I Shall Say More Upon This Important Subject When We
Arrive Among The Last Remaining Forests Of The Troodos Mountains.
We rode onwards, always through the same wilderness of old tree-stems
hacked, and young trees that would be
Hacked; at length we saw on a
cleared space in the distance what I imagined to be a long brown rock
lying upon the surface; but upon riding out of the path to examine this
object I found it was a splendid trunk of a pine-tree more that two feet
in diameter. Why this had been spared for so many years I cannot say,
but its size suggested reflections upon the original forests that must
have covered the surface and have ornamented the once beautiful island
of Cyprus; now denuded, and shorn of every natural attraction.
I again became angry; visions of the past primaeval forests appeared
before me, all of which had been destroyed: and as formerly we hung a
man in England for cutting an oak sapling, I thought that the same cure
for timber-destroying propensities might save the few remaining forests
in this island. While indulging in this strain of unphilanthropic
thought we overtook another throng of wood-laden donkeys and their
proprietors: again they smiled, courteously salaamed, and vacated the
path for us, little knowing what my inward thoughts had been. Of course
I smiled, salaamed as courteously in return, and forgave them at once;
and we proceeded on our way condemning Turkish rule, the impecuniosity
of our own government, the miserable conditions of our present
occupation, which rendered Cyprus neither fish, flesh, nor fowl, and
thus by degrees I lashed myself into the worst possible frame of mind,
until . . . we overtook another throng of polite donkeys and their
proprietors, who salaamed and got out of our way. Upon suddenly emerging
from the forest upon the edge of a steep slope, we looked down upon the
barren sand-coloured plain of Messaria. Our guide Iiani, who had been
asleep and awake for at least eight miles, suddenly burst out into a
ditty, and explained that a village in the plain below was Morphu, the
home of his wife and family.
Even from this elevated point of view Morphu looked a long way off. The
sleepy Iiani was sufficiently wide awake to steer for his wife, and we
had made a long march already. I doubted the possibility of the loaded
camels ascending the steep slope, which had severely tried our mules,
and I felt sure that liani's old camel would either knock up or tumble
down with his load, should he attempt the ascent. It was of no use to
reflect, and as Morphu lay before us in the now barren and sun-smitten
plain, we touched our animals with the spur and pressed on. Descending
for some miles, we passed a garden of olives, that must have been
upwards of a thousand years old, upon our right; and still inclining
downwards, through ground cultivated with cereals completely withered by
the drought, we at length arrived at the broad but perfectly dry bed of
the river.
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