Green, grey, orange,
purple, and, in the farthest distance, blue as of the heaven itself,
make the land one vast rainbow, and fit dwelling-place for its sunny
folk, still happy and industrious--once the most cultivated and
luxurious people in Europe.
As for their industry, it is hereditary. These lands were, it may
be, as richly and carefully tilled in the days of Augustus Caesar as
they are now; or rather, as they were at the end of the eighteenth
century. For, since then, the delver and sower--for centuries the
slave of the Roman, and, for centuries after, the slave of Teutonic
or Saracenic conquerors--has become his own master, and his own
landlord; and an impulse has been given to industry, which is shown
by trim cottages, gay gardens, and fresh olive orchards, pushed up
into glens which in a state of nature would starve a goat.
The special culture of the country--more and more special as we run
eastward--is that of the mulberry, the almond, and the olive. Along
every hill-side, down every glen, lie orchard-rows of the precious
pollards.
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