NOTES ON BRAZIL. 



to assemble, at the close of day, in large flocks ; but our pilot said that 

 they were Patos, a sort of diver, large, brown, and exceedingly nume- 

 rous on the coast. From these, it seems, came the Portuguese name of 

 the lake ; the Briizilian one is lost. 



A little after midnight we landed on a fine beach, skirted with thick 

 brushwood ; when, having agreed upon the necessary signals, we sepa- 

 rated in search of a habitation, which, we believed, lay at no great 

 distance. An hour brought us together again at the desired point ; it 

 was a mere hovel, where hides and tallow were stored, in which, to drive 

 away musquitoes, a fire had been kept burning on the ground. The 

 smoke proving offensive, the people civilly extinguished this light, and 

 fabricated another with a lump of tallow, placed on a flat dish, in ^vhich 

 they stuck the husk of Indian corn for a wick ; a contrivance whose 

 simplicity pleased me, and which answered its purpose well. We saw 

 no furniture, except a cup or two made from the shell of Gourds, but 

 slept soundly on hides spread upon the earthen-floor. 



The view which presented itself, when we turned out, at a late hour 

 in the morning, was pleasant. We were on the extreme Eastern point 

 of Cangazu ; before us was a round island, over which the opposite 

 coast of the Bay showed itself; a flat country, much intersected with 

 water, stretched away to the West and South, as far as the eye could 

 discern ; and towards the North and North- West ah expanse of water 

 like the ocean. Very near lay a Smack of a hundred and fifty tons 

 burthen, bound to Rio de Janeiro, taking in two bullocks as sea-store. 

 The channel ran close to this point of the island, and she was riding in 

 seven fathoms water. 



While taking our breakfast, which, though served in the simplest 

 way, consisted of milk drawn from the udder of a cow, standing with 

 her calf close beside us, together with coffee and hard baked bread ; the 

 owner of the island arrived, whose approach had been announced by a 

 servant. He was a Major in the Mihtia, a stout handsome man, dressed 

 in a cotton jacket and waistcoat, dimity trowsers, Hessian boots, and a 

 large straw hat of home manufacture, with a hanger suspended at his 



