Vol. XVIII, No. 12 WASHINGTON December, 1907 



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MADEIRA, ON THE V\^AY TO ITALY 



By David Fairchild 



THERE is something about an isl- 

 and in mid-ocean which is at- 

 tractive, and if it is one of those 

 mere specks on the blue field of a school- 

 boy's geography, so small that one's boy- 

 ish wonder is that it was worth naming 

 at all, it is almost irresistible. 



There is one such spot of land, little 

 more than twice the size of the District 

 of Columbia, which has on it mountains 

 6,000 feet high, and which, although dis- 

 covered before America and so thickly 

 populated that there are 625 inhabitants 

 to the square mile, has deep valleys that 

 have scarcely been explored and inhabit- 

 ants who have grown to old age without 

 ever owning a looking-glass. On this 

 spot of land the tropical banana and tree 

 fern and the temperate-region oak and 

 sycamore grow in sight of each other, 

 and over every high wall great masses 

 of flowering creepers are in bloom, and 

 in the gardens masses of camellias and 

 all sorts of flowering shrubs are perpetu- 

 ally in flower, frowned down upon by the 

 snow-banks which cover the mountain 

 peaks. This is Madeira, 'one of the most 

 unique, one of the most beautiful, of all 

 the volcanic mountain peaks that raise 

 their summits above the surface of the 

 ocean. 



It is one of the quiet spots of the 

 world and one to which tired souls from 



our great cities are turning for rest when 

 the gray skies and the piles of sooty snow 

 in the streets make the nervous life of 

 a metropolis unbearable. No wonder it 

 is one of the quietest places in the world, 

 for, although the roads are paved with 

 round beach pebbles, there are no horses 

 shod with iron nor jolting wheels to re- 

 mind you of the fact. This seems so 

 small a thing to describe that one cannot 

 conceive what a difference the absence 

 of horses and carriages makes to one 

 fresh from the streets of an American 

 city teeming with them. 



All vehicles in Madeira are on run- 

 ners. If you go calling, it is in a bullock 

 sledge, with canopy top and comfortable 

 seats. If you move a bank safe or a 

 steam-boiler, it is carried on a "stone 

 boat" or sledge of poles, and you may 

 have to get forty oxen to pull it. If you 

 are in a villa on the hillside and want 

 to get downtown, you take a running 

 car and slide down over the cobblestones. 



A ride in a running car is an experi- 

 ence to be ranked with the initial ride in 

 an auto. You sit down in a comfortably 

 cushioned seat in a low basket on wooden 

 runners and brace yourself for the slide. 

 Two strong men, each holding a guide 

 rope, pull your car over a bag of grease 

 to grease the runners, and then give you 

 a running shove, and jump each on a 



