Norwich bulletin., 1917-04-12

kingdom. and it still has few connec-
tions with it's fellow -Spaniards, who,
in turn. rarely visit. 1t and who take
their impression of the Gahcians from
those who go down TO the plains for
the harvest season and from whom the
Spaniard has coined the word 'gallego'
drawer of water. At home they are
| hardy highlanders, proud of the des-
cent which they Calm from Teucer
who, they say, came hither from the
East in the course of his wanderinss
after being disowned by his father for
his lack of vengeance for the death OF
Ajax. his half brother. They speak
harsh patois. more Portuguese than
ed becoming the general tongue of
! the Peninsula because Alonzo ell Sabio
selected the Castilian dialect for his
| works and thus fixed it as the domin-
ant speech, even as Dante made Tus
IAN the linguistic ruler of Italian
tongues.
Under the Roman emperors of
Spanish extraction, Corunna f1ourished.
cient pharos erected by the Phenicians,
/ who founded the town, are still plainly
to be discerned, though many a ruler
since has had a hand in extending the
| were repulsed in s4S by the hardy CAL
| icians; but in the early part of the
Eleventh Century the place fell before
the Caliph of Cordova and passed in
to Moorish hands. With the Christian
restoration, Corunna acknowledged
castilian rule: and it was through the
wife of Peter the Cruel, daughter of
John of Gaunt, that the latter sought
| 10 secure the throne of CASTLE in
1885.
From Corunna Philip III set sail for
England to marry Mary; and a gen.
Grafton later another expedition, less
friendly, quit the port for Engllsh
water-the Invincible Armada, which
| met its fate at brakes hands. Drake
| himself was at -Corunna ten years
afterward, with a fleet which took the
notable British naval victories have
tCorunna as their scene; one In 1I47,
when a French fleet was defeated and
| the other in 1905, when the combined
fleets of France and Spain were put
! out of action.
| In the course of the Napo.eonic
wars Corunna again came to notice,
for 1t was on the neighboring heights
took place between the French under
Marshal Soult and the British unde-
Sir John Moore. who was about to
,mbark his troops after a series of
actions in which the Little Corporal
| himself took part.
In this battle Moore was killed, and
| his soldiers, unable to take his body
| aboard the waiting transports, buried
| him at night upon the ramparts which
| he had defended successfully to the
| last. This sad ceremony, done into
| verse by the Revd. Charles Wolfe, is
| known to many a schoolboy to whom
| the solemn lines have been a standar I'd
accessory for every defamation day
Like many towns of the Biscayan
and Mediterranean coasts, Corunna
consists of the Old Town and the
New, the latter, as is usual lying
along the harbor-for the ancients,
! like the New EnsIanders, were fond of
| building on the heights. 1t is in the
Old Town, within the precincts of the
I n 70 I'd Of
grave is to be seen. surmounted by a
/ stately monument erected by the Brit
ish in 1914 and which bears an equal
| ~ stately inscription in no less state
/ ly Latin. To Moore the place owes its
| chief interest for the tourist. and his
career is one of inspire youth in any
land He Esd at forty-seven, with a
| weH-won reputation as general,
having outwitted Napoleon and de.
| feated one of his most skillfuI of
narshals; and his dominating senti-
meut in life is well summed up in one
| of his letters where he says: When
ever by promoting the public real dig
| tinction is aimed at, ease must be re-
! linguished, toll embraced, and anxiety
endured
'Corunna is now a city of something
less than $4,000 Its manufactures are
| small. the government tobacco factor
| les being of chief Importance en-
| p!oying principally women, many of
| whom come from the surrounding
| country. in some cases travelling many
miles on foot to their employment.
! Steamship lines run thence to Cen
trail and South American ports and to
England the largest lines of export
| being cattle. though some of the
wines OF the country are sent abroad
where they rank with those of Portu-
| gal and the southern Spanish prov
cnceS.
| LAS A military center Corunna now
| holds no Importance. the ancient forts
which once defended the harbor have
| been dismantled, one of them the
castillo de san Anton, picturesquely
situated on a rocky island, serving as
d military prison"