232 



Unexplored Spain 



many fresli species of birds, including : — nuthatch (not seen 

 elsewhere in Spain), green woodpecker, common (but no azure) 

 magpies, golden orioles, pied and spotted fly- catchers, grey 

 and white wagtails (breeding), whitethroats and nightingales, 

 longtailed tits, woodlarks, corn-buntings, rock-sparrows, and quite 

 a number of warblers (spectacled, rufous, and suljalpine, Bonelli's 

 and melodious wdllow-warblers), besides the usual common species 

 — serins, chaffinches, robins, wrens, and so on. On the sterile 

 upland plateaux, both here and in Castile, the black-bellied sand- 

 grouse breeds, as well as stone-curlew, bustard, and the usual 

 larks and chats. 



Granadilla 



At the extreme northern verge of the plain one encounters a 

 singular survival of long-past and forgotten ages, the " fenced 

 city " of Granadilla, so absolutely unspoilt and unchanged by 

 time that one breathes for a spell a pure mediaeval air. Grana- 

 dilla is mentioned in no book that we possess ; but it stands there, 

 nevertheless, perched on a rocky bluff above the rushing Alagon, 

 and entirely encompassed by a thirty-foot wall. Not a single 

 house, not a hut, shows up outside that rampart, and its single 

 gate is guarded by a massive stone-built tower. 



This tow^er, we were told by a local friend, was erected after 

 the " Reconquest " (which here occurred about 1300), but the 

 bridge which spans the Alagon, immediately below, is attributed 

 to the Romans — more than a thousand years earlier ! and the 

 town itself to the Moors — a pretty tangle which some wandering 

 archaeologist may some day unravel.^ That the Moors established 

 a settlement here, or hard by, we are confident owing to the 



' Innnediately adjoining tlie south approacli to the bridge over the Alagon is sculptured 

 on the bluIF a heraldic device representing a figure j)lucking a pomegranate (Granada) from 

 a tree — the arms of Granadilla. There is an inscription, with date, beneath ; but these we 

 failed to decipher. 



