and the arbutus, with berries ; whilst the native fig tree and
prickly pear supplied them with cooling and agreeable fruits.
So innocent and so unsuspecting of wrong were those happy
natives of the Fortunate Islands, that they assisted their plunderers
to land on their shores. And when the famous robber
of those days, (for he deserves no better appellation,) Jean de
Betancour, a Frenchman, formed the project of subduing the
Canaries, for the charitable purpose of converting the infidels
to Christianity, they laboured at those very fortifications which
were the means of reducing them and their offspring to slavery
and wretchedness, and finally effected their complete extermination
as a people. The descendants of the few who might
have blended with the invaders have lost all distinctive features
of their origin ; and it may be doubted if their mixture
with another nation has tended to improve the race.
The condition of the great bulk of the islanders appears to
be pretty much the same as those of the inhabitants of Madeira,
which, notwithstanding the little encouragement held
out by the proprietors of estates and cultivators of the land,
ought to be considerably better, were they less averse to
labour. I t is true, the mere necessaries of life are neither so
numerous nor so urgent as in regions of a colder temperature,
where clothing and fuel are so indispensable as to be ranked
among the articles of the first necessity. Here, a jacket of
coarse woollen cloth and drawers of canvas, with a handkerchief
bound round the head, or a coarse hat, constitute the
usual dress of the majority of the peasantry. The ambition
of most of the petty dealers and mechanics prompts them to
add skirts to their coats, by which they are entitled to the
honour of wearing a sword. The dress of the lower class of
women is pretty nearly the same as that which is worn in
Madeira. We saw little of those in the higher ranks,, who indeed
rarely stir abroad ; and who at such times are generally
veiled or, more correctly speaking, half-veiled, as they always
take care to shew one of their pretty black eyes and, accidentally
as it were, sometimes the whole of the countenance, especially
if they perceive that they are observed by strangers.
Their complexions by confinement become pale and sickly,
but they have almost invariably fine dark eyes and good
teeth. When full dressed for some particular occasion, they
wear long flowing veils of thin white silk, and Spanish cloaks
of scarlet cloth, richly embroidered and edged with gold lace.
The undress consists of a short jacket and petticoat, when then-
long black hair bound with a fillet falls straight down behind.
The hooded cloaks of the middle class are of fine English flannel
dyed black, a very considerable manufacture of which is
carried on in the city of Salisbury, and exported through Lisbon
and Cadiz to the Portugueze and Spanish colonies. Numbers
of females are condemned to pass then- days in nunneries,
with which every town and village in the island abounds ; and
the younger sons of the great land-holders are usually brought
up for the church, in order that the family name and estate
may be transmitted to posterity through the eldest son.
The influence of the clergy in Teneriffe is paramount. I t
extends to all the concerns of domestic life, and its authority
is backed and confirmed by the terrors of the Holy Inquisition.
The existence of this tribunal must, wherever its baneful
influence extends, be incompatible with a free and unre-
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