The Canary Islands

by Florence Du Cane

The traveller Humboldt is said to have been a guest at La Paz for a few days, which has caused many Germans to call it “Humboldt’s villa,” and even to go so far as to say that he built it, though he only paid a flying visit of four days to Orotava in 1799. From the account of his visit in his “Personal Narrative” it appears doubtful as to whether he stayed at La Paz or at the house belonging to the Cologan family, in Villa Orotava. Alluding to his short stay, he remarks: “It is impossible to speak of Orotava without recalling to the remembrance of the friends of science, the name of Don Bernardo Cologan, whose house at all times was open to travellers of every nation. We could have wished to have sojourned for some time in Don Bernardo’s house, and to have visited with him the charming scenery of San Juan de la Rambla. But on a voyage such as we had undertaken, the present is but little enjoyed. Continually haunted by the fear of not executing the design of to-morrow we live in perpetual uneasiness....” Further on he says: “Don Cologan’s family has a country house nearer the coast than that I have just mentioned. This house, called La Paz, is connected with a circumstance that rendered it peculiarly interesting to us. M. le Borde, whose death we deplored, was its inmate during his last visit to the Canary Islands. It was in a neighbouring plain that he measured the base, by which he determined the height of the Peak.” The house has no pretensions to any great architectural beauty, but has an air of peace and stateliness which the hand of time gives to many a house of far less imposing dimensions than its modern neighbour.

On one side of the house a few steps lead down to the walled garden, a large square outlined and traversed by vine-clad pergolas, which again form four more squares. In the centre of one an immense pine tree shelters a round water basin, where papyrus and arums make a welcome shelter for the tiny green frogs. One feature of these old Spanish gardens might well be copied in other lands; a low double plaster wall some two feet thick, called locally a poyo, makes a charming border for plants: geraniums, verbenas, stocks, carnations, poppies, and the hanging Pico de paloma, all look their best grown in this way, and at a lower level a wide low seat ran along the walls. The beds were edged with sweet-smelling geranium, the white-leafed salvia, a close-growing thyme, or box, all kept clipped in neat, compact hedges. Some of the garden has now, alas! been given over to a more profitable use than that of growing flowers, and a potato crop is succeeded in summer by maize, but enough remains for a wealth of flowering trees, shrubs, creepers and plants. The brilliant orange Bignonia venusta covers a long stretch of the pergola, drapes the garden wall and climbs up to the flat roof-top of one of the detached wings of the house. In summer a white stephanotis disputes possession and covers the tiled roof of a garden shed, filling the whole air with its delicious scent. Among other sweet-smelling plants were daturas, whose great trumpets are especially night-scented flowers, and in early spring the tiny white blossoms of the creeping smilex smell so much like the orange blossoms which have not yet opened, that their delicious fragrance might easily be mistaken for it. Sweet-scented geraniums grow in every corner, and heliotropes, sweet peas and stocks all add to the fragrance of the garden.

The grounds contain several good specimen palms, too many perhaps for the health of flowers, as their roots seem to poison the ground; hibiscus, coral trees, pittosperums and a long list of trees common to most sub-tropical gardens find a home, but the tree I most admired was a venerable specimen of the native olive growing near a grove of feathery giant bamboos.

The cypress avenue leads to a broad terrace at a dizzy height above the sea; the surf beats against the cliffs below, but the salt air does not seem to affect the beautiful vegetation, and for long years great clumps of Euphorbias and Kleinias have stood against the winter storms when great breakers roll in and crash against the rocks. On the left lies the little flat town of the Puerto, over which in clear weather the Island of La Palma emerges from its mantle of clouds, and many a gorgeous sunset bathes the whole town in a mist of rosy light, recalling the legend that in days of old, navigators had christened the little fishing-port the Puerto de Oro, after Casa de Oro, the House of Gold, which title they had given to the Peak, as night after night the setting sun had turned its cap of snow to pale gold.

On the right the broken coast-line stretches away into the far distance, and the mountains rise above the little villages; they in their turn are caught by the setting sun and kissed by her last departing rays, and turned to a rosy pink, but as the ball of fire sinks into the sea, the shadows creep up, and in one moment in this land which knows no twilight, the light is gone and the cold greyness of night takes possession.

Just behind La Paz are the Botanical gardens, which owe their existence to the Marquez de Nava, who in 1795 undertook at enormous expense to level the hill of Durasno, and lay it out for receiving the treasures of other climes. Though complaints are often made of its distance from the so-called “English colony,” the site was well chosen, as the soil on this side of the barranco, which separates it from the lava bed, is decidedly more fertile, and being of a heavier nature and deeper is less liable to blight and disease, which are the curse of the gardens on light dry soil, and which no amount of irrigation will cure. In this garden are collected treasures from every part of the world; new ground is sadly needed as the immense trees and shrubs have made the cultivation of flowers a great difficulty. Humboldt appreciated the use of these gardens for the introduction of plants from Asia, Africa and South America, remarking that: “In happier times when maritime wars shall no longer interrupt communication, the garden of Teneriffe may become extremely useful with respect to the great number of plants which are sent from the Indies to Europe: for ere they reach our coasts they often perish owing to the length of the passage, during which they inhale an air impregnated with salt water. These plants would meet at Orotava with the care and climate necessary for their preservation; at Durasno, the Protea, the Psidium, the Jambos, the Chirinoya of Peru, the sensitive plant, and the Heliconia all grow in the open air.”

BOTANICAL GARDENS, OROTAVA

To give a list of all the trees and plants would be an impossibility and any one who is interested in them will find an excellent account of the gardens in a pamphlet written by Dr. Morris of Kew, who was much interested in his visit to the Canary Islands in 1895. The gardens for some years fell into a neglected state from lack of funds, but once again bid fair to regain their former glory under new management. Among the chief ornaments of the gardens are the very fine specimens of the native pine, Pinus canariensis, an immense Ficus nitida, one of the best shade-giving trees, and travellers from the tropics will recognise an old friend in Ravenala madagascariensis, the “Traveller’s Tree,” in the socket of whose leaves water is always to be found.

Further up the road is the property of San Bartolomeo; the land is now entirely devoted to banana cultivation, the house is handed over to the tender mercies of a medianero, and the garden tells a tale of departed glories. In the patio of the house a donkey is stalled under a purple bougainvillea, and tall cypresses look down reproachfully at the fallen state of things. In the chapel of the house mass is still said daily, but for seven years I was told the sala had not been opened. In the garden the myrtle hedges have grown out of all bounds, jessamines have become a dense tangle, and the plaster poyos, which once were full of plants, are crumbling to decay.