[33] A Sketch of Madeira; containing Information for the Traveller, or Invalid Visitor. By Edward Vernon Harcourt, Esq. With Sketches by Lady Susan Vernon Harcourt.—London; John Murray, Albemarle Street. 1851.
[34] You must not look for many pretty faces in Madeira after the age of thirteen: amongst the upper classes inertness, and amongst the lower, hard work, reduce the standard of beauty. The upper class of women are hardly ever seen in the streets, save on their road to mass, or when going to pay a visit; on these occasions all the jewels, plate, and ribbons, of apparently very ancient families, are to be seen in full display. The ladies generally live on their balconies, watching passers-by. The English ladies, going to church draw forth many fair beholders and critics, and on Sundays the balconies are lined with native fashion. The glory of the Madeira women is their hair, which is of the richest growth and blackest hue, and their eyes, which are dark and bright.—Harcourt.
[35] One of these traditions is very gracefully and attractively told by Mr. Charles Knight, in his agreeable volumes, published by Murray, a couple of months back, and entitled ‘Once upon a Time.’
[36] Lodgings in Madeira are plentiful and good. For a family, the most comfortable plan is to take a Quinta, that is to say, a house with a garden, standing in the suburbs of the town. The price asked for the season of six months varies according to their size, from £50 to £200. In such cases the tenant is supplied with everything but plate and house linen. For single persons the boarding-houses are least troublesome, as well as most economical: a bed-room, sitting-room, attendance, and board are obtained there for fifty dollars, or £10 8s. 4d. a month. These houses are conducted on a liberal scale, and every English comfort is provided. If a Quinta is taken, a supply of servants, board, plate and linen, may be procured at a given rate. It is inconceivable what annoyances you are saved by such an arrangement; besides the endless impositions practised upon the ignorance of foreigners by servants and tradesmen, it is no small luxury to be able to pay a given sum down monthly, instead of the interminable daily payments which the ready money system of Madeira requires. Plate, furniture, pianofortes, saddles, guns, and, in fact, any things that are brought out as luggage, are allowed to pass through the Custom House free of charge, on the bond of some resident householder being given that the owner of the property will export it in eighteen months. Portuguese servants may be hired for house and kitchen work at the rate of about from four to six dollars per month for the former, and from six to eight dollars for the latter, service. Those who are content with a plain table, average honesty, and moderate attention, have no reason to be dissatisfied. Provisions of all sorts are cheap. English bread, which is sold at 2½d. the pound, is the dearest article of food; the quality of it, however, is excellent. Mutton, which is an indifferent meat, fetches from 3½d. to 4d. a pound; beef, which is good, from 3½d. to 4d.; and veal, from 4d. to 5d. Fowls may be purchased at from 10d. to 1s. 3d. a couple. The markets are held at daybreak, and all the meat, the best fish, and best fruits are brought at that time. Tea, soap, and tobacco are contraband, but the Custom House is not inexorable. A common English wardrobe, with the addition of a few lighter articles, and a waterproof covering for the mountains, suffice for clothing.—Harcourt.
[37] Two distinct species of finch (Carduelis) appear to have afforded the different varieties of singing bird, familiarly known by this name. The one which is best known in its wild state is the Carduelis canaria of Cuvier, and is very abundant in Madeira, where its characters and habits have been observed with much attention by Dr. Heineken. ‘It builds,’ says this naturalist, ‘in thick, bushy, high shrubs and trees, with roots, moss, feathers, hair, &c.; pairs in February; lays from four to six pale blue eggs; and hatches five, and often six times in the season. It is a delightful songster, with, beyond doubt, much of the nightingale’s and sky-lark’s, but none of the wood-lark’s, song.’—‘A pure wild song from an island canary, at liberty, in full throat, in a part of the country so distant from the haunts of men that it is quite unsophisticated, is unequalled, in its kind, by any thing I have ever heard in the way of bird-music’ The canary-bird was brought into Europe as early as the 16th century, and is supposed to have spread from the coast of Italy, where a vessel, which was bringing to Leghorn a number of these birds, besides its merchandise, was wrecked. As, however, they were males chiefly which were thus introduced, they were for some time scarce; and it is only of late years that their education and the proper mode of treating them have been known.—Brande, 1853.
[38] Brazil, as before stated, was originally so named from its valuable dye-wood, called Braziletto or ‘Cisaljuna Braziletto,’ or Pernambuco, Wood of Saint Martha, or Sipan, according to the place which produces it, and by Linnæus, Cæsalpinia custa, which was for many years the richest dye in Europe, and from which the famous Turkey red colours were produced, rivalling the ancient Tyrian purple, and, like it, passing into oblivion, after vast popularity; for other drugs having been substituted, Brazil wood became comparatively little used. It was a close monopoly of the government, who derived a large revenue from its sale, from £100 a ton upwards being the current price in London, and only 8 years ago 4,500 tons were imported into Great Britain. Brazil timber also possesses qualities not generally known, one of which is mentioned by Sir W. G. Ouseley, and accounts for the infrequency of conflagrations in some of the cities of South America, as compared with what happens in the northern portion of the continent, where fire brigades are among the most prominent institutions of the country, and yet do not by any means prevent the mischief they are meant to guard against. He says:—‘A proof of the incombustible nature of Brazil wood was afforded at this house (the Mangueiras) previous to my arrival at Rio de Janeiro, when it was occupied by Baron Palencia, at that time Russian Minister to the Imperial Court. One night an attempt was made to set fire to the outside door-like shutters of one of the windows, with a view, doubtless, to getting into and robbing the apartments. In the morning was discovered a heap of still smoking, combustible materials, partially consumed, applied to the outside of the shutter, the planks of which were little injured, although their surface was charred, as the fire had been in actual contact with the wood probably for some hours.’ Brazil wood (the dye now so called) is very small sized—sticks, comparatively speaking,—and is not used at all for building purposes, being much too valuable. The ordinary timber of the country is of quite another description.
[39] Of the simultaneousness of these discoveries, Humboldt says:—‘The course of great events, like the results of natural phenomena, is ruled by eternal laws, with few of which we have any perfect knowledge. The fleet which Emanuel, King of Portugal, sent to India, under the command of Pedro Alvarez Cabral, on the course discovered by Gama, was unexpectedly driven on the coast of Brazil on the 22nd April, 1500. From the zeal which the Portuguese had manifested since the expedition of Diaz in 1487, to circumnavigate the Cape of Good Hope, a recurrence of fortuitous circumstances, similar to those exercised by oceanic currents on Cabral’s ships, could hardly fail to manifest itself. The African discoveries would thus probably have brought about that of America south of the Equator; and thus Robertson was justified in saying that it was decreed in the destinies of mankind that the new continents should be made known to European navigators before the close of the fifteenth century.’
[40] It is after this beautiful quarter of the city of Pernambuco that the second vessel of the ocean line of the South American and General Steam Navigation Company was called. Olinda is situated on several hills, clothed with the most luxuriant tropical vegetation, from the midst of which the convents, churches, snow-white cathedral, and numerous private residences, mostly of the same colour, are seen to great effect, though, on a near approach, in a sadly decayed state. Olinda, however, may be regarded in something of the light of an East End to St. Antonio, the West End, or official quarter, where are situate the principal governmental departments and offices; while Recife is the actual place of business, and where all the foreign merchants are located. The value of the exports from Pernambuco annually exceeds a million and a half sterling; and that of the imports from England is about £800,000.
[41] Few spots in the New World are more indebted to nature than the environs, all possible combinations of scenery being included in one magnificent perspective. One of the best views is from the Corcovado Mountain, which although upwards of 3,000 feet in height, can be ascended on horseback. Like most mountains around, it is rather a rock, or titanic monolith, than a mountain, and it may be compared with the gnomon of a gigantic sun-dial; and, in fact, its shadow in particular localities supplies the place of a parish clock. Its sides are still in great part covered with forest and ‘matta,’ or jungle, notwithstanding numerous fires by which it has been devastated, the immediate result of the last being a deficiency in the supply of water to parts of the capital, for the destruction of trees here, as elsewhere, causes a scarcity of the aqueous element, and the springs which rise on and around this mountain feed the conduits and aqueducts that convey that fluid into Rio. From the summit may be seen the whole extent of the harbour and city; the Organ Mountains in the distance, several lakes along the coast, a wide expanse of ocean, and innumerable ravines and spurs of the mountain clothed with richest foliage. The most remarkable, however, of all the mountains near the capital, is the Gavia, with a flattened summit, sometimes called by the English the Table Mountain, in Portuguese, the ‘square topsail,’ to which it bears a resemblance. It is reputed to be inaccessible, at least it has not yet, as far as can be ascertained, been ascended. Opening into the outer harbour is Botafogo Bay, a short distance from the capital, where many foreign merchants reside to enjoy the cool sea breezes, and where the buildings are of a superior description, with beautiful gardens attached, many being luxuriantly planted with oranges and lemons, bananas, pomegranates, palm trees, and a vast variety of shrubs and vegetables peculiar to Brazil, including the universal cabbage plant in great profusion. The aqueduct, which is passed in several places in the ascent of the Corcovado, is a well-built and striking object, crossing several streets of Rio, and conveying excellent water from the heights of that mountain to the different fountains in the town.
[42] The only publication relative to Brazil that has appeared since I left England, or at least that I have seen since my return, is one which, though it touches but lightly on the country, as might be expected in ‘A Sketcher’s Tour Round the World,’ [by Mr. Robert Elwes], contains some of the best word-painting of Brazilian city life anywhere to be met with. The following description, for instance, will be readily recognized as most just by all who have been long in the capital; and the concluding passage in particular, I fear, is but too applicable:—