ance. I had taken a carriage for
Valdemosa, after a long talk with the proprietor, a most agreeable
fellow, when I suddenly stopped, and exclaimed to myself, "You are
talking Spanish,--did you know it?" It was even so: as much of the
language as I ever knew was suddenly and unaccountably restored to me.
On my return to the Four Nations, I was still further surprised to find
myself repeating songs, without the failure of a line or word, which I
had learned from a Mexican as a school-boy, and had not thought of for
twenty years. The unused drawer had somehow been unlocked or broken
open while I slept.

Valdemosa is about twelve miles north of Palma, in the heart of the only
mountain-chain of the island, which forms its western, or rather
northwestern coast. The average altitude of these mountains will not
exceed three thousand feet; but the broken, abrupt character of their
outlines, and the naked glare of their immense precipitous walls, give
them that intrinsic grandeur which does not depend on measurement. In
their geological formation they resemble the Pyrenees; the rocks are of
that _palombino_, or dove-colored limestone, so common in Sicily and the
Grecian islands,--pale bluish-gray, taking a soft orange tint on the
faces most exposed to the weather. Rising directly from the sea on the
west, they cease almost as suddenly on the land side, leaving all the
central portion of the island a plain, slightly inclined toward the
southeast, where occasional peaks or irregular groups of hills interrupt
its monotony.

In due time my team made its appearance,--an omnibus of basket-work,
with a canvas cover, drawn by two horses. It had space enough for twelve
persons, yet was the smallest vehicle I could discover. There appears to
be nothing between it and the two-wheeled cart of the peasant, which, on
a pinch, carries six or eight. For an hour and a half we traversed the
teeming plain, between stacks of wheat worthy to be laid on the altar at
Eleusis, carob-trees with their dark, varnished foliage, almond-orchards
bending under the weight of their green nuts, and the country-houses
with their garden clumps of orange, cactus, and palm. As we drew near
the base of the mountains, olive-trees of great size and luxuriance
covered the earth with a fine sprinkle of shade. Their gnarled and
knotted trunks, a thousand years old, were frequently split into three
or four distinct and separate trees, which in the process assumed forms
so