54 MADEIRA METEOROLOGIC. PARTY. 



and as to its timber trees Madeira is the country of 

 laurels grown enormous j 1 a happy situation where the 

 magnolia thrives better than the oak ; where the oak 

 keeps its old leaves till the new ones appear ; where the 

 oleander, the bougainvillea, and the camellia make gor- 



1 The representative tree of the island, the Til, is one of these ; the 

 biggest tree with the shortest name, or a not very pleasing one if we go to 

 the botanists and learn to call it Laurus fastens j but the disagreeable smell 

 which the wood is infected with soon after it is felled, gradually evaporates ; 

 and, like the " Stink-hout " of the Cape Colony, leaves the happy owner who 

 has employed it, in possession of furniture almost indestructible, and always 

 quotable in the market at an extra price. The poet, as a matter of course, 

 enters into none of these things ; but has some grand words to say for all 

 that of 



THE GIANT TIL. 



Of forest trees there's none, there's none 



Can match the mighty Til ; 

 Like fubies that sparkle in the sun, 



His leaves the horizon fill. 

 His girth it is a giant's, 

 And his shade a host might hide ; 

 A forest is he, 

 That single tree, 

 So stately and so wide ! 



When Zargo lighted on our Isle 



A monster Til he found, 

 Whose branches measured nay, do not smile 



A thousand paces round ! 

 Cold-blooded Northern sceptics, 

 Behold what our Sun can do ; 

 Of stalwart men 

 Hand-linked were ten 

 To, embrace that Til too few ! 



