The various ceremonies which take place during Lent seemed to me the most impressive, and some of them were exceedingly well-arranged.The people, both performers and spectators, conduct themselves with more gravity on these occasions, and there is no holiday-making.Performances, representing the last events in the life of Christ, are enacted in the churches or streets in such a way as to remind one of the old miracle plays or mysteries.A few days before Good Friday, a torchlight procession takes place by night from one church to another, in which is carried a large wooden image of Christ bent under the weight of the cross.The chief members of the government assist, and the whole slowly moves to the sound of muffled drums.A double procession is managed a few days afterwards.The image of St.Mary is carried in one direction, and that of the Saviour in another.The two images meet in the middle of one of the most beautiful of the churches, which is previously filled to excess with the multitudes anxious to witness the affecting meeting of mother and son a few days before the crucifixion.The images are brought face to face in the middle of the church, the crowd falls prostrate, and a lachrymose sermon is delivered from the pulpit.
The whole thing, as well as many other spectacles arranged during the few succeeding days, is highly theatrical and well calculated to excite the religious emotions of the people-- although, perhaps, only temporarily.On Good Friday the bells do not ring, all musical sounds are interdicted, and the hours, night and day, are announced by the dismal noise of wooden clappers, wielded by negroes stationed near the different churches.A sermon is delivered in each church.In the middle of it, a scroll is suddenly unfolded from the pulpit, upon which is an exaggerated picture of the bleeding Christ.This act is accompanied by loud groans, which come from stout-lunged individuals concealed in the vestry and engaged for the purpose.The priest becomes greatly excited, and actually sheds tears.On one of these occasions Isqueezed myself into the crowd, and watched the effect of the spectacle on the audience.Old Portuguese men and Brazilian women seemed very much affected-- sobbing, beating their breasts, and telling their beads.The negroes themselves behaved with great propriety, but seemed moved more particularly by the pomp, the gilding, the dresses, and the general display.Young Brazilians laughed.Several aborigines were there, coolly looking on.One old Indian, who was standing near me, said, in a derisive manner, when the sermon was over: "It's all very good; better it could not be" (Esta todo bom; melhor nao pude ser).
The negroes of Para are very devout.They have built, by slow degrees, as I was told, a fine church by their own unaided exertions.It is called Nossa Senhora do Rosario, or Our Lady of the Rosary.During the first weeks of our residence at Para, Ifrequently observed a line of negroes and negresses, late at night, marching along the streets, singing a chorus.Each carried on his or her head a quantity of building materials--stones, bricks, mortar, or planks.I found they were chiefly slaves, who, after their hard day's work, were contributing a little towards the construction of their church.The materials had all been purchased by their own savings.The interior was finished about a year afterwards, and is decorated, I thought, quite as superbly as the other churches which were constructed, with far larger means, by the old religious orders more than a century ago.
Annually, the negroes celebrate the festival of Nossa Senora de Rosario, and generally make it a complete success.
I will now add a few more notes which I have accumulated on the subject of the natural history, and then we shall have done, for the present, with Para and its neighbourhood.
I have already mentioned that monkeys were rare in the immediate vicinity of Para.I met with only three species in the forest near the city; they are shy animals, and avoid the neighbourhood of towns, where they are subject to much persecution by the inhabitants, who kill them for food.The only kind which I saw frequently was the little Midas ursulus, one of the Marmosets, a family peculiar to tropical America, and differing in many essential points of structure and habits from all other apes.
