live, cotton-cloth being their chief manufacture; but neither is there any great store of this cotton.  There also are some trees within the island, but none to be seen near the seaside; nothing but a few bushes scattering up and down against the sides of the adjacent hills; for as I said before the land is pretty high from the sea.  The soil is for the most part either a sort of sand, or loose crumbling stone, without any fresh-water ponds or streams to moisten it, but only showers in the wet season which run off as fast as they fall, except a small spring in the middle of the isle, from which proceeds a little stream of water that runs through a valley between the hills.  There the inhabitants live in three small towns, having a church and padre in each town:  and these towns, as I was informed, are 6 or 7 miles from the road.  Pinose is said to be the chief town, and to have 2 churches:  St. John’s the next, and the third Lagoa.  The houses are very mean:  small, low things.  They build with figtree, here being, as I was told, no other trees fit to build with.  The rafters are a sort of wild cane.  The fruits of this isle are chiefly figs and watermelons.  They have also callavances (a sort of pulse like French beans) and pumpkins for ordinary food.  The fowls are flamingos, great curlews, and guinea-hens, which the natives of those islands call galena pintata, or the painted hen; but in Jamaica, where I have seen also those birds in the dry savannahs and woods (for they love to run about in such places) they are called guinea-hens.  They seem to be much of the nature of partridges.  They are bigger than our hens, have long legs, and will run apace.  They can fly too but not far, having large heavy bodies and but short wings and short tails:  as I have generally observed that birds have seldom long tails unless such as fly much; in which their tails are usually serviceable to their turning about as a rudder to a ship or boat.  These birds have thick and strong yet sharp bills, pretty long claws, and short tails.  They feed on the ground, either on worms, which they find by tearing open the earth; or on grasshoppers, which are plentiful here.  The feathers of these birds are speckled with dark and light grey; the spots so regular and uniform that they look more beautiful than many birds that are decked with gayer feathers.  Their necks are small and long; their heads also but little.  The cocks have a small rising on their crowns, like a sort of a comb.  It is of the colour of a dry walnut shell, and very hard.  They have a small red gill on each side of their heads, like ears, strutting out downwards; but the hens have none.  They are so strong that one cannot hold them; and very hardy.  They are very good meat, tender, and sweet; and in some the flesh is extraordinary white; though some others have black flesh:  but both sorts are very good.  The natives take them with dogs, running them down whenever they please; for here are abundance of them.  You shall see 2 or 300