The sunken glen, whose sunless shrubs must weep,
The tender azure of the unruffled deep,
The orange tints that gild the greenest bough,
The torrents that from cliff to valley leap,
The vine on high, the willow branch below,
Mixed in one mighty scene, with varied beauty glow.’
The ridge, on the highest pinnacle of which the convent of our Lady of the Rock is situated, is wild, rugged, and precipitous, ascending to an elevation of about two thousand five hundred feet. A low cliff skirts the sea-shore, and singular masses, apparently of drift sand, make their appearance, stretching for some miles along and inland.
A very picturesque appearance is often presented by the fishing-boats when the breeze is fresh. They have a drag-net attached to the extreme end of a long outrigger, stretching some thirty or forty feet beyond the vessel, and hundreds of sea-birds follow the net, with the view, apparently, of picking up any stray fish they can extract from it.
The Rock of Lisbon, a huge, unshapely, but striking mass, indicates the approach to the Tagus. The river opens up magnificently from the sea. The spires and lofty buildings of Lisbon are distinctly visible, with the vessels at anchor off the quay. Cape Espartelle, a remarkable headland, with a lighthouse upon its extremity, becomes visible a little to the south of the debouchure of the Tagus. The cliff is obliquely stratified, and marked like those of Alum bay, Isle of Wight. The land now recedes, and is in a considerable measure lost sight of, till, rounding close in upon cape St. Vincent, the scene of the celebrated engagement in 1797, the bay of Cadiz is entered. In crossing this bay, land is for some time lost sight of. It becomes visible again off cape Trafalgar; but this celebrated headland it was our misfortune to pass in the dark.
The next place of importance reached by the steamer is Gibraltar, where we quit the Atlantic ocean, and enter the Mediteranean. The rock of Gibraltar first comes into view about ten miles off. As the bay is approached, the suddenness of the change in the color of the water, from bright deep blue to green, as the soundings decrease at once from twenty-four to sixteen fathoms, strikes the voyager. The transition is instantaneous, without any intermediate hue or shading. Rounding the point Carnero, and breasting Europa point, you find yourself at once within a beautiful sheltered and spacious recess, some six miles across and ten in depth, with British men-of-war, steamers, and merchant-ships of every nation at anchor. The appearance of the rock of Gibraltar, with respect to its known military strength, generally disappoints the stranger. The most formidable of the batteries are either concealed in mysterious galleries in the bosom of the rock itself, half-way up, or lie so close on the line of the sea, as to be lost sight of amongst the hulls of the vessels around. The promontory consists of a vast rock, rising from twelve hundred to fourteen hundred feet above the sea; it is about three miles in length, and from one-half to three-quarters of a mile in width, and is joined to the mainland by a low sandy isthmus, about a mile and a half in length. On the north side, fronting the isthmus, the rock is almost perpendicular, the east and south sides are also steep and rugged; but on the west side it slopes downward to a fine bay, nine miles long by four and a half miles broad. On this slope lies the town, containing a mixed population of sixteen thousand, and above rise the principal ramparts of the rocky fortress, which is generally garrisoned by from three to four thousand troops. The ordnance consists of more than seven hundred cannons fit for service.