The ground becomes
firmer and a salt breeze fans your cheeks; it looks like a vast desert
from which the waters have receded. Long, flat strips of sand,
superposed indefinitely in indistinct planes, ripple like shadows, and
the wind playfully designs huge arabesques on their surfaces. The sea
lies far away, so far, in fact, that its roar cannot be heard, though we
could distinguish a sort of vague, aerial, imperceptible murmur, like
the voice of the solitude, which perhaps was only the effect produced by
the intense silence.
Opposite us rose a large round rock with embattled walls and a church on
its top; enormous counterparts resting on a steep slope support the
sides of the edifice. Rocks and wild shrubs are strewn over the incline.
Half-way up the slope are a few houses, which show above the white line
of the wall and are dominated by the brown church; thus some bright
colours are interspersed between the two plain tints.
The post-chaise drove ahead of us and we followed it, guiding ourselves
by the tracks of the wheels; finally it disappeared in the distance, and
we could distinguish only its hood, which looked like some big crab
crawling over the sand.
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