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In connection with the special character of the tales included in the present sample of modern Brazilian short stories, particularly those by Machado de Assis and Medeiros e Albuquerque it is interesting to keep in mind the popularity of Poe and Hawthorne in South America. The introspection of these men, as of de Maupassant and kindred spirits, appeals to a like characteristic of the Brazilians.
Motionless, feeling slightly creepy, concealed under the roof corner, he waited. A sound came a stealthy sound. Something was creeping in. Lourenço and Pedro, perhaps? Stooping low, he peered along the ground under the hammocks. A man was coming coming on all-fours like an animal. He was too stealthy to be either of the Brazilians.
Here the eldest sons of the family dwelt laboured, and died, for many generations. "In the year 1808 Portugal was invaded by Napoleon Buonaparte, and the sovereign of that kingdom, John the Sixth, fled to Brazil, accompanied by his court and a large body of emigrants. The king was warmly received by the Brazilians, and immediately set about improving the condition of the country.
The principal cause of their decay in numbers seems to be a disease which always appears amongst them when a village is visited by people from the civilised settlements a slow fever, accompanied by the symptoms of a common cold, "defluxo," as the Brazilians term it, ending probably in consumption.
"Those are negroes just landed from a slave ship," said I, for in those days the Brazilians had no law against slaving.
His grave is in that wild and lonely valley. At first a wooden cross marked the spot where he lies, but this has disappeared, and a bush, one of many that grow around, is pointed out as growing above it. Even at this day, though more than four years have elapsed since the enactment of that tragedy, the scene remains as the Brazilians left it.
They had on board, according to the registers, 1,914,176 dollars worth of bullion for the king, and 6,086,617 dollars for merchants, or 8,000,000 dollars in all, besides rich cargoes of silk, cochineal, sarsaparilla, indigo, Brazil wood, and hides; the result of two years of pressure upon Peruvians, Mexicans, and Brazilians. Never had Spanish finances been at so low an ebb.
Ever ready to fly to the help of womankind, and, generally, to assist in a "row," Barney darted through the bushes, and came upon the scene of action just in time to see the white skirt of a female's dress disappear down an avenue, and to behold two Brazilians savagely writhing in mortal strife.
They held two or three dances, and we were again struck by the rhythm and weird, haunting melody of their chanting. After supper they danced beside the camp-fire; and finally, to their delight, most of the members of our own party, Americans and Brazilians, enthusiastically joined the dance, while the colonel and I furnished an appreciative and applauding audience.
These are so called in the books the Brazilians call them "carregadores," or porters because they are always carrying bits of leaves and blades of grass to their underground homes.
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