Mérida was my southernmost limit, and detained me somewhat longer than I had intended. But, indeed, the very origin of the city seems to constitute an invitation to repose. First invaded and last subdued of all the Roman provinces, Spain was just witnessing the dawn of her early millennium when Augustus founded this home of rest for the veterans of the final campaign. If rest was his intention, it would rejoice his heart to see how diligently it is still practised by the descendants of his original colonists. But my own sojourn was not entirely voluntary. I had tried once more for Trujillo, and been forced to put back for repairs. Even a fate-compelled idleness, however, may sometimes be found opportune.
The great ruined aqueduct, the headquarters{229} of all the storks of the Guadiana, towered over the Cáceres road to the right of me as I again bore away to the northward. It had been the first object to greet my arrival, and was the last to haunt me as I left. The huge gaunt piers and crumbling arches seem more imposing in their ruin even than the complete structure at Segóvia, though I believe actual measurements place the latter first by a short head. “The Miracles,” the townsfolk call them; and the title is well bestowed. Yet Estremadura can boast one other miracle more stupendous even than these.
Once more I sallied forth from Cáceres, and set my face towards the west; and surely in all the solitudes of Estremadura there are none more solitary than this. Mile after mile the straight, white road heaves its long line across the ridges of the rolling moor. Its dust is seamed with the trail of the viper, and here and there the eagle hangs poised above his hunting-ground; but other life or landmark there is none for leagues together, till one feels one has been riding there for ever, and will probably continue till the end of time. Sometimes a ruined watch-tower will afford a distant beacon; sometimes a well-ambushed hamlet, whose swine are reputed to develop a specially succulent{230} bacon by a strict adherence to a viper dietary. They appear like the phases in a dream, and are swallowed in the immensity of their surroundings. As well seek a pin in a haystack as a homestead in this boundless waste.
If there be any faith in the milestones, Alcántara cannot lie beyond that great purple combe ahead of me. Yet how can there be room for the Tagus valley on the hither side? But even as I am flouting their promise, the road dives gracefully over the lip of an unsuspected hollow, and the fragments of a crumbling rampart resolve themselves into the long-sought town. The gateway admits me to a forlorn and grimy street; the houses are ruinous and neglected; everywhere is dirt and misery and dilapidation. What went ye out into the wilderness to see?
Just beyond the town, and far below the level of the moors, the Tagus has carved its deep and savage glen. Right and left, as far as the eye can reach, the bare bluff headlands stoop down into the abyss like the tors on the Devonshire coast; and at the bottom, pent between its walls of rock, the tawny river swirls down the ravine. All is vast and huge and desolate; the town itself hardly shows in such a picture; yet in the midst one{231} object catches the eye which seems to challenge comparison even with nature itself,—the work of Titans rather than men,—The Bridge—Al Kántarah.