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ALMISSA
and excellent wine, the best I have found in Dalmatia, since the War has ruined the admirable Dalmatian vintage one used to get everywhere ; at Almissa there is a good sound red wine and a perfectly delicious “ prosecco ” of the usual tawny colour, with its bouquet of roses and violets. From the inn one passes along the single street that forms the town of Almissa. The shops have the Oriental single opening, half of which is door and the other half the counter for the display of goods. The church of S. Michele, the Duomo, has a remarkable incised string-course running along its southern wall; the west door, with the date 1621, has graceful columns with a triple-pleated pattern and an engaging design of tulips on the jambs, above it a wheel rose window with cherubs’ heads in the spandrels between the spokes ; altogether an irregular and fantastic but not unpleasing façade. The cathedral contains a very fine silver crucifix encrusted with precious stones, which the pirates presented as an ex-voto after some successful raid.
   Some of the houses show a picturesque Venetian architecture, the Spera house, for example, whose courtyard displays the motto :
Cautus con prosperis
Fortis con adversis,