When the principle of democracy was proclaimed by the "big whites" of Brazil, they could rely for support only on the leading intellectuals of sound general education, and on the inorganic masses of the population formed or deformed morally by slavery, and its attendant evils, with an incoherent admixture supplied by immigration. This, necessarily, was the situation that had to be faced on the morrow of the decree of emancipation. By degrees this state of affairs has been and is still being improved. The substratum of the community remains, however, such as I have shown it. I am aware, of course, that in this immense territory there are vast districts of varying soil and climate where Indians and blacks are very unequally divided. For the purposes of this brief summary, I am naturally only taking into account representative centres of population. In some parts the negroes have deserted the plantations for the towns to which they were attracted by the opportunities for employment, and their place has been taken by Italian colonies who have established themselves as small farmers. Elsewhere the ex-slaves remained in their cabins and continued their accustomed tasks with more or less zeal, content if thus enabled to live as they liked. They appear to work and live in perfect harmony with their former owners.
As regards the social élite, it is less easy to pick out its general features here than it is in the Argentine, where on every hand there are visible points of comparison with Europe. We are constantly obliged to revert to our starting-point, which is a feudal oligarchy, the centre of culture and refinement, which by a voluntary act is in process of formation into a single heterogeneous mass without any jarring of racial relations. For a long time the Empire preserved a nucleus of aristocracy of which only a vestige remains to-day. There might now be a danger of submersion beneath an inferior intellectual element which lacks the powerful bias towards higher education peculiar to the Brazilian mind. It is necessarily this element which will prove the salvation of the country. It is on his plantation (fazenda), in the centre of his influence, that we must seek the planter (fazendero). Of a highly refined theoretical feudalism, deeply imbued with European ways of thinking, and with the generous social standards that distinguished, at one time, our own eighteenth-century aristocracy, sublimely unconscious—and destined probably to remain so—of the first spasmodic movements of forces whose evolution towards a new order implies confusion at the outset, he is infinitely superior to the generality of his kind in Europe, who are either the product of tradition or the outcome of democratic circumstance. He leads the broad and simple life of the large landowner in a land whose soil offers every inducement to try fresh experiments. Everywhere within you will notice evidences of his search for the Beautiful and his thirst for knowledge. And everywhere without you will see the convincing proofs of his endless activity. In Paris one of these influential men may pass unnoticed, so little does he resemble his prototype as invented by satirists, with his modesty of speech and simplicity of bearing. He would, however, repay a closer study, and when he comes among us to obtain fresh force for his strenuous task, I should like to see some of our young men seize the opportunity to improve themselves by paying him a visit.
All these social forces have a natural tendency to form themselves into groups. But the Brazilian planter, like other feudal survivals in Europe, is exposed to the attack of every modern commercial and industrial force that is tempted to wield some sort of social authority. This is now the base of all communities—in Rio, in Saint Paul, or in any other city of the world. A reception on extremely Parisian lines given by Senator Azeredo, assisted by Señora Azeredo, proved once again how strong is the likeness between circles that believe themselves to be utterly different. A single telegram suffices to give uniformity to the toilettes of all the women in the world, and if those to be seen in Señora Azeredo's salons were less extravagant than some Parisian examples, Rio struck me as being quite as eager as Paris in its pursuit of beauty's adornments. Shall I mention that Brazilian women have large black eyes, which seem to ask a thousand questions, usually pale complexions, sometimes of a golden bronze tint, that they are vivacious in speech and take a delight in conversational tourneys?
Señores Pinhero Machada and Guanabara were kind enough to give me an invitation that enabled me to see a little more of some of their politicians. Señor Pinhero Machada has a house that is built among the palm-trees on a height that commands the whole of the bay. I confess that in this enchanting place I was more tempted to open my eyes than my ears; still, in spite of the counter-attractions of the lovely landscape, I managed to study the mysteries of Brazilian politics a little more closely, and, as I had begun to do at Señor Guanabara's, to realise that reasons for union are and will remain predominant providing that the question of personalities does not obtrude.
How shall I fail to speak of the ball given in commemoration of the Independence of Chile, where I had the pleasure of meeting the flower of Rio society together with the representatives of all the foreign Powers? I should only give it a passing mention were it not that the President of the Republic, who opened the ball in person, had conceived the idea of inviting me to form one of the official quadrille, with the thought, of course, of paying a compliment to my country. When the excellent Prefect of Rio announced this decree of public authority, I believed a catastrophe was imminent, and did not hesitate to impart my fears to his charming wife, who declared herself ready to go under fire by my side. The worst of it was that I had before me the mocking eyes of the papal nuncio with whom I had just shaken hands, and I could see that he was far from wishing me success in the perilous career on which I was about to embark. Timidly, I broke it to my partner that it was over fifty years since I had danced a quadrille, and she returned my confidence by acknowledging that her education as regards the art of dancing had been totally neglected. The great fat man in scarlet, whose ring was large enough to boil an egg in, found our predicament vastly amusing. I saw myself about to become the scandal of Christianity. Uniting our ignorance, my partner and I took up our positions and arranged to imitate to the best of our ability the movement that might be suggested by the music to the youthful couple that formed our vis-à-vis. Thereupon, the orchestra, a piano and some other instrument, began to play, and we saw that the charming young couple on whom we relied were obviously waiting for us to set the example. What was to be done? I looked at my neighbours. They could not agree. One advanced, the other retired. The President of the Republic tried to encourage the rest of us by getting himself into hopeless muddles. I soon saw that all we needed to do was to tread on the toes of our neighbours and then bow our apologies, to begin again immediately the same manœuvre. This I accomplished, to the great disappointment of the scarlet man, who was obliged to give a wry smile at the spectacle of the grace I managed to display in the service of my country.
I should have liked to see the theatres. Time was lacking. I saw only a performance of The Daughter of the Regiment, given in Italian at the Lyric Theatre, formerly the principal play-house of Rio under the Empire. The Imperial box was placed at my disposal and proved to be a veritable apartment, furnished in the style of Louis Philippe. I was told it had been kept unchanged.
The Municipal Theatre, practically a copy of our own opera-house, is one of the finest buildings in the Brazilian capital, its only fault being that it swallowed up too many of the public millions. On the ground floor there is a very luxurious restaurant containing a faithful copy in glazed bricks of the frieze The Immortals, brought by M. and Mme. Dieulafoy from Suez and now in the Louvre. Here the French colony gave a dinner in my honour. A certain number of statesmen accepted the invitation of my compatriots, and thus I had the great pleasure of assuring myself by my own ears of the friendly relations that exist between French and Brazilians. At one time we had a very important colony in Rio. For reasons that are not too clear to me, it has dwindled away of late. I found, however, at the reception held by the French Chamber of Commerce that if lacking in quantity, the quality of these French representatives left nothing to be desired. The natural affinity between the two peoples is so obvious that the multiple attractions of this great and beautiful country are for French people enhanced by the joy of a genuine communion of thought and feeling which links their hopes and aims. To my intense satisfaction, I had a proof of this at my first contact with the public of Rio, and the same experience was pleasantly renewed later at Saint Paul; I found that I could speak with the utmost freedom as a Frenchman to Frenchmen, for there was not the smallest suggestion of a foreign element in the mind of my audience to remind me to adapt myself to new susceptibilities. I know not how adequately to thank my audiences for what in French eyes appeared the supreme gift of a spontaneous manifestation of French mentality. The Academy of Medicine were good enough to invite me to pay them a visit, and I will freely confess that a consciousness of my unworthiness made me hesitate to face this learned assembly. On this point they reassured me by declaring that the meeting would be merely in honour of French culture. I went accordingly, and scarcely had we exchanged our first greetings when I already felt myself at home in a French atmosphere. Medical science being out of the question, the delicate fare offered to me was some reflections on the general philosophy of science, as developed by the magnificent intellectual labour of France, and on the powerful lead given to the activities of civilisation by our country. Could anything be more encouraging than this disinterested acceptance of the testimony of history, considering how many there be who would exalt themselves at the expense of France?
A very different atmosphere awaited me at the Bangu factories, where are admirable spinning and weaving mills; here the raw Brazilian cotton is transformed into those printed stuffs of vivid colourings in which the working classes love to drape themselves and thus supply a feast for our eyes. Here there were fewer abstract terms employed to declare the esteem so freely accorded to France. But here, as in other parts of the great Republic, I found the few brief words uttered in private encounters still more convincing than the noisier demonstrations. Wherever the work of social evolution is being carried on, wherever there is seen a fine promise for the future, their it is a joy for the French to find the name of their country associated with the forward movement. The splendid industrial development of Bangu among many other similar centres shows what is being done in Brazil in this direction. I have seen nothing more striking in Europe. The Brazilians possess in an equal degree with the Argentinos the capacity of bringing to the highest possible perfection any work to which they set their hand.
I have already said that in Brazil our laws for the protection of industrial and agricultural labourers are unknown. Not but what politicians have studied the matter. But in the imperfectly centralised organisation of all these floating authorities, it is difficult to see how such laws, if voted, could be effectually applied. All the more credit is therefore due to the large employers of Brazilian labour who have done their best to improve the material condition of their hands without waiting to be compelled to do so. The working population of Bangu is scattered about the country in chalets that appear to be admirably hygienic, and all wear the aspect of the finest of physical and moral well-being. A large building has been provided for meetings of all kinds and a theatre in which the hands may amuse themselves with theatricals and concerts. It is unnecessary to state that we were received to the strains of the Marseillaise and that the French Republic was vigorously cheered. I do not go so far as to say that there were no dark sides here or elsewhere to the picture. I have not concealed the fact that immigrants complain loudly of the want of supervision from which they suffer in some regions. It seems fair to infer from what has already been accomplished that more is being attempted. It is naturally the farmer on the fazendas who receives the most attention because he is the deep and almost inexhaustible source of the national wealth.
It would appear that there are no limits to the productiveness of this soil, whose fertility has been developed and renewed during so many centuries by the combined action of sun and rain. Side by side with the barbarism of slavery there has been a barbarous system applied to the land, which has resulted in its impoverishment. Now the relation between production and fertilisation has come prominently forward. There is still, however, much virgin land that awaits the farmer. The real problem of a rational system of agriculture to be applied in Brazil will be left for a future generation. Meantime, their finest forests are burning and filling the horizon with smoke. This represents what the Brazilians call "clearing" the land. But the Brazilian forests deserve a volume, not a paragraph, or chapter—and its writer should be both learned and a poet. I did not visit the fairylike regions of the Amazon, but however amazing they may be, I think they could scarcely surpass the powerful impression made on me by the forests of Saint Paul. There is a limit to our nervous receptivity, beyond which point we become insensible to sensation. We in Europe have dwelt amid a beautiful harmony of the forces of Nature which have moulded all our impressions in a certain form of beauty; to find fault with them would be sacrilege, since the highest inspirations of art have been drawn from this source. Thus, consciously or not, we have lived in an equilibrium of pleasing emotions, that imposes on us certain limitations of sensation to be derived from the spectacle that Nature provides. Therefore, when we are suddenly confronted with an unknown Nature, whose power and vigour shatter all our preconceived notions, and alter the whole focus of our organs, the only possible effect at first is one of complete bewilderment. We must take time to get used to this new order of sensations before we expose ourselves to another and get back again to the standpoint of a corresponding sense of æsthetics. I had to endure several headaches before I could rise to the level of the genius of Berlioz or Wagner. What if we compared our own landscape with the music of Gluck or Mozart? Then you may grasp the Wagnerian fury of the virgin forests which produce a stupefaction that leaves you incapable of analysis and a prey to a tumult of superlatives. And all this happens simply because we have been exposed to the shock of a higher manifestation of the terrestrial forces of the world.