but
on learning that I was a foreigner, he immediately ordered two good
rooms to be prepared for me and my men, in a house adjoining that in
which he resides. On being introduced to him, I found him to be an
elderly man, of hale appearance, and of very pleasing manners. I
passed the evening very agreeably in his house, when he informed me
that M. Auguste de St. Hilaire remained a day and night with him during
the course of his journey to the Rio de San Francisco. Although he made
no mention to me of the circumstance, I afterwards learned that some
observations made by that learned traveller and botanist, in the
account of his visit to San Eloi, had much offended this worthy man.
The obnoxious passage was the following :—"Pendant tout le temps que je
passai chez le Capitaine (for he was then only a captain) Virciani, la
maitresse de la maison ne se montra point; cependant, tandis que nous
mangions, je voyais un minois feminin s'avancer douce-ment a travers la
porte entr'ouverte; mais aussitot que je jetais les yeux de ce cote, la
dame disparaissait. C'est par une curi-osite semblable que les femmes
cherchent a se dedommager du peu de liberte dont on les laisse jouir."*
The
same lady was still alive, and I saw her every time I was in the house,
but twenty years had made great alterations on the pretty face of which
St. Hilaire had only a few glimpses. She had, however, several
daughters grown up, who were no less shy than the mother was in her
younger days. As soon as the colonel ascertained that I was acquainted
with the practice of medicine, he talked upon no other subject, being,
as he said himself, a Curioso, which is the appellation given to those
who dabble in any profession, without having been regularly educated to
it'. As a number of his slaves were indisposed, I accompanied him on a
visit to each in succession, his object being to ascertain whether he
was treating them properly, and to have my advice respecting their
complaints. His usual guide in these matters was a Portuguese
translation of Buchan's Domestic Medicine. T found all over Brazil,
individuals possessed of no better information, who made a livelihood
by their practice of medicine, passing
* Voyage dans les Provinces de Rio de Jaueiro et de Miuas Geraes, t. 2. p. 350.
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