AND PORTO SANTO. 119 



varieties of the African Banana have been naturalized, but confine 

 themselves to the lower parts of the island; when cultivated, 

 however, they grow at a considerable height, and the leaves 

 (before they are fully developed) are now found by the coopers 

 to be very superior to the rushes formerly imported from Lisbon, 

 for the headings of the wine casks. The Guinea grass is cidtivated 

 and thrives well ; I have not been able to find a good description 

 of it: therefore, after dissecting and examining a great many 

 locusta, I have given the results s. 



To complete the idea of that happy medium and variety of 

 climate, which makes Madeira preferable even to TenerifFe, for a 

 garden of naturalization; the phcenix dactylifera flourishes and 

 bears fruit; pine-apples (bromelia ananas), and custard apples 

 (annona squamosa), are grown in the open air; the arrow-root 

 (viaranta indica) succeeds perfectly well, the rff//i//os. flourish and 

 produce seed, the arctotis angustifolia becomes a shrub, the camellia 

 Japonica astonishes us as a considerable tree, the fuchsia coccinea 

 and the pelargonia form thick hedges many feet high, the ricinus 

 communis becomes a tree, the papaw (carica papaya) and the 



streams are kept up by attraction, and will not hear of the sheltering of the soil from 

 the powerful action of the sun, after the heavy rains, and the consequent diminution 

 of evaporation as an adequate explanation. The first Governor, Zarco, entailed this 

 inconvenience, which might have amounted to a calamity, on all future generations, 

 when he indiscriminately set fire to the thick woods which covered the flanks and 

 tops of the mountains. All the colonists, men, women, and children, were compelled 

 to fly into the sea to avoid its fury, where they remained two days and two nights, up 

 to the neck in water, and without food : it is said to have continued burning upwards 

 of six years. Colle^ao de Noticias, p. 9. 



= Panicum polygamum, (Guinea grass.) Involuc. parvum, valvis simile spathas. 

 Flores polygames. Gluma biflora, 2-valvis. Calyx 2-valvis ovatis, acuminatis. In 

 florem hermaphroditum, ovarium parvum. Styli duo, plumosi, rubri. Stamen unicum. 

 In florem masculum, stamina tria. Flores lax^ pamiculati. Articulationes villosae. 

 Folia glabra, lanceolata, acuminata. 



