MANNERS AND CUSTOMS. 



417 



notwithstanding the impure state 

 in which the Christian church ex- 

 ists in that country, still such are 

 the beneficent effects of the Chris- 

 tian religion, that these, its adopted 

 children, are improved by it to an 

 infinite degree ; and the slave who 

 attends to the strict observance of 

 religious ceremonies invariably 

 proves to be a good servant. The 

 Africans who are imported from 

 Angola are baptized in lots before 

 they leave their own shores, and 

 on their arrival in Brazil they are 

 to learn the doctrines of the 

 church, and the duties of the re- 

 ligion into which they have enter- 

 ed. These bear the ina;k of the 

 royal crown upon their breasts, 

 which denotes that they have un- 

 dergone the ceremony of baptism, 

 and likewise that the king's duty 

 has been paid upon them. The 

 slaves which are imported from 

 other parts of the coast of Africa, 

 arrive in Brazil unbaptized, and 

 before the ceremony of making 

 them Christians can be performed 

 upon them, they must be taught 

 certain prayers, for the acquire- 

 ment of which one year is allowed 

 to the master, before he is obliged 

 to present the slave at the parish- 

 church. This lavv is not always 

 strictly adhered to as to time, but 

 it is never evaded altogether. The 

 religion of the master teaches him 

 that it would be extremely sinful 

 to allow his slave to remain a 

 heathen ; and indeed the Portu- 

 guese and Brazilians have too 

 much religious feeling to let them 

 neglect any of the ordinances of 

 their church. The slave himself 

 likewise wishes to be made a 

 Christian, for his fellow-bondmen 

 will in every squabble or trifling 

 disagreement with biw, clo§e their 



yot. Lix, 



string of opprobrious epithets with 

 the nar,ie of pagam (pagan). The 

 unbaptised negro feels that he is 

 considered as an inferior being, 

 and although he may not be aware 

 of the value which the whites 

 place upon baptism, still he knows 

 that the stigma for which he is 

 upbraided will be removed by it ; 

 and therefoie he is desirous of 

 being made equal to his compa- 

 nions. The Africans who have 

 been long imported, imbibe a Ca- 

 tholic feeling, and appear to forget 

 that they were once in the same 

 situation themselves. The slaves 

 are not asked whether they will be 

 baptized or not; their entrance 

 into the Catholic church is treated 

 as a thing of course ; and indeed 

 they are not considered as mem- 

 bers of society, but rather as biute 

 animals, until they can lawfully 

 go to mass, confess their sins, and 

 receive the sacrament. 



The slaves have their religious 

 brotherhoods as well as the free per- 

 sons ; and the ambition of a slave 

 very generally aims at being ad- 

 mitted into one of these, and at 

 being made one of the officers and 

 directors of the concerns of the 

 brotherhood ; even some of the 

 money which the industrious slave 

 is collecting for the purpose of 

 purchasing his freedom will often- 

 times be brought out of its con- 

 cealment for the decoration of a 

 saint, that the donor may become 

 of importance in the society to 

 which he belongs. The negroes 

 have one invocation of the Virgin 

 (or 1 might almost say one virgin) 

 which is peculiarly their own. 

 Our Lady of the Rosary is even 

 sometimes painted with a black 

 face and hands. It is in this man- 

 ner that the slaves are led to place 



% £ their 



