580 



NOTES ON BRAZIL. 



Fiador, but he stood in a very different relation to the Creditor from that 

 which Bondsmen occupy among us. He could be compelled to pay only 

 after the Debtor had been declared, by the laws of the country, to be insol- 

 vent, and when the dividends from his effects had fallen short of one hun- 

 dred per cent. ; and there were many cases where the real estate both of the 

 Debtor and the Bondsman was so fenced by the laws as to be utterly 

 intangible by the Creditor. 



Under such circumstances, it is evident that a great deal of our early 

 business with Rio must have been done for ready money, until the con- 

 tents of the Merchants' Coffers were exhausted by the varied and multi- 

 plied demands for cash. Then it was, that people of a lower description, 

 of good character and industrious habits, learned the value of the opinion 

 which others entertained of them, were enabled to establish themselves 

 in the very line of their former masters, soon learned the important 

 rudiments of Commercial Knowledge, and, acquiring habits of confidence 

 and punctuality, opened connections with distant places upon new and 

 general principles. 



It was not wonderful that confidence was sometimes abused, that we 

 found it occasionally ill placed, and that bad people took advantage of 

 legal quibbles to defraud their Creditors. An attempt of this kind was 

 made in the early part of 1815, upon a scale and in a way which excited 

 public attention, and was frustrated in a singular mode. During the per-, 

 formance of a Comedy at the Theatre, one of the Actors happily introduced 

 the case, with a good deal of point, and produced through the house a 

 general sensation. Thus the parties found themselves unexpectedly held 

 up to the severity of public scorn ; their Store was forsaken ; the traders 

 of Rio received a lesson which they have not forgotten, and Creditors 

 obtained, in this instance, from the well-timed sarcasm of a Comedian, 

 what would have been never, or with difficulty, procured from the jus- 

 tice of the Magistrate. 



While these things were going on, the Bank of Brazil was estab- 

 lished upon the principle of subscriptions or responsibilities ; that is, 

 the Capital was to be divided into a certain number of Actions, and each 



