The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1906-07-05
STREET LIFE IN RIO.
YOU NEED NOT EVEN LOOK OUT TO
KNOW WHAT is COMING.

seem to be in hurry are the peddlers.
They go at half running dog-trot.
seldom stopping unless somebody calls
them with that peculiar 'pstscht' the
one unwritable word in the Portuguese
language. a low sound between the hiss
of snake and the splitting of an angry
cat, which is also in general use for
signaling car-drivers, calling restaurant
walters, etc, and is much more effec-
tive in attracting attention than the
Yankee halloo. Each peddler has his
own special cry and one can tell with
out going to look exactly what COM
modify is being carried past. The end
lessly varied cries are sometimes as
startling as they are quaint, for each
hawker has exerted his ingenuity in in
venting some new twist of the tongue
or torture of language wherewith to
advertise his wares. Some give vent at
frequent intervals to a war-Whoop that
would raise an Apache's scalp-lock;
others emit occasional agonizing
screams, as if suffering the extremity
of bodily anguish, and others indulge
in a chant as weird as witch's mean
tation.
If the cook has pot or pan that
needs repairing. she waits for the street
tinker to come along, and she need no.
watch for him. She will know of his
approach by the noise he makes beating
an iron spoon OH one of the pans he
carries. The soap man bangs the side
of a box that rests on top Of his head
singing meanwhile with queer semi
quavers, 'ja-bon, ja-a-a- bon, ia boo
cen" the word meaning just plain soap
and the first letter really pronounced
but having a gruesome resemblance to
Jaw bone CObblers 90 about the streets
collecting old shoes that need mending,
stringing them all on piece of Irvine
festo0ned around the shoulders; and
after few days you are notified Of
their return by the saW-filing sound Of
'Iapatoes. z-z-zapatoes," shouted under
the window. The cobbler's shop is Gil
the sidewalk, with his back up against
the wall of a church and his feet in
eyerybody's way. Though bareheaded
and barefooted, his dignity is maintain
ed by an apprentice or two. There are
many merchants of these humber sorts
who thus get their rent free in the open
air, as did their progeuetors thousands
of years in old Rome and Tyre. The
itinerant tailor, tapping his jointed
yard sticks sharply together, marches
ahead OF the servants who bear speci-
mems of the cloths which he would like
to make into coats and trousers for
you; and the dry goods merchants go
about in the same way, having their
wares in small tin trunks gorgeously
painted Sometimes three or four of
these trunks are toted on the head of
one man, who is bent nearly double
under their weight. In the days of
slavery, Rio merchants had their own
negroes to carry the trunks. but now
they are reduced to the ignOble necessi-
ty of hiring Drawn and muscle
Ask one of these rowing commerce.
antes the price of a piece of lace-said
to be handmade, but which resembles
what we call torchon and sells in the
[ nited States for % or 30 cents yard
i'll two inch widths and you are abso-
Iutely staggered to be told that the en-
tire bunch of ten varas a vara is about
of a yard is held at ten
thousand refs until you remember
that it requires twenty reis to make
one American penny.
Speaking of the merchants tin trunks
reminds me that though you would
hardly think of going to tmsmith for
such an Indispensable adjunct of the
travellers outfit, but that is precisely
what you would have to do if needing
trunk in Rio de .Janeiro. They give you
a very gorgeous article, about the size
of an ordinary wash-boiler, but shaped
like housekeepers cake-box, for six
or eight dollars The tin is left un-
painted inside, and all the artists
genius is exhausted on the lid, front
and side in remarkable landscapes and
punches of roses upon a body of rose
pink, sky blue or canary yellow. They
make conspicuous luggage, to say the
least, but are better than wooden boxes |
in this insect-infested climate. The !
trunks are so small that good many
of them are required to contain the !
of clothing that a family ordi-
narily carries on a journey, and it is |
funny to note the variety Of gorgeous |
ness that is taken aboard ships at every |
Brazilian port Funnier still, for every
body but the owner, it is to watch their .
unloading at the end of the voyage.
When pitched out of the crowded hold, !
where they have been banged against
and piled upon by heavier articles, the
frail tin is generally knocked into a
and its blooming bouquets
are in a sad state of decentralization.
Cows are driven around the streets
each COW with a muZzled calf tied to
her tail and bell on her neck, the ring
ing of the latter announcing the APP
nrOach and snmmOniug the maids to