The name of the plant the gardener declared to be _convoladia_. I spell the word phonetically. And when I asked what the appearance of the flower was, he made the incredible statement--and stuck to it--that the plant had none.
It is impossible to stay in Sóller without feeling the magnetic attraction of the Puig Mayor, which is higher than any mountain in the British Isles. A dozen times in an hour we found ourselves turning to see how it looked, for its aspect held the charm of exhaustless variety. One might leave it a purple shadow amid light-hued satellite hills and turn again a few minutes later to discover it rose-tipped and the others in shadow.
Next morning I looked out on a lovely scene. In the growing light of dawn the encompassing mountains showed clearly their outlines, unblurred save by a wanton wisp of mist that seemed too trivial to bear any meaning. But when my breakfast tray was brought in, rain was falling with the quiet persistence of rain that has come to stay. So we spent the morning indoors enjoying refreshing gossip, and refreshing peeps into English books, and in watching from the windows and balconies the ever-changing cloud effects on the mountains.
There were moments when the crest of the Puig Mayor rose majestic above a rolling fleece of vapour that blotted out all the lesser heights; and times when, though the clouds hung heavy over the town, and the few passers-by huddled beneath time-worn umbrellas, every red rock and cleft of the mountain glowed under a sun that shone for it alone. Or again the Puig Mayor itself might vanish, and some nearer height stand out against the wall of mist in unexpected beauty of contour--imposing only because of its temporary isolation.
In the afternoon the sky cleared a little and we ventured out. The Good Fairy, our hostess, who abounds in individualities that are as charming as they are original, possessed, by right of purchase, the fruit of a tree of sweet oranges. Her tree grew in an orchard on the outskirts of the town that is itself an orange garden. And hither we went to listen to the sweet clamour of the nightingales while eating the fruit we had plucked.
Among the glossy-green leaves Keats's "light-wingéd Dryads of the trees" were singing "of summer in full-throated ease." We would gladly have lingered long, but heavy rain again encompassed us; and we returned to the comforts of the hotel, reluctant to leave the melodious plot, but rejoicing for the sake of the islanders, in whose expectant ears the sound of the rain falling on their thirsty land must have been much more musical than the song of the immortal bird.