The church or chapel formed one side of a quadrangle, in
the middle of which a large clump of bananas were growing. On
another side was a hospital, containing about a dozen
miserable-looking inmates.
We returned to the V?nda to eat our dinners. A considerable number
of men, women, and children, all as black as jet, collected to
watch us. Our companions were extremely merry; and everything we
said or did was followed by their hearty laughter. Before leaving
the town we visited the cathedral. It does not appear so rich as
the smaller church, but boasts of a little organ, which sent forth
singularly inharmonious cries. We presented the black priest with a
few shillings, and the Spaniard, patting him on the head, said,
with much candour, he thought his colour made no great difference.
We then returned, as fast as the ponies would go, to Porto Praya.
Another day we rode to the village of St. Domingo, situated near
the centre of the island. On a small plain which we crossed, a few
stunted acacias were growing; their tops had been bent by the
steady trade-wind, in a singular manner--some of them even at right
angles to their trunks. The direction of the branches was exactly
north-east by north, and south-west by south, and these natural
vanes must indicate the prevailing direction of the force of the
trade-wind.
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