The streets in the city are paved, but the roads
in the country are impassable for wagons. Merchandise is carried on pack
mules or in ox-drags. Horses are rarely seen and carriages are few.
Quaint vehicles are used in their stead for the conveyance of
passengers.'

"How odd these vehicles are we shall find out when we land. We shall
have a busy day. I am eager to start."

It was yet early when we ascended the deck, but the sun was shining
brightly. Funchal appeared like a beautiful picture. Overhead was the
azure sky of a summer day; before us, stirred by a gentle breeze,
glistened in blue and silver the waters of the harbor; on the curving
shore, tier above tier, reflecting the sunshine, rose the white and
yellow stone buildings of the city surmounted by roofs of red tiling;
above the city, white cottages amidst a dense foliage of green shrubbery
dotted the steep hillsides, and beyond, but seeming very near, higher
mountains formed a dark and appropriate background.

[Illustration: THE WOMEN WERE WASHING CLOTHES.]

"The steam tenders are ready to carry you to the shore," announced one
of the officials, interrupting our survey of the picture.

We descended the long ladder of fifty steps from the deck of the steamer
to the bobbing barge in the water below, and were soon landed on the
stone steps of the breakwater, which, extending out to a picturesque
crag, protects and partially encloses the harbor. There, in place of
cabs, a hundred low sleds with canopy tops and cushioned seats were in
readiness to convey us on a sight-seeing excursion through the city.
This ride in ox-drags was a novel experience. Each sled was dragged by
two bullocks, driven without reins by loud-voiced natives who, with
frequent yells and prodding sticks, urged on their teams. The drivers
carried bunches of greasy rags which they occasionally threw underneath
the sled-runners as a lubricant to diminish the friction of their
movement over the stone-paved streets.

[Illustration: IN THE SLED READY TO START.]

The sights in the city were strange. The shops on the narrow streets
were plain and unattractive, and the signs unintelligible. The windows
of the lower floors of the dwellings were grated with iron bars like a
prison. Beneath a bridge over a walled ravine that kept a rushing stream
within bounds in the rainy season, women washed clothes and spread them
on rocks to dry. In the public square the women carrying water from the
fountain or