48 VEGETATION ANTICIPATING SPRING. Chap. II. 



image was decorated the following week with a golden 

 coronal, worth 22.1., for sending the long-delayed and 

 much-needed rain. We never looked with disdain on the 

 rites or ceremonies of any church ; but, on witnessing the 

 acts of worship on this occasion, so great was the irreverence 

 manifested, — the kneeling worshippers laughing and joking 

 between the responses, not even ceasing their grins when 

 uttering " Ora pro nobis," — that we could not help believing 

 that if, like the natives, they have faith in rain-making, they 

 have faith in nothing else. 



Most of the trees shed their leaves in May, the beginning 

 of winter, and remain bare until the rains come in November ; 

 several kinds are in the curious habit of anticipating, 

 as it were, the rains by instinct; and in the beginning of 

 October, when the dry season has reached its driest point 

 and there is not a drop of dew, they begin to generate 

 buds, and in a few days put forth fresh and various-hued 

 foliage, and sometimes beautiful blossoms. In a somewhat 

 similar manner, the trees in the Arctic regions are said to 

 anticipate the coming spring, and display fresh green leaves, 

 when the ground is hard frozen, to a depth greater than that 

 to which roots ever penetrate. 



The Portuguese of Tette have many slaves, with all the 

 usual vices of their class, as theft, lying, and impurity. 

 As a general rule the real Portuguese are tolerably humane 

 masters and rarely treat a slave cruelly ; this may be due as 

 much to natural kindness of heart as to a fear of losing 

 the slaves by their running away. When they purchase an 

 adult slave they buy at the same time, if possible, all his 

 relations along with him. They thus contrive to secure him 

 to his new home by domestic ties. Punning away then 

 would be to forsake all who hold a place in his heart, for the 



