an anecdote 
 of his stay in London and at least one of his published 
 letters 14 is dated from there, while in his "Memorial," to 
 be mentioned later, he remarks, no doubt as a result of his 
 experience, that "it requires greater finesse to be a Catholic 
 in England than to be a Christian in Rome." His 
 connection with our country through his writings does not 
 end here, 15 for among the printers whom he employed in 
 after years on the complete edition of his works was 
 Juan Stenop (John Stanhope?) of London, while an 
 English version of his " Carta de Guia de Casados " 16 
 appeared there in 1697, and when the Portuguese Liberal 
 
 12. v. Epistle V. of La Fistula de Urania, in the " Obras Metricas.' 
 Lyons, 1665. 
 
 13. ed. cit. p, 90. 
 
 14. v. " Cartas Familiares," ed. cit, p. 8, 
 
 15. One of his sonnets betrays a curious lack of humour in subject and 
 treatment ; it is addressed to " The Most Serene Kin'' of Great Britain 
 on Hits Majesty having been bled the day after a Palace Feast." The 
 King was Charles II. 
 
 16. By Captain John Stevens, who also translated Faria e Sousa's 
 "History of Portugal" and his " Portuguese Asia." Mr. Fitzmaurice 
 Kelly calls him " a famous pirate and botcher of other men's .work." 
 The period between 1580 and 1680 was prolific in English versions of 
 Portuguese works, e.g., Lichfield's translation of Castanheda's "History 
 of India," Munday's translation of "Amadisde Gaula," and of "Palmeirim 
 de Inglaterra," Fanshawe's translation of " The Lusiads," Cogan's trans- 
 lation of the "Peregrination" of Mendes Pinto (who is now proved to 
 have been a more truthful narrator than either Congreve or his own 
 countrymen thought) and Wyche's translation of the "Life of D. John 
 de Castro," by Freire d' Andrade, while no less than four Editions 
 appeared of L' Estrange's version of " The Letters of a Portuguese Nun.''
 
 16 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 exiles in England began to reprint the classics of their 
 literature at the beginning of the last century, they 
 included this volume in a series destined to keep alive the 
 spirit of patriotism in a foreign land. 17 
 
 From England, Mello proceeded to Holland at the summons 
 of the Portuguese Ambassador, Tristan de Mendonc>, and 
 after helping him to collect and equip a fleet in aid of 
 their country, he took command and in the midst of great 
 difficulties and dangers succeeded in convoying it safely to 
 Lisbon. It proved the most valuable succour that had yet 
 been received, for the vessels were many in number and 
 carried soldiers, munitions of war and provisions, together 
 with some foreign officers of note who had volunteered for 
 service against the Spaniards. This was in the spring of 
 1642, and Mello spent the next two and a half years in 
 carrying out important commissions, such as the reorganisa- 
 tion of the army in the Alemtejo, which cost him a twelve 
 months' labour on the spot, and the conveyance of the 
 surrendered Spanish troops to the border : in the 
 intervals, the Ministers were continually calling him in to 
 consult with them on difficult diplomatic and military 
 questions, especially as to the fortification of the frontier 
 towns. He directed the construction of the forts at the 
 Lisbon bar, and drew up a plan for the defence of the 
 capital against a threatened attack by the English fleet, 
 while at the same time the King employed his ready pen 
 in the defence of his title to the throne, as well as on a life 
 of his father, Duke Doni Theodosio. To all appearances 
 Mello had now attained to the summit of his ambition 
 when, without warning, the wheel of fortune took a sharp 
 turn 18 and justified the saying : " Call no man happy 
 
 17. London, T. C. Hansard, 1820. The reprints included the Pindaric 
 Odes of Diniz da Cruz e Silva and the curious " Arte de Furtar," for long 
 falsely attributed to Father Antonio Vieira. 
 
 18. In one of his letters he complains that he "made shipwreck at the 
 doors of rest."
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 17 
 
 until bis death," for he found himself charged with having 
 procured the assassination of one Francisco Cardozo, the 
 steward of the Count of Villa Nova, and on the 19th 
 November, 1644, he was thrown into prison, where he 
 remained nine years. His trial 19 would seem to have been 
 conducted with a strange disregard of justice, for though 
 no real evidence of his guilt could be produced, and forty 
 witnesses, all men of high position and character, testified 
 in his favour, the Court of his Order, which included some 
 strong personal enemies, condemned him to perpetual exile 
 in Africa and the payment of a heavy monetary fine which 
 reduced him to poverty. He appealed 20 against this 
 sentence, with the only result that he lost his Commenda, 
 while India was substituted for Africa as the place of 
 banishment, and a further appeal brought his cause 
 for decision before the King as head of the Order, but 
 the latter allowed year after year to pass by without 
 pronouncing a final judgment, for reasons which will 
 presently appear. During all this time powerful friends 
 like Father Antonio Vieira, the great Jesuit preacher, 
 missionary and publicist, were working hard to procure his 
 freedom, and the Queen Eegent of France, Anne of Austria, 
 condescended to write in his favour to John IV., in the 
 name of her young son, afterwards Louis XIV., and the 
 Elector Palatine also offered to intercede for him. His 
 enemies, however, strove to nullify these efforts, and, as a 
 compromise, his sentence was finally commuted into one of 
 six years' exile to Brazil. We have now reason to believe 
 that though the supposed crime of inciting to murder served 
 as a pretext, it was not the true cause of the severe punish- 
 
 19. No final opinion can of course be pronounced until the "process" 
 is found and printed in full. It is to be noped that some investigator of 
 things literary and historical in Portugal will do this before long. 
 
 20. A letter of his dated lltli June, 1648, relates the proceedings up to 
 that time, v. "Cartas," ed. cit, p. 233.
 
 18 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 ment inflicted on a man who had rendered invaluable 
 services to King and country, for Camillo Castello Branco, 
 the famous novelist, has unearthed the details of this sorry 
 business from a contemporary genealogical MS. 21 If this 
 authority can be relied upon, it appears that both the King 
 and Mello, then a gallant gentleman of thirty, beloved 
 of ladies, had for some time past been carrying on an 
 intrigue with Donna Marianna de Alencastre, the third 
 and youthful wife of the aged Count of Villa Nova, 
 whose beauty formed a theme for the poets of the Court. 
 On a certain night she had given a rendezvous to her 
 royal lover, but Mello, who suspected he had a rival in 
 her affections, was on the watch and happened to 
 arrive at her palace at the same hour as the King. Both 
 endeavoured to enter together, and each refusing to give 
 way to the other, they drew their swords and fought until 
 the sound of the combat brought the Countess to a window 
 and they had to retire. The combatants were masked, but the 
 King had recognised Mello, though the latter only learnt 
 in prison the identity of his opponent ! A subsequent visit 
 of his to the same lady became known to Cardozo, who had 
 been acting the spy, and he at once reported the affair to his 
 master. Shortly afterwards, Cardozo was murdered at the 
 instigation of a man with whose wife he had been living 
 in adultery, but the Count attributed the death of his 
 faithful servant to his wife's lover, and, doubly enraged 
 against Mello, solicited his punishment from the King, 
 who, perhaps not unwilling for a pretext to remove his 
 rival, accepted the delation and yielded to the Count's 
 request. Meanwhile the real murderers of Cardozo had 
 been caught and condemned to the gallows after having 
 
 21. Vide the Preface to his edition of the " Carta de Guia de Casados," 
 Porto, 1873, reprinted with a corrective note in " Bohemia do Espirito," 
 Porto, 1886.
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 19 
 
 disclosed the name of their principal, but they were 
 now put to the torture once more, and their sufferings, and 
 the insinuations of the jailors, drew from them the 
 calumny which implicated Mello in the crime. He was 
 now a lost man, for the Count, who did not shrink from 
 poisoning his wife, was not likely to spare her lover, and 
 the King, entangled in the affair himself, had not the 
 courage to intervene in favour of his friend and relative, 
 and undo what the tribunals had done. He must have 
 known that Mello had been condemned on the evidence 
 of perjured witnesses, but he evidently felt that it was not 
 for him to expose them, and so balk the Count's 
 vengeance. At first, Mello probably expected an early 
 release from prison on the merits of his case and through 
 the efforts of his friends, but when the years passed by and 
 the Count and his other enemies continued their persecu- 
 tion, he began to lose hope, and in 1650, as a final resource, 
 he drew up a Memorial to the King in his defence which 
 the historian, Alexandre Herculano, calls " perhaps the 
 most eloquent piece of reasoning in the Portuguese 
 language, a model of vehemence, feeling and style." It 
 availed him nothing, however, and he went back to his 
 books, the only consolation that remained. In the first year 
 of his imprisonment he had published his history of the 
 Catalonian War, in 1647 appeared a life of St. Francis of 
 Assisi, and in the following years one of St. Augustine. 
 Next came some verses, and on the 5th March, 1650, he 
 put the final touches to the " Carta de Guia de Casados " 
 and issued this, the first of his Portuguese writings, and 
 one of his three famous literary achievements, in the 
 next year. At last, in the middle of 1653, he left 
 his prison home. 22 He appears to have been allowed 
 
 22. One would like to ascribe some of the credit for this to the Prince 
 Royal, Theodosio; v. Mello's personal appeal to the heir to the throne 
 in his " Enistola Declamatoria," printed in the " Aula Politica," ed. cit. 
 He there details his services, and gives many biographical details.
 
 20 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 out on parole, for his " Aula Politica " is dated from Luz on 
 the 29th August, 1653, and the dedication of the third of 
 the "Epanaphoras" from Bellas on the 29th September, 
 1654, both of which places are in the vicinity of Lisbon. 
 Early in the following year he set sail for Brazil and on 
 the 13th November, 1655 we find him at Bahia. 23 After 
 serving the term of his exile, he returned to Portugal and 
 spent the years 1659 to 1663 in Lisbon, frequenting the 
 meetings of the celebrated Academia dos Generosos, 24 the 
 members of which elected him their President no less 
 than five times. 
 
 In July, 1663, Father Manoel Godinho encountered him 
 at Marseilles, on his way to Rome, journeying under the 
 assumed name of the Chevalier de St. Clement, with letters 
 of recommendation from the Kings of England and 
 France. " My delight in meeting him," says the Jesuit 
 traveller, " can be conceived only by those who know how 
 to appreciate his estimable qualities and have enjoyed his 
 admirable com^ersation, have read his ingenious books, 
 have formed that opinion of his singular judgment which 
 all the world has, and been obliged by his courtesy as I 
 have been, for all these things taken together were the 
 reasons of my delight at his visit." Arriving in the Eternal 
 City at the end of the year, or at the beginning of 1664, 
 de Mello consorted with its leading men in every depart- 
 ment of learning, 25 and further busied himself in arrang- 
 ing for an edition of his collected works. It opened 
 
 23. The dedication of the second of the ' Apologos Dialogaes" is dated 
 from there. 
 
 24. Founded in 1647 by Doni Antonio Alvares da Cunha, it lasted until 
 1668, and had for its emblem a lighted candle, with the motto " Non 
 Extinguetur." The men of the time most distinguished by learning and 
 social position were numbered among its members. 
 
 25. He mentions their names in the preface to his " Obras Metricas." 
 It was on his return from India that Father Godinho met Mello ; vide 
 his " Relagao de novo caminho que fez por terra e mar vindo da India 
 para Portugal no anno de 1663," Lisbon, 1665, ch. 30.
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 21 
 
 with two volumes of " Obras Morales," dedicated to Queen 
 Catherine of Braganza, wife of our Charles II., containing 
 his life of St. Augustine, under the title of "The Phoenix 
 of Africa," and his life of St. Francis, under that of " The 
 Greatest of the Little," and the first of these was regarded 
 as such a model of Spanish prose that the Roman students 
 used it as a text-book. He planned the edition on a large 
 scale ; it was to consist of ten volumes, and to secure its 
 completion in a reasonable time, he set five printers to work 
 at once, three in Rome, one in Lyons, and one in London, 
 but want of pecuniary means prevented the realisation of 
 his scheme, and only two more volumes appeared, viz., the 
 first portion of his " Cart as Familiares," and his " Obras 
 Metricas." 26 On his way back from Rome, he stayed in the 
 French city correcting and polishing his verses with the 
 aid of friends, and he saw the last-named volume through 
 the press in April-May, 1665. In the same year he 
 returned to Portugal and little more than a twelvemonth 
 later, on the 13th October, 1666, died in Lisbon at the 
 relatively early age of fifty-five and was buried in the 
 Church of San Jose de Ribamar, west of Belem. 
 
 Mello must be judged as a poet by the volume of 
 " Obras Metricas," which he edited himself with loving 
 care. It is divided into nine parts, each named after one 
 of the Muses, and comprises Sonnets, Odes, Eclogues, 
 Epistles, Ballads, Madrigals, and many other varieties of 
 short lyrics, very much in the manner of Quevedo and 
 Gongora, though his Portuguese Tercets and Sonnets on 
 moral subjects are free from the failings characteristic of 
 the latter poet, as may be seen from the following example, 
 
 26. It would be a good service to Portuguese literature to print a 
 selection of the verses contained in these 700 closely-printed pages. An 
 English translation of a small number by a Mr. Lawson was published in 
 London, in 1819, under the title " Relics of Melodino." Another Edition 
 of the little book appeared in 1820.
 
 22 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 while his Sonnets vie in melancholy, truth and delicacy of 
 expression with those of Camoens : 
 
 THE FABLE OF DEATHS 
 
 Once I saw Death go sporting through a plain 
 
 Of living men, and none perceived him there ; 
 
 The old, of what they did all unaware, 
 Each moment ran against him, to their bane; 
 The young, trusting their youth, that of the pain 
 
 Of death knows nothing, gave him not a care ; 
 
 Purblind were all, none sought to 'scape the snare, 
 While with his hand he counted out the train. 
 
 Then he prepared to shoot, closing each eye: 
 He fired and missed. I, that his aim did see 
 
 Thus reckless, shouted, " Butcher, hold thy hand." 
 He turned, and "Such is war" was his reply; 
 " If you pass life without a glance at me, 
 
 How dare you more respect from me demand ? " 
 
 His innate good sense taught him to avoid many of the 
 absurdities of the Seiscentistas, and he strove hard to 
 emancipate himself from subservience to Spanish styles 
 and the Spanish language, and to resuscitate "the grave 
 style of our forefathers." Inspired by the national 
 traditions, he succeeded so well in this attempt that he 
 became Portugal's leading lyric poet, and one of her two 
 great prose writers, of the 17th century. 
 
 Speaking generally, his verses deal with moral, amatory, 
 familiar, occasional or academic subjects. About one-third 
 of them are in Portuguese, and these he rightly preferred, 
 while the remainder are in Spanish, which he wrote with 
 equal facility and grace and so as, in the opinion of his 
 contemporaries, to rival the best poets of that country. In 
 
 27. v. " Obras Metricas," ed. cit. A tuba de Calliope. Sonnet 81.
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 23 
 
 this frequent employment of what was literally his mother 
 tongue, he only followed the example set by the master 
 poets, Sa de Miranda, Gil Vicente and Camoens, and the 
 fashion of writing in Spanish, growing during the 
 " Sixty Years Captivity," endured until nearly the close of 
 the 17th century. Some Portuguese, like Jorge de 
 Montemor, used it as almost their sole vehicle of expression 
 and, producing classics, are rightly reckoned among the 
 great sons of Spain, though of foreign birth. 
 
 We know of only one dramatic work in Portuguese by 
 Mello worthy of mention, 28 namely, a witty comedy called 
 the "Auto do Fidalgo Aprendiz." Though divided into 
 jornadas after the fashion of Lope de Vega, it is written in 
 redondilhas, and affiliates our author to the school of Gil 
 Vicente 29 the Eschola Velha which expired worthily 
 with this, its last representative, after a life of conflict, first 
 with the Classicists led by Sa de Miranda and Antonio 
 Ferreira, then with the Jesuits and their Tragicomedies in 
 Latin, and all along with the Inquisition and its powerful 
 arm of offence the Index. The play, by its form, the 
 natural character of both plot and dialogue, the flow of 
 the verse, and the appropriateness of its diction, will 
 always rank as one of the strongest of its kind in 
 Portuguese literature, while the chief character recalls the 
 type of the "fidalgo pobre" in the works of the founder 
 of the theatre, and may be compared with Moliere's 
 "Bourgeois Gentilhomme." 
 
 A large proportion of Mello's Spanish poetry seems 
 nowadays of inferior quality and interest ; the frequent 
 parade of classical learning, the false rhetoric, and the 
 many and varied conceits, disfigure his art and tire his 
 
 28. No judgment can be passed on his unpublished plays, as they are 
 apparently lost. 
 
 29. An account of Gil Vicente and his School will be found in the Man- 
 chester Quarterly, for July and October, 1897.
 
 24 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 readers, though it must be confessed that these defects are 
 to be seen at their worst in his Academic Orations. By 
 way of compensation, his prose writings which have lived 
 and will live, the " Guerra de Cataluna," the " Apologaes 
 Dialogaes," and the " Carta de Guia de Casados," 30 are 
 almost entirely free from reproach in these respects, for 
 he drew his inspiration as an historian and critic from real 
 life, and had gone through the great schools of politics, 
 battles, voyages, revolutions, and captivities. His 
 published correspondence, which was mainly written 
 during his imprisonment, 31 would have been more valuable 
 had it comprised his letters on matters of state policy 
 instead of being of the kind known as " familiar ;" never- 
 theless few similar collections include more of literary 
 and biographical interest than these sometimes serious, 
 sometimes light, chatty and even witty epistles. They are 
 addressed to statesmen, great nobles, ambassadors, leading 
 ecclesiastics, poets, litteroti and all sorts of men, at home 
 and abroad, on the most varied subjects, and the 
 interest is maintained throughout, though a goodly 
 number turn on Mello's personal troubles, which if related 
 by a man lacking his philosophy, humour and powers of 
 expression, would have made the letters monotonous reading 
 He evidently did not pen them with a view to publication, 
 and their plain and simple diction, the absence in them of 
 conscious literary effort, and the popular phrases and 
 proverbs they contain, differentiate them entirely from 
 other collections of the century, while, like Mello's 
 
 30. Tliis has always been the most popular of Mello's works. The 
 editions of it are dated 1651, 1665, 1670, 1678, 1714, 1747, 1765, 1809, 
 1820, 1827, 1853 and 1873. Next in favour comes the " History of the War 
 in Catalonia," with the following editions, 1645, 1692, 1696, 1808, 1826, 
 1827, 1840, 1842, 1852 and 1883. The portrait in the edition of 1826 
 represents a different Mello, as its date sufficiently shows. 
 
 31. He says that in the first six years of his time in prison he wrote 
 no less than two thousand six hundred letters, v. " Cartas," ed. cit. p. 243. 
 The,letter reproduced is one of these, and bears date the 5th February, 1645.
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 25 
 
 writings in general, they show a deeply religious mind, a 
 manly spirit, a highly-trained intellect, wide reading and 
 much reflection. 32 His commerce with the best authors of 
 other countries, as well as his own, appears very clearly in the 
 "Hospital das Lettras," a penetrating and witty chapter of 
 literary criticism, 33 which forms the fourth of the " Apologos 
 Dialogaes." It is written in the form of a dialogue between 
 four personages, one of whom is his friend Quevedo, and 
 contains some sound judgments on Camoens, his translators, 
 and commentators, on Juan de Mena, Garcilasso, Monte- 
 mor, Lope de Vega, Gongora, and other writers. 34 After 
 Camoens, the Portuguese author he most affects is the 
 Horatian Sa de Miranda, doubtless because the tempera- 
 ments of the two men were akin; he calls him "the great 
 Sa," quotes him frequently, and declares that his writings 
 include the whole of moral philosophy, and we know that 
 he compiled a series of annotations to the epistles of the 
 founder of the Classical School which are unfortunately 
 lost. 
 
 In the first volume of his " Obras Morales," Mello sets 
 out a list of his works under ten headings, which includes 
 twenty published volumes and more than eighty in MS. 35 
 The mere titles show the wonderful variety of the sub- 
 jects he treats: divinity, philosophy, morals, criticism, 
 genealogy, politics, international law, mathematics and the 
 art of war do not exhaust them. One of the most useful 
 
 32. A circular letter to the learned men of Portugal asking for infor- 
 mation to enable him to compile a bibliographical dictionary is note- 
 worthy, v. " Cartas," ed. cit. pp. 238 and 328. His correspondents included 
 Francisco de Quevedo, Jaeinto Freire d' Andrade, Manoel de Faria e 
 Sousa, and Manoel Severim de Faria. 
 
 33. A masterly analysis of "Saudade," which he calls "the child of 
 love and absence," will be found in the " Epanaphoras," ed. cit. pp. 286-8. 
 
 34. Cf. his judgment on the poems of Dom Francisco de Portugal. 
 "Cartas," ed. cit. p. 189. 
 
 35. Another but shorter list will be found in the " Apologos Dialogaes," 
 ed. cit. p. 407.
 
 26 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 of his works is the "Feira dos Anexins," a methodically 
 ordered collection of Portuguese metaphors and popular 
 locutions, and his "Arte Cabalistica," full of strange lore, 
 is not the least curious, but the book that has perhaps worn 
 best is the "Carta de Guia de Casados." As we have seen, 
 it was published in Lisbon in 1651, and in 1697 Captain 
 John Stevens rendered it into English, faithful rather to 
 the spirit than to the letter, 36 and printed his translation in 
 London under the title "The Government of a Wife, or 
 Wholesom and Pleasant Advice to Married Men In a 
 Letter to a Friend." The book commends itself by its 
 worldly wisdom, robust common sense and lively wit, and 
 has the additional interest of exhibiting the ideas of a 
 cultured man of the time on one of the most knotty 
 problems of human life. Some extracts from the quaint 
 old English version, a scarce book now, will show the char- 
 acter and style of the original which purports to regulate 
 the relations of husband and wife, and to guide the former 
 in the ordering of the two lives, and the government of 
 his children and household. To a 20th century reader, 
 accustomed to hear of and witness the " management of a 
 husband," the attitude of Mello towards the other sex 
 may appear strangely superior, and it is necessary to pre- 
 mise by way of explanation that, in Portugal at least, the 
 women of those days very generally accepted in their 
 literal signification the words of St. Paul "the husband 
 is head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the 
 
 Church," "therefore as the Church is subject to 
 
 Christ, so let the wives be to their husbands in every- 
 thing." 37 
 
 36. Here and there lie omits pages of the original l>ecause of the differing 
 customs of Portugal and England, and substitutes what he considers 
 more appropriate matter of his own. 
 
 37. Ephesians, v, 23, 24. Cf. the "Perfecta Casada" of Frei Luis de 
 Leon.
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 27 
 
 The Portuguese woman was then, as she still remains, 
 docile and affectionate, half Arab by temperament and 
 education, if not by race, rarely self-assertive, and never 
 masterful, differing in this from her Northern sisters, and 
 she desired nothing more than to be a " mulher caseira," a 
 housewife, a stay-at-home. If of the better class, she 
 was rarely seen abroad, except on her way to and from 
 Mass, and then always accompanied by her husband or a 
 servant. Her ambition being limited to the walls of 
 her house, and her time taken up with the care of 
 her children, on whom she lavished an unmeasured affec- 
 tion, she usually proved an obedient helpmate to her lord 
 and master as the result both of her training and dis- 
 position. Having said this, it is only necessary to add that 
 Mello answers the charge of harshness towards women 
 at the close of his treatise. 
 
 Its origin is thus described in the Publisher's Preface : 
 " Our author being desired by a friend that was about 
 marrying to give him some good advice relating to that 
 course of life, writ this discourse without any art, but plain 
 and easy, as he himself owns, this being a good quality to 
 gain credit to what he asserts." Mello shall now speak 
 for himself, and first of his qualifications for the task he 
 had undertaken: "I am at years of discretion, have 
 been bred in Courts, have travelled, made remarks and 
 remember what I observed ; I have seen and heard. From 
 this experience I will deduce my rules, hence the examples 
 I shall follow. These shall be the books I will quote and 
 perhaps some tales I can remember, being here offered, 
 will be no less to the purpose than the old stories of Greeks 
 and Romans so often served up by those we call learned 
 and which, as often, we are to nauseate." 
 
 He then goes on to discuss the common cause of 
 marriage : " I am persuaded this thing the world calls
 
 28 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 'love' is not only one, but several distinct beings under 
 the same name. I suppose two sorts of love. The first is 
 that common sympathy or affection which of its own 
 natural force (without any reason) carries us away to love, 
 we know not what nor why. The second is that which 
 continues our inclination and good will to those objects 
 we know and converse with. The first ends in the 
 possession of the object desired. The second begins there ; 
 but in such manner that neither does the first always 
 produce the second, nor does the second always proceed 
 from the first." 
 
 Discussing marriages in general, he continues : -" For 
 the satisfaction of parents it is requisite there be some 
 equality in birth, for the good of the children that there 
 be a proportion of fortunes, and for the satisfaction of the 
 married couple that there be no disproportion of years. 
 What odds there are, ought always to be on the husband's 
 side, who in all respects must be superior to the woman, 
 yet the greatest happiness always consists in the greatest 
 equality. A great Courtier among us used to say : ' There 
 were three sorts of marriage in the world : a marriage 
 of God, a marriage of the Devil, and a marriage of Death. 
 Of God, where a young man marries a young woman; of 
 the Devil, where an old woman marries a young man; and 
 of Death, where an old man marries a young woman.' He 
 who marries a young wife has already half compassed his 
 ends. Tender years are free from ill customs, because 
 such as there are, having taken no root, are easily removed. 
 A man accusing his wife for her ill qualities before his 
 Prince, was asked by him at what age he married her, and 
 the husband saying at twelve years of age, the King 
 replied 'Then it is you who ought to be punished for 
 breeding her so ill.' Education is a second birth, and if 
 it differs from the first in any particular, it is only that the
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 29 
 
 second is the more prevalent." Mello next considers the 
 different kinds of bad qualities found in the sex, that his 
 readers may be able to apply the proper remedies, and 
 quotes an old saying " No man has more need of patience 
 than he who has a good wife, a good servant, and a good 
 horse, because each of them, sensible of their own worth, 
 follow their own will and not that of their master or 
 owner." " On the same reason perhaps was grounded that 
 old Spanish saying : ' A good mule, a good goat, and a 
 good woman are three scurvy beasts.' An ugly wife is a 
 common trouble, but may be eased many times in a day, 
 that is as often as the husband goes out of her sight or she 
 out of his. Let him consider the security of his 
 thoughts is of much more value than the pleasure of his 
 eyes." 
 
 " Imperious and high-spirited women are the hardest to 
 be reclaimed, because they grow more haughty upon the 
 meekness of a husband which ought to be their only cure. 
 Among people of credit no force or violence can be used, 
 which gave occasion to a wise man to say that, among other 
 things the commonalty had wrested from the gentry, one 
 was the privilege of correcting their wives whensoever they 
 deserved it." 
 
 " A jealous wife is very apt to cause discontent, for 
 jealousy, like God, makes something out of nothing. A 
 man of judgment used to stay : Keep a jealous wife idle : 
 that is, give her no occasion and she will not seek it." 
 
 " Extravagant, wasteful women are the devouring name 
 of houses and families, and money in the hands of a woman 
 is as unbecoming as a weapon. Much caution and discre- 
 tion is requisite to manage one of these women, for, as in 
 a ship at sea, the springing of a leak, because under water, 
 is more dangerous than if many breaches were made upon 
 the deck or sides of the ship that bear above the sea, so no
 
 30 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 other defect is equally dangerous as the profuseness of a 
 wife, because it is a fault under water and ruins the whole 
 stock and the family must inevitably perish. A gentleman 
 once fell sick with grief and concern to see himself loaded 
 with debts through the excess of his wife's needless 
 expenses, and being in a high fever and seeing a dish of 
 preserved citrons which his wife used to treat herself with, 
 though very dear, the poor sick man said : ' Give me that 
 citron, for I will eat it all.' His wife begged he would 
 not eat it because citron adds fire to a fever, and he 
 answered : ' I know it is the fire that consumes me ; but I 
 would try whether citron have the same property as a mad 
 dog, whose hair, applied to the sore made by his teeth, is 
 a certain cure.' One of his servants was no less witty, for 
 being asked by a gentleman whether he might see his 
 master, answered : ' My master is not in a condition to be 
 seen, for my mistress and her company are eating him for 
 a collation.' As for wilful women, they are either very 
 foolish or very proud. I cannot allow of arguing with a 
 wife for this is granting them an equality of judgment 
 and authority which must be carefully avoided. She must 
 be made sensible that it is not her part to understand but 
 to obey, and to be led, not lead." 
 
 "How will it be taken," continues Hello, "if I should 
 find fault with the manly Amazonian ladies ? Were I sure 
 the courage of women would be rightly applied, I could 
 bear with it ; but that being very dubious, it is better they 
 should shake at the sight of a naked sword and fall into a 
 swoon at thunder. God ordained they should be timorous ; 
 it is best they should be so." 
 
 Himself a man of high intellectual attainments, he did 
 not love learned women. 
 
 " Travelling one day, I heard a poor Carrier say : ' God 
 deliver me from a mule that brays and a woman that speaks
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 31 
 
 Latin.' " Again : " I will venture to tell you another 
 story. An ancient, sober woman, went to confession to 
 an old surly Friar. She beginning to say the confiteor in 
 Latin, the confessor asked her: 'Do you speak Latin?' 
 She replied : ' Father, I was bred in a convent.' Then 
 said the Friar : 'Are you married, maid or widow ? ' She 
 answered : 'A married woman.' 'Where is your husband ? ' 
 says the Friar. 'In India,' says she. Then the old man 
 wittily replied : ' Hold then, child ; you understand Latin, 
 were bred in a convent, and your husband is in India. 
 Then go about your business and come some other day, for 
 it is certain you have much to say, and I am in haste at 
 present." 
 
 And again : "A lady desired her brother, who was a 
 man of science, to give her some motto for a device she 
 desired to have engraved on a seal, and he answered : 
 ' Sister, leave devices for the shields of knights errant, and 
 do you devise how to make a tart for your husband, when 
 you have one.' I would not have women be too knowing 
 in matters of war and politics, nor aim at it. I abhor some 
 that will talk of government, judge of discourses, decide 
 points of honour, and raise disputes, others that pretend 
 to skill in poetry, have a stammering of strange languages, 
 define love and its effects, study hard questions to puzzle 
 the learned, and talk of unknown places ; others that know 
 all the secret virtues of herbs, that tell the significance of 
 colours, that censure sermons, that pick difficult sentences 
 out of them, that use cramp words, that speak by metaphors, 
 that have unusual ways of praising, and that keep time to 
 their discourse with the motions of hands and eyes." 
 
 " To talk always is bad, to talk loud is worse, and to talk 
 in improper places is worst of all. Some women value 
 themselves upon answering loud in Church, and will 
 converse with their acquaintances that are at a distance
 
 32 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 on purpose to be heard. To sigh at sermon, to make 
 motions with the head in token of approbation, to pray 
 aloud, to beat time to the musick, are actions in no way 
 allowable. A discreet woman must speak as much as is 
 requisite, in reason, in a low voice, so that the person she 
 directs her discourse to may hear and not those who are 
 not concerned. A judicious person once compared people 
 to bells; the ringing discovers whether they are sound or 
 cracked. Women's discourse ought to be about their work, 
 the season of the weather, complaints of their maids ; and 
 I will allow them to complain of their husband's unkind- 
 ness, even though it be false. Because these are narrow 
 limits, they may be permitted to praise or condemn the 
 fashion of their clothes, to like or dislike the fancy, so 
 they do not extend to interpreting of colours." 
 
 "What shall I say of laughter? If a woman has white 
 teeth, a pretty mouth and dimples in her cheeks, therein 
 lies the greatest danger. Some of these sort of creatures 
 will laugh all the while at a funeral sermon only to expose 
 their treasure. It is infallibly true that much laughter 
 betokens folly." 
 
 Dealing with a wife's accomplishments, Hello pro- 
 ceeds : " It is very commendable for a woman to sing to 
 her husband and children, and it may be permitted her to 
 dance, if very young, in her own apartment. I cannot 
 approve of carrying castenets in her pocket, learning wild 
 catches and dancing jiggs; these are all incentives of 
 lewdness. To rally and set up for a wit in every company, 
 at church, at court, at the play, is most pernicious and 
 hard to prevent. Let the husband keep a watchful eye, 
 and if he reclaims her, it is a great work, for as yet I never 
 saw any that was sick of that distemper recover." 
 
 "To sum up the place of the wife is at home. The 
 husband must bring in, the wife must keep, or to quote an
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 33 
 
 old Portuguese proverb : ' the husband a boat, the wife a 
 chest. 3 " Talking of female friends he observes : " The 
 name of friends and enemies in Portuguese differs but in 
 one letter, the one being ' anmigas,' the other 'imigas.' 1 
 am so wicked to believe women's friends have done them 
 more harm than their enemies. Therefore I commonly 
 say : ' Men are ruined by their enemies and women by their 
 friends.' " 
 
 Of pets he says : " I cannot approve of trimmed lap-dogs 
 that have mystical names. Being in a church, a page 
 came running out of breath to ask me if I had seen such a 
 lady's 'delight' that was lost?' And having asked what 
 the lady's 'delight' was, found it was a little dog of that 
 name. Parrots and monkeys are needless troubles and 
 often inspire ill thoughts. Little diverting blacks, witty 
 foundlings, silly country fellows (who sometimes are not 
 so silly as they appear), clothed in several colours, who 
 have liberty to go where they please, are not fit, nor would 
 I have them be seen in a house. I protest I ever loathed 
 the ladies in Romances because I always found lap-dogs, 
 lions and dwarfs about them. So great is my aversion 
 from that sort of vermin that I cannot bear with them in 
 fabulous books ; think how I shall like them when real." 
 
 Next he speaks of servants, and the modern ring of such a 
 complaint as the following, makes one forget for a moment 
 that he wrote it two and a half centuries ago. "In our 
 days, contrary to the ancient practice, it is grown a 
 custom for the women servants to be as well clothed as 
 their mistresses. They use policy, persuading their poor 
 ladies that it is for their credit their attendance should be 
 as well apparelled as themselves. Thus it often happens 
 the mistress is not known from the maids." Dealing with 
 their diet he continues : "A prelate of a very strict religious 
 order told me he always kept his Friars hungry that they
 
 34 MANGEL DE MELLO 
 
 might still be thinking how to feed better. The contrary 
 must be used with servants, for their thoughts are not so 
 bad when their bellies are full." He notes with approval 
 the scriptural saying "the more servants, the more enemies," 
 and most persons will endorse his opening remark on the 
 next topic : " receiving and paying of visits is a tiresome 
 encumbrance." Some pages on the management of the 
 household give a glimpse of old-time customs and are 
 curious. "I would have no black or tawny women that 
 go errands; they generally prove fruitful and in my 
 opinion every slip of theirs is a scandal to the house. Men 
 that practice sleight of hand, those that mimic sermons, 
 imitate beasts and act other men are a destructive genera- 
 tion. But above all those women are so who sell washes 
 for the face, take away freckles, make false eyebrows, and 
 smooth the skin, and those who go about begging for 
 others, and pedlars. All this sort of people that usually 
 resort to great houses, stick like fish to the rocks ; they are 
 hard to remove, but worse to be endured." 
 
 The treatment of children next engages Hello's atten- 
 tion and after condemning those fathers who make them- 
 selves the nurses or cradles of their children, and reproving 
 the custom of endowing infants with a string of names, he 
 passes on to speak of the table. He advises a man of quality 
 to keep a "decent, not a hungry table, that it be rather to 
 feed the mouth than the eyes," and tells the story of a grandee 
 of Spain " to whom the reversion of a prince's table belonged. 
 The meat was carried to his house and served up to his own 
 table; next it descended to his son and heir, who kept a 
 table apart and entertained company, and by him I was 
 sometimes invited, and this was the third time these dishes 
 appeared in public. But it stopped not there, for thence 
 they went down to the chief servants and from them to 
 the inferior, so that these dishes appeared in five several
 
 MANGEL DE MELLO 35 
 
 places before they were consumed. This gave occasion to 
 a servant of that family, with the native sharpness of the 
 country, to say his master was the greatest man in Spain 
 for that he was served by grandsons of princes, because all 
 his servants were but four degrees removed from His 
 Highness, alluding to the four tables by which the dishes 
 gradually descended to them." 
 
 Though Hello's book is directed to the subject of 
 women and their failings rather than to men, he does not 
 leave the latter without guidance and rebuke where 
 necessary, and after declaring that " all praises are too 
 little for a virtuous woman," he puts this apology at the 
 close : " If this doctrine (the book) should be judged by 
 the women too rigid and austere, 38 I do assure them I 
 designed it not so, but rather to direct all things for their 
 satisfaction, service and reputation. That this may more 
 manifestly appear, let any desire me to write a Letter of 
 Instruction for the married women, and they shall see 
 what I say in their behalf, if they are not satisfied with 
 what I have said to their husbands." 
 
 He winds up thus : " Sir, a clean house, a neat 
 table, decent diet, attendance without noise, good servants, 
 one to direct them, wages duly paid, a coach upon occasion, 
 a fat horse, much silver, less gold, some jewels, as much 
 money as may be, all utensils, a store of furniture, the best 
 of pictures, some books, a few arms, a house of your own, 
 a little country house, prayers at home, much alms, few 
 neighbours, children not pampered, good order in all 
 things, a virtuous wife, and a christian-like husband, make 
 life pleasant and death happy." 
 
 It is not surprising to learn that so keen a critic as 
 Dom Franciso Manoel de Mello lived and died a bachelor ! 
 
 38. It happened as he had foreseen, for he has to confess in September, 
 1657, that "some women did not take my raillery in good part." 
 v. " Apologos Dialogaes," ed. cit. p. 406.
 
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