FAZENDA LIFE. 115 
scorching sun. Little black children were sitting on the 
ground and gathering what fell under the bushes, singing 
at their work a monotonous but rather pretty snatch of 
song in which some took the first and others the second, 
making a not inharmonious music. As their baskets were 
filled they came to the Administrador to receive a little 
metal ticket on which the amount of their work was 
marked. A task is allotted to each one, so much to 
a full-grown man, so much to a woman with young chil- 
dren, so much to a child, and each one is paid for what- 
ever he may do over and above it. The requisition is a 
very moderate one, so that the industrious have an oppor- 
tunity of making a little money independently. At night 
they all present their tickets and are paid on the spot for 
any extra work. From the harvesting-ground we followed 
the carts down to the place where their burden is deposited. 
On their return from the plantation the negroes divide the 
day's harvest, and dispose it in little mounds on the dry- 
ing-ground. When pretty equally dried, the coffee is 
spread out in thin even layers over the whole enclosure, 
where it is baked for the last time. It is then hulled by 
a very simple machine in use on almost all the fazendas, 
and the process is complete. At noon we bade good by 
to our kind hosts, and started for Juiz de Fora. Our stage 
was not a bad imitation of Noah's ark, for we carried with 
us the beasts of the field and the birds of the air and the 
fishes from the waters,* to say nothing of the trees from 
the forest. The party with whom we had passed such 
please nt days collected to bid us farewell, and followed 
* Senhor Lage had caused an extensive collection of fishes to he gathered 
from the waters of the Rio Novo, so that this excursion greatly extended 
the range of my survey of the basin of the Parahyha. L. A. 
