CHAPTEE IV. 



FROM MADEIRA TO THE CAPE. 



A Charmed Island Madeira from the Sea Its Foreign Aspect Old Buildings 

 and Their Inmates New Blood Wanted Land Sharks Its Horses 

 Teneriffe A Splendid Picture African Memories " Whales ! " Ex- < 

 perience Teaches Whales Porpoises, Bonito, and Skip-Jacks Amusements 

 on Board Ship A Death at Sea Holly redivivus The Plunger's Little 

 Game The Poundmaster's Ignorant Insolence Table Bay. 



AFTER a most prosperous run across the Bay of Biscay, 

 and an equally smooth sea along the coast of Portugal, 

 on the fifth day we sighted Madeira at sunrise. The 

 ocean was calm as a mirror ; a few fishing-boats lay idly 

 for the first flaws of wind to take them to their moor- 

 ings, while the 1 warm russet-tinted hill-tops told that 

 autumn had come, and that the grain had long since 

 been garnered in its stores. The nearer we approach 

 this charmed island, the easier is it to distinguish that 

 the water's edges possess a fringe of verdant colour as 

 bright as that of Devonshire, while the white houses 

 and villas call the observer back to Staten Island, in 

 New York Bay, early in June. Madeira is, truly, 

 wondrously pretty ; it is a priceless gem in the setting of 

 an ocean of blue enamel. But it does not always look 

 so fair, for the placid sea that now kisses its shore can, 

 like the angry Southern woman, smite with cruel blows 

 the object of its love. Look ! even now upon that 

 beach lie the remains of what has been a noble steam- 



