(Garachico, wealthy town; wasteful of thy wealth,
may an ill rock fall upon thy head!)
both sexes were in their ‘braws.’
The men wore clean blanket-mantles, the women coloured
corsets laced in front, gowns of black serge or cotton,
dark blue shawls hardly reaching to their waist, and
the usual white kerchief, the Arab kufiyah,
under the broad-brimmed straw or felt hat, whose crown
was decorated with the broadest and gayest ribbons.
But even this unpicturesque coiffure, almost worthy
of Sierra Leone, failed to conceal the nobility of
face and figure, the well-turned limbs, the fine hands
and feet, and the meneo, or swimming walk,
of this Guanchinesque race, which everywhere forced
itself upon the sight. The proverb says—
De Tenerife los hombres;
Las mugeres de Canaria.
It is curious to compare the realistic accounts of
the nineteenth century with those of the vulcanio
two centuries ago. Ogilby (1670) tells us that
the Moors called it El-Bard (Cold), and we the ’Pike
of Teneriff, thought not to have its equal in the world
for height, because it spires with its top so high
into the clouds that in clear weather it may be seen
sixty Dutch miles off at sea.’ His
illustration of the ‘Piek-Bergh op het Eilant
Teneriffe’ shows an almost perpendicular tower
of natural masonry rising from a low sow-back whose
end is the ‘Punt Tenago’ (Anaga Point).
The ’considerable merchants and persons of credit,’
whose ascent furnished material for the Royal Society,
set out from Orotava. ’In the ascent of
one mile some of our Company grew very faint and sick,
disorder’d by Fluxes, Vomitings, and Aguish
Distempers; our Horses’ Hair standing upright
like Bristles.’ Higher up ’their
Strong waters had lost their Virtue, and were almost
insipid, while their Wine was more spirituous and brisk
than before.’ In those days also iron and
copper, silver and gold, were found in the calcined
rocks of the Katakaumenon. It is strange to note
how much more was seen by ancient travellers than
by us moderns.
THE SPANISH ACCOUNT OF THE REPULSE OF NELSON FROM
SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE.
[Footnote: From the Relacion circumstanciada
de la Defensa que hizo la Plaza de Santa Cruz,
by M. Monteverde. Published in Madrid, 1798.]
The following pages afford a circumstantial and, I
believe, a fairly true account of an incident much
glossed over by our naval historians. The subject
is peculiarly interesting. At Santa Cruz, as at
Fontenoy, the Irish, whom harsh measures at home drove
for protection to more friendly lands, took ample
share in the fighting which defeated England’s
greatest sailor. Again, the short-sighted policy
which sent to the Crimea 20,000 British soldiers to
play second instrument in concert with 40,000 Frenchmen,
thus lowering us in the eyes of Europe, made Nelson
oppose his 960 hands to more than eight times their
number. The day may come when the attack shall
be repeated. Now that steam has rendered fleets
independent of south-west winds, it is to be hoped
the assailant will prefer day to night, so that his
divisions can communicate; that he will not land in
the ‘raging surf’ of the ebb-tide, and
that he will attack the almost defenceless south instead
of the well-fortified north of the city.
