742 NIEUHOFF S BRAZIL. 



ment of their debts, at certain limited times, and that at the rate of one per cent, 

 intereft per month only, all pretenfions and occafions of a revolt were thereby re- 

 moved, at leaft for that time ; the firft term of payment being fet out for a confider- 

 able time. 



To make this the more evident, thefe following heads deferve our particular obfer- 

 vation : that the company and the merchants, being creditors of the mafters of the 

 fugar-mills, endeavouring at the fame time to force them to the payment of their debts, 

 by executions: this occafioned, from the year 1647, '° ^^^ ^™*^ ^^ ^^^ making of 

 thofe contracts, fuch a confulion, as mufl needs have tended to the total deftrudion of 

 the fugar-mills, and, consequently, of the merchants and company ; which induced 

 them to apply themfelves to the great council, to find out fome means, by way of dif- 

 count, or otherwife, to put thefe debts into the company's hands. 



The counfellors of juftice did not, at firft, agree in all points to thefe propofals, but 

 at their meeting on the 1 2th of Auguft 1 644, being better convinced of the matter, 

 and that the company was fufEciently fecured and benefited th^ereby, the next following 

 day did not only approve of the fame, but alfo were of opinion, that fome things might 

 be rather mitigated for the advantage of the mafters of mills and their creditors, than 

 not to relieve them at this juncture ; fo that the conditions were, the loth of November 

 1644, agreed unto with the confent of the counfellors of the court of juftice and the 

 finances. 



Purfuant to thefe, the great council took care that public notice fliould be given of 

 thefe agreements made betwixt the company and certain private perfons, by which every 

 one was forewarned not to fell any thing upon credit to them, without the confent of 

 the great council ; and their creditors fummoned to make good their debts within three 

 weeks time, or elfe to be excluded from the benefit of the contradt, till after the time 

 therein limited was expired. From all which, it is fufficiently demonftrable, with how 

 little appearance of truth fome have attempted to infinuate, that thefe contrafts were 

 prejudicial to the company, and had given no fmall occafion to the enfuing revolt of 

 the Portuguefe ; when it is beyond all queftion, from what has been faid before, that 

 thefe were the only means to prevent thofe calamities, wherewith the mafters of the 

 fugar-mills, and the farmers or country -planters, were overwhelmed all at that time, 

 who were forced to let their mills ftand ftill, and leave the ground uncultivated ; all 

 which, as it tended to the utter deftru6lion of the fugar-mills, fo the company fuftained 

 an irreparable lofs, viz. thirty-eight pounds per cent, yearly in Brazil, and thirty-feven 

 pounds per cent, in Holland, which being feventy-five pounds per cent., did altogether 

 arife from the ufe of the fugar-mills, 



Befides this, there were not a few of thofe merchants that were creditors of the 

 fugar-mills, that were confiderably indebted to the company, who pleaded infolvency, 

 by reafon of the non-payment of their debtors ; the company would have been con- 

 fiderable lofers by them, unlefs by this way of difcounting, they had found means to 

 recover thofe defperate debts. All which moved the great council to make a virtue of 

 neceflity, and, with the advice of the mafters of the fugar-mills and their creditors, 

 and the approbation of the council of Nineteen, to enter upon thofe articles ; which 

 could not be in anywife detrimental to the company ; though fome malicious perfons 

 have objedled againft them, that (fuppofing there had been no revolt) thefe mafters 

 would not, in twenty years, nay, perhaps never, have been in a condition to wrong the 

 company, what they had laid out upon their account ; when it is fufficiently known 

 that the great council never paid one farthing of ready-money for them on the account 

 of the company ; befides, that for the fatisfaftion of the company, twenty-five fugar- 

 mills were engaged, which, one with another, affording from two hundred and thirty 



to 



