64 HISTORY OF MACH1M. [chap. IV. 



HISTORY OF MACHIM. 



An Englishman, of obscure birth, named Robert Machim, 

 who lived in the latter part of the reign of Edward III., fell 

 in love with Anna DArfet, a beautiful damsel of a noble 

 family. Her father, incensed with his presumption, obtained 

 the imprisonment of the lover, and married his daughter to a 

 more illustrious suitor. The bridegroom, however, having 

 left his castle near Bristol to attend the king in his wars, 

 Machim, when released, procured access to Anna, and per- 

 suaded ber to escape with him to France. They sailed with- 

 out a pilot for the coast of Bretagne, but, a storm arising, 

 lost their reckoning, and after running for ten days before 

 the gale, at length discovered in the horizon the coast of 

 Madeira, and landed, in the year 1346, in a bay afterwards 

 named Machico from him. 



Another storm drove Machim's vessel from its anchorage, 

 leaving those who had landed from it in such distress, that 

 the lady died of grief, and Machim, refusing all food, did not 

 long survive her, and was buried in the same grave. The 

 rest, having ornamented the tomb with a large wooden cross, 

 and placed near it an inscription which Machim had pre- 

 pared, requesting the first Christians who might read it to 

 raise a chapel on the spot, took to their boat, and being car- 

 ried to the coast of Barbary, were made captives by the 

 Moors. Whilst in captivity, they related their adventures and 

 described the position of Madeira to a fellow-captive, who 

 afterwards communicated the facts to a Spanish pilot called 

 Morales, in the employ of Goncalves Zarco. 



This tale, it should appear, was not deemed worthy of no- 

 tice by the Portuguese historian De Barros, who ascribes the 



