Morning journal and courier., 1889-12-07
IN THE AZORES.

boneiros-A Quaint Old Inn In the
 City of Kiberia Grande-PrettY Way
 side Pietures-A Delightful Climate.
 FURNAs, ST. MICHAEL, Azores, Nov. 5. To the Editor of the JOURNAL AND COURIER:
 We were received with every manifesto tion of delight by the oarboneiros, the hos- soothing to the Azorean Rip Van Wrinkle, Colorado Madraco, that he has not yet awak- ened from his two-centur1es' sleep. Our donkeys were tethsred and cared for; water for washing was brought in ponderous ewers from a oool represado or spring; cheap wine, agoaardente or brandy, and tobacco in ex- traordinary quantities were provided; queer, big-eyed and hslf-naked rapszos and meni- mas, boys and girls, to whose simple cons sciousness the strangers were as marvel and dream, gathered about us, looked. wondered, and with silvery bursts of laughter fled to their mothers or the forests for recovery; a supper of such proportions, variety and gro- tesqueness was provided as never before greeted the eyes of civilized man, and dur- ing the long evenings these half-wild men and women charcoal-burners of the noun tains-- brisk, shapely and muscular wo- men digging out of odd corners of shadowy old cabins many a bsuble and bit of fnery for the occasion-danced for us, and with us, upon the grimy smooth-worn ground such hilarious zapateos, such outlandish bailes, and such grotesque fandangoes as no fervid pen could describe or lax moralist be willing to approve. It was gipsy scene in- deed, lacking only the hooded tents and the circling, huddled wagons for here and there the eharcoal-fires fared as flare the camp
 fires of the gipsies; knots of fir famed and fiekered at the tops of huge bikes or from cressets bound to overhanging trees; scores of swarthy forms whirled in the half-lights and shadows; aud the glowing stars, pulsing in their semi-tropio fires quivered through the weird, dark plumes of luxurious verdure above.
 We set out from the carboneiros' camp at very early hour the next morning. As we descended the mountains towards the coast we missed our way for little, which gave us pleasing deep-woods experience. Of a sudden we found ourselves in a dense forest of frs, broken here and there by abrupt juttings of lava rock along whose sides and over whose heights indesoribable wealth of ferns ran in banks of gently-waving plumee. At the bases, and from the sides of each mass of rock numberless natures fountains wimpled and spouted, and from these, little streams bounded and sang towards the val leys below with surprising melodiousness. As far as we penetrated, the earth's covering beneath the frs was like carpet of velvety puce. The footballs of our donkeys could scarcely be heard. Up, up, up, thirty, fifty, sometimes eighty, feet straight as an arrow shot the russet fir trunks. Then the arches interlaced and the verdure grew 80 densely that the sky was shut from sight. Now and then in that upper lace-work of bough and shadow little fscks of saffreny light seemed floating tremulously. And in these what bird orchestras were welcoming the radiant day for our delightl Countless numbers of the famous green canaries and the almost as wonderful singers, the merlos, or the Ago rean blaokbirds, were singing their rival madrigals; and the most remarkable part of it all was the seeming regularity of alterna- tion in their marvellous melodies. For .
 
 selves. Again only the notes of the canaries
 would be heard. Then both, as if to out- sing each other or the really orchestral eff fects of the brooks beneath them, would blend their shrill trebles and soft contraltos into sustained and ravishing diapason of bird-voice song. Old Manuel, the guide, re- gardsd my enhancement for . time in digni. fled silence. and finally with grave shake of his head remarked.
 "Ah, yes, like women, beautiful to the eye or ear, but sad pests at times. When they sing 50 sweetly we islanders know it is be- cause their crops are full, and our field- stores have been devastated. So our govern msnt gives twenty reis per dozen breaks for the canario and the mario. If Mateito and could carry the beaks of all that are now singing above us back to Ponta Delgada we could each be master of a quinta like the
 rich of the city'
 l Nateito was so excited over this sudden l vision of afauence that he set about larrup ing our donksys in such fsrooious manner 1 that the beasts of their own accord returned l to the path from which we had diverged Indeed in the entire descent towards thu
 northern coastwiss villages such rapid pace was made that when we had reached the fine city of Riberia Grande we welcomed shor I rest at quaint old inn. The host was an l acquaintance of Manuel, which fact caused 1 to be set before us such stores of food and
 such dagons of native wine as gave one won