Journal Of A Voyage To Brazil Part 12

_Friday, 2d November._--Several of our people having yielded to the temptations of some worthless persons in the town, who induce sailors to desert in order that they themselves may profit by the premium given for the discovery of deserters, and having consequently swam on sh.o.r.e, the frigate has been moved up the harbour as far as Bom Fim, and it is intended to take her up still higher. I am glad of the opportunity of seeing more of this beautiful bay, and shall endeavour to land on the Ilha do Medo, or the point of Itaparica, where the first adventurers from Europe underwent hardship that appear hardly credible in our modern days. We also wish to examine the harbour within the funil or pa.s.sage between the two islands, and into which the river or creek of Nazareth, which supplies Bahia with great part of the mandioc flour consumed there, runs.

_Sat.u.r.day, 3d November._--Our plan of proceeding farther up the harbour is suspended for the present. The disputes between the European Portuguese and the Brazilians in the city, seem to be about to come to a crisis. Early this morning, we learned that troops were a.s.sembling from all quarters, and that therefore it was advisable, for the protection of the British property and the persons of the merchants, that the ship should return to her station opposite to the town. The first provisional junta has lost several of its members, two of them being gone as delegates to Lisbon, and others being absent on account of ill health or disgust. The party opposing this junta talk loudly of independence, and wish at least one-half of the members of the provisional government to be native Brazilians. They also complain bitterly, that instead of redressing the evils they before endured, the junta has increased them by several arbitrary acts; and a.s.sert that one of the members who has a great grazing estate, has procured a monopoly, by which no man can supply the market with beef without his permission, so that the city is ill supplied. Such a ground of complaint will always excite popular indignation, and it appears now to be at its height. There has already been some skirmishing, in which, however, I hear there have been only three men killed. The Brazilian artillery occupies Fort San Pedro; the governor, and the wreck of the junta, have the town and the palace. The governor, indeed, has arrested several, I think seventeen persons, in an arbitrary manner; among these, two of my acquaintance, Colonel Salvador[72] and Mr. Soares, and have put them, some on board the Don Pedro, some on board transports in the bay, for the purpose of transporting them to Lisbon. Some of these persons are not permitted to have any communication with their families; others, more favoured, are allowed to carry them with them. These are not the means to conciliate.

We have sent on sh.o.r.e to offer shelter to the ladies, and Captain Graham has agreed upon certain signals with the consul, in case of increased danger to his family.

[Note 72: Colonel Salvador, though born in Portugal, has all his property and connections in Brazil; he served with credit in the peninsula. Mr. Soares, a Brazilian, had been long in England.]

_Sunday, November 4th._--On looking out at daylight this morning, we saw artillery planted, and troops drawn up on the platform opposite to the opera house. I went on sh.o.r.e to see if Miss Pennell, her sister, or any of our other friends would come on board; but they naturally prefer staying to the last with their fathers and husbands. Notwithstanding the warlike movements of these last two days, it appears most likely that the chiefs of the opposite parties will agree to await the decision of the cortes at Lisbon, with respect to their grievances, and at least a temporary peace will succeed to this little disturbance.

It appears, however, next to impossible that things should remain as they are. The extreme inconvenience of having the supreme courts of justice so far distant as Lisbon must be more and more felt as the country increases in population and riches. The deputies to the cortes are too far removed from their const.i.tuents to be guided in their deliberations or votes by them; and the establishment of so many juntas of government, each only accountable to the cortes, must be a cause of internal disorder, if not of civil war, at no distant time.

_Monday, 5th._--A day of heavy tropical rain, which has forced both parties on sh.o.r.e to house their guns, and to desist for the present from all farther hostility. The governor, however, continues his arbitrary arrestations. It is curious how ancient authority awes men; for surely it is the accustomed obedience to the name of the king, and the dread of the name of rebellion, that prevents the Brazilians, armed as they are, from resisting these things.

_Tuesday, November 6th._--The Morgiana, Captain Finlaison, came in from Rio de Janeiro. She belongs to the African station, and came to Brazil about some prize business connected with the slave trade. Captain Finlaison tells me tales that make my blood run cold, of horrors committed in the French slave ships especially. Of young negresses, headed up in casks and thrown overboard, when the ships are chased. Of others, stowed in boxes when a ship was searched; with a bare chance of surviving their confinement. But where the trade is once admitted, no wonder the heart becomes callous to the individual sufferings of the slaves. The other day I took up some old Bahia newspapers, numbers of the Idade d'Ouro, and I find in the list of ships entered during three months of this year,

Alive. Dead.

1 slave ship from Moyanbique, 25th March, with 313 180

1 do. 6th March 378 61

1 do. 30th May 293 10

1 do. 29th June from Molendo, 357 102

1 do. 26th June 233 21 ____ ___ 1574 374 ____ ___

So that of the cargoes of these five ships reckoned thus accidentally, more than one in five had died on the pa.s.sage!

It seems the English ships of war on the African coast are allowed to hire free blacks to make up their complements when deficient. There are several now onboard the Morgiana, two of whom are petty officers, and they are found most useful hands. They are paid and victualled like our own seamen.[73]

[Note 73: The negroes of the _Cru_ nation come to Sierra Leone from a great distance, and hire themselves out for any kind of labour, for six, eight, or ten months, sometimes for a year or two. They have then earned enough to go home and live like idle gentlemen, for at least twice that time, and then return to work. When their engagements on board men of war are fulfilled, they receive regular discharges and certificates.]

_Thursday, November 8._--We went on board Morgiana to call on Mrs.

Macgregor, a lively intelligent Spaniard, who with her husband, Colonel Macgregor, is a pa.s.senger. She joined me in visits on sh.o.r.e, where the only news is, that the governor continues to arrest all persons suspected of favouring independence.

_November 9._--The Brazilians who occupy the forts of San Pedro and Santa Maria, had threatened to fire on the Don Pedro, if she attempted to get under weigh with the state prisoners on board. Nevertheless during the night she bent her sails, and sailed early this morning, carrying, it is said, twenty-eight gentlemen, who have been taken up without any ostensible reason. They are understood to have spoken in favour of the independence of Brazil. Several of our officers went on sh.o.r.e to dine with the gentlemen of the English club, who meet once a month, to eat a very good dinner, and drink an immoderate quant.i.ty of wine for the honour of their country.

_Tuesday, November 13._--We have had, for ten days past, some of the heaviest showers I remember to have seen, and in going to and from the ship, we have generally been wet through; nevertheless some of our friends ventured on board to-day to dine with us, among the rest Colonel and Mrs. Macgregor; they were a little late, owing to a skirmish between the Portuguese and Brazilians, that occurred close to their house, just as they were setting off. Apparently it had not been premeditated, for the parties were fighting with sticks and stones, as well as swords and fire-arms. The combatants would not allow any officer in Portuguese regimentals to pa.s.s, so that Colonel Macgregor was obliged to go back and change his dress before he could come. All this appears to proceed more from a want of police than any other cause.

_16th_.--Several of our young people and I myself have begun to feel the bad effects of exposing ourselves too much to the sun and the rain.

Yesterday I was so unwell as to put on a blister for cough and pain in my side, and several of the others have slight degrees of fever. But generally speaking, the ship's company has been remarkably healthy.

_Friday, 16th_.--Captain Graham taken suddenly and alarmingly ill.

Towards evening he became better, and was able to attend to a most painful business. Last night a man belonging to the Morgiana was killed, and the corporal of marines belonging to the ship severely wounded, on sh.o.r.e. It appears that neither of these men had so much as seen the murderer before. He had been drinking in the inner room of a venda with some sailors, and having quarrelled with one of them, he fancied the rest were going to seize him, when he drew his knife to intimidate them, and rushed furiously out of the room. The young man who was killed was standing at the outer door, waiting for one of his companions who was within, and the murderer seeing him there, imagined he also wished to stop him, and therefore stabbed him to the heart. Our corporal, who was pa.s.sing by, saw the deed, and of course attempted to seize him, and in the attempt received a severe wound. It is said, I know not with what truth, that Captain Finlaison is so hated here, on account of his activity against the slave trade, that none of his people are safe, and the death of the unfortunate man is attributed to that cause; but it appears to have been the result of a drunken quarrel. The town, however, appears to be in a sad disorderly state: besides our two men, a Brazilian officer was dangerously wounded in the dark, and three Brazilian soldiers and their corporal were found murdered last night.

Captain Graham had sent one of his officers to act for him on the occasion, and to apply through the British consul to the police magistrate, Francisco Jose Perreira, for redress.[74] He himself is sensibly worse since he exerted himself to attend to this painful business.

[Note 74: Mr. Pennell accordingly wrote to Mr. Perreira, stating the circ.u.mstance and also that the prisoner was taken. The magistrate a.s.sured him that he had laid his communication before the provisional government, and that the punishment directed by law should be inflicted, and the greatest sorrow was expressed by the junta for the accident.

Colonel Madera, commanding the active military police, also a.s.sured Mr.---- the lieutenant of the Doris, on his honour, that the a.s.sa.s.sin should be brought to trial. But it was not done while we remained in Brazil, and it is probable not at all. The political state of Bahia shortly afterwards would scarcely leave leisure for such a matter.]

The disorders of this climate are sadly enfeebling; they attack both mind and body, producing a painful sensitiveness to the slightest incident.

_November 18th._--Our invalids have been sadly disturbed by the rockets which have been fired, ever since sunrise, from the church of our Lady of Conception[75], whose feast is on the 8th of December. But the three Sundays previous to it the church and convent are adorned, sermons are preached, rockets are fired, contributions are made, and the shipping in the harbour fire salooes at sunrise, at noon, and at sunset. The annual expense of rockets, and other fireworks, is enormous. Those used in Brazil all come from the East Indies and China. Sometimes, when manufactured goods are unsaleable here, the merchant ships them on board a Portuguese East Indiaman, and gets in return fireworks, which never fail to pay well. I have seen a set of cut-gla.s.s sent to Calcutta for the purpose, or a girandole, too handsome for Brazilian purchasers.

[Note 75: One of the two parishes of the lower town.]

Yesterday the ship's pinnace, which had been absent five days with the master, my cousin Glennie, and young Grey, returned. They had gone to examine the river of Cachoeira, and came back highly delighted with their trip, though they had some very bad weather; however, with tarpaulines, cloaks, and a blanket or two, which I insisted on their taking, they managed so well as to have returned in good health.

Cachoeira, about fifty miles from Bahia, is a good town, where there is one English merchant resident. It is populous[76] and busy; for it is the place where the produce, chiefly cotton and tobacco, of a very considerable district, is collected, in order to be shipped for Bahia.

It is divided into two unequal parts, by the river Paraguazu. Its parish church is dedicated to our Lady of the Rosary. It has two convents, four chapels, an hospital, a fountain, and three stone bridges over the small rivers Pitanga and Caquende, on which there are very extensive sugar-works. There are wharfs on both sides of the river. The streets are well paved, and the houses built of stone, and tiled: the country is flat, but agreeable. The river is not navigable more than two miles above the town; it there narrows and becomes interrupted by rocks and rapids, and there is a wooden bridge across it. About five miles from Cachoeira, there is an insulated conical hill, called that of Conception, whence there often proceed noises like explosions. These noises are considered in this country as indicative of the existence of metals. Near this place a piece of native copper was found, weighing upwards of fifty-two arobas. It is now in the museum of Lisbon.

[Note 76: In 1804 it contained 1088 hearths.]

Our exploring party landed on several of the islands, on their way up the river, and were every where received with great hospitality, and delighted with the beauty and fertility of the country.

_22d._--At length all the invalids, excepting myself, are better; but, with another blister on, I can do little but write, or look from the cabin windows; and when I do look, I am sure to see something disagreeable. This very moment, there is a slave ship discharging her cargo, and the slaves are singing as they go ash.o.r.e. They have left the ship, and they see they will be on the dry land; and so, at the command of their keeper, they are singing one of their country songs, in a strange land. Poor wretches! could they foresee the slave-market, and the separations of friends and relations that will take place there, and the march up the country, and the labour of the mines, and the sugar-works, their singing would be a wailing cry. But that "blindness to the future kindly given," allows them a few hours of sad enjoyment.

This is the princ.i.p.al slave port in Brazil; and the negroes appear to me to be of a finer, stronger race, than any I have ever seen. One of the provisional junta of government is the greatest slave merchant here.

Yet, I am happy to say, the Bahia press has lately actually printed a pamphlet against the slave trade. Within the last year, seventy-six ships have sailed from this port for the coast of Africa; and it is well known that many of them will slave to the northward of the line, in spite of all treaties to the contrary: but the system of false papers is so cunningly and generally carried on, that detection is far from easy; and the difficulties that lie in the way of condemning any slave ship, render it a matter of hazard to detain them. An owner, however, is well satisfied, if one cargo in three arrives safe; and eight or nine successful voyages make a fortune. Many Brazilian Portuguese have no occupation whatever: they lay out a sum of money in slaves; which slaves are ordered out every day, and must bring in a certain sum each night; and these are the boatmen, chairmen, porters, and weavers of mats and hats that are to be hired in the streets and markets, and who thus support their masters.

_24th._--Yesterday the Morgiana sailed for Pernambuco, whence she will return to the coast of Africa. To-day the Antigone French frigate, commanded by Captain Villeneuve, nephew to the admiral of that name who was at Trafalgar, came in. Whenever France and England are not at war, the French and English certainly seek each other, and like each other more than any other two nations: and yet they seem like two great heads of parties, and the other nations take the French and English sides, as if there were no cause of opposition but theirs. Others may account for the fact, I am satisfied that it is so; and that whenever we meet a Frenchman in time of peace, in a distant country, it is something akin to the pleasure of seeing a countryman; and it is particularly the case with French naval men. Frequent intercourse of any kind, even that of war, begets a similarity of habits, manners, and ideas; so I suppose we have grown alike by fighting, and are all the more likely to fight again.

There is a report, but I believe not well founded, that placards are stuck up about the city threatening that all Europeans, especially Portuguese, who do not leave the place before the 24th of December, shall be ma.s.sacred. I listen to these things, because reports, even when false, indicate something of the spirit of the times.

_December 8th._--This place is now so quiet that the merchants feel quite safe, and therefore we are leaving Bahia. I have taken leave of many hospitable persons who have shown us much attention; but my health is so indifferent, that but for the sake of that civility which I felt due to them, I should not have gone ash.o.r.e again: however, it is all done, and we are in the act of getting under weigh.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

_9th._--As we sailed out of the bay, we amused ourselves with conjecturing the possible situation of Robinson Crusoe's plantation in the bay of All Saints. Those who had been at Cachoeira chose that it should be in that direction; while such as had been confined to the neighbourhood of the city pitched on different sitios, all or any of which might have answered the purpose. There is a charm in Defoe's works that one hardly finds, excepting in the Pilgrim's Progress. The language is so homely, that one is not aware of the poetical cast of the thoughts; and both together form such a reality, that the parable and the romance alike remain fixed on the mind like truth. And what is truth? Surely not the mere outward acts of vulgar life; but rather the moral and intellectual perceptions by which our judgment, and actions, and motives, are directed. Then, are the wanderings of Christiana and Mercy, and the sufferings of the shipwrecked mariner, true in the right sense of the word truth? True as the lofty creations of Milton, and the embodied visions of Michael Angelo; because they have their basis and their home in the heart, and soul, and understanding of man.

But we are once more upon the ocean, and our young people are again observing the stars, and measuring the distances of the planets. I grieve that one of the most promising of them is now an inmate in my cabin, in a very delicate state of health.

_12th._--Yesterday we found soundings, which indicated the neighbourhood of the Abrolhos, and lay-to all night, that we might ascertain the exact position of those dangerous shoals; which, at the distance of three leagues, bearing N. W. by W., appeared like one long ragged island to the westward, and two smaller very low to the east.

The banks extend very far out to the eastward. There is a deep pa.s.sage between them and the mainland. With a little attention, a most profitable fishery might be established here.

_Rio de Janeiro, Sat.u.r.day, December 15th, 1821_.--Nothing that I have ever seen is comparable in beauty to this bay. Naples, the Firth of Forth, Bombay harbour, and Trincomalee, each of which I thought perfect in their beauty, all must yield to this, which surpa.s.ses each in its different way. Lofty mountains, rocks of cl.u.s.tered columns, luxuriant wood, bright flowery islands, green banks, all mixed with white buildings; each little eminence crowned with its church or fort; ships at anchor or in motion; and innumerable boats flitting about in such a delicious climate,--combine to render Rio de Janeiro the most enchanting scene that imagination can conceive. We anch.o.r.ed first close to a small island, called Villegagnon, about two miles from the entrance of the harbour. That island, however small, was the site of the first colony founded by the Frenchman Villegagnon, under the patronage of Coligny, whom he betrayed. The admiral had intended it as a refuge for the persecuted Hugonots; but when Villegagnon had, by his means, formed the settlement, he began to persecute them also: the colony fell into decay, and became an easy conquest to Mem de Sa, the Portuguese captain-general of Brazil.[77]

[Note 77: See Introduction, p. 15.]

We moved from this station to one more commodious nearer the town, and higher up the harbour, towards the afternoon, which soon became so rainy, that I gave up all hopes of getting ash.o.r.e. I was really disappointed to find that my excellent friend, the Hon. Capt. S. had left the station with his frigate before we arrived; I had, however, the pleasure of receiving a kind letter from him, and he had left me a copy of the great Spanish dictionary. n.o.body that has always lived at home, can tell the value of a kindness like this in a foreign land.

_Sunday, 16th_.--I had the pleasure of seeing on board Mr. W. May, who has long been a resident in Brazil, and with whom I had spent many happy hours in early life. The pleasure such meetings give is of the purest and wholesomest nature. It quiets the pa.s.sions by its own tranquillity; and, in recalling all the innocent and amiable feelings of youth, makes us almost forget those harsher emotions which intercourse with the world, and the operation of interest, pa.s.sion, or suffering have raised.

_Monday, 17th_.--By the a.s.sistance of some friends ash.o.r.e, we have procured a comfortable house in one of the suburbs of Rio, called the Catete, from the name of a little river which runs through it into the sea. To this house I have brought my poor suffering midshipman, Langford; and trust that free air, moderate exercise, and a milk diet, will restore him. We have been visited by several persons, who all appear hospitable and kind, particularly the acting consul-general, Col.

Cunningham, and his lady.

_December 18th_.--I have begun house-keeping on sh.o.r.e. We find vegetables and poultry very good, but not cheap; fruit is very good and cheap; butcher's meat cheap, but very bad: there is a monopolist butcher, and no person may even kill an animal for his own use without permission paid for from that person; consequently, as there is no compet.i.tion, he supplies the market as he pleases.[78] The beef is so bad, that it can hardly be used even for soup meat, three days out of four; and that supplied to the ships is at least as bad: mutton is scarce and bad: pork very good and fine; it is fed princ.i.p.ally on mandioc and maize, near the town; that from a distance has the advantage of sugar cane. Fish is not so plentiful as it ought to be, considering the abundance that there is on the whole coast, but it is extremely good; oysters, prawns, and crabs are as good as in any part of the world. The wheaten bread used in Rio is chiefly made of American flour, and is, generally speaking, exceedingly good. Neither the captaincy of Rio, nor those to the north, produce wheat; but in the high lands of St.

Paul's, and the Minas Geraes, and in the southern provinces, a good deal is cultivated, and with great success. The great article of food here is the mandioc meal, or farinha; it is made into thin broad cakes as a delicacy, but the usual mode of eating it is dry: when at the tables of the rich, it is used with every dish of which they eat, as we take bread; with the poor, it has every form--porridge, brose, bread; and no meal is complete without it: next to mandioc, the feijoam or dry kidney-bean, dressed in every possible way, but most frequently stewed with a small bit of pork, garlic, salt, and pimento, is the favourite food; and for dainties, from the n.o.ble to the slave, sweetmeats of every description, from the most delicate preserves and candies to the coa.r.s.est preparations of treacle, are swallowed wholesale.