653 



gold-washings, 6600 kilogrammes, and in our 

 days, from 1817 to 1820, 600 kilogrammes less. 

 In the province of Saint Paul, the extraction of 

 gold has entirely ceased ; in that of Goyaz, it 

 was 803 kilogrammes in 1793, and in 1819 

 scarcely 75. In the province of Mato Grosso 

 it is almost nothing; and M. d'Eschwege thinks 

 that the whole produce of the gold of Brazil 

 does not amount at present, to more than 

 600,000 cruzades (scarcely 440 kilogrammes). 

 I dwell on these precise results, because, in con- 

 founding the different epochas of the riches and 

 poverty of the washings of Brazil, it is still 

 affirmed in all the works that treat of the com- 

 merce of precious metals, that a quantity of 

 gold equivalent to four millions of piastres, 

 that is 5800 kilogrammes of gold % flows into 



* The error is double, (Eschwege, Journal von Brasilien, 

 Vol. i, p. 218) j it is probable that Brazilian gold, paying the 

 quint, has not during forty years past, risen to 5500 kilo- 

 grammes. 1 heretofore shared this error with all the wri- 

 ters on political economy, in admitting, from a memoir of 

 M. Correa de Serra, otherwise highly instructive, that the 

 quint in 1810, was still (instead of 26 arrobas or 379 kil.) 

 51,200 Portugueze ounces, or 1433 kil. ; which supposed a 

 product of 7165 kil. (See my Pol. Essay, Vol. iii, p. 394. 

 Malte Brun, Geogr. Vol. v, p. 675. Lowe, present State of 

 England, 1822, p. 267.) The very exact information given 

 from two Portugueze manuscripts on the gold washings of 

 JMinas Geraes, Minas Novas, and Goyaz, in the Bullion Re- 

 port for the House of Commons, 1810, acc. p, *29, goes as far 



