On the Agriculture of Spain. 
345 
sugar plantations are increasing, the proprietors having benefited 
by the abrogation of the tithes. Notwillistanding the surpass- 
ing fertility of a part of this district, the far greater part is a 
dry and arid desert, as far as agriculture is concerned, vast tracts 
producing only the most fragrant and beautiful wild plants in 
Europe. The establishment of pantanos or reservoirs to collect 
the winter rain, in the mode of those of India, for which there is 
great facility, would produce extraordinary change in the face of 
this most interesting region. The principal food of animals in 
some parts is the pod of the algarroba, or locust tree (Cercis sili- 
quastruni), which grows in the most arid soil, but the value of it 
is almost exclusively known to the Valencians and Catalonians, 
whilst, from the want of better animal food, baccalao or dried cod 
fried in oil is a staple article in that of man. It is not eaten in 
compliance with the ordinances of the church, the people of the 
whole of Spain being exempt by special bull from the ordinary 
fasts of the Roman catholic church, but as a regular standing 
article of food, and in most of the villages the traveller can pro- 
cure little else. To show more clearly the nature of the line I 
have drawn as to the climate, on the 20tli of May they were in 
the middle of the wheat harvest in the Vega of Malaga, whilst in 
that of Granada, which belongs to the second division, a fortnight 
afterwards the corn was perfectly green, and there was nearly a 
month difference from that and the " tierra caliente" only a few 
miles distant. 
The second region is by far the greatest in extent, in value, 
and importance, in every way, of the Spanish peninsula. It com- 
prises the two Castiles, Aragon, Estremadura, the greater part of 
Catah)nia, Upper Andalusia, and part of Navarre and Leon. 
From the products of the greater part of it, the term 'cerealian' 
may be applied to it with great propriety. Throughout its vast 
extent wheat is produced in quality, and would be in quantity if 
it were properly tilled, equal, if not superior, to that of any country 
on the globe. The better parts of this division are the two table- 
lands of Old and New Castile,* with the territory of La Mancha 
and of Cuenca, the territory of Guadalaxara, the Alcarria, a dis- 
trict near the sources of the Tagus, that of the valley of the same 
river above and below Talavera, the province of Toledo. In Old 
Castile the territory of Olmedo and Palencia, of Burgos, of Medina 
de Rio Seco, and most parts of the course of the Duero and its 
tributaries. 
The kingdom of Leon, with its noble streams of the Esla and 
* The greater part of the Castiles is almost entirely arable, producing 
remarkably fine wheat, from which is made throughout Spain, some of the 
best bread in Europe. The country is mostly bare of timber, and rises 
imperceptibly to Madrid. — F. B. 
