CLIMATE AND PRODUCTIONS.
Spain may be roughly divided into five climates: (1) that of the north
and of the Pyrenees, where rain is abundant; (2) the west or Atlantic
climate, including Portugal; (3) the north-east or Mediterranean; (4)
the east and south, or African climate; and (5) lastly, the climate of
the great Central Plateau, or the Continental. All these are well
marked, and differ greatly in their temperature, in elevation, in
exposure, in rainfall, and in prevailing winds. To speak of an average
temperature, or of an average rainfall in Spain, is only to mislead. The
temperature of the south and south-east is higher than that of the
opposite coast of Africa, while the winters in Castile recall those of
Scandinavia in their bitterness. In some of the Asturian valleys there
is, perhaps, the heaviest rainfall in Europe; while the lower valley of
the Ebro is almost a desert, from want of rain; and in parts of Valencia
and Murcia, and even in Andalusia, not a drop will fall for years; yet
at times these provinces, and their driest portions, are visited--as in
1802, 1879, and 1881--by overwhelming and destructive floods. To strike
an average, then, even for the same spot, through several years, is
often merely deceptive.
We have remarked above on the similarity of the conformation of the
western coasts of Galicia to those of Norway, Scotland, and Ireland.
They partake also of the same Atlantic character in their climate and
productions. Galicia and the Asturias are essentially grazing countries;
and from the Galician ports, up to 1878, about 20,000 head of fatted
cattle were annually sent to England. Except in the more sheltered
valleys, where the productions of a warmer clime will flourish, the
native flora is not unlike that of the milder parts of Ireland and of
Devonshire. The average temperature of Santiago is about 55 deg. Fahr., with
a maximum of 95 deg., and a minimum of 28 deg.; Oviedo is given as 54 deg. average,
maximum 80 deg., and minimum 24 deg.; while the rainfall of the former is from
58 to 68 inches, and that of the latter varies from 38 to 50 in ordinary
years, but in 1858 it attained 80 inches. Proceeding eastward we meet
the northern or Pyrenean climate, where the rainfall is not so great,
and, except in the immediate vicinity of the highest mountains, lessens
gradually as we either go eastward or descend into the plains. The
moisture is condensed and wrung out of the clouds brought by the watery
western winds, and precipitated on the mountains of the west and north.
From the Picos de Europa, in the province of Santander, which may be
considered as the meeting-point of the two climates, the waters descend
on the one side by the Ebro to the Mediterranean, by the Pisuerga to the
Douro and the Atlantic, and by the shorter northern streams to the Bay
of Biscay. In the valley of the Cabuervega (Santander) the rainfall is
57-1/2 inches. Passing eastward we find Bilbao and San Sebastian, with
an average temperature of 56 deg. and 55 deg., a maximum of 93 deg., and minimum
23 deg., while the rainfall has diminished from 55 to 48 inches. At Vergara,
more inland, it is 52. At Huesca, in Aragon, notwithstanding its
proximity to the mountains, the rainfall is only 25 inches; at Balaguer,
in Catalonia, only 15-1/2. At Saragossa the climate becomes more
extreme; the average is 60 deg., the maximum 96 deg., and the minimum 20 deg., while
the rainfall descends to 14 inches. The equalizing influence of the
neighbourhood of the sea is felt in the Mediterranean climate at
Barcelona; for while the average is 63 deg., the maximum is only 88 deg., and
the minimum 32 deg., and the rainfall ascends to 24 inches. The difference
is still more marked if we compare the extreme oscillation between the
maximum and minimum temperatures. At Saragossa this is from 120 deg. to
130 deg.; at Barcelona from 90 deg. to 100 deg. Fahr.
The productions of this northern zone vary greatly according to
elevation and exposition. Those of the Basque Provinces still belong to
the north temperate zone climate--cattle, corn, and cider, as well as
wine. The olive, and the mulberry for silk, are almost unknown; but
maize is largely grown. As we approach Catalonia these products give way
to those of the Mediterranean region of Provence and of the Riviera--the
olive, the grape, the mulberry. A powerful red wine is made on the lower
southern spurs of the Pyrenees and of the Cantabrian Mountains, in the
Riojas, in Navarre, and in Aragon. Much of it would be excellent if more
attention were paid to the preparation, and especially to the conditions
of transport. Great quantities are at present exported to France by sea
from Bilbao and San Sebastian, and also by rail, for the purpose of
mixing with the thinner and poorer clarets of Bordeaux, to fit them for
the taste and market of England. In Catalonia the wine improves, and is
less used for mixing. The chief kinds are a red wine, like Rousillon,
and sweet, luscious wines, Rancio, somewhat like Muscat or Malaga. Of
late the manufacture of effervescing wines like champagne has been
carried on with considerable success. The wine made in Catalonia amounts
to one-fifth of the whole produce of Spain. Already the orange and the
palm appear.
Proceeding southwards from Catalonia, we gradually advance into the
south-eastern and southern climate of Spain, a climate which is rather
African than European in its character, and both whose products and
dryness have more relation to the African continent than to that of the
rest of Europe. It is here that the date-palm ripens--which it does not
on the opposite coast of Algeria--and the camel breeds, and can be used
as a beast of burden equally as in Egypt and the East. Sheltered by the
mountain ranges to the east and north from the cold winds which sweep
the plateau of Castile, exposed by the slope of the country to the full
influence of the southern sun and its powerful evaporation, the
characteristics of the climate are warmth and dryness, while the
vicinity of the Mediterranean partly tempers the extreme range of heat
and cold which might be found in lands more remote from the sea. Thus
the average temperature of Valencia is 65 deg., its maximum 102 deg., its
minimum 41 deg., and extreme range 100 deg.. Alicante, still further south, has
an average of 66 deg., a maximum of 100 deg., and a minimum of 35 deg.. The average
rainfall at Valencia is stated at 17, and that of Alicante at 18 inches;
but, as remarked above, in this south-eastern district of Spain averages
of rainfall are quite deceptive. In some years the quantity marked is
only a very few inches, 3 or 6, over the whole district, and there are
considerable portions where rain does not fall for years. The country
is rendered fertile and productive, not by its rains, but by irrigation
from the rivers, fed by the winter snows on the mountains which border
the great plateau. At times, however, as in 1802 and 1879, storms of
rain descend on the high lands of Murcia and the eastern sierras, and
floods rush down, sweeping away dams which have stood for centuries,
washing away towns and villages, and spreading destruction far and wide.
To compute the rainfall of such floods into an average is only to play
with figures. Murcia has an average temperature of 64 deg., maximum 112 deg.,
minimum 24 deg., and an extreme range of 120 deg.. The rainfall averages about
12-1/2 inches on the coast, but varies greatly; at Albacete it is said
to average 13 inches. The directly southern coast, from the Cabo de Gata
to Gibraltar, has a milder and more equable climate than that of the
south-eastern coast; but in the inland valley of the Guadalquiver the
range is more extreme, both for heat and cold. The dryness in the
eastern district still continues from Cartagena to Almeria; the rainfall
is said to be only 12 inches. At Malaga, while the average temperature
is 66 deg., about the same as that at Valencia and Alicante, the maximum is
said to be only 78 deg., and the minimum 53 deg.. At Motril, between Malaga and
Almeria, the maximum is 77 deg., and the minimum 52 deg.. In Seville on the
other hand, the average is 68 deg., with a maximum Of 118 deg., and a minimum of
30 deg.. Cordova, somewhat colder, has a maximum of 93 deg., and a minimum of
27 deg.. The rainfall is also more moderate at Malaga, 15-1/2 inches, and 23
at Seville. Granada, in its upland but sheltered valley, at an elevation
of 2681 feet, defended from the east and south by the snowy range of the
Sierra Nevada, and by the mountains of Granada to the north, has still
an average of 65 deg., with a maximum of 97 deg., and a minimum of 42 deg.. The
rainfall varies considerably in different years, and various geographers
give its average as 23-1/2 33-1/2, and the latest (Reclus) 48-1/2. Cadiz
has an Atlantic climate, which in temperature and greater rainfall, 37
inches, closely approximates to that of Madeira. Moving westward it
decreases, at Gibraltar, 34-1/2, San Fernando, 27; while at Huelva and
Tarifa, where the moisture of the north-west gales is intercepted by the
Portuguese mountains, it descends to 24-1/2. We have now only to treat
of the climate of the great central elevation, the plateau, which ranges
at an average height of some 2000 feet above the sea. Thus, Madrid is
2148, Segovia 2299, Burgos 2873, Soria 3504, and the Escorial, 3683 feet
above the sea-level. But even these altitudes do not wholly account for
the rigour of the climate in the latitude of Naples, Rome, and
Constantinople. We have seen how excellent is the climate of Granada at
a nearly equal elevation, only three degrees further south. The extremes
of heat and cold felt at Valladolid and Madrid are due more to the
uncovered mountain ranges to the north, the treeless, waterless plains,
over which the wind sweeps unchecked, than to mere elevation. The want
of rain is greatly owing to the ranges of mountains parallel to the
frontier and to the Atlantic in Portugal, which condense and wring all
the moisture from the rain-clouds of the Atlantic, and distribute it
almost wholly on the western slope. Thus at Lisbon the fall is 29, at
Coimbra 35, at Oporto 63, in the mountains of Beira and Tras os Montes
from 68 to 100 inches; while on the eastern slope, at Salamanca it is 9,
Valladolid 12, at Badajoz 12-1/2, Ciudad Real 14. From the bare granite
range of the Guadarrama steals down the treacherous icy wind so fatal in
Madrid--not sufficiently strong to extinguish a candle, but quite enough
to destroy human life. It is the dislike of the Castilian peasant to
trees, which would overshadow so much of his small property, the
destruction of the mountain forests, and the want of good agriculture,
which has embittered the climate of these plateaux. Were the hill-sides
clothed with wood, the country dotted with farms, the wide and bare
plains covered throughout the year with varied agricultural produce, the
climate would soon be modified and become sensibly warmer, and no
longer, as it at present is, an obstacle to civilization and to
improvement. In spite of all neglect these plains grow some of the
finest wheat in Europe, and the lower mountain ranges supply pasture in
the summer for the immense flocks which return to winter in the plains
of Estremadura. The average temperature of Madrid is 59 deg., its maximum
104 deg. to 107 deg., and its minimum only 7 deg.. That of Salamanca is said to be
57 deg., with a maximum of 97 deg., and a minimum of 12 deg.. The average rainfall
of Madrid is only from 9 to 14 inches, that of Salamanca 9, while Soria,
nearer to the mountains, in some years reaches 25 inches.
From the above sketch of the climate the reader will expect to find the
productions vary greatly in the different districts. The north and
north-west are the lands of cattle and of pasture. In Galicia and in the
Asturias the products are almost like those of the warmer parts of the
south-west of England and of Ireland, save that in the more sheltered
valleys the orange, citron, and pomegranate flourish; a palm is even now
and then to be seen; and the wine, especially on the confines of
Portugal, is excellent, and needs only more care in preparation to be a
rival to the famous Port of the neighbouring country. In the eighteenth
century, that of Ribadavia was considered to be the finest wine in all
Spain. Maize, too, is freely grown; but on account of their extreme
poverty, rye and spelt often replace both it and wheat as food for the
peasantry. The upland plateaux afford excellent pasture, especially for
cattle and horses; the hardy and sure-footed hacks of Galicia and the
Asturias are celebrated. The mountains here are often clothed with wood;
oaks of various kinds, and the edible chestnut, and the hazel-nut--of
which over 1000 tons, value 23,000_l._, are annually exported from
Gijon--grow on the lower spurs, giving food to herds of swine; beech,
and pine, and fir appear as we approach the tops. In the lower woods the
arbutus especially flourishes, and the young wild boars in autumn are
said to become half stupefied with its narcotic berries. As we proceed
eastward from Galicia to the Asturias the climate becomes sensibly
colder--the valleys face the north instead of the west; the orange is
less known, the mulberry will not flourish sufficiently well to pay for
silk cultivation, the olive will not grow, and the cork does not pay for
cultivation; the wines lose somewhat of their strength and lusciousness;
and cider, made from the excellent apples of the country, rivals the
juice of the grape in popularity. The mountains are covered with heath,
and fern, and furze, but the aromatic plants are fewer than in Galicia.
This description applies to the northern slope of the Cantabrian chain
and to the rolling hills and plateaux of the Basque provinces; but the
southern slopes of the chain, towards the Ebro, are again a land of vine
and olive, and of maize, which is everywhere the staple. In the Basque
provinces the plough is replaced by the ancient "laya," an instrument
as old, at least, as Roman times. It is a heavy two-pronged steel or
iron fork, with prongs one and a half to two feet long. A strong man
will work two of them at once, one in each hand, driving them into the
ground to their full depth, then with a backward strain turning up the
deep soil. Usually, four or five men work together, and raise their
arms, plunge the fork downwards, and heave, in perfect time. The
cultivation thus effected is excellent, but the expenditure of labour is
immense The productions do not vary greatly along the slopes of the
Pyrenees from those above described until we reach Catalonia; but in the
lower valley of the Ebro, where rain is rare, in the Bardenas reales of
Navarre, and in the monegros, or despoblados of Aragon, we meet with a
phenomenon only too frequent in Spain--tracts of almost utter
barrenness. The Bardenas reales are low spurs of the Pyrenees, with
table-lands, bluffs, and deep gorges, and these could scarcely be
brought under cultivation; but the "despoblados" (dispeopled lands) of
Aragon might be irrigated, either by the Ebro or by its tributaries, if
the water of the canal of Charles V. were but economically applied. The
sterility of some parts seems to have been the slow result of an
oppressive land tenure; for as Don Vicente de la Fuente has remarked,
the lands which belonged to the ancient senors (the feudal lords) lie
barren, while the lands of the comunidades, the free districts, are
still fertile. In treating, of the cultivation and the products of
eastern and southern Spain two facts become evident at once--how many of
the products are exotic, and how much of the cultivation is still
Arabian. We shall see in another chapter how deep a mark the Moor or
Arab has left on the population and toponymy of Spain; and the
agriculture of the greater part of central and southern Spain is still
Arabian. The methods of the Spanish peasant are almost all Arabian;
often he uses the Arabian hoe in preference to the Roman plough. The
_noria_, or water-wheel; the _sha'doof_, or swipe, the pole and bucket
for lifting water; the huge dams and reservoirs, the canals and ditches
(_acequias_), the regulations for the fair distribution of the
water,--all these, and even the very superstitions as to times of
sowing, the rotation of crops, the treatment of his animals--for all
these the Spanish peasant of the South is indebted to the Moors. The
treatise of Abu Zaccaria, with its traditions of Nabathean agriculture,
is still one of the manuals of agriculture in Spain. It is the Moors,
too, who first made the winter gardens in the sands near San Lucarde
Barameda, at the mouth of the Guadalquiver, and which supply Cadiz and
Seville with the earliest and latest vegetables. The Roman, with his
lofty aqueducts, brought water to the towns; but it was the Moor who
gave that blessing to the thirsty soil of the country districts of
Spain. And not only the methods of agriculture, but many of its fruits
and products were introduced by the Arab from the East, and some of
these are now the very staple of Spanish produce. It is they who brought
into Spain the cotton plant, rice, and the sugar-cane; mulberries, both
for fruit and for silk culture; sesame, the caper, the locust bean, the
castor-oil plant, alfalfa (lucerne), the pomegranate, almond, the walnut
and filbert, the chestnut and the ever-green oak, the wild olive, the
jujube, the pistacchio nut, the palm, several kinds of roses, the
wall-flower, with many another garden herb or flower. It was they who
improved the Andalusian steed into one of the most excellent in Europe
for riding, and the strain may still be traced even in the ponies of the
north. But the cultivated vegetation of the south which meets the
stranger's eye is perhaps still more indebted to the Americas.[1] It
needs an effort now to picture what Spanish agriculture and what Spanish
life was before the time of Columbus, when maize, and the potato, and
sweet potato, were unknown; when not a cigar was smoked or cigarette
made, or leaf of tobacco grown in Spain; when only garlic was known, and
those indispensable condiments of every dish, the tomato, and the
pimentos had not yet entered a Spanish kitchen, and chocolate had not
yet been sipped by Spanish ladies; when the hedges were bare of aloes,
and the prickly pear gave the beggar no fruit. And besides these common
gifts, there are the more luxurious ones of pine apples, grenadines (the
fruit of the passion-flower), abocado pears, chirimoyas, guavas,
earth-nuts, bananas, and many others, while the gardens are enriched
with magnolias and passion-flowers, and a wealth of creepers of all
kinds. The Australian eucalypti, also, are highly valued in Spain, both
as a febrifuge and for their prophylactic qualities in prevention of
malaria in marshy ground; and a decoction from their leaves has quite
passed into the popular pharmacopeia.
[1] For the converse of this, the plants and fruits introduced by the
Spaniards into America, see Markham's "Peru," in this series, p. 120.
The most common plant on the sun-dried hills of Valencia and Murcia, the
esparto-grass (_Stipe tenacissima_), after having been long used in
various native manufactures, has since 1856 become an article of
exportation, and an important addition to the wealth of Spain; but the
cultivation of the barilla plant for soda has much decreased. It is from
Valencia that the oranges come which are such favourites in Paris. The
tree is so valuable, both for fruit and flowers, that an acre will
sometimes give 600_l._ worth of produce. The dried raisins and almonds
so familiar in England, so eagerly looked for at Christmas time, and
the green preserved grapes, come from the districts of which we are now
speaking, the coast-lands from Valencia to Almeira and Malaga. The wines
are equally celebrated, from the strong red wines of Benicarlo, near the
frontiers of Catalonia, to the sweet wines of Alicante and of Malaga,
which are preferred by Continental taste to the drier and more fiery
sherries, wines of the Guadalquiver valley, which please the English
palate. Near the coast on the lower grounds, wherever there is
sufficient water, rice is grown; but, on account of the unhealthy
character of the cultivation, its culture is forbidden in the
neighbourhood of towns. Sugar-cane is extending on the southern coast.
In Andalusia alone more than 7000 acres are devoted to this culture, and
the total yield of the sugar-cane in Spain is estimated at nearly 20,000
tons. Palms are grown as an ornament and garden-tree from Barcelona to
Malaga, but in Murcia, and especially at Elche, they are planted for
production. Though the number seems declining, there are still some
40,000 palms together in the neighbourhood of Elche; in the last century
they are said to have numbered from 50,000 to 70,000. It is not for the
fruit alone, the date, but for the leaves (the so-called palm-branches)
that the trees are grown. In the winter these are tied into a close
bundle to exclude the rays of the sun, in order that they may become
white, and they are then exported to Rome and Italy, for use in the
Easter ceremonies of Palm Sunday. Oils and essences, extracted from many
plants and flowers, are also products of this region. The
liquorice-root, and many another flower, or fruit, or root of medicinal
value grows wild on the hills. The slopes of the eastern mountains are
covered with aromatic herbs, thyme, myrtle, box, rosemary,
southern-wood, mint, lavender, marjoram, nearly all the sweet-scented
herbs which were once carefully cultivated in the gardens of our
ancestors, are natives of these hills; and the flocks of goats returning
from their pastures bring the sweet odours into the tainted towns and
villages, and the first draught of milk from them is highly flavoured
thereby. On these treeless hills, and the warmer parts of the higher
plateaux, these aromatic herbs are often the only fuel which the peasant
can employ. The wealth of this portion of the Spanish soil, the variety
and beauty of its products, can be best seen in a visit to a fruit or
flower market in any of the towns of the south and east. The richness of
colour, the size and beauty of form, are amazing to the stranger; but
the quantity and the cheapness, the way in which these fruits and exotic
vegetables enter into the diet of the poor, is that which most
astonishes those from less generous climes. We have not space to
enumerate in detail a tithe of these productions; this must be sought in
more special treatises.
Almost equal in agricultural and garden wealth to that of the
coast-line, and superior to it as regards the culture of the vine, is
the valley of the Guadalquiver. The oranges of Seville (the civil
oranges of our forefathers, the main ingredient of marmalade), sack, and
sherry, are known in every English home of the middle and upper classes.
It is in the valley of the Guadalquiver, from San Lucar de Barameda to
above Cordova, that the finest sherries are produced. From San Lucar
comes the pleasant Manzanilla, the lightest and most wholesome of all
the sherries, but with a peculiar bitter taste and bouquet, like that of
the wild camomile-flower. In the neighbourhood of Jerez de la Frontera
the best sherries are produced, both brown and golden; the Amontillado,
the nutty-flavoured wine so much sought after, comes from Montilla, to
the south of Cordova. Several other kinds are manufactured, and have a
great local reputation. Comparatively very little of these strong and
fiery wines is consumed in Spain. Spaniards take them only as a liqueur,
not as the usual accompaniment of a meal or desert. Sherry, though grown
in Spain, is the foreigner's, and especially the Englishman's wine. The
red Valdepenas, from the northern slope of the Sierra Morena, replaces
it at the Spaniard's table. For the modes of preparation of the various
sherries, we must refer our readers to special treatises; of its
statistics as an article of commerce we shall speak in another chapter.
The first palm-tree introduced into Spain is said to have been planted
near Cordova. The olives of this district are considered the finest in
Spain. Comparatively little of the oil is exported, but the home
consumption is enormous. The cork forests, too, are abundant; their bark
forms an important article of commerce.
We have now only to speak of the great central plateau, the Continental
climate of Spain, and its productions. This is peculiarly the
corn-growing district of Spain, the land of wheat and maize, especially
in the Castiles. Estremadura and Leon are rather pastoral districts. It
is in these provinces that the laws of the _Mesta_, for the protection
of the celebrated merino sheep, ruled supreme, and which, though
modified at the close of the last century, and some of their worst
abuses done away with, were finally repealed only in 1835. By these laws
the sheep and cattle which fed in the winter in the plains of
Estremadura, and in the summer on the mountains of Leon, were privileged
to enter almost any property on their line of march, to feed or to pass
the night there. A space of ninety yards wide was reserved on each side
of the highways for their accommodation; no land, especially no
corn-field, was allowed to be enclosed; and right of forcible entrance
was given to all orchards and vineyards where pasturage might be found.
Wherever the flocks had once fed, the land could not be sold or
alienated to any other purpose. The shepherds who tended these flocks
became almost as savage and ignorant as the beasts they looked after;
their privileges produced in them a contempt and hatred of all kinds of
fixed property, and they were ever trying to extend their oppressive
right at the expense of the more settled and agricultural portion of the
community. Under the influence of these laws Estremadura, which, in the
time of the Romans and Moors had been one of the richest provinces of
Spain, became under their Christian conquerors not only one of the
poorest and most thinly peopled districts, but also a curse and source
of destruction to the rest. Not only were all the evils of the old Roman
"latifundia" reproduced in this mediaeval system, but the locust, which
never breeds in cultivated lands, or where the plough passes, was
enabled to make its home in the wilds and pastures of Estremadura,
whence it periodically sallied out to devastate the fairest and richest
portions of the land. In the years 1754 to 1757 it desolated the whole
of the provinces between Estremadura and the Mediterranean. In 1686 and
the following year it reached the principality of Barcelona, and, in
spite of exorcisms, ravaged the country till there was nothing more to
destroy. The provinces nearer to Estremadura are much more frequent
sufferers, and in recent years (in 1876 the crops in Ciudad Real were
utterly destroyed) a division of the army has been more than once
employed to destroy or to check them on their march. The only plant they
spare is the tomata, which they will not touch. Besides flocks,
Estremadura maintains huge herds of swine, which feed on the sweet
acorns and chestnuts of its woods, and whose flesh is renowned through
Spain. Owing to its situation on the borders of Andalusia, in which
province the Moors retained their powers long after they had lost the
rest of Spain, Estremadura was exposed to their frequent incursions;
every flock and herd was liable to be carried off, every fruit-tree to
be cut down, the farms burnt and crops destroyed; and in their
retaliation the Christian knights were almost as fatal as the Arab
horsemen. The country was never thoroughly peopled after the reconquest,
and the sense of insecurity remained long after the cause of it had been
removed. The laws of the Mesta and the emigration to the Americas (both
Cortes and Pizarro were Extramenos) finished the work of depopulation,
and left the province, as it has since remained, naturally one of the
richest, actually one of the poorest in Spain. The products, besides
those above mentioned, are cork, oak-bark and acorns for tanning,
honey, nuts, and chestnuts.
The bare plains of the Castiles are now the great corn-producing country
of Spain. But they have little or nothing of the beauty and variety of
cultivated land in other countries. There is no succession of crops, no
mixed husbandry, no scattered farm-houses, neither tree nor fence to
break the bare monotony. The hill-sides and mountains are given up to
pasture, the plains to wheat and maize. The husbandmen live in villages,
and ride out on donkeys in early morn to their distant fields, and
return home at night. A sense of insecurity seems still to brood over
the land, as if the peasant dared not trust himself outside the walls of
village or town. Only at harvest-time, in the warm summer and autumn
nights, he camps out among his crops, to thresh them on the spot, and
bring the produce home, a habit which often produces fever and ague.
Year after year the process is repeated; no improvement is ever made; if
rain falls the harvest is plentiful--so plentiful sometimes that the
lazy peasant will not reap his most distant fields, or procure new skins
or barrels for the over-abundant wine, though with the extension of
railways this evil is fast disappearing. There is hardly a greater
contrast than between the habits of the Castilian peasants and those of
the peasant-proprietors in the Basque provinces and in those of north
and north-west. In the Basque provinces the farms are scattered all
over the country, and travellers from other districts of Spain speak of
the whole district as if it were one city. The farm-house stands in the
midst of its grounds, with orchard, garden, trees and fences, meadow and
corn-land round it. To Englishmen this description is almost a matter of
course, and one must read the narrative of travellers from Castile fully
to appreciate the force of the contrast. There is, moreover, no natural
impediment whatever to a similar course of life in many districts of the
Castiles. Barren and dreary as they look, the plains called the "Sierras
de Campos," and some others, are watered by a kind of natural capillary
attraction; dry as the surface appears, water is always to be found at a
few inches below the surface, and the roots of the wheat and other
cereal crops penetrate to it. It is only the mixture of pride and
laziness and ignorance of the Castilian peasant, his senseless disdain
of all improvement, his want of ambition for anything better, that
prevents progress in this part of Spain. He refused to make use of the
machinery invented for him in the last century, nor will he avail
himself of the means of irrigation and the still better machines
provided for him now. Yet there is no agricultural country in which
machinery could be introduced to greater advantage.
Perhaps no better idea can be given of the productions of Spain, and of
the diversity of its climates and fruits, than by comparing those of
Murcia with those of the north-west and the centre. In January the bean
is in flower in Murcia, in April in Madrid; the vine and the wheat
flower in April in Murcia, but not till May or June in the province of
Madrid. The climate of Galicia, with its almost continual rain, and
Murcia with its droughts, are perhaps the most opposite climates of
Spain. The one is a land of pasture and of flax cultivation; its fruits
are the apple, the pear, the peach, strawberries, currants, and nuts of
all kinds; the predominant plant on the hill-sides is the furze, in
Murcia it is the Esparto grass. The fruits there cultivated in the
gardens are exotic, and have almost wholly replaced the indigenous
flora; the "huertas," the gardens or cultivated plains, are there almost
like oases in a desert.
The fauna of Spain--except in one particular, the monkeys (_Macacus
Innuus_) which inhabit the rock of Gibraltar, and which are the only
animals of their kind wild in Europe--does not greatly differ from that
of the rest of Southern Europe. In the highest part of the Pyrenees, in
the Sierra de Credos, and in the Sierra Nevada, the izard or chamois
still exists in considerable numbers. Whether the bouquetin is really
extinct, or still survives in the Spanish Pyrenees, is a disputed point.
In the forests which clothe the lower spurs, roe and fallow deer, wild
goats and wild boars, and in some districts red deer, are still to be
found. The beasts of prey are the bear, the wolf, the lynx, the fox,
wild cat, marten, ferret, weasel, &c.; and these are assisted by the no
less rapacious birds of prey--the vultures, eagles, hawks, falcons,
kites, harriers, pies, and jays. The game birds and animals are the
pheasant, now very rare, partridges of both kinds, bustards, both large
and small, sand-grouse, quails, which come in immense quantities to the
vineyards and maize-fields in the summer and autumn, woodcock, snipe;
wild duck, geese, all kinds of water-birds and waders, visit the marshes
of the rivers and the lagoons of the coast in winter; and on the
southern shores meet the flamingoes, pelicans, spoonbills, and other
birds from the African coast. From the same quarter come numerous and
brighter-plumaged birds of passage; orioles, bee-eaters, hoopoes, and
other natives of a warmer zone, are brought over by the hot south wind
so irritating to the nerves and temper of a southern Spaniard. It is
then that the shores of the Mediterranean are lined with sportsmen, when
the moon is near full, to take heavy toll of these winged travellers.
The entomology of Spain is probably very rich. We have spoken of the
locusts of Estremadura; and in the wilds where they breed--mere
solitudes in summer, when the flocks are absent in their northern
pastures--many a rare species of butterfly, cicada, and insect is
doubtless to be found. The insects of Spain, however, are not all
noxious or without value. Silk-worms are largely bred in the coast
provinces of the east and south, not only for their silk, but also for
the gut so precious to all trout and salmon fishermen. The cochineal
insect, which feeds on the leaves of the prickly pear, is cultivated for
its brilliant dye.
Of useful and domesticated animals, the sheep of Spain have always been
celebrated; the very name, "merinos," has been given to the softest kind
of wool or woolly tissue. It is said that the breed attained its
excellence through a present of English South Down rams by Edward I. to
the father of his Castilian bride, and that the wool has improved under
climatic influences. However this may be, the superiority has hardly
been maintained, and careless shepherding has sadly deteriorated the
breed; still the half-bred Spanish merinos are the favourite flocks
throughout the north of Spain and Southern France, and they are slowly
superseding the coarser native and local breeds. The Spanish cattle from
Galicia are well known in the English market, but they are not the
choicest of their kind. The bulls that are bred for the bull-fights are
reared chiefly along the marshy banks of the Guadalquiver, which, like
the delta of the Rhone, supports herds of half-wild cattle and
buffaloes. Cow's milk is little known or used in many districts of
Spain, and butter still less. Sheep or goat's milk supplies the place
of the former, and the olive-oil, excellent were it not too often kept
till rancid, that of the latter. Cheese and various kinds of curdled
milk or whey are also made from the milk of sheep. Since the advent of
the Arabs the Andalusian steed has been much celebrated. It is now
scarcely equal to its former fame, but, like many a horse of warmer
climes, its performances are better than its looks; hardy, sure-footed,
swift, and docile, if not over-weighted it will do more than one of many
a finer-looking but less enduring breed. The horse, however, is not the
true beast of burden in Spain; he is the charger, or the luxury of the
rich. The real work of the country is done by the humble mule or ass,
or, in some districts, by the ox. The fine Spanish mules are now seldom
bred in the country, but are procured from Poitou, or from the south of
France, where great attention is paid to their production, and where the
average price of a mule of six months old is higher than that of a horse
of the same age. For long journeys, and for carrying produce over the
mountain paths, or along the bad roads of the interior, the mule and
pack-saddle is still generally used. In fact, in some districts no other
mode of conveyance is possible; but the loss to commerce from want of
better communications is immense. It is this mode of carriage which
necessitates and continues the use of the tarred wine-skin, by which so
much excellent wine is rendered unsalable and almost undrinkable. It is
hard to recognize the delicious wine when tasted at the vineyard, in the
pitch-flavoured, half-fermented liquor which has travelled for days in a
skin exposed to the sun's heat by day, and the closeness and fetid
odours of the inns by night. Besides these, the camel, buffalo, and
llama, and vicuna have been introduced successfully as an experiment for
breeding, but not in sufficient numbers to affect the means of transport
in the peninsula.
The fisheries in Galicia and along the north-west Atlantic coast, and
also at Huelva and at Cadiz, are very valuable. Not only are they an
abundant means of support to the inhabitants of the coast and of Leon
and Northern Castile, but the fishermen engaged in them furnish the best
sailors to the Spanish navy. The chief kinds of fish are sardines and
pilchards, of which great numbers are preserved in oil, the tunny, and
the sea-bream, of which enormous quantities are annually taken. The
rivers, from the Minho to the Bidassoa, furnish trout and salmon. In the
Mediterranean, tunny, and the anchovies which replace the sardines, are
the chief fisheries, but many Spaniards are also engaged in the
coral-fishing off the coasts of Catalonia, of Algiers, and of Tunis.
The total production of Spain has been approximately valued at
Agriculture L80,000,000
Mines 6,271,000
Manufactures 63,480,000