296 OUTDOOR STUDIES 
of a sailor’s life. But the untravelled Fayalese 
peasantry are a very gentle, affectionate, child- 
like people, pensive rather than gay; indus- 
trious, but not ingenious; with few amuse- 
ments and those the simplest; incapable of 
great crimes or very heroic virtues; educated 
by their religion up to the point of reverent 
obedience, and no higher. 
Among the young men and boys, one sees 
the true olive cheeks and magnificent black 
eyes of Southern races. The women of Fayal 
are not considered remarkable for beauty, but 
in the villages of Pico one sees in the doorways 
of hovels complexions like rose petals, and faces 
such as one attributes to Evangeline, soft, shy, 
and innocent. Yet the figure is the chief won- 
der, the figure of woman as she was meant to 
be, beautiful in superb vigor, — not fragile and 
tottering, as happens so often with us, but erect 
and strong and stately ; every muscle fresh and 
alive, from the crown of the steady head to the 
sole of the emancipated foot,—and yet not 
heavy and clumsy, as one fancies barefooted 
women must be, but inheriting symmetry and 
grace from the Portuguese or Moorish blood. 
T have looked in vain through the crowded halls 
of Newport for one such figure as I have again 
and again seen descending those steep moun- 
tain paths with a bundle of firewood on the 
