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rainy season forms fine cascades ; it is narrow 

 and tortuous. I have been assured since my 

 return, that Mr. de Perlasca has laid out a new 

 road, which will admit carriages. Near the town 

 we met some white camels, which seemed to be 

 very slightly laden. The chief employment of 

 these animals is to transport merchandise from 

 the customhouse to the warehouses of the mer- 

 chants. They are generally laden with two chests 

 of Havanna sugar, which together weigh 900 

 pounds ; but this load may be augmented to thir- 

 teen hundred weight, or 52 arrobas of Castile. 

 Camels are not plenty at TenerifFe ; while they 

 exist by thousands in the two isles of Lanzerota 

 and Fortaventura ; the climate and vegetation 

 of these islands, placed nearer Africa, are more 

 analogous to those of that continent. It is very 

 extraordinary, that this useful animal, which 

 breeds in South America, should be almost bar- 

 ren at TenerifFe. In the fertile district of Adexe 

 only, where the plantations of the sugar cane are 

 most considerable*, camels have sometimes been 

 known to breed. These beasts of burden, as 

 well as horses, were brought into the Canary 

 islands in the fifteenth century by the Norman 

 conquerors. The Guanches were unacquainted 

 with them ; and this fact seems to be very well 

 accounted for by the difficulty of transporting 



* They do not at present produce yearly above 300 quin- 

 tals of moist sugar. 



