Africa Illustrated #261675

HE Straits of Gibraltar are perhaps among all the straits of the world those which separate decisively two countries the most completely dissimilar. On the northern shore the traveller, from any quarter of Europe or America, finds himself still in a country which reminds him more or less of his own. The visages, the costumes, the habitations, are still like those to which he has been accustomed; three hours southward and everything is Changed. The names of these continents have already become strange and distant, their Civilization is ignored or feared, Christian means enemy; from the primary elements of social life to the most insignificant details of private life, nothing testifies to the neighborhood of Europe. The traveller finds himself in an unknown country where everything is for him to learn anew. From the shore he may still perceive the European coast, but he experiences a sensation of immeasurable removal, as if this narrow arm of the sea were an ocean and the distant blue mountains a mirage. In the space of three hours he has accomplished the most marvelous transformation possible on this earth.