At stated times diligences run the twelve miles between Palma and Valldemosa, and the charge is only sevenpence-halfpenny. But the diligence goes no farther than Valldemosa, and that is three miles distant from the Hospederia. So, when we had decided to go on the Tuesday morning, we engaged Bartolomé, a good-looking bachelor charioteer, who stabled his carriage and pair of horses in Son Españolet, to drive us thither.
But Tuesday morning, when it came, brought a sudden change of weather. A strong easterly wind was blowing, and the temperature, for the first time since our arrival on these favoured isles, nearly approached cold. Bartolomé was warned that the journey was postponed for a day at least, and we spent the hours of uncertainty in grumbling at the weather, and in consuming the most perishable of the stock of provisions we had laid in for the expedition.
Judging the Majorcan climate by our knowledge of that of other countries, we were all secretly convinced that we had delayed too long, that the weather had probably changed for the winter, and that our little excursion might require to be postponed until spring.
But to our surprise and relief the succeeding morning proved calm and sunny. Having been duly instructed, Bartolomé drove up at ten o'clock precisely, with a jingling of bells that I am convinced set every feminine head in the Calle de Mas a-peer behind its discreetly closed venetian shutters. In appearance Bartolomé was the embodiment of buoyant geniality. His black hair curled in rings about his smiling face, and he had dressed for the occasion in a white suit, a pink shirt, and a pair of bright yellow elastic-sided boots.
Bartolomé's carriage, the sides of whose interior were decorated with four antimacassars on each of which was embroidered a flamboyant representation of a rampant steed, proved both roomy and comfortable, and we were only three in number. Yet when we had got packed in with our luggage, which included sketching materials as well as comestibles, there was scarcely room to stir. Never before had we realized what a cumbersome article food was: or calculated the bulk of—say—the bread even so small a family will consume in three days. And when you add to the loaves the meat and groceries, the vegetables and fruit, necessary for three days' moderate consumption, they will be found to occupy a surprisingly large amount of space.
The first portion of the journey led through the broad, fertile plain north of Palma, where plantations of almond, fig, and olive succeed each other with scarcely a break—that wide expanse whose fruitfulness has gained Majorca the title of the orchard of the Mediterranean. Near where the hills meet the plain we passed the village of Esglayeta, an attractive hamlet consisting of little more than a church and a wayside fonda.
The noses of the horses had been pointing directly towards a precipitous cleft in the range of mountains, and almost unexpectedly we entered the valley that divided two great hills. As we drove on, the winding road gradually ascended, until we found ourselves in the midst of the mountains and within sight of the outlying portion of lovely Valldemosa.
In his Byways of Europe Bayard Taylor said: "Verily there is nothing in all Europe so beautiful as Valldemosa." And indeed the ancient town, rising on its heights amid still higher heights above the valley that runs seawards, is strikingly beautiful.
It is only when taking Valldemosa in detail that one notices that its people are not quite so handsome, that they lack the gracious and light-hearted bearing of the inhabitants of Palma, that their dress is poorer, and the streets more squalid. Perhaps the difference in climate may account for the difference in appearance, for Valldemosa stands high among the mountains, and its climate is both colder and damper than that of Palma. The situation is supposed to be extremely healthy. It was at Valldemosa, on the site afterwards occupied by the Carthusian monastery, that in 1311 King Sancho, who was afflicted with asthma, built a palace to which he removed his Court, and from which he gave his hawking parties.
At the suggestion of Bartolomé, we paused to visit the church attached to the old monastery, which was shown us by an elderly woman, who, unlike most of the country people, spoke excellent Spanish and understood our efforts in that language.