Richard Ford’s visit to Gibraltar, 1845

We continue with Ford’s accounts of his visit to Gibraltar and his views on the population and houses:

“Gibraltar is said to contain between 15,000 and 20,000 inh., exclusive of the military. In day-time it looks more peopled than it really is, from the number of sailors on shore, and Spaniards who go out at gun-fire. The differences of nations and costumes are very curious: it is a motley masquerade, held in this halfway house between Europa, Asia, and Africa, where every man appears in his own dress and speaks his own language. Civilization and barbarism clash. It is a Babel of languages. Nothing can be more amusing than the market-places. The houses, the rent of which is very dear, are built on the Wapping principal of paltry, stuffy vulgarity, with a Genoese exterior; all is brick and plaster and wood-work, cribbed and confined, and filled with curtains and carpets; they are calculated to let in the enemy, heat, and are fit only for salamanders and “scorpions,” as those born on the Rock are called. These English furnitures and comforts are positive nuisances; we sigh for the cool penury of Algeciras. The narrow streets are worthy of these nutshell houses; they are, except the main street, yclepped “lanes,” e.g., Bomb-house Lane and Horse-barrack Lane. Few genuine Moro-Peninsular towns have any streets; the honesty and England scorns the exaggerations of Spanish Calles, and calls things here by their right names.”

Image: Water carriers at Gibraltar. Illustrated London News. 22nd April, 1876.