KIO DE JANEIRO AND ITS ENVIRONS. 49 



dancing, while the upper part of the body and the arms 

 had that swaying, rhythmical movement from side to side 

 so characteristic of all the Spanish dances. After looking 

 on for a while we went into the garden, where there 

 were cocoanut and banana trees in fruit, passion-vines 

 climbing over the house, with here and there a dark 

 crimson flower gleaming between the leaves. The effect 

 was pretty, and the whole scene had, to my eye, an aspect 

 half Southern, half Oriental. It was nearly dark when 

 we returned to the boat, but the negroes were continuing 

 their dance under the glow of a bonfire. From time to 

 time, as the dance reached its culminating point, they 

 stirred their fire, and lighted up the wild group with 

 its vivid blaze. The dance and the song had, like the 

 amusements of the negroes in all lands, an endless mo- 

 notonous repetition. Looking at their half-naked figures 

 and unintelligent faces, the question arose, so constantly 

 suggested when we come in contact with this race, 

 " What will they do with this great gift of freedom ? " 

 The only corrective for the half doubt is to consider the 

 whites side by side with them: whatever one may think 

 of the condition of slavery for the blacks, there can be 

 no question as to its evil effects on their masters. Captain 

 Bradbury asked the proprietor of the island whether h*^. 

 hired or owned his slaves. "Own them, — a hundred and 

 more ; but it will finish soon," he answered in his broken 

 English. "Finish soon! how do you mean?" "It finish 

 with you ; and when it finish with you, it finish here, it 

 finish everywhere." He said it not in any tone of regret 

 or complaint, but as an inevitable fact. The death-note 

 of slavery in the United States was its death-note every- 

 where. We thought this significant and cheering. 

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