The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-05-05

2, Rio Janeir0
 ing humanity that he was created a Baron by the late Emperor Dom Pe- dro II.
 The fresh meat, called carne verde, is carried around the city of Rio de Janeiro in large wooden vans, drawn by four mules and the carts of the street cleaning department are hitched to the slow moving OK. A drink, called casache Is made from the juice of the sugar cane and it is ground out by little machines which perambulate the streets and play a tune as they grind by means of min iature organ attachment. The employ ment of the head as a vehicle of trans portation is universal and I have seen coffins.. pianos, trays of fish, ice and even closed umbrellas so carried. once saw two boys fighting, each one of them | having a tray of sweets upon his head. | It Is long ride from Metropolis to Rio de Janeiro, the train consuming four hours in a trip one way This makes eight hours of travelling for those merchants who go backward and forward each day and much of the time Is occupied in playing chess upon tiny portable boards with pockets for squares into which dlminutive paper
 
 made a move. The railroad from the northern shore of the bay to the foot of the Organ mountains Is the oldest in Brazil, having been constructed in 1854 and after traversing 12 miles of savannah climbs the serrs. by means of the Riggenbach system. The grade is steep and hazardous, often repre- senting a rise of a foot in every six and the train is segregated and loco motive assigned to each carriage. Upon the edges of the cars are placed trail Ing slaves with steel shoes sharply pointed to arrest the descent of the carriage should it by chance break loose from it's engine.
 Boys will be boys and those in Brazil resemble ours of North America in many respects It is quite amusing to watch them on Sundays and holidays using several miles of this road as toboggan. They seat themselves upon the scoop of an old shovel with the broken handle between their legs as rudder and off they shoot like the proverbial greased lightning, using, of Course, the middle rail, which is duplex and Hanks a series of sockets into which the cogs of the climbing wheel of the locomotive fit. The friction is terrific and of course the shovel be- comes very hot. but young Brazil Is equal to the emergency and pads his seat with a bundle of green grass
 This pastime and the ringing of church bells are the only two things ever saw the Brazilans do in a hur- ". When I heard my first church bell there I mistook 1t for fire alarm and if one can place words in any tin tinnabulation those bells surely kept repeating Johnny get your hair cut, hair cut, hair cut. The cathedral bells on t6A It-aa chimes of "Sagrado Corasao" (sacred Heart, whose mellow, melting music so often lulled my soul to slumber and reverie half divine, were assuredly as enchanting as any that ever wooed a human ear.
 If there be a thread uniting this world with the beyond, an arc span ming the interstice which lies between the celestial and the terrestial, that thread, that arc is music. I have some times opined that 1t Is the voice of unembodied souls frequenting the realms of the invisible; for It's subtle yet potential influence gets nearer to the human heart and reaches farther into the depths of that hearts recesses than any other of the unseen external agencies. Man may commune3 with deity through prayer. but heavens responses are breathed in the measures of melody
 As the heart craveth. so the mouth speaketh. The shepherd paints hfs heaven a a land of green pastures and still waters the dreamer describes his as abounding with delectable mountains and eternal founts; the savage calls lit happy hunting ground" while the sordid soul of the miserly writer revels over gates of precious stones and paves |of gold, and the ancient scribe, for getting that he was inditing for pos terity and that time changes all things, depicts It. in his own narrowness of mind, as a city of walls, defining their length. breadth and number of por- tals with marvellous minuteness: but the inspired psalmist delights to style its a place of harp and song, sonant with glorious rhapsodies born of th6 cherub's trump and drawn from ser aphic Tyre. The Sweet singer of Israel' has caught the true conception for Paradise is best portrayed as the home of perpetual music and sempiternal hallelujahs. The Hitting of those chimes of Sagradc Coracao was a threnody bern in Paradise.
 Brazil is not without its folklore and many pretty legends are current One of the latter is worth the while of repetition. Close to Nictheroy there rests upon the sunny slopes that shut in Iurujiiba's bay little mound k nown D. The Indian legends have recorded that many centuries ago there came to this land of aureate wales and laughing wa ters tall pale-faced, fair locked stranger, with cohorts as 1.-the in form and strong in limb as their blue eyed oh,eftain, who hailed from afwondrous cline where half the year was dark ness, and water slept in crypts as crys- tai rock This stranger made war Iagainst Guanabara and his tribe and the aged Indian chief. deeming the visitation a scourge,. sent by the Great Spirit. besought to sappease offended deity by offering as a sacrifice his only daughter, Humayti The maiden's body grew to ashes the sacrificial pyre, he white stranger and his compatriots were exterminated, but as the last in- Ivader lay expiring upon the crimson |sands a huge stone, hurled by the hand Iof the thunder god. fell from heaven and smote Guanabara in the hour of his triumph
 Upon the iieighborng hillslooesthe pale