86 POLITICAL STATE OP BRAZIL. 
which are open to the public, and where causes are decided on 
appeal by a majority of the judges. 
These tribunals are, first, the Relacao, of which there are two 
branches, one at Rio and the other at Bahia, each composed of eight 
judges. Second, the Supreme Tribunal of Justice, of twelve judges. 
The inferior courts are those for the trial of civil and criminal cases, 
an Orphans' Court, and a Court and Judge of Findings and Losings, 
the last of which is not yet abolished, however obsolete it may have 
become. Great corruption exists in them all, and no class of people 
are so unpopular as the judges. It is generally believed, and the 
belief is acted upon, that to obtain justice, all classes, including 
priests and laymen, lawyer and client, legislators and people, regents 
and ministers, must submit to great imposition; that it is next to 
impossible to recover a debt by law if a debtor has money or 
patronage, and refuses to pay, except through bribery. It is difficult 
to obtain the payment even of an acknowledged note of hand, 
through the process of the law, and it generally takes years to 
accomplish. 
It is, however, greatly to the praise of the Brazilians, that it is not 
often necessary to have recourse to law for this purpose. The 
greatest injustice occurs in the Orphans' Court; but the Court of 
Findings and Losings is one of the most singular in this respect. It 
takes charge of all things lost and found, making it the duty of a 
person finding any thing to deposit it with the judge. The loser, to 
prove property, must have three witnesses to swear that they saw 
him lose it, and three others, that they saw the finder pick it up, 
otherwise it remains in deposit. To show the working of this 
system, a gentleman of Rio found a bank note of four hundred 
milrees (about $250). The owner went to him and claimed it, 
proving satisfactorily to the finder that the identical bank note was 
his, upon which the finder gave it up. The Judge of Findings and 
Losings heard of the circumstance,' sent for him, and asked a state- 
ment of the case, which the finder unsuspectingly related. The 
judge praised his honourable conduct, and was punctiliously polite. 
The next day, however, he issued an order for the deposit of the 
money found, and because it was disregarded, the finder, a respect- 
able foreign merchant, w^as arrested in the street, and sent to prison, 
to be confined with common criminals. The jailer, however, having 
private apartments for those who could pay for them, he became his 
guest, and was preserved from the disgust of being a close prisoner, 
