Chap. XXIX
Leave Tempio.—Sunrise.—Light Wreaths of Mist across the Valley.—A Pass of the Limbara.—View from the Summit.—Dense Vapour over the Plain beneath.—The Lowlands unhealthy.—The deadly Intempérie.—It recently carried off an English Traveller.—Descend a romantic Glen to the Level of the Campidano.—Its peculiar Character.—Gallop over it.—Reach Ozieri.
I have reason to believe from information received during a recent visit to Sardinia that the insecurity which, to some extent, prevailed when we were in the island in 1853, had considerably lessened. But while at Tempio in that year we learnt by an official communication from Cagliari that some of the central mountain districts, through which we proposed to pass on a shooting excursion, were in a disturbed state and must be approached with caution. In consequence, the Lascia portare arma forwarded to us was accompanied by an open order from the Colonel commanding the royal Caribineers, addressed to all the stations, for our being furnished with an escort. So, also, on our visit of leave to the Intendente of Tempio he pressed us to allow him to send us forward under escort, though I did not learn that there had been any recent outrages in his own province. On our declining the offer, as at variance with our habits and feelings, the Intendente said, “I assure you that, here, the lowest government employé will not travel without an escort;”—and he again urged our accepting it, adding, “the Marchese d’Azeglio having put you under my especial protection, I am responsible for your safety, and wish to use every precaution, lest anything unpleasant should occur.” On our again respectfully declining the offer, the kind Intendente said, with a shrug, “Well, gentlemen, I have done my duty, and I hope that when you get to Turin you will so represent it.”
Such precautions exhibit a singular state of society in the midst of European civilisation; I apprehend, however, that the Piedmontese officials, and the continentals in general, paint the Sardes in darker colours than they merit; and there is little good blood between them.
Having no such prejudices, and entertaining no apprehensions, we started, as usual, having a honest viandante, with his saddle and pack-horses, for our only escort. The sun was just rising over the serrated ridge of the eastern mountains, when, emerging from the fetid shade of the narrow streets of Tempio, we came suddenly into his blessed light. The mountain sides still formed an indistinct mass of the richest purple hue, while, over the whole plain beneath, light mists rolled in fantastic waves, floating like a mysterious gauze-like veil, shreds of which touched by the sun’s rays became brilliantly coloured, and others drifting through the scattered woods had the appearance of being combed out into long and fine-spun threads like the spiders’-webs which, gemmed with dew-drops, hung from spray to spray. It was a magnificent view, of great breadth, like one of Martin’s mysterious pictures, and seen under the most splendid effects; but so transitory that after we crossed the first ridge all was changed. Meanwhile denser, but still light, wreaths close at hand mingled with the mists, as the blue smoke curled up from the vineyard sheds where the industrious Tempiese had already commenced their labours. The temperature was delicious, and rain had fallen in the night cooling the air and refreshing vegetation. Pleasanter than ever was our early ride through the pretty winding lanes dividing the vineyards and gardens skirting the town, and again, as we descended through deep banks among scattered woodlands to the open plains extending to the foot of the Limbara Mountains.
A long but easy ascent led to the top of the pass, the ridge we mounted being thickly clothed with evergreen shrubbery, the arbutus predominating, profusely decked with fruit and flower. The summit of the pass opened to us a double view in strong contrast. Looking back, we once more saw through a gap the mountains of Corsica, in faint outlines, eighty miles distant, with a glimpse of a blue stripe of water, the Straits of Bonifacio. Turning southward, we stood at the summit of a long winding glen richly wooded with ilex and cork trees, and far away beneath there lay before us a broad plain partially covered with a sea of vapour, not like the gay wreaths of mist that lightly floated over the elevated plateau surrounding Tempio, but so still, so condensed, so white, as to have been easily mistaken for a frozen lake powdered with snow, and its hills for islands rising out of the water.53
But such an image is unsuited to the climate of Sardinia at any season. Smiling as the landscape now appeared, its most striking feature was associated with the idea of death.
That dense creamy vapour, formed by the pestiferous exhalations of the lowlands, is the death shroud of the plain outstretched beneath it.
During the heats of summer, nay, sometimes from April till the latter end of November, the ravages of the deadly intempérie extend throughout the island to such a degree that in Captain Smyth’s list of nearly 350 towns and villages included in his “Statistical Table of Sardinia,” full a third are noted as insalubrious. The disorder has the same character as malaria, but is far more virulent. Captain Smyth thus describes the symptoms: “The patient is first attacked by a headache and painful tension of the epigastric region, with alternate sensations of heat and chilliness; a fever ensues, the exacerbations of which are extremely severe, and are followed by a mournful debility, more or less injurious even to those accustomed to it, but usually fatal to strangers.” We have conversed with natives and residents who have recovered from repeated attacks of intempérie; foreigners suffer most. “Instances have been related to me,” observes Captain Smyth, “of strangers landing for a few hours only from Italian coasters, who were almost immediately carried off by its virulence; indeed, the very breathing of the air by a foreigner at night, or in the cool of the evening, is considered as certain death in some parts.”54
Not twelve months before our visit, an English officer was suddenly struck down and carried off while on a similar excursion in this part of the island. Sir Harry Darrell was one of the last men I should have thought liable to so fatal an attack. A few years ago, when returning from Caffreland just before the breaking out of the last war, I met him on the march to the frontier. I had off-saddled at noon, and while my horses were grazing, knee-haltered, on a slip of grass by the side of a running stream, was lying under the shade of a wild olive-tree, when the head-quarters’ division of the —— Dragoon Guards passed along the road. Sir Harry and some other officers rode down into the meadow, and we talked of the state of Caffreland and of the principal chiefs, most of whom I had recently seen. I heard afterwards that he had got out fox-hounds and hunted the country about Fort Beaufort. He was a keen sportsman and clever artist. Some of his sketches in South Africa were published by Ackerman. His remains lie at Cagliari, where he was conveyed when struck by the intempérie, dying a few days after. A friend of mine, who was there at the time, informs me that Sir Harry’s constitution had become debilitated, and he had rendered himself liable to the attack by exposure and over-fatigue. I mention the circumstance as a warning, but do not think there is much risk, with proper precautions, for men in good health, through most parts of the island, after the November rains have precipitated the miasma and purified the air. We ourselves slept in most pestiferous places, where the ravages of the disease were marked in the sallow countenances of the inhabitants, without experiencing the least inconvenience.
We rested at the summit of the pass commanding the distant view of the Campidano, which led to these remarks on the insalubrity of the country and the scourge of the intempérie. They are not, however, confined to the plains, but of course are more prevalent where marshes, stagnant waters, and rank vegetation engender vapours rising in the summer. Leaving my companion to finish the sketch copied in a former page, I slowly trotted on with the viandante, and, the descent becoming rapid, proceeded leisurely down the wooded glen, a depth of shade in which the heat, as well as the picturesque character of the scenery, tempted to linger. Old cork and ilex trees, with their rugged bark and grey foliage, throwing out rectangular arms of stiff and fantastic growth, wild vines hanging from the branches in festoons of brilliant hues, other trees with tawny orange leaves,—I believe a species of ash,—some of a rich claret, and the never-failing arbutus, here quite a tree, with its orange and crimson berries, all these massed together formed admirable contrasts in shape and colour. And then there was the gentle brook, never roaring or boisterous, but purling among rocks dividing it into still pools, with giant ferns hanging over the stream and bunches of hassock-grass luxuriating in the alluvial soil of its little deltas, and, where the forest receded, a graceful growth of shrubbery feathering the winding banks.
Some of the cork-trees were fine specimens, of great age. Several I measured in a rough way by embracing their trunks with extended arms. This, repeated four or five times, gave a circumference of twenty or twenty-five feet. The bark was ten inches thick. While so employed I was startled by a wild boar rushing by me into the thickets. The cork wood gradually thinned into scattered clumps on the slopes of the hills, and the winding valley, five or six miles long, was abruptly terminated by a bold mamelon, or green mound, covered with dwarf heath or turf; so shorn and smooth it appeared, probably from being pastured, in immediate contrast with the shaggy sides of the mountain glen. The horsetrack, avoiding this obstacle, led up the eastern acclivity of the glen, and the summit commanded the Campidano, now clear of fog, spread out before us, far as the eye could reach, in a broad level, broken only by some singular flat-topped hills in the foreground.
Striking and novel as this landscape appeared at the first glance, I confess that, at the moment, my attention was most directed backward on the track I had just followed. It was now some hours since I parted from my fellow-traveller. I had often listened for his horse’s steps in the deep glen, where there was no seeing many hundred yards backwards or forwards; and though the present elevation commanded some points in the track, he did not appear. I was getting fidgetty, and the guide’s replies to my inquiries did not tend to reassure me, for there are “malviventi” as well as “fuorusciti” in the wilds—a well known distinction—when, just as we were on the point of returning back, after half an hour’s additional suspense, I got a glimpse of my friend trotting out of the woods close under the point of view. He, too, had lingered in the romantic glen after finishing his sketch.
We had now cleared the defiles of the Limbara, and, descending to the level of the plains, made up for lost time by galloping ventre à terre over the boundless waste. Here were no shady nooks, no forest masses, no fantastic growths, no grey crags, no bright-flowered thickets, so grouped as one might never see again, and tempting to linger. All the features were now on a broad scale; they were caught at a glance, and the few which broke the monotony of the scene were repeated again and again. But they were not without interest. The rivulet had expanded into a wide stream, making long bends through the deep loam of the grassy meads, and looking so cool and refreshing, that, but for the pebbly shoals in its bed, it was difficult to conceive the midsummer heats rendering these verdant plains desolate and pestilential.
Along the banks of the river, and far away in every direction, were scattered herds of cattle, guarded by armed shepherds, wild bearded fellows in goatskin mantles and leather doublets, mostly on horseback. We meet such figures on the grassy track, looking fiercely as we sweep along; we see them at a distance on the edge of some of the gentle slopes in which the plain is rolled, when only the profile of the horse, the stalwart rider and his long gun, comes out clear against the sky. There is more life on the Campidano than in the mountains. Not that it is inhabited; there is scarcely a house on this whole plain, fifty or sixty miles in circumference. Not that there is much cultivation; here and there, at rare intervals, we see patches of a livelier green than the surrounding expanse of grass, and the young wheat just springing up, the strong blade and rich loamy furrow, remind us that Sardinia was reckoned in former times a granary of Rome. We see also the grey mounds of the Nuraghe scattered over the plain, some mouldering down to its level, a few still rearing their truncated cones, like solitary watch-towers, for which they have been mistaken. They, too, remind us of times long past, of a primitive age. But they are to be found in all parts of the island, and we shall fall in with them again, more at leisure to examine their structure and hazard a conjecture as to their origin. Now we gallop on over the level plain. The sward on the beaten track is close and elastic, and our cavallante’s spirited barbs, spared in the glen during the noontide heat, spring as if they had never been broken to the portante pace. The morning fog and the cadaverous features of the shepherds have warned us that the teeming Campidano is no place to linger in after nightfall. Their homes are in the villages scattered round the edge of the great plain; not much elevated, as the paese in Corsica, but standing on gentle acclivities. We marked them at a distance. Already we have passed Sassu on our right and Oschiri on our left; they are poor places. Codriaghe and Codrongianus and Florinas stand at the extremity of the plain towards Sassari, and we shall see them on our road thither, if we ever get there. Ardara, once the capital of the province of Logudoro, founded as early as 1060, and having many historic traditions, crowns, with its massive towers rising above the ruined walls, a hillock on the plain right before us. It boasts also a fine church, enriched with curious objects of art; but the town has dwindled to a collection of hovels with a small population, few of whom, we are told, survive their fiftieth year, so destructive is the intempérie. We turn away: Ozieri stands invitingly on rather a bold eminence at the head of a gorge where the plain narrows towards the hills. The rays of the setting sun are full upon its houses and churches. It is a place of some importance, and lies in our proposed line through byroads to the forest districts of the interior. If our pace holds on we may reach it by an hour after sunset. Perhaps we shall find good cheer, the best preservative, I should imagine, against the miasma that produces intempérie.