Читать книгу Roraima and British Guiana, With a Glance at Bermuda, the West Indies, and the Spanish Main онлайн

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Those splendid beds of tulips were not in the Savanna when we last passed through! As we approach, we see they are not composed of flowers, but are merely gorgeous head-dresses. Another trait, and a charming one too, of Martinique costume. Here you see no dyed feathers, or artificial flowers and fruits, decorating the flashy hats and bonnets so dear to the negro soul. Bright coloured foulards, twisted into various pyramidal, circular, and oval shapes, crown every head with rainbow hues. There are ten different ways of tying these kerchiefs, and the initiated can tell by the twist whence the wearer comes.

Near the band is a motley group. Two or three old negresses dressed in flowered chintz, and with trimly turned head-dresses gossip over the last scandal; slowly sweeping along comes a majestic creature, her long white dress hitched up on one side and displaying a foot neatly blacked by nature; in that family coach are some white Creole ladies with charming faces, and tastefully dressed in the latest Parisian fashion, while the youngsters who force their bouquets on them are habited in little else than “native” worth. The excitement is of the mildest kind, but enjoyment is universal. Here and there some little maidens dance to the music, boys run races, the elders give the prizes, handsome carriages and wretched fiacres continue their monotonous round, and meeting is so perpetual that everybody smiles at everybody else, till at length the sun goes down. Then the vehicles are turned towards home, dandies prance off on their rocking horses, old ladies put up their umbrellas against the dew, peasants take off their shoes preparatory to their homeward tramp, and very soon the Savanna is deserted.