86 



NOTES ON BRAZIL. 



thick and light, but not strong, and can serve only for small vessels, and 

 in mild waters. The demand for labourers on shore has also produced 

 among sailors a spirit of desertion, from a service, into which most of 

 them have been compelled to enter, and which they cordially dislike. 

 Notwithstanding there is near the Custom-house a small place filled with 

 jackets, and hammocks, and lanterns, there is not a sufficiency of these 

 things to supply a frigate ; nor can this little store be considered as any 

 bar to the general conclusion, that it is hardly possible a Colony should be 

 more destitute than this is, of every article, Avhich is essential to the 

 prosperity of shipping.- 



Over this paltry Storehouse, is an apartment called the Treasury, of 

 which I am told that a more impoverished place of the kind never 

 existed. JNIy informants added, that it is indebted to public servants 

 and private individuals, beyond what it can possibly discharge, and 

 that neither the army nor navy has received its pay for several months. 



By such a state of things the spirits of the people must, of necessity, 

 be greatly affected ; there is produced by it, beyond this, a sort of habi- 

 tual imbecility. At the same time that they seem much disposed to 

 pride themselves in the changes which have taken place in their circum- 

 stances and relations, and are filled with no small astonishment at their 

 own magnificence, and the degree in which strangers minister to it * an 

 alarm prevails among them at what they reckon the extravagance of the 

 Court, supported by a comparison of the present demands upon the 

 Treasury with what they formerly were. There even appeared a consi- 

 derable degree of indecision, whether they should support the Sovereign, 

 or demand their antiquated rights. Such a compHcated state of the 

 public mind may account, in some measure, for the panic, which pre- 

 vailed, when, in November, 1808, a French flag appeared off the 

 harbour, though there was only one vessel in sight, and she manifested 

 no hostile disposition. It is true, the alarm did not extend to the naval 

 or military department, much less to the Government ; but the people 

 were full of anxiety, and showed what might be expected from them, 

 in case of a serious attack. The ship proved to be a cartel, with prisoners 

 from the Isle of France. 



