The Sunny South: An Autumn in Spain and Majorca

by John William Clayton

The following morning we started at dawn straight across the island to the town of Artá, situated on the eastern coast, forty-five miles from Palma. We were accompanied by a guide, who had with him a supply of blue-lights, roman-candles, and other combustibles, with which the famous stalactite caves of Artá were to be lit up for our gratification. We hired a little open carriage and a couple of small, wiry horses, which carried us over the well-made road with considerable alacrity.

In the afternoon we reached Manacor, which, next to Palma, is the largest town in Majorca, having a population of about 12,600. It is a very clean town, rather glaring in appearance, from the liberal use of whitewash. In external aspect it is a cross between the Spanish and Oriental, but, otherwise, is remarkable for nothing in particular.

Late at night we arrived at the little town of Artá, and jolted over the rather undulating pavement of its streets. The sensation was by no means agreeable, though, fortunately, it was of short duration, and, therefore, was tolerated with greater patience. We slept at the smallest and most primitive of posadas imaginable! The style of architecture it would be impossible to determine, though the building was very simple in structure. It consisted of a heap of bricks, mortar, dried mud, whitewash, and a board or two, with little holes scooped in the edifice, helping to form the apartments. The supply of fresh air was not so deficient as usual; for in the sleeping-rooms window-frames were apparently regarded as superfluous luxuries.

After a frugal meal, we attempted to enjoy a little slumber; but it proved to be equally frugal in amount and quality. As early as it was possible for cocks to favour each other with their shrill responses, there was a perfect concert of cock-crowing around the house, and, we believe, on the top of it too. The ornithological entertainment began and was kept up with great spirit until our guide knocked at our door to go through the very unnecessary ceremony of calling us. It is true we were supposed to be enjoying our repose in a posada, or "place of repose," but the noises that commenced with the first dawn of morning were so numerous and so loud as effectually to murder sleep.

We started in the early morning, after a refreshing breakfast of red mud, called chocolate, some black bread, and no butter. After walking across fresh prairie lands, green with sprouting corn, and over sandy tracts interspersed with aloes and the universal olive, we began to ascend the steep pathway at the foot of the mountains covered with dark pine trees, dwarf oak, and arbutus, which led to the mouth of the cave. The cave is hewn out of a vast mass of limestone, of which the hills in this neighbourhood are composed. We toiled upwards, following the steps of our guide, who, as well as a little boy whom he had pressed into his service by the way, was laden with a perfect fagot of port-fires, blue lights, and other combustibles.

Before us was a magnificent natural arch, the vaulted roof of which rose to the height of a hundred and forty feet. By this vestibule of nature we approached the darkening galleries tunnelled in the rock, and leading to those mysterious caverns which concealed so much that was beautiful in the deep bowels of the mountains. As we advanced, the obscurity deepened, and we had to light our torches. Happening to look back, we perceived the bright archway of light at the entrance diminished into a luminous speck in the distance. Upon reaching a level space, at the foot of a rude hewn staircase, we found ourselves in the middle of a splendid hall or vaulted chamber, in which the uncertain gleam of the torch fell faintly upon tall uncouth objects, apparently white, though rather dim in hue, standing at intervals. Without any extravagant exercise of the imagination, one might have pictured to himself this chamber as the Pit of Acheron, and these gaunt shapes as the petrified forms of those doomed to imprisonment in its gloomy recesses.

The great pillars which adorn this noble hall are calcareous deposits, formed by the everlasting droppings from the percolated roof above. We picked our way further downwards over a wooden staircase, with the natural roof rising over us into arch after arch of great beauty, but irregular form. The guide, accompanied by the boy moving on in front with blazing torches, looked like some demon with his attendant imp luring us spell-bound into some vast and fatal labyrinth. One great hall in which we found ourselves was noble and grand in appearance. In the middle of the gloom loomed masses of fretted white stalactite, rising upward in spiral forms, while some tall, slender objects appeared like the graceful stems of palm-trees capped with feathery plumage. These were formed by the pillars, as they joined the roof, being pushed backwards and spread out like boughs of drooping foliage.

In another chamber called the Hall of the Virgin, a marvellous effect was produced. In the middle of the spacious concave we dimly perceived some lofty object of a grey and misty hue. "Momento," said the guide, "don't move;" and in another instant a blue light was kindled. No words can describe the effect that was instantaneously produced. The walls shone like crystal of dazzling brilliancy. The roof was like a firmament ablaze with a million stars. The numerous columns that supported it were adorned with a profusion of filigree work which had some resemblance to Gothic tracery. A lofty marble-like pedestal, apparently supporting a graceful female figure which, amidst many folds of gauzy drapery of the most brilliant whiteness was caressing a sleeping infant, composed a group at once beautiful, majestic, and serene.

In the Hall of the Organ there is a great number of airy white pillarets collected in a mass, which in the gloom natural to these subterranean halls have some resemblance to the pipes of an organ. Wandering about in passages that appeared almost like aisles in nature's temple, we anticipated every moment a burst of mysterious melody in harmony with the wonderful character of a place so rarely seen by human eye.

The name of the Hall of the Curtain is sufficiently suggestive of what is to be seen in the chamber so designated. A wall of dazzling white stone is of such airy texture that it seems in the fitful glare of the torches to be driven backwards and forwards by the wind. So, in the Hall of the Banners, a flag appears to be drooping from its staff and occasionally waving in the breeze. We know it is only a delusion, but for the moment it is wonderfully like reality. As we followed our guide in these awful caverns by stairway and corridor, through hall and gallery, we could almost imagine that we were pacing the courts of some buried palace of some long-forgotten Titan race.