NOTES ON BRAZIL. 



509 



Englishman, but have been m this country several years; I hold an 

 office under government, which brings me to Villa Rica." " Where, 

 then, do you reside ?" " Beyond Tejuca, where I have obtained a grant 

 of land, through which runs a river full of gold and diainonds." " You 

 are very fortunate. Sir," I replied, looking at him with incredulous 

 wonder. His air and manners were partly British, partly foreign ; his 

 bald head was highly powdered; he wore a shabby loose coat, a still 

 shabbier cotton waistcoat, a dirty shirt, and torn neckcloth ; short black 

 breeches, cotton stockings, and Hessian boots, much too large for his 

 legs, brushed but not blacked, and barked for the want of it. To contem- 

 plate such a figure as the possessor of a " river full of gold and diamonds," 

 involved much of the ridiculous ; yet I gravely invited my countryman 

 to my lodgings, assuring him that I had yet a bottle of port wine, and 

 a few Paraguay segars, which were at his service. Such attractions were 

 irresistible ; he brought with him a young man from Goyaz ; and from 

 both I obtained much information respecting the Northern part of the 

 province of Minas Geraes, and the South of that adjoining. 



To a few of the inhabitants of Villa Rica, some of them members 

 of the church, others engaged in trade, I became greatly indebted for 

 such friendly attentions as are peculiarly acceptable to a stranger. My 

 judgment might be, in some measure, biassed by their kindness, but 

 they seemed to possess good hearts, and their manners were attractively 

 simple and warm. To me my friends appeared like exceptions from 

 the prevailing character, and to be, if I may borrow a sacred meta- 

 phor, the salt of the place. Few places, indeed, could stand more 

 in need of such a preservative. In the appearance and maimers of the 

 Villaricans in general, there is something very bad ; the greater part 

 of the population consists of blacks and mulattoes— a race of people who 

 show a mixture of blood from various fountains ; and, I am inclined to 

 believe, that by every admixture the human mind is debased- — that, 

 whatever the offspring gains by the superior intellect of one parent, is 

 perverted by the bad qualities which are derived from the other. Vice 

 can never appear so deformed, nor do so much mischief, as when 



