An Abandoned Province 229 



dimensions, roe, wolves, and wild-boars abound on Estremenian 

 sierra and vccju. Then, too, there may well be isolated spots of 

 interest in 20,000 square miles, but which escaped our survey. 

 Yet what we write represents the essential fact — Estremadura is 

 a barren lifeless wilderness and offers no more attraction to 

 naturalist than to ao-riculturist. 



The cause of all this involves questions not easily answered. 

 In earlier days the case may have been different. Obviously the 

 Romans thought highly of Estremadura and meant to run it for 

 all it was worth. The Caesars were no visionaries, and such 

 colossal works as their reservoirs and aqueducts at Merida, the 

 massive amphitheatre and circus at the same city (a half- 

 completed bull-ring stands alongside in pitiful contrast), besides 

 their construction of a first-class fortress at Trujillo, all attest 

 a matured judgment. After the Romans came the Goths, 

 and they, too, have left evidence of appreciation (though less 

 conspicuous) alike in city and country. Four hundred years 

 later the Arabs overthrew the Goths on Guadaletc (a.d. 711), 

 and within tw^o years had overrun two-thirds of Spain. But the 

 Moor (so far as we can see) despised these barren uplands, or 

 perhaps assessed them at a truer value — a single strong outpost 

 (Trujillo) in an otherwise w^orthless region. 



Much or little, however, each of those successive conquerors 

 found some use for Estremadura. A totally different era opened 

 with the fall of Moslem dominion. After the Recvnquista and 

 subsequent extermination of the Moors (seventeenth century), 

 Estremadura was utterly abandoned, by Cross and Crescent 

 alike, till the highland shepherds of the Castiles and of Leon, 

 looking down from its northern frontier, saw in these lower- 

 lying wastes a useful winter -grazing. Then commenced 

 seasonal nomadic incursions thereto, pastoral tribes driving down 

 each autumn their flocks and herds, much as the Patriarchs did in 

 Biblical days — or the Masai in East Africa till yesterday. 



Though the land itself was ownerless, shadowy prescriptive 

 rights gradually evolved, and under the title of Mestas continued 

 to be recognised by the pastoral nomads till abolished by Royal 

 Decree in the sixteenth century. From that date commenced the 

 subdivision of Estremadura into the present large private estates 

 — ao-ain recallino- the back-veld Boers, who hate to live one 

 within sight of another, except that here owners are non-resident. 



