“Amateur Bastilles.”

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLV, Issue 25, 21 December 1910, Page 46

“Amateur Bastilles.”

It has probably occurred to a good many English people that the expulsion of the monastic orders from Portugal is likely to mean the dumping of a further supply of those institutions upon the convenient and long-suffering shores of Great Britain. The Spanish people have been giving physical demonstrations of their unwillingness to receive the fugitives, Italy has taken prompt measures to resist invasion, and France, of course, is closed ground. By a process of exhaustion. it appears but too likely that England will be selected as the refuge of communities which seem to enjoy such unanimous dislike in the territories where they are best known. The “Times” correspondent gives the following description of one of the Jesuit institutions at Lisbon whose inmates have just been evicted. “Its interior disclosed,” he says, "a quaint blending of Inquisitorial mysteries and modern educational and domestic appointments,” while it was underlaid with “a maze of subterranean passages, crypts, and caches that would have done credit to the Bastille.” A London journal remarks: “It is safe to say that England does not want any multiplication of “Inquisitorial mysteries” or amateur Bastilles; and if the Aliens Aet offers no protection, it would be as well to consider the necessary barriers against what is certainly an undesired immigration.”