34 cook's first voyage dec. 



so great, that the people who saw it from the cabin 

 windows thought the town had been on fire. 



The inhabitants, however, may pay their devotions 

 at the shrine of any saint in the calendar, without 

 waiting till there is a procession ; for before almost 

 every house there is a little cupboard, furnished with 

 a glass window, in which one of these tutelary powers 

 is waiting to be gracious ; and to prevent his being 

 out of mind, by being out of siglit, a lamp is kept 

 constantly burning before the window of his taber- 

 nacle in the night. The people, indeed, are by no 

 means remiss in their devotions, for before these 

 saints they pray and sing hymns with such vehemence, 

 that in the night they were very distinctly heard on 

 board the ship, though she lay at the distance of at 

 least half a mile from the town. 



The government here, as to its form, is mixed ; it 

 is notwithstanding very despotic in fact. It consists 

 of the Viceroy, the governor of the town, and a 

 council, the number of which I could not learn : 

 without the consent of this council, in which the 

 Viceroy has a casting vote, no judicial act should be 

 performed ; yet both the Viceroy and Governor fre- 

 quently commit persons to prison at their own plea- 

 sure, and sometimes send them to Lisbon, without 

 acquainting their friends or family with what is laid 

 to their charge, or where they may be found. 



To restrain the people from travelling into the 

 country, and getting into any district where gold or 

 diamonds may be found, of both which there is much 

 more than the government can otherwise secure, cer- 

 tain bounds are prescribed them, at the discretion of 

 the Viceroy, sometimes at a few, and sometimes at 

 many miles' distance from the city. On the verge of 

 these limits a guard constantly patroles, and whoever 

 is found beyond it, is immediately seized and thrown 

 into prison ; and if a man is, upon any pretence, 

 taken up by the guard without the limits, he will be 



