Life in Brazil;

Front matter

^OPERTY Of

PRINCETON , htC, FE.B 1882 .

THSOLOGIO&^

Preface

and making professional tours round it. Histrionic artists rivaling old circumnavigators !

Such facts the world never witnessed before. What they forebode Ileaven best knows. If precursive of a breaking up of the old recluse habits of the species, and introductory of a system by which distant branches of the human family will become better known to, and be led to the interchange of sentiments and civilities with, each other, who would be among the last to feel the generous impulse ? Indeed, who, with health and leisure, can now stay at home inactive — be content to grow, remain, and die upon one little spot of this glorious sphere, when even females dance and sing, and music-masters fiddle round it ?

These questions the writer put to himself; and the result was a determination to cast oft’ for a season the instincts of home, and hie away to a region of butterflies and flowers. Inclination led him across the equator to the verge of the southern tropic, where he found a succession of novelties in the moving panorama of a Brazilian city that supplied subjects in abundance for both crayon and pen.

As I give my impressions regardless, in this politic age, of the policy or impolicy of so doing, there are doubtless among them opinions with which every reader will not sympathize. But what then? The Creator never designed us all to think and feel, see and speak, reflect and write alike. It is absurd to expect it, and worse than Manchegan folly to get angry about it. This would be a tame world if all things on it were modeled after one or two patterns, and men wTere fac-similes of each other.

I am told that I should have kept silence on ecclesiastical matters ; that it is improper for laymen to meddle with them, i can only say I did not go out of my way to find them. In Brazil, religion, or that which is so called, meets you every where ; you can do nothing, observe nothing, without being confronted by it in one shape or another. It is a leading feature

PREFACE

Vll

in public and private life. Festivals and processions constitute the chief amusements of the masses — are their principal sports and pastimes, during which the saints themselves come out of their sanctuaries, and, with padres and people, take part in the general frolic. To pass by them would be omitting the most popular acts, and neglecting the favorite actors in the national drama.

I have occasionally commented freely on facts, but I have distorted none — not one ; nor have I forgotten that South American superstitions were once common, and that their rejection by our ancestors is of no remote date. The world is still a ragged school.” Of the races and nations that make up its classes, few have got through the horn-book of knowledge ; and it is certain they never can be seated on the same form in religion any more than in arts, sciences, and civil polity. The dogma of uniformity is opposed to the organic law of diversity.

In whatever light the physique of Romanism may appear to others, it is full of interest to me. Almost as purely heathen as before the advent of Christ, it is a living and luminous exponent of pagan mysteries and ceremonies. Restore the old terms “ temples” and “ gods” for “ churches” and “ saints" (they are strictly synonymous), and there is scarcely aught in it but what was in common use ages before the times of the Caesars. Churches, their internal arrangements and accessories, their store-rooms for machinery, chests and closets for dresses, ornaments, insignia, and jewels belonging to the images ; artists to take charge of and repair these ; several shrines located in one temple, forms of worship at them, candles on the altars, mass-bells, vows, penance, flagellation, pilgrimages, pocket and household images ; the various orders of priests, of monks and nuns, habits of the priests, rosaries, the Inquisition and its tortures, the tonsure, ex votos, holy water and its applications, professsional attributes of saints, bodily cures wrought by and character of miracles ascribed to them, &c., all belong to classic

PREFACE.

viii

and anterior epochs. Bulls of excommunication and commination, involving confiscation of property and death, arc versions of those issued against Alcihiades and other alleged heretics; so, also, exceptions taken by enlightened Iiomanists to such wholesale cursing are finely illustrated by Tlieano, who excused herself, saying she was “ a priestess for prayer and not for execration."

It is impossible to witness for the first time ecclesiastical pageants without calling to mind the same things established by the Gentiles, and which constituted a cherished source of their entertainments. Now, as then, the business of a city is ever and anon arrested, its streets are swept and strewed with leaves, the fronts of the houses decked with evergreens and drapery, women and children throng the windows, country people Hock in to the sight, and groups of both sexes are every where waiting for it. At length appear full-sized statues painted to ihe life, mounted on platforms, and borne in triumph on men's shoulders, amid crowds of officials in their varied costumes. Mitred pontiffs, with their trains held up by pages, walk under canopies, accompanied by civil magistrates and escorted by battalions of soldiers, the whole preceded and followed by cohorts of priests, monks, lay-brothers, and acolytes, with music, banners, flambeaux, staves, censers, symbols on poles, &c., while from the mixed masses of spectators proceed sotto voce remarks, reverend and profane, as each wooden deity and its perspiring supporters pass by. What is all this but a continuation of the pomps of Isis and Cybele — of festivals celebrated in honor of the gods and goddesses of Egypt, Assyria, Asia Minor, Carthage,

< ireece, and old Rome '? Similar scenes and performers at Nineveh, Babylon, Corinth, Delphos, and Athens pass literally before one ; at least so it seemed when the sight first opened upon me in Rio.

1 believe Romanism, as it exists in Brazil and South America generallv, to be a barrier to progress, compared to which oth-

PREFACE.

IX er obstacles are small, and there are native statesmen alive to the fact ; but, incorporated as it is with the habits and thoughts of the people ; transfused, as it were, through their very bones and marrow, unless some Kempis or Fenelon, Luther or Itongc, arise to purify it, generations must pass before the scales drop from their eyes, and they become mentally free.

Of those who think differently, I trust none will suffer their ire to glow at this expression of an opinion, or at recitals of facts upon which it may be based. I am for every one telling his own stories and commenting on them in his own way ; and while he who, in doing this, expects to please every body, is a miller or the son of a miller, those who insist on his seeing things only through their glasses are verily allied to the companion of rEsop's two grinders of grain.

Besides Church affairs, I noted whatever interested me, and that, in sooth, was nearly every thing : arts, manners, customs, buildings, trades, tools, pottery, food, slaves, animals, agricultural products, climate, diseases, population, antiquities, &c.. &c. ; hence this volume will be found a miscellanea of tropical life. It was in preparation when the late President Tyler honored the writer with an official appointment in Washington ; the sheets were then laid aside, but, as they relate to matters that arc all but unchangeable, there is nothing to regret in the delayed publication.

Washington, D. C., 1855

.

Chapter I

New York to Hampton Roads : Passports. — Wrinkled Faces. — Bataleurs. — Richmond.— Market. — Mules. — -Lotteries. — James River. — Floating Boarding-house — A Virginian Job. — Crippled Slave. — The Roads Page 17

Chapter II

Ten Days’ Sail: Beat out. — New Sensations. — Captain in Costume. — A Gale — Sea-sickness.— Water Rams. — Gulf Stream. — Christmas Carols.- — Human Daring— Ship hunted by marine Demons. — Hard Life of Seamen. — Cook and Captain.— Enchanting Skies. — Minute Crabs 2fi

Chapter III

Twenty-four Days’ Sail: Sea Sorrows— A Genoese. — Rough Weather. — A Flying-fish.— Flowers of Death. — Oceanic Skies.— The Atmosphere charged with red Dust. — Firmamental Paintings. — Flying-fish Latitudes. — Cream-colored or Quaker Skies. — Flying-fish again. — A Meniscus. — A Squall. — A ship in Distress.— A young Fly. — In the Variables. — The Ocean unchangeable. — Temperature of Air and Water. — Brazilian Coasts 35

Chapter IV

Diagram of the Ship’s Motions. — The Ravels at Sea. — Sailing in Elysium — Worlds are Ships of the Almighty Merchant. — The Nebulae his Ship-yards. — The Ocean a Type of the Sea of Life. — Abrolhos and Squalls. — Cape Frio. — Land-breeze. — Sea-breeze. — Sugar-loaf. — Enter the Bay. — Former Treatment of Foreigners. — Table of Latitudes and Longitudes during the Voyage 47

Chapter V

The Bay, City, and Suburbs from the Ship — The Forts. — I land alone. — The Cattete. — A Brazilian Parlor. — Meeting of twq^ Brothers 57

Chapter VI

Almanacs. — Livery Stables. — Carriages. — Honorable H. A. Wise. — The Host — Booming of the Surf. — The Matadoura. — Beeves. — Assist at Mass. — Esmola Box — Apollonia. — A Funeral. — Funeral Customs. — Mourning. — Cost of Masses for the Dead 62

Chapter VII

The Military Arsenal: its Manufactures. — Fine old bronze Ordnance. — School — Ceremony of the Hat. — Larangeiras. — Cattete Brook and Washerwomen. — A Brazilian Chacara. — Old Portuguese Customs — Butterflies — Fountains xil

— Indian Medicine-tree. — A Dessert after the manner of Eden. — Uniformity of tropical Heats. — Iron Collars on Slaves. — Shoes and Neckcloths symbols of Freedom. — The Vicar and Sneezing. — The public Garden an earthly Elysium Page 71

Chapter VIII

Sudden Floods and their singular Inconveniences. — Discovery of Brazil. — Indians and early Navigators. — Rio founded by French Protestants. — Their religious Disputes. — An Indian Chief knighted. — His Descendants. — Location of the City. — Saints of the Hills. — Streets and Pavements. — Houses. — Jalousies. — Roofs. — Chimneys. — Spouts. — Street Lamps. — Substitute for Bells and Doorknockers.— Signs. — Markets. — Fountains. — No Sewers or Sinks. — Rio a City of Quarries. — Neighboring Mountains. — Names of Streets, etc 81

Chapter IX

Sedans. — Removing Furniture to new Dwellings. — Street “Cries." — Peddlers. — Large Lizard — Penny Portraits of Saints. — The Intrudo and its Sports. — Of

Hindoo Origin. — Death and Burial of the Secretary of the Institute. — The Church, Coffin, Corpse, Cemetery, and Orations 90

Chapter X

The Marimba. — Procession announced.— Unloading Lime-boats. — Lapa Convent and Lady at Confession. — The Campo and Lavandeiras. — Dog-killers — Custom-house.— Trucks. — A Slave chained to one. — Young and old Women in Chains — Coffee Carriers. — Crippled Slaves. The Spectacle given up. — An Angel. — TheMusuem. — Antiquities, etc. — Fathers of Snuff and the Snuff-trade. — Original Snuff-mills and Sniffing Apparatus. — Slave-traders. — Monastery of San Bento : its Monks, Chapel, Cells, Library, and Bookworms. — Sopping — Great Wealth of this Monastery Ill

Chapter XI

Diversity of Complexion in one Family. — Sabbath Diversions. — Street of Silversmiths.— Its staple Manufactures. — Amulets. — Figas. — Lock and Key. — Passage in Shakspeare explained. — Eating-houses. — Charges.— Sneezers “ blessed. ” — Priests. — Free colored Men. — Great Consumption of Pork. — National Dish. — Pastry and Confectionery. — Heavenly Bacon — Francis of Penitence —Brotherhoods akin to modern Odd Fellows. — Terms of Admission. — Advantages. — Who this Francis was. — Garden, and Electric Eel. — Current Philosophy respecting the Sex. — Divination — Provincial Nicknames. — Dowries in Cocoa and Coffee-trees. — Vegetable and other Sobriquets. — Horsewomen — Officers' Wives on Drill in Military Costume.— Morals of the Priesthood 130

Chapter XII

Visit to Christoval : native Sheep — Palace of a Peddler — Imperial Quinta. — Rapacity of the old Queen. — Miguel. — A Viscount and his strange Employment. — Emperor’s Apartments. — Objects of Natural History. — Collection of Coins — Peruvian, Egyptian, and Roman Antiquities. — Laboratory — Theatre, and Garden ■ ^4 xiii

Chapter XIII

Poor Anthony robbed. — Ex Yotos. — Their Manufacture. — Humming-bird and Bou quet. — Affronted Image and wicked Painter. — His Punishment, and Process of “ disaffronting” the Image. — Imperial Chapel and its Shrines. — Turk’s Head.— Barefooted Friars. — Esta<;io de Sa. — Slab over him. — Chief of the Capuchins — Virgin’s Shoe-sole. — Architectural Remains. — Ajuda Convent. — Dumb Waiter.— Glimpse into the Interior. — Vestals. — Nuns in the Ajuda, and their Treatment Page 151

Chapter XIV

Candelaria Church. — Jacks of the Clock. — Peccary. — God’s Stepfather. — Botanic Garden. — Snake. — Fences. — Dinner and its Cost. — Catalogue of Plants in the Garden . 1 G'J

Chapter XV

Goddess of the Blind. — Her Church, Shrines, and Symbols. — A Slave consulting her. — Interview with her Sacristan. — Ex Votos. — Our Lady of the Cape of Good Hope. — Insuring Friars. — Other Professional and Competing Saints. — Street Images 176

Chapter XVI

Rain — Mechanical Professions. — Labor versus Respectability.— Effect on young Men. — Building. — Hammer-gamut. — Working Hours and Wages. — Rejoicings over Rafters. — Masons and Masonry. — Scaffolds. — Walls. — Antiquity of the Tools. — Plummet. — Hatchet or Adze. — Carpenter's Bench. — Saw and Planes. — Mode of laying Floors. — Doors, Shutters, Hardware. — Pavers. — Lithography. — Coppersmiths — Lamp. — Slave Artisans. — Merchants. — Barbers. — Beggars — Lawyers. — Lotteries 183

Chapter XVII

Mate and Cups. — Sunday Scenes. — Gloria Church. — Images, Vestry, Ex Votos. and Paintings. — Miracles in behalf of Pedro I. and one of his Daughters. — Lady of Gloria and a Larangeiras Absalom. — Chapel of the Ajuda grated like a Jail — Its Shrines and Images. — A Penitent licking the Dust. — Public Notice of a Procession. — Images, Angels, and Pomp described. 198

Chapter XVIII

All Fools’ Day. — Streets flooded. — Breaking down Mountains. — Notices of Festivals.— Flying Visit to Francis Paula, St. Anne, Joaquim, St. Rita, Bom Jesus, and the Candelaria. — No Animal Oils burned in Churches. — Carmelite Procession with full-grown Images. — The Nimbus and its curious Origin 208

Chapter XIX

Palm Sunday : Ceremonies and Customs. — Eunuch Singers. — Specimens of Ecclesiastical Advertisements. — Benedictine Chapel. — Dark Wednesday. — A Mer- <;eeiro. — Juno Lucina of Rio. — Lady of Civilities — Holy Thursday. — Matracas. — Silver Plate in the Carmo Church. — Kissing a dead Christ in the Candelaria. — Appearance of the Interior. — Kissing the Floor and Steps in the Bom Jesus — Plate in the Paula. — Mine-finders. 217

XIV

CONTENTS.

Chapter XX

( rood Friday. — Capuchins preaching. — Burial of God. — Dresses and Jewels of the Angels. — Allelulia Saturday. — Blessing Fire and Water. — Paschal Candle. — Killing Judas. — Church Machinery. — Cinerary Urns and Commemoration of the Dead. — Symbols carried by Angels. — Boy Monk. — Little Prospect of Protestant Missions succeeding in Brazil. — Mary of Nazareth Page 227

Chapter XXI

Amulets : the Church a Mart for them. — Measures of Saints. — Royal Touches and metallic Tractors. — Bentinhos. — Pictures of Saints.— Indulgences. — Hindoo Pictures. — -Portable Images. — Medals of Saints. — Bedini. — Symbols of the Cross. — Crossing Manual. — Pieces of holy Rock. — Hippocanthus. — Figa. — Ashes of Palm. — Rue. — Love Powder. — Sieve and Shears. — Curing the Bewitched.— Negro Witches. — Cures for Whitlows and Toothache. — The Evil Eye. — Rio Poulterers troubled with it. — Horns quench it 241

Chapter XXII

Begging for the Holy Ghost. — The Symbols. — Mr. Barboza. — An afflicted Mother.— The City agitated through Mistake. — San Jorge. — Market. — Church of Peddlers. — Burying-ground of Heretics. — Small Water-craft. — Beeves of the Sun. — Lady of Navigators. — Mozambique tribal Marks. — Church of Boa Viagem. — Ex Votos and Miracles. — Curious Lavatory. — View of the Harbor and Mountains. — Alms-box. — Ships’ Sails vowed to Our Lady, and sold on her Account.— Indian Boy. — Wax offered to Marine Deities by old Pagans. — Other Heathen Types of Romish Customs 250

Chapter XXIII

People of Color. — Twilight and Climate. — Barbonos Monks. — The Ex-Nuncio. — Henry A. Wise recalled. — Arrival of the Emperor and Anxieties of Courtiers — A new Saint. — Mask. — Market Incident. — St. Peter’s Church. — N. S. Concei^ao.— Plaster Images proposed. — Collecting-days and Collectors. — Church of the Mother of Men. — Fat Ladies and Gentlemen. — Unctuous Worship of N. S's. Shoe-sole. — Bedini, the new Nuncio 267

Chapter XXIV

Pluvial Deity. — Aqueduct Records. — Pope John. — Ecclesiastical “Cries.” — Slaves. — Army Recruits. — The Emperor opens the Legislature. — Fires and Fireengines. — Slaves: — Suicide. — Begging for the Holy Ghost. — Auction of Slaves 275

Chapter XXV

Winter. — New Saint. — Lady do Parto. — An English Monk. — Black and white Infants in Purgatory. — -Auction at a private Dwelling : its Furniture, Garden, Lares. Oratorio, and Slaves. — Barber’s Basin and Shaving-cloth. — Mass and Capuchins.— Church of the Rosary, its Images and Ex Votos. — A sick Man. — Old Slave. — Uncertain Origin of the Negro Saint. — Ramble through Nictherohy 284

XV

Chapter XXVI

Inauguration of a new Saint: how the alleged Bones were procured. — Buried in a waxen Figure. — The Bishop’s Letter. — The Affair generally condemned. — Bedini and Miranda. — The Emperor declines joining the Procession. — The Pomp. — The “ Area” and Saint within. — Official Account. — Newspaper Puff. — A Visit to Priscilliana. — Miranda’s Circular. — A French Tribunal on Religious Impositions Page 294

Chapter XXVII

A Day for getting Souls out of Purgatory. — Trip to the Falls of Tejuca. — Character of the Country. — Anacharsis and Charcoal. — Fat Pigs and Morphea. — Mills — Cotton-tree. — Coffee Plantation. — Tailless Dogs and Fowls. — Process of preparing Coffee for the Market. — Early Notice of Cauphe. — The Falls. — Dinner and Dessert at them. — Inscriptions on the Gavia 30b

Chapter XXVIII

Church Advertisements. — Auction and Fire-works at St. Rita's Church. — Articles sold. — Official Puff. — Horse-racing in honor of the Holy Ghost. — St. Gomjalo the Friend of the unmarried. — Capuchin preaching. — Two Slaves given to the Friars, and their Baptism by Bedini. — Chief Capuchin. — Priscilliana. — Famine in Ceara. — Indians bought and sold 312

Chapter XXIX

Winter and Western Islanders. — Brazilian Names: their Derivation and Import — Primitive Patronymics. — Combinations. — Names in connection with Professions.— Names of Ships. — Pigs and Pig-stealing.— Invitation to Tea . 324

Chapter XXX

St. Anthony of Padua : his Monastery and Miracles. — His Rank and Salary as a Soldier. — Shameful Treatment of his Images. — Feast of the Holy Ghost. — Auctions and Fire-works, etc 329

Chapter XXXI

Vicar and Vintems. — Theatricals. — Barbonos Monks and the troublesome Blacksmith.— Priscilliana. — Host and drunken Bellman. — Proceedings of the National Senate arrested. — Slave-trader’s Office. — Anthony of the Poor : his Festival and Tablets. — Mosquitoes and Lizards. — Corpus Christi and St. George. — Showmen and the Burial 349

Chapter XXXII

Crockery- wares : Talhas. — Monkey. — Moringues. — Furnaces, Flower-pots, etc. — Water-baril. — Serubbing-brush. — Mortars. — Fuel 35?

Chapter XXXIII

A Trip to Macacu. — Steam up the Bay. — Prospects. — Slaves. — Sambayratiba. — Dense Mist. — Bed-chamber. — Attacked by Rats. — Extent of the Pest. — Sugarhouse. — Stingless Bees. — Sheep. — Dogs without Tails. — Visit other Estates. — Wasps’ and Ants’ Nests. — The Rats again. — Scenes in the Forest. — Sipos. — Spoon Wheels. — Female Slaves making Brick. — Chigres. — Muleteers camping — Estate of the Carmelites. — Mules 361 xvi

CONTENTS.

Chapter XXXIV

Macacu. — A large Tree. — Its Form, Dimensions, and extraordinary Roots. — Why so few old Trees. — Vegetable Origin of Forms and Ornaments. — Singular Forms of Boles. — Natural Moulding. — The Sloth-tree and Sloth. — Fabrication of Farinha. — Cultivation of the Plant. — Grating and pressing the Pulp. — The Tipiti — Musical Wagons. — Rats keeping Carnival. — Return to the City . . Page 371

Chapter XXXV

Apbllonia and Carasco. — Divinations. — Beatified Galcns. — The Mizericordia. — Meeting of Isabel and Mary. — The Chapel. — Emperor.- — Foundlings. — Isabel the Representative of a Pagan Goddess. — Manual and tibial Worship. — Fourth of July. — Lame leading the Blind. — British Chapel, Preacher, and Prayer-Book — Nictherohy. — Fine Estate and its small Cost. — A Paca. — The Nuncio denounced.— Lost Image. — Shrine in a Brothel. — Legislation invoked. — Theatrical and sacerdotal Exhibitions 384

Chapter XXXVI

Capuchin Attractions: Fireworks, Music, Auction, etc. — The Mint. — Lanternbellows. — Lady of Lampadoza.— Balthazar.- — Peter Coelho. — A winged Monk.— A dead Christ by a Negro Artist.— Ceara.- — How the Emperor was anointed. — More Galas. — Conveying Presents. — Interior of a Drawing-room. — Proverbs. — The Neckcloth. — Bedini. — British Embassador. — Chamber of Deputies. — Jaunt to the Gavia. — Inscriptions — Tailor. — Dead Slave. — Pride and Piggishness. — God’s Grandmother. — Bedini again. — Lady of Snows. — Birth of a Princess — A Wizard's Stock in Trade . 395

Chapter XXXVII

The Corcovado Mountain and Carioco Aqueduct : View from chamber Window — Aqueduct Arches. — Ascent of the Tereza Hill — Conduit and receiving Basins — Romantic Character of the Work — Section of Conduit. — Mother of M aters. --Paineiras and Pic-nic. — Forest Features. — Ascent of the Corcovado. — Vegetable Instincts.— Summit of the Mountain.— Prospects from it. — Descent. — The Paineiras tributary to the Mother of Waters.— Reach Home by Lamp-light. — Subsequent Visits to the Aqueduct. — Its Length and Fall. — Section of Channel over the Arches. — Entire Length of the Aqueduct and Feeders. — Water furnished by it. — Might be conveyed through Tubes into every dwelling. — No Reservoirs 407

Chapter Xxxviii

Population of Brazil. — Diseases. — National Income. — Police. — Literature. — Library.— Newspapers. — Character of Brazilians. — Slaves. — Voyage Home 430

SKETCHES

OF

LIFE IN BRAZIL.

Chapter I

New York to Hampton Roads : Passports. — Wrinkled Faces. — Bataleurs. — Richmond.— Market. — Mules. — Lotteries. — James River. — Floating Boarding-house. — A Virginian Job. — Crippled Slave. — The Roads.

Free travel and free trade are not yet. The barbarism that in the Old World prevents man from traversing the earth and communing with his species at his pleasure prevails over South America. Tourists are not allowed to step on nor to leave the shores of Brazil without passports. I had, therefore, to call on the Brazilian consul, and pay him for an invoice, or pen-andink sketch of myself. With it I left New York on the 2d of December, 1845, by rail for Richmond, Va., to join tire bark Mazeppa, in which I had engaged a passage to Rio. In passing through Jersey, crowds were assembled in every village in expectation of the President’s Message. It met us at Bristol, when every one responded to the sentiments concerning Oregon. The feeling was universal that not another foot of North America should be polluted with monarchy ; that here, come what may, people should be free from the evils of hereditary rulers, primogeniture, tithes, and a state priesthood.

From the corrugated countenances of two loquacious old gentlemen, I was led, for want of something else to think on, to infer that the diversified wrinkles in the human face are produced pretty much in the same way as are similar marks in the leathers of bellows. The movable board, like the movable jaw, ever stretching and collapsing the flexile material, at length determines and defines the lines. No two faces are crimped alike, neither are two bellows. Both cheeks and leathers are

B smooth when new, and it is only by long-continued action that the creases become stereotyped in either. To be sure, the living skin requires more working to take and retain the impressions than that prepared by the tanner, but then how vastly more is it worked ! The muscles of the mouth and the play of the lower jaw scarcely have a moment’s rest from the beginning of life to the end of it. The lines in the hands are formed in the same way.

Night traveling is favorable to revery. There were some three hundred passengers in the train — politicians, editors, ladies, and ladies’ maids, place-hunters, merchants, planters, military and naval officers, artisans, and engineers — every one more or less absorbed in cogitation. In fact, we are all itinerant Bataleurs, proprietors of little cosmoramic exhibitions, which wc carry about for our individual entertainment, and whose value varies with the pictures put into them. How large a part of life is spent in working these, and what pleasure they impart when Hope fingers the strings !

After a short stay in Philadelphia, we rushed on, through Baltimore, to Washington, where I spent a day over the lions, and left for Richmond. We descended the Potomac in a small steamer, some forty miles, to Aquia Creek, whence the cars ran us, in a few hours, to the capital of Virginia. The landscape for a hundred miles presented a uniform icy arborescence. Gusts of wind rustled through clumps of trees and shrubbery, shaking down showers of crystals, which came whirring in waves over the glassy fields toward us.

.Arriving according to appointment, I leam that the vessel — loading with flour nineteen miles below on the Appomattox — will not complete her cargo for several days. Not expecting to stop here twelve hours, and to be detained perhaps a week, is enough, in such weather as has now set in, to give one mental chills and bodily ague-fits. The air is tangible from excessive moisture, and at night darkness is literally felt. The fog is so dense as completely to hide from view buildings on opposite sides of the street. If “in thick mists the devil is smoking tobacco,” this must be a favorite place for taking his pipe in. But travelers should not be discouraged nor readers frightened off by preliminary disagreeables.

LIFE IN BRAZIL.

Richmond is picturesque in its location, occupying both high and low grounds. The river at its feet is crowded with rocks, which nothing hut a canoe can thread ; the longest bridge in the state, a very high one, crosses immediately below them. The canal sweeps along the banks at an elevation of some forty feet, presenting enviable sites for hydraulic motors, and in these sources of wealth rivaling the water-power of Paterson and Lowell. The houses, of diverse fashions, run up and cross precipitous streets, while the State House, on an eminence, overlooks the city and surrounding scenery. “ Main Street” is two miles long, its lower end terminating at “ Rockets,” the nearest place to which steamers and small craft can come up. The middle portion of this avenue — the old business part of the city — is steep, and occupied on both sides witli substantial stores and dwellings. In other parts the edifices are poor. I was surprised to find decent white people living in very mean apologies for dwellings. Several old streets are not paved, neither middle nor sidewalks. I am told no marked changes have been made in the city during the last thirty years.

The State House is a handsome structure. In the hall stands Houden’s statue of Washington, in citizen’s dress, and a walking-cane in his hand — a perfect picture in marble of a Virginian gentleman of the eighteenth century. True to life, it will convey to posterity a far more correct idea of the Father of his Country than the half nude Roman figure at Washington.

The market is well supplied, and prices are moderate. Beef and mutton from 4| to 6 cents per pound ; pork, 6 cents ; turkeys, 75 cents each, and ducks the same per pair. Fish averages 3 cents per pound.

A numerous class of animals killed here and elsewhere, but seldom eaten, are mules — the cheapest, easiest fed, and most enduring beasts of draught and burden. It is surprising how they climb icy acclivities with loads so disproportioned to their slender frames. Some streets have a rise of eight or ten feet in a hundred. The Exchange Hotel opens on one, and it is painful to witness them tacking from side to side as they pass it, for ascend direct they can not. See those two small ones struggling with a ton of building-stone from the river side, straining as if their limbs must become disjointed and their sinews torn asunder ! Scalding vapor pours from their nostrils and rolls over their panting sides. Their clinched teeth are wide exposed, for their quivering lips are drawn apart and corrugated by their efforts. Conscious that if they ceased their exertions the load would drag them backward and whirl them down the steep, how spasmodically they strike their toes into the ground to secure a footing ! It is wonderful how their delicate pastern joints endure without snapping such violent grapplings with the pavement. The driver now turns their heads across the street, and blocks the wheels to allow their palpitation to subside. In many streets they can not ascend over twenty feet without thus resting. Richmond is the mules’ Tartarus. There was some reason, if not piety, in the reply of the old Spanish hybrid to his young associate in harness as to the preference to be given to level or to undulating roads. His answer w.as, “ A curse on both, and on the fiends that made them.”