402 
VISITS TO MADAGASCAR 
CHAP. XIVi 
It was a scene which it was perhaps well to witness once in 
a lifetime. It appeared something like the reality of what 
the gorgeous and imposing pageants of our theatres are re¬ 
ported to represent; destitute, indeed, of the flood of light, 
and all those rich and gay accompaniments with which artistic 
skill and taste surround such exhibitions, but encircled by 
the grander scenery of nature, beneath a cloudless sky, and 
illuminated by a tropic sun. The whole seemed to belong to 
regions resembling those 
“ Where the gorgeous East with richest hand 
Showers on her kings barbaric pearls and gold.” 
The men and women were not actors; their decorations 
were not tinsel. It seemed their highest style of dress and 
most exalted entertainment; yet I felt a sort of regret as I 
gazed on the manly forms, the bold and open foreheads, the 
quick, keen, glancing eyes of the noble youths before me, and 
thought of what, with education, they might have achieved; 
and if the time and the place had been suitable for the ex¬ 
pression of opinion on the spectacle I had witnessed, I 
might perhaps have said that proficiency in dancing was 
not the highest excellence of princes, and that, without 
discarding amusement, their constant aim should be to learn 
how nations are made great. More than once I longed for 
the camera, that I might have transferred to my portfolio 
some of the splendid and beautiful groups I had seen. 
i 
