738 nieuhoff's brazil. 



offering confiderable abatements and rewards to fuch as would underhand furrender or 

 tranfport their efFeds ; and thofe divifions were not a little fomented by fome ill-minded 

 perfons, to the prejudice of the government ; many of thofe, who, either by unwarinefs 

 or other mifmanagement, loft their debts, laying the fault thereof at the door of the 

 Regency and of the courts of juftice, vainly imagining, that what they had loft by 

 their own neglect or want of care, ihould be made good by the public purfe ; efpeci- 

 ally if it happened fo, that the fame perfons were indebted to the company as well as 

 private perfons, there arife great contefts about the preference. 



The debts of the company did alfo increafe every day, which at laft amounted to 

 fome millions : for the dire£tors, which before the year 1 640 had the management of 

 affairs in Brazil, did fell moft of the confifcated eftates, fugar-mills, and merchandizes, 

 as well as the negroes bought on account of the company in Africk, upon credit, fo 

 that their books were filled with debts, but their cafh empty of money. The fucceed- 

 ing members of the great council, Melfrs. Hamel, Bulleftraet, and Kodde, did leave no 

 ftone unturned to correal this cuftom, and to fell their commodities for ready money, 

 or otherwife to exchange them for fugars, thereby to eafe the company in the great 

 charge they were forced to be at in their feveral expeditions ; and it is certain, that in 

 1640, 1 64 1, and 1642, they fent fuch vaft cargoes of fugar to Holland, that the like 

 had never been known before in Brazil. Notwithftanding which, by the vaft numbers 

 of negroes that were imported, after our conqueft of Angola, the company fell more 

 and more in debt, by reafon their debtors were very dilatory in their payments. The 

 council of Nineteen fent exprefs orders to remedy this evil, by felling the negroes lor 

 ready money, or exchanging them for fugar ; but this could not be put in praftice, be- 

 caufe there was nobody who would buy upon thofe conditions, fo that the price of the 

 negroes falling daily lower and lower, and thefe being a great burden to the company, 

 and fubjedt to diftempers and mortality, this order was fain to be revoked, unlefs they 

 would fee the negro-trade dwindle away into nothing ; for the inhabitants being for the 

 moft part fuch as had beftowed moft part of their fubftance in the fugar-mills, planta- 

 tions, and negroes, they could not pay ready money, but were forced to deal upon 

 credit, till they could reap the benefit of their labour. 



The members of the great council did therefore take all imaginable care to call upon 

 their debtors exaftly at the time of their fugar-harveft, and ordered their officers in the 

 country to feize upon fome of them on account of the company. 



From hence arofe nothing but law-fuits, fentences, executions, and imprifonments : 

 the members of the great council thinking it not below their ftation, to go fometimes 

 in perfon into the country to promote the payment of the debts owing to the company. 

 But this had a contrary effed, for the merchants and fadors began to be extremely difla- 

 tisfied, that the company fhould ieize upon the fugar in the mills, without letting them, 

 who were creditors as well as they, have their fhare in them. This occafioned not only 

 murmurings, but alfo threats and complaints to the council of Nineteen, where they 

 mifreprefented thefe tranfad:ions under the worft colours they could, hoping thereby to 

 deter the officers of the company from doing their duty. The great council having 

 taken the matter into mature deliberation, and fearing, not without reafon, that in time 

 it might occafion a general difcontent, they left no flone unturned to fatisfy the minds 

 of the people, by finding out means to have their debts fatisfied. It was propofed by 

 feveral underftanding perfons, that the company fhould undertake to fatisfy the debts of 

 private perfons, either by way of payment or exchange ; in lieu of which the mafters of 

 the fugar-mills fhould furrender to the company every year, the whole product of thefe 

 mills, till they had fatisfied all their debts. And to make the fame the more effeftual, 



I for 



