It gilds all objects, but it alters none.

There was about a stone of potatoes in the centre of the table, bursting flourily through their skins, the steam rising from them.

August felt the everlastingness of love; as many another man in a supreme crisis has felt it.

And there was the band’s centerpiece and glory, the interlocking rhythm of a trap-set drummer, a percussionist, and three standing drummers playing the alfaia, the large wooden drum from the African-derived, northeastern Brazilian song-and-dance tradition of maracatu.