LS Magazine Dark Studios Presents Dark Robbery 1.avi.25

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Monika Gessford

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Dec 20, 2023, 9:57:24 PM12/20/23

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Madeira (pop. 1900, 148,263), the largest island of the group,has a length of 30 m., an extreme breadth of 12 m., and a coast-lineof 80 or 90 m. Its longer axis lies east and west, in whichdirection it is traversed by a mountain chain, the backbone of theisland, having a mean altitude of 4000 ft., up to which many deepravines penetrate from both coasts and render travel by land verydifficult. Pico Ruivo, the highest summit, stands in the centre ofthe island, and has a height of 6056 ft., while some of the adjacentsummits are very little lower. The depth and narrowness ofthe ravines, the loftiness of the rugged peaks, often covered withsnow, that tower above them, the bold precipices of the coast,and the proximity of the sea, afford many scenes of picturesquebeauty or striking grandeur. The greater part of the interioris uninhabited, though cultivated, for the towns, villages andscattered huts are usually built either at the mouths of ravinesor upon the lower slopes that extend from the mountains to thecoast. The ridges between the ravines usually terminate in loftyheadlands, one of which, called Cabo Girão, has the height of1920 ft., and much of the seaboard is bound by precipices of darkbasalt. The north coast, having been more exposed to the erosionof the sea, is more precipitous than the south, and presents everywherea wilder aspect. On the south there is left very littleof the indigenous forest which once clothed the whole islandand gave it the name it bears (from the Portuguese madeira,Lat. materia, wood), but on the north some of the valleys stillcontain native trees of fine growth. A long, narrow and comparativelylow rocky promontory forms the eastern extremity ofthe island; and here is a tract of calcareous sand, known as theFossil Bed, containing land shells and numerous bodies resemblingthe roots of trees, probably produced by infiltration.