The Fortunate Isles Part 28

"Under it we are as nothing," Amoras had said reverently, as he stood beneath it, and one felt that had he worn a hat he would have uncovered before the column.

There was a delightfully nerve-soothing effect in the absolute stillness of the caves. Not a sound from the outer world could penetrate these vast recesses.

"All the neighbours are asleep," Amoras replied drily when the Man remarked on the silence.

Though the Caves of Arta are astonishing in their immensity, there is nothing alarming or gruesome about them. It did not occur to anybody to speculate secretly on what would happen if the guide were seized with illness or anything happened to the lights.

Both sets of caves--the Dragon and the Arta--are well worthy a special expedition. If it were possible to see only one I would give the preference to the Caves of Arta. But that is a matter of mere personal taste. I must confess that men seem more impressed by the fantastic marvels concealed in the Dragon Caves.

I had promised to show Senora Rande the English way of serving spinach as a vegetable course. So when we reached the _fonda_, only a quarter of an hour late for lunch, the senora was waiting to hold me to my word.

Fortunately the cooking of spinach is the simplest of culinary devices, and while the fresh green leaves were sinking to a pulp in the earthen pipkin, I had the privilege of watching the senora make one of her excellent omelets--an invaluable lesson, and one that I humbly trust will render impossible my again making such an egregious failure as I did when attempting to cook an omelet at the Hospederia at Miramar.

Being certain of a good driver and good horses, we had engaged Canet to return for us at three o'clock. We were anxious to get a near view of the quaint old town, Capdepera, whose distant appearance had attracted us as we drove to the caves in the morning. And we wished also to visit Cala Retjada, a little fishing village a mile or two farther away, that we had heard was celebrated for its known fish and for its suspected smugglers.

The short drive was full of the life and interest that characterize an agricultural district. About the stone dikes, sloe blossom lay in drifts, looking strangely home-like beside the giant clumps of cactus.

Leaving the carriage when we had reached Capdepera, we walked about briskly, for the wind was fresh, bent on exploration. A peep into the church revealed nothing of special note. Turning away, we climbed a steep street, and found ourselves outside the old gateway leading to the fortified enclosure that in bygone days had evidently been the place of refuge for the citizens when danger threatened.

And of a truth the s.p.a.ce enclosed within these battlemented walls would have afforded shelter to a great community.

To the well-preserved ramparts Nature had added an impregnable defence in the form of a thick growth of cactus. Both without and within the wall their p.r.i.c.kly leaves luxuriated.

From the flat roofs of the watch-towers that surmounted the battlements the watchers must have been able to see to a surprising distance. A white line across the sea revealed the coast of Minorca, twenty miles away. Close by was Cabo de Pera, the eastmost point of the island. With a vigilant guard stationed in these watch-towers no enemy, either from land or sea, could have reached Capdepera before the inhabitants had timely warning to remove themselves and their valuables within the safety of the stronghold.

The old parish church--Our Lady of the Hope--is within the enclosure, close by a modern house that bore signs of occupation. In pockets of hungry soil a little spindly grain grew about the roots of h.o.a.ry fig-trees. While all the fig-trees outside were still naked, one in a sheltered corner already showed bursting leaves and the diminutive knubbly warts that were to swell into fruit. Besides tufts of wild mignonette, henbane reared its downy foliage and evil-smelling creamy blossom.

Seated in the open doorways of the houses, the women of this remote town were making baskets from the dried leaves of the palmetto (garbayous), a dwarf palm-tree that abounds on the mountains of Arta. Some were pleating the split fronds into long strips that others were sewing into the baskets, which besides being largely used in Majorca are exported by ship-loads to France.

The pleasant and cleanly little industry seemed the ruling influence of the town. In the street we pa.s.sed men carrying great numbers of the baskets fitted snugly inside one another. A glimpse into the open door of a warehouse revealed the place close packed from floor to rafters with the baskets. On the way to Cala Retjada we drove past a cart piled high with stock ready for shipment; and in a sheltered cove beyond the fishing village we saw, lying at anchor, the _pailebot_ that was waiting to convey the goods to an over-seas market.

When we reached Cala Retjada the wind was blowing in fresh from the sea, and the boats lay snugly drawn up on the beach of a tiny haven.

A number of small shut-up houses lining the semicircle of the bay showed that the stone-washed sh.o.r.e was a favourite place of summer residence. To the west is the imposing headland of Cape Vermay.

Westwards pine woods clothe the rocky slopes about the sea. Truly a pleasant place to fly to when the interior of the island is hot and relaxing.

The people of the eastern town struck us as being more Moorish in type than those of the more northern or western parts of Majorca. In Cala Retjada, in the person of the handsome bronzed captain of the _pailebot_, we saw and instantly recognized our ideal of a pirate chief--the heroic pirate who treats his enemies n.o.bly. He wore a scarlet nightcap with a gra.s.s-green band, a golden brown velvet suit, an orange c.u.mmerbund, and yellow string-soled shoes. Truly he was a joy to behold.

Daylight was fading when we turned our faces towards Arta; and as we approached the romantically situated town, we pa.s.sed many parties of returning labourers, and many little bands of pretty girls, who had presumably strolled out to meet them, though each s.e.x kept rigorously apart.

It is the rarest thing to see an unmarried man and a girl walking alone in Majorca. The strict system of chaperonage that prevails in the higher cla.s.ses evidently has its prototype in the lower also, for the maidens walked with twined arms--like some Maeterlinck chorus--and the men, as far as we could judge, confined their attentions to admiring glances.

We had heard that the remains of a Phoenician village still existed in an ancient forest of ilex not far from Arta. When we questioned the senora next morning, as she poured out the coffee, regarding its whereabouts, she promptly suggested that her husband would take us there. So when we sallied forth it was in company with Senor Rande and the _perro de Rande_--a fine specimen of the ancient hunting dogs that are still prevalent in the island. It amused us to see him leap high into the air to sight his prey.

The way, though it covered a bare half mile, was devious, and without a.s.sistance would have been difficult to find. But it ended in something far more wonderful than we had been led to antic.i.p.ate.

Near the summit of a gentle mound that was covered with ilex and low-growing scrub we found ourselves confronted by a wall built of vast, roughly hewn blocks of stone. Before us was an open portal, formed of two huge blocks supporting a third stone, one end of which was pierced by an orifice that had two openings towards the sky.

Within this gateway were the tumbled remains of a city that had been encircled by walls constructed of great single blocks of stone--a city so old that all tradition of its builders was lost. We had thought the Roman remains at Alcudia and Pollensa as of surpa.s.sing antiquity. Here was evidence of an occupation far older still.

An eminence in the centre of the enclosure revealed the site of the inevitable, and at that date indispensable, watch-tower. From its top, though now lowered by the pa.s.sing of centuries and overgrown with herbage, we saw through the gaps in the trees beyond how comprehensive a view the watchers had commanded of the surrounding country.

The top of the mound on which we stood had been hollowed out, and Senor Rande remarked that children came up from Arta to dig for treasures.

"Do they find any?" we asked innocently.

Raising his forefinger, the senor shook it before his face in the gesture we had grown to think characteristically Majorcan.

"_Nada!_" he made laconic reply.

Devil's tomatoes, heavy with golden fruit, and beautiful large-blossomed lavender periwinkle grew in great profusion about the devastated homes of the vanished people. And it seemed a curious coincidence to remember that the last periwinkles I had seen were those growing about the base of the megalithic monuments in Minorca.

One wonders what connection this starry-eyed flower could have had with these prehistoric races.

I had received the information that begonias grew wild in Majorca, with the mental reservation natural to a native of a less gracious climate. So it was a pleasant surprise to recognize a leaf or two of their distinctive marled foliage thrust out from between the heaped stones of the ruined Phoenician village.

Our return journey from Arta was not worthy to rank in our memories with our triumphal progress thither. We had a special conveyance, but as Canet was already in Manacor, having driven the diligence that left Arta at three o'clock that morning, he could not act as our charioteer, and his employer, who drove us, set the pace sedately.

The wind was high, dust was more than a possibility, and the box seat held no attractions. So we sat inside and yawned a little as the kilometros crept slowly past.

In the little gra.s.s-grown station at Manacor the afternoon crowd was beginning to gather. And in the station yard the diligences for Arta, for Capdepera, for San Lorenzo, were drawn up prepared to start as soon as the train had arrived and their pa.s.sengers had climbed into their seats.

We had taken our places in one of the empty carriages that were standing ready to be attached to the train for Palma, when the smiling sun-tanned face of Canet appeared at the window. He had come to bid us good-speed, and remained to share our tea, and to puzzle over the powers of the Thermos bottle. Though he politely praised the tea, I am convinced that he secretly scorned the bad taste of the "Ingleses" who chose to drink so uninteresting a decoction in a land overflowing with good red wine.

Our little excursion, undertaken though it had been with something of reluctance, had proved like others a charming one, and one whose every moment had been full of new interests.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Palm-Sunday at Soller]

XXI

AMONG THE HILLS

March was more than half over; we had already reluctantly begun to measure our stay in the Fortunate Isles by weeks instead of months when we drove to Soller to spend a few days with an English friend, who, with all the world to choose from, elects to make her home at Soller.

When we left Soller on our previous visit in early December, darkness had fallen long before we reached Palma, so the first half of this return journey was new to us. And as the day was beautiful, we sat luxuriously back in the open carriage and enjoyed it to the full. The shower that had fallen had greatly refreshed the land, and though more rain was eagerly hoped for, the almond-trees were heavy in leaf.a.ge and thickly ruched with the green-velvet casings of the embryonic fruit.

During the winter we had noticed few wild birds. Now, amongst the olive-trees that lined the highway as we approached the rising ground, many were flying. A brightly plumaged bird with a crested head crossed our path like a flash of gold, and disappeared among the trees. It was the hoo-poo, the typical Balearic bird, known locally as the _pu-put_.

The highway between Palma and Valldemosa pa.s.ses through a picturesque gulch. The road between Palma and Soller climbs a considerable mountain, up whose steep sides the native makers of roads--surely the most ingenious in the world--have carried the path in a series of amazing zigzags, so that the view of the traveller varies incessantly. As we mounted higher and ma.s.sive crags rose about us, we sometimes stopped the carriage to look down over the vast orchard that covers the plain, to where the far distant spires of Palma Cathedral showed against the sea.

As our alt.i.tude increased the air became colder. The wind that met us at the top was almost keen, and we were glad to rattle down the farther side of the hill up which we had climbed so slowly.

A few turns down the zigzag, a fine old cross, its carvings gnawed by the corroding tooth of time, stands overlooking the valley and the tawny-roofed houses of Soller, as they lie surrounded by their orange gardens. A poor cottage was hard by, and while we paused to let the Man make a rapid sketch, two children, a boy and girl, crept nearer and nearer, until at last they grouped themselves in conventional att.i.tudes at the foot of the cross. It did not require words to tell us that they must have posed in the foreground of many photographs of the same subject.

At the Hotel Marina, where our friend was staying, three good things awaited us--a gracious welcome, a glorious fire of almond sh.e.l.ls, and a daintily spread tea-table.

In the evening we went to Son Angelats, a beautiful "possession"