What James has below would be what you would see after you ran the RS232 signal through a Max232 or similar translator. This sequence would also be what the PIC would transmit on its tx line.

-----Original Message-----
From:   Justin Crooks [SMTP:jcrooks@WYOMING.COM]
Sent:   Thursday, March 12, 1998 6:22 PM
To:     PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
Subject:        Re: Bit time for 9600 baud

True RS-232 inverts the data: a low is +10V, a high is -10V.  The start bit
should be a low (+10V).  Usually, +5V and 0V will work, but not always

----------
> From: James & Ili <jandi@MPSI.NET>
> To: PICLIST@MITVMA.MIT.EDU
> Subject: Bit time for 9600 baud
> Date: Thursday, March 12, 1998 4:36 PM
>
> Hello,
>         I am a little confused about the bit time for RS232.
> My understanding is that the period is 104 microseconds and
> it looks like this:
>
> ________             ________               ___________>
>               |            |             |              |
>               | 104us  |  104us   |  104us   | ......>  Repeat 10
> times ( 1 Start, 8 data, 1 stop)
>               I_______I             I________I
>            Start bit         bit1         bit 2 .........>
>
> I may have the polarity of the start bit wrong, I'm not sure if it
> goes low or high.
>
>
> James & Ili
> Irving, TX. 75038