VOYAGE UP THE COAST TO PARa'. 



129 



straint upon the free blacks, the fact that they are eligible 

 to office, and that all professional careers are open to them, 

 without prejudice on the ground of color, enables one to 

 form some opinion as to their ability and capacity for 

 development. Mr. Sinimbu tells us that here the result 

 is on the whole in their favor ; he says that the free 

 blacks compare well in intelligence and activity with the 

 Brazilians and Portuguese. But it must be remembered, 

 in making the comparison with reference to our own coun- 

 try, that here they are brought into contact with a less 

 energetic and powerful race than the Anglo-Saxon. Mr. 

 Sinimbu believes that emancipation is to be accomplished 

 in Brazil by a gradual process which has already begun. 

 A large number of slaves are freed every year by the 

 wills of their masters ; a still larger number buy their 

 own freedom annually ; and as there is no longer any 

 importation of blacks, the inevitable result of this must 

 be the natural death of slavery. Unhappily, the process 

 is a slow one, and in the mean while slavery is doing its 

 evil work, debasing and enfeebling alike whites and blacks. 

 The Brazilians themselves do not deny this, and one con- 

 stantly hears them lament the necessity of sending their 

 children away to be educated, on account of the injurious 

 association with the house-servants. In fact, although 

 politically slavery has a more hopeful aspect here than 

 elsewhere, the institution from a moral point of view has 

 some of its most revolting characters in this country, and 

 looks, if possible, more odious than it did in the States. 

 The other day, in the neighborhood of Rio, I had an 

 opportunity of seeing a marriage between two negroes, 

 whose owner made the religious, or, as it appeared to 

 me on this occasion, irreligious ceremony, obligatory. The. 



6 * I 



