The whole of the surbazes and wooden work about the windows and doors were of well-polished and solid mahogany, of the most costly description. These rooms were all fitted with glass sashes, that opened into the piazzas—long galleries, about fourteen feet wide, that enclosed the whole house; with white pillars and green blinds, fitted between them like those of a tanwork, but smaller, which, when open, with the feather edges of the blades towards you, as you looked at the fabric from a distance, gave it the appearance of a Brobdingnag bird-cage; and indeed, so far as the complexion of the majority of the male figurantes on the present occasion went, it might be said to be well filled with canaries.
The roof was composed of what are called shingles in the United States—pieces of cypress splinters, about eighteen inches long by four broad, and half an inch thick, which are nailed on, overlapping like slates; indeed, when weatherstained, at a distance you cannot distinguish the difference, excepting as in the present case, when they are covered with brown paint to preserve them.
From this peculiarity in the covering of the roof of a West Indian house, it often happens, when the rains set in suddenly after a long drought, that the water finds its way down, in consequence of the warping of the wood, in rather uncomfortable quantities; insomuch, that when you go to bed, the rooms in the houses in the country being often unceiled, an umbrella may be as necessary as a nightcap. However, after the seasons, as they are called, have continued a few days, the cypress or cedar swells, and a very indifferent roof becomes perfectly water tight.
To return. No sooner did the shower abate, than a whole crowd of negroes, male and female, once more clustered round the door, and scrambled up on the trees round the house, to get a peep at the company through the open windows and blinds.
"Do you admire our West India fruits, Mr Brail?" quoth Twig, cocking his eye at the blackies aloft.
I was exceedingly struck by the profuse and tasteful display of flowers and green branches with which the rooms were decorated; many of the latter loaded with the most luxuriant bunches and clusters of fruits—oranges, star-apples, citrons, and a whole array of others, which as yet were nameless luxuries to me.
There was a golden pine-apple on a silver salver, on a side-table, eighteen inches high, by nine in diameter, that absolutely saturated the whole air of the room with perfume.
The novelty and elegant effect of the carpetless, but highly polished, mahogany floors, which at the sides of the room, where not dimmed by the feet of the dancers, reflected every thing so mirror-like, was very striking, although at first I was in terror at the shortness of the ladies' petticoats, and the reflection of the brilliant chandeliers. The dresses of the fair dames, although they might have been a little behind the London fashions of the day, were quite up to what those were when I left home, except in the instances of several natural curiosities from the inland and mountain settlements, who were distinguished by their rather antediluvian equipment and sleepy Creole drawl; but as a counterpoise to both, they had the glow of the rose of Lancaster in their cheeks.
As for the other fair creatures resident in the hot plains in the neighbourhood of the sea, and in the still hotter towns of the island, they were to a man (woman—oh, for Kilkenny!) so deadly pale, that when one contemplated their full, but beautiful and exquisitely managed figures, you were struck with amazement at the incongruity, if I may so speak, of their sickly complexions, and sylphlike and most agile forms.—"So these faded lilies are really in good health after all." Between the fair mountaineers and lowlanders, since I have spoken of the roses, it might indeed be said, that there still existed the emulation of the two houses of York and Lancaster. As to figure, they were both exquisite—Lancaster, however, more full of health, more European looking in complexion, and a good deal more hoydenish in manner—York more languid and sentimental, to appearance at least.
But the men—"Oh, massa neger!" to borrow from Quashie—what a sallow cadaverous crew! with the exception of an officer or two from the neighbouring garrison, and one or two young chaps lately imported—what rigs!—such curious cut coats—some with the waists indicated by two little twin buttons between the shoulders, and scarcely any collar, with the long tapering skirts flapping against the calves of their legs, in shape like the feathers in the tail of a bird of Paradise—others with the aforesaid landmarks, or waist-buttons, of the size and appearance of crown-pieces, covered with verdegris, and situated over against the hip-joints, and half a yard asunder, while the capes stood up stiff and high, and the square-cut skirts that depended beneath (perfect antitheses to the former) were so very short and concise, that they ended as abruptly as a hungry judge's summing up. However, no fault could be found with the average manners of the whole party, whatever might have been objected to their equipment.