' NOTES ON BRAZIL. 321 



not treat of any bargain beyond the value of a few pounds. They were 

 rich in lands alone ; possessing few slaves, and the white people being 

 too much on an equality to serve each other. They displayed their impa- 

 tience of the slight restraint under which they were held, and their 

 eager desire to engage in smuggling transactions, more especially in the 

 line of dyeing woods. 



Our accommodations for the night were singularly good. The hut 

 at which we halted belonged to a great landholder, who sent us supplies 

 from his own house, and rode a couple of miles to witness our enjoyment 

 of them. In return we had to gratify his curiosity, nor did he leave us 

 until he had gone through the whole usual routine of questions, and 

 fancied himself completely informed as to who we were, whence we 

 came, what was our object, and what all others, supposed to be within 

 our range, were doing. When he was gone, we sate down to a well 

 cooked supper, served on a table. We also found bedsteads with wooden 

 bottoms and clean mats ; and though our bed-room was encumbered 

 with chests and harness, there was space enough to lie down and enjoy a 

 secure and pleasant repose. Our very beasts had their luxuries, were 

 placed beneath a shed, had cribs to hold their allowance, and those filled 

 with good grass. Who, in such a situation, could wish for more ? We 

 hoped, indeed, to carry our enjoyment beyond the period of our halt ; 

 but in vain. Aware that the next day's journey would be longer than 

 usual, and through uninhabited woods, we wished to provide a cold 

 fowl to eat on the way ; but a thing so monstrous was never heard of in 

 the land, and we were obliged to take up with some hard boiled eggs 

 and farinha. 



We advanced nearly Northward, soon entered the woods, and found 

 the soil, in the more elevated parts, a reddish yellow clay, and between 

 the hills, many small plains, which were formerly lakes, but now over- 

 grown with a sedgy vegetation. A few huts appeared in secluded situa- 

 tions, which were said to be the dwellings of a low race of people, who 

 hid themselves from notice in order to escape taxes and the military 

 service ; cultivated a little corn for their own use, and cut dyeing wood 



s s 



