52 CAPE VERDE. 



astonishment it ran with readiness over the edge of the 

 parapet, round the projection, and down the flat face of the 

 wall, with all the ease of a fly under similar circumstances. 



At last my guide, John Antonio, a negro who spoke English, 

 arrived. He was to have been at the rendezvous at 3 a.m., but 

 said he was too sleepy. We mounted and rode off inland; 

 after about an hour's ride day began to break. As we ascended 

 successive terraces the hills became greener and greener, 

 being covered with a continuous carpet of seedling grass and 

 other herbs, as yet only two or three inches in height. John 

 said that it would be a foot or eighteen inches high later on, 

 and that then the quails would abound and the gallinis breed, 

 so that the breeding season of these birds appears here to 

 occur in autumn, determined by the rainy season. Numbers 

 of the gallinis are taken when quite young, and their eggs are 

 also sought after. 



The quantity of birds of prey in San Jago is remarkable. 

 We passed numerous large falcons at rest on dead trees, and 

 several hawks, and an owl flew across the road just at day- 

 break. I saw also two eagles in San Domingo Valley. Ravens 

 and crows are abundant. 



The valley of San Domingo, into which our road at length 

 led, is deep, with precipitous cliffs and steep mountains on 

 either side, rising from 1,000 to 2,500 feet above sea level. 

 The valley is broken here and there by lateral offsets, and 

 backed towards its head by irregular mountain masses. The 

 view up the valley is very beautiful. Beneath the cliffs, which 

 are encrusted with lichens and stained of various colours, 

 often of a deep black, are steep talus slopes covered with oil 

 trees, with a few other shrubs sparingly intermingled. At 

 the bottom of the valley is a strip of comparatively level land, 

 on which are cultivated all sorts of tropical fruits, pineapples, 

 bananas, oranges, lemons, guavas, and cocoanuts ; with cassava, 

 sweet potatoes, and sugar-cane as field crops. 



All along the valley a little way up the slopes are small 

 huts, where boys are stationed, whose duty it is to keep off 

 the monkeys, which abound amongst the rocks, and the wild 

 blue rock pigeons {Cohwiba livia), which are very numerous, 

 and were seen flying about in flocks and alighting in the road 

 as we went along. 



John Antonio said that the monkeys used their tails to pull 

 up the sugar cane and cassava with ; an unlikely story, since 

 the monkeys must be some imported African species run wild. 

 I was astonished to hear that there were monkeys at all in 

 the island, and have not seen the fact mentioned in any 

 account of the place. John said that the monkeys never 



