238 Notice of Madeira. 



ease on board. The board of health sat on our case, — we explain- 

 ed, urged and made every effort, but nothing would do. They re- 

 fused to admit us even to quarantine. Now, our ship has not lost a 

 man since we left the N. River : for one of its class, it is remarkably 

 healthy and as to Asiatic Cholera, we have nothing bearing any re- 

 semblance to it on board. So we were forced to heave anchor and 

 be off, and now find ourselves a little like the spectre ship of Cape 

 Horn, flying about on the waters without a resting place, every where 

 feared and shunned ; what will be the result we cannot tell. Gibral- 

 tar is usually considered quite lax in its sanitary regulations ; it may 

 be that we shall succeed in Mahon, to which we are now bound, 

 but the court at Madrid, has just sent them word at Gibraltar, that 

 unless they became more rigid there, they shall be cut off from all inter- 

 course with Spain. This seems but poor comfort as regards Mahon, 

 but we have no better resource. 



Notice of Madeira. 



I mentioned that we stopped at the island of Madeira. Few things can 

 be imagined more beautiful than this gem of the ocean, (as it is called) 

 as it disengaged itself from the darkness, one fair morning, toward the 

 close of last month, and its lofty, picturesque mountains, its ravines 

 with their cascades, and its numberless vineyards, became rapidly de- 

 veloped. The island is sixty miles long and about twenty in breadth. 

 Its general appearance, will be best understood from a few simple re- 

 marks as respects its geology. It appears to have been originally a 

 small and rather low island, composed principally or entirely of trans- 

 ition limestone. It seems at some remote period of time, to have 

 been suddenly torn asunder by volcanic action, and an immense mass 

 of mountains ejected, in a double ridge, with a vast chasm between, 

 running nearly the whole length of the island. The chasm is called 

 by the natives Corral. Simultaneous with this, appears to have been 

 the ejection of a great quantity of liquid matter, which flowing from 

 the sides of the ridge, has formed a smoother surface down to the 

 sea, in some places leaving the basalt exposed, sometimes tearing it 

 up, and at others covering it to a great depth with tufas, various in 

 color and consistence. A short time before our arrival, part of a 

 bank close by the usual landing place of Funchal, and nearly a mile 

 west from the city, having been undermined by the constant action 

 of the water, had fallen down. I clambered over the huge pieces of 

 rocks barely to examine it, and found the upper twenty feet of the- 



