Passing down a narrow street of steps we came upon an old house whose wide outer court tempted us to enter. Exploring, we found ourselves in an olive oil factory. In the inner chamber a patient mule, his eyes blindfolded by having miniature straw baskets tied over them, was walking sedately round, supplying the force that crushed the olives, and from the press the oil was gushing in streams that went to fill the vats underneath the floor.
On the outside wall of the post office a caged bird was singing cheerily. Next door was the prison, but that cage was empty. The barred window of its cell opened breast-high on the street, but spiders had, undisturbed, woven webs across its bars, and the key stood in the door. Evidently malefactors are scarce in the quaint hill-town.
Leaving the crooked streets, we strolled up the side of the torrente, which flowed amidst orange orchards and by the sides of picturesque houses. Pomegranate-trees, their dainty foliage flecked with autumnal gold, had rooted in the high banks by the water, and the unplucked rose-red fruit had already supplied many a luxurious meal for the birds. Were I a bird I would elect to build my nest at Fornalutx, for there I would be sure to find an abundance of good food. Figs bursting with ripeness hung on the trees, and all around were oranges, and vines, and yet more oranges.
Far up the precipitous hill-path, at a point so high that it afforded a glorious view of Sóller, we came upon a farm-house known to our friends.
The occupants, greeting us kindly, took us into the most curious kitchen imaginable. Goatskins covered the ceiling, and in the centre was a place where seats encircled a charcoal brazier—a Majorcan "cosy corner," where the household could sit and snugly toast their toes, when storms blew snell about the mountains and rain obscured the valley.
The garden space in front of the farm-house had been turned into a great bower by a huge vine that, trained along a trellis, cast over it a pleasant shade.
It was late in the season—the last day of November—yet a few glorious clusters of grapes, the berries all golden and pink and wearing a bloom unmarred by touch of hand, hung heavy from its branches. Here another instance of native generosity awaited us, for the housewife, resolutely refusing recompense, sent us away laden with bunches. As we descended to where the carriage waited we must have presented something of the appearance of the returning spies that Moses had sent out to view the land of Canaan.