The North Americans, particularly those of the back settlements, are celebrated for their inquisitiveness; but this seems to be a very general failing with all those who are shut out from frequent intercourse with strangers. A curious instance of this feeling occurred a few days after I returned to Penêdo. I had brought letters from Maceio to a gentleman who lived here with a married brother, they were among the most respectable people in the place. Although not yet eleven o’clock, I found the lady, a remarkably fine and good-looking woman, with her husband busily engaged at cards, she lying in a hammock, while he was seated on a chair beside her; she had recently been smoking, an almost universal accomplishment among the ladies of the interior, as a long pipe was lying near her, and the floor beneath bore strong indications of excessive expectoration. I was desired to be seated, and was immediately inundated with a flood of questions from the good lady who possessed great volubility of tongue. Among a host of others I may enumerate the following. What countryman are you? What is your name? How old are you? Are you a medical man? Are you married? Are your father and mother alive? What are their names? Have you any sisters? What are their names? Have you any brothers? What are their names? Have all your countrymen blue eyes? Have you churches and priests in your country? Do oranges and bananas grow there? &c., &c. If, however, she was inquisitive about my concerns, she was not less disposed to tell me much that related to herself. Thus she informed me that she was married when she was nineteen years of age, that she was now five years married, and in that time had presented her husband with a yearly gift, all of whom were alive with the exception of one. Her husband, she said, was thirty-six years of age, and she desired me to feel his pulse, as he was always complaining of bad health. I soon discovered his complaint to be indigestion, one of the most frequent ills that Brazilians are subject to, arising, no doubt, from the enormous quantities which they eat, and that generally not of the most digestive materials, as well as from the heavy late suppers which they indulge in. I had then to feel her pulse in turn, and she seemed much pleased when I told her it was an excellent one. I afterwards became very intimate with them, and spent many agreeable hours in their society; their brother to whom I brought the letters was a lawyer, and a well-educated and intelligent man.