A Spanish Schoolboy.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 450, 1 March 1890, Page 3

A Spanish Schoolboy.

iN'Franeisco de Quovedo's rollicking history of Don Pablo of Segovia wo find plenty of information as to how the Spanish students of the old days used to amuse themselves. At school Don Pablo s great friend was Don Diego, in proof of which lie tells us : ‘I used to exchange tops with him when mine spun better than his'. I used to share my breakfast with him ; I bought him picture books, taught him how to fight, played at saddle-my-nag with him, and constantly amused him. 5 The reader will please remember that this story of Don Pablo’s adventures was published more than 200 years ago. The author of them, Quevedo, was born in 1580, and died in 1645. One day Pablo and Diego were walking home from school when they met a man named Pontius of Aguirra. ‘ Pablo,’ whispered Diego, ‘ call him Pontius Pilate ; and then run away.’ Pablo, to pleasehis friend, called the man Pontius Pilate and then ran, pursued by the other, sword in hand, so hotly that he barely had time to escape into the schoolhonse, where, at the request of the angry man, poor Pablo was soundly whipped by the schoolmaster. At each stroke with the birch tho master said, ‘ Will you ever say Pontius Pilate again?’ ‘No,:sir,’ replied Pablo. ‘ Will you ever say Pontius Pilate again?’ ‘No," sir, no sir; never again.’ Next morning, when Pablo had to recite the prayers at the opening of school, ho stopped short when he came to the creed, and having to say, ‘He suffered under Pontius Pilate,’ bub remembering his whipping and his promise, he innocently substituted, ‘He suffered under Pontius of Aguirra,’ which so much amused the schoolmaster that Pablo received exemption from the next two whippings he might deserve. During Carnival time the Spanish schoolboys had great fun with the procession of the so-called ‘ King of the Cocks,’ when they all dressed up in fantastic costumes, and paraded the streets of the town, headed by one of their number on horseback. Bub it was when they went to the University that the real fun as well as misery began. From all accounts we must conclude that in the 16th, 17bh, and 18th centuries the Spanish students were sad Bohemians, the plague of all peaceful citizens, and for the most part so poor that, unless they stole or fought for their food, many of them must have died of starvation. The first appearance of Don Pablo in the court-yard of the Uuiversiby was greeted with the cry of‘A Freshman ! a Freshman !’ and the whole band of students surrounded him, and pummelled him, and otherwise maltreated him. The brutality of these students is too dreadful to be described. Poor Pablo suffered terribly during the first week. But at last he determined to do as others did ? and so he became one of the most mischievous and turbulent students in Alcala, while his friend Don Diego, who was rich, was the most virtuous, calm, and religious. Pablo passed a great part of his time in fighting with the watch, playing practical jokes and robbing the provision shops in a dashing, piratical sort of way, always ready to draw his sword and often using his sword to spear or harpoon the fish or the capon which the appetite of the growing youth demanded, but which the purse of the poor student could not pay for. There is absolutely nothing exemplary in the conduct of Don Pablo, or in tne manners and habits of the old Spanish students, whose Bohemianism was often another name for i thieving and bloodshed For that matter, all the students were not as bad as Pablo ; and we may be sure that the gentle boy whose portrait by Velasquez is preserved in the Czernia Gallery at Vienna was too self-respectful and too noble-minded to indulge in such terrible pranks as-those we have referred to.