The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1899-06-18

Wicked Para - Something About
Brazilian Women How They
Look, Act and Live-They Have
Sweet Teeth-Pictures of Mnnaos,
the Metropolis of the Upper ANA
zOn-Its Hig Stores.
Copyright, 1899, by Frank G. Carpenter.
MANAOS Brazil, May 26.-I want to
tell you about the two chief cities of the
Amazon valley. 1t seems odd to think
of the savage Amazon having cities at
all; but it is really a great trade center,
and it exports products which are worth
tens of millions of dollars a year.
The biggest city upon it lies at its
mouth. 1t is q thousand miles east of
where this letter is written. 1t is the
city of Para. 1t now has a population
of 100000, and it is growing as fast as
the dense vegetation by which it is sur
rounded.
Fara already has electric lights, tele-
phones and street cars. 1t has vast
theater, two second-class hotels and an
amount of vice which would shock Pas
tor Parkhurst and the reformers of New
York. It has numerous cafes, in some
of which string bands with women per-
formers nightly act, and on the main
street in the very center of the city is a
building known as the High Life Hotel"
which is devoted to life of the lowest
order The hotel, as pronounced by the
Portuguese, is called the "Higgy Liffey,'
for that is the way the Portuguese pro-
nounce high life.
IN PARA
Notwithstanding this wickedness,
rather liked Para. The town has very
respectable club, the members of which
give dances twice a week, and to which
the families of the better classes come.
1t has some fine residence streets, a num-
her of beautiful parks, and were it not
for the fear of the yellow fever, which
always hangs over it, life in 1t would
not be uncomfortable. AS It is, nearly
every foreigner is in constant dread of
the fever, ana half the business men
carry bottles of castor oil about in their
pockets and down a tumblerful at the
slightest headache or intimation of indi-
gestion. This is, am told, the best rem
edy for immediate use in case of a yell
low fever attack.
But let me tell you how Para looks. AS
you see IL from the river 1t is a low,
white city, with red and other bright
colored buildings rising out of the white.
A long row OF palm trees lines the shore,
and back of these are the great wood
and corrugated iron warehouses from
which the Para rubber is shipped to all
parts OF the world. You look at this
scene through a thicket of masts. The
Amazon is here filled with shipping.
There are big ocean steamers from Eu-
rope and the United States. There are
1ro liThf oh
back boats of the lakes. There are
scores Of queer sailing vessels and hun
dreds of dugout canoes, with dark-faced
boatmen padding them to and fro.
A STREET SCENE.
AS you land you find yourself in one of
the busiest Of the South American ports
Negroes and mulattoes are loading and
unloading the steamers. They are carry
ing on board great boxes of rubber They
are toting on their heads boxes and bales
TO the shore The crowd about the
wharves is much the same as that on the
docks OF New Orleans. The people are
of all shades Of white, yellow and black.
There are swarthy negroes from Jamaica,
yellOw-skinned men from upper Brazil,
sallOw Portuguese and sprinkling Of
all the nations of Europe.
The laboring people are In their bare
feet and most of them are bare-headed.
The men wear cotton shirts and trousers,
the latter held up by Wristbands. The
women dress In bright-colored calicoes.
See the negro trotttng along with bale
of sole leather on his head? Behind him
is woman carrying great basket of
mandioca in the same way, and further
back comes q mulatto with an enormous
turtle balanced upon his crown. That
turtle is as big around as a waShtub. 1t
kicks out its legs and agonizingly thrusts
forth its head as 1t lies there upside
down, shading the man.
Here comes a cart hauled by a pony.
It looks as though 1t had a load of hams
IN II, and as 1t goes by the hams smell
like a smoke house. Those are Jumps of
rubber on their way to the shipping
houses for sale.
There are scores of rubber houses near
The wharves. Every one is handling rub
Der and the air smells as though there
had been q recent fire and water had
been dashed over 1t. Men are carrying
rubber from the canoes to the ware
houses. They are taking 1t in and out of
the buildings. They are chopping 1t up
and packing 1T into boxes and marking
II for shipment to all parts of the world.
Para is the greatest rubber port on earth,
and the chief business of the city is the
supplying of rubber camps with goods
and selling the product
LOOK AT THE GIRLS
But let US take street car and ride
out through the residence section. Para
is one of the cleanest and best built
towns of Brazil. 1t has hundreds of
houses, made of ventilated brick, cover
ed with stucco and painted in all the
colors of the rainbow. Some are fres-
coed and others are decorated with
Wreaths and figures in plaster There
are many houses faced with porcelain
- h,O,1 <rhk hnro PrOr,
Portugal. Some of the houses have ball
comics of wrought iron and many have
wrought iron work over their windows.
The houses all face the streets and are
flush with the sidewalk. Each has two or
more windows On the first floor looking
out on the street, and each window has
one or more Brazilian girls on its Sill
looking out The girls are bareheaded,
with flowers In their hair. They are of
all ages from six to sixty and many are
sweet sixteen. They watch the street
cars as they pass If they see anyone
they know, they crock their fingers at
him as though reckoning him to come In
This is the method of salutation and
means How do you do" All the girls
are brunettes and some to such an ex-
tent that you can see the negro blood In
their faces. They are not, as a rule, good
looking, and so far the homliest women
have found on this continent are In the
land of Brazil,
BRAZILIAN WOMEN.
The women here are not as far adj,
vanced as they are IN Chile. They have
no business chances in comparison with
our women. They do not clerk in the
stores. They have not yet made their
way Into the telegraph offices and the girl
bookkeeper has yet to break into the
business establishments. The beautiful
typewriter has not yet appeared nor are
there brazilian postoftice girls or tele-
pranh nfrls Whnrn,rers tInra nr.o tnlo