THE MONASTERY OF TROODITISSA.
The monastery of Trooditissa had no architectural pretensions; it looked
like a family of English barns that had been crossed with a Swiss
chalet. The roofs of six separate buildings of considerable dimensions
were arranged to form a quadrangle, which included the chapel, a long
building at right angles with the quadrangle, which had an upper balcony
beneath the roof, so as to form a covered protection to a similar
arrangement below, and an indescribable building which was used by the
monks as their store for winter provisions. The staircases were outside,
as in Switzerland, and entered upon the open-air landings or balconies;
these were obscure galleries, from which doors led to each separate
apartment, occupied by the monks and fleas. The obscurity may appear
strange, as the balconies were on the outside, but the eaves of the roof
at an angle of about 48 degrees projected some feet as a protection from
the winter's snow, and occasioned a darkness added to the gloom of
blueish grey gneiss which formed the walls and the deep brownish red of
the tiled roof.
The great walnut-tree overshadowed a portion of the mule stables that
formed a continuation of the building, and faced the exterior courtyard,
which was inclosed upon two sides of the square, in the centre of which
was an arched entrance to the inner court. This doorway was beneath a
covered gallery, and the ground floor formed a well-protected verandah,
from which a magnificent view was commanded down the great gorge towards
Phyni, overlooking the lower mountain tops to a sea horizon beyond the
peninsula of Akrotiri and the salt lake of Limasol.
The covered gallery above this verandah was supported by stone pillars
with exceedingly rude capitals, upon which long beams of the native
pines, laid horizontally, supported the joists and floors. It was a dull
and dirty abode, and at first sight I was disappointed. The angle of the
mountain in which the monastery stood was formed by a ravine which
intercepted the principal gorge at almost a right angle, thus a path
which continued at the same level from the courtyard to the other side
of the ravine, represented the letter V laid horizontally. From the
walnut-tree across the broad base of the letter would be about a hundred
yards, to a series of cultivated terraces upon an equal level.
This might have been made a lovely station, as no less than three
springs of water issued from the mountain side in various positions: the
first already mentioned; the second on the further side of the letter V,
beneath another splendid walnut-tree; and the third upon the same level
beyond, which fell into a trough beneath a large trellis, upon which
some vines were trained to produce a shade.
The terraces formed an angular amphitheatre, the outer courtyard of the
monastery being the highest level, looking down upon tree-tops of planes
and pines throughout the dark gorge to Phyni. The gardens appeared much
neglected; they were overcrowded with fruit-trees, including filberts,
mulberry, pears, apples, figs, walnuts, plums; the only grape-vine was
represented upon the trellis; the position was too high for apricots.
An Englishman's first idea is improvement, and I believe that upon
entering heaven itself he would suggest some alteration. This was not
heaven, but, as a monastery, it was the first step, and a very high one
for this world, being 4340 feet above the sea. We began by cleaning, and
I should have liked to have engaged Hercules, at the maximum of
agricultural wages, to have cleaned the long line of mule stables, a
dignified employment for which the hero-god was famous; the Augean were
a joke to them. Piles of manure and filth of every description concealed
the pavement of the capacious outer yard of the monastery. The narrow
path by which we had arrived from the spring was a mere dung-heap, from
which the noxious weeds called docks, of Brobdignagian proportions,
issued in such dense masses that an agricultural meeting of British
farmers would have been completely hidden by their great enemy. The
priests or monks had filthy habits; it would have been impossible for
civilised people to have existed in this accumulation of impurities,
therefore we at once set to work. I had a spade and pickaxe, and we
borrowed some other tools from the monks, among which were strong
grubbers (which combined the hoe and the pick). There were a number of
people belonging to the monastery, including some young embryo priests,
that we might accept as deacons; these I set to work with the pickaxe at
one shilling a day wages. The boys who were being educated for the
Church I employed in removing all the loose stones which choked the
surface of the ground, and subsequently in sweeping and scraping the
courtyard. I gave them sixpence a day if they worked from early morning,
or threepence if they came at noon after their lessons. There was a
shepherd's family, upon the hill about 250 feet above the monastery, of
seven handsome children, two boys of nineteen and seventeen, and five
girls. These were hard at work, even to a pretty little child of four
years old, who carried her stones, and swept with a little broom with
all her heart (this was little Athena). Of course they were all paid in
the evening with bright new threepenny pieces which they had never seen
before. Even the priests worked after a few days, when the spirit of
industry and new shillings moved them, and in the history of the
monastery there could never have been such a stirring picture and such a
dust as we made in cleansing and alterations. Nearly a month was
occupied in this necessary work, by which time the place was entirely
changed. I had made a good road as an approach from the spring, with a
covered drain, dignified by the name of an "aqueduct," which led the
water when required to a little garden that I had constructed close to
the tent, where a nondescript slope had become a receptacle for filth. I
had cut this down from the road, and mixed the earth with the
accumulated dirt and manure, which I levelled off in successive layers,
so that the stream led from the spring would irrigate my beds in
succession. This garden was carefully fenced against the intrusion of
goats and donkeys, to say nothing of pigs, and it was already sown with
tomatoes, cucumbers, melons, barmia, and beet-root. The priests had a
grand bed of onions upon a terrace, which was usually occupied by the
pigs, goats, and donkeys, as they had been too lazy to arrange a fence.
The docks in the monastery gardens were at least six feet high; I had
these cut and collected to thatch the sides of a peculiar shed (in which
I am writing at this moment), which was a great comfort and formed a
very original retreat, combining a seat in an amphitheatre with a modern
summer-house. This was an oblong, of fifteen feet by twelve, erected
within three feet of the tent beneath the walnut-tree upon the extreme
verge of the abrupt incline. I laid a foundation of stones, which I
covered with pounded earth and water, to produce a level with the tent.
I then placed horizontally a beam of wood, secured from slipping with
stakes driven to the heads into the bank upon the edge of the incline.
Upon this a row of large stones was cemented together with mud to form a
margin level with the floor, from which the abrupt inclination at once
leapt to the lower terraces and the deep gorge, continuing for upwards
of 4000 feet to the sea; this was visible beyond the inferior mountain
tops.
There was nothing pretty in the arrangement of this "rachkooba," as it
would be called in Africa; it was a simple square of upright poles,
connected with canes secured across, thatched inside with ferns, and
upon the outside with docks, fastened down with the peeled willow-like
shoots of mulberry-trees. The mulberry-trees for silkworms are always
pollarded annually, and they throw out shoots about seven or nine feet
in length every season; the wood is exceedingly tough, and the bark of
these wands when stripped is serviceable for tying plants or securing
fences in lieu of cord. For lack of silkworms the monastery
mulberry-trees had several seasons of growth, and the shoots were
serviceable for our work. The ceiling of our opera-box was cloth, with a
curtain of about three feet suspended along the front, which broke the
morning sun as it topped the high ridge of the mountain on the other
side of the gorge, about a thousand feet above us. The shed was carpeted
with mats and furnished roughly with a table and chairs; hat-pegs were
suspended around, made from the red-barked wood of the arbutus, simply
cut so that by inverting the branch with the stem attached to a cord,
the twigs, cut at proper lengths, would form convenient hooks.
From this cool hermitage we looked down upon the dense foliage of
rounded mulberry-tops and the fruit-trees of the gardens within the
gorge, while exactly in our front, a hundred yards across the deep
ravine, was the rocky steep of the mountain side, densely clothed with
ilex and arbutus, until the still higher altitudes banished all
underwood, and the upper ranges of Troodos exhibited a surface of barren
rocks clothed with tall pines and cypress, 2000 feet above us.
By the time we had completed our permanent camp a certain degree of
improvement had taken place in the people, as well as in the actual
cleanliness of the locality. Everybody washed his, or her, face and
hands. The customs of the monks had so far reformed that the immediate
neighbourhood was no longer offensive. When strangers with mules arrived
the road was immediately swept, and upon Saturday evenings a general
embellishment took place in honour of the approaching Sunday. The young
clergy were remarkably good and active; they worked in my little garden
at a shilling a day, went on errands to Platraes and the camp at
Troodos, and made themselves generally useful for a most moderate
consideration. I can strongly recommend all young curates who are
waiting in vain for livings to come and work upon the holy soil of
Trooditissa at one shilling per diem; and should they (as curates
frequently are) be poor in this world's goods, but nevertheless strong
in amorous propensities, and accordingly desirous of matrimony, they
will find a refuge within the walls of this monastery from all the
temptations of the outer world, far from garden-parties, balls, picnics,
church-decorations assisted by young ladies, and all those snares of the
Evil One; and the wholesome diet of the monks, including a course of
soaked broad-beans and barley bread, with repeated fastings upon
innumerable saints' days, will affect them sensibly, both morally and
physically; under this discipline they will come to the conclusion that
a wife and large family upon an income of 500 pounds a year in England
would not confer the same happiness as one shilling a day with the
pickaxe, broad-beans and independence, at Trooditissa, which is true
"muscular Christianity."
It was extraordinary to see the result of a life-long diet of beans and
barley-bread in the persons of the monks, who very seldom indulged in
flesh. The actual head of the monastery was a handsome man of seventy,
perfectly erect in figure, as though fresh from military drill, and as
strong and active as most men of fifty. The younger priests were all
good-looking, active, healthy men, who thought nothing of a morning's
walk over the fatiguing rocky paths to Troodos and back (twelve miles),
to be refreshed on their return by an afternoon's work in their gardens.
The head of the Church was an especial friend of ours, and was a dear
old fellow of about seventy, with a handsome face, a pair of greasy
brass spectacles bound with some substance to retain them that was long
since past recognition, and swelled feet that prevented him from walking
beyond the precincts of the monastery, which he had never quitted for
twelve years. The feet looked uncommonly like the gout, but I can hardly
believe in the co-existence of that complaint with dry beans and
barley-bread, although the truth must be confessed, that the monks are
fond of commanderia, or any other production of the vineyard. There was
one exceedingly disagreeable monk with whom we held a most remote
acquaintance, and whose name I willingly conceal; he has been seen upon
several occasions to sit down upon an imaginary chair, the real article
of furniture being eighteen inches distant, and the stunning effect of
arriving suddenly in a sitting posture upon the hard stone of the
courtyard disabled him from rising; and even when assisted his legs were
evidently affected by the shock. His enemies declared (as they always
do) that he was the victim to an over-indulgence in the raki and wine of
Phyni. We generally knew him by the alias of "Roger," in memory of the
Ingoldsby Legends, where
"Roger the Monk
Got excessively drunk,
So they put him to bed,
And tucked him in."
There was no friend to bestow such care upon our Roger, he therefore lay
helplessly upon the bare stone until refreshing sleep restored his
eyesight and his perpendicular.
Our particular friend the head of the Church was a very different
character, and was a most simple-minded and really good religious man. I
employed a photographer of the Royal Engineers (kindly permitted by
Major Maitland, R.E.) specially to take his picture, as he sat every
morning knitting stockings, with a little boy by his side reading the
Greek Testament aloud, in the archway of the monastery. This was his
daily occupation, varied only when he exchanged the work of knitting
either for spinning cotton, or carving wooden spoons from the arbutus:
these he manufactured in great numbers as return presents to those poor
people who brought little offerings from the low country. Never having
mixed with the world, the old man was very original and primitive in his
ideas, which were limited to the monastery duties and to the extreme
trouble occasioned by the numerous goats which trespassed upon the
unfenced gardens, and inflicted serious damage. The chapel, which was
under his control, was of the usual kind, and at the same time rough and
exceedingly gaudy, the pulpit being gilded throughout its surface, and
the reredos glittering with gold and tawdry pictures of the lowest style
of art, representing the various saints, including a very fat St. George
and the meekest possible dragon. Our old friend had never seen a British
sovereign with the St. George, and was vastly pleased when he discovered
that his saint and ours were the same person, only differing in symmetry
of figures and in ferocity of dragons.
There was one very extraordinary effigy in bas-relief upon silver-gilt
about two feet six inches high, of the Virgin Mary, to which peculiar
miraculous properties were attributed. The possession of this relic
formed the principal attraction of the monastery. About a quarter of a
mile above the present establishment there is a small cave concealed
among the ragged masses of rock that crust the mountain side; this has
been formed by one rock which, leans across another, and each end has
been walled up artificially, so as to form a stone chamber of about
twelve feet in length by seven in width, with a small entrance.
According to the account given by the old monk, this cave was the origin
of the present monastery through the following accident. Among these
wild mountains, where no dwelling of any kind exists, it has always been
the custom after the melting of the snows in early spring to pasture the
numerous flocks of goats, which are at that season driven up from the
parched herbage of the low country to the fresh herbs of the cooler
altitudes. Three or four hundred years ago a shepherd, having lost his
goat at night, was surprised at the appearance of a light among the
rocks high up on the mountain, and with superstitious awe he related his
discovery to his fellows. For some time the mysterious light was
observed nightly, and various conjectures were on foot as to its origin,
but no one dared to venture upon an examination.
At length, the authorities of the Church having been consulted, it was
resolved that a priest should accompany the party of investigation and
the matter should be thoroughly cleared up.
It was a difficult climb to the pathless crags at night, but the light
was glimmering like "the star that the wise men saw in the east," and
though occasionally lost at intervals, it guided the party on their way.
Upon arrival at the cave, there was no inhabitant. A lamp burnt before a
small effigy of the Virgin Mary suspended against the wall of rock, but
no trace of human foot or hand could be discovered.
Such is the legend; and the inexplicable mystery caused much excitement
and agitation in the minds of the Church authorities. At length it was
determined that, as the apparition of the light was miraculous, it was
incumbent upon the people to erect a monastery upon the site of the
appearance, contiguous to the now sacred cave.
This was an extreme difficulty, as the inclination formed an angle of
about 60 degrees; and the mountain was hard gneiss that could only have
been scarped by expensive blasting. However, it was hoped that a
blessing would attend the good work; therefore, in spite of all
obstacles, it was commenced, and masons were engaged from the village of
Phyni to arrange a foundation.
There was no water nearer than the torrent in the deep hollow half a
mile below, therefore extreme labour was required in mixing the mortar
for the walls; the jars in which the necessary water was conveyed upon
men's shoulders up the precipitous rocks appeared to be influenced by
some adverse, but unseen, agency, as they constantly slipped from their
hold and broke. During the night the work which the masons had
accomplished in the day fell down, and was discovered every morning as a
heap of ruin; the building could not proceed. In this perplexity the
Church was relieved by a supernatural interposition. Early one morning a
jar of pure water was discovered in the sharp angle of the hollow
between the hills, exactly below the rachkooba, where I am now writing.
It was evident to the priestly mind that an angel had placed this jar of
water to denote the spot where some hidden spring might be developed,
which would be a favourable site for the new monastery. They dug, and
shortly discovered the expected source.
It was therefore resolved that instead of erecting the monastery close
to the effigy in the cave, where bad luck had hitherto attended their
efforts, it would be more advisable to commence the building upon a
favourable spot, where a level already existed, in the angle between two
mountain slopes within a few yards of the spring; it would be easier to
convey the small effigy to the new building than to erect the monastery
close to the effigy. Accordingly the work was commenced: the walls no
longer fell during the night, and the unseen agency was evidently
propitious.
Upon completion of the monastery the original effigy was enshrined, and
Trooditissa became famous as a holy site. Years passed away, and the
reputation of the establishment was enhanced by the arrival of a lady of
high position from Beyrout, together with her husband, as pilgrims to
the now celebrated mountain cave. The lady was childless, and having
presented a handsome offering, and kissed the rock entrance of the cave,
in addition to the effigy within the monastery, she waited in the
neighbourhood for a certain number of months, at the expiration of which
she gave birth to a son. The monks claimed this boy as their lawful
prize, and he was brought up as a priest; but there is some discrepancy
in the accounts which I could not well understand, as it appears that
his parents insisted upon his restoration, and that an angelic
interposition at length prevented litigation. It may be well imagined
that the result of the lady's pilgrimage spread far and wide; the
reputation of the monastery reached its zenith, and all the unfruitful
women flocked to the shrine to kiss the cave and the picture of the
Virgin within the church; at the same time offering a certain sum for
the benefit of the establishment. The friction of constant and
oft-repeated kissing at length began to tell upon the sacred effigy, and
it became almost worn out; it was therefore determined that a beautiful
silver-gilt Virgin and Child should be supplied by a first-rate artist
which should cover the original relic within. This was remarkably well
executed by Cornaro, and a small aperture like a keyhole of a door has
been left, which is covered by a slide; this is moved upon one side when
required, and enables the pilgrim to kiss through the hole a piece of
rather brown-looking wood, which is the present exhausted surface of the
effigy.
Although decayed by time and use, the miraculous property remains
unchanged. This was exhibited a few years ago in a remarkable manner,
where a childless lady had become old in barren expectation; but a visit
to Trooditissa produced the desired result, and conferred much happiness
upon the once despairing wife, who now became a mother. In addition to a
monetary offering, this lady had presented the Virgin with a handsome
belt with massive silver-gilt buckles, which she had worn during
pregnancy. This offering is now suspended around the present effigy, and
for a small consideration any lady applicant is allowed to fasten it
round her waist. The effect is infallible, and quite equals that of the
rock and silver Virgin. This remarkable inductive power may perhaps be
some day explained by philosophers, but it is now exceedingly dangerous,
and unfortunate results have occurred, when in a sudden impulse of
devotion young maidens have kissed the rock entrance to the cave, or
imprudently pressed their lips upon the sacred effigy.
During my sojourn at Trooditissa no arrivals of despairing wives
occurred, but in the exhausted conditions of the finance throughout the
island, it would have been the height of folly to have desired an
increase of family, and thereby multiply expenses; possibly the
uncertainty respecting the permanence of the English occupation may
deter the ladies, who may postpone their pilgrimage to the monastery
until their offspring should be born with the rights of British
subjects.
I have described the origin of the ecclesiastical retreat at Trooditissa
as nearly as possible according to the viva-voce history related by the
monks. It is impossible to gauge the opinions of the world, as
individuals differ as much in nervous structure and in theological
creeds as they do in personal appearance; some may accept the monks'
belief implicitly, while others may suggest that the original occupant
of the cave was some unknown hermit secluded from the world, whose
solitary lamp burning before the Virgin had attracted the attention of
the shepherds from the mountain opposite. The old man may have fallen
down a precipice and died, leaving his lamp still alight; but it would
be unfair to interfere with the original legend, which must remain with
the usual clouds and uncertainties that obscure the tales of centuries.
About 250 feet above the monastery the ridge of a spur afforded a level
space beneath some tall pines which threw a welcome shade, and would
have been a convenient camping-ground. This spot was occupied by the
roughest of log-huts, which had been erected by a shepherd as his summer
residence when the goats should be driven from the low ground to the
mountain pasture. This man was originally a Turk, and formed one of a
peculiar sect known in Cyprus as Linobambaki (linen and cotton). These
people are said to be converts to Christianity, but in reality they have
never been troubled with any religious scruples, and accordingly never
accommodate their principles to the society of their neighbourhood. In a
Turkish village the Linobambaki would call himself by a Turkish name, as
Mahomet, or Hassan, &c., while in a Christian community he would pass as
Michael or Georgy, or by other Greek appellations. The name "linen and
cotton" applied to them is expressive of their lukewarmness and
time-serving, their religious professions fluctuating according to the
dictates not of conscience, but personal interest. It is supposed that
about 1500 of these people exist in various parts of Cyprus; they are
baptised in the Greek Church, and can thus escape conscription for
military service according to Turkish law. The goatherd upon our
mountain had been a Turkish servant (shepherd) in a Greek family, and
had succeeded in gaining the heart of his master's daughter, whom he was
permitted to marry after many difficulties. This woman must have been
very beautiful when young, as, in spite of hard work and exposure, she
was handsome at forty, with a pair of eyes that in youth might have been
more attractive than the mysterious light in the hermit's cave. It is
one of the blessings of fine eyes that they are almost certain to
descend to the children. Property may vanish, litigation may destroy the
substance of an inheritance; but the eyes, large, soft, and gentle,
which can occasionally startle you by their power and subdue you by a
tear, are the children's entail that nothing can disestablish. Even when
time has trampled upon complexion, the eyes of beauty last till death.
The children of this Linobambaki and his handsome wife were seven--two
boys of about nineteen and seventeen, and five girls from fourteen to
one and a half--all of whom had the eyes of the mother developed most
favourably. I cannot well describe every individual of a family: there
were the two handsome shepherd youths who would have made level ground
of mountain steeps, through their power and activity.
"Right up Ben Lomond could he press,
And not a sob his toil confess."
These young fellows matched the goats in clambering up the rocks and
following their wayward flocks throughout the summits of the Troodos
range; and their sisters the little shepherdesses were in their way
equally surprising, in hunting runaway goats from the deepest chasm to
the sharpest mountain-peak.
I hardly know who was our greatest favourite. There was "Katterina"
(about fourteen) too old to make a pet of, but a gentle-charactered
girl, always willing to please and never out of temper, and even in the
big, hateful, beauty-destroying, high hob-nailed boots she could run up
the mountain soil and clamber like a monkey. Then came, I believe, our
best favourite, the bright, large-eyed, sparkling child "Vathoo," who
was the real beauty of the family, about ten years old; she was full of
life and vigour, a perfect goat upon the mountains, with a most lovely
face that would have charmed Murillo as a subject, with an extreme
perfection of features, a bronzed complexion, but hardly the soft
expression required for a sacred picture; in fact Vathoo was a perfect
little gipsy beauty, with perhaps more devil than angel in her impulsive
character.
Then came the real gentle little face with gazelle-like eyes, "Baraksu,"
about eight years old: followed by a minimum shepherdess, "Athena," of
nearly five years old, who climbed the rocks, shouted, and threw stones
at her refractory flock, as though an experienced goatherd of forty. The
youngest was just able to stand; with a pair of the biggest black eyes,
and a natural instinct for gorging itself with unripe fruits and hard
nuts, which, added to its maternal sustenance that it was still
enjoying, proved the mill-like character of its infantine digestion. For
two months we thought this young Hercules was a promising boy, until by
an accident we discovered it was a "young lady" Linobambaki! When we
arrived at Trooditissa these children were in rags and filth, but under
the tutelage of my wife they quickly changed, and the never-failing
fountain, assisted by a cake of soap supplied occasionally, effected a
marked improvement in all complexions.
They were remarkably well-mannered after the first natural shyness had
worn away, and formed a contrast to children of a low class in England
in never misbehaving when intimate. All these little creatures were
employed in cleaning and improving the place; even the minute Athena
might be seen carrying a great stone upon her small shoulder, adding her
mite to the work, and rubbing the galled spot as she threw down her
load. The bright threepenny pieces were in great favour, and the
children invariably hastened to their mother with their earnings at the
close of the afternoon. When the camp and monastery surroundings were in
perfect order there was no longer any remunerative employment for the
family, except the uncertain and occasional work of collecting wild
flowers for the tent and table. The myrtles bloomed in early July, and
in the deep ravine by the waterfall the oleanders were then still in
blossom. Several plants which were strange to me were added to the
collection; the days were generally passed by the children in minding
the numerous goats until the evening, when each child brought some
simple offering of flowers. We bought sheep from the low country at
about six or seven shillings each, and Vathoo was the special
shepherdess of our small flock, for which she was responsible; they were
invariably driven out at 4 A.M. and brought home at 8 to avoid the sun,
and again taken out from 4 P.M. till 7.
In this simple manner we passed our time at Trooditissa; my amusements
were my small garden, writing an account of Cyprus, and strolling over
the mountains: the latter occupation being most unprofitable, as I
destroyed all my boots upon the horrible surface of loose stones, in
which there was little geological interest, as they were all gneiss and
syenite, cracked and starred during a process of subaquean cooling. The
deplorable aspect of the otherwise beautiful mountains was occasioned by
the wholesale and wilful destruction of pine-trees, which is the
Cypriote's baneful characteristic, and as this is one of the most
important subjects in the modern history of the island, I shall devote
the following special chapter entirely to the question of "Woods and
Forests."