_Monday, July 24th_.--What one gains in the beauty and abundance of
vegetable life here, one loses in its rapid and premature decay. Fruit
gathered in the morning is scarcely fit to eat at night, and the
flowers brought on board yesterday evening were dead to-day at 4.30
a.m.; whilst some of the roses we brought from Cowes lasted until we
reached Madeira, though it must be owned so many fell to pieces that
my cabin used to be daily swept with rose-leaves instead of
tea-leaves.
We went ashore soon after six, and drove straight to the garden of the
Marquis de Sonzal, where there is a beautiful palm-tree, 101 feet
high, the remains of an enormous dragon-tree, old even in the
fifteenth century, besides hedges of myrtle, jasmine, and clematis,
and flowers of every description in full bloom. The dragon-tree is a
species of dracaena, and looks rather like a gigantic candelabra,
composed of a number of yuccas, perched on the top of a gnarled and
somewhat deformed stem, half palm half cactus. Another beautiful
garden was next visited, belonging to the Marquis de la Candia, who
received us and showed us his coffee and plantains in full growth, as
well as a magnificent Spanish chestnut-tree, coeval with the
dragon-tree. Out of one of its almost decayed branches a so-called
young tree was growing, but it would have been thought very
respectable and middle-aged in any other locality.
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