825 nieuhoff's brazil, 



therein by c^^rtain perfons of our party, with whom they kept a fecret correipondency f 

 and though they were in the dark upon whom in particular to fix the intended treachery, 

 yet did ^hey think it conducing to the fafety of that fo important place, to remove 

 Captain Sluyter with his company from thence, and in their (lead to fend thither the 

 company commanded by Captain William Lambartz, and to intruft him with the 

 fupreme command of all their forces there, which was put in execution accordingly 

 the next day. The entrendiments round the church and the fort Orange were alfo 

 ordered to be ftrengthened with palifadoes ; and the firft (purfuant to the advice of 

 Garflman and Dortmund), I ordered to be furrounded with a counterfcarp, within the 

 compafs of which a company of Brazilians were lodged, with their wives and children, 

 and the reft to be employed in the defence of the fort Orange; fo the redoubt 

 which commanded the place, from which the fort was fupplied with water, was ordered 

 to be repaired againft a fudden attack, without which the fort could not long fubfift, 

 or hold out againft an enemy. 



Letters were about the fame time delivered to the council, dated the 5th of Odober, 

 by Major Auftin de Magethaes, fent by Andrew Vidal, to treat about the exchange of 

 prifoners; he told them, that fmce Admiral Serrao de Payva had by two feveral 

 letters folicited his releafement, he defired that the fame might be exchanged for other 

 foldiers, or be ranfomed by Antonio Telles de Sylva, governor of the Bahia. He 

 defired alfo that a cartel might be agreed upon for the exchange of the foldiers ; and 

 that in the meanwhile fuch of the Portuguefe inhabitants, as were prifoners with 

 us, might be releafed for reafonable ranfom, which was not accepted of by the 

 council. 



In the meanwhile (purfuant to the letters from the commander-in-chief of Rio 

 Grande, and John Hoek of the 6th of October;, Jacob Rabbi, with a fmall troop of 

 Tapoyers and Brazilians, in conjundlion with thirty Dutch inhabitants, made themfelves 

 mafters of the feat of John Leftan, with the flaughter of fifteen Portuguefe. But 

 they had not the fame fuccefs at Fernandez Menda*s houfe in the Potigi, which being 

 defended by fifty Portuguefe, they were repulfed with fome lofs. 



The enemies finding themfelves difappointed in their delign of gaining Parayba by 

 treachery, did again apply all their care to block up the avenues leading to the Receif, 

 in hopes of reducing it by famine. This occafioned many fkirmifbes, in which the 

 Brazilians, who got the greateft part of their provifion out of the country, did a 

 confiderable mifchief to the Portuguefe ; who for their greater fecurity built a fort in 

 Pernambuko (as they likewife did in the Vergea of Parayba) near the fugar-mill of 

 George Huomo Pinto, but flightly foi'tified, and not able to hold out againft any 

 vigorous attack. In Rio Grande the Tapoyers played the mafters over the Portuguefe ; 

 for as we told you before, that according to their cuftom they entered the faid captain- 

 ihip in July 1645, when being informed of the rebellion of the Portuguefe in Per- 

 nambuko, they out of an in-born hatred to that nation, attacked the 1 6th of July fome 

 of them in the fugar-mill of Kunhao, and killed every foul of them, the Dutch inha- 

 bitants thereabouts not being ftrong enough to prevent it. From thence the Tapoyers 

 marched to Monpobu, Goyana, and Potofi, places belonging likewife to Rio Grande, 

 where finding a body of Portuguefe entrenched with palifadoes in the nature of a 

 Palanka, they forced them, in conjundion with fome Brazilians, to furrender, under 

 condition that their lives fhould be faved, provided they did not give any further occa- 

 fion of difturbance. But fome of the Portuguefe flying afterwards into Parayba, the 

 Tapoyers looking upon this as a breach of the late treaty, did with the before-mentioned 

 Brazilians agree to put the reft to the fword wherever they met with them, which they 



did 



