B*MI^HMita 



Antiquities 



"For here an amphitheatre of hills 



Swept sheltering upwards, a fair strand around ; 

 And Zargo fixed amid three murmuring rills 

 The island capital upon this ground. 



" And for that on this stripe of level strantl 



(There's round the Isle, I ween, no other mall) 

 Grew store of fennel gay by zephyrs fanned, 

 The Donatorio named the place Funchal." 



Nearly two hundred pages are filled with 

 this sort of thing, interspersed with songs, some 

 of which in their own way are gems. The 

 giant Til-tree, the wood of which may or may 

 not have been used in the decoration of the 

 Spanish Armada, is thus referred to — 



" 'Twas in the Cadea Velh he stood 

 Till Spain usurped the crown, 

 When Philip for his Armada-wood 



The noble tree cut down. 

 Its beauteous veins dark-polished 

 Shone in many a gay saloon ; 

 But a storm arose. 

 And his English foes 

 That Armada finished soon ! " 



Of the vine our author has much to say — 



" His joy is to shoot forth his leaves. 

 And from trellis to trellis to pass, 

 And when ripened to wine, upon sociable eves, 

 To be poured into glass upon glass,' 



and so on. Tobacco appears as " the shrub 



narcotic which the fair disdain." But the tair 



have changed since 1 845. 



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