Slow Signal Fade ebooks

During the early part of my stay at Santarem, a little party of
instrumentalists, led by a tall, thin, ragged mulatto, who was
quite an enthusiast in his art, used frequently to serenade their
friends in the cool and brilliant moonlit evenings of the dry
season, playing French and Italian marches and dance music with
very good effect. The guitar was the favourite instrument with
both sexes, as at Para; the piano, however, is now fast
superseding it. The ballads sung to the accompaniment of the
guitar were not learned from written or printed music, but
communicated orally from one friend to another. They were never
spoken of as songs, but modinas, or "little fashions," each of
which had its day, giving way to the next favourite brought by
some young fellow from the capital.
At festival times there was a great deal of masquerading, in
which all the people, old and young, white, negro, and Indian,
took great delight. The best things of this kind used to come off
during the Carnival, in Easter week, and on St.


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