100 CANARY ISLANDS. 



are susceptible of performing a great deal of labor, or of 

 encountering the utmost hardships. The natives of Fuer- 

 teventura are bony and well-set men, but spare, and very 

 tawny ; they are excessively dirty in their person and 

 habits, and will not work any longer than to supply their 

 present wants. They are wild and ferocious, and are 

 excessively vindictive, and are provoked to anger by the 

 most trivial offences. The proximity of this island and 

 Lanzarote to the Barbary coast, and the frequent invasions 

 made on them by the Moors in former times, together with 

 the intercourse kept up between them at present, give 

 the inhabitants many of the manners and customs, and 

 even the looks of the natives of Barbary. For example, 

 their manner of sitting balanced on the balls of their feet, 

 with their hams resting on their heels, is decidedly a 

 Moorish custom ; and the shortness of the distance that 

 divides them, is indicated by one of their popular sayings : 



*' De Tunege a Berheria, 

 Se va, y se viene en un dia." * 



Education. All the larger towns are provided with 

 schools of some sort or other, mostly taught on the Lan- 

 casterian system, and in a few instances, there are schools 

 for teaching the ancient and modern languages, some of 

 the sciences, and ornamental literature. There is also a 

 university at Laguna, which was in a flourishing condi- 

 tion a few years ago, but about the time of the revolution 

 in France, it was considered a dangerous institution by 

 the regal authorities, and it was ordered to be closed. 

 Notwithstanding these advantages, not more than one half 

 of the natives can read or write. The more wealthy por- 

 tion of the inhabitants send their children abroad to be 

 educated, or more latterly, they are sent to their better 

 schools at home. It is a happy thing to find that most of 

 the young people who have been kept at school, can read 

 or speak the English or French languages. The pi^vail- 

 ino- language of the province is Spanish, and the higher 

 classes speak the Castillian in its utmost purity ; but the 



* From Tiinege, (a spot on the S.E. shore of Fuerteventura) you may go to Bar- 

 bary and back again in a day. 



