Though not exactly in the route of the Argentina, nor intended to be touched at by any of the company’s vessels, still being comparatively so near the Canaries, and especially of that particular one whereof mention is made by the great English bard, in verse as majestic as the phenomenon he speaks of:
On the other side, Satan, alarmed, Collecting all his might, dilated stood, Like _Teneriff_ or Atlas, unremoved: His stature reach’d the sky, and on his crest Sat horror plumed.—Paradise Lost, Book iv.
we must present a souvenir of our proximity to so celebrated a vicinage; and we cannot do so in a more graceful or welcome form than the sketch prefixed to this chapter.
The Cape Verds consist of seven principal islands, and were tolerably populous, but of late years have been subjected to a continuous emigration to South America and the West Indies, where, like the hardy mountaineers from Madeira, they are found most useful in tilling the soil, and in other laborious occupations; thus demonstrating the fallacy of the old notion, that laziness is the predominant element in the Spanish and Portuguese idiosyncrasy. What appears to be a present disadvantage, in regard to this human flight from the Verds, may prove beneficial hereafter, when the Ilheos (as they are called) return to their homes, possessed of a little money wherewith to improve their social and moral condition. The islands produce wine, barilla, large quantities of orchilla weed, and cochineal, the cultivation of which is rapidly forming a more and more considerable item of export. Steam navigation will ere long bring them into much closer commercial contact with the world, and enhance the appreciation of their products and natural advantages. The climate is fine, though subject to occasional high temperature and frequent droughts. Despite the name Verds, suggestive of Arcadian animation, nothing can be more desolate than the appearance of the islands, as approached from the sea; bold, high rocks, against which the surge breaks violently, with mountains towering in the clouds, are general characteristics, to which those of the island of St. Vincent offer no exception. On our arrival the weather was thick, with drizzling rain, as we made Porto Grande; and only cleared up in time to enable us to see Bird Island, a most remarkable sugar-loaf rock, standing right in the entrance of the bay, after passing which we reached the anchorage ground in a few minutes. A more convenient little harbour can hardly be imagined, being nearly surrounded with hills (or mountains as they may be called), which protect it from all winds save the westward, where Bird Island stands as a huge beacon, most admirably adapted for a light-house, and on which it is to be hoped one will soon be placed. There is deep water close to the shore on most sides of the bay, that where the town is built being the shallowest; and here some wooden jetties are run out, having very extensive coal and patent fuel _depôts_ close at hand, where these combustibles are put into iron lighters, and sent off to the vessels. So beautifully clear is the water in the bay that you can see the bottom at a depth of from twenty to thirty feet, literally alive with fish of all kinds, but for which the people seem to care very little, either for home consumption or export, though there is no doubt that, in the latter direction, a large business might be done with profitable results.