When we got back to Bahia on February 10 a brand new hotel had been opened on the space left between Ruben’s present theater and the invisible one I had the opportunity of some day managing. It was a five-story, flat-iron placete on the height of the city, the highest building in Bahia, or, indeed, in the state, and was the wonder of the region. The only elevator in the paunch of South America, except the outdoor one between the lower and higher city, ran all the way up it, but when “Tut” and I entered, it refused at first to work, whereupon I stepped out again to get something I had forgotten.

“Oh, don’t be afraid!” cried the servant, himself ashy with fear, who was attempting to manipulate it, “it won’t fall.”

On the fifth floor, spoken of with a catch of the breath in Bahia, we had a pleasant little room with a vast outlook over city and ocean—and as it was starting in to acquire a reputation, the place was strictly a hotel and not a brothel. Materially it was a great relief from what we had been enduring for weeks past, and the unwonted sensation of living in well-nigh civilized surroundings again was welcome, but a hotel, after all, takes its tone from its guests and servants, and these being Bahianos, it was doubtful whether so expensive an establishment would be able to keep its head above water. Speaking of water, the shower-baths were extra, as usual in Brazil, but when I confided to the manager that I would move out again next day, he hastened to assure me that no one would notice when I bathed.

Street-cars and walls were again flaunting Kinetophone advertisements inviting everyone to come and see the “marvel of the age.” But it was “reheated soup” in Bahia now, and out at Itapagipe, where we had played three nights to crowded houses only a week before, the Latin enthusiasm had effervesced and we had only a straggling audience. If only we had had some new numbers, say a couple of Caruso! The second night was worse, with our share only 36$, and the owner refused to give a show at all on the next and last night, saying the few days before carnival were the worst in the year in the theatrical business, as everyone with a tostão was keeping it to buy masks, confetti, and scented water.

Carnival costumes and the silly soprano speech that goes with them were already beginning to appear in the streets, and by noon on Sunday negroes and half-negroes in fantastic make-up were everywhere. Most of the “São João” employees were drunk or excited or parading the streets by the time we opened for the matinée, and as I could watch the door as well from there, I sat down behind the wicket and became ticket-seller. Few ticket-offices in the world can compare with that of the old “São João” in situation, under the deep colonial porch, open to all the trade winds of the blue Atlantic, golden-bathed by day and silver-lighted by night, lying a few hundred feet below and stretching away unbrokenly to the coast of Africa.

Masked figures came, asking for tickets in the falsetto they hoped would disguise their voices, as well as the usual haughty, tar-brushed class in the full dress of public appearance. I quickly acquired the professional ticket-seller’s “snappy” language and could toss out a handful of change or a concise bit of information quite as scornfully as the most experienced station-agent in my native land. Not a great many spectators entered that afternoon, however, for which I did not blame them. Why pay to go inside a musty old theater when the brilliant summer day outside is full of free entertainments? Only two weeks before there had been a similar celebration, but there is a constant string of this expensive tomfoolery the year round in Bahia. The amount spent on trolley-car and automobile floats alone would have built a good school-house, to say nothing of the bands of music, costumes, and playthings. Scores of automobiles filled with fantastically garbed men and girls crawled through the streets, while thousands afoot were arrayed in wild and generally ugly and orderless fantasy, with masks or head-pieces equal to Bottom the Weaver. It was evident that the paraders were mainly from the lower classes and had little originality of ideas in designing costumes. Nearly everyone’s slight sense of humor prompted him to pose as the opposite of what he was in real life; every negro who could afford it wore a rosy-cheeked mask and white gloves; many of the few whites had blacked up or donned negro masks, and perhaps half the men were made up as women, while there was a perfect rage, particularly among the part-negro girls, to appear in male attire, their hips bursting through their otherwise loosely flapping nether garments. “Ladies of the life” took advantage of the spirit of the day and sat bare-legged in their balconies over the main streets, the police, of course, never interfering, since correction or suppression are unusual and unpopular in South America. We cancelled the third “section” that night and joined the throng parading the streets amid cloud-bursts of confetti, rivers of scented water, and maudlin uproar, and after looking in at a popular ball that had many suggestions of a witch dance in the heart of Africa I went home for my last night’s sleep in São Salvador da Bahia.