Morning journal and courier., 1889-11-30

something as you do the wild and waiting 1 Irish jaunting car, sitting sidewise. with your legs dangling over the donkeyis right side, and, in moments of peril, with your l two hands violently clutching the horns of the front yoke. You will make a sad busi- ness of 1t if you undertake a rigid and state- l 1y posture; but observing the native Azore-
 an doubled upon his donkey into the form of printers reversed mark of Interrogation,
 and faithfully copying his riding, which is l chiefly upon the backs of the knee joints, | you may always do almost as we'll as to- l walk. From padre to peasant everyone 1 owns 8 donkey, and they are brought into
 acquisition for the most tridiDg journeys. The padre will not walk rood if his own or | any other persons donkey be within call. The goat herd on the mountains has him for an inseparable companion, and if the feeds ing ground is shifted but half mile all the preparations for long journey are made and the goat-herd rides in state to. his new station among the rocks. So if 8 peasant laborer is engaged for days service on an adjoining farm, if he has occasion to go from one field to another, or if women in | the country wish bit of gossip at the next cabin, or cross roads, each sets out with boundless preparation, arrives as if from a ton days pilgrimage, and giving tho donkey kick or a whack as admonition to self sup- port, never recalls 90 triding subject mat ter as the beast until it is wanted for the re- turn trip. Then all any Azorean has to do to get his donkey is to say that he wishes it. A horde of lads, whooping and bowling, hunt him, capture him and rush him to his owner in perfect hurricane of lava-dust, goads and forid Portugese oaths. when his duties are aemurely and faithfully resumed. The other extraordinary uses to which tho Azorean donkey is put were illustrated fully in our few hours journey between Ponta Dolsada to Sette Cidades or the ancient era ter called the s'Seven Cities" The roads seem filled with them. Here is procession ridden by peasant women, each cloaked and cowled in the monstrous capote @ capello on their way to Ponta Delgada with all manner of country produce sway- ing from the wooden saddle-yokes. < lone donkey laden with water-oasks plods along without companion or driver, sent from somewhere to somewhere over his oft-trav- eled way, and with pitiful look of worried responsibility in his gray, old face. Here come bevy completely hidden by piles of corn-leaves piled 50 high that it seems the stacks are waltzing into the city on invisible legs Bells iangle in maf1ed way beneath the fodder; and barefooted country lads prod the bobbing mysteries viciously. Again a score come tripping and mincing along 8 slender path beneath huge wall, laden with wheat and corn in casks and panisrs. Two are met sustaining strong beam across their backs, and to this beam trunk of tree, being conveyed to the city for pier timber in this outlandish way, is swung, and, being nearly balanced, one end bangs the donkeys' heads and shoulders while the other lightly bounds along the way, source of peril to all passers upon the road. But the oldest burden of all was met just as-having wend- ed our way past fountains where donkeys, peasants and water-carriers were all lettering l to bray, babble and gossip, over hills, down l dark and ferny valleys, and through half l dozen struggling villages-we had reached ! the higher uplands leading to the prsoipitous ! edges of the Seven Cities. This was pa 1 tient being transported to "da Misericordia," the splendid hospital of Ponta Delgada, for l some surgical operation to be performed. | The sufferer was a woman who had fallen ! over some cliff in the mountain beyond. | Two timbers were fastened lengthwise along | the donkeys' backs. From the ends of these ! timbers extended across from back to back, l securely fastened with thongs, and from the latter ropes depended and sustained . rude hammock of pine slaves, such as are used in ! boxing oranges, covered with the stout linen ! woven by the peasantry. The sufferer was thus being very comfortably borne from her mountain home, accompanied by a large del egation of relatives and neighbors, all
 prompted by their sympathetic natures to
 continually give expression to grievous meanings and lamentations.
 We had now reached 2, grand plateau from which the view was surprisingly beau
 tifui and inspiring. The typographical out. line of St. Michael was almost entirely visi ble. The mountain ranges, all jagged, hol- low cones and over6ows of extinct volca- noes, almost in the form of 8 Greek cross, with it's head to the west, ran the full length ! of the splendid island, it's short, clumpy arms breaking away in the direction of Pon- ta Delgada ct its southwestern corner, to. l wards the fine city of Riberia Granda near its northwestern extremity; its extreme head ! terminating in the wonderful wave eaten and ! eavernous hsadland of the Capellas, ''the Chapsls," from their resemblance to vaat | lava arohed churches, and near it's base to I the east, that dream of Azorean beauty and peace, the idyllic Valley of Furnas. Not a cloud was in thu sky, giving it in it's intensi- | ty of blue sense ot inconceivable distance. | To the north, south and west swept the H. l limitable Atlantic, calm and spotless as the | sky above, and so blue that, save for some distant sail,- no horizon could be traced. | Then along the vast shore line ran dazzling | fringe of white where the ceaseless surf ! sparkled like rift of be.diamoned plumes | swaying in the sun. Between this and the | foothills more than score of cities and ! struggling villages could be seen, their blue | or white walls contrasting pleasantly with | the lavish verdure almost enshrouding them, | or with the rich red of their quaintly tiled roofs; while nearer still, following the val ! leys, or perched picturesquely along the ! edges of darker gorges were the white, wide | and ample guintas and villas of the rich, ! their demesnes being outlined with gray and sinuous walls; while still nearer, and almost | at our feet, were now and then a mountain ! eer's cottage, goatherd's hut, or carbon ! eiro's cabin, set with it's humble belongings, like some pretty nest within the upland val
 leys, the breezy heather or the fragrant pines. Even in this November weather
 flowers and bloom are in every hedge and | copse, and lavishly clambering upon every cottage and wall. A subtle odor of mingled
 heather, pine and orange fills the air; and
 mingled with the distant chiming of village
 church bells, the nearer tinkling of count less bells among the herds, and the notes of
 shepherds pipes far and near in the noun
 tains about us, are heard from hidden groups
 of peasants snatches of their high keyed
 island songs, mooked and mimicked in the | notes of innumerable island birds.
 We had proceeded pleasantly for little
 time in climbing the heathsry uplands, when
 our road, now nearly an unfrequented bridle path, came to an apparently abrupt termina-
 tion. Quietly disnounting, old Manuel bade me follow, and in 8 moment more it seemed
 that half tho space beneath the horizon had disappeared.
 ssSse!n said Manuel with e lofty gesture,
 "there lie the Seven Cities before youl"
 No real seven cities were to be seen. But we stood upon the brink of undoubtedly the
 vastest extinct volcano crater in the world. | We were nearly three thousand feet above it's | lowest levels. It was over nine miles in cir conference At 8 score of places near us on the north and east sides ono could step from & bunch of upland heather and fall sheer twenty-eight hundred feet. Though now but little after midday it's lower swails were purply and dark. Hawks cireled about its jutting teeth-like edges in search of prey. A thousand feet below, gulls like fakes oi
 snow, fiuttersd, poised and uttered their gurgling, whistling cries. Two lakes like bits of polished glass reflect in mid-day the stars. These are Lagoa Azul and Lagos
 Grande. The first is light blue in color,
 and the second, though connected with the
 former by living stream, is deep green. | No one has ever taken the trouble to account
 for this startling difference in color, nor te
 settle the question how the as remarkable
 name of Sette Cidades, or "Seven Cities, | where there never was sity, came to be 1 given tho lone and eerie spot. On one side
 of the valley crater are seven ghostlY hol-
 lows or tarns, whose centers show the gleam
 of shadowed poels. Sette eoncavfdades
 means s'seven hollows;" and, in any event
 if you como to the Azores and journey to
 this wondrous and grewsoms crater, you will
 come in fact not to ssSeven Cities." nor any
 other number, but to the great valley of the
 "Seven HolloWs." Away down, down there
 in the dark and purple of the western edge | of the basin are few tiny specks of white. | Movr,aI fa1l ia ftn vSl1ora of Qak%o