67 
there is a crater (caldero) four miles in circuit, having a lake 
at the bottom, round which the Dicksonia arborescens grows 
in such profusion, that the silky down of its stems is used by 
the principal inhabitants as stuffing for their mattresses. 
* The town exports a great quantity of white wine, of a 
good quality, selling at from £20 to £25 a pipe. It is made 
in the adjacent island of Pico, mostly the property of the 
merchants of Fayal. ‘The peak of Pico is estimated at 1172 
toises high. On the summit, which is of difficult ascent, there 
is an enormous crater, from the centre of which rises a sub- 
sidiary cone, as if the summit had sunk to a certain depth 
into the bowels of the mountain, without any cree of 
its form. 
* The population of the island of Fayal is computed at 
22,000 souls, an immense multitude for a mere speck of land 
not above 40 miles in circumference. It is accordingly crowded 
to redundance, and to all appearance wretched. Sailing along 
the coast, we could not perceive, in a great tract of cultivated 
land, a single farm-house, or any building whatever, except 
here and there a huge monastic pile that seemed to lord it 
over the circumjacent grounds. "Fo see the dwellings of the 
peasantry you must traverse the fields, and there, if you look 
sharp, you will find their wretched hovels thrown up against 
the corner of the stone pec a cue maples ig for se spon 
for human beings.” 
Captain Carmichael soon found that the crowded metropolis 
of London was not congenial to his retired habits, and he 
spent the winter of 1817-18 in Edinburgh; but even there, 
the opportunities afforded him of cultivating scientific acquaint- _ 
ances with less pain to his reserved manners, did not com- 
pensate for the pleasures of a country life. He felt that cities 
were rather fitted for the habitation of the inquirer and 
deseriber than of the observer, and in 1818 he returned to 
Argyleshire, to hold yet more familiar converse with the scenes 
of his childhood, and to find OO € 
F 
