By the way, a well-known author, Mrs. B——­, tells a marvellous story about these snakes.  She says that they always go in pairs, have great affection for each other, and are prepared on all occasions to resent affronts offered to either of them.  She narrates that a peasant once killed a big anaconda, and that the other, or chum snake, followed the man several miles to the house where he had taken the dead one, got in by the window, and crushed the destroyer of his friend to death.  I expect that some salt is necessary to swallow this tale, but such is the statement Mrs. B——­ makes.

The most lovely birds and butterflies are found near Rio, and the finest collections in the world are made there.  The white people are Portuguese by origin—­not a nice lot to my fancy, though the ladies are as usual always nice, especially when young; they get old very soon through eating sweets and not taking exercise.  There is very little poverty except among the free blacks, who are lazy and idle and somewhat vicious.  I always have believed that the black man is an inferior animal—­in fact, that the dark races are meant to be drawers of water and hewers of wood.  I do not deny that they have souls to be saved, but I believe that their role in this world is to attend on the white man.  The black is, and for years has been, educated on perfect equality with the white man, and has had every chance of improving himself—­with what result?  You could almost count on your fingers the names of those who have distinguished themselves in the battle of life.

Sometimes, while cruising off the coast of Rio de Janeiro looking out for slave vessels, we passed a very monotonous life.  The long and fearfully hot mornings before the sea breeze sets in, the still longer and choking nights with the thermometer at 108 deg., were trying in the extreme to those accustomed to the fresh air of northern climates; but sailors have always something of the ‘Mark Tapley’ about them and are generally jolly under all circumstances, and so it was with me.  One day, while longing for something to do, I discovered that the crew had been ordered to paint the ship outside; as a pastime I put on old clothes and joined the painting party.  Planks were hung round the ship by ropes being tied to each end of the plank; on these the men stood to do their work.  We had not been employed there very long when there was a cry from the deck that the ship was surrounded by sharks.  It seems that the butcher had killed a sheep, whose entrails, having been thrown overboard, attracted these fearful brutes round the ship in great numbers.  As may be imagined, this report created a real panic among the painters, for I believe we all feared a shark more than an enemy armed to the teeth.  I at once made a hurried movement to get off my plank.  As I did so the rope at one end slipped off, and so threw the piece of wood, to which I had to hang as on a rope, up and down the vessel’s side, bringing my feet to