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Lusitanian sketches of the pen and pencil
Lusitanian sketches of the pen and pencil Author:William Henry Giles Kingston Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: SKETCH III. Oporto. Bravery of its Inhabitants. Extent and Population. Appearance from the River. Topographical Ramble. Principal Streets. Suspension Bridge. ... more »Fountains. Convent of San Bento das Freiras. Localities of different Trades. Unconcemedness of the Shopkeepers. Pracas or Squares. Town Hall. Italian Opera House. Lovely Walk of the Fontainhas. Fine situation of the Largo do Torre da Marco. Suburbs of Oporto. The more Ancient portion of the City. Recent Improvements. The heroic and ever-unconquered city of Oporto, as it is now designated, is one of the most irregularly built towns with which I am acquainted. Few of its streets are level, and fewer still run at right angles with each other ; indeed, its inhabitants seem to have an abhorrence of right angles; it is, however, a very picturesque, interesting place. It well earned the title of heroic from the gallant defence it made against the army of the usurper Dom Miguel, in 1832, when every military man declared that, according to all the rules of military tactics, it ought to have been taken. The armed inhabitants, the few regular troops, and the foreign auxiliaries, thought otherwise, or, being ignorant of the art of war, did not know when to yield ! so the city was preserved, to prove the nucleus whence the genial beams of true liberty and enlightened education may radiate over the fair surface of Lusitania. As to its claim to the title of " the ever-unconquered," the inhabitants, when they gave it, surely must have forgotten the circumstances of its capture by Soult, and all the miseries they suffered during the short time his army held possession ; EXTENT AXD POPULATION OF OPORTO. 31 as also too, probably, its relief by the gallant British troops under our great duke. The Portuenses have so well proved their ...« less