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Updated: May 18, 2025
On the left lies the Casa de Campo, an immense extent of park, containing, on the high ground, some splendid specimens of the Scotch fir, and, in more sheltered spots, groves of beech, avenues of plane, and masses of the dark-leaved ilex, which grows to great perfection in this climate.
On the greensward just back of them, under the shade of the dark-leaved orange-trees, played troops of careless children, who had been sent here by their parents to beg, but had forgotten their vocation.
Crimson ramblers, giving promise of the bloom that was yet to come, climbed over one end of the porch, and there were fine dark-leaved lilac-bushes near the doorway: oh, a pleasant, friendly, quiet place! I opened the front gate and walked straight in, as though I had at last reached my destination. I cannot give any idea of the lift of the heart with which I entered upon this new adventure.
Imagine my surprise on seeing at the bottom of one gulch, a grove of good-sized, dark-leaved, very handsome trees, with an abundance of smooth round green fruit upon them, and on reaching them finding that they were orange trees, their great size, far exceeding that of the largest at Valencia, having prevented me from recognizing them earlier!
There were large groves of broad-leaved plantains and graceful cocoa-nut trees, the slender tapering betel-nut palm and elegant palmyras; while the showy-looking papaw, and here and there a rhambutan tree, or a dark-leaved guava, contrasted with the golden fruit of the shaddock, and the delicious mangustan and the curious-tasted durian were to be found in numbers among them.
Here were thriving orange and fig-trees mingled with glistening, dark-leaved myrtles, which were bordered by an edging of box so high and stout of limb that the main stems were more like trees than shrubs. The guide told us they were centuries old.
It is said that 15,000 people are buried away in these low-browed, shadowy houses, under the glossy, dark-leaved trees, but except in one or two streets of miscellaneous, old-fashioned looking stores, arranged with a distinct leaning towards native tastes, it looks like a large village, or rather like an aggregate of villages.
Soon its slopes were climbed, and there among the dark-leaved bushes and the rocks the black soldiers butchered them, every one. I saw and swooned away. I believe that I remained senseless for many hours, though towards the end of that time my swoon grew thin, as it were, and I heard a hollow voice speaking over me in Zulu.
We rejoice in the gladdening warmth afforded by unbroken sunshine and by the complete absence of cutting winds which Monte Sant’ Angelo’s towering form excludes from these shores; we note with delight the premature unfolding of buds and blossoms, and we marvel at the young fruit of the dark-leaved loquat trees—the nespoli of the South—turning to pale yellow even in February.
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