The Basque language, _Eskuara_, was described by the Spanish historian, Mariana, as “coarse and barbarous,” and a traveller among the Basques in the Middle Ages recorded that to hear them speak one would say they were dogs barking. In English, the word “jingo” has been said to derive from the Basque _Jincoa_, “God,” introduced by Wellington’s troops after the Peninsular War. The Basque word is an abbreviation of _Jaungoicoa_, “the Lord on high,” _jauna_, “lord,” being the common form of greeting between peasant and peasant. It becomes more and more rare to hear pure Basque spoken; foreign words creep in and, with the definite article “_a_” suffixed, hide under a Basque form: _dembora_ (Lat. _tempus_) thus ousting the Basque word _eguraldia_ for “weather,” _gorphuntza_ (Lat. _corpus_) being “body,” and so on.[64] Pure Basque recedes to remote villages in the mountains, and there the Basque maintains his ancient customs, as averse from change to-day as when Horace described him as “Cantabrum indoctum juga ferre nostra.”[65]
An old Latin account speaks of the Basques as going nowhere--not even to church--without arms, usually a bow and arrows, and says that they are “gens affabilis, elegans et hilaris--courteous, graceful, and light-hearted;”[66] but, in spite of their known hospitality, their distrust of the foreigner and their hatred of intrusion are shown in more than one of their proverbs, as “The stranger-guest does not work himself, and prevents you from working.” The Basques are, indeed, the most energetic, as they are the most ancient people of the Peninsula. “Naguia bethi lansu--The idle man is ever busy,” says another of their proverbs; and, again, “Idle youth brings needy old age.”[67] Their fields are well and economically cultivated, and if their methods are antiquated, this is partly due to the mountainous nature of the country and the smallness of the holdings, making it simpler, _e.g._, to thresh corn by beating it sheaf by sheaf against a stone. Numerous small factories--of cloth as at Vergara, of paper at Tolosa, of iron and steel at Eibar and Elgoibar, of furniture at Azpeitia--and many quarries and tile-factories prove their industry; and entering a small Basque town such as Elgoibar, one may hear in tiny shops on all sides the sound of sandal-makers and workers in wood and leather. They know how to work, and they know how to enjoy themselves with thoroughness at the village fêtes. From dawn to dusk the ball is to be heard against the wall of the pelota court on Sundays, with intervals of dancing to the shrill pipe and drum of the _chunchunero_. Voltaire, thinking of their love of dancing, described them as “un petit peuple qui danse sur les Pyrénées,” and certain dances still survive. The sword-dance, _ezpata danza_, is one of the most remarkable, and has been described by Pierre Loti in “Figures et choses qui passaient;” and other dances are those representing the primitive methods of agriculture, the vintage, weaving, etc. The Basque pelota has, unfortunately, become, of recent years, a game of professionals, and as played, _e.g._, at Madrid, the interest is rather in the betting than in the play. The enthusiasm formerly excited among the Basques by the game is illustrated by the story that several Basque soldiers left the Army of the Rhine, returned to their country to play a game of ball, and, having played and won it, rejoined the army in time to take part in the battle of Austerlitz.[68] A game played in the immense court of a small Basque village is still a splendid sight, though it has lost much of its splendour, and the old Rebot is fast dying out. Pierre Loti has described a game of Blaid, as seen in a French-Basque village, in his novel of the Basque country, “Ramuntcho”; and this form of the game has been played in Paris and London. But old peasants will shake their heads and say it is no longer “as of old.” The expression “of old” is common on the lips of both French and Spanish Basques;[69] they willingly praise the past, and are intensely conservative of all their customs, their immemorial language, their games, privileges, religion. The ox-carts, with wheels of solid wood, to be seen under the vine-trellises of Basque farms, seem as old as the withered trunk of the oak of Guernica, and similarly many ancient customs have been retained. In some parts, at funerals, the men wear long cloaks reaching to the feet, the women also wearing long, full cloaks with hoods, that completely hide the face. The men go first, and then all the women--men and women in single file--the chief mourners coming last.