Habitations Males Females Total Madeira.............28,522 62,900 67,367 130,267 Porto Santo......... 435 874 874 1,748 _______ 132,015 _No. of Persons who can read and write._ Males Females Total Madeira..............................4,454 4,286 8,740 Porto Santo.......................... 77 34 111 ______ 8,851 _No. of Persons who can read but not write._ Males Females Total Madeira.......1,659 2,272 3,931 Porto Santo... 42 60 102 _____ 4,033 Miss Taylor (_Madeira_, p. 58) reduces to 33,000--evidently a misprint--this population about four times as dense as that of Portugal.] Many Madeirans highly distinguished themselves in the Dutch-Brazilian wars, especially the 'Castriota Lusitano.' His name is unknown; he changed it when he left his islet home, the townlet Santa Cruz. These islanders were the model 'navvies' of the age before steam: Albuquerque applied for Madeirans when he formed the barbarous project of diverting the Nile to the Red Sea. Their descendants are beggars from the cradle; but they beg with a good grace, and not with a curse or an insult like the European 'asker' when refused: moreover, the mendicant pest is not now over-prevalent. In the towns they cheat and pilfer; they gamble in the streets; they drink hard on Saturdays and Sundays, and at times they murder one another. Liquor is cheap; a bottle of _aguardente_ or _caxaça_ (new raw rum) costs only fivepence, and the second distillation ninepence. I heard of one assault upon an English girl, but strangers are mostly safe amongst them. Their extreme civility, docility, and good temper, except when spoilt by foreigners, makes it a pleasure to deal with them. They touch their hats with a frank smile, not the Spanish scowl near Gibraltar, or of Santa Cruz, Tenerife. The men are comparatively noiseless; a bawling voice startles you like a pistol-shot. I rarely heard a crying child or a scolding woman offering 'eau bénite à la Xantippe;' even the cocks and hens tied to old shoes cackle with reserve. The climate tames everything from Dom to donkey. Except in January and February it is still, intensely still--the very leaves seem to hang motionless. This softness shows itself especially in the language, which has none of the abruptness of European Portuguese. The sound is a drawling singsong; the articulation is peculiar, and the vocabulary is in some points confined to the Island.