Yet, with this exception, the manners are
agreeably simple. Your admission to the house guaranties you as a proper
acquaintance, there are no introductions, and you may address any one in
any language you can coin into a sentence. Many speak French, and two or
three English,--sometimes with an odd mingling of dialects, as when the
Military Governor answered my inquiry, made in timid Portuguese, as to
how long he had served in the army. _"Vinte-cinco annos,"_ he answered,
in the same language; then, with an effort after an unexceptionable
translation, "Vat you call, Twenty-cinq year"!
The great obstacle to the dialogue soon becomes, however, a deficit of
subjects rather than of words. Most of these ladies never go out except
to mass and to parties, they never read, and if one of them has some
knowledge of geography, it is quite an extended education; so that, when
you have asked them if they have ever been to St. Michael, and they have
answered, Yes,--or to Lisbon, and they have answered, No,--then social
intercourse rather flags. I gladly record, however, that there were some
remarkable exceptions to this, and that we found in the family of
the late eminent Portuguese statesman, Mousinho d'Albuquerque,
accomplishments and knowledge which made their acquaintance an honor.
During the intervals of the dancing, little trays of tea and of cakes
are repeatedly carried round,--astonishing cakes, in every gradation of
insipidity, with the oddest names: white poison, nuns' kisses, angels'
crops, cats' tails, heavenly bacon, royal eggs, coruscations, cocked
hats, and _esquecidos_, or oblivion cakes, the butter being omitted.
Pages:
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82