. Wild Spain ... records of sport with rifle, rod, and gun, natural history and exploration . arm to the traveller, a restfulrefreshing draught of Icdssez /aire, and a glimpse into along-past epoch that can hardly be enjoyed elsewherein Europe. Here of old fierce fights were fought forthis rich prize in soil and climate ; its fabled fertilityattracting hither in turn the legions of Rome, the Goths,and, last, the Moorish hordes, to conquer and to hold forseven hundred years. The Province of Andalucia with its corn-plains and vine- 8 WILD SPAIN. yards, orange and olive-groves, barren wastes and
. Wild Spain ... records of sport with rifle, rod, and gun, natural history and exploration . arm to the traveller, a restfulrefreshing draught of Icdssez /aire, and a glimpse into along-past epoch that can hardly be enjoyed elsewherein Europe. Here of old fierce fights were fought forthis rich prize in soil and climate ; its fabled fertilityattracting hither in turn the legions of Rome, the Goths,and, last, the Moorish hordes, to conquer and to hold forseven hundred years. The Province of Andalucia with its corn-plains and vine- 8 WILD SPAIN. yards, orange and olive-groves, barren wastes and lonelymarismas, covers a stretch of three hundred miles fromeast to west, and half that extent in depth ; and is bounded—save on the Atlantic front^by an unbroken circle ofsierras. Commencing at Tarifa on the south, the moun-tain-barrier is carried past Gibraltar and Malaga to theSierra Nevada, whose snow-clad summits reach 12,000feet; and beyond, on the east, by the Almerian in the lap of this long southern range lies thenarrow belt of Africa in Europe, above alluded to,. FAIR SEVILLANAS. where, secured from northern winds and facing the blueMediterranean, grow even cotton and the sugar-cane; whilethe date-palm, algarroho or carob-tree, the banana, quince,citron, lemon, and pomegranate, with other sub-tropicalplants, flourish in this Spanish Eiviera. Then, from theeasternmost point of the province, the Sagres Mountainscontinue the rock-barrier to the point where the SierraMorena separates the sunny life of Andalucia from thebarrenness of La Mancha and primitive grim and almost unbroken solitudes of the Sierra ANDALUCIA. 9 Morena form the entire northern boundary, continued by theSierra de Aroche to the frontier of Portugal, and thence, bya lesser chain, to the Atlantic once more. The short coast-line between Trafalgar and Huelva thus forms, as it were,the only opening to this favoured land, secure in a moun-tain-setting—the gem for ^Yhich c
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, bookidwildspainrecords00chapric
