70 



PROVINCE OF RIO DE JANEIRO. 



they take off their hats in the public streets, offer up a prayer, or repeat Avi 

 Marias ; from which they have acquired the habit of denoting that period of 

 the evening by the term of Avi Maria. And they say so and so before Avi 

 Maria, at Avi Maria, or after Avi Maria, 



I have been in the house of a Portuguese family at Avi Maria, when they 

 appear to repeat a short prayer, after which a general salutation takes place, by 

 saying " bao noite^' (good evening,) and holding out their hands, as if they were 

 mutually bestowing a blessing. It is the custom for all slaves to hold their 

 hands out in a similar manner night and morning, as soon as they see their 

 superiors, for the purpose of offering a blessing, while their usual expression is 

 " Ahengoa senliorT 



Rio de Janeiro, although the residence of the court, is centuries behind in 

 the comforts and enjoyments of civilized life. Strangers are disgusted with a 

 first ramble through this city, and would not voluntarily pay it a second visit. 

 Friendly attention to foreigners, although they may have letters of introduction, 

 the Brazilians are seldom or ever known to practise. After some ceremony, 

 they follow the person introduced to the top of the stairs, wait there till he 

 arrives at the bottom, subject him to the further forni of turning round to 

 receive their final salutation, and thus the matter briefly ends. How different 

 to the refinement of their neighbouring colonists, the Spaniards, whose houses 

 and tertulas, at Monte Video, at Buenos Ayres, and all other parts of Spanish 

 America, are open to strangers, who experience every liberality and social atten- 

 tion from them, I was assured by an English gentleman, who has resided ten 

 years in the Brazil, that he never witnessed any symptom of genuine hospitality, 

 and he had notwithstanding acted with friendship to many; and to one 

 gentleman, in particular, he had rendered frequent services, at whose house he 

 had called on various occasions, and sometimes casually at the dinner hour, 

 but was never invited to take dinner or any kind of refreshment. Even the 

 principal people have no idea of the comforts of the table ; when they giv6 

 feasts, it is with an extravagant profusion of dishes, without any regard to the 

 arrangement, and unattended with any of that elegant ease and order practised 

 by similar classes in most European countries. 



To the want of encouragement and public spirit on the part of the leading 

 inhabitants, and the consequent unwise regulation of the government, may be 

 attributed the present state of the provision-market. The beef is of such a 

 quality, that it is really quite disgusting to the sight. The cattle are certainly 

 driven a great distance, and are in a wretched state on their arrival at the 



