5 
IN THE WESTERN AZORES. 3 
ter temperature is equal to that of May in England. I had 
expected to sail in April, but a succession of trifling circum- 
stances (not all of them accidental or unavoidable, I suspect) 
concurred to detain the Styx a month longer in England, and 
it was not until the 18th of May that we at length steamed 
out of Plymouth Harbour. The War Steamers are built with 
a much sharper run from the deck to the keel, than is seen in 
the ordinary trade and passenger steamers ; their form being 
something like the rapidly sloping roofs of old-fashioned 
houses turned upside down. In consequence of this build, 
` they roll about most tumultuously on the ocean, and are by 
far the most uncomfortable ships in regard to their motion, 
that my slender experience has hitherto made me acquainted 
with. However, if the Styx rolled much from side to side, she 
rolled onwards also at a brisk rate ; and by eight o'clock in the 
morning of the 25th, I was gratified, on going on deck, by 
seeing that we were already among the Central Azores, having 
passed Terceira, and being then on the. north side of Santo 
Jorge; beyond which, in the distance, appeared the lofty 
Peak of Pico, rising high and sharp into the deep blue sky, 
with a wreath of white clouds floating like a loose drapery 
around its dark sides, much below the summit. Before one 
o'clock of the same day, we dropped our anchor in the Bay of 
Horta, the principal town of the island of Fayal, right oppo- 
site to which, at a distance of five miles, is the northern ex- 
tremity of Pico island, whose towering Peak thus forms a 
noble background to the sea-view from the town of Horta. 
Looking at this great volcanic cone from the deck of the ship, 
I felt extremely anxious to be upon it, anticipating a rich har- 
vest of Alpine plants, on a mountain whose altitude had been 
variously estimated from 6700 to 9000 feet. This anticipa- 
tion -was not afterwards realised; the other islands visited 
yielding me a larger supply of such plants, although their 
mountains have only half the elevation of the Peak of Pico. 
To a lover of plants, who had before never been farther - 
south than Cornwall, the island of Fayal afforded much of 
interest and attraction. It is of small size, about. Di 
Sx E 2 cod 
