INTRODUCTION. Ixvii 



here mount up to large and beautiful trees, and their flowers, 

 glowing with the most vivid colours, are viewed against the 

 most brilliant sky in the world. 



His own feelings, on being thus suddenly transported 

 from the moss-grown mountains of his native country to a 

 more genial climate, are thus expressed in a letter to his 

 friend ; " how shall I be able to describe to you, how de- 

 clare to you what I have here felt, what I have here seen ! 

 How shall I be able to give you an idea of the variety, 

 of the singularity of those forms, of that beauty and that 

 brilliancy of the colours, of all that magnificence of nature 

 which surrounds me ! We ascend the sloping ridges of 

 the mountains which embrace the splendid city of Fun- 

 chal; we rest ourselves on the margin of a brook, which 

 falls in numberless cascades across thickets of roseniar}-, 

 of laurels, and of myrtles ;— the city at our feet, with its 

 forts, its churches, its gardens, and its roadstead ; above 

 us, forests of the stone pine and of chesnuts, interspersed 

 with the flowers of the spartium and lavender. A whole 

 legion of Canary birds makes the air resound with their 

 sweet song; and nothing here, but the snow on the moun- 

 tain tops, which now and then pierce through the clouds, 

 would recal to my recollection my native country." 



M. Von Buch observes, that neither the torrents of rain 

 which fell almost daily, nor the dense clouds which con- 

 stantly covered the mountains for more than half of their 

 height, nor the snow which enveloped their summits, could 

 restrain them from attempting to ascertain the distribution 

 of vegetation on this island, and the height of its moun- 

 tains. They found by the barometer, the altitude of 

 Nostra Senhora da Monte to be 1778 Enghsh feet above 



