144 JOURNAL. 



me. — If I cannot better their condition, why awaken them to a 

 sense of its miseries ? 



Leaving the Rincona, instead of going directly to the Almendral, 

 I skirted the hill by the hamlet called the Pocura, where I found 

 huts of a better description, most of them having a little garden with 

 cherry and plum trees, and a few cabbages and flowers. In the 

 veranda of one of them a woman was weaving coarse blue cloth. The 

 operation is tedious, for the fixed loom and the shuttle are unknown ; 

 and next to the weaving of the Arab hair-cloths, I should conceive 

 that in no part of the world can this most useful operation be per- 

 formed so clumsily or inconveniently. At the further part of the 

 Pocura an English butcher has built a house that looks like a palace 

 here, to the great admiration of the natives. Immediately above, 

 on a plain which may be from 80 to 100 feet above the village, is 

 the new burying ground or pantheon, the government having wisely 

 taken measures to prevent the continuance of burying in or near the 

 town. The prejudice, however, naturally attached to an ancient 

 place of sepulture prevents this from being occupied according to 

 the intention of the projectors. Separated from this only by a wall, 

 is the place at length assigned by Roman Catholic superstition to 

 the heretics as a burial ground ; or rather, which the heretics have 

 been permitted to purchase. Hitherto, such as had not permission 

 to bury in the forts where they could be guarded, preferred being 

 carried out to sea, and sunk; — many instances having occurred of 

 the exhumation of heretics, buried on shore, by the bigotted natives, 

 and the exposure of their bodies to the birds and beasts of prey. 



The situation of this resting-place is beautiful ; surrounded by 

 mountains, yet elevated above the plain, it looks out upon the ocean 

 over gardens and olive groves ; and if the spirit hovers over its mor- 

 tal remains, here at least it is surrounded with " shapes and sights 

 " delightful." But I trust it is better employed than in watching the 

 frail and perishable creature of clay ; a task, alas ! but irksome, when 

 life itself is the reward, but how disgusting to a pure intelligence, 

 which, once freed from its sublunary fetters, must delight in its liberty 



