ns wild pirouettes in the yard.

Besides our bird-models, the street criers, who pass our doors at all
hours, are occasionally induced to lend their services to the cause of
art.

Early in the morning la Lechera goes her rounds, with a large can of
milk miraculously poised upon her head. The black milkmaid is attired in
a single garment of cotton or coarse canvas; her feet and ankles are
exposed, and her head is bound with a coloured handkerchief like a
turban. We purchase daily of the Lechera a medio's worth of milk, but
she grins incredulously, when one day we invite her to enter our studio.
She is a slave belonging to the proprietor of a neighbouring farm, and
what would 'mi-amo,' her master, say, or more probably 'do,' if he heard
that his serf employed her time by sitting for her 'paisaje?'

The Almidonero next favours us with a 'call.' This gentleman traffics in
starch, an article in great demand, being employed for stiffening a
Cuban's white drill clothes. The vendor of starch is a Chinese by
birth, and, like other Celestials residing in Cuba, answers to the
nickname of Chow-chow, from a popular theory that the word (which in the
Chinese language stands for 'provisions') expresses everything in a
Chinaman's vocabulary.

Chow-chow carries upon his head a wooden tray, containing a number of
circular pats of starch, of the consistency and appearance of unbaked
loaves.

The Panadero, or baker's man, visits us twice a day. In the cool of the
early morning the little man--an Indian by birth--is extraordinarily
active and full of his business, but during the heat of mid-day, when
his visit is repeated, time to him seems of no importance. Our Indian
baker is usually discovered sleeping a siesta on our broad balcony, and
by his side lies a flat circular bread-basket as large as the wheel of a
quitrin. Despite the scorching sun, he remains in this position hatless
and bare-footed.

La Cascarillera frequently passes our door with her double cry of 'Las
Cosi-tas!'--'La Cascar-il-la!' The negress offers for sale a kind of
chalk with which the ladies of Cuba are in the habit of powdering their
faces and necks. She also sells what she calls 'cositas francesas,'
which consist of cakes and tarts prepared by the French creoles of Cuba.
Many of the less opulent Madamas of the town employ their time by making
French pastry, which their slaves afterwards dispose of in the public
streets.

The Dulcera deals in 'dulces,' and h