This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.
[[preprinted]] 28 [[/preprinted]] good - as are some of the younger women. The mulatoes do not lower themselves to this kind of dancing. It is only the poor solid blacks who cavort in this manner. [[margin]] IX-12-35 [[/margin]] Before I leave I thought I had better copy down some of the other apt remarks by Struthers Burt. (1) "The English and Americans colonize, and fix the water supply, and do good, and keep to themselves, and shave, and everybody hates them; the French take native mistresses and don't shave, and care nothing about the personal behavior of their subjects, and the land never forgets them." 2 "The French have never lost a colony by rebellion except Haiti?" - Not true how about Mexico (I suppose he blames this on Austria) 3 "Voodoo drums - that's nonsense; the ill-advised reports of the curious breed of globe-trotting authors who find life insufficiently exciting unless lied about. 4 "The bombache, the interminable [[end page]] [[start page]] [[preprinted]] 29 [[/preprinted]] dance that goes on for hours without a single interruption. On Saturday nights, as on the eves of holidays, you can beat out the bombache on the drums until you fall asleep with exhaustion." The remark about authors reminds me that one, by the name of James Saxon Childers, spent a few days here. When it came to the night before leaving he came to Mr. Barnes with a copy of some book of travel which he had written, and a request that Mr. B cash a $500 check (travellers) for him. It wasn't a real request - straight forward like - as he intimated that it would be preferable if Mr. B. let him send the money from the U.S. "O.k." says the autocrat. Well, that night Childers for in a crap game with two fellows here - one of whom can little afford to loose so much, - and Childers came up with enough money to pay for his stay. It must be lovely to travel on other people's money. [[end page]]