Читать книгу Galicia, the Switzerland of Spain - Annette M. B. Meakin - Страница 5

Table of Contents

Boundaries of Galicia—Spurs of the Pyrenees—The Rias—Exuberant vegetation—Herds of cattle—Rivers—The “River of Oblivion”—The Miño and the Sil—Sword-making—Ptolemy—The first map—France and geographical literature—The finest harbours in Europe—Columbus and Galicia—Rich in relics of the past

GALICIA is bounded on the north by the Bay of Biscay, on the south by Portugal, and on the east by the provinces of Asturias and Leon. This province is the most westerly and at the same time the most northerly part of Spain, and her cape—Finisterre—was once the uttermost part of the Roman Empire. It was from the Romans that Finisterre received its name, “the End of the Earth.” The Pyrenees, which extend along the whole of northern Spain, have their last ramifications in Galicia, meeting the Atlantic Ocean at Cape Finisterre.[28] If we place our hand flat upon a table with palm downward and fingers and thumb outstretched, the thumb pointing northwards and the middle finger due west, we have before us a rough idea of the configuration of Galicia. The back of the hand, the highest part, represents the mountains of moderate altitude which form the centre of the province, while the outstretched thumb and fingers represent the ridges into which these mountains divide as the Atlantic Ocean is approached. The waters of the Ocean run inland between each finger of the Pyrenees, forming a wide and beautiful Ria, such as in Scotland we should call a loch, and in Norway a fjord. But here the similitude to the human hand ends, for the beautiful bends and curves of the rias, their snake-like insinuations landward among the mountain slopes, bear no likeness to the straight lines of the human finger. The four principal inlets are called Rias bajas; they are the Ria de Muros, the Ria de Arosa, the Ria de Pontevedra, and the Ria de Vigo. The seacoast formed by these Rias and the smaller inlets to the north of them is so dangerous to ships that sailors call it “the coast of death.” Many an English vessel has been lost on that coast—indeed, two ships from our shores met with disaster there in the year 1907. But a reform which has long been demanded by England seems at last about to be carried out. Señor Besada, Minister of Public Works, and one of the most eminent men in the Conservative party, is, we are told, about to give instructions for the provision of luminous buoys and fog-signals at the points of danger. A Commission of Engineers has already been nominated to study the question. It is here that the furious waves, working like yeast, break against the half-hidden rocks, and, rising to a stupendous height, swoop down upon them with thundering noise even in the most smiling weather. It is here that corpses of unfortunate fishermen are so constantly washed ashore that the local papers announce such events almost without comment. It is truly most appropriate that San Telmo, the patron saint of all Spaniards who go down to the sea in ships, should have had his birthplace in Galicia,[29] Spain’s breakwater against the Atlantic.[30]

The last outposts of the Pyrenees advance a considerable distance into the sea. The Atlantic Ocean alone checks the spread of “the great dorsal chain which comes down from Tartary and Asia,”[31] whose highest peak within the boundaries of Galicia is the peak of Guina, in the Sierra de Ancares, which is only a little over two thousand metres high:[32] many winters pass without its once becoming covered with snow. A glance at the map of Galicia will show the reader that this province is entirely composed of alternating peaks, hills, and valleys. It has often been called on this account “the Switzerland of Spain.” The rock of which the mountains and boulders are formed is almost entirely of granite. In fact, all the higher levels of the province of Pontevedra are so covered with granite that it is impossible to tell what other formation this stone has replaced. The rocky soil possesses all the ingredients most favourable to rich vegetation. Galicia has many different climates, resulting from the varied heights of the different zones above sea-level. The differences in temperature and in the humidity of the air are very considerable. Central Galicia is in the same latitude as Russian Turkestan, as part of Albania, and as Pennsylvania, but her climate is infinitely more humid than that of these countries. Heavy and continuous rains soak through the earth and replenish the innumerable mountain springs which are the great cause of Galicia’s wonderful fertility; the springs, themselves perennial, feed in their turn the countless streamlets, each of which is again a fresh centre of evaporation. The vigorous vegetation which responds to these extremely favourable conditions helps to preserve, by the cool moisture of its rich and abundant foliage, the dampness of the atmosphere, and to the reunion of these three causes may be traced the remarkable humidity of the province.

The vegetation varies with the height; wheat, maize, and rye thrive in the basins of the valleys and in all the spots on a level with the sea. The peasants raise two crops a year on the same ground, but many writers who have studied the question say that these double harvests often result in more harm than good—the blind ambition of the ignorant peasants leading them to dry their rye too soon in their hurry to get the maize planted.

Right down to the seashore the ground is remarkable for its spontaneous vegetation, which is in itself a cause of the richness of the soil. Every kind of fruit tree known to Europe thrives upon the lower slopes of the ever-verdant valleys, the fruit upon the higher slopes ripening twenty days later than that upon the sea-level. Woods of oak and chestnut cover the hillsides, and pines dominate the loftiest crags of the mountain peaks. Within a radius of ten miles my eyes have rested upon pine-clad mountain scenery wild and beautiful as that of Norway, and upon a riviera of vegetation like that of Mentone, embracing the orange, the cactus, the olive, the fig, and even the lemon tree laden with its ripening fruit. The sides of the narrow and undulating valleys are often entirely vine-clad; the steeper slopes, cut into terraces, are planted with potatoes, cabbages, or bristle-pointed oats. Sometimes a mountain-side appears as if it were provided with a majestic flight of verdant steps cut in its side from base to summit.

High up among the mountains the peasants breed large herds of cattle, which graze upon the fertile plains and slake their thirst in the crystal water of the running brooks. “As one travels through Galicia,” wrote a monk of Osera in the seventeenth century, “one experiences at every mile—nay, at every step, let me say—a change of air, a change of sky, and a change of scene sufficient to create the impression that one has entered another country. Every kind of fruit, every kind of vegetable will thrive in Galicia; and if any particular kind is wanting, its absence must not be put down to any fault of the soil and climate, but to the laziness of the inhabitants in failing to cultivate it. It is true that one country may excel another in the quality of one particular fruit, but it is nevertheless certain that, not only in all Spain, but, without any exaggeration, in all Europe, there is not a province that equals Galicia in the fertility of its soil.” I may add that all who have studied the subject from that day to this have added their testimony to that of this monk of Osera as to the extraordinary capabilities of the Gallegan soil.

The principal rivers of Galicia have kept the names given to them by the ancients—because the land through which they flow was never, like the rest of Spain, conquered by the Moors. Galicia is the best-watered territory in the Peninsula. The river Limia, known to the ancients as Lethes, or Oblivionis, was mentioned by Pliny as running between the Miño and the Duero, and Silius Italicus said of it—