t to the botanical gardens, some of our
invalids have been gaining ground: others who were well have become
invalids, and I have done nothing but ride about or talk with them, and
look at the beautiful views of the neighbourhood, and get a little
better acquainted with the inhabitants; of whom the most amusing, so far
as I have yet seen, are certainly the negroes, who carry about the fruit
and vegetables for sale. The midshipmen have made friends with some of
them. One of them has become quite a friend in the house; and after he
has sold his master's fruit, earns a small gratuity for himself, by his
tales, his dances, and his songs. His tribe, it seems, was at war with a
neighbouring king, and he went out to fight when quite a boy, was taken
prisoner, and sold. This is probably the story of many: but our friend
tells it with action and emphasis, and shows his wounds, and dances his
war dance, and shouts his wild song, till the savage slave becomes
almost a sublime object. I have been for an hour to-night at a very
different scene, a ball given by Mr. B----, a respectable English
merchant. The Portuguese and Brazilian ladies are decidedly superior in
appearance to those of Bahia; they look of higher caste: perhaps the
residence of the court for so many years has polished them. I cannot
say the men partake of the advantage; but I cannot yet speak Portuguese
well enough to dare to pronounce what either men or women really are. As
to the English, what can I say? They are very like all one sees at home,
in their rank of life; and the ladies, very good persons doubtless,
would require Miss Austin's pen to make them interesting. However, as
they appear to make no pretensions to any thing but what they are, to me
they are good-humoured, hospitable, and therefore pleasing.

_Monday, 31st Dec. 1822_.--I went to town for the first time; our road
lay through the suburb of the Catete for about half a mile. Some
handsome houses are situated on either hand, and the spaces between are
filled with shops, and small houses inhabited by the families of the
shopkeepers in town. We then came to the hill called the Gloria, from
the name of the church dedicated to N.S. da Gloria, on the eminence
immediately overlooking the sea. The hill is green, and wooded and
studded with country-houses. It is nearly insulated; and the road passes
between it and another still higher, just where a most copious stream
issues from an aqueduct (built, I think, by