View PDF version of this page

use, as he could not afford a game licence, but he offered to show me a spot where hares were abundant, j The shooting-season was long since closed, therefore partridges and francolins were sacred, but I should have had no scruples in bagging a hare for a stew. My guide conducted me over very likely ground down into ravines with bush-covered sides, then upon the hill-tops, and among patches of cultivation where the1 hares had played sad havoc in nibbling the wheat and barley ; but we found none. My dogs hunted every! bush in vain, and the burning sun had dried out every' vestige of scent. I believe the hares escape the sun * by taking refuge beneath the rocks, otherwise we must have moved at least one or two. My guide was much disappointed, but as game was absent he hunted fori wild asparagus, which grew in considerable quantities ! beneath the thick clumps of bushes upon the hill-sides, i By the time that we arrived in camp he had collected sufficient for a good dish. This variety is not quite ^ so thick as good cultivated asparagus, but it is superior in flavour, although slightly bitter. We rode to Lefka, about three miles distant. This is one of those happy lands of Cyprus which is watered with unfailing streams from the Trôôdos range, that have enforced prosperity. The town is important, andI is situated upon the sides of the hills, which form a* valley, through which, in rainy weather, a river flows ; at other seasons, like all Cyprian torrents, the bed is dry. The houses of Lefka are almost concealed by the luxuriant foliage of the gardens and orangeries. W e rode through narrow lanes streaming with water and shaded with the elm, ash, maple, and innumerable fruit-trees. Mills, turned by water, the masonry of the I aqueducts being ornamented with the graceful maiden

View PDF version of this page