Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1894-10-25
The BAsQuEs OF SPAIN.
AN Onconquered People Descended From
Antiquity.

Antiquity.
Whether the Aryan peoples. tho Cor.
mans, the Celts, etc, poured in over
Europe from the shores of the Caspian
"or mad their original home in north
western Europe, certain it is that wher.
ever they advanced they found the
country In possession of a people, who
perhaps, had no more claim to be the
hrse settlers that the Aryans them
selves This people was of Turanian
STOCK, and was represented in the stone
age by the lake jewellers of Switzer-
land and of Ireland.
It's best-known modern representa-.
ives are the Greenlanders, the Esai-
mo- and the Basque people of Spain.
whose little country is on the northern
ana southern slopes of the Bases
fyrenees, on the shores of the
oay OF Blscay. For the most
part the old settlers were conquered
pc the newcomers and exterminated or
absorbed or driven to the mountains,
where remnants of them survived as
dlstlnct people down to comparatively
recent times. But in all civilized Eu-
rope, Spain is the only country in which
any remnant of the race has succeeded
In maintaining itself distinct to the
present day. This remnant. known as
Basques, has played conspicuous role
In history, and something of its story
Is told by Elizabeth T. Spring in the
Cosmopolitan, from which we extract
the following:
The first impression of this people,
as one settles among them, is of ex-
traordinary force, nobility and intelli-
gence Dignity is stamped on their
faces, and an air of high-minded, sim
pie sincerity inspires absolute conf
dence. As the acquaintance ripens,
TINS impression grows deeper. These
people are pure, in spite of their French
nelghbors on the north, industrious
and practical, though they touch
lSpanlards on the south. As loyal as
they are independent, they are to the
last degree hospitable and generous
With all this they are intellectually
keen and discriminating. An acute
observer says of them:
They have the natural active DO
likeness of the Irish, without servility:
the sagacity of the Scotch, without
cuteness; the steady self-respect of the
upper classes of England. without
N-@>OA SeuRAuAty. nave Scch lHtIH tA-
ecute vengeance without an angry
word, resem bling North American In
dams in the self-possession of their
dlspassionate conduct. One instinc-
lively recognizes them not only as men
OF the highest order, but as absolute
gentlemen, even in the rudest noun
taineer dress. Their manner toward
each other, as toward strangers, is
singularly courteous and direct and
marked by genuine kindness and ami
ability. There is no roughness what
ever in their forcefulness.
''The women are very beautiful;
their physiognomy extremely mobile.
with frequent play of eyebrows and
quivering of lips. Their gait is elastic.
their hands and feet are small and ex-
Quisitely formed. Their chances some
times seem ironical, half hooking, but
always clear and full of fire.
But these people of Spain, and yet
not Spaniards, who are they? Models
of ancient manners, untained by time,
so marked. SO separate-as distinct in
racial characteristic from their nearest
nelghbors as from the most remote-so
rooted to this soil, how shall we ac-
count for them?
"Velasco, their own historian, grave
ly traces their descent directly from
Tubal-Cain. Humboldt calls them Celt-
Iberians. Theory on theory. each one
disproving the last with equal learn
ing, has been advanced to account for
this phenomenon. Nothing now seems
more probable than that they are
remnant of the troglodytes of the age
of stone, the same with the men whose
bones are to be found in the caverns of
the Alps and the Pyrenees beside those
of the huge animals they hunted. In
this case their unwritten history dates
from twenty centuries before the
Christian era.
SIT is from the eighth century, when
they destroyed the Frank army, and
when, in the fight against the Sara
Gems, they stood out in the full light
beside the Spanlards, that the in
finite history of the Basques dates.
1t was De Haro. lord of Biscay,
and his men who really won the day in
the decisive battle of Las Navas de To
loso 1t is to them the honor is due of
taking the chains from the Caliph's
tent, which hang now in the Church of
Pampiona, and are carved since that
time on the shield of CASTLE. All Span
iards who took part in that struggle
were ennobled. The Basques, having
never been subjected either to the Sar-
acens or to any other race, were pro-
nounced all noble, so that ever since,
to secure patent of nobility. it is only
necessary to produce proof of Basque
birth. Hence the continuance of the
primitive absence of caste, or social
distinctions, an ideal state unknown to
such a degree elsewhere, in which the
test of worth lies wholly in essential
personality.
I'm Don Quixote' Donna Rodriguez
saws of her husband: He is as we'll
born as a king, because he comes from
the mountains and when Sancho Pan
"a, as governor of Barretaria, seeks a
secretary, one of his attendants ex-
claims: L, sir, am the man, for 1 can
read and write: and, moreover, l am a
Basque
.s.With that addition says Sancho,
you are fit to be secretary to an en-
:peror.'
One Basque. at least-Ignatius Logo
Ia-has left his name upon the worlds
records. The author gives an account
of the circumstances which led this
once gay cavalier to take up the Lives
of the Saints" when he lay wounded,
and read until he was fred with en-
thusiasm to emulate them; and how
he won over another another Basque
Francois Xayier-to a similar career of
Christian warfare But as race the