NOTES ON BRAZIL. 



43 



As soon as the skin is stripped off, the carcases are cut into quarters, 

 thrown into clumsy carts, besmeared with fresh and coagulated blood, 

 and in that state driven through the city to the several licensed shops, 

 where beef is sold in such quantities as each purchaser may want. The 

 general condition of the animals, and the process through which they 

 passed rendered the meat so bad that nothing but dire necessity, or the 

 perpetual sight of it in the same wretched condition, could induce a 

 person of the least delicacy to taste it. Like other articles it gradually 

 became somewhat better, when the demand was well ascertained and 

 steady, and the market more regularly supplied. 



Perhaps no situation, no attention and care, can render a slaughter- 

 house a pleasant scene; it must, under any management, be a task of 

 difficulty to keep it perfectly clean. Such places ought, therefore, to 

 be hidden from view; but the sole house destined to this purpose in 

 Rio stands in a public road, and is rendered more offensive by the blood 

 and filth issuing from it being allowed to mix with, to discolour 

 and taint the water of the bay. Into that water the offal also is thrown, 

 where it floats about, unless a sufficient number of black people, of the 

 lowest order, be present to seize and wash the entrails as cases for 

 polonies, or for other purposes of a domestic or medicinal nature. 



The beef, thus brought to market, used to be employed almost 

 entirely as a basis for soup. At a later period, it appeared at table in 

 pieces, and in the form of steaks ; in this state it was chiefly confined to 

 the higher ranks. Others seldom tasted of it, except household slaves, 

 who, in many families, had, with their regular allowance of feijam, a 

 small quantity of boiled beef or bacon. The Carne-secca, which is beef 

 killed at a distance from the city, cut into ffitches, and dried in the 

 sun, was in much more common use. 



In the year 1808, a few scattered sheep, of various tribes, were 



found in the neighbourhood of Rio, and a few others were brought for 



sale from different quarters. As nothing but beef is affected by the 



impolitic contract above-mentioned, sheep may be slaughtered, and 



mutton sold, by any one. Some small advantage was taken of this 



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