Cyprus, As I Saw It In 1879 By Sir Samuel White Baker





















































 -  A field of broad-beans that we had left in
early blossom twenty-four days before now produced our well - Page 100
Cyprus, As I Saw It In 1879 By Sir Samuel White Baker - Page 100 of 274 - First - Home

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A Field Of Broad-Beans That We Had Left In Early Blossom Twenty-Four Days Before Now Produced Our Well-Known Vegetable For Dinner, And I Observed That The Native Children, With Their Usual Liking For Uncooked Food, Were Eating These Indigestible Beans Raw!

There had been no rain since our departure, and every crop that was not irrigated was absolutely destroyed.

The aspect of the country was pitiable; it should have been at this season a waving sea of green barley and young wheat, but it was a withered desert --with a few patches of verdure like oases in a thirsty wilderness. This terrible calamity extended throughout the entire district or plain of Messaria, and exhibited a sad example of the great necessity of Cyprus--"an organised system of artificial irrigation."

We remained some days at Kuklia, during which I strengthened the gipsy-van by lashing the frame-work with raw bull's-hide and securing the blocks of the springs to the axles with the same material. It is worthy of note "that a fresh hide should never be used for lashing, but a skin that has been already dried should be soaked for twenty-four hours, and then cut into a strip as carefully and as long as the size will permit. When thus prepared, it should be re-soaked for four or five hours, and used while wet as a lashing, drawn as tight as possible. The power of contraction is enormous, and when dry the skin becomes as hard as wood; but a fresh hide has not the same contractive power, and will stretch and become loose when subject to a severe strain." It was a great comfort to return to the luxury of the gipsy-van, which looked the picture of neatness; the gorgeous Egyptian lantern had ceased to exist as an object of value, as it had several times been upset and thrown completely off its hook by the jumpings and bumpings of the vehicle when forcibly dragged over the steep banks and watercourses. It was now reduced to an "antique," and looked as though it had been recovered from the ruins of an ancient temple.

The post was kindly forwarded from Famagousta by the chief commissioner, and we revelled in newspapers, which during our stay in the Carpas had been a complete blank. Our cook Christo had also received letters which disconcerted him. After dinner at about 8.30 P.M. he suddenly appeared at the tent door with a very large breakfast-cup in his hand. "I beg your pardon, sir, but I'm sorry to say my mother has just fallen down and broken her leg!" was his first announcement; and he continued, "she is an old woman, past fifty, sir, and a broken leg is a very bad thing; I have come to ask for some brandy, and I've brought a cup."

"Your mother broken her leg, Christo? Why, where is she?" I replied.

"She is at Athens, sir, and I want a drop of brandy, as I have just received the letter, and I am very anxious about her."

I now discovered that the brandy was not intended for his mother's leg, but for his own stomach, to comfort his nerves and to allay his filial anxiety.

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