A flat valley lay between the heights, both of which
were occupied by numerous houses and narrow lanes, while the rich soil
of the low ground, irrigated by the water of the river withdrawn by
artificial channels, exhibited splendid crops of wheat and barley.
Groves of very ancient olive-trees existed in the valley, and we halted
beneath the first oak-trees that I had seen in Cyprus. These were wide-
spreading, although not high, and I measured the girth of one solid
stem--eighteen feet.
We had hardly off-saddled, when crowds of women and children collected
from all quarters, with a few men, to stare at the new-comers; not at ME
personally, but at my wife. They were, if possible, more filthy than the
average of Cyprian women, and a great proportion of the children were
marked with recent attacks of small-pox. I regretted that I had not a
supply of crackers to throw amongst and disperse the crowd that daily
pestered us; any lady that in future may travel through Cyprus should
have a portmanteau full of such simple fireworks. It was in vain to
explain that the people were a nuisance if too near: when driven to a
moderate distance, they would advance shyly, by degrees; two or three
children would come forward and sit down a few paces in front of the
main body; after a few minutes several others would overstep this
frontier and sit down five or six yards in advance of the last comers,
and by this silent system of skirmishing we were always surrounded in
twenty minutes after the original crowd had been dispersed.
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