The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-12-06

rangular rock, crowned on it's summit with an
Anticipated fort, and fitted with signal appliances
for commercial purposes. Three rivers run
through the town into the bay. In summer
they are dry, but in winter they become rushing
torrents. There are many well appointed resi-
dences in and around the town, surrounded by
handsome grounds well laid out in flower beds,
fruit and shade trees, and commanding pretty
views of the town and bay.
The beach is steep and pebbly, and there is
generally a good surf piling up on it, requiring
considerable skill and specially c%ontrived boats
to effect q dry landing. Approaching within a
the foot of the one principal street, willing
hands seize your boat as soon as it grounds and
run 1t up high and dry. You now encounter a
phase of Madeira experience very disenchanting.
In the mere matter of putting your foot on
shore, you have put yourself, in some mysterious
way, under pecuuiary or other obligations to
some five or six suave, bowling, scraping Portu-
guese %loafers, who insist, in the face OF your
most violent protests, that they will show you
anywhere, get you horses, hammocks, sleds,
etc, until you angrily start NJ the steep street,
only to be followed as long as you stay on shore
by a troop of such persistent bores, that, the
more you lose your temper the more calm and
imperturbable they become. Going into a store
they follow You, and interpret your slightest de-
sires, OF, remaining outside. calmly await your
reappearanee. Bits of children and
called beings, whose capital in business
consists, mainly. in some hideous deformity,
poster you at every turn with that peculiar,
plaintive wall that no musical instrument on
earth yet invented can even approximately imi,
tate. noticed after a few days, however, that
these bores ceased to modest us. and, on inquiry,
learned the cause. The island is quite oyerpop-
ulated and wages are very low, i. e., from 20 TO
30 cents per day. On an average seventy steam
ers touch in a month. /. e., two or three a day.
These are the steamers of the various English
lines to Australia, the Cape OF Good Hope, the
African coast and Rio Janciro; the Belgian line to
Rio, several German lines and a Portuguese line
from Lisbon, as well rs smaller lines to the Afri-
can coast. Tho passengers, having sometimes
only a few hours on shore, are
anxious to employ guides, and are
very liberal. as most travellers are, with their
fees and tips. The cholera quarantine against
vessels from French and English ports is now
strictly enforced, and fewer passengers get on
shore. We arrived when these beggars and
~loafers, as well as good guides, were quite des-
perate from slack business, and we were over
whelmed accordingly. AS soon as we systemat-
icaliy rebuffed their advances and denied their
obsequiously preferred claims for the privilege
of their company. they began proportionately to
find us uninteresting.
Sunday evening we went to the plaza to hear
the band play, and to see the beauty and fashion
of Funchal. The plaza is simply a wide street
formed by terraeing into the mountain side, but,
nevertheless, it is pretty and answers the pur-
pose of a promenade, being, in fact, about the
only level plat of public ground in the town.
The music was passably good, but idleness has
evidently had its effect on the fair sex in making
them large, pale and homely. In fact, they
seem to belong to a different race from the men
who are slender. tough and wiry. Several
passably charming senoritas were to be seen
lolling back in graceful elegance in the family
coach, drawn by two subdued looking oxen.
Owing to the s%teepness of the roads in the
island (all of which are paved with small smooth
cobbie stones), wheeled vehicles are not used,
and the family coach in question was a sled on
which was mounted a can0pied bed of the gen
eral pattern used. They possess every requisite
excepting speed, which could hardly be looked
for in oxen. We spent the day following in
looking around the town, learning the prices of
Madeira commodities, visiting wine vaults, and
arranging for trips around the island.
On our second day a party of five of us was
met at the rendezvous by hammocks for each,
borne by two men, with a spare man for each
of the heavy weights of our party. We were
carried along quite comfOrtab lJ in digniied pro-
cession up the steep and narrow streets, each
hammock being carried up Obllquely, so that our
heads were little higher than our feet, besides
giving us a good view of the town and the sea
below us. The high stone walls and the hou SEES
at first shut out our view of the gardens and
vineyards, but higher up we saw fruits and
flowers, which for variety, beauty and abundance
excited our astonishmenL. We were each kept
busy looking at the various points along the
road. What in our country we regard as rather
rare hot house plants and flowers, there grew in
the widest profusion. Mauve and purple pas
sion flowers and all kinds of creepers, hibiscus
and myrtle twelve to sixteen feet high, oleander
trees, masses of heliotrOpe, geraniums, roses,
fuchsias, and hydrangeas grew apparently with
little effort to encourage them; the flowers and
fruits of the tropics mingled with those of the
temperate zone. For two miles up the mountain
our hammock men carried us with rapid step,
streaming with perspiration, but only pausing
once. Their endurance was all the more re-
markable az they are great wine drinkers. Ar
irving at the church so conspicuous from the
bay, we discharged our hammock
men and enjoyed the lovely view
both to seaward and around the mountains.
We enjoyed q good lunch and a walk around to
several points commanding views, and then Or
dered out our sleds which had been sent up pre-
viously. These consisted of a basket work bed
with seats for two or three. mounted on tough
wooden runners, well creased, and were tended
each by two men who, with long laniards Sc
cured to the runners, held back at the danger
Gus or steep places, or at the more level places
pulled the Sled along. There was no pulling
along to do on our trip down. for with a whoop
and a hurrah we shot down the smooth cobble
stone road at a rate that rot only made the run
ners smoke but our nerves Jingle with the exhil-
aration of speed, novelty and danger. Coming
down into the town, ~donkeys, OK sleds and pack
men quickly lodged out of onr way, while foot
passengers discreetly got into ~doorways as we
hove in sight around surprising curves and down
steep declivities. We made the distance of over
two miles IN ten minutes. .-
Next day, three of us planned q visit to the
Gran Curral, a wonderful or &c in the mountains
between three lofty peaks, and at the head Of a
deep ana fertile valley. At an early hour we
found three good Spanish stations and three
runners awaiting us on shore. We struck up
towards the left, following the shore for some
distance, until we got well out of the town,
where, from the crest of a hill, we obtained a
splendid view of Funcnal bay with the town
stretching along its shores. Resuming our way,
the same profusion of flowers struck us as be-
fore, the more surprising as We had learned
that this was not the season for flowers. Along
the shores and on the foot hills where the air is
warm and where the temperature varies less
than ten degrees during the year, tropical plants
flourish luxuriantly. Along with the vineyards
were pine-apples and groves of oranges, and
mounted higher we saw bananas, ngs, pomegran-
ates and sugareane interspersed with the fruits
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