POWER OF PRIESTS. 85 and boards, on which some letters of the vessel's name still remained, had been turned into a cottage door; spars had been collected by the roadside; planks, with tree-nail holes, had been turned into window shutters; and, in Largens, a heap of beams and bulwarks standing before the house where we rested, with "THE PLYMOUTH BaltiMORE," in large white letters on them, told a melancholy tale of the horrors of being cast away on this reefy coast. In thick weather, or at night, no warning is given until the vessel is actually on the rocks,- for they rise from the ocean bed without shoal or shallow. We were told of an incident connected with one of these wrecks, which will well illustrate the power, and, in this case, the well-directed power, then possessed by the priesthood of this island over the minds of the poor. An anchor, belonging to a wrecked vessel, had been missing. No one, of course, knew anything about it; and, after every search had in vain been made for it, application was made to the priest. On the following Sunday, after mass had been said, he bade his congregation stop, as he had something serious to say to them; and, turning round from the altar to the people, he concluded some such 86 POWER OF PRIESTS. words as these, with the following strong metaphor: "I have heard," said he, "with much sorrow, that an anchor, from the vessel that was wrecked upon our coast, has been stolen from the shore, by some of my parishioners. I am informed, that search has everywhere been made for that anchor, and that hitherto it has not been found. There are among the people who now hear me, those who well know both the persons who have stolen it and the place where this anchor is concealed. I do not wish them to come forward now and openly confess their guilt, for that there is no necessity; but I charge them, by the holy office which I hold, to return that anchor to the place from which it has been taken before seven days have gone by; and I here announce to those deluded men who shall persevere in obstinate disobedience to my commands, that, in the last great day, that anchor shall drag down their souls deeper and still deeper into hell." The next morning it was returned. It is said, that before the authority of the clergy was lessened by the government, which confiscated their revenues, it was not unusual, about the time of confession, for domestic servants in this island, either to return the things which hai-gensLajens STATISTICS. 87 they had stolen, or to ask their masters' forgiveness; the priest insisting upon something more than the mere acknowledgment of their sins. But since the greater civilisation of the people, this has been less frequent. At Largens we were entertained by the governor of that division of the island, a handsome, fresh-coloured man, who gave us a luncheon, and explained the statistics of his government, and politely drew for us, on the spot, a plan of Flores, for our guidance in going round it.* His house * The statistical returns of the population in this gentleman's district (which included about half the island) were kept very methodically. The following was the table of the population, births, marriages, and deaths, for 1837 : Births. Marriages. 38 This is worth attending to, as it relates to a people in an extremely inartificial condition,-residing in a temperate and equable climate, where extremes, either of heat or cold, are unknown; who live on the simplest food (chiefly vegetable, with fresh fish), who are temperate, and only drink unadulterated and wholesome wines, and whose diseases are very little interfered with by medical art. The annual mortality is rather more than 1 in 26 persons, whereas in Great Britain it is 1 in 47, and in the healthiest counties of England, only 1 in 67. Even in London it is 1 in 44; in Geneva, 1 in 43; in Paris, was empty and new, with a few chairs and a few loose French lithographs. A meeting of the inhabitants of Flores, we were told, had been called, some time before, by a paper addressed "to the Nobility, Gentry, and Clergy of the Island of Flores;" and our entertainer, I presume, would have been ranked among the first of these classes of society. He inquired, rather anxiously, whether it was true that England was going to war with Russia; and, on hearing that it was only a newspaper rumour, he turned to his son, who sat by him, and uttered a common exclamation among the Azoreans, very clearly, but rather coarsely expressive of disappointment. A war with England would have brought vessels to Flores for pro visions. From Largens we pushed on to Fajem Grande, passing on our road the small village of Lajedo. 1 in 36; in Madrid, 1 in 35. Among the causes of this mortality may be the total absence of efficient medical relief; for the only educated medical man residing on the island is an Englishman, who does not live in this district, and is rarely consulted by those at a distance until all domestic remedies have been exhausted, and the disease is become incurable. Besides this, the population consists almost wholly of poor, amongst which class the rate of mortality is highest, and there is no legal relief for the destitute. In the valley where this village stands was a huge, isolated, mass of lava, several hundred feet in height. There was no more accounting for how it came there than for the flies in amber. It seemed impossible that any force could blow such a block into the air, and plant it in the earth entire; yet such may possibly have been the case. It is too large to have been carried down by a flood. Some volcano may have shot it out from the bowels of the earth like a rocket, and down it may have come in the valley with force enough to root it there for ever. The sides of this valley were covered with evergreens, and lower down it was divided into fields. After riding through some well cultivated land, beyond which were heathy mountains and precipices, in some parts of which were masses of rock whose surfaces were distinctly columnar, we passed a small farm, and came to the village of Fajemsinho. The village is only so far worthy of notice, as being connected with the grandest scenery, perhaps, to be found among the Azores. It stands on the level floor of a magnificent semi-amphitheatre of cliffs, facing the open sea. It is surrounded by green fields and fresh vineyards, well-watered by the numerous streams that flow |