ngs had Venetian blinds of a very sensible pattern.
They were not double shutters, hinged at the sides, but a single broad
shutter, hinged at the top; you push it outward, from the bottom, and
fasten it at any angle required by the sun or desired by yourself.

All about the island one sees great white scars on the hill-slopes.
These are dished spaces where the soil has been scraped off and the
coral exposed and glazed with hard whitewash. Some of these are a
quarter-acre in size. They catch and carry the rainfall to reservoirs;
for the wells are few and poor, and there are no natural springs and no
brooks.

They say that the Bermuda climate is mild and equable, with never any
snow or ice, and that one may be very comfortable in spring clothing the
year round, there. We had delightful and decided summer weather in May,
with a flaming sun that permitted the thinnest of raiment, and yet there
was a constant breeze; consequently we were never discomforted by heat.
At four or five in the afternoon the mercury began to go down, and then
it became necessary to change to thick garments. I went to St. George's
in the morning clothed in the thinnest of linen, and reached home at
five in the afternoon with two overcoats on. The nights are said to be
always cool and bracing. We had mosquito-nets, and the Reverend said the
mosquitoes persecuted him a good deal. I often heard him slapping and
banging at these imaginary creatures with as much zeal as if they had
been real. There are no mosquitoes in the Bermudas in May.

The poet Thomas Moore spent several months in Bermuda more than seventy
years ago. He was sent out to be registrar of the admiralty. I am
not quite clear as to the function of a registrar of the admiralty of
Bermuda, but I think it is his duty to keep a record of all the admirals
born there. I will inquire into this. There was not much doing in
admirals, and Moore got tired and went away. A reverently preserved
souvenir of him is still one of the treasures of the islands: I gathered
the idea, vaguely, that it was a jug, but was persistently thwarted in
the twenty-two efforts I made to visit it. However, it was no matter,
for I found out afterward that it was only a chair.

There are several "sights" in the Bermudas, of course, but they are
easily avoided. This is a great advantage--one cannot have it in Europe.
Bermuda is the right country for a jaded man to "loaf" in. There are
no harassments; the deep peace and q