LOCALITIES FOR COLLECTING. 25 
with scrub and brushwood ; and little is to be done in the 
bird line in that dii'ection. 
The sierras being too far distant, cannot be worked from 
Gibraltar ; it is necessary to go to Algeciraz, Faginas, 
Pulverilla, or some cortijo near the hills you wish to work. 
Very deceptive in appearance, looking quite low and easy to 
ascend, it takes three or four hours to reach their tops, 
which, bare, rugged, and wild beyond description, are alone 
worth visiting for the view, which, always grand, on a clear 
day is magnificent, that from the Peiion del Fraile at the 
west of Algeciraz being the finest. From these mountains 
run down numerous wooded valleys {gargantas) clothed 
with cork and oak trees, many of very large size, though 
badly mutilated by being lopped by charcoal-burners. The 
rocky streams which flow down these valleys are fringed 
with rhododendron, arbutus, holly, hawthorn, laurestinus, 
bay, myrtle, giant heather, cistus, and many sorts of ferns, 
conspicuous amongst them being the Osmunda and maiden- 
hair, while here and there is an occasional Caladium with 
its huge leaves reminding one in shape of elephants^ ears ; 
the leaves of this plant, called hojas de llama, are much used 
by the country people as a medicine for fevers ; many of 
the rocks and all the trunks of the cork trees are festooned 
with hare^s-foot fern [calaguala) , also used medicinally. 
In spring these ravines are, from then' natiu'al beauty 
and the colour of these various shrubs and flowers, so 
picturesque that one cannot help lingering about them 
merely to admire the charming scenery, becoming apt to 
forget the birds for which one is in search. These places 
are seldom visited by an Englishman, only by stray smugglers, 
goatherds, and charcoal-burners ; and every pass, hill, valley, 
in fact every well-marked situation, has its name, many 
as familiar to me as the streets of London. 
Those valleys most worth visiting near Gibraltar are the 
Garganta del Capitan, to the north-west of Algeciraz, on the 
way to Ojen by the mountain-path of la Trocha, which is 
within easy distance (five or six miles) of Algeciraz. 
The valley of the Guadalmalcil, halfway on the road 
