NOTE.—The Madeiran Archipelago consists
of five islands disposed in a scalene triangle, whose
points are Porto Santo (23 miles, north-east), Madeira
(west), and the three Desertas (11 miles, south-east).
The Great and Little Piton of the Selvagens, or Salvages
(100 miles, south), though belonging to Portugal and
to the district of Funchal, are geographically included
in the Canarian group. Thus, probably, we may
explain the ‘Aprositos,’ or Inaccessible
Island, which Ptolemy
[Footnote: The great Alexandrian is here (iv.
6, Sec.Sec. 33-4) sadly out of his reckoning.
He places the group of six islands adjacent to Libya
many degrees too far south (N. lat. 10 deg.-16 deg.),
and assigns one meridian (0 deg. 0’ 0”)
to Aprositos, Pluitana (Pluvialia? Hierro?), Caspeiria
(Capraria? Lanzarote?), and another and the same
(1 deg. 0’ 0”) to Pintouaria (Nivaria?
Tenerife?), Hera (Junonia? Gomera?), and Canaria.]
includes in his Six Fortunates; and the Isle of SS.
Borondon and Maclovius the Welshman (St. Malo).
The run from Lizard’s Point is laid down at
1,164 miles; from Lisbon, 535; from Cape Cantin, 320;
from Mogador (9 deg. 40’ west long.), 380; and
260 from Santa Cruz, Tenerife. The main island
lies between N. lat. 32 deg. 49’ 44” and
32 deg. 37’ 18”; the parallel is that
of Egypt, of Upper India, of Nankin, and of California.
Its longitude is included within 16 deg. 39’
30” and 17 deg. 16’ 38” west of
Greenwich. The extreme length is thus 37-1/2 (usually
set down as 33 to 54) miles; the breadth, 12-1/2 (popularly
15-16 1/2); the circumference, 72; the coast-line,
about 110; and the area, 240—nearly the
size of Huntingdonshire, a little smaller than the
Isle of Man, and a quarter larger than the Isle of
Wight. Pico Ruivo, the apex of the central volcanic
ridge, rises 6,050-6,100 feet, with a slope of 1 in
3.75; the perpetual snow-line being here 11,500.
Madeira is supposed to tower from a narrow oceanic
trough, ranging between 13,200 and 16,800 feet deep.
Of 340 days, there are 263 of north-east winds, 8 of
north, 7 of east, and 62 of west. The rainfall
averages only 29.82 to 30.62 inches per annum.
The over-humidity of the climate arises from its lying
in the Guinea Gulf Stream, which bends southward, about
the Azores, from its parent the great Gulf Stream,
striking the Canaries and flowing along the Guinea
shore. (White and Johnson’s Guide-Book, and ’Du
Climat de Madere,’ &c., par A. C. Mourao-Pitta,
Montpellier, 1859, the latter ably pleading a special
cause.)
A FORTNIGHT AT MADEIRA.
I passed Christmas week at the ‘Flower of the
Wavy Field;’ and, in the society of old and
new friends, found nothing of that sameness and monotony
against which so many, myself included, have whilom
declaimed. The truth is that most places breed
ennui for an idle man. Nor is the climate
of Madeira well made for sedentary purposes: it
is apter for one who loves to flaner, or, as
Victor Hugo has it, errer songeant.
