The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1896-01-18
Daily Life in Nicaragua.


Correspondence of the Boston Transcript
The routine of daily life is much simpler
than in colder climates; there are no car
pets to gather dust and moths, and there
is very little furniture and few pictures
and bric-a-brac to be busted and cleaned
The clothing of the children is also much
simpler and the fashions are not variable.
The children of the lower class wear no
clothing until II or IA years old, and in
the upper class one garment, sort of
shirt, is enough for home wear, and chill
dren sometimes go on the street in this
simple garb. What marketing is not
brought to the door is done by the master
of the house, and so the women are free
to lolI in their hammocks and nurse their
babies
The delight of going shopping is en-
tirely unknown. If anything in the dry
goods line is wanted servant is sent to
the shop, who brings home an armful of
whole pieces of the desired goods. Ifnone
of these suit, or if the sonora desires to
look at others, these are carried back, and
another armful is brought. This same
servant can be trusted to pay for whatever
is bought, for they are very honest in
money matters, only indulging in small
pilferings. One of the servants at the
college was accustomed to go to the Treas
urer every month to draw the salaries of
the teachers, and she used to have each
ones money wrapped up in different part
of her dress, and she never made mis-
take giving the wrong sum to anyone.
While the women are very affectionate,
if death invades their homes you do not
see the despair and gloom that so often
reign with us in like affiiction; they seem
to thoroughly take in their religious belief
that their dear ones are translated to hap
pier scenes, and that the separation is only
temporary. The women of the family do
not 90 to the cemetery with their dead !;
only the male members and friends. There
are no hearses, and the coffin is borne on
their shoulders, and they are relieved by
different relays every little way, ColoFed
cofins are used for young people, blue be-
ing favorite color The coffin is usually
rented by the lower class, just for the fu-
neral, and the body is removed at the
grave and inferred in the ground, with
nothing to preserve it from contact with
the earth. The wealthy have vaults, or
inches in the brick wall surrounding the
cemetery, but these are only rented, and
it is nothing unusual to read an adver-
tisement in the paper that if the relatives
of such and such an one do not pay the
rent of the vault, the body viii be removed
by such Ii date.
After a death in house, the piano, if
the family is rich enough to own one, is
removed from the sala, or parlar, to the
back of the house, and though it may be
moved in room or two, nearer its former
station during the year, it is not opened
for that length of time. After the death
of the wife of President Gayala, bis daugh-
ters lent their piano to Mrs. Guzman, the
wife of the Niearaguan Minister to this
country, who had just come there as a
bride, so that it might be used during their
year of mourning, and not be spoiled by
being shut up and gathering dampness, for
during the rainy season everything mildews
which Is not exposed to sqRshlRe occasion
ally.