Yellow

Pallenis spinosa is a beautiful herbaceous biennial plant of  the Mediterranean region that bears bright yellow daisy-like flowers with hard spiny bracts, and is the only member of the small genus Pallenis in Menorca. The large yellow flowers are surrounded by sharply pointed bracts.

Colias croceus is a small butterfly of the Pieridae family, that is, the Yellows and Whites.

The upperside is golden to orange yellow with a broad black margin on all four wings and a black spot near the centre forewing. The underside lacks the black borders and is lighter, with a more greenish tint, particularly on the forewings. In the forewing underside is the same dark spot as on the upperside, but often with a light centre; the hindwing underside has a white centre spot, often with a smaller white or dark dot immediately above it. Sometimes, a row of black dots occurs on the underwings' outer margins, corresponding to where the black border ends on the upperside.

Females differ from the males in having yellow spots along the black borders on the upperside. In a small proportion of females the golden upperside colouration is replaced by a pale cream colour.

THE 61st (South Gloucestershire) REGIMENT OF FOOT.

After a period of garrison service in England, Ireland and the Channel Islands the 61st Foot was stationed on the island of Minorca in 1771. The island had become a British possession under the Treaty of Paris of 1763. 

By 1779 Britain was involved in a war with America, France and Spain. In the following years and after an outbreak of tertian fever had hit the garrison, in August 1781 the Duc de Crillon landed with 8000 Spanish troops and 100 guns, the garrison had only 1500 men. The 61st found themselves besieged in Fort St Philip. Soon after another 8000 French troops joined the Spanish. The Duc demanded the surrender of Fort St Philip. The garrison held out until February 1782 when it was forced to surrender, the enemy commanders were so impressed with the conduct of the defenders that they paraded their troops as the garrison marched out.

 Fort St. Phillip

The remains of the regiment were repatriated in May 1782 where they began recruiting. In August 1782 all regiments of foot without a royal title were given a county designation, and the regiment became the 61st (South Gloucestershire) Regiment of Foot in 1782. In 1783 the regiment moved to Ireland where it remained until 1792. In the latter year they moved to Gibraltar.

Link to Soldiers of Gloucestershire Website

New engravings added to the Hotel collection.

Some engravings by John Kay have been recently added to our collection.

John Kay (1742 – February 21, 1826) was a Scotish caricaturist and engraver born near Dalkeith in Midlothian. He was originally a barber-surgeon, but after the success obtained with the first caricatures, he then dedicated to it, professionally.

Kay's portraits were collected by Hugh Paton and published under the title A series of original portraits and caricature etchings by the late John Kay, with biographical sketches and illustrative anecdotes (Edinburgh, 2 vols. 4to, 1838; 8vo ed., 4 vols., 1842; new 4to ed., with additional plates, 2 vols., 1877), forming a unique record of the social life and popular habits of Edinburgh at its most interesting epoch. 

Those books are nowadays difficult to find as most of them have been mutilated for their original engravings.

Print Title: Napier, Pilmer, Clarkson of the Hopetoun Fencibles

 - Original Print 1795 by John Kay

Our gratitude to Mr. Mellon for helping us to find some.

The Ash Tree Criket Club from Macclesfield, Cheshire.

The Ash Tree Cricket Club was touring in Menorca this year and we had the pleasure in allocating them at the Hotel del Almirante. The weather has been glorious these last days and the team have been able to enjoy two days for their games, and another couple of days of tourism in Menorca.

 

Pictures by Mr. Bill Kavanagh

The "Besitos" moored in the calmed Ciutadella harbour

Should you walk through the port of Ciutadella, you might find this boat moored next to the building of the old port captaincy. Besitos is her name. She is a traditional Menorquin boat of a type called "llaut" operated with a latin rig, a triangular sail set on a long yard mounted at an angle on the mast, and running in a fore-and-aft direction.

more about

Latin Rig

Poisonous beauty

Echium plantagineum, commonly known as purple viper's bugloss or Paterson's curse, is a species of Echium native to western and southern Europe (from southern England south to Iberia and east to the Crimea), northern Africa, and southwestern Asia. It has also been introduced to Australia, South Africa and the United States, where it is an invasive weed. Due to a high concentration of pyrrocilidine alkaloids, it is poisonous to grazing livestock, especially those with simple digestive systems, like horses. The toxins are cumulative in the liver, and death results from too much Paterson's curse in the diet.

Throughout these weeks their purple flowers bright in Menorca's prairies together with other herbs that bloom at the same time. Despite their beauty, people of the island do not have them in high esteem for being often the cause of death of horses that eat those plants when grazing.

The Hotel del Almirante in stitches

For some two years one of our guests; Mrs. Maureen Wright has been capturing the ambience of the hotel entrance carefully perfected in the medium of cross stitch.

Maureen has presented this to the Hotel and I am pleased to tell you it is framed and displayed in our home.

Walking among partridges at Cutaynet.

Throughout the eighteenth century the flourishing trade between the port of Mahon and other ports of the Mediterranean gave way to an era of prosperity in the island. The bourgeois who got rich on trade and privateering wanted, as a symbol of their prosperity, buy land, which so far, were in the hands of the nobility since Middle Ages.

 Thus, at this time the large agricultural holdings on the island were segregated and the new ones, often preserved part of the array name.

Cutaynet is one of those properties whose land belonged one day the vast region known as Cotaina

As I walked around the area I have been in the middle of a group of partridges that had been singing as daylight was coming to its end.