Sierra Morena 149 



nor wild-boar, whereas it forms the selected home of ibex and 

 lammergeyer, both of which are conspicuous by their absence 

 from Morena, save for a single segregated colony of wild-goats 

 near Fuen-Caliente. 



Although the Sierra Morena partakes rather of massive than 

 of abrupt character, yet there occur at a couple of points outcrops 

 of naked rock of real grandeur. Such, for example, is Despefia- 

 perros, through whose gorges the Andalucian railway threads 

 a semi-subterranean course. The very name Despefiaperros 

 signifies in that wondrously adaptive Spanish tongue nothing 

 less than that its living rocks threaten to hurl to death and 

 destruction even dogs that venture thereon. 



Another interpretation suggests that in olden days, such 

 were the pleasantries of the Moors, it was not dogs, but Christians 

 (since to a Moor the terms were synonymous) that were hurled 

 to their death from the riscos of Despefiaperros. 



These rock-formations are superbly abrupt. Great detached 

 crags, massive and moss-marbled, jut perpendicular from ragged 

 steeps, or vast monoliths protrude, each in rectilineal outline 

 so exact that one wonders if these are truly of nature's handi- 

 work, and not some fabled fortalice of old-time Goth or Moor. 

 Despite its striking contour, however, its crags and precipices 

 are too scattered and detached (with traversable intervals 

 between) to attract such a rock -lover as the ibex, and no wild- 

 goat has ever occupied the gorges of Despefiaperros. 



A similar rock-region, but more extensive and continuous, 

 is found near Fuen-Caliente — by name the Sierra Quintana. 

 This range, though its elevations barely exceed 7000 feet, forms 

 the only spot in the Sierra Morena at which the Spanish ibex 

 retains a foothold. 



Thereat the writer in 1901 endured one of those evil 

 experiences which from time to time befall those who seek 

 hunting-grounds in the wilder corners of the earth. It was in 

 mid-February that, forced by bitter extremity of weather, we 

 fain sought refuge in the hamlet of Fuen-Caliente clinging at 

 5700 feet on the steep of the sierra, as crag-martins fix their 

 clay-built nests on some rock-face. Fuen-Caliente dates back to 

 Roman days. AVarm springs, as its name implies, here burst 

 from riven rock, and stone baths, built by no modern hand, 



