70 Canon Tristram — Notes on the 



was no communication with the outer world, save by wretched 

 little schooners ; and the only trade of any importance 

 was that with Havana, chiefly consisting in the export of 

 onions. Happy, bright, rather lotus-eating, troubled for 

 the most part with neither poverty nor riches, the people 

 of Palma might be taken for lineal descendants of the cul- 

 tivators of the garden of the Hesperides. 



The land rises steeply from the shore at Santa Cruz de 

 Palma or, as it is universally called there, La Ciudad, and 

 a finely engineered road, the only one of the kind in the 

 island, zigzags up the hill for several miles, affording magni- 

 ficent views at every turn, and then runs southwards through 

 a sloping plain to Buenavista. Everywhere the land is care- 

 fully cultivated from the shore upwards. Every kind of fruit, 

 from the pine-apple and orange to the cherry and the plum, 

 thrives at one elevation or another. One of the staples of 

 the island is a tine quality of silk, grown, spun, dyed, and 

 woven on the spot ; its cigars pass as the choicest Havanas ; 

 and its wines are the best in the Canaries. What can a 

 reasonable man desire which he may not find in Palma ? 

 And besides, there is or, perhaps I should say, there was, till 

 yesterday, a chance of discovering a new species of bird. 

 This latter, however, was not one of our pleasures of antici- 

 pation when we landed at Ciudad, though it was the most 

 agreeable of the pleasures of surprise. We inquired after 

 local naturalists on our arrival, but without success. How- 

 ever, in a country where visitors are few, news spread 

 quickly, and soon we had a call from one gentleman who had 

 been collecting the Lepidoptera of the island, and who brought 

 his collection to show to us ; and from another, the editor of 

 the local paper, who was really a botanist, and brought some 

 specimens of a local subalpine plant ( Viola pahnensis) , which 

 only grows, at a height of 7000 feet, in two spots, where, from 

 his information, we afterwards found it. 



Our first day's expedition was to an evergreen forest, some 

 four miles N.W. of Ciudad, where we had reason to believe 

 we should meet with the "Turqueze" Pigeon, whatever 

 species it might be. The first part of our ride was rugged and 



