Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1896-05-28
THE CANARY ISLANDS.
ANOTHER OF CAPT. RICHARD
SONS INTERESTING LETTERS.
SOMETHING ABOUT THE ISLANDS,
THEIR HISTORY AND THEIR PEG
PLz-sl RIOUS RELIGIOUS OBJ
SERVANCES.

Amer lns, rs any inhabited civil lands
Of t.. world.
The seven islands of the archipelago,
Eyine ,rs.Ha near the African coast, are
entirely af 3leanic origin but are very
old. They we're quite well known some
what previous to the time of Christ and
again became almost forgotten until the
fourteenth injury. During that century
de-u,tare and mischevous trade opened
betNa.-. GERS of the peninsula and
the aturig iaai inhabitants.
The orig Il OF the natives, notwith-
stanoj3s many theories, is entirely UNI
known. They were white-skinned, fair
hair,a people, sIniable and ingenious, un-
war; Sc but brave. They had laws customs,
and modes o. living quite equal to the
Europeans 4 that day, and their probitS
exceeded tGat Of their final eonqueror, to
no less an extent than the treachery and
vilenees OF their Spanish foes differed
from the many virtues of the islanders.
They eriluu=themselves ,'Guayadeques,
which, in lie Spanish, was made into
,,Guauchas.
The attempts to subjugste them COM
mitte"tiv carried on both by Spanish and
Portuguese they in turn lighting each
other until the last of the islands, Ten
eriffa was conquered in 1f97-it having
been settled previously that Portugal
should give up all claim to the entire
group.
All of those long years Of persistent
eudegyor t. ~ubdue the Guanehas were
chapters cruelty, cunning and blood
she'd rrleli5ed by so-ca!Ied christians
3gans, aIraye and inoffensive people
Who fought yalisntly in defence OF their
homes and Their freedom. At last they
were completely subdued, baptized and
enslarad, AID spain had Won great VIC
tory for ne awn temporal power and
For the Dry Of God
At this late day, all through the Is
lana@, red er fair hair With blue or grey
eyes may be seen. not common to pure
Spanish blood, which proves that the re-
Egioas conqaerors forgot their morals
and pride, rat her freely lntermixing with
The Gespised hesthen.
Since finally suhduing them Spain has
held almost uudisputed control, while
England does The business and trade of f
the entire islands The Dutch once made !.
an unsuccessful attack ON the island OF
Gomera, and, As I mentioned in q previous
writing, Lord Nelson attacked Tenetif fe {
Fer The COED # the island il Is great
Pity hat the English admiralts attempted F
invasion failed e success.
From the late demonstration" of the F
people against al things American pre-
viousiv written about, one might readily F
suppose that they are well treated and
are exceedingly loyal to Spain; but such I
reasoning should not be too quickly ar
rived at. SPANS war-taNes are laid heay- T
~ upon tle0i, and the forced couscrip-
tious ot me-. are continual and relentless. /
Hence they easily arrive at the very logi- I
cal conclusion that any country embar-
rassing the spanish power makes their
own personal burdens heavier and their f
family SORROWS greater
INDUSTRIES OF THE ISLAND.
Cne # the known industries Of the
sborigiues was the collection of dragons I
blood by forcing the trees to bleed. In
crude form it : a resinous gum and was
used largely preserving the dead
When trading visits began from the pen
1nsuia it became, ss a dye, an export Of
ereat value; but me trees We're few and
of the slowest growth known in vegeta-
ton. One noted dragon tree, DESTROYED
by violent storm in 1868, at Oratava
Tenerife ISLAND, was declared by conserv-
alive botanists to be no less than six
thn4IsQDH nj hi 10 bar
its age at ten thousand years. The trunk
was sixty feet in circumference, and its
branches spread out more than two hun
bred feet.
Perhaps the memory or tradition of
how valuable thst dye had been made he
people, later on, take more readily to the
cochlneal industry. The bug was intro
duced from Mexico soon after 1900. and
as the cactus on which it feeds is very
thrifty here, growing even in the bare
volcanic cinders, cochineal raising be-
came craze to the exclusion OF nearly all /
other and slower valued productions.
Every one was going 10 be rich. and some
did make fortunes from it. But vixen
the aniIlne and mineral dyes became
2heaply and successfully introduced TO
the world, the halcyon Canarian days
were over. The fabulous profits Of coch-
EMBARRASSING We're destroyed, and ruina-
ton brought to thousands of individuals
with almost universal bankruptcy to the
islands
The people had to go back to old and
forgotten industries and learn to repro
duce vegetation that had long been neg
iected. The dye Is still produced, rather
.inProttahiy, TO some small extent. The
bug, being an awkward and indolent
creature, Will not take pains to cling to
the cactus pads, but drops off and dies if
left to its own care. To overcome this /
loss every individual leaf of the food