34 



RESIDENCE AT RIO DE JANEIRO. 



on the building of St. Sebastian (Rio de Janeiro), under Martim 

 Afonso, for the Indians, who had behaved very bravely in the various 

 actions with the French and the Tupinambas, their allies, and in their 

 expulsion. Since that time, the Jesuits have brought thither newly 

 converted Goaytacases to people the place again. The Indians now 

 residing there are consequently descended from that colony. 



After this digression, I return to the peaceful habitations of St. Lou- 

 renzo. The walls of the huts are constructed of lattice-work of staves, 

 the intervals being filled up with clay ; the roofs are covered with 

 leaves of the cocoa-palm. The furniture is very simple. Rush mats, 

 laid on rude tressels, supply the place of beds ; sleeping-nets, made 

 of cotton lines, which were used by them in former times, are still oc- 

 casionally seen. Both these kinds of beds have been adopted by the 

 lower classes of the Portuguese throughout all Brazil. Large pots, 

 called talha, in which water is kept constantly cool, are in use here, 

 as in the whole country : they are made of a porous clay, through 

 which the water slowly filters, and being condensed on the outside of 

 the vessel, keeps that within cool. To these vessels belongs the half 

 of a cocoa-nut shell, with a wooden handle fixed in it, to serve as a 

 ladle. Some earthen pots fpr cooking, called panellas; cuias, or 

 gourd shells, to be used as plates, with several trifling articles of 

 dress, and perhaps a gun, or a bow and arrows, for the chace, consti- 

 tute the rest of their furniture. 



All these people are partly supported by their plantations of man- 

 diocca and maize. Besides the above productions, which compose 

 the food of the inhabitants of Brazil of all nations, they plant pimento 

 trees, and various kinds of capsicum ; and bushes of ricinus, called 

 carrapato in Pernambuco, with its angular leaves, surround each ha- 

 bitation, and supply the family with an oil, obtained by crushing the 

 seeds. Our botanist, Mr. Sellow, found, near the habitations of the 

 Indians, a species of cress, growing wild, which in taste resembles that 



