THE climate and soil of Galicia are so varied that not only can every plant known to Europe be made to flourish there, but many tropical ones as well. In the low and sheltered valleys both dates and bananas have been known to ripen in the open air; the magnolia and the camellia grow there in profusion. The magnolia was first imported to Europe from Carolina, New Jersey, in 1688, by Pedro Magnol, from whom it derives its name; the wood of one variety of this tree is used in Galicia for many purposes; it has a beautiful grain and is almost an orange colour; the magnolia grandiflora often reaches the height of a hundred feet and more; it bears a handsome white blossom. There is also a small Japanese magnolia which is trained against the wall. The camellia exhibits here some six hundred varieties, and is, during the winter months, the chief ornament of the public walks and gardens: this shrub was introduced to Europe by a Spanish Jesuit, Pedro Camelli, in 1738. The mimosa, covered with yellow blossom, takes the place of our laburnum, and might be taken for it at a little distance. Another favourite tree is the azalia, which is constantly found in the public squares and gardens. Wisteria does as well here as in Japan. I noticed it especially luxuriant in Pontevedra. The cane, or bamboo, arundo donax, is much cultivated in Gallegan fields and gardens, especially in the province of Pontevedra, where canes are used to form trellis-work to support the vines, as well as for fishing-rods; they flower in August, and often grow to the height of ten feet.

The chestnut, the oak, and the walnut are three of the commonest trees in Galicia. The chestnut, the king of the Gallegan forests, grows to perfection, and its nut formed, until quite recently, one of the principal means of sustenance among the poor; but of late years the ignorant peasants have taken to cutting down their chestnut trees for firewood, and are thus killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. In many districts the chestnut woods are disappearing with ominous rapidity, and, added to this, there has been for the last twenty years a disease among them which is killing them off in thousands,—they dry up and die, hundreds together,—and it is feared that, with the disappearance of its woods, the land will also suffer from a change of climate. Walnut wood is considered to be the best for the manufacture of furniture, and as this tree is so plentiful, it is even used for flooring in the houses of the wealthy. The wood of the cherry tree is also much used in making furniture. The fruit or nut of the walnut is of two kinds, one very large, the other rather small. I was told that a bit of maize bread, a skinned walnut, and a lump of cheese were “the finest mouthful in the world!” The poor have a process by which they smoke and dry the chestnuts that are to be preserved for winter use; these are eaten just as you would eat a hard biscuit. I tried one, but found it too hard for my teeth. The pigs in many parts are fed largely upon chestnuts; hence the remarkably fine flavour of their bacon.

Pine trees cover the higher mountain slopes; the shipping of pine stems to other countries forms one of the principal industries of several of the coast towns, such as Noya, which ships pine wood to Cardiff in great quantities, and also to the Asturias, whence coal is brought back in the returning vessels. The sad part of it is that when the pine trees are cut down few think of planting fresh ones, although those who planted would be well repaid for their pains, as the pines of Galicia grow with remarkable rapidity. A priest told me that one of his parishioners had realised a comfortable little fortune in the space of twenty years by planting pines in a few acres of hilly land and selling the trees to shipbuilders when grown; but he added that such enterprise was rare, and that the people were too ignorant to take in the idea that any good could come of planting trees, though they were willing enough to cut down those that were there already.

A few years ago the attention of the Spanish Government was drawn to the growing scarcity of wood, and several towns were ordered to make plantations, but want of proper instruction led to failure. There is plenty of room for forests in those parts where other vegetation does not thrive. The fact that pines are necessary for navigation, and that ships cannot be built without them, has led to the pine forests being partially protected by Government from the firewood-collecting peasants. It is high time that something should be done to protect so valuable a tree as the chestnut, whose fruit has more than once taken the place of bread in times of famine.

The eucalyptus, originally imported from Australia, grows to a great height in Galicia, and its bark, as I have already mentioned, may be seen lying across the roads in spring-time like wide bars of iron. The black poplar lines the streets of Monforte, but it is not so common in Galicia as in Castille. Box is plentiful, and grows to a greater height than with us. There are three kinds of laurel in most of the public gardens, and the dwarf palm is also much used as a decorative tree.

The birch, betula alba, only grows in the higher zones. I found this tree on the high moorlands near the Portuguese frontier. The willow, the ash, and the Portuguese laurel grow in abundance in the valleys along the river banks, and in most places where the ground is moist. The lime is another tree that grows abundantly, and to a great height, in Galicia. In March and the early part of April the uncultivated parts of the country are gloriously yellow with gorse, ulex EuropÆus, which sends out long shoots and branches covered with brilliant blossom, and is altogether finer than I had ever seen it in England. When its flowering bloom is over, the peasants cut down the gorse and pound it, with some grass, into a kind of paste for their cattle; it is said to improve the flavour of their beef. They call this shrub tojo.

Tobacco also does remarkably well here, and grows to a great height, but it is not cultivated. It was in the forties of the nineteenth century that Ford wrote: “In order to benefit the Havanah, tobacco is not allowed to be grown in Spain, which it would do in perfection in the neighbourhood of Malaga; for the experiment was made, and, having turned out quite successful, the cultivation was immediately prohibited.”

Flax was very extensively grown at one time, and it is still much cultivated in Lugo and Orense; it grows also in the valley of the Ulla, round Padron. Ever since the days of Pliny, Spain has had a reputation as a flax-growing country, and Galicia has always been one of the provinces which produced the largest quantity, her damp and rainy climate being the most favourable to its growth. The ancients called the linen made from Spanish flax carbasus, and esteemed it more highly than that of Italy. The fact that the sails of ships were called carbasus has led to the conjecture that the sails of Roman ships were manufactured from Spanish cloth. Catullus mentions the beautiful Spanish handkerchiefs used by the Roman ladies, sudaria saetaba, but these received their name from a town in Valencia, Saetabis, where flax was also grown. The linen industry flourished in Galicia during the Middle Ages, but it was already in its decline in the seventh century. In 1656, Francisco Martinez de la Meta tried to rouse the Government to the danger of allowing Russia and other countries to import their manufactured goods into Spain, and thus become the ruin of the linen industry.[303] Towards the close of the eighteenth century the falling-off of this industry in Galicia was attributable partly to the fact that a great deal of bad flax was sown. In the early part of the seventeenth century, an Asturian author, Francisco Consul, wrote a treatise on the bleaching of Gallegan linen, which he considered to be the finest in Europe. In 1804, Labrada wrote that the manufacture of linen was the chief industry of CoruÑa, and that certain Englishmen had started factories there and imported the latest kind of carding machinery.[304] At present the peasant women carry their distaffs about with them, and spin in the fields as they mind their cows. When they wish to bleach their linen, they boil it and spread it in the sun, then boil it again and spread it once more in the sun; if by this time it is not sufficiently bleached, they repeat the process.

The potato is extensively cultivated; it forms, with maize, kidney beans, and cabbage, the chief food of the Gallegan poor. When it was first introduced, the peasants refused to plant it, but they gradually came to see its usefulness, and in 1778, when there was a famine in the land, they learned that the very rain which may spoil a harvest only fattens the potato. The value of the plant was at last brought home to them, and from that time to this it has been assiduously cultivated.

A special feature of every landscape in Galicia is its innumerable maize barns with their thatched or tiled roofs and church-like spires. There is one in the back garden of every peasant’s cottage. Maize is the most popular cereal in the province. When Borrow entered Galicia on horseback, he was surprised to find that, instead of barley, maize was given to his horses for provender, and he was equally surprised to find that the animals ate it without hesitation. Wheat, rye, barley, and millet are also cultivated, but not to the same extent as maize. The peasants sow wheat or rye and barley for their first crop, and as soon as this has been harvested they sow maize in its place, and thus get two harvests in the year. Opinions differ as to the ultimate advantage of this practice.

Galicia is essentially a vine country; from time immemorial her vines have been appreciated, but rather for their abundance than their quality, as too little care has been bestowed upon their cultivation. Of late years disease has crept into the vineyards, and heavy loss has been experienced in consequence. A new kind of vine is now being introduced from America as likely to withstand disease better than the old kinds. The American vines can easily be distinguished from the older kinds, for they grow on sticks like hops, while the gnarled branches of the latter are trained over trellis-work made of the local bamboo. Every peasant house has its vine-covered verandah, and the beauty of many a Gallegan landscape is greatly due to the vine-clad terraces that cover the hillsides. In the early spring, when the branches are still bare, they look, in the distance, like fishermen’s nets spread out to dry in the sun.

Most of the peasants grow grapes for themselves and make sufficient wine to supply their own households. A peasant who lived in a little cottage near Orense showed me in an outhouse a large vat in which he made his wine. The vat, which was of oak, lay on its side; it was strongly bound with wood and iron, and had a square hole on the upper side into which the grapes were put. My informant explained to me that as soon as the grapes were in the vat he would wash himself thoroughly, and then, wearing no garment but a shirt, which he drew up round his waist, he would get into the vat and proceed to stamp upon the grapes till they were reduced to a soft pulp. This process he would repeat three days following,[305] kneading the grapes for about twenty minutes on each occasion. “I then close the vat and leave it for a month,” he continued, “after which I can draw the wine from the tap, and it flows clear and is quite ready for the table.”

“But what are those long black boxes above the vat?” I asked.

“Those are coffins,” was the reply. “I keep a store of them, and sell them to my neighbours when wanted at six pesetas” (five shillings) “apiece. It is convenient to have them ready, as our village is so far from any town.”

Although wine is so plentiful and cheap, the very poor content themselves with water, and seldom touch any other beverage. Red wine is supplied free at all the Gallegan hotels, and a very pleasant drink it is; there is hardly more alcohol in it than would be found in an ordinary fruit syrup, and the wines of Pontevedra are said to be even less alcoholic than those of Orense. I have already mentioned how the town of Ribadavia lies in the very centre of the vine country. The people of that part are said to indulge rather freely in the wine that their soil produces for them in such abundance. When a man has made himself drunk after his midday meal, the neighbours say, “He has climbed up into his vine” (estar subido a la para); and the story goes that an English wine-merchant once came to Ribadavia to negotiate with some of the husbandmen for the purchase of their wine, but that at every house where he inquired for the master he was told that the owner of the vineyard had “climbed into his vine,” and could not be seen. Tradition has it that the Englishman grew very indignant, and made a remark in his notebook to the effect that these particular wine-growers should be avoided in future; he did not realise that the men he had wished to do business with were one and all too drunk at that hour to drive a bargain, and that his wisest course would have been to call again later in the day. In this connection we may add that during the English attack on Vigo in 1719, one of the officers wrote in his journal: “Most of the soldiers abused themselves so much with wine that a small body of men might have given us a great deal of uneasiness” (Macaulay).

A species of cabbage, known as the Gallegan cabbage, grows very plentifully all over Galicia; local writers speak of it as “the bread of the poor”; it is said to be the most economical and the most digestible kind of cabbage that exists. The life of this plant is usually four years, and it grows with a long stalk, the heart of the cabbage often reaching a height of a foot and a half above the ground. It is of this cabbage that the famous Gallegan broth—caldo Gallego—is chiefly made; the richer classes add the water in which half a pig’s head has been boiled, but the poor often put in nothing but cabbage, potatoes, and a few haricot beans. In spring, when the cabbage water has a strong smell, the vegetables are boiled separately, after which the cabbage is taken out of its water and placed in the pot with the potatoes.

One of the principal exports from Orense to our shores is the “Spanish onion.” This vegetable, in the words of a local housekeeper, “is often as large as a plate.” It grows plentifully in the valley of the Ulla, all round Padron, and in most of the low-lying valleys of Galicia.

Every kind of fruit known to Europe can be cultivated in Galicia. I have already stated that in all the lower valleys every peasant’s garden has its lemon tree, also oranges ripen well in the neighbourhood of Pontevedra and Noya, but they are never very large. During the fourteenth century an aromatic oil, or attar, was manufactured at Noya from orange flowers grown in the neighbourhood. The Spaniards called this oil atatiar, and it is probable that they learned the art of making it from their Moorish conquerors.

Fig trees are to be found wherever there are oranges. I saw particularly fine ones in some of the gardens; their growth was very sturdy, and not unlike that of the oak. In the vicinity of Tuy there are a good many olives scattered amongst the other trees, but there are no plantations of them. The needle-pointed cypress is also to be seen, but, as I have said, this tree is rarely found outside the gardens of the aristocracy.

Apples are produced in great variety: there is a small sweet russet—manzana parda; a large green apple with little black spots—tartiadillo; a pretty greenish-yellow apple that has its name from the town of Sarria near Lugo; a green apple as large as a football—tres en ramid (three on a branch); and another large green apple, wide at the base and rather tapering, very sweet—fada.

The finest pear for eating is considered to be the Urraca, which is small and dark green in colour. The fact that this variety has been named after Queen Urraca leads to the supposition that it originated in Galicia. Another pear, pera de manteca (butter pear), is of two kinds: de oro (golden) and de plata (silver); both these varieties are very large. Then there is the pera de Judas, a large green pear, excellent for eating.

The earliest fruit is the wood strawberry, which is ripe about the middle of May. Cherries are plentiful in June, especially a large black one, very sweet—guinda. Later there are several kinds of greengages and plums: the claudia is greatly prized for preserving in syrup. Apricots and peaches also abound; one kind of peach, the pavia del revero, was selling in the local markets at fifteen dollars per hundred in 1906. Melons also do well here, especially the water melon, which is very plentiful. Medlars of two kinds are seen in the markets in great quantities, where they are sold at the equivalent of threepence a pound. The earliest grapes are a very small white kind, which ripen about the end of September, and sell at about sixpence a pound. Pomegranates grow in the warmer valleys; so far as I could make out, there are no almonds, though it is probable that these too, like the date and the banana, would thrive here if once introduced.

During the summer months the squares and public places are crowded with fruit-sellers, and the quantities of fruit they bring in from the country round are a sight to see.

Among the plants that interested me there was one called Torvisco (probably from the Latin Turviscus), which is known to us as the flax-leaved daphne. Its leaves are used by the peasants for catching trout. The fish nibble the leaves when they are placed in the stream, and are poisoned at once; whereupon they are taken out of the water and cooked for the table. It seems that this kind of poison does not in any way affect the wholesomeness of the fish for eating purposes.

Reeds grow in quantities near Padron, and the gathering and selling of them forms the principal occupation of whole villages. A kind of rough waterproof worn by the labourers in rainy weather is manufactured from reeds; and rush hats are also worn. The villagers of Laino have a refrain which they sing when they go rush-gathering:—

Which is in English:—

A well-made reed hat is considered rather a luxury; it costs upwards of a pound, and is only worn by the well-to-do peasants.

The pimiento dulce (capsicum), or sweet red pepper, grows to perfection in all the valleys. There are three crops in the year: small green pimientos are gathered in May, large green ones in July, and large red ones in August. The pimiento is a favourite ingredient in Spanish cooking, and it is also served as a salad to cold meat.

There are flowers out of doors all the year round. Not only is the camellia brilliant with white and red blooms in December and January, but high hedges of wild geraniums are also in bloom, and sweet-scented violets abound in the woods in January. In March and April the hoop-petticoat narcissus carpets meadows as profusely as the wild hyacinth does with us. I have seen it both a delicate creamy white and a brilliant yellow. Many of the wild flowers are much the same as those of our own Devonshire hedges and meadows, but I noticed a number that I had never seen in England; and there is no doubt that were an English botanist to devote the months of March, April, and May to the wild flowers of Galicia, he would be amply rewarded for his trouble, and feel the additional satisfaction that is always derived from the consciousness of being the first in the field.