Diário de Lisboa
- Portugal’s problems and the Peniche case
- The Portuguese community in Brazil
- About 3 million foreigners in France
A technology-and-livelihood column is read alongside emigrant relief from Brazil and foreign-population figures in France. The expanded page connects local industry with Portugal’s communities abroad.
Peniche closing section, Brazil relief and migration plea, France population brief; other editorial and book-review passages not fully transcribed.
Translation
Portugal’s problems and the Peniche case
A bloody episode in Peniche has demonstrated the old struggle between progress and routine.
When someone discovered a way of closing food tins without soldering, the solderers felt their livelihood threatened.
They decided to react. How? By killing the man who had made the invention practical and easy. A bullet struck him down. The murderer was sent to prison.
And now? The solderers will have to change trades or accept the inevitable—learn the new method of closing tins.
Although the newspapers gave this crime only a few lines, it deserves special prominence.
Michelet wrote his history books believing, as Hegel did, that peoples advance from fate towards freedom. Others have contested that idea, holding that man will never break his chain, but walks out his destiny as though harnessed to a water-wheel.
What happened in Peniche really does not support Michelet.
The mechanic António de Azevedo—the most skilful among his companions—was sacrificed to grim hatreds. Inventions free the human arm, and the arm is only a rudimentary part of him.
Ferocity hides beyond reason and conscience, in a dark region where light has never penetrated.—Titus.
The Portuguese community in Brazil
The Portuguese community in Brazil has sent, or is about to send, 2,000 contos to the disaster victims on Faial.
We have never appealed in vain to these brothers of ours, who, though living far away, are always close to us in feeling.
By contrast, we do not always remember to give their requests due consideration, even when they offer us the means needed to meet them.
When will a shipping service to Brazil become a reality? Would it be so difficult to enact a law protecting emigrants, including the assistance organizations so necessary as they take their first steps?
About 3 million foreigners in France
According to recent, updated migration statistics, France currently has about 3 million foreigners: 807,000 Italians, 467,000 Spaniards, 460,000 Belgians, 310,000 Poles, 146,000 Swiss, 92,000 Russians, 84,000 British, 65,000 North Americans and 35,386 Portuguese. France shelters emigrants from all over the world, with Portugal in 12th place.
Context
A labour-saving invention threatens a skilled trade
The Peniche dispute turns on a specific change in production: closing tins without solder. What saved one operation also threatened the income of workers trained to perform it. Titus makes the killing an argument about resistance to change, insisting that violence cannot restore the old technique’s necessity. The deeper economic conflict is between the benefits of a new process and the cost borne by people whose existing skill loses its place.
Disaster relief becomes a claim for reciprocal support
The donation from Brazil is used to ask what Portugal owed its emigrants in return. The requested shipping route and protective organizations address the practical difficulties of moving abroad and staying connected with home. This makes the appeal more than gratitude for charity. It argues that an overseas community able to help during a disaster should also be able to expect transport and institutional support from the country it assists.
Portuguese migration in a wider European picture
The France table situates Portuguese migrants among much larger communities from other countries. Its concluding rank tells a Portuguese readership where its own emigrants stood within a broad destination country. Read beside the Brazil appeal, the two items reveal different connections abroad: a community presented as a source of aid across the Atlantic, and a smaller group counted within migration to France. Both made overseas lives part of domestic newspaper debate.
Original
Os problemas portugueses e o caso de Peniche
Em Peniche, deu-se um episodio sangrento, demonstrativo da velha luta entre o progresso e a rotina.
Como alguem descobrisse o processo de fechar as latas de conservas sem soldagem, os soldadores sentiram-se ameaçados no seu pão.
Resolveram reagir. Como? Matando o individuo que tornara pratica, facil, a invenção. Uma bala prostrou-o. O assassino deu entrada na cadeia.
E agora? Os soldadores vão mudar de oficio ou têm que resignar-se ao inevitavel—aprender o novo processo de fechar as latas.
Embora os jornais tenham contado este crime em poucas linhas, ele merece um destaque especial.
Michelet escreveu os seus livros de historia, pensando, como Hegel, que os povos avançam da fatalidade para a liberdade. Já houve quem contestasse esta ideia, afirmando que o homem nunca quebrará a sua cadeia, percorrendo o seu destino, como se puxasse a uma nora.
Realmente o que se passou em Peniche não é a favor de Michelet.
O mecanico Antonio de Azevedo—o mais habil entre os seus camaradas—foi sacrificado a odios torvos. As invenções libertam o braço humano—uma parcela rudimentar.
A ferocidade esconde-se para além da razão e da consciencia—numa zona sombria, onde a luz nunca penetrou.—Titus.
A colonia portuguesa do Brasil
A COLONIA portuguesa do Brasil enviou, ou vai enviar para os sinistrados do Faial a quantia de 2.000 contos.
Nós nunca apelámos debalde para esses nossos irmãos que, apesar de viverem longe, estão sempre ao pé de nós, pelo sentimento.
Em contraposição, nós nem sempre nos lembramos de tomar na devida conta os pedidos que nos fazem. Nem mesmo quando eles nos oferecem os meios necessarios para serem atendidos.
Quando será uma realidade a carreira de navegação para o Brasil? Custará muito publicar uma lei de protecção ao emigrante, incluindo os patronatos tão necessarios nos seus primeiros passos?
Cerca de 3 milhões de estrangeiros em França
SEGUNDO uma recente e actualisada estatistica de emigração, sabe-se que em França ha presentemente cerca de 3 milhões de estrangeiros, dos quais 807.000 italianos, 467.000 espanhois, 460.000 belgas, 310.000 polacos, 146.000 suissos, 92.000 russos, 84.000 ingleses, 65.000 americanos do norte, 35.386 portugueses. A França abriga emigrantes de todo o mundo, estando Portugal em 12.º lugar.