The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-12-28

iitcS prevail OI Oped duu Slidhc-N W Oi
 ship, brought from the African jungle'
 All the towns are poor. dirty places
 with few decent buildings in the Whol
 group. What promises to become
 vast improvement has been inaugura
 ted within the last few years in the es | tablishment of a government primar
 school in each village of consequence
 conducted by the priests; but as yet tn
 attendance is very small, not bein
 compulsory for children of the lowe
 classes, and the wealthier citizens con
 tinuing to send their children to Lisbol
 for education.
 As rule, the Cape Verde islander
 are not vicious or turbulent. but lag.
 as the laziest and dirty beyond degree
 They speak strange patois of corrup
 ted Portuguese mingled with various
 African dialects, queerly like that O.
 the negroes of Jamaica and called il
 Portugal lingua creoula.
 Like other ex-slaves, the negroe.
 seem to have sworn off, work alto | gether. The baobab tree furnishes | plenty of monkey bread,' and witt
 their food growing wild, no necessity 1
 is not much incentive to labor Agri-
 culture is generally out of the question | for lack of water, and what little work is done at St. Vincent and other ship ping points is performed by the women | As in the West Indies, you see brawny | half-naked negresses coaling ships and steamers, loading and unloading light | CTS, singing and shouting the while in high good humor. A good deal of salt is made in the islands by solar evapo- ration. The planters, who still own slaves under the new laws, raise con- siderable cotton, tobacco, sugar cane, rice, French beans, and even a little coffee. Tolerably good cotton cloth is manufactured at Ribera Grande, and stockings are woven in several villages. Some poor wine is made; also pottery, soap and leather. Cattle are raised in the few valleys where grass grows, and goats are numerous in the mountains, though great numbers of them are killed every year for their skins, even to supply the leather workers of Fez and Morocco. Fowls are so numerous that in the local markets they seldom bring more than a penny apiece; and as for pigs, the islands are simply overrun with them! Every household CT of the lower classes includes among his family a number of lean but socia- ble porkers; and as in the Irish song, "They keep the pig in the parlor' and literally share with it their bed and board.
 There are no roads in the islands. and the only means of getting about is on donkey back, trusting to Providence for nightly shelter and the wherewithal to be fed. Therefore our explorations will be very limited, though l presume there is little danger of unger among these poor but good natured hospita- ble darkies if one can endure their ways. There are few wild animals to be feared, the worst being mischievous apes; but serpents are said to be nu- merous in the wild interor-of large size and hugging proclivities. Santia go Island, (San Jago, "St James,'o is the largest an} most unhealthy in the archipelago. Its chief port, Porto Praya, at the southern end is town of about two thousand inhabitants. The governor eneral resides here; the streets are wide and partially paved, and there is some Portuguese society. Before the British established their new coal depot on St. Vincent island this town was oftener visited by travellers than any other in the archipelago. Xii beira Grande the former capital, at the other end of Santiago island, is pictur- esquely situated at the head of ravine and is reached from the sea by long inlet like a, canyon river. It has ca thedraI. a ruined fort and a few we'll to-do Portuguese families.
 Sac Antao island, the northernmost of the group, is said to be the most healthful and fertile; but 1t is so GOV cred with jagged peaks that it is i'm possible to go from one part of the is- land to anothe except around the out side, by sea. It has three indifferent landing places; and at one of them, Porta del Sol stands the Cape Verde custom house. Sal, a narrow island, perhaps twenty miles long, is wholly given up to the manufacture of salt, some fifteen hundred tons of it being turned out every year Boa Vista is he most beautiful island of the group, | put the most insalubrlous. its popula- ion being often swept away by inter- militant levers and sudden epidemics. | Togo island is noted for it's active vol | ,ano, nearly ten thousand feet high, | the smoke of whose torment" is visi- | ole far out at sea. Brava, the most l island of the group, is the most densely populated, though its area S only thirty-siX square miles. All are # volcanic origin and covered with IT, egular hills, as if the earth had bub- ,led up red hot and suddenly frozen tiff where it stood.
 Tn short, as you see, there is little to .ttract the tourist to this end of the Happy Islands'--no scenery of ac cunt, no natural curosities. no anti uities. no flourishing modern indus ries; nothing but unnecessary dirt, qualor and poverty. Were they not aluabe as coaling station-all the outh African steamers and many on he way to India calling here for their upply of fuel--the Cape Verde archi- elago would be of no account whatev- r. FANNIE B. WARD.