TRAVELS IN BRAZIL. 



199 



of Oiro Preto is precisely the richest in gold mines, but 

 the poorest in fruitful land, and was therefore abandoned 

 by many farmers. With double the population, Minas has 

 three and a half times as many negro slaves and nine times 

 as many free negroes as S. Paulo. 



Note 2. 



The fii'St discoverer of Minas Geraes appears to have 

 been Sebastiao Tourinho, of Porto Seguro, who, in the 

 year 1573, sailed up the river Doce and returned to the 

 coast along the Jequetinhonha. He was followed by Ant. 

 Dias Adorno and Marcos d'Azevedo for the purpose of 

 seeking the emeralds and sapphires (aqua-marines, green 

 tourmalines, and blue topazes ?). But this country became 

 more accurately and quickly known in the latter part of 

 the seventeenth century by means of the journeys by land, 

 which were undertaken by the Paulistas, not to carry away 

 the Indians as slaves, but to collect gold. Ant. Rodriguez, 

 of Taubate, in 1693, traversed the eastern part of the pro- 

 vince; Bueno, Miguel d' Almeida, in 1694, and Manoel 

 Garcia, in 1695, the districts of S. Joao d'El Rey, Sahara, 

 and Villa Rica. The Serro Frio was discovered by Arzao 

 and Antonio Soares, perhaps twenty years before. The 

 quantity of gold which these adventurers brought home 

 induced great numbers of native Brazilians, as well as Por- 

 tuguese, to emigrate to this new Eldorado. The land was 

 soon peopled ; Villa Rica and Mariana were declared villas 

 in 1711 ; S. Joao d'El Rey and Sahara, in the year 1712 ; 

 and Villa do Principe, in the year 1714. Since the year 

 1720 Minas has been a separate capitania, independent of 

 S. Paulo, to which it had before belonged ; and in the same 

 year it received a superintendant of the gold- washings. 

 Louren90 d' Almeida, the first governor-general, already 

 found the country a little peopled, and divided into four 

 comarcas. In the year 1818, Villa Rica was declared the 

 capital of Minas, in the same manner as Villa 3oa of 



o 4 



