196 FROM EDINBURGH TO THE ANTARCTIC 
The sons were tall men — rather wiry than muscular ; 
they liked the life, and wisely desired no change ; they 
had been born and brought up on the islands, and, with 
the exception of short visits to the Brazilian coast, had 
seen no other land ; yet they were quick and clever, and 
took interest in the affairs of the world abroad. Their 
voices were quiet, perhaps a little weak ; but the accent was 
very pleasant and soft, a little like that of Inverness— a 
blending of Irish and Spanish, with a faint colonial twang. 
In their garden they showed us a flourishing potato 
crop and some gooseberry bushes with the fruit forming, 
and as a proof of the mildness of the climate they pointed 
out an apple tree five feet high on which six or seven 
blossoms were trying to blow. 
The climate of the islands must not however be con- 
demned because fruit-trees do not flourish and barley does 
