The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1904-09-22
until the steamer is again ready for

custom house, where passengers can
claim it at any time between nine a. M
and two p. m. Nothing can be passed
on board without special permission,
not even your handbag or shawl-strap.
1t is wise plan to pack the few things
needed for a day or two into grip
sack and leave the trunks to their fate
until you are established in hotel
One should remember that passports
are required, both on entering and leav-
ing Brazil, and no steamship company
is permitted to sell a ticket to a
foreigner until his passport has been
properly vised at the central police
station. There is also port regula-
ton which fOrbids any communication
with vessels. in the harbor after eight
p. m. without special permit. There
fore, if you have gone ashore merely
for a look about town and are unac-
quainted with the Portuguese language
you would better keep an eye on your
watch and not put faith in the rosy
| lights that inger long on the mountain
tops after the sun has disappeared
i unless you want to spend some uncom-
Portable hours i'll prison and require the
services of the [. S. consul to get you
out in the morning-and meanwhile the
ship may sail away without you
The first place on shore that for
eigner generally seeks is the establish
ment of some money-changer, in order
to convert his American gold or Eng
liSh soveregns, or the coin of the last
country he visited, into the 'tcirculat-
ing medium of Brazil. And very
much aStonished will he be when the
changer hands over a huge pile of metal
copper, brass, iron and nickel-that
looks like old pewter plates, stove lids
and the ponderous brass tags that land
| lords sometime attach to door keys to
prevent then from being carried off in
| the pockets of their patrons. A very
few American dollars, exchange added,
when converted into the currency of
this country, require a cart rather than
a peck in which to take it away.
Brazil still adheres to the absurd old
| Portuguese system of financial enum-
Grafton, in which it takes 1000 refs to
make what we call half dollar, the
word "reis" being the plural of real.
When refs are at par, 100 of them are
worth about five cents American
money. What a hard time of it Brazil
ian bookkeepers must have, with the
long lines of figures which represent
! the ordinary commercial transactions
of a banking or mercantile house For
example, a real-the unit of the none
| tary system-is written SOOOl, and is
equal to the value of one-tWentieth of
the I. S. cent. There is no such coin
in circulation, the smallest being 10
refs. There is copper coin of 40 refs,
a nickel coin of 100 reiS and another of
200 refs. Next comes the paper money
in notes of one thousand refs, called
mlreiS. There are two-milreis, five,
ten, twenty, thirty, fifty and one hun
dred milreis, numerically expressed
! this Way-500S00O. Then there is an
imaginary denomination named cento
which means a thousand miIreis and is
expressed on paper 1;000s. The par
value OF the paper mllrels is equal to
about 81 cents American money but of
| - ~
On the day of the revolution which
banished good Dom Pedro and made a
burlesque republic of this country,
| November 49, 1889, the milreis was at
par, and has never been since 1t has
been down as low as II cents and up as
high as 80 cents. A ponderous copper
coin of the old monarchy worth half a
cent, still circulates largely in Brazil
and is fit only for paper weights, or to
use in driving nails, being altogether
too heavy to carry in the pocket. No
body ever steals them, though they lay
around ever so carelessly, being too
burdensome to get away with.
On inquiring the price of living at a
Brazilian hotel, you are at first amazed
to find that it is millions of refs per
diem, and are absolutely staggered
when the laundry bill is presented in
six figures. Fancy a full-proportioned
bank note worth five cents. 1t takes
eight of these hundred million reis bills
to pay for a horse-car ride out to the
Botanical Garden and back. In course
of that rather long drive you will OBJ
serve that the conductors pocket and
the breast of his coat bulge out more
and more with these bank notes, till by
the time he is possessed of dollar
and half he looks like a carelessly
stuffed scarecrow.
One Of these bills closely resemble
our ''greenbacks'' and has engraved
upon its back, sides, margin and four
corners the satisfying figures 500. The
possession of few of these makes one
feel like multi-millionaire or ''bloat-
ed bond-holder," until one learns from
sad experience how little they may buy.
This Brazilian greenback bears the