Fayal stands, with Pico and San Jorge, rather isolated from the rest of the group, and out of their sight.  It is the largest and most populous of the islands, except St. Michael and Terceira; it has the best harbor and by far the most of American commerce, St. Michael taking most of the English.  Whalers put into Fayal for fresh vegetables and supplies, and to transship their oil; while distressed vessels often seek the harbor to repair damages.  The island is twenty-five miles long, and shaped like a turtle; the cliffs along the sea range from five hundred to a thousand feet in height, and the mountainous interior rises to three thousand.  The sea is far more restless than upon our coast, the surf habitually higher; and there is such a depth of water in many places around the shore, that, on one occasion, a whale-ship, drawn too near by the current, broke her mainyard against the cliff, without grazing her keel.

The population numbers about twenty-five thousand, one-half of these being found in the city of Horta, and the rest scattered in some forty little hamlets lying at irregular distances along the shores.  There are very few English or French residents, and no Americans but the different branches of the Consul’s family,—­a race whose reputation for all generous virtues has spread too widely to leave any impropriety in mentioning them here.  Their energy and character have made themselves felt in every part of the island; and in the villages farthest from their charming home, one has simply to speak of a familia, “the family,” and the introduction is sufficient.  Almost every good institution or enterprise on the island is the creation of Mr. Dabney.  He transacts without charge the trade in vegetables between the peasants and the whale-ships, guarantying the price to the producers, giving them the profits, if any, and taking the risk himself; and the only provision for pauperism is found in his charities.  Every Saturday, rain or shine, there flocks together from all parts of the island a singular collection of aged people, lame, halt, and blind, who receive, to the number of two hundred, a weekly donation of ten cents each, making a thousand dollars annually, which constitutes but a small part of the benefactions of this remarkable man, the true father of the island, with twenty-five thousand grown children to take care of.

Ten cents a week may not seem worth a whole day’s journey on foot, but by the Fayal standard it is amply worth it.  The usual rate of wages for an able-bodied man is sixteen cents a day; and an acquaintance of ours, who had just got a job on the roads at thirty cents a day, declined a good opportunity to emigrate to America, on the ground that it was best to “let well alone.”  Yet the price of provisions is by no means very low, and the difference is chiefly in abstinence.  But fuel and clothing cost little, since little is needed,—­except that no woman thinks herself really respectable until she has her