316 



NOTES ON BRAZIL. 



stood at the head to do its honours. His daughter, apparently near 

 twenty, but with the manners of a laughing girl, had evidently never 

 before seen such a deviation from estabhshed customs, and brought in two 

 or three of her companions to wonder at the foreigners. Her fancy was 

 so tickled at the scene while we dined, that she was obliged to leave 

 the room ; nevertheless she and her father appeared to be the most 

 civilized beings in the place. 



For several miles along the road we had observed with regret, that 

 all travellers carried either a sword or a facam, an instrument much like 

 the coulter of a plough, brought to a sharpened edge, and if alone, every 

 one seemed anxious to join company. The weapon which they carry is 

 made in the Capitania of Esperito Santo, and is there very useful against 

 the native Indians. We engaged as an attendant, a very dark Mulatto, 

 a man of good repute, who agreed to accompany us, in the future part 

 of our journey, on foot. 



Having entered the lake at the Eastern end of the village, and ridden 

 through it for half a mile, the water being three feet deep, and the 

 bottom a hard sand, our guide struck into a flat sedgy country, which 

 we supposed to have been once covered with water. Though now nearly 

 filled with vegetable matter, the soil was still soft, and cattle wandering 

 upon it sunk in it to their knees. The road passed along a narrow elevated 

 bank, which looked as if it had formerly been a Restinga, but now 

 overgrown with herbage. There was within this another bank, which 

 bore marks of the same formation ; and on the side nearer the sea, a third 

 broader and higher than the two within it, but still naked ; and beyond 

 this, nature seems to be forming a fourth. 



After travelling several miles through an uninteresting country, the 

 fine expanse of Irudma opened to our view, and proved itself entitled to 

 its name. The stench arises from an accumulation of mud and putrid 

 shell fish. This water is improperly called a lake, because it communicates 

 with the sea to the Northward of Cape Frio. Its extent is nearly twenty 

 miles from East to West, and eight or nine across. The Northern 

 shore is skirted by hills, which, though low and gentle, may claim to b@ 



