February' 1, 19;35, iiio de Janeiro# 
This evening at 8 p.m« Bertha took 
me to Santa mlexandrina >vith Joachim in the Institute car. Santa ai exan- 
drina is a suburb of Kio, but rather hi^iier. as it is on the bottom of the 
slope leading to oorcovado 
^it the end of a dirt road 
between 
high thickets of bamboo \ie caiiB to a white vvooden gate, and after some 
calling managed to get the attention of a young colored boy who finally 
unlocked it for us. Bertha led me up a beautiful stone path lined with 
ferns, and v/ith all sorts of small plants growing on the rocks 
which bordered it. The night was rainy, and frog voices came tliru the 
darkness from all around us. vfe had to pa^^ a call at the house first, 
and 1 sav/ nxy first typically Brazilian interior, — a great high ceilingel 
room with wide wooden boards on the floor, — ‘Scme modernistic furniture 
of exquisite inlaid v/oodwork, a funny old piano, an even older granophone 
(with a homJ It vms dreadful, — ?/e heart it plajdng from a distance later 
onj) and crocheted elaborate mats and embroidered i cheap) tablecovers, and 
a terrible lot of chromolithographs of saints, and awful, lu-cent store 
statues of religious subjects stuck everp^where, and one ^^souvenir^^ tray of 
butterflies* ?/ing.s stuck up above the piano on the mxll 
# -iX 
rather nice 
big black dog came in, — ^not playful, but distantly polite, — and l petted 
him, althoiigh his ears also bore moie than a suspicion of Biange. Looking 
out of the screenless long windov/s the garden made a 'beautiful sight \d.th 
wet leaves Reaming and shimmering under the sparse electric lights at the 
far end of the street. The Brazilian woFjar of the house was not beautiful, 
and ^of course, spoke no Bnglish. The mn, who was wearing pale blue 
pajamas, is a florist, and took us into his greenliouse , where he had some 
marvelous begonias, ohristmas cactus in bloom, maiden hair fern occupying 
