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CLAUDE DELAVAL COBHAM
Exerpta Cypria
page 443

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TURNER. 433 the erosa into her mouth, and so pressed round her tiiat I wonder she was not stifled by the heat. All remonstrance* were in vain, for the only answer that I could get was that the cross would certainly cure her. The terrace of the convent commands a fine view, extending about twenty miles on every side. The evening was rather misty, but I coniti with my glass plainly discover Larnaea to the east, six bom's distant, aud Nicosia (called by the inhabitants Levcosia) eight hours off, lying north by east. The sea lay visible to the east, south-east and south ; Limesol is risible in clear weather. The view consisted of plains, burnt up by the sun, interrupted by low round hills, and bounded by high pointed mountains. Very little cultivation was visible, and that only of olive trees and vines. The mountains were generally naked, but those round S. Croce were clothed with pine bushes, and other wild verdure : the convent is built on an isolated precipice of grey rock, which overhangs the mountains below. I descended the mountain after sunset, and .amused myself asking questions of my peasant guide, who inveighed bitterly against his Mahometan oppressors, whom he named " the dog of a Turk." 1 reached S. Barbara by moonlight, and there found a good snpper prepared for us by the caloyers, and slept in a tolerable bed provided for me by Signor Peristiuiii. October 7. (Thenn. 85°,) Mehined and 1 set off at daylight, and rode with a guide through the delicious country at the foot of S. Cruee, of which the wild beauty that appears in precipitate crags of grey rock, in pine bushes, tamarisks and brushwood, is occasionally contrasted with a few cultivated vineyards, and a small grove of olive trees. At the foot of tho mountain near S. Barbara is the small village of Stavros (the Cress). We dismissed our guide at Psefgas, whence we returned by our yesterday's road to Larnaea, which we reached at ten o'clock. October 9. (Therm. So".) I passed all the morning writing in my room, and in the evening went with my friends to the fete of a Catholick mairiage at the Marina, where wo remained dancing till near eleven ; most of the bettor class of inhabitants were there, all dressed à la grecque, without any variation from the common costume. The Romaïka was danced, not, as 1 have usually seen it, in a ring, but by two only, who scarcely moved from one place, but confined their activity to raising and bending their arms, making des -petits pas with more voluptuousness than grace. Oct. 10, Therm. 89°. Oct. 11, Thenn. 88°. Oct. 12, Therm. 96°. Having arranged this morning an excursion to Famagosto, 1 set off at seven o'clock with Ismail, the brother of Mehmed who had accompanied me to S. Thecla, and who found himself ill in consequence, he said, of the violent exertion of that five hours' journey. In two hours we reached the mountains (not veiy high to the east) that bound the plain on which stands Larnaea. This plain though of the richest land is, except in the immediate environs of the town or of the neighbouring villages, utterly uncultivated, but covered with rich long grass, heath, palm, and tamarisk bushes. We then rode an hour close to the sea, having to our left low rocks which overhang the sea, aud are perforated by time and weather, and naturally formed into stalactite shapes. The land round us through the whole of the journey was of the same description as the plain of Larnaea, displaying, that is, the greatest richness in its abundance of brushwood, and the length of its grass ; but L do not believe that in the whole of onr ride there were fifty acres uf cultivated land, and that was all laid out in vineyards. I have as yet seen little or no corn in Cyprus. In the neighbourhood of a village one sees a few olive trees and vines, but beyond its precincts all is barrenness. We saw but four villages on the road. The first of these was Ormithia. When Cyprus was yet considerable in the hands of the Turks, and an English factory resided here, Ormithia was tjieir favourite village, at which most of them had their villas, and

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