566 



NOTES ON BRAZIL. 



A British Hospital had been established for many years, and placed 

 under excellent management. It seemed, in some few instances, to unite 

 the advantages of an Infirmary and a place of discipline ; some few, I 

 hope, went out from that house at once cured of their diseases, and 

 mended in their morals. 



As one of the smaller circumstances connected with public improve- 

 ment and with the Hospitals, it may be noted that the places of public 

 interment had been placed under better arrangement, the occurrence 

 of the former disgusting scenes was prevented, and the last offices were 

 performed with greater decency, and more privately. General attention 

 to the dead, and the places of their repose, is a strong indication, in any 

 country, that public manners are humanized : it may certainly be so 

 managed as to promote the best affections of the heart. 



Public justice, that basis of all good government, received a share 

 of attention, although the infamous practices of the lower Courts and 

 the inferior Judges remained unaltered. In one part of Brazil, at least, 

 this body of men had even publicly maintained that they possessed a 

 right to sell their sentences, and vindicated such a practice by alledging 

 that they had been appointed to their posts as places of emolument ; and 

 that the stipends which they received evidently could not be considered 

 as a remuneration of services, because the expenses which the Court 

 required of them exceeded the amount of salaries which it gave. 

 Nevertheless, in the higher departments, vexatious suits were discounte- 

 nanced, claims respecting disputed titles were held to have no vahdity 

 after sixty years undisturbed possession of an estate, and uncertain and 

 rigorous quit rents were abolished. Causes of minor consequence were 

 ordered to be decided by the Ouvidors of Comarcas, those of more 

 importance by the Governor of the Province in which they occurred, 

 and only those of the greatest weight by the Camaras, or Chambers in 

 Rio. So early as 1814 a judicial decision, which had been obtained by 

 a priest in a distant province, against a common soldier, was set aside 

 by the Regent, who thus showed to the people that the Church should 

 not always prevail in litigation. In criminal cases he brought oflFenders 

 more speedily to trial, and punished by degradation, public exposure. 



