Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 69, No. 427, May, 1851Various
General
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 69, No. 427, May, 1851
Various
England -- Periodicals; Scotland -- Periodicals
the Anglo-Saxon. "Waiter!" cried a thirsty customer, within hearing of
M. Marmier, "bring me a President Taylor!" "A President Jackson for
me!" exclaimed another voice. M. Marmier, with praiseworthy curiosity,
tried both Taylor and Jackson. The ingenious confectioner, he declares,
had had due regard to the characters of the two venerable Presidents,
when he gave their names to his cunningly compounded liquors: Taylor
was a sweetish and cooling draught, Jackson an energetic punch. At the
theatre, where an Italian company performed _Lucia_ in most creditable
style, M. Marmier was struck with the elegance of the house and the
aristocratic appearance of the audience. The pit was full of men in
white waistcoats and trousers; the three ranges of boxes, instead of
wainscoting at the back, and a heavy wooden balustrade halfway up the
front, had Venetian blinds in the one place, admitting air and light,
and in the other a light trelliswork, which afforded a full view of the
fair inmates from their luxuriant hair down to their fairy feet.
"Above the boxes is the place allotted to the negroes, who seem
stationed there that their thickset figures and black faces
may serve as a foil to the white doves in the boxes. Ladies'
fashions have here no resemblance to those of Paris. Velvet is
not to be thought of; even satin is too heavy and inflexible
for those delicate forms, and Cinderella's slipper would be too
heavy a load for those bird-like feet. A flower in the hair,
a flood of gauze and lace on the body, a silk ribbon, with an
imperceptible sole, for a shoe, and another ribbon of the same
colour round the instep,--this is all that these lilies of the
tropics can support. One might take them for those Northern
elves, who formerly, in the forest glades, wove themselves
garments out of moonbeams."
Lavish and luxurious in dress, the Havanese lady does not long retain
the fresh and delicate tissues that drape her slender person, but
transfers them, often scarcely worn, to her black waiting-maids, who
turn out upon the Sunday, like so many African princesses, in all
the glory of satin shoes, lace mantilla, and muslin robes. At the
Havana, as at New Orleans, and even to a still greater extent, the lot
of the domestic slaves might be envied, as far as material comforts
go, by most of the lower classes of free Europeans. They form part
of the family in which they are brought up, enjoy great kindness and
indulgence, and frequently grow rich by hoarding the presents they
receive.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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