the signal for the breaking of the lines; and the men snatch their partners and twirl more giddy circles. Interesting as the dancing was it could not be called either fascinating or unique. Save for the coloured skin of the dancers, and the curious odour of the room, a similar scene can be witnessed in any European ballroom. From the dignity ballroom we went to a concert hall where all the performers were coloured and all the audience jet black. The performers seemed to enjoy the entertainment most of all. The songs were delivered in European concert fashion, and they were mostly well known ballads:--“Robin Adair,” “I dreamt that I dwelt in Marble Halls,” and other old airs of that description. It was not an interesting performance. But the audience applauded everything, they encored everyone, and when a reciter appeared and gave a rendering of Hamlet by “Mr. William Shakespeare” members of the audience could scarcely contain themselves. It was a bad recitation, but I fancy the people in the body of the hall had paid their entrance money and were determined to make the best of the business. Certainly they seemed to like hearing themselves shout. We asked a supercilious half-breed, who wore an evening suit and a crimson necktie, where we could hear some native singing. “If,” said he, “you refer to the songs of the negroes, I can only indicate the low rum shops, and even there it is not permitted.” Evidently his opinion of the musical abilities of the black man was not a high one. However we accepted his advice and journeyed to the rum shops. In the architecture of their drinking saloons, as in nearly everything else, the Jamaicans have imitated New York rather than London. You enter a swing door and discover a long room fitted with a serving counter, and otherwise bare of furniture. A man presides over the rum bottles, and the drinkers are mostly negroes of the richer class; small shopkeepers, clerks, buggymen, and adventurers. We put our heads in the doors of many of the drinking shops but we never heard the native music. We had to be content with a pilgrimage through the deserted streets of the capital. Save for a few buggies and now and then a noisy road car, Kingston was almost deserted. At some of the street corners groups of men were engaged in violent conversation, and occasionally we saw a policeman; otherwise the empty pavements echoed only the noise of our walking. There are no theatres in Jamaica, and all the wealthier people live in the distant suburbs. The poorer black men who live in the side streets of the town have to be up betimes, so they do not waste their strength by keeping up late at night. It is a cold and a deathly place at night, this little town of Kingston. No shop keeps open after dark; no lights appear in the windows of the houses; no crowds of people promenade the High Street, and jostle each other in friendly rivalry.