English-speaking travellers in Galicia (II) : Galicia, the Switzerland of Spain by Annette M. B. Meakin

Excerpts from the book Galicia, the Switzerland of Spain (1909) by British author Annette M. B. Meakin

   Fare thee well, Galicia! [...] Thou art a land that for the wonderful richness of thy soil and the exuberance of thy vegetation might be made the Garden of Europe. All these thou art, and more; yet not only art thou practically unknown to the rest of the world, but thou art forgotten even by Spain: thy own Peninsula is almost unconscious of thy existence, though thou art the spot which has provided her with her most sacred traditions, her poetry, her trovadors, and her Patron Saint. Thy beautiful mountains, thy pine-clad peaks, thy waterfalls, thy torrents and thy rias, thy smiling valleys and thy mossy ravines, thy terraced slopes and thy limpid streamlets, are separated by the rest of Europe by the waters of the River of Oblivion.

A glance at the map of Galicia will show the reader that this province is entirely composed of alternating peaks, hills, and valleys. It has often called on this account «the Switzerland of Spain». The rock if which the mountains and boulders are formed is almost entirely of granite [...] The rocky soil possesses all the ingredients most favourable to rich vegetation. Galicia has many different climates, resulting from the varied heights of the different zones above sea-level. The difference in temperature and in the humidity of the air are very considerable. Central Galicia is in the same latitude as Russian Turkestan, as part of Albania, and as Pennsylvania, but her climate is infinitely more humid than that of these countries. Heavy and continuous rains soak through the earth and replenish the innumerable mountain springs which are the great cause of Galicia's wonderful fertility; the springs, themselves perennial, feed in their turn the countless streamlets, each of which is again a fresh centre of evaporation. The vigorous vegetation which responds to these extremely favourable conditions helps to preserve, by the cool moisture of its rich and abundant foliage, the dampness of the atmosphere, and to the reunion of these three causes may be traced the remarkable humidity of the province.

   Within a radius of ten miles my eyes have rested upon pine-clad mountain scenery wild and beautiful as that of Norway, and upon a riviera of vegetation like that of Mentone, embracing the orange, the cactus, the olive, the fig, and even the lemon tree laden with its ripening fruit. The sides of the narrow and undulating valleys are often entirely vine-clad; the steeper slopes, cut into terraces, are planted with potatoes, cabbages, or bristle-pointed oats. Sometimes a mountain-side appears as if it were provided with a majestic flight of verdant steps cut in its side from base to summit.

Narcissus bulbocodium (Photo Carlos Rueda)

The climate and soil of Galicia are so variated that not only can every plant known to Europe be made to flourish there, but many tropical ones as well [...] The magnolia and the camellia grow there in profusion [...] The camellia exhibits here some six hundred varieties, and is, during the winter months, the chief ornament of the public walks and gardens [...] Another favourite tree is the azalia, which is constantly found in the public squares and gardens. Wisteria does as well here as in Japan. I noticed it specially luxuriant in Pontevedra. [...] There are flowers out of doors all the year round. Not only is the camellia brilliant with white and red blooms in December and January, but high hedges of wild geraniums are also in bloom, and sweet-scented violets abound in the woods in January. In March and April the hoop-petticoat narcissus carpets meadows as profusely as the wild hyacinth does with us [...] Many of the wild flowers are much the same as those of our own Devonshire hedges and meadows, but I noticed a number that I had never seen in England. [...]

 

Old chestnuts by the river Sil (Photo Carlos Rueda)

 The chestnut, the oak, and the walnut are three of the commons trees in Galicia. The chestnut, the king of the Gallegan forests, grows to perfection, and its nut formed, until quite recently, one of the principal means of sustenance among the poor [...] The poor have a process by which they smoke and dry the chestnuts that are to be preserved for winter use; these are eaten just as you would eat a hard biscuit. I tried one, but found it too hard for my teeth. The pigs in many parts are fed largely upon chestnuts; hence the remarkably fine flavour of their bacon. [...] The birch, betula alba, only grows in the higher zones. I found this tree on the high moorlands near the Portuguese frontier. The willow, the ash, and the Portuguese laurel grow in abundance in the valleys along the river banks, and in most places where the ground is moist. The lime is another tree that grows abundantly, and to a great high, in Galicia. In March an the early part of April the uncultivated parts of the country are gloriously yellow with gorse, ulex Europaeus, which sends out long shoots and branches covered with brilliant blossom, and is altogheter finer than I had ever seen it in England.

 

Vineyards on terraces at Ribeira Sacra (Photo Alberto López)

Galicia is essentially a vine country; from time immemorial her vines have been appreciated, but rather for their abundance than their quality, as too little care has been bestowed upon their cultivation [...] Every peasant house has its vine-covered verandah, and the beauty of many a Gallegan landscape is greatly due to the vine-clad terraces that cover the hillsides. In the early spring, when the branches are still bare, they look, in the distance, like fishermen's nets spread out to dry in the sun.

I understood now how it came about that the Gallegan emigrants sometimes died of home-sickness, for I had experienced something of the inexpressible charm of their beautiful country, their hills and valleys always green, and their perennial streams that are never parched, and I could understand something of what it must be to these poor fellows to be separated from such a home by thousands and thousands of miles in a land where all nature was so different. South America, with its wide prairies under a merciless sun, its wild and savage mountains where one may travel for days together without finding a sign of human life, is very different from populous Galicia with its gentle, smiling scenery, its mountains whose slopes are veritable gardens, its innumerable springs, its rias and its rivers, its vines and its orchards. [...] Yes, I had begun to understand the devotion of the Gallegans to their beautiful native land. Who would not love passionately so sweet a birthplace? Even the Russian loves his steppe, where the scene never changes for thousands of miles. In Galicia, every nook, every crag, every peak, every valley has a distinctive character that is all its own, with its own peculiar beauty. Galicia's cottage homes are of granite, they last for many generations; even the Russian exile loves his home, though his isba of wood will not last twenty years. Shall not the Gallegan regret Galicia, where there is so much that his memory can cling to? There are two kinds of home-sickness to which the Gallegan emigrants are subject, -saudades, a milder form, and morriña, already mentioned; they die of the latter, but the former is not fatal, and the sound of their beloved musical instrument, the gaita, or bagpipe, has been known to revive their spirits and give them the power to throw it off.