Page:Rowland--The Mountain of Fears.djvu/274

  'I am afraid that noise will go on all night, Dr. Leyden. I understand that the peasants are having one of their dances to-night.' He slightly emphasized the word peasants.

" 'The bamboula?' I asked, curiously, for, of course, I knew of the rites attendant upon voodoo worship, although I had never witnessed them.

" 'Yes,' he answered; 'one of my servants told me this evening that there was to be a dance to-night. This relic of paganism is one of the curses of our country, Dr. Leyden. Although we whites have done our best to discountenance it, it still persists.'

"Unlike most Haytians of the better class, who pretend to a black aristocracy socially superior to the white, Dr. Fouchère always referred to himself as white, although a blacker man never walked in the full blaze of the equatorial sun. No doubt this was due to his prolonged residence among the white race.

" 'Is the affair, then, as bad as it is [ 258 ]