CHAPTER XVII
SPALATO AND SALONA
Westward Along the Coast—First Glimpse of Spalato—The Campanile—Diocletian’s Palace—Salona and Her Ruins.
The full glow of the morning sunlight gleamed and danced upon the brass-work of the little steamer Petka as the stevedores finished their loading of her freight from the dock at Cattaro and the last assortment of passengers had wobbled noisily up the gangway.
It was exactly ten o’clock when the lines were cast off and the ship steamed slowly ahead, turning on her course to gain the Adriatic. She circled about almost at the very edge of the shore line, for there is no semblance of a beach and the deep water extends to the bases of the mighty cliffs that surround the harbour, until Cattaro in the distance put one in mind of a collection of Noah’s Ark houses. The waters were calm and smooth as the surface of a mirror, and held quiescent and in perfect outline the reflections of the rugged mountains.
Once the Petka had negotiated the many consecutive mouths of the Bocche and had finally passed the grim walls of the fortresses on Punta d’Ostro, close on the starboard, she set her course almost due west with her ultimate destination Fiume, her home port; but she was due to call en voyage at almost all of the towns along the coast.
Her main deck was an odd and interesting sight. It was crowded, so crowded that one could see scarcely one square inch of planking, with a rare galaxy of Montenegrins, Cattarines, Albanians, Greeks and Austrian soldiers, each garbed in some bit of costume that made his or her nationality unmistakable. All sprawled about in the sun, smoking or sleeping, their heads and shoulders entwined about their luggage and their legs aimed across the deck like the tails of so many comets.
Above the upper deck, reserved for first-class passengers, white awnings had been stretched, and under these we followed the examples of the natives on board, to a certain extent, to enjoy the beauties of the land-locked passage, through which the ship set her course after leaving Gravosa.
Here on deck, lunch was served at noon and dinner in the evening, each meal an elaborate affair with wine, and composed of some of the most palatable dishes to be had anywhere in Europe. Seven constitutes the usual number of courses served at dinner on board any of these Adriatic coasters, and lunch is hardly less voluminous: hors-d’œuvres, of course; soup; fish; a sort of cold fish salad with mayonnaise; spring lamb and delicious vegetables; game of some description; salad; and dessert.