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Children, Their Schools and What They Learn
on Beginning Primary School
Children, Their Schools and What They Learn
on Beginning Primary School:
English and French Educational Legacies
in Cameroon Schools

By

Genevoix Nana
 Children, Their Schools and What They Learn on Beginning Primary School:
English and French Educational Legacies in Cameroon Schools,
by Genevoix Nana

This book first published 2013

Cambridge Scholars Publishing

12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Copyright © 2013 by Genevoix Nana

All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or
otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

ISBN (10): 1-4438-5130-2, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-5130-5

To my late parents
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Illustrations ...................................................................................... x

List of Appendices .................................................................................... xiii

Preface ...................................................................................................... xiv

Acknowledgements ................................................................................... xv

List of Abbreviations ................................................................................ xvi

Introduction ................................................................................................. 1
1. Thesis
2. Main research aim and questions
3. Summary of chapters

Chapter One ................................................................................................. 7

Rationale and Conceptual Background, Presentation of Cameroon’s
Education System and a Historical Review of the Language Situation
in the Country
1.1 Overview of the relationship between language, education
and society
1.2 Conceptual background
1.3 Presentation of Cameroon’s education system
1.4 Physical presentation
1.5 Conclusion

Chapter Two .............................................................................................. 44

Literature Review
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Language socialisation
2.3 Language ideology
2.4 Language identity
2.5 Bilingualism and bilingual education
2.6 Comparative education
2.7 Literature review conclusion
viii Table of Contents

Chapter Three ............................................................................................ 88

Research Design and Methodology
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Qualitative and quantitative research approaches
3.3 The methodological stance of this study
3.4 Case study, definition and scope
3.5 Piloting the study
3.6 Main study’s research design and sampling
3.7 Validity and reliability
3.8 Data collection procedures
3.9 Analysing data
3.10 Conclusion

Chapter Four ............................................................................................ 128

Data Analysis of Madubon 2 and Massanabo 1 Schools
4.1 Introduction
4.2 Madubon 2 School: An Anglophone primary school
4.3 Massanabo 1 School: A Francophone primary school
4.4 Conclusion of data analysis from Madubon 2 and Massanabo 1

Chapter Five ............................................................................................ 194

Data Analysis of Ribenabo 1 and 2 Schools
5.1 Introduction
5.2 School practices and processes
5.3 The schools, their pupils, their staff and the community:
School as a social site for interaction and dutifulness
5.4 Thematic analysis of interview and observation data from
Ribenabo 1 School
5.5 Thematic analysis of interview and observation data from
Ribenabo 2 School
5.6 Views from education officials
5.7 Conclusion of data analysis from Ribenabo 1 and Ribenabo 2

Chapter Six .............................................................................................. 272

Discussion
6.1 Question 1. What perceptions do 4-7-year-old multilingual pupils
have of themselves as learners of English/French in their first year
of schooling in the multilingual language socialisation/learning
context of Cameroon?
6.2 Question 2. How do pupils experience schooling for the first time
and what perception do they have of their learning?
 Children, Their Schools and What They Learn on Beginning Primary School ix

6.3 Question 3. What instances of teaching, learning and speaking

in the school environment are likely to instantiate Anglophone,
Francophone or Bilingual Education orientations?
6.4 Question 4. What learning situations outside the classroom are
pupils exposed to and how do these foster their developing sense
of identity, especially in relation to language?
6.5 Educational implications of the research
6.6 Recommendations
6.7 Reflections on research methodology and design
6.8 Summary of the study and its strengths and limitations
6.9 Further research

Appendices .............................................................................................. 317

Notes........................................................................................................ 358

References ............................................................................................... 365

Index ........................................................................................................ 390

 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Figure: 1.1 The education system in Cameroon

Figure: 1.2 Map of present day Cameroon
Figure: 1.3 Geographical distribution of the population of Cameroon
Figure: 1.4 Languages of Cameroon : Language families
Figure: 1.5 Languages of Cameroon by area
Figure: 1.6 British and French Cameroon before and after independence
Figure: 1.7 Cameroon Mandated Territories (1922–1946) and Trust
Territories (1946–1961)
Figure: 1.8 Mapping of some Cameroon standardised languages
Figure: 1.9 Cameroon lingua francas
Figure: 3.1 Table I: Schools in pilot and main study
Figure: 4.1 Madubon 2 Year 1 classroom at 7:30 am on the first day of
school
Figure: 4.2 First day of school: A view of Madubon 2 Year 1 classroom
door and premises
Figure: 4.3 Madubon 2 Year 1 teacher and pupils say the ‘Grace before
Meal’ in the classroom on the first school day
Figure: 4.4 Madubon 2 Year 1 story time
Figure: 4.5 Left: Nature studies, Right: Environmental education lessons
Figure: 4.6 Madubon 2 rules and regulations for the pupils
Figure: 4.7 Madubon 2 rules and regulations for the teachers
Figure: 4.8 Madubon 2 Year 1 teacher and pupils doing sport
Figure: 4.9 Madubon 2 School pupils reciting the school’s pledge with the
right hand lifted
Figure: 4.10 A view of Year 1 classroom board, Madubon 2 School
Figure: 4.11: A partial view of Massanabo 1 School and a vandalised
window frame of the Year 1 classroom
Figure: 4.12 Massanabo1 School’s caretaker hoists the flag while teachers
and pupils look on
Figure: 4.13 Some Massanabo 1 Year 1 pupils sleep during lessons
Figure: 4.14 A pupil reads on the board while the teacher and another
pupil who could not read look on
Figure: 4.15 The ‘enchaînement’
Figure: 4.16 Massanabo 1 School’s rules and regulations
Figure: 4.17 Display of pupils’ flasks in front of the class
 Children, Their Schools and What They Learn on Beginning Primary School xi

Figure: 4.18 Left: Zigzag writing as an initiation to French cursive

handwriting, Right: Learning to form letters
Figure: 4: 19 The male ‘chief whip’ designates a pupil to come and read
while the female ‘chief whip’ looks on
Figure: 4.20 Right: Anglophone and Francophone handwritings from the
teacher. Left: Pupils’ writing of one and two in Anglophone and
Francophone handwritings
Figure: 5.1 A partial view of the Bilingual School of Ribenabo
Figure: 5.2 Left: Two Ribenabo 1 senior pupils whose sandals were seized
by the headteacher, Right: A Ribenabo 2 senior pupil going barefooted
and wearing a torn school shirt
Figure: 5.3 Both Ribenabo 1 and 2 pupils praying at the assembly ground
Figure: 5.4 Ribenabo 1 and 2 teachers and pupils dancing to a gospel tune
Figure: 5.5 Ribenabo 1 Year 1 pupils praying in class
Figure: 5.6 A panoramic view of Ribenabo 1 Year 1 board
Figure: 5.7 The Ribenabo 2 teacher writes in both baton and script
writings
Figure: 5.8 Ribenabo 1 rules and regulations for the pupils
Figure: 5.9 Ribenabo 1 rules and regulations for the teachers
Figure: 5.10 Ribenabo 2 rules and regulations for the pupils
Figure: 5.11 Left, Ribenabo 2 Year 1 pupils march like soldiers around the
mast, Right, Ribenabo 1 Year 1 pupils play and climb on the window
in the absence of their teacher
Figure: 5.12 Parents’ ‘convocation’ issued by the headteacher of Ribenabo
2
Figure: 5.13 A parent’s signature in Arabic in a pupil’s exercise book
Figure: 5.14 Left: A Ribenabo1 Year 1 pupil reads while others unable to
read look on, Right: A pupil counts while the teacher and others unable
to count look on
Figure: 5.15 Left: Ribenabo 1 older boys play football during break, Right:
Ribenabo 1 and 2 pupils playing at break
Figure: 5.16 Left: Some pupils writing the dates on the board, Right:
Pupils lifting their slates with the day’s date written on them for the
teacher to check
Figure: 5.17 Calligraphy in Ribenabo 1 classroom: The Ribenabo 2 Year 1
teacher compares her writing to that of a pupil
Figure: 5.18 Left: French language tests: Dictée, copie, vocabulaire, Right:
Initiation to script writing through literacy activities such as écriture
Figure: 5.19 Ribenabo 2 Year 1 pupils performing a dialogue passage from
the reader
Figure: 5.20 A pupil’s performance in dictée and copie
xii List of Illustrations

Figure: 5.21 Left: The English test on the board with some lines linking
objects to their names wiped, Right: A pupil’s performance in the
English test
Figure: 5.22: Left: Some Ribenabo 2 girls play while boys look on, Right:
Break time: Ribenabo 1 and 2 pupils at play
Figure: 5.23 Socialising pupils to the knowledge of Cameroon’s flag
colours through the colours of exercise books’ cover
Figure: 5.24 Bilingualism rhetoric: A banner about the yearly day of
official bilingualism
Figure: 5.25 Bilingualism rhetoric at Ribenbo 1 and 2. Left: Writings on
the school gate’s door about the celebration of the 2009 day of official
bilingualism, Right: A poster from the Ministry of Basic Education
about the day
 LIST OF APPENDICES

Appendix A: Research field letter from the department of English,

University of Buea, Cameroon, English and French versions
Appendix B: Evidence of schools heads’ approval of pilot and main study
to be conducted in their schools
AppendixB1: Authorisation to visit schools obtained from the Inspector of
Basic Education for Douala IV subdivision
Appendix B.2: Sample of authorisation letter to conduct fieldwork in
Government Primary School Madubon II, Buea, by the Headmistress
Appendix C: Sample of parental consent to pupils’ participation in the
study
Appendix D: Tables of group and individual interviews dates, time and
duration
Appendix: E Tables of observation
Appendix F: Sample of pupils’ individual interviews
Appendix G: Sample of individual interviews with the teachers
Appendix H: Sample of individual interviews with the headteachers
Appendix I.1: Ministerial decree requesting primary school teachers to
teach the second official language in their classrooms, 2002
Appendix I.2: Ministerial decree requesting primary school teachers to
teach the second official language in their classrooms, 2003
Appendix J: Extracts of Education Orientation Law about the promotion
of official bilingualism and national languages in schools
Appendix K.1: Education Minister’s circulars instituting and following up
the yearly bilingualism day
Appendix K.2: Education Minister’s circulars instituting and following up
the yearly bilingualism day
Appendix L: 2008/2009 school year sequential calendar
Appendix M: Timetables from the four studied schools
Appendix N: National Anthem of Cameroon (English and French version)
Appendix O: The organigram of the Ministry of Basic Education
Appendix P: Pupils, teachers and education officials questions for the pilot
and main studies
 PREFACE

This book draws on data from a comparative study of socialising early

years primary school pupils to the learning of English and French, and
how this language socialisation shapes their perception of themselves as
Anglophones and Francophones and foregrounds identity issues in the
multilingual language socialisation context of Cameroon where English
and French are official languages. The study explores the education
system in Cameroon from a classroom and school perspective and seeks to
understand how classroom and school processes and practices in English
and French, school organisation, rituals and norms and values instantiate
Anglophone and Francophone education traditions and translate language
policy application at the national level, especially with reference to the
implementation of official bilingualism policy. Multimodal empirical data
collected through an ethnography of four selected Anglophone and
Francophone schools show how sociological patterns are embedded in
educational practices and expose an inadequacy between official bilingualism
discourse and its implementation in schools, while problematising the
construct of a Cameroonian identity as constitutive of Anglophone,
Francophone and local cultures. The book also seeks to establish, from
classroom and school processes and practices of language socialisation,
parallels between Cameroon Anglophone and Francophone subsystems of
education, drawing on their similarities and differences and how such
similarities and differences may reflect the education history of both
subsystems or foreground the dynamics of their coexistence. While the
four schools studied in this book may not be representative of Anglophone
and Francophone schools in Cameroon in terms of the total number of
schools in both subsystems of education, the schools and their intakes are,
however, a microcosm of Anglophone and Francophone schools in
Cameroon and may potentially reflect Anglophone and Francophone
cultures writ large. The narrative, analysis and findings of this study are,
therefore, of relevance to educational communities in other countries, as
issues of language ideology, identity, bilingualism/multilingualism and
comparative education are raised from a language and culture learning
perspective, while the documentation of practice at each study site
highlights the perspective of the local, national and the global. This work
thus stands as a pioneering study in the context of Cameroon and Africa.
G. N.Milton Keynes, January 2013
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

One head cannot hold all wisdom. The present product would not have
come to completion if many a one did not join in its realisation.
I express profound gratitude to Janet Maybin and Indra Rita Sinka who
did not relent in displaying commitment, interest, encouragement and
intellectual assistance from the inception to the accomplishment of this
work.
I acknowledge incommensurable help from other staff of the Faculty of
Education and Language studies whose advice and attention have helped
build my confidence and determination. The Walton Hall Open University
Library staff and the British Library have also been helpful with source
documents and materials.
My gratitude is also extended to Madubon 2, Massanabo 1, Ribenabo 1
and Ribenabo 2 Schools and the research participants and other resource
persons, particularly the bilingual inspectors who provided invaluable
information for the achievement of my study.
I am indebted to the Centre for Research in Education and Educational
Technology (CREET) which granted me the award for my programme of
study.
I am appreciative of the company fellow researchers provided me with
in the course of my term at the OU. I am already missing much of such a
colourful group.
I am grateful to Amanda Millar of Cambridge Scholars Publishing for
her assistance in formatting the final version of this book.
Finally, the encouragement and moral assistance of my entire family
boosted my energy in making my endeavour fruitful.
 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

BERA British Educational Research Association

BICEC Banque International du Cameroun pour l’Épargne et le
Crédit
CABTAL Cameroon Association for Bible Translation and
Literacy
CRB Criminal Records Bureau
GCE General Certificate of Education
MDG Millennium Development Goal
MINEDUC Ministry of National Education
NACALCO National Association of Cameroonian Language
Committees
PROPELCA Programme Opérationnel Pour l’Enseignement des
Langues au Cameroun
SIL Société Internationale de Linguistique
UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organisation
UNO United Nations Organisation
 INTRODUCTION

1. Thesis
It appears to be a truism that people learn a way of life as they learn a
language. It is assumed that children learn a society’s norms and values as
embedded in its language when they acquire the latter. Learning cultural
patterns through the use of language then shapes them to view themselves
as speakers of a particular language. While it seems natural to empathise
with someone with whom one shares the same language, by the same
token, language is a ferment of divisiveness, discrimination and exclusion.
In supposedly monolingual countries, language has been construed as a
defining feature of nationalism and has fuelled ideological debates in
public discourse and in education. This thesis focuses on the multilingual
contexts of Cameroon where the ideology of “one language, one nation”
has been imported through colonisation. The option for English and
French as official languages after independence was on the grounds of the
country’s unity and utilitarianism. The thesis rests on the assumption that
the way children are socialised to the use of English and French in primary
schools in Cameroon mostly shapes them to view themselves as
Anglophones or Francophones rather than united by shared bilingualism. It
comparatively researches language socialisation of 4-7-year-old
Anglophone and Francophone pupils in two Anglophone and two
Francophone schools through participant observation and focus group and
individual interviews.
The observation of teacher-pupil and pupil-pupil interactions in and out
of Anglophone and Francophone classrooms broadened my understanding
of teachers’ and pupils’ perspectives on the teaching and learning process.
The study focuses on documenting the normative practices and learning
processes through which pupils in primary schools in Cameroon learn, via
the use of the school languages, of their new identities as pupils and the
impact this has on their perception of themselves as English and French
language learners and speakers of other local languages. This highlights, in
the language socialisation process, language ideology and identity issues
in a multilingual language learning context that the study explores through
the elicitation of children’s experience and teachers’ and education
2 Introduction

officials’ understanding of the implementation of official bilingualism

policy, and of the introduction of national languages in school.

2. Main research aim and questions

This research has as its main aim the study of the impact of the
English and French educational legacies in an Anglophone, a Francophone
and a bilingual school in Cameroon; focusing on the experience of 4-7-
year-old children beginning school for the first time and on their
perception of themselves as language speakers and learners.
More precisely, the research addresses the following four research
questions:

Question 1. What perceptions do 4-7- year-old multilingual pupils have of

themselves as learners of English/French in their first year of schooling in
the multilingual language socialisation/learning context of Cameroon?

Question 2. How do pupils experience schooling for the first time and
what perception do they have of their learning?

Question 3. What instances of teaching, learning and speaking in the

school environment are likely to instantiate Anglophone, Francophone or
bilingual education orientations?

Question 4. What learning situations outside the classroom are pupils

exposed to and how do these foster their developing sense of identity,
especially in relation to language?

3. Summary of chapters
This book is divided into six chapters. Chapter One is divided into two
main parts. The first part establishes a link between school and the
community through the interactional order of a school’s social life
mediated by language that foregrounds a school culture as well as mirrors
society norms and values. It then sets the conceptual background with
regard to the relationship between language and culture especially in the
context of Cameroon where language ideology has tended to polarise
Anglophone and Francophone identities (Nkwi 2007). The first part of
Chapter One finally gives a presentation of the education system in
Cameroon. The second part of the chapter takes a historical look at the
language situation and education in Cameroon from the pre-colonial period
 Children, Their Schools and What They Learn on Beginning Primary School 3

to the present day. It highlights the various colonial administrations’ language

policies in education and underscores the interplay between each colonial
administration’s approach to the language issue and its underlying vision
of the colonisation mission (Vernon-Jackson 1967; Stumpf 1979; Fonlon
1969; Robinson 1996; White 1996). The second part of Chapter One ends
with an overview of the present day language and education situation in
Cameroon.
Chapter Two reviews the literature in five domains of language and
comparative education of interest to the study. The first domain of
literature review considers language socialisation in relation to group
membership and problematises the traditional conception of language
socialisation in an increasingly multilingual society (Schieffelin and Ochs
1986a; Garrett and Baquedano-López 2002). In education, and in
monolingual contexts, language socialisation has been taken to mean the
learning of a standard variety of a language and the mastery of the
mainstream culture embedded in that language. In multilingual contexts
like Cameroon, this has resulted in the dominance of official languages
over local ones. The review of language ideology looks at linguistic
ideology as foregrounded in the concept of “one language, one nation”
which has also fuelled linguistic imperialism (see Makoni and Pennycook
2007). This concept is however ideological and has been perceived, in
education, as contributing to the reproduction of an elite’s culture
(Bourdieu 1977, 1991; Bourdieu and Passeron 1977).
In the context of Cameroon, linguistic ideology is construed as divisive
and representative of both inherited cultural legacies of the country while
local languages and cultures are made peripheral. The review of language
identity examines the perception of identity as predicated on language, and
questions such assumptions in a world of globalisation and mobility
(Block 2007b; Rampton and Harris 2003). In education, linguistic
diversity is viewed as a problem and in multilingual contexts such as
Cameroon; the monolingual ideology has highlighted English and French
as official languages and languages of instruction in schools. The review
of bilingualism and bilingual education looks at official bilingualism in the
context of Cameroon and Canada and the policy of bilingual education in
both contexts (Baker and Prys Jones 1998; Makarenko 2007; Nama 2006;
García 2009). It finally examines the politics of official bilingualism in a
multilingual context like Cameroon where other language models have
been suggested for education but not adopted (Bot Ba Njock 1966,
Tadadjeu 1975). The review of comparative education highlighted three
tenets which showed how systems of education may reflect societal values
(Noah 1985). Studies also sought to relate local practice to a global
4 Introduction

process of knowing and underscored the relevance of multilevel and

vertical case study approaches to comparative research in education (Bray
and Thomas 1995; Vavrus and Bartlett 2006). In the context of Cameroon,
the local practices of Francophone and Anglophone subsystems of
education may appear to be the reflection of the English and French
systems, at least insofar as these subsystems use French and English as
media of instruction.
Chapter Three describes the research design and methodology. It
defines the qualitative and quantitative research paradigms and sets the
study’s methodological stance which uses ethnography as a strategy and
case study as an approach to researching the studied phenomenon
(Hammersley 1992; Burns 2000). It delineates case study as an approach
to studying natural phenomenon and particularly details vertical case study
as a specific approach to comparatively research layers of meaning at
various levels and as a way of contrasting local and global perspectives on
studied cases (Vavrus and Bartlett 2006). Drawing on the results of a pilot
study, it outlines the research design and sampling and describes the
methods and procedures of data collection and analysis as well as
examines their validity and reliability (Webb et al. 1966; Mitchell 1984;
Schofield 2000; Cohen, Manion and Morrison 2003) It critically reflects
on issues arising from data collection related to research ethics and to
researcher objectivity. Chapter Three finally clarifies the transcription
standard used in transcribing recorded data and describes and exemplifies
the thematic data analysis approach used for analysing data (Aronson
1994; Hammersley and Atkinson 1995; Rubin and Rubin 2005).
Chapter Four analyses data from the Anglophone and Francophone
primary schools, Madubon 2 and Massanabo 1, in terms of the themes
relating to the five domains identified in the literature review. Looking at
the schools as social sites for interactions, it examines the processes and
practices as foregrounding these schools’ culture and discipline (Bernstein
et al. 1966; King 1973). It examines the use of language by pupils in and
out of schools and highlights issues of language ideology in the analysis of
pupils’ views relating to the sidelining of their mother tongue in
Massanabo 1 and of Pidgin English in Madubon 2. It exposes pupils’
views about their schooling and underscores issues of language learning,
discipline and likes and dislikes of schooling. The analysis of data from
Madubon 2 and Massanabo 1 in Chapter Four also looks at pupils’ and
teachers’ views about the learning of the second official language in their
schools and the instantiation of Anglophone, Francophone or bilingual
education traditions. Data from the two schools indicates that pupils’
views differed significantly about the teaching of the second official
 Children, Their Schools and What They Learn on Beginning Primary School 5

language depending on whether they were actually taught English and

French in their school. Chapter Four also looks at pupils’ views about
other learning experiences constitutive of their identity in relation to
language. Views from pupils in both schools about language use and
identity shaping pointed to a complex linguistic identity consciousness that
reflects the multilingual context of the study. The chapter finally discusses
views from the Madubon 2 Year 1 teacher and headteacher as well as
those of the Year 1 teacher of Massanabo 1 about official bilingualism and
language in education policy.
Chapter Five analyses data from the Anglophone and the Francophone
Sections of the Bilingual School of Ribenabo. These two schools share the
same campus. The chapter shows how school processes and practices at
the site point to emergent patterns of commonality but at the same time
highlight instances of interactions relating to discipline or school culture
that foreground Anglophone and Francophone education traditions. As
with Chapter Four, Chapter Five analyses data under the themes relating to
the five domains identified in the literature review. It discusses views from
pupils about language socialisation and multilingualism that show a
consciousness of language use in relation to the context, especially with
Ribenabo 1 (Anglophone) pupils. The chapter also explores views from
pupils in Year 1 of both sections of the school about their perceptions in
relation to language learning and discipline and their likes and dislikes of
schooling. The chapter also shows pupils’ views regarding the teaching of
the second official language in their schools that point to a language
ideological divide grounded in institutional belonging. However, informal
language use in the playground by pupils shows a significant use of
English and French which foregrounds this interactional language practice
as fostering bilingualism among Anglophone and Francophone pupils in
the school. Chapter Five equally analyses pupils’ views about other
learning experiences in relation to language which indicate that pupils are
aware of their multilingual identity and that their language preferences are
heavily influenced by parental choice. The chapter finally examines views
from teachers and headteachers from both sections of the school and from
educational officials about official bilingualism, education traditions and
language in education policy that highlight the ineffectiveness of official
bilingualism policy.
Chapter Six draws the work together, critically examining the data
under the four research questions designed for the study and according to
the analytical themes derived from the literature review and from the data.
It identifies similarities of patterns across schools, as well as for
specificities at individual schools, as these relate to the micro- and the
6 Introduction

macro-levels of meaning and tries to link analysis to theory. It reflects on

the process of data collection and analysis and how this impacts on the
study’s findings. It draws educational implications from findings and
makes recommendations to policy-makers as well as suggesting areas for
future research.
 CHAPTER ONE

RATIONALE AND CONCEPTUAL BACKGROUND,

PRESENTATION OF CAMEROON’S EDUCATION
SYSTEM AND A HISTORICAL REVIEW
OF THE LANGUAGE SITUATION
IN THE COUNTRY

This chapter is divided into two main parts. The first part of the
chapter envisages school as a social community where participants’
interactions, via the medium of the school language as language of
instruction, foreground a school culture as well as mirror society norms
and values. Taken as a site where such norms and values are fostered,
participants’ interactions at a given school are, however, dynamic. Though
a school’s practices and learning processes may be a reflection of a
particular education tradition, such practices and processes are far from
static.
In the specific context of Cameroon, language ideology has been made
relevant in schooling as a result of the country’s inheritance of English and
French as colonial languages and of her choice of the latter as official
languages, in spite of the existence of the many national languages of
Cameroon. Such a choice has tended to project Anglophone and
Francophone identity perception along the lines of linguistic and cultural
affiliation made significant in Anglophone and Francophone schools by
the use of English or French as the main language of instruction.
Cameroonian identity representation is not, however, limited to the one
fostered by each of the education traditions through the use of the school
language nor reduced to the state’s construct of an official bilingualism.
The first part of this chapter ends with the presentation of Anglophone and
Francophone subsystems of education in Cameroon.
The second part of the chapter takes a historical look at the language
situation and education in Cameroon from the pre-colonial period to the
present day. It puts into perspective the various colonial administrations’
8 Chapter One

language policies in education and underscores the interplay between each

colonial administration’s approach to the language issue and its underlying
vision of the colonisation mission. From this viewpoint, the German,
British1 and French administrations’ stances on the language to be taught
in school were divergent although in the end they all laid emphasis on the
use of German, English and French respectively as languages of
instruction in school. Such emphasis sought to promote these languages
through subsidies to mission schools and, eventually, in the cases of the
German and the French administrations, laws banning the teaching of local
languages in school were introduced.
The politics of language of instruction in Cameroon schools today
appear to be reminiscent of what prevailed during the colonial era. While
the choice of English and French as official languages of the country
appears to have mainly been determined by arguments about the country’s
unity, such unity may be undermined by the way pupils are socialised to
the use of English and French in Anglophone and Francophone schools
and to the learning of the cultural patterns embedded in these languages.
While the state’s projection of a bilingual Cameroon through the learning
of English and French in school is still a long-standing project in the
making, the recent introduction of laws promoting the teaching of national
languages in school problematises the construct of a Cameroonian identity
as foregrounded by the learning of English and French in school and their
use in the public sphere.

Part One: Background and rationale

1.1 Overview of the relationship between language,
education and society
When we reminisce about our school days, we often have memories of
our interaction with peers and teachers in the classroom, in assemblies and
in the playground. In this recall, the boundary between our understanding
of what school really was and the projection or representation of school is
sometimes blurred. School days’ memories thus seem to give prominence
to some events rather than to others. This, Bernstein argues, is due to the
fact that school shapes pupils’ consciousness towards a particular reification:

The pedagogic device acts as a symbolic regulator of consciousness; the

question is, whose regulator, what consciousness and for whom? It is a
condition for the production, reproduction and transformation of culture.
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 9

However, the device is not deterministic in its consequences (Bernstein

1996, 52).

While Bernstein questions the purpose for regulating pupils’ consciousness

and the agency behind this regulation, Durkheim has no such preoccupation,
as he views education as:

The influence exercised by adult generations on those that are not yet ready
for social life. Its object is to arouse and to develop in the child a certain
number of physical, intellectual and moral states which are demanded of
him by both the political society as a whole and the special milieu for
which he is specifically destined (Durkheim 1956, 71).

For Durkheim, there appears to be a symbiosis between societal values and

those instilled into children through education as he upholds that: “education
is, then, only the means by which society prepares, within the children, the
essential conditions of its very existence” (Durkheim ibid, 71). Bernstein,
on the other hand, underscores the role of language as an:

Important means of initiating, synthesising and reinforcing ways of

thinking, feeling and behaviour which are functionally related to the social
group. It does not, of itself, prevent the expression of specific ideas or
confine the individual to a given level of conceptualisation, but certain
ideas and generalisations are facilitated rather than others (Bernstein 1959,
43).

Bernstein thus believes that it is through the use of language that children
and members of a given community learn of their societal roles and
functions (Bernstein 1975, 263). This view has earlier been propounded by
advocates of the sociocultural theory of mind development who uphold that:

The speech structures mastered by the child become the basic structures of
his thinking […] thought development is determined by language, i.e. by
the linguistic tools of thought and by the sociocultural experience of the
child. Essentially, the development of inner speech depends on outside
factors […] the child’s intellectual growth is contingent on his mastering
the social means of thought, that is language (Vygotsky 1986, 94).

Language appears thus to be a mediation tool for the learning of

culturally meaningful patterns of everyday life. Robin Alexander (2000, 5)
points out that language and culture “must be handled as central and
pervasive” in a comparative study of educational processes, mainly because
“the power of language in shaping what is distinctive about teaching and
10 Chapter One

learning in a particular country is readily evident” and also because “the

first stage of compulsory schooling is a particularly potent arena for
cultural transmission and socialisation.” Bernstein holds it as evidence that
school socialising transforms pupils’ lives:

It is well known that school transforms the identities of many of the

children: transforms the nature of their allegiances to their family and
community, and gives them access to other styles of life and modes of
social relationships (Bernstein 2003, 37).

In the educational mission of “moulding and fashioning souls” (Entwhistle

1979, 82-3), Planel (1997, 349) thinks that underlying educational values
give meaning to styles of pedagogy and Bernstein (2003, 85) echoes Planel
in arguing that pedagogy determines what counts as valid transmission of
knowledge. It may then be assumed that the curriculum (what counts as
valid knowledge) and pedagogy (what counts as valid transmission of
knowledge) together with other rituals practised in educational milieus in a
particular context is what makes one system of education different from
another and shapes what Sadler calls the “national character”:

A national system of education is a living thing, the outcome of forgotten

struggles and difficulties and “of battles long ago”. It has in it some of the
secret workings of national life. It reflects, while it seeks to remedy, the
failings of the national character. By instinct, it often lays special emphasis
on those parts of training which the national character particularly needs.
Not less by instinct it often shrinks from laying stress on points concerning
which bitter dissensions have arisen in former periods of national history
(Sadler 1979, 49–50).

The present study reports on fieldwork conducted in Anglophone and

Francophone primary schools in Cameroon. While it shares the view by
Durkheim that schools are sites where societal norms and values are made
relevant through language socialisation, this study, however, distances
itself from Durkheim’s somewhat deterministic and binding perception of
the link between society and education:

There is no man who can make a society have, at a given moment, a system of
education other than that which is implied in its structure, just as it is
impossible for a living organism to have other organs and other functions than
those which are implied in its constitution (Durkheim op. cit., 94).

This research rather views schools as interactional sites where participants

involved in the teaching and learning process, and in other practices within
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 11

school premises, construct a dynamic discourse which may eventually

impact on pupils’ perception of themselves as learners. From this vantage
point, the present study agrees with Bernstein that the structural
organisation of school, its power relations, its rituals and symbolic
representation may transform pupils’ identities to the extent that children
schooled in different educational systems pledge allegiance to their
schooling traditions and may consequently view themselves as English
rather than French, Anglophones rather than Francophones.
While acknowledging with Bernstein the school’s role as an agency in
the shaping of pupils’ minds towards a given character, this study focuses
mainly on the interactional dynamics of school life and argues that in the
interweaving discursive environment of a school, character framing is not
static. It examines the normative practices and learning processes through
which education traditions are instantiated in school via the use of
language. It agrees with Foucault (1981) that schools, like other institutions,
use “grids of specification” for categorising, classifying and diagramming
the subject through various forms of techniques and strategies called
“technologies” to the extent of generating self-surveillance or self-
colonisation where subjects take it upon themselves to monitor their
morality, language and body. Foucault thus defines the technologies of the
self as the forms of knowledge and strategies that:

Permit individuals to effect by their own means or with the help of others a
certain number of operations on their own bodies and souls, thoughts,
conduct, and way of being, so as to transform themselves in order to attain
a certain state of happiness, purity, wisdom, perfection, or immortality
(Foucault 1988, 18).

1.2 Conceptual background

In the contexts of England and France, English and French are the
languages of instruction in schools. Given that the fundamental predicate
of these nations is based on the use of a common language, children in
these countries have English and French as their mother tongue2.
Increasingly, however, England has become multicultural and multi-
linguistic and for many children the language of the home3 may not be that
of instruction in school. In Cameroon, likewise, the language used at home
may not necessarily be the one used in school. The country’s education
systems are inherited from its colonial past, with English and French as
official languages and media of instruction in schools, while a wealth of
national languages are made peripheral in school and in the public sphere.
Over time, the idealised pre-independence education systems have
12 Chapter One

certainly been reviewed and the post-independence systems broadened to

include elements of local realities and cultures (Tchombe 2001). Despite
education laws promoting the teaching of Cameroon languages in schools
(Law no 98/004 of 14th April 1998 laying down guidelines for education in
Cameroon) and the vision upheld by the present Cameroon president Paul
Biya in a shared national culture enriched by the different cultures making
up Cameroon human entities (Biya 1986), the two education systems in
Cameroon are still easily demarcated by their use of English and French as
media of instruction and their claims in the sharing of the cultures
permeated by these languages. These claims have been made relevant in
the above-mentioned education law which stipulates in its section 15,
paragraphs 1 and 2 that:

(1). The educational system shall be organised into two subsystems: the
English- speaking sub-system and the French-speaking subsystem, thereby
reaffirming our national option for bi-culturalism.
(2). The above mentioned educational subsystems shall co-exist, each
preserving its specific methods of evaluation and award of certificates.

Such claims prompted this research. Invited to a reception of the

fellows of the Cambridge Commonwealth Society in 2005, I was
introduced by a fellow Cameroonian to a third-party as a “Francophone”
Cameroonian. Intrigued by this specification from a fellow national, I
started trying to understand the reasons behind his identifying me as
“Francophone” Cameroonian rather than simply a Cameroonian. My
conjecture led me to believe that perhaps I was labelled as “Francophone”
Cameroonian because of the place I hailed from in Cameroon. This idea
was quickly abandoned as I figured out that one could be born in the
Francophone part of Cameroon but brought up and schooled in an
Anglophone way of life. I thus imagined that I was branded as
“Francophone” Cameroonian because of my education. Taking in the latter
point, I felt perplexed about my categorisation as “Francophone”
Cameroonian, given that my education is a blend of the Anglophone and
Francophone schooling traditions and that being schooled in both
education traditions makes me rather a model of a Cameroonian citizen as
projected by the country’s option for official bilingualism. Besides, I
wondered why my fellow countryman opted to reduce my being
Cameroonian (which obviously could be determined by some other
criteria) to an ascribed borrowed linguistic identity, albeit Cameroonian4.
The perception of my fellow countryman may not be different from that of
those who wage language ideological battles in Cameroon with reference
to English and French. Such battles have sought to reify or idealise the
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 13

Anglophone in opposition to the Francophone, and vice versa, to the

extent that the words “Anglophone” and “Francophone” are no longer
mere linguistic terms referring to the speakers of the English and French
languages. In a redefinition of a definition (Nkwi 2004, 186)5 he earlier
gave of an Anglophone, Nkwi upholds that:

The word Anglophone is not only linguistic. She is not any Cameroonian
who speaks English but that Cameroonian whose roots are planted in, or
are traceable to that part of Cameroon, which has been known since 1972
as the North West and the South West Provinces. Better still, the
geographical location which during the British administration was known
as British Southern Cameroon or West Cameroon during the Federal
period. Besides just locating the Anglophone within latitudes and
longitudes, he originated here and was culturally nurtured in the Anglo-
Saxon model (Nkwi 2007, 156).

Nkwi goes on to give the characteristics of the “Anglophoness” and of

what he thinks is the “typical” Anglophone Cameroonian. Differentiating
between the “indigenous” and the “linguistic” Anglophone, he argues:

The specificities of Anglophone are clear and are imperative worth

examining here. First, the Anglophone has a geographical boundary. […]
For instance, there is an indigenous Anglophone whose ancestry can and is
rooted in the North West and South West provinces. By the same token
there is a linguistic and/or political Anglophone who can speak English but
whose ancestry is traceable to French Cameroon. These species of
Anglophones are therefore linguistic Anglophones and not typical or
cultural Anglophones (Nkwi ibid, 156).

Vested with the mission of a full demarcation between “indigenous” and

“linguistic” Anglophone and a complete definition of what he thinks
Cameroon Anglophones and Francophones are, Nkwi carries on with his
categorisation:

Another distinguishing feature of the ‘Anglophoness’ of the Anglophone is

that these are people who were brought up in the British colonial way of
doing things. The police force according to them is that modelled in the
likes of Scotland Yard and Robert Peel. They remember the empire day
and the great songs like “The Sun of the Empire Shall Never Set”. They
see the Barclays bank and not BICEC. They quickly remember how they
were schooled in Shakespearean drama/sonnets and the London General
Certificate of Education. All these and several others make up the
anglophonity of an Anglophone (Nkwi ibid, 156).
14 Chapter One

Nkwi finally attempts a definition of a Francophone. In his own

understanding, he states that:

What is embarrassing enough is that the cultural denominator and/or

matrix of the Anglophone do not receive the equivalent gravity as far as a
Francophone is concerned. It is dominant and a truism that a Francophone
is the only Cameroonian whose roots are to be found in the territory
formerly under the French Mandate and Trusteeship. When a Francophone
hears French it is his/her language. Paris is home; bureaucratisation is the
order of the day. The capital of his country has always been Yaoundé6. The
gendarmerie force is not new to him. The problem then arises in this
dichotomy. An indigenous Anglophone finds himself/herself at odds. She
has been subjected to changes; at least his Francophone counterpart has
never undergone any cultural ruptures after the days of the Germans (Nkwi
ibid, 157).

It is of interest to note the dogmatic assertion and ascription of “a”

Francophone as the “only” Cameroonian whose roots are to be found in
the territory formerly under the French Mandate and Trusteeship. Nkwi’s
geographical and cultural determinants of Anglophones and Francophones
appear to be binding and as such seem to be in defiance of interculturalism,
bilingualism, multilingualism and mobility (see Rampton 2003). Also,
Nkwi problematises and even politicises the definitions of “Anglophone”
and “Francophone” from the onset with the subtitles he uses in the sections
where the terms are defined. Thus, the subtitle of the section where he
defines the term “Anglophone” is phrased “An Anglophone in a Bi-
cultural Cameroon” whereas the section where the word “Francophone” is
defined is subtitled “The Francophone in a Bilingual Cameroon.”
The last two sentences of Nkwi’s last quotation echo a strong political
overtone that I prefer not to examine here as it is of lesser interest to this
study. However, Nkwi’s definitions of an “Anglophone” and of a
“Francophone” raise issues which are of importance to my work. Going by
Sadler’s definition of the framing of a “national character” via an
education system, Nkwi’s idealised Anglophone and Francophone systems
of education patterned on the pre-independence English and French
education systems are at odds with schooling realities in both subsystems
of education in present-day Cameroon, though some prominent features
like the English and French languages still hold sway in Cameroon
classrooms. Equally, as mentioned earlier, the English and French
education systems have undergone a series of reforms over the years with
no concomitant effect on both Cameroon subsystems of education7. Their
moulding of modern Frenchmen and Englishmen may not reflect the
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 15

reified Anglophone and Francophone identities projected by NKwi. This

hagiographic projection, in my view, is illusory and may even be contrary
to the first objective of education laid down by the 1998 Education
Orientation Law in its section 5, paragraph 1 which reads that education
aims to “train citizens who are firmly rooted in their cultures, but open to
the world and respectful of the general interest and the common weal.”
Besides, as Sadler (1979) advised, national models of education should
seek to shun “bitter dissensions” which are part of the nation’s past history
and value characteristics of importance to the building of the national
character. Such characteristics, Biya asserts, will lead to the making of
Cameroon’s national cultural bouquet:

At an ethnic level the development of national (=African) languages,

special vehicles of ethnic cultures, must be encouraged. It follows that each
language expresses the culture which it carries. Developed in this way,
these cultural germs will be transferred on to national stage to the great
benefit of all. It is therefore appropriate to let all our linguistic flowers
blossom, as a necessary and indispensable phase in the history of making
up our national cultural bouquet. We are therefore opting for the
integration of each Cameroonian into his or her community by means of
their mother tongue, on the understanding that this is only a strategic step
towards better integration into the national community: plumbing the
depths of each ethnic personality will mean that one brings what is
excellent from each group and can benefit the whole nation, by means of
national languages and by means of official languages8 (Biya 1986, 116).

Biya’s quotation seems to proffer a national character encompassing

all the linguistic and cultural elements of the Cameroonian nation that the
polarisation of Anglophone and Francophone identities would rather
obliterate. Nug Bissohong (2009) upholds that the polarisation of
Anglophone and Francophone identities may have its origin in the two
versions of the country’s national anthem9 (see appendix N for the English
and French versions of the hymn). Nug Bissohong argues that these
versions, apart from the title and the melody that accompanies them when
they are sung, have nothing in common and are actually two different
hymns. He thus wonders how the “rallying song” (the national anthem)
may be an exaltation of national integration and unity when, in actual fact,
it projects different representations of Cameroon as a nation.
The idealisation of Anglophone and Francophone identities, beyond
political enfranchising, may reflect what Bourdieu terms “symbolic
violence”, a term likened to Foucault’s “self-colonisation” which is the
effect of agency machinery of mind and body sublimation, everlasting
when practised in early childhood:
16 Chapter One

The body is an instrument which records its own uses and which, although
continuously modified by them, gives greater weight to the earliest of
them; it contains… the trace and the memory of the social event…The
effects of any new experience on the formation of the habitus depend on
the relationship between that experience and the experiences already
integrated into the habitus in the form of classifying and generative themes
(Bourdieu 1977, 660).

The body then becomes the object of self-regularisation but also of

another’s attention. It predisposes the mind towards doing what is
required by the teacher or by the school’s rules and regulations. Body
postures prefigure the mindset and instantiate expected praxis. Postures
at the desk, during prayers and assemblies enact specific activities at
various moments of the daily life of the school and develop into what
Bourdieu calls “habitus.” Practices such as word formation, in order to
correctly “inscribe the self” through writing (Wajda 1999), the training
of the mouth for accurate articulation or as Bourdieu ( 1977, 661) puts it,
a “‘preferred’ shape of the buccal aperture”, perhaps to better pronounce
Shakespeare’s sonnets, the teacher’s gaze, gesture, voice and discourse
and school culture contribute to the construct of a self identity as a
learner and to the training of “the body literate” (Luke 1992) or better
still, as Nishida, the Japanese philosopher, holds it, the “historical
body10” (Nishida 1998).
Historical bodies may thus instantiate Anglophone and Francophone
identities in the context of Cameroon. However, as Nishida observes, the
world is shaped by the actions of individuals who create their identities
while interacting in it. Although the many historical bodies found in one
world may differ from one another, they form a “discontinuous
continuity”, a type of unity that holds together differences without
sublating them, which Nishida calls a “self-identity of absolute
contradictories.” Arguably, in Cameroon, English and French are not the
only languages in use. Besides being drilled in school to use these
languages, children are also socialised to the use of many a language in
their family and social environment. The acquisition of these languages
also impacts on their experience as language learners and may even
interfere, conflict or inhibit the learning of the school language or vice
versa (Levy et al. 2007). Also, as Bernstein (1975, 229) points out, major
socialisation sites include the school, the family, peer groups and the work
place, and relationships and interaction in these various groups impact on
members’ perception of their role in society.
Though school appears to be the site where children’s identities are
shaped to reflect citizenship expectations, it may be worth noting that
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 17

school does not merely pass down societal norms and values. In everyday
interaction in school, forms of belief, knowledge, feeling and emotion
develop, giving way to school culture, friendship and kinship leanings or
even religious affiliations. It thus becomes debatable whether to assert that
school reflects society or that society imposes its norms and values on
school, as what goes on in one site or classroom may not necessarily
replicate itself in other classrooms or locations. School then becomes a site
for fostering multiple identities, both collective and individualistic.
Collective in the sense that pupils share in a school’s norms and values
that may mirror those of society. For instance, they are introduced to
gender role learning that categorises them as boys and girls. They are
socialised to school culture which later makes them alumni of a given
school rather than another. School also develops individualistic identities.
Parsons (1983, 96) argues that on the basis of equal opportunity of
chances, inequality is perpetuated in school, as pupils are streamed along
the lines of class division.
One could oppose this somewhat deterministic view with the fact that
children can have inborn aptitudes which predispose them to become
successful in their career as a pupil, although there is no gainsaying a
school’s role in stimulating competitiveness among pupils through a
system of testing and examination. Schooling also highlights certificates
and degrees as a gateway to the job market to the extent that Sadler
believes that the Frenchman is fond of asking about a young man: “What
examination has he passed?” whereas the Englishman’s usual question is:
“What sort of a fellow is he?” This common trait in the representation of a
youth may reflect the patterns of education or the “pedagogic devices”,
(Bernstein, 1996), at work in systems of education both in England and in
France. Spatial organisation, members’ understanding of their role as
teachers and pupils, the boundary between what is wrong and what is
right, public and private11 or what Raveaud (2002, 6) calls “the domains of
intervention by the school on the child”, may all actually add up to make
the difference between education systems and their products in various
countries and maybe between the Anglophone and the Francophone
subsystems of education in Cameroon, and possibly between Anglophone
and Francophone pupils schooled in each of these education traditions.

1.3 Presentation of Cameroon’s education system

As already mentioned, the education system in Cameroon is made up
of two subsystems: the Anglophone subsystem and the Francophone
subsystem. These subsystems represent the English and French education
18 Chapter One

traditions in Cameroon, given that English and French are used as the
main languages of instruction in schools in the territories formerly under
French and British colonial rules. Both subsystems of education have
cohabited since reunification with each maintaining their traditional
characteristics (see section 1.4.6 below).
From the first year of primary school to the end of high school, English
is a compulsory subject in the Francophone subsystem. In the Anglophone
subsystem, however, French is compulsory from the first year of primary
school only up to the end of secondary school (around age 16, see figure
1.1 below). In high school in that subsystem, only pupils who opt for the
Arts may choose to sit French in their Advanced Level examination. The
structural organisation of schools is modelled on the English and French
systems with both Anglophone and Francophone pupils doing six years of
primary schooling. However, the country’s educational reforms seem to
have been prompted by local realities rather than being consequential to
reforms that have taken place in recent years in England and France (see
sections 1.2, 1.4.6 and sections 2.6.1 and 2.6.4).
The number of years spent in secondary education is seven in both
subsystems of education with Francophone pupils originally doing four
years in college while the Anglophones do five years and the former doing
three years in high school while the latter do two (see sections 16 and 17
of the Education Orientation Law in appendix J). During his education
career, from primary school to the end of high school, a Francophone pupil
pursuing general education passes four official examinations: the C.E.P.E
(Certificat d’Ɯtudes Primaires Ɯlémentaires), the B.E.P.C (Brevet
d’Ɯtudes du Premier Cycle), the Probatoire12 (Certificat de Probation) and
the Baccalauréat (these examinations and various schooling stages are
represented in figure 1.1 below). His Anglophone counterpart passes three
examinations from primary school to the end of high school: the F.S.L.C
(First School Leaving Certificate), the GCE O ‘Level (General Certificate
of Education Ordinary Level) and the GCE A ‘Level (General Certificate
of Education Advanced Level). With the Francophone subsystem of
education, the C.E.P.E and the B.E.P.C are examinations set and conferred
by the Ministries of Basic and Secondary Education while the Probatoire
and the Baccalauréat are set and conferred by the Office du Baccalauréat
based in Yaoundé. In the Anglophone subsystem of education, the F.S.L.C
is organised and conferred by the Ministry of Basic Education while the
GCE Ordinary and Advanced Levels are set and conferred by the GCE
Board based in Buea13.
The Office du Baccalauréat and the GCE Board are independent
structures from the Ministries of Basic Education in charge of Nursery,
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 19

Primary and Primary school teachers’ training education and that of

Secondary Education in charge of college, high school general and
technical education as well as the training of a given category of secondary
technical college teachers.
Technical education is patterned on the French model of education in
terms of structural organisation, the number of years14 spent in college and
high school and the certificates obtained. The official examinations that
technical pupils pass are organised by the Ministry of Secondary
Education15 and conferred by the Office du Baccalauréat for the Probatoire
and the Baccalauréat techniques while the C.A.P (Certificat d’Aptitude
Professionnel) which marks the end of secondary technical education is set
and conferred by the Ministry of Secondary Education. Interestingly, in
the two Anglophone Regions of Cameroon, pupils in technical colleges
and high schools follow the Francophone model of education and pass
Francophone technical examinations set and conferred by the Ministry of
Secondary Education and the Office du Baccalauréat and not by the GCE
Board16.
Vocational training is under the Ministry of Professional Training and
Employment. Pupils enter vocational centres after primary education for
two years of training and leave these centres with an attestation signed by
centre directors which allows them to look for a job or proceed to a
technical college and further their education. Universities and other higher
educational institutions such as higher teachers’ training colleges, both
technical and general, are under the Ministry of Higher Education.
Under the influence of French educational centralisation, the Basic
Education Ministry stands as the central institution for both subsystems
with regard to curriculum and policy orientation17. Policy and other
important educational decisions are taken at the Ministry and are written in
English and French. They are generally the same for both subsystems
although there may be some peculiarities for each of them18. Policy
documents are channeled to Francophone and Anglophone schools
through regional, divisional, sub divisional and district delegations (see
appendix O for the organisational chart of the Ministry of Basic
Education). Education delegations at the various levels serve as relay
institutions for the channeling of these measures from the Ministry to the
classrooms, though they may often decide on local educational issues
unrelated to the measures or of lesser policy relevance.
20 Chapter One

Normal age 19-27 VIII PhD

VII
MD VI VI
DIP V V Master

IV IV DIP IV
DIP III III III 1st
degree
II II II II BTS
I
I I I I
Higher Schools Specialised Schools Universities Institutes of technology
Higher Education

Bac XIII Normal age 16/17-19 Bac XIII CERT XIII

Prob XII A/L XIII Prob XII XII
XI XII XI XI

Francophone Stream General Anglophone Stream General Technical Professional

High Schools

XI O/L
Normal age 12-16/17
BEPC X X
X CAP
IX IX IX
VIII VIII VIII VIII CERT
VII VII VII VII
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 21
Francophone Stream General Anglophone Stream General Technical Vocational
Secondary Schools

Key
PhD Doctor of Philosophy Normal age 6-12 VI FSLC/CEPE
MD Medical Doctor V
DIP Diploma IV
BTS Brevet de Technicien supérieur III
CERT Certificate II
Bac Baccalauréat I
A/L Advanced Level Primary schools
Prob Probatoire
Normal age 4-6
O/L Ordinary Level
BEPC Brevet d'études du premier cycle Nursery II
CAP Certificat d’aptitude Nursery I
professionnelle
FSLC First school leaving certificate Nursery schools
CEPE Certificat d’études primaries
élémentaires

Figure 1.1: The education system in Cameroon

22 Chapter One

Education officials working in regional delegations of Basic Education

are appointed from the Ministry. Generally, their appointment is not
determined by the language that they speak, given that they are expected
to be bilingual, but rather by the call of duty to serve wherever they are
needed in the national territory. However, Anglophone officials are most
often sent to Anglophone regions and their Francophone counterparts to
Francophone regions. Since the advent of the bicultural education system
in the 1960s (see section 1.4.6 below and sections 2.5.1 and 2.5.3), the
promotion of official bilingualism has been the order of the day. Policy
decisions relating to this promotion have equally applied to both
subsystems of education. Recent bilingualism policy decisions regarding
primary education have made both English and French compulsory in the
First School Leaving Certificate and Certificat d’Ɯtudes Primaires
examinations. These decisions also required that primary school teachers
now teach both English and French in their classrooms as subjects19,
irrespective of whether they have enough knowledge of these languages to
teach them (see the 14th of October 2002 Ministerial decision in appendix
I1). The bilingualism policy is then carried out with varying degree of
effectiveness in different schools.
The 1998 Education Orientation Law in its section 22, paragraphs 1
and 2, divides the school year in Cameroon into 36 weeks of curricular
activities covering a nine-month period with periods of holiday. The
yearly schedule of subjects for Year 1 indicates that each subject is taught
in 6-week blocks or one sequence across the school year (i.e. 6 sequences
of six weeks each). At the end of each sequence, there is a test for each of
the subjects featuring on the timetable (see appendix L for the 2008/2009
school year sequential calendar and appendix M for the Year 1 timetable
from each of the studied schools).
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 23

1.4 Part Two: The language situation in the research

context
1.4.1 Physical presentation
Cameroon, officially Republic of Cameroon, is located in Central
Africa. It is bounded to the north by Lake Chad, on the southwest by
Equatorial Guinea, on the south by Gabon, on the southeast by Congo, on
the east by the Central African Republic, on the northeast by Chad, on the
northwest by Nigeria and on the west by the Gulf of Guinea. The territory
covers a total area of 183,569 square miles (475,440 km2) (see Figure 1.2
below).The country is shaped like an elongated triangle, and forms a
bridge between western and central Africa. Administratively, Cameroon is
divided into ten regions: Centre, South, East, North, West, North West,
South West, Adamawa, Far North and Littoral. The country’s name
originated from the Portuguese’s word Camarões (prawns) when
Portuguese visited the Wouri estuary around 1472. Since then, the name
mutated in accordance with the various colonial and postcolonial
administrations of the country (see sections 1.4.3, 1.4.4 and 1.4.6).

1.4.2 The language situation prior to the German Protectorate

Cameroon is ethnically very diverse with a population made up of
Sudanese, Fulbe, Bantu and Semi-Bantu (see figure 1.3 below for a
distribution of Cameroon population). This melting pot of people speaking
many languages has brought about linguistic diversity (see figures 1.4 and
1.5 below for a representation of the language groups of Cameroon). Many
languages were spoken in Cameroon before the arrival of the first
Europeans. Breton and Fohtung (1991) record 248 languages spoken in the
country while the Ethnologue20 (2002) documents 279 and Bitja’a Kody
(2003) lists 285. Languages such as Ewondo, Duala and Fulfude are lingua
franca in the South, the Littoral and the Northern parts of the country (see
figure 1.8 below).
In spite of the Portuguese derivation of the country’s name, Fonlon
(1969) suggests that due to the great influence English enjoyed along the
Cameroon coast as a language of trade, it must have been the first
European language used in the Wouri estuary. However, historical
accounts about the country’s exploration indicate that at about 500 BCE a
Carthaginian navigator, Hanno, was the first to venture into the coastal
areas of Cameroon. It is not certain whether Hanno spoke his Punic
language along the Cameroon coast before the arrival of Portuguese; it
24 Chapter One

seems therefore impossible to say with conviction what language was the
first foreign language ever to be used along the Wouri estuary.
Notwithstanding the argument about the anteriority of use, English and
Pidgin English gained influence along the Cameroon coast. Mbassi-Manga
(1973) points out that Pidgin English originated along the Cameroon coast
around 1400 as a mixture of English and other European and Cameroonian
languages and assumed the status of a lingua franca for trade. English and
its offspring, Pidgin English, thus came to be established as the language
of court proceedings21 and of religion - The Bible was translated in Pidgin
English and some Cameroonian languages such as Isubu, Bulu, Duala and
many others for the purpose of evangelisation and education, (see Joseph
1980 and Kouega 2008, 86). With regard to the use of English and some
Cameroonian languages as media of instruction in schools, Fonlon (1969,
30) remarks on a common pattern brought about by missionaries’
settlement: “the trilogy of mission-house, church and school.” He observes
that in the west and in the south-east, the missionaries systematically
studied the indigenous languages, Duala and Bulu, reduced them to the
written form and taught them in schools alongside English, as well as
using them in evangelisation.
Todd (1983, 161) indicates that between 1843 and 1884, Baptist
missionaries had established 24 mission stations, each with a vernacular
school. Joseph Merrick, a pastor of the Baptist Missionary Society of
London, was the first missionary to arrive Cameroon in 1843. According
to Che (2008) citing Atoya (2000) and Ihims (2003) he opened
Cameroon’s first primary school in Bimbia in 1844. Joseph (1980, 7-8)
indicates that English was used as the language of instruction in that
school. The following year, other Baptist missionaries such as Saker and
Johnson emulated Merrick and opened a second English22 medium school
in Douala. Merrick introduced gospel singing in church and in school as a
liberation tool for the colonised and the survival of gospel singing in
Anglophone schools in Cameroon today is to be traced back to him
(Cameroon movies director Teno, cited by Walther, 2006).
The language landscape of Cameroon before the start of the German
administration indicates that English, Pidgin English and some
Cameroonian languages enjoyed a relative status as media of instruction in
schools, language of the administration and lingua franca for trade and
evangelisation. However, language conflict soon set in with the start of the
German administration as Joseph (op.cit., 8-9) notes that “the German
colonial administration waged a relentless campaign against the
widespread use of English by Africans, traders, missionaries and even its
own administrators.”
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 25

1.4.3 The language situation in German Cameroon

Although the British were initially the dominant power along the
Cameroon coast, they were supplanted by the Germans. On the 11th July
1884, Dr Gustav Nachtigal, the plenipotentiary of German Chancellor Otto
Von Bismarck, arrived in Douala. On the 12th July, he signed a treaty with
King Bell and King Akwa establishing German rule and on the 14th July
1884, Nachtigal hoisted the German flag and Kamerun23 became a
Schutzgebiet (protectorate) of the Kaiser’s Reich.
On beginning their administration, the Germans found it difficult to
address the language issue immediately. Functional communication
continued to be in English and the German administration used English at
the start while waiting to implement a language policy germane to their
rule (see Joseph, ibid, and also Fonlon 1969, 31). English and some
indigenous languages such as Duala, Mungaka, Lamnso, Bulu, Basa’a,
Ewondo Fulfulde, Bamun were still being taught in schools (Mbuagbaw
2000; Echu 2003; Kouega 2008). However, the German administration
soon began substituting German for English in schools and limiting the
use of indigenous languages.
In 1897, the colonial administration, through Governor Von Puttkammer,
put a ban on the use of indigenous languages in schools. Only the German
language was henceforth to be used for education. Instruction in the
German language was encouraged by financial grants-in-aid from the
government to mission schools. In 1900, a colonial law, known as the
“Schutzgebietgesetz” (Protectorate act), limited the use of local languages
by missionaries to evangelisation. The policy to supplant English with
German and to limit dominant vernaculars was set by a decree of 1910
which “brought the church schools under closer state control and ordered
that German had to be the dominant language of instruction” (Joseph
1980, 17).
26 Chapter One

Figure 1.2: Map of present-day Cameroon.

My research was carried out in three sites: an Anglophone primary school in Buea
and a Francophone and a bilingual primary school in Douala. The name Douala is
written in bold on the map and is located by the biggest black round dot. Buea is
next to it on the left. Taken from Maison des Français de l'étranger. Available
online at: http://www.mfe.org, accessed on 28/01/08.

Joseph notes that with the German administration’s subsidies to mission

schools, German became the predominant language of instruction and
Kouega (2008, 87) observes that “with time education in the vernacular
languages was interrupted and German therefore became the only
instructional language.” With the German defeat in the First World War,
Cameroon became a League of Nations mandated territory.

1.4.4 From Mandate to Trusteeship: British and French

Cameroons
In the aftermath of the First World War, Cameroon was shared
between the French and the British who drove away the Germans. The
French share was referred to as East Cameroon (Cameroun Oriental in
French) and was around 432,000 km2 while the British possession was
called West Cameroon (Cameroun Occidental) and consisted of about
272,725 km2. It was made up of two discontinuous strips of land along the
Cameroon–Nigeria borders, the strip in the north was referred to as
Northern Cameroons and the strip in the south was called Southern
Cameroons (see figure 1.6 below). This sharing of German Cameroon
between the two victors was given legal recognition through a treaty
signed in Versailles in 1919. The League of Nations, created shortly after
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 27

this, confirmed the de facto annexation of Cameroon by France and Britain

and mandated them to run and develop their respective shares. The League
of Nations mandate to Britain and France ran from 1922 to 1946 when the
Second World War finished.
After the Second World War, a new body, the United Nations
Organisation (UNO), replaced the League of Nations and became the new
international organisation. As a result, the Cameroon League of Nations
mandated territories were renamed the UNO Trust Territories [see figure
1.7, Cameroon Mandated Territories (1922–1946) and Trust Territories
(1946 1961)]. This change of appellation, however, did not affect the
system of administration already put in place, as the territories continued
to be administered by their respective colonial masters until independence
in the 1960s.

1.4.5 Language and education in British and French

Cameroons
1.4.5.1 British Cameroons

White (1996, 9) indicates that differences in colonial policy were

conditioned by local socio-political and economic realities, the role of the
missionaries and “the moral stances underlying colonial practice.” The
moral policy underlying British colonial administration was that of
indirect rule and in keeping with this, the language policy tolerated the
teaching of local languages in school. Robinson (1996) indicates that a
commission visited British African territories in 1920-1923 and made
recommendations that school systems should be adapted to local realities,
should give priority to local languages and should educate as many people
as possible.
Fonlon (1969, 36) remarks that education and language policy at the
start of British mandate was lackadaisical, and different in the two British
Cameroons. Vernon-Jackson (1967) contends that by the mid-1920s there
were only primary Koranic schools with no mission or government
schools in Northern Cameroon. Eventually, when regional government,
local administration and the missions established schools in Northern
Cameroon, these were part of the educational system of the northern
provinces of Nigeria and government education officers from Nigeria
viewed the Cameroon territories as no more than districts of Nigerian
provinces. Language policy in primary schools encouraged the use of the
vernacular, to be followed in higher classes by instruction in English. A
British Government Report to the League of Nations on the administration
28 Chapter One

of British Cameroons stipulated, with regard to language teaching in

elementary schools, that:

The medium of instruction is an African language where there is one of

sufficient importance to become a lingua franca. Elsewhere, English is
taught in the elementary schools and becomes the language of instruction
by the end of the course (British Government 1934, 77).

For further training at secondary, teachers’ training, and technical institutions,

students went to Nigeria where English was the official language. Vernon-
Jackson indicates that script communication was conducted in Hausa by
the local or native administrations, and that federal and regional
government departments used only English. British and Nigerian officers
of all government departments were financially encouraged to pass
language examinations in Hausa, Kanuri, or Fulani.
With regard to Southern Cameroon, Vernon-Jackson points out that it
was educationally linked to the Eastern region of Nigeria with an almost
nonexistent educational policy as schools, under the control of military
officers, were nearly all closed down when Britain started withdrawing her
troops after the First World War. With the Nigerian Education Ordinance
for the regulation of schools of 1926, a government education officer was
appointed to Southern Cameroon. However, it was with the Colonial
Development and Welfare Act of 1940 that there appeared to be some
improvement in schools. Missionaries who ran most of the schools started
receiving financial aids from the government which insisted on the
introduction of English to supplant the vernacular in the second year of
primary school. Nevertheless, education was limited to the primary level.
Secondary and tertiary level education was only offered in Nigeria.
Tchombe (2001, 9) indicates that only one mission secondary school
existed in British Southern Cameroon in 1947 as compared to three
government secondary schools in French Cameroon during the same year, and
that by the time British Cameroon acceded to independence in 1961 six such
mission secondary schools existed in British Southern Cameroon as opposed
to 20 government secondary schools in French Cameroon. A government
school happened to be opened in Southern Cameroon only with the advent of
the federation, after 1961. Che upholds that the mission influence on
educational administration in Anglophone Cameroon lacked a strong focus on
enculturation. Citing Ihims (2003), she points out that given that:

The primary concern of mission educators was religious and moral

instruction, they often sought local examples in an attempt to make their
message more effective; thus, much of the education in Anglophone
 Rationale and Conceptual Background 29

Cameroon was more focused on and adapted to local conditions than to

overtly acculturating natives to British ways of life (Che 2008, 642).

With reference to this, Todd (1982, 10b) indicates that at the start of
British administration in Cameroon, there were, in 1927, 299 vernacular
schools teaching 7,155 children. She upholds, Todd (1983, 163), that local
languages were used as languages of instruction in the first four years of
primary education while English was used during the last four years. Her
view is supported by Bitja'a Kody (1999, 82) who points out that in
Southern Cameroon, languages such as Bafut, Duala, Kenyang and
Mungaka were used alongside English in schools. Stumpf (1979) indicates
that, in 1953, the British colonial Board of Education set a policy of using
the local language where children of one language were in the
overwhelming majority, of using a trade language – a “dominant
vernacular” – in mixed areas, and of using “simple English” where no
African language could be said to be common to a majority of children (see
also Baker and Prys Jones, 1998: 356). However, Todd (1983) notes that by
1959 English had supplanted vernacular education and 99 per cent of
children in schools were taught through the medium of English. According
to Todd the reason behind the decline of the teaching of indigenous
languages in schools was to be found in a ministerial decree issued by the
autonomous government of Southern Cameroon on the 27th September 1958
instituting English as the sole language of instruction in primary schools.
The decree thus reads: “English is to be the medium of instruction in
primary schools and all the textbooks used are to be in English” (Todd 1983,
167). For Stumpf (op.cit.), the policy of using local languages in schools
seemed to have been overtaken by the desire of young people to have access
to salaried jobs and by the deliberate lack of debate about local languages by
the incoming independent government (also see Robinson 1996, 116). The
next section looks at language and education in French Cameroon.

1.4.5.2 French Cameroon

In French Cameroon, the colonial administration considered the

teaching of French in schools as “la porte ouverte vers la culture, vers
l’avenir, vers le progress” (Fonlon 1969, 36). Not only was French taught
as a subject by itself but it was considered essential that instruction in the
other subjects should be in French almost from the first day in school.
Fonlon observes that there was a definite policy against encouraging
African languages and the teaching of French was linked to the aim of
assimilation of the natives to the French way of life. Quist (2001, 3)
upholds that the French saw “assimilation of the Africans as a definite
Another random document with
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 It must be noted that Salamanca’s name was not in the list of
Ministers suggested by Narvaez. The Queen wished it to be added,
but Narvaez declined to follow suit, as he knew that this statesman
was supported by Bulwer, whose dislike of the King was well known;
and the way he had spoken of Francisco before his wedding
naturally made the King averse to seeing him.
Bulwer worked with Bermejo against Isabella during the
premiership of Salamanca, and the publication in The Times of a
demand for the royal divorce was due to him.
At last Francisco and Isabella were reconciled. It was on October
13 that the King returned to the capital. He entered the gate of the
palace in a carriage drawn by six horses, with a mounted escort of
the Guardia Civil. He was dressed quietly in black, and Brunelli, the
Pope’s Legate, was seated on his left. Narvaez, Count Alcoy, Count
Vistahermosa, rode by the coach, and two carriages followed with
the high dignitaries of the palace.
The King looked pleased. General Serrano, whom he hated so
cordially, had left Madrid, and the Queen was waiting for him at the
window. Brunelli was about to follow the royal couple as they walked
away after their first meeting, but Narvaez said: “Whither away, Your
Eminence? Let them be alone with their tears and kisses. These
things are done better without witnesses.”
The Queen arrived that day at her dwelling in the Calle de las
Rejas. There was a family dinner-party in the evening at the palace,
and, in a private interview with her daughter, Maria Cristina begged
her to be more discreet in future; and she reminded her that although
she had, as a widow, allowed herself to be captivated by a
commoner, whilst she was the wife of the King she had never
allowed her thoughts to wander beyond the circle of her rank and her
duty.
 The reckless extravagance of the Queen excited much remark.
Courtiers are still living who recollect seeing Isabella give her
bracelets to the beggars who sometimes infest the courtyard of the
palace.
When Miraflores, who was considered the soul of truth, received
a reckless order from the Queen to dispense a certain amount of
money on some petitioner, he had the sum put in pieces on a table,
and it was only the sight of the large sum which was thus laid before
the Queen which showed her the extravagance of her command.
A great influence was soon found to be at work in the palace in
the person of Sister Patrocinio, whose brother, Quiroga, was one of
the gentlemen-in-waiting.
 CHAPTER XI
ATTEMPT ON THE LIFE OF QUEEN ISABELLA—THE OVERTHROW OF THE
QUEEN-MOTHER, MARIA CRISTINA

1850–1854

There was much variety of feeling when it was known that an heir to
the throne was expected. On the day of the birth, July 12, 1850, the
clerics, Ministers, diplomats, officers, and other important
personages of the realm, assembled at the palace to pay their
respects to the expected infant. But the bells and cannon had hardly
announced to the nation the birth of the girl-child when it expired. So
the dead form of the infant, which had only drawn breath in this world
for five minutes, was brought into the assembly of dignitaries, and
after this sad display the gathering dispersed in silence. The kind-
heartedness of the Queen was shown in her thoughtful generosity to
the nurses who were disappointed of their charge.
“Poor nurses, they must have felt it very much!” she exclaimed.
“But tell them not to mind, for they shall be paid the same as if they
had had my child.”
In February, 1852, an heir to the throne was once more expected,
and the birth of the Infanta Isabella was celebrated by the usual
solemn presentation. When the King showed the infant to his
Ministers, he said to the Generals Castaños and Castroterreño:
“You have served four Kings, and now you have a Princess who
may one day be your Sovereign.”
 It was on February 2, 1852, that the dastardly attempt was made
on the life of the Queen, just before leaving the palace for the
Church of Atocha, where the royal infant was to be baptized. The
Court procession was passing along the quadrangular gallery, hung
with the priceless tapestries only displayed on important occasions,
when Manuel Martin Merino, a priest of a parish of Madrid, suddenly
darted forward from the spectators lining the way, with the halberdier
guard. The petition in the cleric’s hand and his garb of a cleric led to
his step forward being unmolested, and the Queen turned to him,
prepared to take the paper. But the next moment the other hand of
the assassin appeared from under his cloak with a dagger, which he
swiftly aimed at the royal mother. Fortunately, the Queen’s corset
turned aside the murderous weapon, and, although blood spurted
from her bodice, the wound was not very deep; but she was at once
put to bed and placed under the care of the royal physicians.
The royal infant was promptly seized from the arms of its mother
at the moment of the attack, by an officer of the Royal Guard, and for
this presence of mind the soldier was afterwards given the title of the
Marquis of Amparo.
With regard to the assailant, the Queen said to her Ministers:
“You have often vexed me by turning a deaf ear to my pleas of mercy
for criminals, but I wish this man to be punished immediately.” And,
with the outraged feeling of the object of such a dastardly deed,
Isabella turned to the would-be murderer, and said: “What have I
ever done to offend you, that you should have attacked me thus?”
During the trial in the succeeding days the Queen softened to the
criminal, and said to her advisers: “No, no! don’t kill him for what he
did to me!”
However, justice delivered the man to the hangman five days
after his deed.
 The efforts to discover Merino’s accomplices were fruitless, and it
was thought that the deed had been prompted more by the
demagogue party than by the Carlists.
The cool, cynical manner of the cleric never left him even at the
moment of his execution.
When the priest’s hair was cut for the last time, he said to the
barber: “Don’t cut much, or I shall catch cold.”
The doomed man’s request to say a few words from the scaffold
was refused. When asked what he had wished to say, he replied:
“Nothing much. I pity you all for having to stay in this world of
corruption and misery.”
The ovation which the Queen had when she finally went to the
Church of Atocha to present the infant surpasses description.
Flowers strewed the way, and tears of joy showed the sympathy of
the people with the Queen in her capacity as mother, and at her
escape from the attempt on her life.
From 1852 to 1854 Isabella failed to please her subjects, and the
outburst of loyalty which had followed the attempt on her life
gradually waned. Curiously indifferent to what was for her personal
interest, as well as for the welfare of the country, Isabella turned a
deaf ear to the advice of her Ministers to dissolve a Cabinet which
was under the leadership of the Count of San Luis, who was known
to be the tool of Queen Maria Cristina, now so much hated by the
Spaniards. Miraflores wrote a letter to Isabella, advising the return of
Espartero, the Count of Valencia, but the letter never reached its
destination.
Remonstrances which had been made upon the Government
were now directed straight to the Throne.
“You see,” said her advisers, “how the persons whom you have
overwhelmed with honours and favours speak against you!”
 The Generals O’Donnell and Dulce finally took an active part
against the Ministry, supported by the Queen-mother and Rianzares.
The Count of San Luis was a man of fine bearing and charming
manners. He had been conspicuous in his early days for his
banquets and gallantries, but he had also been known for many a
generous deed to his friends; and it was noticeable that when the
tide of favour left him he was deserted by all those to whom he had
been of service.
The birth of another royal infant in 1854 excited little or no
interest in the capital, where discontent with the reigning powers was
so evident. General Dulce was accused in the presence of the
Queen and San Luis of having conspired against the Throne. This
the officer indignantly denied on the spot, declaring that never could
he have believed in the perfidy which had prompted the report.
At last the storm of revolution broke over Madrid, and the parties
of the Generals O’Donnell and Dulce came into collision with those
of the Government. Insulting cries against the Queen-mother filled
the streets, and during the three days’ uproar the house of Maria
Cristina, in the Calle de las Rejas, was sacked, as well as those of
her partisans. The furniture was burned in the street, and Maria
Cristina took refuge in the royal palace.
After the Pronunciamento of Vicalvaro and O’Donnell to the
troops, it was evident that the soldiers of the Escorial would also
revolt against the Government.
It was then that Isabella was filled with the noble impulse to go
alone to the barracks of the mutinous regiments and reason
personally with them. With her face aglow with confidence in her
soldiers and in herself, she said: “I am sure that the generals will
come back with me then to Madrid, and the soldiers will return to
their barracks shouting ‘Vivas’ for their Queen.”
 But this step, which would have appealed with irresistible force to
the subjects, was opposed by the Ministers, who objected to a
course which would have robbed them of their portfolios by the
Sovereign coming to an understanding with those who were
opposed to their opinions.

T H E C O U N C I L O F M I N I S T E R S O F I S A B E L L A I I . D E C L A R E S WA R
AGAINST MOROCCO

From a Painting by R. Benjumea

At this time Isabella received from the Infanta Josefa, daughter of

the Infanta Louisa Carlota and Francisco de Paula, a letter which
showed that the Princess had inherited her mother’s hatred of the
Queen-mother, Maria Cristina; for she wrote:
 “Your Majesty should distrust the artificial and partial counsels of
the Queen-mother. This lady, to whom you owe your birth, is
sacrificing you to her insatiable greed of gold. Beyond your life you
do not owe anything to Maria Cristina. She has done nothing for
Spain that you should give her submission and obedience in your
conduct as Queen. Hardly had Your Majesty’s father gone down to
his grave than his widow gave you the pernicious example of an
impure love, which began in a scandal, and ended, ten years later, in
a morganatic marriage, to the incalculable harm of the country.
“Maria Cristina is lax in the principles of morality, which ought to
be the foundation of the education of Princes, and she knew not how
to inculcate them in the mind of Your Majesty. Whilst you were a
child, she did nothing but accumulate money and arrange for her
future booty.
“The disinterestedness and the generous sentiments which
enrich Your Majesty’s heart, and the high tendencies which have
shone in your mind, and which have only been suffocated by the
pettiness of your entourage, are exclusively a gift from Heaven, and
under favourable circumstances they would have developed into
great and glorious deeds. When the time arrived for the marriage of
Your Majesty—an event of such import to your destiny—Your
Majesty knows that the Queen-mother only used her influence to
make you marry a man whose sole merit lay in his power of
ministering to her omnivorous nature. Never did a mother behave in
such a self-interested way in what concerned her daughter’s
domestic happiness! And now she continues the soul of the
Government, counselling Your Majesty for her own ends, and with
utter disregard of the wishes of the people.”
This letter, which gives an idea of the dissensions of the Royal
Family, and the expression of feeling against Maria Cristina, was
shared by the people. Indeed, the hatred of the Queen-mother was
publicly shown after she took refuge in the royal palace. The Plaza
de los Ministros resounded with the cries from the townsfolk of
“Death to Cristina!” A storm of stones broke all the windows of the
palace. The soldiers fired on the people. The palace gate of El
Principe had to be guarded by two cannon commanding the Plaza
de Oriente. Twelve guns were stationed in the great courtyard called
the Plaza de las Armas, and all the cavalry at Madrid was
summoned to the defence of the royal abode; and during the siege
there was serious anxiety that the provisions would not last long.
Queen Isabella sought to encourage and support her mother, but
she saw that the stream of public hatred was now too strong to be
stemmed.
The arrival of Espartero in Madrid, on July 29, raised the siege of
the palace, and the people, delighted at the sight of their favourite
leader, gave a loyal ovation to Queen Isabella when she appeared at
a window of the palace.
The days from July 17 to August 28 were fraught with anxiety for
the Queen of Spain. The cries for the dismissal of the Queen-mother,
and for her trial for the appropriation of State moneys, could no
longer be silenced, and the day came when the royal lady found that
her personal safety demanded her departure from the country. So,
accompanied by a mounted escort, Maria Cristina submitted to the
decision of Espartero, as the mouthpiece of the people, and she
finally bade farewell to her weeping daughter at the palace door, and
left the country, never more to return.
Espartero made a crusade against the undue priestly influence at
Court. The weak-minded King was quite under the power of “the
bleeding nun,” as Patrocinio was called, and his constant visits to her
apartments in the palace were said to have been in search of
spiritual counsel, with which she was supposed to be miraculously
endowed by reason of the wounds in her forehead and hands, which
refused to be healed, as they were said to be illustrative of those of
the Saviour. The Queen and all the Royal Family became
hysterically hypnotized by this phenomenon.
But Espartero soon put an end to the matter by having the lady
put under the authoritative care of a doctor, who had her hands tied
so as to prevent her irritating the wounds; and thus in a short time
the supposed miracle was over, and the power of the religieuse and
her brother, the Archbishop Claret, was at an end.
Espartero had O’Donnell as his Minister of War. Dissensions
broke out again in the Cabinet, and O’Donnell reaped the success of
his camarilla influence at the midnight Council meeting held before
the Queen in July, 1856. For when Espartero found that his
measures for the new Constitution were rejected, he offered his
resignation; and then, to his surprise, the Queen, by a prearranged
concert, turned to his colleague with her sweetest smile, saying, “I
am sure you won’t abandon me, will you?” and he was sworn in as
Prime Minister the following day.
But O’Donnell had a powerful rival for favour at the palace in the
person of Narvaez, a General of some fame, whose alert, dapper
little figure, said to have been improved by corsets, made him
popular at Court as a dancer.
This officer was extremely arrogant, and noting that the
grandees, by right of their special prerogative, stood covered in the
royal presence during the ceremony of the King washing the feet of
the poor, and feeding them in the historical Hall of Columns, he
promptly put his own cocked hat on his head, and bade his officers
do the same.
O’Donnell, who was of a heavier, clumsier build than his rival,
suffered much at the sight of the success of Narvaez in the arts of
society. One day at a state ball at the palace the two Generals stood
in readiness to conduct the Queen through the mazes of the rigodon.
As Prime Minister, O’Donnell considered that the distinction of taking
Isabella’s hand for the figures was his by right, but Isabella could not
resist the temptation of having for a partner a man distinguished as a
follower of Terpsichore, and she therefore singled out Narvaez as
her partner.
In a fury at what he considered a public slight, O’Donnell gave in
his resignation the next day as President of the Council, and General
Narvaez was chosen to fill the vacant place.
It was well known at Court that the British Ambassador, Bulwer
Lytton, was working against the Court of Spain in England, and
consequently he was an object of great aversion to the military
leader of the Government.
Irritated at the Englishman’s assumption of authority, Narvaez
said one day to Bulwer Lytton that Spain did not interfere with the
affairs of Queen Victoria like England did with those of Isabella II. To
this remark the British diplomat returned that Victoria did not owe her
throne to foreign intervention, as Isabella did.
One day Narvaez was in his bureau in a great state of irritation
about some action of the British Ambassador, when Bulwer Lytton
was announced. He drew a chair close to Narvaez, and, although
the Spaniard pushed his back, drew his seat still closer. Upon this
Narvaez jumped up in his excitable manner, and then, wishing to
seat himself again, he missed the place and found himself lower
than he wished.
Upon this the Ambassador made some remark which added fuel
to the fire of the General’s wrath, and, advancing to the Englishman,
he made him rise from his seat, took him by the neck, and kicked
him so that he nearly fell to the ground. The Ambassador took his
papers for England that day, and this incident doubtless added to the
bitterness with which Bulwer reported on the affairs of Spain.
 The incident just related, of this last interview of Sir Bulwer Lytton
with the Spanish Premier, was evidently never reported in all its
bearings, but enough was known for it to be seen that the
Ambassador was apt to embroil matters. For in “The Letters of
Queen Victoria,” vol. ii., p. 207, Her Majesty writes:

“May 23, 1848.

“The sending away of Sir H. Bulwer[17] is a serious affair, which

will add to our many embarrassments. The Queen, however, is not
surprised at it, from the tenor of the last accounts of Madrid, and
from the fact that Sir H. Bulwer has, for the last three years, been
sporting with political intrigues. He invariably boasted of being in the
confidence of every conspiracy, though he was taking care not to be
personally mixed up in them; and, after their various failures,
generally harboured the chief actors in his house under the plea of
humanity. At every crisis he gave us to understand that he had to
choose between a revolution and a palace intrigue, and not long ago
he wrote to Lord Palmerston that if the Monarchy with the
Montpensier succession was inconvenient to us, he could get up a
Republic.”

[17] “Lord Palmerston had written a letter to Bulwer (which the

latter showed to the Spanish Premier) lecturing the Spanish Queen
on her choice of a Minister. This assumption of superiority, as Sir
Robert Peel calls it, led to a peremptory order to leave Spain in
twenty-four hours.—Editor.”

But Isabella’s realm was still torn by insurrections. In January,

1860, the Prefect of the Police reported that a rebellion was being
prepared in Spain against the throne by the Carlist party, under Don
Carlos Luis de Bourbon y de Braganza, Count of Montemolin. When
justice was prepared to take its course against the insurrectionists,
Don Carlos wrote to Isabella, saying:
“I am certain that your compassionate heart, which has always
shown pity for the unfortunate, will not fail to have mercy on your
cousins, and not deny the pardon that we crave.”
This mercy was also eloquently pleaded for by the unhappy
mother of the delinquents. So, obedient to the impulse of her kind
heart, Isabella said to the weeping parent: “Be at rest; your son shall
not die.”
However, the Carlist family soon forgot the clemency of the
Queen, and the letter of Juan de Bourbon, son of Don Carlos,
Ferdinand’s brother, showed that the spirit of animosity burnt as
powerfully as ever in the breast of the claimant to the throne.
“Twenty-seven years you have reigned,” ran the Prince’s letter to
his royal cousin, “and you must confess that the hand of God has not
helped you. I know the country; I know equally well that your heart is
good, and that you do good when you can, and you regret the evils
which afflict Spain. But you try in vain. You cannot fight against
Providence, which never wills that evil should prosper. Be assured,
dear cousin, that God did not choose you to make the happiness of
Spain, and that Divine Providence has denied you the lot of being a
great Queen. Descend, Isabella—descend from the throne! Show
yourself great in this matter, and take the place to which you have a
claim in my family as my dear cousin, and as having occupied the
throne for so many years, and do not expose yourself to final
disaster and bring ruin on the family.”
 CHAPTER XII
COURT INTRIGUES

1864–1868

On November 28, 1857, “the birth of Alfonso XII.,” as Martin Hume

says, “added another thong to the whip which the King-Consort
could hold over the Queen for his personal and political ends, and it
also had the apparently incongruous effect of sending Captain Puig
Moltó into exile.”
Of course there were the usual rejoicings at the birth of a Prince,
but things were far from satisfactory at the Court. The Queen had
now a taste of personal power and a higher notion of her own
political ability. The Congress was in slavish servitude to the palace,
and, acting in accordance with this sentiment, it had managed to get
rid of the men in the Senate who had been working for the
constitutional privileges of the country which would have led to the
indispensable protection of the prerogative of a true suffrage; and
freed from these patriots, the press was silenced and Parliament
was suspended.
The return of Maria Cristina, the Queen’s mother, was another
step which added to the unpopularity of Isabella II. Once more
wearied out with waiting for the realization of constitutional rights, the
people’s exasperation was voiced by the soldiers at the barracks of
San Gil, within view of the royal palace of Madrid. O’Donnell at once
took steps for the suppression of the insurrection.
 The cries of “Viva Prim!” “Viva la Libertad!” showed that the spirit
of republicanism was rampant.
Swiftly as O’Donnell went to the scene of action, Narvaez was
before him, and so the Prime Minister had the mortification of seeing
his rival carried into the palace to be tended for the slight wound he
had received in the conflict.
The rebellion was soon quelled, and the insurgents were shot;
but disinterested advisers of the Queen might have shown her that
such émeutes proved that the fire of discontent was smouldering,
and with a strong Government for the constitutional rights for which
the country was clamouring the revolution of 1868 would have been
avoided.
On the day following the San Gil insurrection a man of influence
at the Court went to plead pardon for two of the insurgents from Her
Majesty herself.
The interview was characteristic of the kind-heartedness of the
Queen.
After waiting for half an hour in the antechamber, the gentleman
was shown into the royal presence.
“You have been quite lost,” said Isabel graciously, as her visitor
bent over her hand. “It is a thousand years since you have been to
see me.”
Whilst excusing himself with courtly grace, Tarfe noticed that
during the two years in which he had been absent from the palace
the Queen had grown much stouter, and had thus lost some of her
queenly dignity. She seemed distrait and troubled, and the red lids of
her limpid blue eyes gave her an expression of weariness. They
were, moreover, the eyes of a woman who had been brought in
contact with the encyclopædic array of the various forms of the
despoilers of innocence.
 The petitioner submitted his plea for mercy for his friends by
saying that his request was backed by a letter from the holy Mother,
begging her to write two letters to General Hoyos for their release. To
the delight of the intercessor, the Sovereign at once wrote the letters.
When this was done, the surprise of the courtier was increased when
the Queen, who was generally mañanista, said in a quick, nervous
tone: “Do not delay giving these letters; do not wait till to-morrow; do
it to-day!”
Before leaving the royal presence, Tarfe ventured to say that
O’Donnell was much upset by the events of the preceding day, and
the Queen replied in a tone curiously devoid of feeling: “Yes, I like
O’Donnell very much.” This she said three times in the same
passionless voice, and then, seeing that he was dismissed, Tarfe
took leave of Her Majesty; and after fulfilling the mission to Hoyos,
he went to see O’Donnell at his palace of Buenavista.
The General declined to believe the reports of his friends, of the
intrigues which were to compass his fall.
The victor at Tetuan was more able to repel the open advance of
an enemy than the underhand plots of a palace.
But when Ortiz de Pinedo suddenly came in, and said, “Gonzalez
Brabo has left San Juan de Luz to-day, and he is coming to form a
Ministry with Narvaez,” the General was somewhat taken aback.
On the following morning, after finishing a long despatch for the
royal signature, he repaired to the palace, and, anxious to know the
real state of affairs, he submitted to Her Majesty the list of
appointments to the Senate-house, many of which had been
suggested by Isabel herself.
To the surprise of the Minister, the list was rejected by the Queen
in a cold, disdainful way, so O’Donnell found himself forced to offer
his resignation. This was accepted with the usual meaningless
smiles and compliments.
Then O’Donnell returned to his house, where his friends were
waiting for him. His face betrayed his rage and mortification, and,
throwing his gloves on the table with an angry gesture, he
exclaimed:
“I have been dismissed just as you would dismiss one of your
servants.”
“My General,” exclaimed one of the partisans of the ex-Minister,
“the camarilla delayed the change of Ministry for two days after the
mutiny; why was that? And Ayala returned because it was better for
Narvaez that we should have the odium of shooting the insurgents.
Now he can take his place in Parliament with all the airs of
clemency.”
O’Donnell, who could not deny the truth of this remark, took
General Serrano by the arm into another room, but they could plainly
hear their indignant followers saying: “Eso, señora, es imposible!”
The Marquis of Miraflores says that a General Pierrad, the head
of the Pronunciamento, told a chief of the halberdiers that he had
better tell the Queen that there were no means of putting down
meetings, and this for two reasons: Prim and his friends only wanted
a change in the power by a disciplined Pronunciamento, but the
artillery, through some strange influence, would not recognize
military chiefs. He who said this was to have been shot down by
them; he saw them drunk and faithless to their commands. This
communication was made to the Queen. In 1867 an important
interview took place in the Palace of Madrid between Isabel II. and
her sister, the Duchess of Montpensier.
It will be remembered that, after the adventures of the royal
couple in the revolution of 1848, the Duke and Duchess retired to
Seville, where they lived in the Palace of San Telmo with all the state
dignity of sovereigns. The Queen had made the Duke an Infante of
Spain, and he had also been appointed Captain-General.
The Duke decided to take his wife to Madrid to counsel her sister
to adopt a more liberal policy. The Duchess was expecting another
child, but she was advised not to postpone her visit to the royal
palace of Madrid. The interview was far from satisfactory, for Isabella
had no intention of allowing Montpensier to have an active part in the
Government. So the Princess returned to Seville, and Isabella
afterwards wrote her a letter, in which she expressed displeasure at
her aims. This letter received an angry reply, first from the husband,
and then from the wife. So a coldness grew up between the sisters,
and, indeed, Isabella’s want of confidence in Montpensier was
proved by the subsequent events in 1868, when Prim himself
rejected the Duke’s offer to raise forces in his favour.
During all this time the little Prince of Asturias, who was nine
years old when the insurrection broke out in the barracks of San Gil
for Prim, was pursuing his education in the palace. The style of the
Prince’s education is given in the remark of the royal child’s playmate
to his father, when he had been to spend a day at the palace.
“Papa,” said the boy, “Alfonso does not know anything. He is
taught nothing but religion and drilling. After the religious lesson,
which was very dull,” the child continued, “Alfonso was given a spear
and a sword, and he waved them about so much that Juanito and I
were afraid he would hurt us.”
A record was kept of the little Prince’s doings during the day. His
frequent colds, his coughs, his acts of devotion, his appetite at
meals, his games, his toys, his little tempers, his deeds of
obedience, were all entered in the register as signs of his
temperament and as indications of his future character as a man.
 The Prince’s apartments were dreary. The windows were high up
in the thick walls, the ceilings were low, and, as a grandee says
when speaking of this fact, it seemed strange that the light and air so
essential for a child should be insufficiently supplied to a future King.
General Pavia, who was gentleman-in-waiting to Alfonso, only
shrugged his shoulders at this remark, but Señor Morphy ventured to
say: “That is our opinion, but she who commands, commands.”
When the grandee was introduced to the little Prince, he returned
the salutation with the manner of one accustomed to it, but with a
pretty smile which was very attractive.
“Yes,” said his attendant, “His Royal Highness is better to-day. He
only has a little cough now, but the doctor says he is not to be tired
with lessons to-day; he is only to rest.”
“Last night,” said the General, “His Highness asked for his lead
soldiers to play with in bed. He did not want to say his prayers. So I
had to fetch the new prayer-book which Her Majesty sent a few days
ago, and I read the prayers whilst he repeated them after me. So in
this way he said his prayers, but not willingly.”
Hereupon Alfonso protested, saying: “But this morning, Marquis, I
said my prayers without your reading anything.”
“Yes, yes,” returned the gentleman; “but Your Highness did not
want to get up, so I had to read stories to you until the doctor came.”
A few pages from the diary of the young Prince of Asturias gives
some insight into the dreary daily life of the delicate child:
“October 1, 1866.—His Highness breakfasted at 11 o’clock. At 1
o’clock he had drilling till 1.40. At 2 o’clock a writing lesson with
Señor Castilla; at 3 o’clock religion with Señor Fernandez; 4.30, rice
soup as usual; 4.50 he went up to the rooms of Her Majesty to go for
a drive with her.
 “October 4.—His Highness played about till 2.15. He had no
lessons to-day, as being Her Majesty’s saint’s day. At 2.43 he went
up to the Queen’s apartments to assist at the reception. He wore the
uniform of a sergeant, with the Cross of Pelayo. The ceremony over
at 6.15, when His Highness came down with Señor Novaliches, as a
boot hurt him (not the Marquis, but His Highness). The said Marquis
took off the boot, and carefully examined the foot, but he found
nothing to account for the pain. Mention is made of this circumstance
as the Chief of the Chamber of His Highness thinks it fitting to do
so....
“October 6.—My Lord Prince lunched at 12 o’clock. I gave him
his lessons. He went to the Church of Our Lady of Atocha. He went
to bed at 10 o’clock, and slept ten hours. He took some chocolate,
made his confession at 9.30, and Father Fernandez celebrated
Mass.
“October 9.—He breakfasted with appetite. He had his lessons at
the marked hours, and he was somewhat restless. At 4 o’clock he
took some soup, and went out for a walk with the Mayordomo, Señor
Marquis de Novaliches, Professor Sanchez, and Juanito. He had
supper at 8 o’clock, and played till 10 o’clock with Juanito, but left off
when he knocked his left leg against a table. He slept from 10
o’clock till 9 o’clock in the morning. He got up at 9.30 without feeling
any pain in his leg from the blow. He did his orisons, assisted at the
Mass in his room; he went out for a walk with his Mayordomo,
returned at 11 o’clock, and assisted at the Mass with Their Majesties
and the Princesses; and at 11.45 he had his hair cut.”
As Perez Galdos says in his works, the long hours of religious
instruction every day would have qualified the little Prince for the
Council of Trent. When any Bishops came to visit Isabella, they were
sent to the apartments of her little son; and thus Morphy writes in the
register: “I gave the lesson to His Highness in the presence of the
Bishops of Avila, Guadix, Taragona, and of other dioceses whose
names I do not remember.” And Losa wrote: “He opened his eyes at
8.30; he dressed and gave thanks to God; he took his chocolate with
appetite, and at 10 o’clock had his religion lesson in the presence of
the Cardinal of Burgos, who was pleased with his progress, and
noted that His Highness was ‘magnificent in everything.’”
Courtiers who were true of heart saw with apprehension the
artificial character of the Prince’s education.
“Ah!” said a man who would gladly have been frank with the
Queen, but he felt he was powerless against her crowd of flatterers,
“Alfonso is a very intelligent child. He has qualities of heart and mind
which would give us a King worthy of the people, were they only
properly cultivated; but we shall never see this ideal realized,
because he is being brought up like an idiot. Instead of educating the
boy, they are stultifying him; instead of opening his eyes to science,
life, and nature, they blind them so that his sensitive soul remains in
darkness and ignorance.”
The same courtier implored the Prince’s educators to give the lad
a chance. “Take him out of this atmosphere of priests and nuns, and
devotional books by Father Claret. If you want Alfonso to be a great
King, let him breathe the pure air of fine deeds. Take him away from
the gloomy atmosphere of the royal palace; let him inhale the fresh
breezes of liberty. His talents will develop, and he will become a
different boy.”
It was indeed true the little Prince was in an unnatural
atmosphere in the palace, where the tunic of the nun Patrocinio had
become an object of worship, and where the King, in his stuffy
apartments, gave himself over to the study of relics which were
brought to him at a high price by the priestly folk, who made harvest
out of his credibility.
The situation of Queen Isabella is graphically given by the
historian Galdos in the reflections of a loyal courtier whilst having,
with his wife, an audience of Isabella II.:
“Oh, your poor Majesty!” he said to himself. “The etiquette
invented by the set-up gentlemen of the Court to shut you off from
the national sentiment prevents me telling you the truth, because it
would hurt you to hear it. Even those on the most intimate terms with
you shut you out from the truth, and they come to you full of lies. So,
kind-hearted Isabella, you receive the homage of my gilded untruths.
All that I have said to you this afternoon is an offering of floral
decorations, the only ones received on royal altars.... You, who are
more inclined to the ordinary and the plebeian than other Kings—you
let the truth come to you in external decorative, and verbal matters,
but in things of public consequence you like nothing but lies,
because you are educated in it, and falsity is the religious cloak, or
rather the transparent veil, which you like to throw over your political
and non-political errors. Oh, poor neglected, ill-fated Queen...!”
The reflections of the courtier were here interrupted by Isabella
saying to his wife: “Maria Ignacia, I want to give you the ribbon of
Maria Luisa.... I shall never forgive myself for not having done it
before. I have been very neglectful—eh?”
The Marchioness was eloquent in her thanks, and Beramendi
could only say: “Señora, the kindness of Your Majesty is
unbounded.... How can we express our gratitude to Your Majesty?”
But the Marquis said to himself: “We take it, because even as you
accept our lying homage, so we receive these signs of vanity. King
and people we deceive each other; we give you painted rags of
flattery, which look like flowers, and you bestow honours on us which
take the place of real affection.”
Isabella continued: “I must give you a title of Count or Viscount,
which your son can take when he comes of age.”
 The Marquis’s wife returned: “Our Queen is always so good; that
is why the Spaniards love her so.”
“Ah, no, no!” exclaimed Isabella in a melancholy tone, “they do
not love me as they did.... And many really hate me, and yet God
knows I have not changed in my love for the Spaniards.... But things
have got all wrong.... I don’t know how it is ... it is through the heated
passions of one and the other. But, Beramendi, it is not my fault.”
“No, indeed,” returned the courtier; “you have not caused this
embroiled state of affairs. It is the work of the statesmen, who are
moved by ambition and egoism.”
This indeed was true, for even as Serrano used the Queen’s
favour to his own ends, and had his debts twice paid by Her Majesty,
he was the first to lead the country against her.
“Do you think that matters will improve, and that passions will
calm down?” asked Isabella anxiously.
“Oh, señora, I hope that the Government will confirm your
authority, and that those that are in rebellion will recognize their
error.”
“That is what they all say,” said Isabella, with a little satirical
smile. “We shall see how things will turn out. I trust in God, and I
don’t believe He will forsake me.”
“Ah!” said Beramendi to himself, whilst his royal mistress
continued in the same strain of religious trust to his wife, “do not
invoke the true God whilst you prostrate yourself before the false
one. This god of thine is an idol made of superstition, and decked in
the trappings of flattery; he will not come to your aid, because he is
not God. I pity you, blind, generous, misled Sovereign.... Those who
loved you so much now merely pity you.... You have been silly
enough to turn the love of the Spaniards to commiseration, if not to
hatred. I see your goodness, your affection, but these gifts are not
sufficient to rule a nation. The Spanish people have got tired of
looking for the fruit of your good heart.”
When Isabella gave the sign of dismissal of the courtier and his
wife by rising to her feet, he said to himself sadly:
“Good-bye, Queen Isabella; you have spoilt your life. Your reign
began with the smiles of all the good fairies, but you have changed
them into devils, which drag you to perdition.... As your ears are
never allowed to hear the truth, I cannot tell you that you will reign
until O’Donnell will permit the Generals to second Prim’s plans. Oh,
poor Queen! you would think me mad if I said such a thing to you;
you would think I was a rebel and a personal enemy, and you would
run in terror to consult with your devilish nuns and the odious set
which has raised a high wall between Isabella II. and the love of
Spain. Good-bye, lady of the sad destiny; may God save your
descendants, as He cannot save you!”
The good-heartedness of the Queen was, indeed, seen by all
about her, and there are people still at the Palace of Madrid who
remember seeing Her Majesty take off her bracelets and give them
to the beggars which infest the royal courtyard. All the best impulses
of Isabella were turned to her own ruin for the want of true patriots,
who by supporting the constitutional rights of the nation would have
secured the sovereignty to the Queen. The self-interested conduct of
the generals and statesmen, whose command in the camarilla of the
palace meant rule over the heart of Her Majesty, tended naturally
only to the overthrow of personal rivals, and to the neglect of the
welfare of the land.
Prim therefore became the hope of the nation. With his return to
the capital, thought the people, crushed down by taxation and
deprived of constitutional liberty, there will be an end to the camarilla,
Narvaez, and Patrocinio, and we shall have the pure fresh air of
disinterested policy.
 The death of O’Donnell at Biarritz relieved Narvaez of the fear of
his rival’s return, but the General had the mortification of seeing his
royal mistress utterly in the hands of Marfori, who had been raised
from the position of Intendente of the Palace to the position of
supreme personal favour.
When the Queen heard of O’Donnell’s death, she is reported to
have said: “He determined not to be Minister with me again, and now
he can never be.”
The Queen now committed the suicidal act of making Gonzalez
Brabo Prime Minister in the place of Narvaez. The poor lady seemed
quite to have lost her head, and there was no one to put her on the
right path, surrounded as she was with harpies.
According to a letter from Pius IX., found in the Princess’s prayer-
book in the royal palace after the Queen had taken flight, the Pope
counselled the marriage of the Infanta Isabella with a Neapolitan
Prince. Even whilst the fêtes of the marriage were going on,
Gonzalez Brabo was concerting with the revolutionary Generals, and
the name of “Prim and Liberty!” was heard on all sides, and
messengers were sent to consult with the leader of the Republican
party in London.
The supporters of the Montpensier party hoped that the
dethronement of Isabella would mean the acceptance of the
Duchess of Montpensier as Queen, and her husband as Prince-
Consort. But this idea was soon nipped by Monsieur de Persigny, the
President of the Privy Council of the Emperor of the French, saying
to Olozaga, who was then Spanish Ambassador at Paris, that he
would never consent to the crown of Spain being on the head of
either the Duke or the Duchess of Montpensier.
After the historic day of September 29, 1868, when Prim made
his successful coup at Cadiz, the Royal Family fled to San
Sebastian.
 The haste with which the flight was made could be seen in the
collections of jewels and money which had been thrust into bags
which were after all left behind.
In the Hôtel d’Angleterre of the seaside resort Isabella still
seemed to expect a miracle to take place in her favour. A throne
does not fall every day, and a crowd hovered about the hotel to see
how the Queen would accept her overthrow.
A murmur of satisfaction broke out among the bystanders when
the loyal-hearted Marquis de Beramendi was seen entering the
hotel. “That is a good thing,” they said, “for Isabella will listen to his
advice, which is certain to be wise.”
The courtier’s remarks to the Lady-in-Waiting were short and to
the point.
“I have come to tell you,” he said, “that, if the Queen keeps to the
good idea of abdicating, certain infatuated people ought to be kept
from opposing it. I have had direct news from Serrano, and he says
that, if Doña Isabella will abdicate in favour of Don Alfonso, he will
save the dynasty, and she herself will be saved. The Duke of Torres
will not put obstacles in the way of this course.”
“Better than that,” returned the Lady-in-Waiting, in a voice which
a cold rendered almost inaudible, “I thought that Her Majesty had the
same idea, ‘that she had better go to Logroño, and abdicate in
favour of the Prince of Asturias in the presence of Espartero.’”
“That’s admirable!” said Beramendi.
“And then, after abdicating, the Queen will depart immediately for
France, leaving the new King in the power of the Regent Espartero.”
“Admirable! splendid!” cried Beramendi; “but there is not a minute
to lose.”
“The departure will be arranged this evening.”
 “But, my God, I fear delays will be fatal; I am afraid that some bad
friend, some plotting courtier of the camarilla, will spoil this saving
step——”
“Well, I must go upstairs now,” returned the lady. “The Señora,
Don Francisco, and Roncali, are busy with manifestoes for the
nation.”
“And Spain will say, ‘Manifestoes to me!’ Now is the time to show
the country fine deeds, and not empty rhetoric.”
On the following morning, when Beramendi went to the hotel, he
came upon Marfori; and although he had had little to do with this
nephew of Narvaez since royal favouritism had raised him to such
undue importance, he said, in a tone of assumed respect: “So Her
Majesty is going direct to France? Something was said about her
travelling to Logroño?”
Upon this Marfori frowned angrily, saying: “You don’t understand,
my dear Marquis, that it would be very humiliating for the Queen of
Spain to ask protection from a General, although he bear the name
of Espartero. All concert with Progressists is dangerous. The Queen
is leaving Spain under the conviction that she will soon be recalled
by her people.”
“I knew it was useless to say more. Don Carlos Marfori was busy
giving orders to the servants. I regarded him with resentment,
because he was the personification of the evil influence which
brought the Queen to her ruin.
“His Arab type of handsomeness, with his large mouth and heavy
jaw, was eloquent of sensuality, and his obesity robbed him of the
attraction which he had possessed in earlier days. He was
impetuous, overbearing, and wanting in the courtesy common to a
superior education.”
 The Marquis was then taken into the presence of the Queen, and
as he bent over her hand she whispered: “You know we have given
up the idea of going to Logroño. No more humiliations! I am going
away so as not to aggravate matters, and to prevent bloodshed; but I
shall be recalled, shall I not?”
“I had to console Her Majesty with one of the usual Court lies,
and the Royal Family soon took its departure, the Queen leaning on
the arm of Don Francisco, the little Infantas with their Ladies-in-
Waiting, and the Prince of Asturias, in a blue velvet suit, led by
Señora de Tacon. The poor little fellow looked pale and sad; his
great eyes seemed to express the royal and domestic sadness of the
scene, and nothing was now wanting but the order for departure.”
Marfori was always much disliked by people at Court. It was in
the summer of 1867. Many courtiers and ladies of high rank were
promenading in the beautiful gardens of La Granja. The soft, well-
kept turf of the shady alleys by the countless sparkling fountains set
off the beauty of the dresses, when, with his usual courtly grace,
General Narvaez advanced to meet the Countess of Campo Alange.
This illustrious lady, whose salons in Madrid were graced by the
highest in the land, was soon to give a ball.
“I have received your invitation,” said the General, after he had
greeted the Countess.
“It is almost the first that I have sent,” returned the lady.
“I have just met Marfori,” said the Duke of Valencia, “and he tells
me he has not received his.”
“Neither will he,” replied the lady sharply.
“And why, being a Minister?” queried the General in surprise,
knowing how the slight to the Queen’s favourite would be resented at
Court.
 “Simply because Cabinet Councils are not held at my house,”
returned the lady caustically, firm in her decision to show her dislike
of the man.
General Narvaez, whose dapper figure and perfect dancing made
him always a welcome guest at the Spanish Court, was still
unmarried when he had to withdraw to Paris as an exile. He had
always been fond of feminine society, but, gay butterfly as he was,
he did not fix his affections upon any one lady.
The beautiful Leocadia Zamora had been once the object of the
officer’s attention, and, indeed, the charming way she accompanied
herself on the harp fascinated other admirers beside the Count of
Valencia. She was a constant visitor in the salons of the Countess of
Montijo, where the lovely Eugénie shone with the brilliance and
charm which were so soon to be transported to the Court of France.
But fate did not reserve the joy of a happy marriage for the lovely
Leocadia, and the sweet spirit, disillusioned by an unhappy love,
retired to a convent in Oviedo, where she passed the rest of her life
performing the duties of a Lady Abbess.
It was said that it was the gallant Don Salvador de Castro who
had taken Leocadia’s heart captive, when she was young; and,
indeed, it is not surprising if this report be true, for he was a typical
courtier of his time, and when he was home from his duties as
Ambassador in Italy he seemed to dwarf all the attractions of the
lady’s other admirers. Leocadia was, in truth, a star of the Court of
Spain, and the beautiful picture by Frederick Madrazo shows the
perfection of her charms, with no other ornament than a white rose
to adorn her simple white dress. Salvador de Castro was honoured
by the friendship of King Francis II. and Queen Maria Sophia when
the Italian Revolution robbed them of the throne of the Two Sicilies,
and he was able to render them marked services and prove himself
as loyal a friend as he was perfect a gentleman. After the
capitulation of Gaeta, the King and Queen rewarded his loyalty by
granting him the title of Prince of Santa Lucia, with the gift of the
beautiful palace on the banks of the Tiber which is known by the
name of the Farnesina, whilst the gardens were sold to the Emperor
Napoleon. The place was deserted, and so near to its ruin that
sheep and goats fed in its grounds, and the custodian took his meals
in the beautiful hall of the frescoes of Sodon.
It was in this palace that Michael Angelo painted a head on the
wall, which is known by the name of “The Visiting Card,” as he left it
as a sign of his call on Raphael when the artist was out.
The Prince of Santa Lucia had the palatial dwelling restored, and
he gave magnificent entertainments in this palace, of which it was
not destined that the lovely Leocadia should be mistress. Indeed, the
lady abandoned all thoughts of love and pomp when she entered a
convent in Oviedo, where she ended her days as Lady Abbess;
whilst the daughter of her old admirer wedded the Marquis of Bey,
and made a mark in Court society of Madrid.
But to return to the gallant little General. His affections were at
last taken captive by another friend of the young Empress of the
French, the beautiful daughter of the Count of Tacher. The Empress
Josephine had belonged to this family, and her parents, the Duke
and Duchess de Tacher de la Pogerie, were much beloved by Queen
Marie Amélie, wife of King Louis Philippe.
It was General de Cordova, who had played such an important
part during the Regency of Queen Maria Cristina, who first took him
to the house of the Tachers. When Narvaez paid a second visit to the
palace on the Boulevard Courcelles, he found that nobody was at
home; and he was waiting in the drawing-room for the return of the
lady of the house, when the daughter came in, looking beautiful in a
white dress, but with her face tied up.
“Are you ill?” asked the General, with concern.