When older,
the same child harnesses his little horse and wagon, he being the horse
and a sheep's jawbone the wagon, and trots contentedly along, in almost
the smallest amount of costume accessible to mortals. All this refers
to the genuine, happy, plebeian baby. The genteel baby is probably as
wretched in Fayal as elsewhere, but he is kept more out of sight.
These children are seldom noisy and never rude: the race is not
hilarious, and their politeness is inborn. Not an urchin of three can be
induced to accept a sugar-plum until he has shyly slid off his little
cap, if he has one, and kissed his plump little hand. The society of
princes can hardly surpass the natural courtesy of the peasant, who
insists on climbing the orange-tree to select for you the choicest
fruit. A shopkeeper never can sell you a handful of nuts without
bringing the bundle near to his lips, first, with a graceful wave of
salutation. A lady from Lisbon told us that this politeness surpassed
that of the native Portuguese; and the wife of an English captain, who
had sailed with her husband from port to port for fifteen years, said
that she had never seen anything to equal it. It is not the slavishness
of inferiors, for the poorest exhibit it towards each other. You see
two very old women talking eagerly in the street, each in a cloak whose
every square inch is a patch, and every patch a different shade,--and
each alternate word you hear seems to be _Senhora_.
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