Brazilian Sketches | Page 9

T.B. Ray
genuine experience of grace to which he bears testimony with
great power.
We arrived at the church about eleven o'clock. We were received with
expressions of great joy. Mrs. Manoela was so happy over our coming
that she embraced us in true Brazilian style. We were shown into our
room, where we refreshed ourselves by brushing off the dust and
bathing. How spick and span clean was everything in that room, even

to the dirt floor!
Before we had completed our ablutions, the good woman of the house
called Maddox out and asked what she could cook for me. She thought
I could not eat Brazilian dishes. He told her, to her great relief, that I
could eat anything he could. Quite right he was, too, for we had been
traveling all the morning on the sustenance furnished by a cup of coffee
which we had taken at the Rio station a little before six o'clock. We
were in possession of an appetite by this time that would have raised
very few questions about any article of food.
Soon we were seated at the breakfast table, which was placed in the
church room with benches around it for seats. I was honored by being
placed at one end of the table. What a meal it was! Not only had Mrs.
Manoela taxed her own larder, but the other members, who by this time
had arrived in large numbers, had brought in many good things. I
cannot tell what the dishes were, for the reason that I do not know. It is
sufficient to say that every one was good--perhaps our appetite helped
out our appreciation of some of them. There were as many as eight
dishes the like of which I had never tasted before. How do you suppose
I managed it when they served some delicious cane molasses, and,
instead of bread to go with it, they served cream cheese? I asked
Maddox how I should work this combination. He replied by cutting up
his cheese into his plate of molasses and eating the mixture. I did the
same thing, and I bear testimony that it was fine. By the time the
breakfast was concluded, I had scored a point with our good friends, for
they thought that a stranger who could render such a good account of
himself at a Brazilian breakfast must be very much like themselves.
(Let us explain about Brazilian meals: They take coffee in the early
morning. Bread and butter is served with the coffee. Breakfast, which is
a very substantial meal, is served about eleven o'clock. Dinner, which is
the chief meal of the day, is served about five o'clock in the afternoon.
At bedtime light refreshments are served, which are often substantial
enough to make another meal).
After breakfast was over, and it was some time before it was over, for
the crowd had to be fed, we assembled for worship. The congregation
was too large for the little room, so the men built a beautiful arbor out
of bamboo cane. When Maddox told me we were to hold services under
an arbor I was dissappointed, for somehow there had come over me a

great desire to speak from that large pulpit in the little room. My
dissappointment was short-lived, however, for when we reached the
arbor there were the pulpit and the lace-covered chairs! It was a
gracious service. The Spirit of the Lord was upon us. The sermon lost
none of its effect from the fact that it had to be interpreted, because
Maddox interpreted it with sympathy and power.
After preaching, four were received for baptism. They were not
converted at this service, but had been expecting to come for some time.
Maddox baptized them in the spring branch, which had been deepened
by a temporary dam being thrown across it. One of those baptized was
a woman ninety years of age.
Our time was growing short now. Maddox changed his clothes in a
hurry. We had to catch the four o'clock train. We did stop long enough
to drink a cup of Brazilian coffee. Such coffee! I will not attempt to
describe it, because our friends in the States can not understand. There
is nothing like it in this country. We took time, too, to say good-bye.
The whole crowd lined up and we went the length of the line, bidding
everyone a hearty godspeed. The Brazilian not only shakes hands with
you, but he embraces you heartily. Yes, some of the good matrons
embraced us. It was a novel experience for me, but a mere custom with
them, and the act was performed with such modest restraint that any
possible objectionable features were eliminated. Having said good-bye
to them all we mounted our gray ponies, and, led by our
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