ENGLISH CONSUL’S HOUSE AT LARNAKA.
M. Vondiziano has often been mentioned by travellers for the hospitable reception which he gave to the English. An ample fortune enabled him to do this with less inconvenience than some others who represented the British nation: but this circumstance ought not to diminish the feeling of obligation for hospitality exercised sometimes (as in my own person), for weeks and even months together.
The arrival of a traveller at the consular house is generally a signal for visits from all those who are in habits of friendship with the consul, impelled by curiosity and the desire of news. Four or five days were thus consumed, in which time I had made the acquaintance of half the people of the place.
A common subject of conversation for the entertainment of travellers is the history of those who have preceded them in the same route. Some gentlemen would be pleased to hear the things that were said of them; but I shall be excused from mentioning personal anecdotes, excepting where they have some reference to Eastern customs.[104]
As there was no vessel about to sail for Europe, I resolved to make an excursion into the interior of the island.
On Monday, January 28th, accompanied by Giovanni, (whom I had brought with me from Syria) I left Larnarka for Leucosia, the capital of the island, and called by the Franks Nicosia. The weather was cold, and, although I was clad in my lambskin pelisse, my fingers became quite benumbed. The first part of the road lay through a few fields of onions, artichokes, and other vegetables, cultivated for the supply of Larnaka market and of the vessels in the roads: but there were no trees whatever, and the soil had a bare appearance, being half covered with shingles. Two leagues from Larnaka we crossed the river Parthenia, and reached some low hills running apparently from the north-east side of the bay of Larnaka to the conical mountain now called the Mountain of the Cross. At the distance of four leagues, we arrived at Athegainos (pronounced by the modern Greeks Atheyanós), where we were to sleep.
Athegainos was a straggling village, containing probably seventy or eighty houses: it was nevertheless one of the largest on the island, the whole population of which it is said does not exceed 15,000 souls. Each cottage was enclosed by a very large yard, hedged in by a fence of prickly acacias, forming three sides of it, the fourth being buildings. The entrance was by large folding gates. Within, was a small room for travellers, the only furniture of which was a deal table placed on trestles to sleep on, with a cushion and mat on it. The floor was mud, uneven as the soil out of doors. Beyond this was a cow-lodge; then the cottage for the family, a stable for the mules, a straw room, and a lodge; in all five: the whole built of sunburnt bricks, with flat roofs on rafters covered with canes laid close together. There was a well in the yard. Such was the construction of all the houses in the village. The peasants there had but one occupation, that of carriers, owing to their central situation between Larnaka and Leucosia. They, their wives, and children, seemed filthy in their persons and habits. They however ate with knives and forks, sat on chairs, and slept on beds raised from the ground: in all which circumstances they differed from the Christians and Turks of Syria, and by some persons will, on that account, be supposed to be further advanced in civilization.
We left Athegainos early in the morning, and, at a small distance on the left, passed a mountain of about a mile long, in shape like an inverted hog-trough. Two or three others, of the same form, might be seen in different directions. On the left was a small conical mountain, the top of which looked like a ruin, but it was the strata of the rock which assumed that appearance. Beyond it was a stream, called Zalia; but neither this nor the one passed on the preceding day flows in summer.
A long range of mountains lay before us, stretching from the north part of the island to the level of Leucosia. Our road was west, somewhat northerly. Near the stream of Zalia was a Turkish village, and over the stream a small but neat bridge. The valley through which the Zalia runs had scattered olive trees planted in it; and we saw near the road, on the right and on the left, two single houses of three stories high, larger and better-looking than any we had yet observed out of Larnaka. These, my guide told me, belonged to Turkish agas, or gentlemen.
The face of the country had hitherto varied but little from a level, and the chain of low hills over which we had come was approached by so gradual a rise, and quitted by so gentle a descent, as to be almost imperceptible. In about two hours, we came in sight of the minarets of Leucosia, of which I counted seven. Two of these, belonging to the church of St. Sophia, towered above the others. Within a quarter of a mile of the city, upon the brow of an elevation, we enjoyed a full view of the place, which, from the number of palm and cypress trees interspersed among the houses, wore a picturesque appearance. The walls, I observed, were broader at the base than the summit. Close to the gate of the city was an infirmary for lepers—a small house, from which pitiable objects, consuming with disease, issued, to the number of thirty or forty, importuning for alms. A long, vaulted gateway, lighted half way through by a pierced dome, led us into the streets. The custom-house officer, placed at the entrance, questioned me on my luggage, but suffered me to proceed. We turned short to the left into the Christian quarter, where lived the archbishop, to whom I had a letter of introduction. On alighting, I was ushered into his presence by several priests, and found a man about forty-five years old, handsome in person, and richly attired in a sable pelisse. His address was pleasing; and, when he had read the letter I presented, he received me with much politeness, expressing great regard for the British nation. But, as French travellers, and those of other nations, relate that the like expressions have been used to them, it will be excusable if we suppose that the natural urbanity of the priest caused him to give an equal share of civility to all strangers. His name was Cyprianus, and he had sprung from a peasant family.