^B 



58 



CRIMINALS. 



very bad state, little attention being paid to the 

 situation of their inhabitants. Executions are 

 rare at Pernambuco ; the more usual punish- 

 ment inflicted, even for crimes of the first mag- 

 nitude, is transportation to the coast of Africa. 

 White persons must be removed for trial to Ba- 

 hia, for crimes of which the punishment is 

 death. Even to pass sentence of death upon a 

 man of colour, or a negro, several judicial offi- 

 cers must be present. There does not exist 

 here a regular police ; when an arrest is to be 

 effected in Recife or its neighbourhood, two 

 officers of justice are accompanied by soldiers, 

 from one or other of the regiments of the line, 

 for this purpose. A ronda or patrole, consist- 

 ing of soldiers, parades the streets during the 

 night, at stated periods, but it is not of much 

 service to the town. Recife and its vicinity 

 were formerly in a very tranquil state, owing to 

 the exertions of one individual ; he was a ser- 

 geant in the regiment of Recife, a courageous 

 man, whose activity of mind and body had had 

 no field upon which to act, until he was em- 

 ployed in the arduous task of apprehending cri- 

 minals, and at last he received special orders 

 from the governor for patroling the streets of 



his escape in this manner, was the relation of a rich person 

 in the interior, who had either committed some crime, or 

 had been thus unjustly punished. 



