England has acquired the reputation of the civiliser
of the world; it is in this character that we were expected to effect a
magic change in the position of Cyprus; instead of which we have
hitherto presented a miserable result of half-measures, where
irresolution has reduced the brilliant picture of our widely-trumpeted
political surprise to a dull "arrangement in whitey-brown" . . . which
is the pervading tint of the Cyprian surface in the absence of
artificial irrigation.
CHAPTER XV.
LIFE AT THE MONASTERY OF TROODITISSA.
The life at our quiet camp at Trooditissa was a complete calm: there
could not be a more secluded spot, as no human habitation was near,
except the invisible village of Phyni two miles deep beneath, at the
mountain's base. The good old monk Neophitos knitted, and taught his
boys always in the same daily spot: the swallows built their nests under
the eaves of the monastery roof and beneath the arch which covered in
the spring, and sat in domestic flocks upon the over-hanging boughs
within a few feet of our breakfast-table, when their young could fly.
Nightingales sang before sunset, and birds of many varieties occupied
the great walnut-tree above our camp, and made the early morning
cheerful with a chorus of different songs. There was no change from day
to day, except in the progress of the gardens; the plums grew large: the
mulberries ripened in the last week of July, and the shepherd's pretty
children and the monastery boys were covered with red stains, as though
from a battlefield, as they descended from the attractive boughs.
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