It is certainly too long an expedition to be performed in one day.  Tents should be taken, and arrangements made for camping out for one, if not two, nights; but, in the case of such a large party as ours, this would have been a great business, as everything must be carried to so great a height, up such steep places, and over such bad roads.  Still, there are so many objects and places of interest, not only on, but around, the Peak, that it is a pity to see them only when hurried and fatigued.

Sunday, July 23rd.—­Orders had been given not to call us nor to wash decks, and it was consequently half-past ten before any one awoke, and midday before the first of our party put in an appearance on deck.

Long before this, the ‘Sunbeam’ had been inundated with visitors from the shore.  We had given a general invitation to the friends of the Vice-Consul to come and see the yacht; and they accordingly arrived in due course, accompanied in many cases by a large circle of acquaintances.  Those who came first were conducted below and all over the vessel, but the number ultimately became so great that, in self-defence, we were obliged to limit their wanderings to the deck, opening the skylights wide, however, to enable them to see as much as possible of the saloon and cabins.

From breakfast-time until prayers, at three o’clock, when the yacht was closed for an hour, there was a constant stream of visitors from the shore.  It was a great nuisance; but still it seemed unkind to refuse to allow them to see what they had never seen before, and might possibly never have an opportunity of seeing again.  All steamers and sailing-ships, as a rule, go to Santa Cruz; and the fame of our vessel having been spread abroad by our visitors of Friday, many of the poor people had come from villages far away over the mountains.  We could not help feeling a certain respect for the determined way in which physical infirmity was mastered by curiosity for, though many experienced very serious inconvenience from the motion of the vessel, they still persevered in their examination.

About five o’clock we went ashore ourselves, and drove up to Villa Orotava.  The wide road is macadamised and marked with kilometre stones, and is planted on either side with pepper-trees, plane-trees, and the Eucalyptus globulus, which has grown 35 metres, or 115 feet, in seven years.  The hedges are formed of blue plumbago, scarlet geranium, yellow acacia, lavender-coloured heliotrope, white jasmine, and pink and white roses.

After driving a few miles, we turned down an old paved road towards the sea, and, by dint of a considerable amount of shaking, arrived at the celebrated Botanical Gardens, mentioned by Humboldt and others.  We passed through a small house, with a fine dragon-tree on either side, and entered the gardens, where we found a valuable collection of trees and shrubs of almost every known species.  The kind and courteous