m 



NOTES ON BRAZIL. 



spirits, and gave us a more pleasant evening than we had enjoyed for 

 a long time. 



Custom-house Officers were put on board at the Batteries, and the 

 next morning the vessel was brought up, in a masterly style to her 

 anchorage, close to the village of St. Pedro do Norte, and three 

 miles from the principal town ; the sand banks not permitting a nearer 

 approach. From the entrance of the river to the anchorage, through a 

 course of nine miles, the same obstructions prevail, leaving a narrow 

 intricate channel, with barely water sufficient for a deep-laden Brig. 

 About six miles up, on the left hand, is a large bay, still called the Bay 

 of Mangueira, though little of that plant remains on the neighbouring 

 swamps. In the bay, fishes of various sorts so abound, that afterwards 

 crossing it at a late hour, great numbers threw themselves over our 

 Canoa, in every direction, and some fell into it. A little higher up is 

 another broad inlet, navigable for Yatches of fifty tons, within which is 

 the fertile island of Marinheiros, containing some of the highest land, 

 and the best cultivated spots, in the neighbourhood. The soil is a red 

 clay, which shows that it was once attached to the Continent, and is of 

 older formation than the bay. It is celebrated for the production of 

 Onions, and of an article of higher value ; from hence, or from the island 

 of St\ Maria, the town is supplied with almost the only drinkable water 

 used within it. Beyond these islands, the water expands to a breadth of 

 more than ten miles, but is so very shallow that the practicable channel, 

 which runs near the Eastern Shore, is, in one part, not more than a 

 hundred jjards wide. Other islands, besides those which have been men^ 

 tioned, are scattered about this expanse of water, and communicate to it 

 some little ornament. The distance from the bar to the entrance of the 

 Lagoa dos Patos is about thirty miles ; the whole of which is, with 

 some impropriety, called the Rio Grand4 and considered as the harbour 

 of St. Pedro. Through this long course, the channel is hardly any where 

 more than twelve feet deep, the water often declining on the sides of it 

 to three feet, and in some places, to six inches ; so that three feet may 

 perhaps be nearly the average depth of the river. 



