It Was Quite Impossible To Proceed To Famagousta With The Vans, And
There Was No Object In Courting Their Destruction By A Desperate Advance
At All Hazards, As We Should Have In Any Case Been Obliged Eventually To
Renew The Difficulty When Retracing Our Route.
I therefore cantered in
upon my mule, with the guide who always lost his way, Hadji Christo.
This man
Was a great ruffian, and had laws existed for the prevention of
cruelty to animals, I would have prosecuted him; nominally he had the
charge of the mule and two ponies, but he illtreated these poor animals,
and the donkeys also, in a disgraceful manner. However, I had no other
guide, and although I knew him to be in partnership with some
Will-o'-the-wisp, I was obliged to follow him. It was an easy course for
saddle-animals, as the cathedral of Famagousta formed the prominent
point; therefore a steeple-chase might have been the direct
cross-country way. There was no change in the usual features of the
barren landscape. We kept upon the high ground on the right, looking
down upon the dreary flat for twenty miles to our left. Occasionally we
passed villages, all of which were mere copies of each other in filth
and squalor. The dogs barked and snapped ineffectually at our heels as
we cantered through; the civil and ever-courteous people turned out and
salaamed; and we quickly accomplished the twelve miles and approached
the walls of Famagousta. Nothing that I saw in Cyprus has impressed me
so much as the site of this powerful fortress and once important city. I
lunched with Captain Inglis, who as chief commissioner of the district,
most kindly received me, and I rode home afterwards; my guide, Hadji
Christo, in spite of my assurances that he had mistaken the route,
persisted that there were many, and not one; and after plunging into
muddy marshes instead of keeping to the high ground, we were completely
lost near sundown, when I happily extricated myself from the difficulty
by insisting upon his riding behind and leaving me alone to find the
track. We arrived at nightfall, after making eighteen miles out of
twelve--a profitable enterprise hardly appreciated by our tired animals.
Famagousta is too important for a cursory description; I shall therefore
reserve it for a future chapter, when on our return from the Carpas
district we pass some days in its immediate neighbourhood.
CHAPTER V.
START FOR THE CARPAS.
I determined to leave my two vans in charge of the head-man of Kuklia,
as the drivers declared it would be impossible to proceed into the
roadless Carpas with any wheeled conveyance heavier than the native
two-wheeled cart. They had accordingly entered into a contract to supply
me with vehicles which the man of ability Theodori assured me could
travel to the extreme eastern limit of the island, Cape St. Andrea, "as
he had been there himself, and knew the way." Georgi, who knew nothing
of this portion of the country, believed all that Theodori said, and did
his bidding. Having lightened the loads by leaving all that was not
absolutely necessary safely locked within the vans, we started on 1st
March with camels, in addition to two native carts, taking the route
direct east, across the extensive flat which at this time was dry and
hard. There was nothing of interest in the day's march; the travelling
was easy along the hardened level surface; we had a clear view of the
cathedral and higher forts of Famagousta, and we passed near the ruins
of Salamis, easily distinguishing the solitary pillars that had
supported the ancient aqueduct which led the water from distant Kythrea.
Although everything was thoroughly dried up, it was easy to imagine the
effect of an inundation of the Pedias river, which had formed this delta
of alluvium, precisely as the Nile on a more extensive scale has
produced the Delta of Egypt. There were a few wretched villages upon the
flat, which were necessarily on the poorest scale, as they existed at
the mercy of a sudden inundation. The unhealthiness of this locality
must be extreme during wet weather, as it is only suitable to the
constitutions of frogs and ducks. Upon arrival at higher ground on the
opposite side of the plain I looked back upon the agueish area over
which we had passed, and I had little doubt of the great engineering
necessity that must be the first step to a sanitary reform in this
pestilential neighbourhood.
As the river Pedias is a mere wayward torrent that NEVER flows as a
permanent stream, but only comes down in impulsive rushes from the
mountains during heavy rains, it has no power to cleanse its original
bed, such as would result from a constant and clear current; but, on the
contrary, the heavy floods from the upper country, being the result of a
sudden rainfall, are surcharged with earth washed down from the higher
ground and thickly held in solution. This vast mass of soil, which adds
a corresponding weight to each gallon of water, is carried forward
according to the velocity of the stream, and is ready to deposit upon
the instant that the propelling power shall be withdrawn. So long as the
river is confined between narrow banks, the high rate of the current is
sufficient to force forward the thickened and heavy fluid; but the
instant that the banks are over-topped and the river expands over an
increased area, the rapidity is reduced, and the water, no longer able
to contain the earth in solution, deposits alluvium, and produces a
delta, which must necessarily increase upon every future inundation. The
result must end either in forming a bar at the mouth of the river, or
(as in the Pedias) in THE TOTAL SILTING OF THE EMBOUCHURE, which
extinguishes all traces of a broad channel, but leaves a series of deep
marshes scored by innumerable ditches, to be in their turn filled with
mud when the next flood shall extend over the wide surface and increase
the deposit.
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