SKETCHES AND ADVENTURES THE ANDALUSIAS OF SPAIN. BY THE AUTHOR OP DANIEL WEBSTER AND HIS COTEMPORARIES.' NEW YORK: HARPER & BROTHERS, 82 Porto Santo Another Storm Arrival at Madeira . ... .13 CHAPTER II. Season of Madeira and England contrasted Agreeabilities of the Island Its Kesources City of Funchal The Fair Sex . . 24 CHAPTER III. The Garden and Establishment of the American Consul The Plaza do Constitutiao The Canons of the Romish Church The Landed Proprietors 34 CHAPTER IV. Rides and walks near Funchal The Mount Church The "Water- fall Cumacha Description of a Quinta 41 CHAPTER V. The Longevity and Fecundity of Madeira Mendicancy Anec- dote of a precocious Youth Ill-repaid Labor . . . .49 CHAPTER VI. Tour of the Island The various Productions The different Peaks Arrival at St. Anna . . 56 VI CONTENTS. CHAPT BE VII. PAGE Ascent of Pico Kuivo View from the Summit Sao Jorge Pass of the Torrinhas The Great Curral 66 CHAPTER VIII. The Vintage The Origin of the Madeira Grape The various kinds of Wine . '.74 CHAPTER IX. Arrival of President Roberts Dinner of the Consul Mr. Roberts' Account of Liberia Its Trade and Prosperity Line of Steamers between the United States and the Western Coast . . .87 CHAPTE R X . Doubts of the Discovery of the Island Plutarch's Story The Phe- nicians The Romance, perhaps true, of Robert Machin and Anne D'Arfert . 94 CHAPTER XI. Departure from Madeira Entrance of the Tagus First view of Lisbon First Interrogatory there Monopolies Arrival . CHAPTER XII. Vexatious Police Lisbon Taxation Military Service Carriages The Queen King Consort 105 CHAPTER XIII. Cintra Palace Quinta of John de Castro Panoramic View Torres Vedras Coimbra Story of Inez de Castro Oporto . Ill CHAPTERXIV. Early History of Portugal The Roman Domination The Arabs The Recapture of Lisbon by the Crusaders The Discoveries under Dom Manuel and Dom Henrique 123 CONTENTS. vii CHAPTER XT. PAGE Arrival at Cadiz Hotel Blanco Olla Podrida The Muchachas Robbers Cigar Manufactory Asylum for the Poor . . . 133 CHAPTER XVI. San Maria Xeres Pedro Domecq's Establishment Wines of Xeres Journey to Seville 151 CHAPTER XVII. Seville Table d'Hote Las Delicias Outside the Walls Don Gaetano Peickler 161 CHAPTER XVIII. High Mass The Cathedral Dolores Bull-fight . . . .170 CHAPTER XIX. Dolores Study of Spanish The Alcazar Casa de Pilatos El Museo Murillo Spanish Courtesy Baile The French Danc- ing-master 185 CHAPTER XX. The Franciscan Friar Visit to Dolores Her views of Confession The Giralda The Cathedral The Drive around the City . 196 CHAPTER XXI. Mr. Peickler on Gipsies Our WalktoTriana Washington Irving's Haunt Gipsies Their Eye Chastity of the Girls The Gipsy Dance 213 CHAPTER XXII. Ride to Cordova Carmona La Luisiana Adventure at a Posada Ecija Cordova Its History The Mosque .... 228 CHAPTER XXIII. A short Exordium Dolores The Theater Catalina The Story of her Life 250 I* CONTEXTS. CHAPTER XXIV. PAGE Danger Scipio Africanus and the Author encountered in Spain The Author greater than Demetrius Polioreetes Breakfast on the Steamer Voyage to Cadiz, and Arrival History of Cadiz Departure for Gibraltar, and Voyage 264 CHAPTER XXT. Gibraltar The Guides and Monkeys The Bock St. Michael's Cave English Officers Rides San Roque . . . .285 CHAPTER XXTI. Start for Ronda- My Costume and Companion Gancin Story of Pcpe Ronda 297 CHA PTER XXVII. View from the Moorish Tower La Casa Del Rey Moro The Fair Bull-Fight Alameda Moonlit Scenery Hog-Funcion Fruit Wild-Boar Hunt 317 CHAPTER XXVII I. Departure Sheep Robber-cave Arrival at Malaga Its Pro- ducts Vintage Raisins The Muchachas cracking Almonds Alameda Start for Grenada 336 CHAPTER XXIX. The Vega of Grenada My Arrival Visit to the Alhambra " El Nieto" Grandson of the Alhambra The Influence of Irving upon ite Present Condition 358 CHAPTER XXX. P6p& Fonda de San Francisco The Hill of the Alhambra Mateo Ximenea His Story The Generaliffe La Silla del Moro An Epitome of Spanish History 373 CHAPTER XXXI. The Moor from Tangier* His Dress The Former Glories of the Alhambra The Moorish and Christian Religions Compared . 393 CONTEXTS. CHAPTER XXXII. PAGE The Archbishop's Palace The Cathedral The Royal Chapel- Ferdinand and Isabella French Occupation and Influence Society of Grenada The Alameda 397 CHAPTER XXXIII. BoabdiTs Gate Pepe's Story of the Haunted Tower . . .405 CHAPTER XXXIV. Bide to El Picacho de la Vileta The Venta The Immaculate Con- ception The Robbers The Copita of Aguardiente The Night at El Prevesin The Ascent of Picacho The View The Re- turn . . .415 CHAPTER XXXV. Mendicancy The Man with Crutches The Beggars' Frolic The old Hag The Muchacha The Contrabandista . . . .431 CHAPTER XXXVI. Sympathy with Traditions and Superstitions Freshness of Span- ish Life Peculiar Institutions Cheapness of Living My De- parture 443 L VIEW OF FUNCHAL FROM THE SEA FRONTISPIECE. II. RAVINE OF SAO JORGE 68 in. BRINGING WINE TO MARKET ix GOAT-SKINS 76 IV. HAULING WINE ON A SLEDGE WITH OXEN 79 V. THE MAJO OF SEVILLE. 175 VL DOLORES KNEELING IN CHURCH. . 186 VII. JOSE, THE RETIRED BANDIT 299 VIII. RONDA 313 XL CUCHARES AND THE BCLL : . . . 329 X. THE ALHAMBRA 361 XI. THE BEGGAR. 418 XII. THE SMUGGLES. .' , . 441 CHAPTER I. START FROM SOUTHAMPTON STORM IN THE CHANNEL EXPECTED DINNER AT THE ISLE OF WIGHT PORTO SANTO ANOTHER STORM ARRIVAL AT MADEIRA. Some love to retain O'er the dark sea foam, Where the shrill winds whistle free." SOME are great fools then, and, on the well-advised interposition of friends, should be confined to a private lunatic asylum. And no less fools, in my opinion, are they who, induced or compelled to a sea-voyage, relin- quish steam for sails. In the latter predicament I stand ; for, on the first day of October in the year of Grace one thousand eight hundred and fifty-two, and of the Independence of the United States the seventy- sixth, I left Southampton for the Island of Madeira, in the brig " Brilliant," of some two hundred tons burden. It had been particularly commended to me as having been previously the yacht of a lord. Had it been con- secrated to the Lord, it had hardly found more favor in the eyes of snobbish John Bull. We started with unpropitious omens. It was on Friday w r e left our moorings a day ever disastrous in nautical calends. The preceding day I saw, or im- agined I saw, the face of a person who had died a year before ; and I thought to have been called by name, and by the voice of a person too distant to be understood by merely human organs. This, according to popular belief, is sure to presage an untimely death. The great 14 ONE DINNER ON BOARD. Dr. Johnson himself was once called hi this way ; and though the call met Avith the same fate as Baxter's " Last Call to the Unconverted," i. e., inattention, the philologist's belief hi this supernatural summons was only suspended, not annihilated. The experiment failed in his case, but the principle remained the same. Had the mighty Julius been deterred by half such portents, would he not have forborne the Capitol, and thus avoided the ungrateful stroke of Brutus ? A steam-tug towed our reluctant keel some miles down the Channel, against wind and tide ; and, on the approach of evening, parted companionship, leaving us inert upon the wave. Is it not Horace who says that he who first dared the dangers of the deep must have possessed a heart of brass ? He indeed might have been bold at Phar- salia, and yet avoided the sea without reproach to manhood. There is something fearful in the ever-pres- ent conviction that but a plank separates you from eter- nity! On the land there seem a thousand chances for life ; on the sea, but one. A hidden rock, an accidental flame, an insignificant leak and no hope save in God ! And beside the heart of brass to go down upon the waters, you require the stomach of an ostrich to en- dure them. Good digestion never waits on appetite. You never eat a natural meal. I dined once on this voyage the first day on cold meats, and with a full table. I recollect it gratefully ; for it was the only dinner at which I " assisted" unaffected by sea-sickness, or nausea, or rebellious stomach, the whole voyage. I turned in early that evening not so much with the desire or from the hope of sleep, as to escape the motion of the vessel, which rocked wearily upon the billows ; these becoming each minute more and more agitated by the increasing wind. THE STOEM. 15 I awoke, in a hurricane of wind and rain, the next morning. My state-room was in the stern of the ves- sel. It had been given up by the captain to the crowd of passengers, and had fallen to my lot. It was filled with his clothes, books, charts, chronometers and gen- eral "fixins." Close to the wheel, it seemed to feel most the motion and noise of the vessel. To stand up- right hi it during the gale without assistance was im- possible. It required, indeed, all my ingenuity and strength to keep myself in bed. The steward, missing me at the morning repast, or urged thereunto by some sympathetic friend, brought me the means of existence in the shape of black tea and dry toast. It was all my palate would tolerate, save an occasional pear which a provident fellow-pas- senger had deposited for safe-keeping in the captain's room. With the increasing day, the storm increased. The wind blew as it would have blown its last. It rushed past, through, and athwart the sails, with a whistling, screaming, maddening energy, appallingly terrific, and with voices like vindictive furies. The shrouds were loosened, the cordage strained, the sails rent, and the tall masts bent, like saplings ; the deck inundated with "shipped seas," and untenable to the trained sailor. This was the scene above. Below squalling children, screaming women, falling tables, and crash of broken crockery, made a concord or discord of sounds fearful in the darkness of my room. Toward night I was informed that all our fresh beef had been swept overboard. I made no repining thereat. I rather rejoiced. Sea-sickness gains rather ridicule than sympathy ; and so I vindictively con- gratulated myself that those of insolent health would be deprived of part of their promised enjoyment. 16 APPREHENSIONS. To reach the gentlemen's room I was obliged to pass through the ladies', or over the deck. The first was contra bonos mores (in the situation in which I might find the softer sex), and the latter was contra my strength ; so I was compelled to remain " cabined, cribbed, confined," and conclude a restless day with a sleepless night. And this was the morning and even- ing of the first day. The next day was like unto it, save that the storm seemed on the crescendo scale. The celebrated admonition of some personage who sought to comfort his fellow-passengers in a storm that threatened a fatal termination "they were as near heaven by water as by land" brought me no peace of mind. In the first place, I did not wish an abrupt termination of life, and in the second place, should have infinitely preferred, to that " bourne whence no traveler returns," a land-route. Nor did Caesar's rebuke to his frightened pilot assure me more : " Quid times f vehis Ccesarem et ejus fortttnam." I had not that dauntless confidence in a great future that possessed his soul. I more resembled him when he had that fever in Spain, and when, according to the person who afterward finished his life, he cried out, " Give me some drink, Titinius." Indeed, I was " hor- ribly afear'd" and but from the fear of showing fear, should doubtless have exhibited much pusillanimity. Thus it is that the moral triumphs over the physical man. The charts, quadrants, and nautical instruments gen- erally of the captain, were fastened most insecurely to the roof of the state-room. So that every motion of the vessel agitated them ; every decided lurch threat- tened to precipitate them against my berth with the momentum of missiles from a catapulta. I threw up a MISPLACED CONFIDENCE. 17 barricade of pillows, bolsters, and what I could other- wise spare of bed-clothes, and awaited the result with Russian determination at Sebastopol. This accumula- tion was not without compensatory advantages ; it diverted the mind from unpleasant imaginings by giv- ing it temporary employment, and any exertion was a gain. For indeed any thing that even in the smallest degree tends to mitigate the unutterable tediousness of a sea-voyage is a blessing to the man safe from sea- sickness, as well as to him afflicted therewith. The next day, to use the strong language of an American poet, "my heart and morning broke to- gether" or rather, had morning lingered but a short time longer, there would have been a simultaneous act of the kind. For all through the long watches of the night I had been tempest-tossed ; my sleep had been broken, my head racked with pain, and my stomach tortured into vain retchings. Darkness too intensifies terrors. For we never wholly recover from child- hood's fancy that there is something terrible in the gloom of night. And I had prayed for morning as sure to bring relief. The early morning promised well. Before breakfast hour we had made some twenty miles down the chan- nel, by short and frequent tacks ; but alas ! at noon, the increased force of a wind yet more adverse, acting with the refluent tide, drove us back beyond even the starting-point of the morning, so that I told the captain, when he made me a visit of condolence (be- cause the storm was so violent he could not remain on deck) that we should only reach Madeira as the boy did his school, when it was so slippery he lost two steps for every one he took : " he turned round and went backward." Some of the ladies' maids Avere frightened into hys- 18 THE FOUKTU 1>AY. terical convulsions by the seeming danger, and uttered the most extravagant outcries. Expostulation quieted some, command silenced others, while two or three of the most refractory were subdued by brandy and opium. These cries and scenes, with the looks of the captain, and overheard expressions of the crew, and the con- tinued tempest, which knew no abatement with the declining sun, gave to my thoughts but one direction ; and, abandoned to the gloomy forebodings that, under such circumstances, will bear down the mind, the dream of the doomed Clarence forced itself upon my recollec- tion : " Oh, Lord ! methought what pain it was to drown I "What dreadful noise of waters in my ears ! What sights of ugly death within my eyes !" For such unbidden, unwelcome images rush into the presence-chamber of the troubled mind, like rebels upon a defeated monarch. The fourth day saw no relaxation of the storm. It raged with unabated violence. Kept awake all the previous night by the noise on deck and clamor below, I obtained during this day one or two fitful slumbers a kind of demi-consciousness wherein you recognize, without seeming able to control, the course of thought. Toward the evening, however, I was fully awakened to earnest realities by a violent trembling of the vessel, or convulsive shivering as with a fever-and-ague-fit, fol- lowed by the shrieks of women, infantile screams, and crash of every thing hitherto unbroken. Fearful that some great calamity had taken place, I thoughtlessly came down from my entrenched position and set foot upon the floor. I had instantaneous cause to regret my precipitation : a feather in a high wind had no more ISLE OF WIGHT. 19 volition. I was first thrown against a suspended lamp, and incontinently demolished the glass into countless fragments ; then, by a ricochet movement, I was forced into collision with the wash-bowl, which I drove out of existence for evermore ; thence I was passed from a table to a chair, from the chair to my trunk, and broke my final fall by crushing an article unnecessary to be described. I lifted up my voice, and shouted ; I lifted up my arm, and madly pulled the bell striving pertinaciously with the din around me. I succeeded in arresting the attention of a chance steward, and gained reassurance from his report of the condition of the vessel and women. He brought me a light, and also a glass of brandy and water, with which, under Providence, I was enabled to get through the night. On the morning of the fifth day, the storm promised to abate, and by noon kept it to the hope. I experi- enced a full sense of relief, a transition indeed from despair to the height of joy, when my servant came into the state-room and informed me we were going into the Isle of Wight, within sight of which, for the five days previous, we had been tempest-driven. "Thank God!" I ejaculated, and sprang out of bed. I knew that the Isle of Wight had not been early con- verted to Christianity ; but I was not bigot enough to believe that in consequence its cuisine had been neglected. I knew further, that it was famous for the smaUness and sweetness of its mutton ! (a leg rarely exceeds four pounds in weight), and I determined that in case the art preservative of all arts was unknown or unappreciated, I would, like one of Homer's heroes, cook my own chops. These chops, curiously cooked, I prepared, while I made a hasty toilet, to accompany with some sliced tomatoes au naturel, besprinkled with much red pepper. The bare imagination of such a feast 20 STANDING OUT TO SEA. drove the blood with an accelerated current through my veins. Horace "Walpole tells us, that his Duke of Newcastle was in the habit of saying " On Friday next, with the blessing of Providence, I propose to get drunk ;" of course, I made in my mind no such prop- osition; but I was equally resolved to feast sumptu- ously that day ! Man proposes. Ascending to the deck, I learned that Ave were not to enter the harbor after all ! The wind, it seemed, had chopped round while we were standing out for the island, and now blew fair for Madeira. The captain said it would be sinful not to take advantage of the only fair wind we had had, and therefore bent his course once more for the north of the channel. I wilted. Chops from that sweet and small mutton, and tomatoes enlivened with cayenne ! How I sympa- thized with old Shylock " I never felt the curse till now !" But I bore the disappointment, cruel as it was, without unmanly repining. I had been blessed with expectation. I was on my feet ; and the very exertion I had made to overcome the languor of my nerves exhilarated and braced them. I breathed freer and deeper. Two days longer yet we tacked and beat and shipped seas in the British channel, making scarce perceptible progress. On the morning of the 8th, more than a week after our departure from Southampton, we bade final adieu to the channel, and stood fairly out to sea. We escaped the storms of the dreaded Bay of Bis- cay, and over the broad Atlantic made three days of ihir sailing. Then we encountered calms or adverse winds, and for four days gained but little on our jour- ney. The sailors told me that the unusual delay and disasters of our voyage were to be attributed to our starting on Friday. But not one of them could tell v.UAND SPECTACLE. "21 me, why Friday, of all the days of the week, should be pronounced unlucky. With them the superstition has survived the knowledge of its origin. In spite of omens or disasters, on the evening of the third Sunday of our departure, we made the little isl- and of Porto Santo, about forty miles from Madeira, historically famous as having been once the residence of the discoverer of America, Christopher Columbus. There are few emotions more to be envied, as there are few less alloyed, than the rapture with which the tem- pest-tost sea-sickened, cadaverous voyager hails the first sight of land. Heliogabalus would have paid a large sum for this sensation rather than never to have experienced it. The stench of bilge-water, forced com- panionship, sea-sickness, and all the deprivations we had undergone, seemed lost in this new emotion. "We had besides, at the close of this day, a most mag- nificent spectacle to exhilarate us. Never was the process of sun-setting (to use a theatrical expression) better " got up." The mise en scene was superb. I had never witnessed a grander sky. The glorious orb of day went down upon the western waters in noon-day splendor. The attendant clouds caught and reflected the dazzling luster of the retiring monarch, arrayed in shapes that had the outer forms of reality. Mosques with domes and minarets, castles with towers and bat- tlements, mountains and crags, blazing in burnished gold, were boldly defined upon the sky in no seeming and unsubstantial pageantry. The scene alas ! was transitory. Around the setting sun these " gorgeous palaces, these solemn temples" lingered awhile ; but, with their architect, disappeared. They died on the rich sky ; they faded to the enrap- tured gaze, and were soon forever lost but to the re- vivifying imagination. 22 1>ANGEK OF FAMINE. Filled with this scene and the peaceful twilight that fell upon the ocean, we retired, in the full hope of reach- ing an anchorage early in the morning. Again to be disappointed ! For storms ushered in the coming day. Every wind seemed conspired against us. Eurus and Notus, and the stormy Afric driving the wet tempest before them, raged against us ; and our fated vessel, lifted up at one time, as it were, to the skies themselves, and at another dashed down to the lowest abyss, was the unresisting sport of the elements. Our condition, contrasted with our hopes of the previous evening, desolated our hearts. Some took to prayers, some to strong liquors I, to bed. "Grief," says Sterne, " naturally seeks a horizontal position." Our patience was exhausted ; so were our provisions. The beef had been early washed overboard ; the mut- ton had been devoured before one half the distance ; and the poultry had followed hard upon it. The pass- age had been calculated at ten days, and we were now in our eighteenth ! A veteran goose, spared a long time for its longevity, had scantily furnished the pre- vious dinner. The fresh water had given out, the soda a week before, and our stomachs refused the ale. Salt beef, and peradventure ham and pork, remained ; but with what could we wash or hold them down ? Beating about, tacking incessantly, and looking well to. compass and to sails, we held our own through the dreary day ; and with the setting sun, made out to reach the Disertas, three sister islets which rise fifteen hundred perpendicular feet from the ocean, directly op- posite the north-eastern extremity of Madeira, about twenty miles from Funchal. They are uninhabited, save by the goats that browse the grass of the penuri- ous rocks. We hugged these islands all night long, and were glad to find in their sheltering arms an es- ol i; AU1MVAL. '23 cape from the ungoverned tempest, which raged with untired animosity the whole succeeding day. The sea- worthiness of our vessel was sorely tried, as well as the skill of the captain and endurance of the crew. How much gratitude do we promise these in such perils ! and how soon after is such promise forgotten ! Our vessel plowed the sea in useless furrows. We could not anchor nor advance one tenable rod toward our landing station. The captain feared our only hope was upon the open ocean. With the wind we had, Funchal Bay, even if attained, could afford us no protection. Vessels riding at anchor there had slipped their cables, as we could distinguish, and run out to sea. We could see the inhabitants crowding the beach, the house-tops, and the rocky cliffs We felt they knew our danger, and could assist us nothing. In our vexed career AVC approached sufficiently close to distinguish the blossomed trees, the varied flowers, and ripened fruit ; and as we turned our backs upon this opening Paradise, we feared the doom of the disobedient He- brew fated to see, but never to set foot upon the land overflowing with milk and honey, wine and oil. But the next sun broke and dispersed the clouds. The wind moderated, and the sea subsided. We came on deck and breathed. The captain bade us hope. By noon, the wind was right ; at two, it was deemed safe to let go the anchor, about half a mile from the shore, in the open roadstead the nearest anchorage with safety. Visited by the Health and Custom house officers to see that we brought neither epidemic nor tobacco, we immediately disembarked, escaping the perils of the sea, the unhealthy closeness of our wooden world, and starvation. I was the first of the passengers to reach "the sure and firm-set earth." CHAPTER II. SEASON OF MADEIRA AND ENGLAND CONTRASTED AOREEAOILITIES OF THE ISLAND ITS RESOURCES C1TV OF FU NCH A [. "I HE FAIR SEX. OF the many kind dispensations of Providence, for which we can never express sufficient gratitude, not the least is that happy faculty of the mind which en- ables us, in our first moments of enjoyment, to erase from the memory all impressions of previous miseries. A warm bath, change of linen, and the admirable cuisine of the American Consul, whose guest I became on landing, made me soon oblivious of all the desayree- inents, delay, and dangers of the voyage. These be- came, in the hour that succeeded dinner, as shadowy and indefinable as myths. We had left England in the midst of autumn. All was in the sere and yellow leaf. The trees had lost their foliage, and the fields their verdure. Cold winds and cheerless skies ushered in and closed melancholy days our voyage had been long and stormy on our arrival, what a change ! " Winter has become sum- mer ; the naked trees which we left are exchanged for luxuriant and varied foliage ; snow and frost for warmth and splendor ; the scenery of the temperate zone for the profusion and magnificence of the tropics : a bright blue sky ; a glowing sun ; hills covered with vines ; a deep blue sea ; a picturesque and novel cos- tume ; all meet and delight the eye just at the precise QUIET HAPPINESS. 25 moment when to have landed on a barren island would have been considered a luxury." Thus Captain Maryatt describes the change, and thus I found it. Some one has summed up the advantages and disad- vantages, the lights and shadows of Madeira life, after this manner : " On the whole, if Madeira were one's world, life would certainly tend to stagnate ; but as a temporary refuge, a niche in an old ruin, where one is sheltered from the shower, it has great merit." This, doubtless, is true, yet npt all that is true. Madeira, assuredly, is no place for turbulent life; our "hot youth" would seek a more active, energetic, livelier existence ; where the play of the passions is more A-arious, and adventure more dramatic. But to him who is satisfied with still waters ; with innocent gratifi- cations ; with untroubled enjoyments ; w r ho seeks rather contentment than distinction, and his own more than others' satisfaction as well as for him who has seen and shared enough the follies and vices of the world who has felt the treachery of friends, the inconstancy of affection, and the spurns which patient merit of the unworthy takes ; who has served, in a word, his ap- prenticeship to the trade of life I know no place bet- ter calculated for an abode. Had Johnson placed Rasselas here instead of in Abyssinia, he might have lived and died innocent and undesirous of change. What a man seeks more than Madeira affords, savor- eth of evil. In beauty and sublimity of scenery it is unsurpassed by lands more famous for both, while the matchless moderation and salubrity of its climate are world-re- nowned. Its soil produces spontaneously the fruits of the tropics the orange, the pomegranate, the banana, the guava, the citron, and olive and, with cultivation, though not in equal perfection, the pear and the apple, 2 JG 60CLBTY. as well as other productions of colder latitudes. The grape that is nourished in most favored spots affords a wine of richer color and superior excellence to any of sunny France, or the boasted vineyards of Germany; Avhile the fish of its waters, the game of its mountains, its herbage-fed and luscious beef, turkeys, and various web-footed birds, supply a rich and abundant table. What can one find more, in any country of Christen- dom, to gratify a well-informed taste ? 'Nor is Madeira unprovided with intellectual re- sources. In the houses of the wealthy residents, as well as in the clubs, there are libraries of the choicest books always attainable by the sojourner; well-inform- ed, agreeable society, among the higher Portuguese and English proprietors the latter distinguished for ready hospitality. In the winter months, dinners, balls, and social evening parties abound ; Avlrile, in summer, noth- ing can be more agreeable than a day spent at the quiutas, or country seats of the opulent merchants : and then for the indulgence of self-communion that most useful of mental occupations there are the ever- varying walks and rides along the shore of " the far- resounding sea," or up to the summits -of the high overreaching hills. Man, indeed, never wants here occupation or amusement who is true to his own na- ture. He has every thing to content him but content- ment. "Weariness, however, springs from the same source as gratification. Our desires increase with in- dulgence; and he who has conquered worlds, weeps for more worlds to conquer. The inhabitants are, to a degree, shut out from the busy world. Daily wars, or rumors of wars affect them not. The regular communication between the island and the continent not being more frequent than a fortnight; their sensibilities are not wounded ISLANDS OF THE BLEST. 27 by the unvaried record of crimes, which, in cities, every newspaper inflicts upon the morning meal. Plato, it is said, excluded all poets from his model republic, lest their prurient imaginations should affect injuriously the mind of the body politic; with how much greater reason would he have kept out editors, whose fictions, no less incredible, are much more dan- gerous ! It is true there are two newspapers publish- ed daily in Funchal. But they do little harm, because, in the first place, they have few readers ; and, in the second place, no believers. Speaking of Plato reminds us that he placed his Atalantis somewhere west of the columns of Hercules. And it is the general belief of the intelligent that "the Islands of the Blest," where the Grecian poets were wont to send their heroes when they had done with them, comprised the Cape de Verdes, the Canaries and Madeira. Surely no more grateful residence could have been selected for the retirement of the favored few whom just Jupiter had loved. Here Achilles, re- covering from the felon-stroke of Paris, might well have congratulated himself that he had exchanged for a glorious immortality the tedious length of human days. Here, Agamemnon, " king of men," indeed, but not of women, fatally convinced of his arrogant credulity in a wife's ten-years' constancy, might have found unhoped- for solace; and here, Dido, forgetting him who had usurped the privileges, without conceding the name, of husband, forgiving even what w r omen, unless Chris- tian, so seldom forgive, spretceque injuria formce, the sated contempt of her charms, might have maintained her youth and beauty amid scenes and climate of such surpassing loveliness ! At least, I doubt not they would have been glad to have made the trial, for I fear they went further and fared worse. 28 FUNCHAL. The approach from the sea gives to Funchal the wild ideal we form of Byron's pirate isle : " It was a wild and breaker-beaten coast, With cliffs above, and a broad, sandy shore ; Guarded by shoals and rocks, as by an host, With here and there a creek, whose aspect wore A better welcome to the tempest-toss'd And rarely ceased the haughty billows' roar, Save on the dead, long summer days, which make The outstretched ocean glitter like a lake." There is properly no harbor where vessels can safely anchor, nor pier, nor mole jutting into the sea, to which they can be fastened. The open roadstead is their only anchorage. Nor is it at all times a safe one. It is exposed to all the blasts from east to south-west, which sometimes rage with fatal violence. To escape their fury, vessels raise their anchors and run out to sea ; and are occasionally absent for weeks. The city of Funchal is built upon the base of a large range of mountains, which rise to the height of 4,000 feet above the level of the sea, and protecting it, like the sides of an amphitheater, form a magnificent back- ground to the view from the deck of a vessel. It is thus seen to the best advantage. Too close proximity makes it more prosaic. The streets are mostly nar- row, and all irregularly built, with as little regard to symmetry as convenience. They are paved with round pieces of basalt gathered from the beach, and set edgeways, to afford a surer hold to the horses' feet ; which require to be shod like ours for snow and frost. The clatter of these quadrupeds, so heavily- ironed, as they gallop through the stony streets, has something fearful in it ; and as there are no causeways for the unfortunate pedestrians, it is sometimes " sauve qui pent" with them. Accidents, however, seldom THE BUEBOQUEBO. 29 happen. The horses are very manageable, and are at- tended, besides, by a kind of gillies or outrunners, here called " Burroqueros," who aid to prevent mischief. It is what the English call a jolly sight, to see one of these animals, with his attendant burroquero, fairly en route. No matter how fast he goes whether on a trot, canter or gallop the burroquero keeps equal ground ; not, perhaps, so much to be wondered at, since the man twists his hand securely into the horse's tail, and hangs to it, " thorough bush, thorough brier." He uses it, too, as a kind of rudder with which to steer the animal's course ; and however viciously inclined it may be, it can not kick or get free its hinder parts, while the burroquero holds firmly to the caudal ex- tremity. Such an apparition has, to the stranger, a ludicrous sense. And when he mounts he determines to get rid of the unnecessary appendage. He urges his horse to rear, to plunge, to shy, to start into a gal- lop, or violently to halt but all in vain. The burro- quero can no more be removed than the gloomy thoughts which, the Roman poet says, sits behind the horseman. There was bufe one forcible means by which I ever succeeded in extricating my horse it was by fording a large stream. The burroquero was like Burns's witches : " A running stream they darena' cross." Still, as there are other as efficacious methods of killing a cat as drowning, so there are better ways than force of separating horse and burroquero, whenever you wish to do so. But sometimes the services of the burroquero can neither, with comfort nor safety, be dispensed with. He brushes the flies from the animal with a horse-tail broom lie has ever in his hand ; holds him while you dismount; compels him to reluctant 30 THE CAP. speed ; and leads him over dangerous paths. Nor is this all. He is your most amusing traveling compan- ion. He knows the secret of every house, and can tell you the latest scandal ; where the jewels of Signora came from, and why that black-eyed boy you so much admired looked so little like his putative father. He can also supply you with all traditionary information of places, persons and occurrences. He is, in a word, " the abstract and brief chronicle" of all times. I had in my employ a perfect bijou of a burroquero the coolest romancer, the greatest cheat, and cleverest valet I ever met with. If any one of you should go to Mad- eira, retain " Matthew" (as he Anglicizes himself), and you will find I am right. These fellows and the lower class generally wear a peculiar sort of cap, something like an inverted saucer, not much larger, but more conical in form. It is sur- mounted by an appendage, not unlike a pig's tail, with a rakish inclination to one side, as a pig might carry his, when making love. How such a cap could ever have been invented puzzles comprehension or what purpose it serves. There is nothing picturesque or at- tractive in it ; and it no more covers the head than a fashionable lady's bonnet. The remainder of the dress is ordinary, no less in appearance than quality. Indeed many of the poorer class have no more covering than sufficient to neutralize nudity. Some of the men are exceedingly well made ; tall, and of symmetrical proportions. They walk erect, and with an ease and elasticity of carriage nowhere surpassed. One of the men attached to the palanquin of the Consular House has the muscular beauty of an Apollo Belvidere ; and his attitudes and motions dis- play a vigorous grace beyond the reach of art. I say less for what is called the softer sex. The THE WOMEN. '31 women arc generally unprepossessing. Indeed among the lower classes I saw but one pretty girl ; and her history will be told hereafter ; whether it be owing to the hard toil they undergo, to early and continual ex- posure, to habits, or to the scanty food they meet with, I know not ; but the melancholy truth is, the women of the island, in youth, are by no means attractive, and in their old age, fearfully ugly. You see withered bel- dames too, at forty. Many of them have no youth. Man-traps and spring-guns appear in all their linea- ments. lS T or is this in all respects an unfortunate cir- cumstance. For they hold their last favors very cheap ; and were they less repulsive, they would be more dan- gerous to morals and health. It is not merely that their features are plain, and their persons coarsely formed they take little or no care of either. The prettiest girl would want attrac- tion, if she wanted cleanliness ; but dirty ugliness turns the stomach. They seem to avoid water like a mad dog ; upon many of their persons, I have been told, cer- tain animals domiciliate themselves, whose names are unspoken " to ears polite" squatters who insist upon their pre-emptive rights. You often see of a sunny af- ternoon, in some of the most public promenades, girls busily engaged in removing from each other's heads these tenacious occupants ; and the innocent abandon with which they interchange such mutual kind offices would afford matter of curious reflection to a peripa- tetic philosopher. But to the ordinary spectator this occupation, however agreeable and even salutary to the parties most immediately interested in it, brings no gratification; nor excites indeed other emotions than repulsion and disgust. The Portuguese ladies du bon ton are of course to be exempted from such a charge. The social outlaws. ;32 MABKIAGES. of whom I have spoken, respect the aristocracy. The upper classes here doubtless are as careful of their per- sons as ladies elsewhere, excepting perhaps the French, whose household deity is cleanliness, and who bathe as often as an early Mussulman. Generally speaking, however, they are not pretty. Many, it is true, have sparkling black eyes, which lend a brilliant irradiation to the features ; but their countenances mostly lack ex- pression; and indolent habits with gross food soon bring on that embonpoint so fatal to sentiment. They are said to be clever and lively in conversation, to posess much ease of manner, and amiable dispositions. Mar- riages among the aristocratic circles, as in the mother O O ' country, and generally on the Continent, are made by the parents. This custom in warm climates, however it may prove " in the cold regions of the moral Xorth," is followed by beneficial results. The marriage de convenance, founded -upon what Philosopher Square would call " the etemal fitness of things," has proved an excellent institution ; while what are poetically termed love matches are generally prolific of mutual misery. Warm climates engender warm blood; and what springs from precocious passion terminates in early satiety. The romance vanishes, the passion evap- orates, the woman remains ! " But something too much of this." He who feels therefore the besoin (fainter in Ma- deira (and where will he not feel it, unless like Jupiter, he goes on a frolic among the "Ethiopians"), will look elsewhere for its gratification than among the Portu- guese ladies ; and may not look in vain. Each win- ter sends to the island many English families, with youthful daughters not indisposed to a proper flirta- tion ; and nowhere in the world are girls better "got up" than in England. I don't allude merely to the LOVE. 33 physique, wherein they confessedly excel but in de- portment, character, repose of manner and intelligence; unlike our girls, they are not sent from the nursery to the drawing-room without intermediate experience, nor allowed to converse without being first taught to think. ZD O With the better classes, the daughters are educated at home under the intelligent affection of a mother; and not intrusted to those social nuisances, boarding- schools, where girls are more likely to learn every thing rather than womanly virtues and accomplishments. " There is a period," says our countryman, Cooper, " in the life of every woman, when she may be said to be predisposed to love ; it is at the happy age when in- fancy is lost in opening maturity when the guileless heart beats with joyous anticipations of life which the truth can never realize, and when the imagination forms images of perfection that are copied after its own unsullied visions." It is at this poetical age that many English girls come out to Madeira. The deli- cious climate and softened sky ; the varied scenery and generous food ; the romantic rides and shaded walks, all inspire and nourish sweet desires. Love, which in its first and least selfish phase, seeks but return of love, which devotes itself to the present without thought of the morrow, springs here spontaneous in the heart. It reveals itself in some unconscious act some casual encounter, or intercepted look ; a mere sentiment at first, it may become, on proper opposition, a passion. Instances have occurred where heads of families have been compelled, to save their daughters from a mesal- liance, to quit precipitately the island. But such in- stances are rare. Marrir.ges, indeed, do not unfre- quently take place, and without any shock to les con- venances / but, generally speaking, nothing more un- fortunate than a sentimental liaison occurs. 2* CHAPTER III. THE GARDEN AND ESTABLISHMENT OF THE AMERICAN CONSUL THE PRAZA DO CONSTITIIT1AO THE CANONS OF THE ROMISH CHURCH THE LANDED PROPRIETORS. IT was near the close of the day when we landed from our tempest-tossed bark upon the shore. The approaching evening and my battered condition alike indisposed me to investigation. I had no inclination for details nor, after dinner, for aught else than re- cuperative sleep. Thus, when I awoke in the morning, I awoke to the fullness of gratified surprise. Throw- ing open my window-curtains to welcome the mount- ain air, the branch of an orange-tree, deeply laden with mellowed fruit, offered itself to my eye and, without unnecessary pause, was grasped by my eager hand. Defended by no prohibition, divine or human, I plucked the fruit and ate : and this was, for mornings, the preface of my breakfast. Water from the mount- ains which overhung the house, two thousand feet in height, furnished me a re-invigorating bath, cold, but not chilling. My ablutions and orisons completed, I descended to the grounds upon which my chamber abutted, to satisfy, by nearer inspection, an imperfect coup tfceil. Besides the orange-trees, whose contrast- ed fruit and foliage enlivened the atmosphere, I saw the curtained pomegranate, the rich banana, the coffee- tree whose fruit rivals the Mocha, the luscious custard- MAKSTKO FRANCESCO. ;'55 apple, and the perfumed citron, all in unaided abund- ance. It was realizing a scene in Persian poetry; while the softened air and transparent sky mingled with and harmonized the bounties of the earth. I partook of breakfast with more than ordinary ap- petite and gratitude ; both strengthened by the lus- cious freshness of the figs that ushered it in. I felt a self-complacent pity for the man who had never com- menced his morning repast with fresh figs. Let no such man be envied. The Salic law prevails in the consular establish- ment. No Avoman : governs there indeed, save one in Wood the figure-head of a shipwrecked bark, I saw none of the softer sex in the house. My chamber- maid was a man of some fifty years ; and it is due him and truth to say, that he performed his functions with more assiduity and less fuss than any fernalB chamber- maid I have had the good or ill-luck to encounter. He never spoke unless Avhen addressed, and then in Portugese, of which I did not understand one word. He never used my combs, nor tooth-brushes; never pretended to be alarmed when I prepared for the bath ; and never stole my cosmetics : took all gratuities without simulated reluctance, and expected no endear- ments. He was, indeed, as John Foy, our sometime Washington friend, would have described him "a ^ay- cock" of a chambermaid. I have met never his su- perior since. " Maestro" Francesco, who presided over the cuisine, was an artist; and properly desig- nated maestro. He composed. He invented. He gave more genius to his dishes than often goes to the composition of an epic, or an opera. He loved his profession ; gloried in it, and was glorified by it. He was not compelled to the office ; xmlike the starved apothecary, his will, not his poverty consented. 36 TOO MUC^ PORK. He was a man of means ; what we call a forehanded man ; a landed proprietor, and owner of houses. His rents had been a sufficient livelihood but he pre- ferred doing good to selfish indolence ; of influence among his countrymen, he was much respected by the stranger that was within the gates. But Homer sometimes napped, and Michael Angelo failed and Francesco, great in his art as they in theirs, had one infirmity ; he was too much disposed to load his table Avith pork. To be sure, the porcine, flesh of Madeira is like such flesh nowhere else so juicy is it, so delicate, so sweet ; and whiter than an infant's. Dr. Barrowby, equally well-known in John- son's time as a physician and lover of swine's flesh, would not have needed to utter, on eating this, the superfluous wish " Oh that I were a Jew !" "Why so ?" some one inquired ; " the Jews are not allowed to eat your favorite meat." "Because," replied he; "I should then enjoy the taste of the pork with the additional pleasure of sinning." The Madeira pork would have left him no possibility of further desire. Still it may be crowded too much upon the table, though it assume as many various disguises as Proteus. In truth, the Portuguese make excellent servants, in whatever capacity employed versatile, active, honest, impressionable, they are as intelligent as the French, and much more reliable. I speak generally ; of course there are rogues and drones among them as in other places. The garden walls of the consulate abut on the Praza do Constitutiao the most popular lounge for those who have nothing to do on the island; i. e., threefourths of the natives, and all the foreigners. Flanked on one side by the castle, and, on the op- posite by the cathedral, with a row of fine trees enclosing it on every side, it affords a picturesque and THE PROMENADE. 37 shaded walk. Here the ladies exhibit their dresses, and their faces ; talk scandal or sentiment excite and reward admiration and the gentlemen smoke and gaze. Day-life is listless, a major part of the time here, and conversation is mostly too great an exertion, unless to those from whom it flows naturally. The principal objection to this resort, as to other most agreeable walks near Funchal, is the number of con- sumptive sick you meet. Our careless and unthinking enjoyment of existence seems to outrage these fated sufferers. It is, however, the blessed characteristic of their disease that they feel not how fast it steals away their blood their life ebbs rapidly, while their hopes increase. The smile on their wan cheeks attest no consciousness of danger and no premonitory pangs anticipate the agony of dissolution. It is easy to while the day in the open air, under cloudless suns, and in a well-tempered clime. A mere sense of existence fills and satisfies the soul. You want no distraction, amusement, or occupation. As the Grecian philosopher proved existence " Cogito, ergo sum" " I think, therefore, I must be" so was defined our daily life " We feel, and therefore live." For what is happiness but a series of pleasurable sen- sations ? And the evening reunions at the consulate were pleasant, and dwell gratefully on the memory. Whist was the general occupation, with tea and toast for the sole refreshment. I do not recollect to have seen wine introduced at all, and no stronger potations are known in polite society. The Portuguese are no wine-bibbers, though they cultivate the vine. They place their choicest vintage upon the table from courteous habit, but indulge even at dinner sparsely; after dinner, most rarely, if ever. 38 CONEGO BKNTO. Among the most frequent and honored guests on these occasions was the Conego Bento, a canon of the Holy Catholic Church. An octogenarian, but more bowed down by the weight of honors than of years. He had obeyed literally the Scriptural injunction : He had sold all he had, and given to the poor. Devoted to his flock and the Church, wealth had been to him a distraction and an incumbrance. During a long life unshadowed by a suspicion, he had gradually divested himself of a large patrimony for the maintenance, of poor relatives ; and whoever was needy was his rela- tive. He had all the amiability, the bonhommie, and quiet deportment of Fenelon, with nothing of his time- serving disposition. Had he been disposed to flatter the great, he too could have obtained the higher dig- nities of the Church. But he preferred conscience to position, self-respect to unworthily-earned promotion. Tolerant, although he had suffered persecution ; fervid, while the times encouraged laxity of opinion, he gained proselytes by kindness, and secured them by example. I have heard him in the pulpit and while generally the mildness of his daily thought was reflected there, on occasions when vice provoked, or his lofty theme urged him onward, I have known him to burst forth in a torrent of indignant or impetuous eloquence, like Bourdaloue rebuking protected sin, or the inspired convert preaching the Unknown God ! His port then assumed a majesty suited to his theme ; his bowed form became erect; his eye regained all its original fire his voice its wonted compass and every linea- ment, feature, and gesture, revealed the struggling Divinity within ! His sole amusement was this game of whist ; his nightly amusement, did no duty prevent. They who have neither his intellect nor beauty of life may pro- CONEGO PEST AN A. 39 nounce it frivolous or objectionable. The intelligent and the charitable, whose censure alone is worthy regard, will approve him. Had they who deserted the Church of Rome made life more tolerable, they had made their religion more desirable. There must be something wrong in the faith which punishes con- tentment in this world Avith damnation beyond it. Conego Pestana was another of the guests ; more learned than his elder confrere, though surely not more devout. Educated at the University of Coimbra, accus- tomed to high society, and of great natural parts, his conversation was as brilliant as it was easy and unaf- fected. He never attempted and never failed to shine. He knew the world, and was too wise to abuse it ; he loved his calling, or had too much sense to discredit it. That is, he sincerely believed, or unsuspectedly doubted. Then we had a " colonel of the regular army," an officer of the customs, the Governor of the island, and an occasional morgado, as the hereditary land-propri- etors are called. With varied conversation and cards, we got through the evenings quietly, pleasantly, and instructively. My knowledge of the language was too sadly limited to allow a full appreciation of the conver- sation ; many a pointed epigram or brilliant repartee escaped me, as well as (I suspect) many a scandalous anecdote, which the sterner sex relish as much as the softer. But some one was always at hand to give me an outline of the mot or story, so that I could imagine what it would be with filling up and coloring. The Portuguese language is an expressive one, and the Por- tuguese themselves the best of mimics and raconteurs, so that the well-selected epithet, the animated eye, and speaking gesture conveyed a meaning which careless or unaided words could never have rendered intelligible. 40 THE MERCHANT PRINCE. But the old hospitality of the island can hardly be kept up. The blight has fallen upon the grape, and there is no longer " fruit in the vine." In former times, no persons any where lived more comfortably or sump- tuously than the noblesse de la viyne of Madeira. They had handsome town houses and elegant country resi- dences, many clubs, and a retinue of servants. They kept an open and a luxurious table. This must all be changed. There are many wealthy residents still ; but their former hospitality and large expenditures must decrease with decreasing incomes. Thirty years since, when a house exported annually some hundreds of pipes at a romantic profit, the height of great extrava- gance even was hardly felt. With regal incomes, these "royal merchants" laughed at all outlays. But with change of times must come change of habits. There can be no exportation of wine, for there are no grapes, and consequently there can be no income. The pro- prietors, who are now drawing upon their stored wines to keep up their establishments, will soon find that re- source exhausted. They must relinquish their old oc- cupation, and devote capital and energy to other pursuits. CHAPTER IV. RIDES AND WALKS NEAR FUNCHAL THE MOUNT CHURCH THE WATER- FALL-^ AMACHA DESCRIPTION OF A QUINTA IT was my custom generally of an afternoon to take one of the many beautiful rides around Funchal, to gratify my love of the picturesque, and to get up an appetite for dinner. We dined seldom before seven o'clock of the evening, when the business of the day was over, and there was naught to disturb our devotions. West of the town they were constructing, while I was there and, doubtless, are still constructing (for a thing is never completed in Madeira) a road, which, if finished, would answer well for wheels, and, with proper care, might, in some places, safely be traveled even with a pair of 2.40s. partly from individual con- tribution, and partly at the expense of the Government. On one side it abuts upon the sea ; and you can look down several hundred perpendicular feet upon the breakers that vex the shores, and hear their angry murmurs as they break against the repelling rocks. It is fearful more so than at Dover Cliff to cast one's eyes so low. The road at times seems but a cincture of the precipitous rock, incapable of ioothold. Its apparent danger lends it additional attraction. But compared with what I have seen of other pathways on the island, winch span with tottering bridges fearful chasms, hang over fatal precipices, and descend per- 42 RIPE TO THK MOUNT CHURCH. pendicular declivities, this " New Road" is an easy promenade. But a ride I more affected and oftener followed, was to '" Nossa Senhora do Monte" the Mount Church, as it is less poetically Anglicized. The ride, from its very commencement, is always on an ascent. The church stands some 2000 feet above Funchal ; and the road is paved throughout. The greater part of the way runs between the high white walls of the quintas, and under their vine-colored corridors. Flowers attend you on every side, and fill the air with perfume ; the geranium and the fuchsia, and other flowering shrubs native to the soil, climb up the walls, and offer themselves to your coming. In its proper season, the grape, "in Bacchanal profusion," bursts out from the leaves that strive to imprison it ; and purple, plump and luscious, seems to court your touch ; while, from many a crevice in the walls, opened for the passage of unwanted moisture from the terraced earth, peep forth flowers of every hue, and dip their blushing heads in the run- ning streamlets at your feet ; for you have, to the very topmost height of the ascent, an ever fresh, sparkling, running rivulet. These are cradled in the inaccessible summits. Their natural hatred of restraint is some- what tamed as they quit their birth-place ; and they are made to flow within rock-built channels, in vehe- ment regularity, down the steep pathway. But even under such control, their precipitous descent, and the increased volume from alliances formed in their course, would terrify with fears of inundations the dwellers of the plain but that their native fierceness is still further subdued by well-timed division. Their Avaters are separated, and singly overcome ; and then devoted to irrigating gardens, turning mill-wheels, washing foul linen, or "such base uses." MOUNTAIN VIEW. 43 As you pause part-way on your ascent, to afford well-needed rest to rider and horse, looking upward you see the .; hureh of "Our Lady of the Mount," rising with its turrets proudly above neighboring hills, huge forest trees, and human habitations no unfit emblem of the Faith it illustrates, which has triumphed alike over the fierceness of nature and over Dominions, Principalities, and Powers ! From the top of the church you have a panoramic view of surpassing magnificence. The church fronts the ocean. Between yourself and this ocean lies Fun- chal, with its white walls and chimneys glistening in the sun. Distance gives it beauty; for whatever of in- congruity, disorder or imperfect architecture may ap- pear to the nearer view whatever in any way liable to criticism, or repugnant to severer taste is lost to the eye, thus removed. From this station, castle and ca- thedral, fortress and monastery, blend and harmonize with the lazar-house and the prison, the broken wall and the vacated hut ; while, before, behind, and every where around you, precipice and ravine, crag, forest, and weather-scarred mountain, rush on the sight. You can descend the mountain in cars not so swiftly, but more safely, than by steam propelled, or rather guided by boys. They are mere sleds such as we used in younger days for coasting, and move as fast over the smooth stones as we formerly over the hard- ened snow. As a varied entertainment, a ride or slide like this is not mal a propos. It is no easy task to descend this hill on foot, particularly after a shower ; and the rejected boys will be sure to accompany any mischance with a portion of the Portuguese vocabulary more expressive than nice. Their gibes and jeers give a sharper anguish to the offended part. No less agreeable than either of these rides is per- 44 SALAMIS. haps the one to the east of the town. The road hugs the cliffs all the way till you reach the Ribeiro de Gon- zalos, a love of a ravine, which unites with the sea a mile from the Sorocco Church. Further than this, the cliffs arise with almost perpendicular violence. The road winds round them, and becomes less picturesque till you reach Cape Garajao, which, with its projection upon the ocean, forms the eastern horn of Funchal Bay, and from the top of which you have a view of a long range of cliffs, rising on either side, one above the other, with furrowed features and grotesque heads, that imagination might convert into any thing fantas- tic. The projection of this cape, met by a correspond- ing one further to the east, forms a bay, or crescent of the sea, wherein a large navy might ride at ease, or hostile armadas find ample room and space enough for fatal encounter, to win or lose a world. Some fancied resemblance to Salamis took one day such strong hold of my imagination that, in temporary forgetfulness, I exclaimed to my astonished burroquero : " Approach, thou craven-crouching slave I Say, is not this Thermopylae ? These waters blue that round you lave, Oh, servile offspring of the free Pronounce what sea, what shore is this ?" My emphatic gesture and indignant voice, I thought, would have given my follower fits ; but I soon reas- sured him, and he went on his way rejoicing. Another excursion in which I indulged, however but seldom, as it was somewhat of a serious character, was to the waterfall. A short distance from the Church of San Koque, we descend the side of a precipitous ra- vine, on reaching the bottom of which we find the path- way no longer practicable for our horses. These we THE WATERFALL. 45 were therefore obliged to abandon, and made the rest of the journey on foot, or in a hammock upon the shoulders of men. The road lies through the bed of the torrent, and we were compelled to climb over boulders and masses of rock, which have been de- tached from the stupendous cliffs on either side, or been driven down by the violence of the winter storms. They are of enormous bulk, and attest the power of the torrent that has dislodged them. It may well be supposed that a journey over these is exhaust- ing. It is, indeed, achieved only by those whose pas- sion for the picturesque subdues physical fatigue. Falling sometimes from, sometimes against a rock slipping at one time among the sharp stones, and at an- other into the current after a struggle of two hours we reached the waterfall, muddied, bruised and ex- hausted. But as the scene presents itself suddenly to our view, we feel, for the moment at least, fully com- pensated. The effect is indeed grand. There had been a short time previous to my first visit a copious fall of rain, and the stream, as it broke through the opening gorge, and fell nearly three hundred perpen- dicular feet, occupied our minds with gratified awe. Here, a view of this kind is prized more highly than in countries more abounding with well-filled streams. The rich and wild island scenery, otherwise incompar- able, loses much of its beauty from the lack of inland water. But far more agreeable than to the Church of our Lady, upon the " New Road," or to the waterfall, was, for me, the ride to Camacha. Not only that it was bordered witli villas and quintas among them "Palheiro," the country seat of the late Conde de Carvalho and with groves of beautiful trees not that it commanded a glorious view of the Disertas, 46 THE QUINTA AT CAMACHA. *. the promontory of Sao Lourenco, with its fossil-bed two hundred and fifty feet above the level of the sea, as well as other no less striking natural splendors but chiefly because I found at Camacha the loveliest quinta and warmest welcome in all Madeira. Inclosed on three sides with embracing hills, which will not beteem the winds of heaven to visit its face too roughly, and open on the other o'er varied and pic- turesque scenery to the ocean, one would suppose these grounds laid out by Nature in one of her hap- piest moods. With glens and running streams, cas- cades and ravines, precipice and natural lawn, brown heath and shaggy wood ; where could we find a hap- pier contrast, or more harmonious variety ? What a place for a honeymoon! Here all day long (while it lasted!) we would while away the flying hours with Anna, Lizzie, Mary, or some other " inexpressive she ;" sit down with her by the side of some waterfall, whose music her voice alone would excel (of course) in silvery sweetness cull flowers more lovely than aught save her cheeks, and more fragrant than aught save her breath descend some glen, whose gloom no sun has penetrated, and find it illuminated by her pres- ence cross ravines deeper than plummet-reach, and feel no fear with her look at her, think of her, talk with her, and feel no ennui the livelong day ! Is there such another place on all this earth ? Do miracles repeat themselves ? A stream runs along the entering pathway of the grounds, and breaks into a gentle fall just as it reaches the house. I noticed, on my first approach, a party swimming and diving in the water directly under the fall. They were extremely decottetee, even more so than the present rage, and I hesitated to advance. Speering out, however, more leisurely from an ambus- THE BATHING LADIES. 47 cade, upon which, on the first danger, I had retreated, I discovered that these naiades were of wood, and that, in drawing nearer, I ran no risk of AcUeon's fate. So I plucked up resolution and passed them. My fright- ened sensibilities soon recoved their wonted tone. These figures, once caught in the vortex of the fall- ing stream, are fated to incessant motion. They alternate between a plunge and a motion somewhat like the gait of a fashionable lady on entering or leav- ing a room. 'Tis n't a walk 'tis n't a glide 'tis n't a swim. It is a je ne sais quoi a motion of the other limbs, like the arms in tossing a baby ; doubtless quite fascinating and unnatural. These wooden ladies can no more leave the circle of the falling water than Dante's damned, theirs and have no more rest than his sufferers. It is funny to see them, naked from the waist upward, dance round, and, seem- ingly, attempt to get out of the vortex. They make such life-like exertions ; and if they get too near the stream, and you see they are obliged to turn a soiner- set, you can always turn your back in time ! There is no more hospitable man on the island than the proprietor of this place and there is no house visited with so much gratification. Ceremony exacts no toll at the door ; the threshold once crossed, the freedom of the house is yours. Welcome meets you, and good-breeding leaves you at your ease. No man had better wine or husbanded it less. lie seemed to like to taste his choicest on the palate of a friend. I can speak gratefully of quantity and quality. After a ride of two or three hours from Funchal, a glass would fall upon my jaded powers like the dew on Hermon. Though wilted, I lifted up my head and freshened. The remembrance warms me now. Two such persons host and hostess characterize 43 THE PROPRIETOR. a place give it a tone, and make it inhabitable. Whether one mountain be a little higher than another, covered with snow, or bare or one river somewhat deeper and wider than another or one climate a little more moderate and salubrious or fruit of the earth more plentiful and delicious, makes, after all, to the cosmopolite, but little difference. The smile of the hostess as we enter the house, the exchange of intellectual sympathies while we remain, and the warm grasp which invites a repetition of our visit ; these constitute the pleasure of a residence. CHAPTER V. TT3LK LONGEVITY AND FECUNDITY OK MADEIKA MENDICANCY ANECDOTE OF X PRECOCIOUS YOUTH ILL-KEPAID LABOR. POETS have sung and physicians praised the delicious climate of Madeira ; and I doubt if there be in the world a more salubrious. Never in any place of equal population, have I found among natives and residents so few affected by disease. I have seen and heard among these, none with pulmonary complaints. Lon- gevity here, too, is more the rule than the exception a general rather than a restricted enjoyment. The age of three of our stock company at whist, of whom I have spoken the two Conegos and the Colonel amounted to an aggregate of two hundred and fifteen years ; and they had i'elt little or nothing of the be- numbing influence of time. True it is that their habits of life had conduced much to the preservation so long of their mental and physical vigor ; never in their youth did they apply hot and rebellious liquor in their blood but much of both is fairly attributable to the salutary temperature of the climate. It knows no extreme of heat nor cold ; and no sudden atmospheric reverses the too frequent curse .of climates less favored. The greatest rigor of winter in Funchal seldom, if ever, precipitates the mercury lower than 52 Fahrenheit ; so that fires are unnecessary to comfort ; while in summer, under the unbridled rage of the Dog Star, it rises in 3 50 CHILDREN. warmest exposure, but to 88 a difference of but little more than thirty degrees between summer's heat and winter's frost ; and this difference overcome by no spasmodic leap, but gently reached in regular grada- tions. Can one be surprised then, that with moderate indulgences, under a sun so well tempered, old age is not only so general, but that when it slowly comes, it comes like " a lusty winter, frosty but kindly." Nor is it merely that it prevents or cures consump- tive complaints, or that it induces or cherishes hale old age, that the climate of Madeira is to be com- mended. It has a genei-ative no less than a conserva- tive or restorative influence, and fertilizes women as well as the soil. It is no uncommon thing to see a woman of middle age followed by a brood of children of the apostolic number ; whose ages succeed each other with the regularity of mile-stones. I have heard that one lady presented her husband with three of these innocent pledges of her affection in twenty-eight months, in installments of one at a time. " Like as ar- rows in the hands of a giant, so are the young chil- dren. Happy is he that hath a quiver full of them !" Of a verity, the people of this island seem to agree with the inspired Psalmist, and discharge their arrows incessantly. Nor is this laudable fecundity restricted to the native women. Those from abroad who come here, and for a while domiciliate themselves, feel the genial influence of the climate ; and, though before unfortunate, in proper time, remove their lords', or their own reproach. In many instances, cases seemingly desperate have given way to proper treatment. Estates, that threat- ened to devolve upon distant or unregarded kinsmen, have been maintained in lineal and satisfactory descent by an unexpected accouchement ; and graceless heirs at THE WIVES OF THE KEGIIEEOT. 5t law, who had thought that the "old fellows" made them wait too long for an estate, or cash, or country- seat, have been balked forever, by what they might call a malicious Providence. Indeed I have heard of one instance of the recupera- tive or suggestive influence of the climate, which, but that it was well attested, I should hesitate to mention ; for I would not willingly be suspected of exaggeration. It is this. While the English, in their extravagant contest with Napoleon, held possession of this island against the enemies of Portugal as well as against Por- tugal herself, they garrisoned Funchal with two regi- ments of soldiers, many of whom brought childless wives with them ; wives, some of them, that had been married and barren a quarter of a century or less. The regiments remained here for some years ; and when, after the war, the soldiers who were married returned to England, they returned, nearly all of them, with the most substantial proofs of their wives' attachment. Scandal believes, or affects to believe, that these " femmes du regiment" changed more than the climate to give their husbands heirs. But I prefer the story in its naked simplicity. Dining one day with a friend on the island, the grati- fied father of a numerous offspring, I took the liberty, after the ladies had retired, to remonstrate against his putting forth any further editions of himself ten being as much, in my judgment, as a Avell-advised public opinion would tolerate. My friend, who has an inclina- tion for piety, replied : "It is all in the hands of the Lord." " Indirectly," I said. The worst feature, so far as the natives are con- cerned, even among the better classes, of this extraordi- nary fecundity is, that as the law of entail prevails here 5 '2 ENTAIL. in all its antiphilosophical rigor, the younger scions of the house, be they boys or girls, are left without the means of livelihood. The moryado (or hereditary land-holder) has no more than sufficient for the main- tenance of the estate not enough surely to cultivate it to advantage. He can not alienate it, if he would. The consequence is, that while his brothers and sisters starve, or seek a disreputable existence, the estate itself runs to sterility. To remedy these two crying evils, two changes are necessary ; first, the abolition of the law of entail ; second, the enforcement of the doctrines of Mai thus. The first is anticipated from the action of the mother country. I know not what legal enactment or preventive police can compel the second. One un- fortunate fact experience has established in every coun- try that the more desperate the circumstances of men, the more eager they are to perpetrate matrimony. On what principle, I know not, unless upon the pro- verbial one " that misery loves company." This atro- cious wrong to woman is likewise a crime against society; for society suffers from unnecessary births; and the principle of self-defense authorizes it to employ every counteracting regulation. This nn governed passion among the poorer class in Madeira makes of the women slaves, and children beggars. Every where, and on every occasion, during my rides, I met meager, half-clad, halt-starved troops of children, from infancy to almost puberty, soliciting alms. I understood their gestures, if not their lan- guage ; for misery never yet wanted a proper organ of communication. Systematic beggary is but a syno- nyme for knavery ; and fictitious sorrows are more eloquent than real ones. Here the practice has reached the regularity of a system ; and some of the most youthful mendicants are the greatest proficients. ANECDOTE. 53 As I was riding one day, somewhere in the parish of San Martinho, I saw a boy, apparently about twelve years old, sitting by the way side, and moaning. Call- ing into use whatever little knowledge I possessed of Portuguese, I inquired what ailed him. After much sobbing, he told me with broken articulation, and O ' ' mournful pantomime, that his mother had given him a pistareen to go to the venda, and buy some meal, as the family was without provisions of any kind, and nigh starvation. He had lost the money from his pocket the last cent that he had in the world and he was sure his father would kill him if he returned home. I was moved with the pathetic tale, and gave him two pistareens, telling him to buy meal with one, and to keep the other for himself. With a fervent acknowl- edgment of the kindness, he took the money, and dried his tears ; and I continued my ride with a feel- ing of virtuous satisfaction. A few days after, chance impelled me to the same locality ; and as I was walking my horse somewhere near the place where I had met the boy, some one run ahead of me, sobbing and vociferating most lugubri- ously. I stopped him, and on his turning, recognized my former beneficiary. " What is the matter, my boy ?" I inquired. " Oh, signor, I shall be killed. My mother gave me a pistareen to go to the venda to buy some meal, and I have lost it, and I can not go home, for my father will kill me, as this is all the money he has in the world." And here of course recommenced the sobbing on the crescendo scale. " You young rascal," said I, " are you losing pista- reens every day ? Did you lose the two I gave you a short time since ?" He looked at me an instant, and, doubtless recogniz- 54 POVERTY. ing me, addressed himself to flight. But I caught him by the collar, and threatened to give him a good whip- ping, which he needed more than pistareens. He threw himself upon his knees, and protested he would never have told me such a story had he known I was the gentleman who had been so kind to him ! I could not but laugh at his impudence ; and telling him if I caught him in a lie again I would certainly punish him, let him go. This is but one of the many instances of precocious roguery we met every where in the island. The destitute condition of the island-population can not however be too strongly stated. The failure of the grape for three years has made poverty chronic, incur- able, save by emigration. American and English char- ity have afforded, it is true, great relief to the suf- ferers ; but further eleemosynary contributions from abroad can hardly be expected, while famine is as im- minent as before. The truth is, the population of the island is dispi'oportionate to the demand for labor, and, consequently, means of livelihood. Wages are insuffi- cient to bare existence, and threaten to become lower. Even at the present time a full-grown boy or man will cut wood all day in the mountains, and in the evening bring the product down on his head to the market for about five cents. The women, however, are generally the carriers of wood; as, indeed, of almost everything else. The poor live mostly upon vegetables and fruit, which are not dear, and they need little clothing in such a warm climate. But many, from the want of sufficient food and clothing, even of the cheapest kind, suffer greatly, and die early. Yet notwithstanding their poverty and their too often extreme suffering, the peasantry of the island do not seem an unhappy race. They are very kind to CONTENTMENT. 55 each other, and sympathy alleviates the evils it can not remove. Thus it is that Providence distributes, after all, its favors more impartially than we sometimes think : upon one portion of mankind it bestows in greater profusion wealth and luxuries; upon another, the greater gift of contentment without them. CHAPTER VI. TOUJt OF THE ISLAND THE VARIOUS PRODUCTIONS THE DIFFERENT PEAKS- ARRIVAL AT ST. ANNA. IT has been said that one should never go with deter- mined purpose in search of the picturesque ; that they alone are fortunate who come upon the beauties of nature unexpectedly, like him who encountered the Goddess of the Silver Bow in all the luxuriance of her unobstructed charms. I doubt. The happiness may come doubled that comes unanticipated ; but is anticipation itself nothing ? Is imagination nothing? and the quickened pulse of hope nothing? Indeed, what is all of life but a con- tinuing hope ? and hell itself, but a hopeless eternity ? But let us leave the question with metaphysicians who will never determine it, while I describe some scenes on this island which I sought out advisedly. Sometime in December I undertook the grand tour of the island. It would be something, I thought, to think and speak of afterward. To have undertaken and accomplished, in " the dead waist and middle" of the winter, a journey, a cheval, over hills thousands of feet above the level of the sea, over streams hazard- ously bridged, precipices of fatal depth, and roads where a false, might be an eternal, step. I had read and heard of moving accidents by field and flood ; of dislocations, broken arms, and perilous SCENERY. 57 falls and longed to show my courage in encountering, and address in avoiding such dangers. From the rustic population I knew I had nothing to apprehend. The peasantry are peace-loving and honest. Unlike the individuals, we were told we should be sure to meet in Spain, these people neither fusilade nor terrify you ; rob you neither of your money, nor your wits. I took with me not only a regular burroquero, but a person I had raised from the ranks and constituted dragoman. He was a cicerone, and a ripe and good one ; who not only pointed out with invariable fidelity all the scenes of interest, but developed their various excellences with admirable discrimination. I had lost much without him. #* * * *#:<:# The matin-bell was tolling, as, after a toilsome ascent, I reached the plateau, about two thirds up the mount- ain, where stands the church Da Nossa Senhora do Monte. The doors hung persuasively open, and I dismounted to mingle my devotions with the crowd within. The prostration and the following blessing, with the sweet temperature of the morning, gave new encouragement to my road, and I achieved the summit of the mountain, well-pleased with mankind. To turn back and look was an immediate and for- tunate impulse. The Bay of Funchal from the Disertas to Cape Giram lay before me, under a transparent atmosphere, which gave more of sky and sea to the vision than I had ever before witnessed ; and every intermediate object between the mountain and the shore shone in unwonted brilliancy. The few vessels in the harbor were taking advantage of the dryness and warmth of the day to restore their rain-soaked sails, which, seen through the vast distance below, 3* 58 THE HILL-TOP. seemed but the foam of broken waves turned by some under-current to the light. The turrets of the church underneath us, embosomed high mid tufted trees, peeped out from the surrounding foliage, and with their gaudy coloring of white relieved the scene, other- wise too invariably green. Nature had not awakened from her nap ; all was quiet and motionless. Mountain, glen, and precipice, cliffs, ravines, and "bosky dell," all, from the height I stood, illustrated what painters call repose. Near where I halted my horse I distinguished a low murmuring, like men in agitated councils. It at first perplexed me but on closer investigation I found it to proceed from subterranean waters. It may have been a council of war, among the Genii of these mount- ain-streams, to determine upon the exigences of the day ; what detachments to send to the ocean direct ; what, circuitously, through Funchal ; the hope of sup- plies, the fear of exhaustion and other cognate mat- ters most urgent upon their consideration. Wanting, however, the power of intercommunication, I put them no question. Happy, indeed, I thought him who could find "books in the running brooks," and by some indefinable agency possess those mysteries of the universe withheld from our grosser sense. The mountains which overlook Funchal are not the highest of the island, but, from their precipitous prox- imity, seem so to the Funchalese, as they shut out from the curtained sight the higher beyond. Still these are some four thousand feet above water-line; and I was right glad to find, on overcoming their tedious summits, a kind of table-land, upon which, with the combined aid of spur and burroquero the latter keeping up "a fire in the rear" I could trot mv horse. THE PEASANTRY. 59 I met, surmounting the crests of further mountains, and, descending in long and wearisome trains toward Funchal, the country population of both sexes, all en- cumbered with faggots on their heads, or borne down to earth with overladen arms. It was a picturesque sight ; the women coming down the mountains in their very short petticoats, with a circular tippet or pelerine thrown carelessly but gracefully over their shoulders, and tied in front ; and their heads crowned with these bundles of sticks, not unlike a Jersey wagon in form and size, walking erect, and stepping out as firm as though they were unencumbered. For some of the prettiest I thought I could have got up a tendresse. They were on their way from their rustic homes, my dragoman told me, with their valueless labor to Funchal to get a little money for the " fiesta," or Christmas Holidays. They were toiling, some of them, for eighteen miles, over hills almost impassable, to gam an insignificant trifle a pistareen, or even "bit," to celebrate the natal day of their religion. Some Avere shoeless and breechless almost all without covering for the head. Yet they plodded on, not uncheerfully, with a ready salutation, or a blessing for an unasked and unexpect- ed trifle. I saw excavated, from within the stony sides of the mountains, an occasional cavity, like a wild beast's den. " These," said my dragoman, " were the dormitories in which belated pedestrians, past all hope of home, went through the night ;" uncouched, uncovered, and unfed but not, I trust, unblessed for " HE that doth the ravens feed, Yea, providently caters for the sparrow," would visit these harsh stones with sleep, denied to beds of down ! 60 THE PEAKS. After a varied pace of some four miles we came to a venda, with the customary initials P. V. B. over the door. They signify pao vigno born or "good wine and bread" and are used as universally as " "W. I. Goods and Groceries" in a New England village. Here I refreshed my followers with a glass of wine, my horse with rest, and myself with a walk to a sum- mit overhanging the road, from which I obtained a pleasant though mountain-restricted view. I found I had traversed about six miles of my journey in an hour and a half I might have rode quicker and less agreeably. I passed on the right Pico Infante, Pico Silva, and Pico Obebras on the left, Pico Lagoa, and Pico Poigo. They stand opposite to each other, with their tower- ing, peaked summits relieved against the sky, like sentinels, or outposts of contending armies; or like warders on castle walls. The observant eye would detect among them features like man's. These ap- peared, as in early youth, fresh, and smiling. Those, in maturer age, with heads somewhat thinned, and with a more subdued expression while others again had scars and furrows, like wrinkles the livery of old age. You find various latitudes with their corresponding temperature and productions in either of these mount- ains. On their lowest slopes, turned to the daily sun, tropical flowers and fruits abound ; among the fruits, the banana, and the warmth-loving custard-apple ; of the flowers, the camelia japonica, in extravagant size and profusion ; the ballad-lily, and many others hardly less beautiful ; while the orange-tree, the coral-tree, the coffee and the cork-tree, dazzle the eye Avith their brilliant foliage, and gratify the odorous sense. Hall- way up the mountains we find the products of our DAXGEROUS ROADS. 61 orchards, the pear, the apple, and the plum and higher still, and on the very summits, the delicious strawberry, so much sweeter in its untamed habits. All these I found in an hour's journey up the ascend- in