Adventurers who come here seeking employment do not receive a hearty welcome. The natives look upon that class of persons as a kind of interlopers, who want to suck the sweets from their oranges, and lick the sirup from their bread, without paying them for it.
Persons here from Northern climes are expected to spend the winter in breathing the balmy air, canopied with skies clothed in the softest radiance of a summer sun, and praising every thing they see. If they have any doubt in regard to what they hear, let them lock it in secret, and keep silent until they leave; for the inhabitants think that this was once the paradise of the Peri, which will some day be restored to its pristine loveliness.
Visitors who are always ventilating their prejudices and preferences too freely, in any place, make enemies. Let none presume to tread upon the dangerous ground of expressing an adverse opinion with reference to what they see, in any of the small settlements with which Florida is filled, or in the larger towns either, if they wish to be fanned by the breath of popular favor. Always take the spirit of volatile indifference with you, to waft you through all the little inconveniences which you may have to encounter, resolving to accept and submit to every thing just as you find it, or fold up your blanket and steal quietly away where you can regulate things to your liking.
CHAPTER XI.
THE old St. Augustine inhabitants are very regular in their attendance at the cathedral exercises, which, during the Holy Days, appear to be their sole employment. The first sound that greets us in the morning is bells for mass. How those harsh tones, jingling like fire-bells run mad, break in upon our soft repose! The alarming speed with which they are rung attracts no attention, this being all the excitement we have in the way of a noise. The earliest sunbeams shine upon groups of worshipers going to offer oblations, while the shades of twilight deepen before vespers are over, and the throng of satisfied penitents move to the quietude of their homes. The most devoted are said “to live in the church.” Surely their lives must pass peacefully, “Mid counted beads and countless prayers.”
The cathedral is an object of interest on account of its ancient architecture more than age, having been commenced in 1793. The church in use previous to its erection was located on the west side of St. George Street. The engineers and officers belonging to the Government—Don Mariana and Don P. Berrio—directed the work, it being completed at a cost of over sixteen thousand dollars. During the many improvements made in the city, the main part of the cathedral has remained the same for nearly the past century, while time has touched it lightly—thus forming a link with the present in a useful state of preservation. The walls are built of coquina of no modern thickness, but as if designed to resist a siege. Its Moorish belfry with four bells, and the town-clock, form a complete cross. One of these bells was taken from Tolemato Chapel, it having been originally brought from Rome, as the lettering indicates. It bears the following date and inscription: “Sancte Joseph, Ora pro nobis, 1682.” The cathedral also contains a crucifix, which is brought into requisition once every year on Good Friday, it being a relic from “Nuestro Cano de la Leche,” which is all that remains. The front doors of the cathedral are now kept locked, as it has been a resort for so many inconsiderate persons, who went there smoking and talking in loud, irreverent tones, as though it was a theater, where some kind of daylight drama was being enacted, instead of a house devoted to worship, and entered with purity of feeling, if not according to prescribed rules, which the faith of everybody induces them to adopt.
To the minds of these Church-devotees all other pageant fades into insignificance before the festivities and solemnities of the Holy Days connected with their Church-services, and the veneration due to their patron saints. Whatever vicissitudes or changes may take place with them in other respects, their religion remains the same; it is, indeed, a part of their being, without which their lives would be considered incomplete, their existence blank as the brutes, which die that others may live. Some of the worshipers rush to the cathedral with the rapidity of an opera-goer, who is afraid the seats will all be taken before he arrives, but enter with the same degree of veneration as the pilgrims who visit and kiss the statue of St. Peter—still clinging to their catechism and creeds firmly, as a part of their life, while their well-learned prayers are repeated as a talisman against temptation and violent death. These old cathedral walls have witnessed stately ceremonials, heard the prayers and confessions of many penitents, whose troubled consciences and sin-burdened hearts could find no relief except at the confessional.
The bishop is regarded by the Catholics as the Vicegerent of Heaven. He lives in the greatest seclusion and simplicity—never appearing in public except amid the glitter and grandeur of a ceremonial, but always accessible to those wishing the administration of Church-rites.