, regular and not devoid of expression.

My companion becomes artistically captivated with Regina, who serves as
a model for an important picture, which Nicasio paints, but
unfortunately does not sell, in Cuba!

Mapi, a mulatto girl of tender years, is equally serviceable, and plays
many parts on canvas; while Cachon and Tatagueita, who are older and less
comely, impersonate characters becoming their condition.

But alas for art patronage in Cuba! these and other fanciful productions
do not meet with a purchaser in the Pearl of the Antilles.

CHAPTER VI.

CUBAN BEGGARS.

Carrapatam Bunga--The Havana Lottery--A Lady Beggar--A Beggar's
Opera--Popular Characters--Charity--A Public Raffle--The 'King of
the Universe.'

Despite the dearth of patrons for the 'legitimate' in art, my companion
and I continue to occupy our leisure moments in collecting such material
as may prove attractive in a more art-loving country. Suggestions for
pictures and sketches are not, however, wholly derived from the street
vendors I have described. The beggars of Cuba are equally worthy of
places in our sketch-books.

Spain's romantic 'Beggar on horseback,' in some respects meets with a
prototype in her colony.

That apparently hapless mendicant shuffling along the white, heated road
of a narrow street, is a blind negro, with the imposing nickname of
Carrapatam Bunga. He is attired in a clean suit of brown holland, and he
wears a broad-brimmed panama. His flat, splay feet are bare, showing
where one of his toes has been consumed by a nigua, a troublesome insect
which introduces itself into the foot, and, if not eradicated in time,
remains there to vegetate. Across his shoulders is slung a huge canvas
bag for depositing comestible alms, and in his hand is a long rustic
staff. Charity with a Cuban is a leading principle of his religion, and
to relieve the indigent--no matter whether the object for relief be
worthy or not--is next in importance to disburdening the mind to a
father confessor. Mindful of the native weakness in this respect,
Carrapatam Bunga bears his sorrows from door to door, confident that his
affliction and his damaged foot will command pity wheresoever he
wanders. But he is impudent, and a boisterous, swaggering fellow. Hear
him as he demands compassion, with his swarthy, fat face upturned to the
blazing sun, and with a long cigar between his bulging lips.

'Ave Maria! here's the poor blind man; po