1848:] 
MEXIANA. 
93 
oldest Negroes conduct the service, kneeling at the altar ; 
the rest kneel or stand about the room. Wliat they 
chant is, I believe, part of the vesper service of the 
Roman Catholic Church, and all join in the responses 
with much fervour, though without understanding a 
word. Sunday is their own day, for working in their 
gardens, hunting, or idleness, as they choose ; and in the 
evening they often assemble in the verandah to dance, 
and sometimes keep it up all night. 
While I was on the island a child of a few weeks old 
was to be baptized. This they consider a most important 
ceremony ; so the father and mother, with godfathers and 
godmothers, set out in a canoe for Chaves, on the island 
of Marajo, the nearest place where there is a priest. 
They were absent three days, and then returned with 
the news that the Padre was ill, and could not perform 
the ceremony; so they were obliged to bring back the 
poor little unsanctilied creature, liable, according to their 
ideas, should it die, to eternal perdition. The same 
evening they sang for three hours to their usual music 
the whole history of their journey, judging from the por- 
tions which were here and there intelligible. 
They made every fact into a verse, which was several 
times repeated. Thus one would suddenly burst out — 
“ The Padi’e was ill, and could not come, 
The Padre was ill, and could not come.” 
CHORUS. 
“ The Padre was ill, and could not come.” 
Then for a time the music continued without the voices, 
while they were trying to find another fact to found a 
