Morning journal and courier., 1892-02-20


 yrus, Sleepy Harbor and City of
 Palma-Colorful Scenes and Ways
 A Hint in Home-Building 10 Rich
 Americans.
 PALMA, Majorics, Jan. 2. To the Editor of the JOURNAL AND COURIER:
 In these days of strong and swift steam CTS plying between England and all Medi- terranean ports it is but a voyage of two nights and day from Gibraltar to the city of Palma, the capital of the Spanish dependency and province of Balearica, are wintering in southwestern Spain, yoa may journey in a night from Valencia or Barcelona to this least visited and most beautiful of all Mediterranean regions.
 Your steamer is seldom out of sight of some huge or tiny Mediterranean craft, and there is always consciousness of pleas ant nearness of other human interests and a quiet and restful sense of companion ship upon this great land-locked sea, al- though it is longer than the Atlantic is broad between Newfoundland and Ireland, I have never known or felt on other wa ters. However treacherous the Mediter- ranean has been to others, I have never seen its face save in its blandest, sweetest mood; when its skies were fair, the sun shine above it mild and loving, its airs zephyrus and dreamful, and its face as blue and smiling as a rift of June.dHy heaven.
 Tha,, hafnra tho tr0t.ia ratrhr as ties softly upon sea and land like a per fumed, translucent cloud of darkening pearl, there is spread before you such reach of grand and glorious coast-line- the real "Afric's coral strand" of tran scendent beauty, and not the dread coast of the old missionary hymn -as renders true picturing impossible; the whole changeful panorama of headland, beach, forest, glittering village and noble bay, backed along the ragged southern horizon by the eternal peaks of the Atlas heights, which even under tropic suns soar above the clouds to the region of silences, ghost lv and phantomful with their crowns of snow and ice.
 The very air upon this sea is odorous as with thyme and balm. The fancy, quick ened by tradition and oriental mysticisms, buiIds woudrous creations surpassing the widest and most fabulous tales of the Arabian Nights" Snug in a steamer chair, one reclines and dreams. Subtle essences as from lotus flowers mingled with subtler rose attars touch the sense and bind in sleep. The deck stewards must be similarly enthralled, for you are never rudely disturbed as on the Atlantic liner; and through all the caressful night, while the stars grow and glow above, and the silent phosphorescent sea pulses and throbs in pale flames baneath, you near this radiant haven of this radiant, storied sea.
 Then for time all is still. The night and sleep and languorous tropic airs en- fold and hold until the dawn has come. The great steamer with her now silent en- ginery, softly tugging at her anchor chain, has drifted with the tide until her stately prov mods gracefully to the quaint city upon the heights. Your chair happens to stand amidships upon the port side. There are sweetest zephyrs playing through the riggings of the curious craft upon the bay. These kiss your face until your eyes open lazily, as one who awakens in regret at the dispelling of pleasing dream. And yet they open as though you are but knowing another dream. They awakened upon morning in Palma; morning so real ly dream, so dresmful a reality, that no painters art has ever caught & single re- cognition of its glory.
 Here, just as the sun is rising, between the sea's bed of crimson and the awaken ing city are swsying on the gentle tide hundreds of strange and curious craft, a wild conglomerate of the marine architec- ture of the Mediterranean, their yellow spars but moment since like giant reeds above the gloaming of shadowy marsh, now pinked from tip to socket with the glorious sunlight, which hints in its play upon their gaudy ensigns of the far lands where their home havens lie; while far out on the waters horizon, rounding Cape Fiji guerra behind, comes the morning fleet of fisher boats, their sails of every striking hue, and the songs of the fishers stealing across the distance in faint but melodious rythm.
 Here and there are Turkish vessels with tremendous single sails, square built fore and aft like settlers log cabin. Scores of the clumsy feluccas from Crete and the Ionian Islands, the chebecs of the Arabs, and the identical great boats of the olden pirates, lie low in the water roundabout, their half naked Greek or Arab sailors, iltuc Ol anu uut-DIOWH OI luce, wv idly recalling those glorious days of Ba- rossa, booty and blood. But quainter than all are the rare old tubs from Chiog- gia and Venice, with the same high prows and sterns they had in the days of the Doges. They come with the glass af Mu- rano and carry back the corn, oil and wine | of the Soller and Valdemosa, and on the bow of each craft is painted an effgy of the Virgin, an endless supplicstion to the waves against every form of evil and peril | at sea.
 And there, facing the shining sea and colorful hsrbor scene, rises from the shore more gracefully than Naples, as fair as AL giers, as tropical in type and seeming as Havana, the amphitheater like city of Pal ma; once the brightest pearl of the sea- | girt isles; still, stately, silent, beautiful; with tone and tint of the Orient in it's pin nacles and minarets, its dome-shaped bel fries and its weird and shadowy palms. Lovingly contemplating the exquisite pie ture, it's romantic history old and new fiutters from the hiding places of memory and troop clear and distinct into your mu- sings; even as the morning doves of Palma
 f