The people enjoy play, and always welcome “_festa_” occasions. Holidays are numerous and all join in their celebration. Brazil has two independence days, the 7th of September and the 15th of November, which are national holidays and universally celebrated. The carnival season, however, which occurs the week preceding Lent, is the occasion of the greatest merrymaking. It lasts for three whole days in Rio de Janeiro, and, during that time, business is wholly suspended in the cities. There are processions with music, and the streets are full of people in mask and gown, who dance and sing and blow horns and make disagreeable noises in general. Disguised in dominoes and masks they blow their horns, talk in falsetto voices, while the balconies and windows are filled with crowds of onlookers, women and children being especially prominent. Few people wear their best clothes, for it is the custom to squirt perfumed water over passers-by from these balconies. This perfumed water is contained in little leaden vials, which are sold at stands all over the city. The streets are hung with the banners of all nations, little flags and coloured lanterns, and have all the appearance of a gala occasion. [Illustration: THE FIFTEENTH OF NOVEMBER IN SÃO PAULO.] On the last of the three days a grand procession is held. It is a procession of mounted military bands, men and women in ancient costume, immense floats, _papier-mache_ figures, grotesque animal representations, men burlesquing women actresses, and women dressed as pages. King Carnival, upon a gorgeous throne, is always a part of the procession. The procession winds in and around one street after another, along the Avenida Central and the Beira Mar, and often takes hours to pass a given point. At night masquerade balls at the various theatres end the gaieties. The galleries and boxes are always filled with an interested audience, but the floor is given up to revelry and suggestive dancing, which would not merit the approval of polite society. CHAPTER XI EDUCATION AND THE ARTS The educational facilities in Brazil are not of the best in the republic as a whole. In some of the states, such as São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and a part of Minas Geraes, the provisions are fairly good, but in none of them has the work been systematized in the same way that it has in our own land. Until the establishment of the republic the instruction was almost entirely in the hands of the church, but the duty now rests upon the various states and municipalities. Statistics upon education in Brazil are very unreliable, just as are their census reports, so that whatever or whosesoever figures are followed there will be errors. It is perhaps safe to say that not over twenty-five per cent. of the total population are able to read and write.