44 



ENVIRONS OF MALAGA. 



150 Spanish dollars per fanega. There is a piece of 

 land, adjoining their own, which they are anxious to buy ; 

 they would give for it 1,500 rials per fanega — to plant 

 it with vines would cost 500 rials more, and there would 

 be no return for three years. Each fanega^ he says, con- 

 tains 650 stocks, and as each stock is seven feet apart 

 from its neighbours, the number of square feet in a fanega 

 will be 31,850, vvhich is 2 roods 37 perches English mea- 

 sure. It required, he said, ten men for a day to hole a 

 fanega for the plantation. If, therefore, 10 stocks give 

 25 lbs. of raisins, a fanega will give 1 ,625 lbs., or 65 

 arrohas or boxes of 25 lbs. each ; which would be, for an 

 English acre, 2^222 lbs. Don Salvador pays his workmen 

 3^: rials, about 8|d. a-day, besides food. The food consists 

 of, in the morning, a soup of lentils, &c. ; at dinner, 

 pork ; and, at supper, the aspachio, or cold soup, formerly 

 described, bread and grapes at discretion. The whole 

 costs about 5f rials, or 14d., a-day. 



Saturday^ 9,2nd October. — Having read over to Mr. 

 Kirkpatrick my notes of yesterday's excursion, he said 

 that Don Salvador's information was generally correct, 

 but added the following observations : — The Muscatel 

 grape, Mr. Kirkpatrick thinks, must be cultivated as 

 much as four leagues from the coast, but will not suc- 

 ceed beyond that distance. The extent of coast which 

 admits of its cultivation must also be five or six leagues, 

 at least, as the principal cultivation is in the neighbour- 

 hood of Velez Malaga, five leagues to the eastward of 

 Malaga. — There are three distinct sorts of raisins: — 1st, 

 the Muscatel, which are the finest, and are always 

 packed in boxes of 25 lbs., and half and quarter boxes 

 containing, respectively, the half and quarter of that 

 quantity. — 2dly, Sun or Bloom raisins : these are pre- 

 pared in a manner in every respect similar to the Mus- 



