The Negro Attendants In Dozens Moved About With Automatic Order, As Is Characteristic Of All The Race On Such Occasions, For The Negro Is A "Model Waiter" At A Banquet.

Their snowy costumes contrasting strongly with their black visages and the jovial scene around.

The merry peals of laughter, as some unlucky wight upset a dish, or scattered the sauce in everybody's face within reach, indicated lightness of heart, and merriment and conviviality seemed the order of the day.

The imposing scene before me, after a long absence from social meetings in civilized life, was very cheering, and, had it not been for the inertia I felt at the time, arising from a fatiguing journey and the tertian ague, I should have felt disposed to participate in the day's enjoyment. Other considerations might, however, have prevented this: I was a stranger to all around, and knew that I should be either subjected to impertinent interrogations, or become the object of invidious remark - this, in my debilitated state of health, I felt anxious to avoid, as calculated to impede my restoration. My joining the assembled party might also have involved the chance of surveillance during my stay, which, before my departure for Europe, I intended should be rather protracted. I may have been mistaken in this view, but, from the character I had heard of the place, I felt justified in giving way to the suspicion.

I was beguiled into the erroneous idea that a sense of happiness and security reigned in the assembled multitude, a notion quite fallacious, from attendant circumstances, as I shall directly explain.

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