eaden continuity; dumplings of adamantine
contexture, that Carthaginian vinegar itself might fail to dissolve;
with offensive vegetables, and something in a round shape, said to be
imported from Holland, and called cheese, but more like the unyielding
rock of flint in the tenacity of its impenetrable substance; a small
quantity of _very small_ wine; abundance of water; and an awful army of
red ants, probably imported from the Brazils--the wood of which the
chairs and tables are made, hurrying across the cloth with
characteristic industry;--such are the principal features of the quiet
family dinner-table of the Portuguese.

_The Dockyard_ of Lisbon is scarcely as extensive as many of the largest
of our private ship-builders on the banks of the Thames and the Avon.

_Funerals._--In Portugal the corpse is placed in an open coffin, and the
head and feet are left bare. A vessel filled with holy water is placed
at the foot of the bier, which the priests and relatives of the deceased
sprinkle on the body. The service being concluded, the corpse is
followed by the relatives down into the vaults below the church, where
vinegar and quick lime having been poured upon the body, the falling lid
of the coffin is closed and _locked_, and the key delivered to the chief
mourner, who proceeds immediately from the funeral, with his party of
friends who have witnessed the interment take place, to the house of the
defunct, where the key being left with the nearest relative, and the
complimentary visit being paid, the rite is considered as terminated. No
fire is lighted in the house of a deceased person upon the day of his
funeral, and the relatives, who live in separate houses, are in the
habit of supplying a ready-dressed dinner, under the supposition that
the inmates are too much absorbed in grief to be equal to giving any
orders for the preparation of food. During the course of the ensuing
week, the chief mourners receive their several relatives and friends at
tea. The assembly is sorrowful and dull. It has been asserted, though
not corroborated, that such is the poverty and disregard of decorum on
the part of the Portuguese government, that when a person dies without
leaving behind sufficient to defray the expenses of his funeral, the
dead body is laid on the pavement of the most public street, with a box
upon the breast, into which passers-by drop copper or silver coin, until
sufficient has thus been obtained to defray the expense of i