Book I. 



AGRICULTURE IN SPAIN AND PORTUGAL. 



115 



Saint Hieronymo told Jacob that they could travel twenty-four miles from Seville on 

 their own property, which is rich in corn, oil, and wine. Such M'^as the corruption 

 of this convent, that notwithstanding all their riches, they were deeply in debt. Lands 

 were, and are cultivated in great part by their proprietors ; and even the monasteries 

 held large tracts in hand before their dissolution. What is farmed, is let out in small 

 portions of arable land, with large tracts of pasture or waste, and a fixed rent is gene- 

 rally paid, chiefly in kind. The lands are open every where, excepting immediately 

 round towns and villages. Many persons in Granada are so remote from the farmeries, 

 that during harvest the farmers and their laborers live in tents on the spot both when 

 they are sowing the corn, and cutting and threshing it. The hedges about Cadiz are 

 formed of the soccotrine aloe and prickly pear ; the latter producing at the same time 

 an agreeable fruit, and supporting the cochineal insect. Farm-houses and cottages are 

 generally built of stone or brick, and often of rammed earth, and are covered witli 

 tiles or thatch. 



699. A bad feature in the polici/ of the ancient regime, considered highly injurious to 

 agriculture and the improvement of landed property, deserves to be mentioned. This 

 is, the right which the corporation of the mesta or Merino proprietors possess, to drive 

 their sheep over all the estates which lie in their r6ute, from their summer pasture in the 

 north to their winter pasture in the south of the kingdom. This must of course 

 prevent or retard enclosing and aration. In Catalonia, as in many parts of the conti- 

 nent, there exists what is called the emfiteutic contract. By the emjiteutic contract the 

 great proprietor, inheriting more land than he can cultivate to profit, has power to 

 grant any given quantity for a term of years ; either absolute or conditional ; either for 

 lives, or in perpetuity ; always reserving a quit rent, like our copyhold, with a relief on 

 every succession, a fine on the alienation of the land, and other seignioral righta 

 dependant on the custom of the district ; such as tithes, mills, public-houses, the obliga- 

 tion to plough his land, to furnish him with teams, and to pay hearth-money, with other 

 contributions, by way of commutation for ancient stipulated services. One species of 

 grant for uncultivated land, to be planted vnth vines, admitted foimerly of much dis- 

 pute. The tenant holding his land as long as the first planted vines should continue to 

 bear fruit; in order to prolong this term, he was accustomed to train layers from the 

 original stocks, and by metaphysical distinctions between identity and diversity, to plead, 

 that the first planted vines were not exhausted, claiming thus the inheritance in perpetuity. 

 After various litigations and inconsistent decisions of the judges, it was finally deter- 

 mined, that this species of grant should convey a right to the possession for fifty years, 

 unless the plantation itself should previously fail. 



700. The agricultural products of Spain include all those of the rest of Europe, and 

 most of those of the West Indies ; besides all the grains, for the production of which 

 some provinces are more celebrated than others, and most of them are known to produce 

 the best wheat in Europe. Flax hemp, esparto, palmetto (^Chamcerops humilis), 

 madder, saffron, aloe, cork-tree {Quercus suber). The kermes grana, a species of coccus, 

 whose body, in the grub state, yields a beautiful scarlet color, and which forms its nidus 

 on the shrub quercus coccifera. Soda from the salicornea and other plants of the salt 

 marshes; honey from the forests; dates (PhcBnix dactylif era), coffee, almonds, filberds, 

 figs, olives, grapes, peaches, prickly pears, carob beans, (the locust trees of scripture, 

 Ceratonia sUiqua), oranges, lemons, pomegranates, and other fruits. 



701. The esjmrto rush (Stipa tenacissimo, L.) grows wild on the plain, and is made into 

 a variety of articles for common use. It is employed for making ropes and cables, and 

 is particularly calculated for the latter purpose, as it swims on the water, and the cables 

 formed of it, are consequently not so liable to 

 rub against the rocks as those which are made 

 of hemp. It is also woven into floorcloths and 

 carpets, and made into baskets or panniers, for 

 carrying produce to market, or manure to the 

 fields. In Pliny's time this plant was used by 

 the poor for beds, by the shepherds for gar- 

 ments, and by the fishermen for nets ; but is it 

 now superseded for these and various other ends 

 by the hemp and flax. 



702. The pita, or aloe, {Aloe soccotrina, 

 fig' 97a.) is an important plant in the hus- 

 bandry of Spain. It grows by the leaf, which 

 it is only necessary to slip off and lay on the 

 ground with the broad end inserted a little way 

 in the soil : it makes excellent fences ; and the 

 fibres, separated from the mucilage, have been 

 twisted into ropes, and woven into cloth. 



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