Account of the riches of Rio-Janeiro.
Rio-Janeiro is the emporium and principal staple of the rich produce of the Brasils. The mines, which are called general, are the nearest to the city; being about seventy-five leagues distant. They annually bring in to the king, for his fifth part, at least one hundred and twelve arobas of gold; in 1762 they brought in a hundred and nineteen. Under the government of the general mines, are comprehended those of Rio das Mortes, of Sabara, and of Sero-frio. The last place, besides gold, produces all the diamonds that come from the Brasils. They are in the bed of a river; which is led aside, in order afterwards to separate the diamonds, topazes, chrysolites, and other stones of inferior goodness, from the pebbles, among which they ly.
Regulations for examining the mines.
All these stones, diamonds excepted, are not contraband: they belong to the possessors of the mines; but they are obliged to give a very exact account of the diamonds they find; and to put them into the hands of a surveyor[[50]], whom the king appoints for this purpose. |Mines of diamonds.| The surveyor immediately deposits them in a little casket, covered with plates of iron, and locked up by three locks. He has one of the keys, the viceroy the other, and the Provador de Hazienda Reale the third. This casket is inclosed in another, on which are the seals of the three persons above mentioned, and which contains the three keys to the first. The viceroy is not allowed to visit its contents; he only places the whole in a third coffer, which he sends to Lisbon, after putting his seal on it. It is opened in the king’s presence; he chooses the diamonds which he likes out of it; and pays their price to the possessors of the mines, according to a tariff settled in their charter.
The possessors of the mines pay the value of a Spanish piastre or dollar per day to his Most Faithful Majesty, for every slave sent out to seek diamonds; the number of these slaves amounts to eight hundred. Of all the contraband trades, that of diamonds is most severely punished. If the smuggler is poor, he loses his life; if his riches are sufficient to satisfy what the law exacts, besides the confiscation of the diamonds, he is condemned to pay double their value, to be imprisoned for one year, and then exiled for life to the coast of Africa. Notwithstanding this severity, the smuggling trade with diamonds, even of the most beautiful kind, is very extensive; so great is the hope and facility of hiding them, on account of the little room they take up.
Gold-mines.
All the gold which is got out of the mines cannot be sent to Rio Janeiro, without being previously brought into the houses, established in each district, where the part belonging to the crown is taken. What belongs to private persons is returned to them in wedges, with their weight, their number, and the king’s arms stamped upon them. All this gold is assayed by a person appointed for that purpose, and on each wedge or ingot, the alloy of the gold is marked, that it may afterwards be easy to bring them all to the same alloy for the coinage.
These ingots belonging to private persons are registered in the office of Praybuna, thirty leagues from Rio Janeiro. At this place is a captain, a lieutenant, and fifty men: there the tax of one fifth part is paid, and further, a poll-tax of a real and a half per head, of men, cattle, and beasts of burden. One half of the produce of this tax goes to the king, and the other is divided among the detachment, according to the rank. As it is impossible to come back from the mines without passing by this station, the soldiers always stop the passengers, and search them with the utmost rigour.
The private people are then obliged to bring all the ingots of gold which fall to their share, to the mint at Rio Janeiro, where they get the value of it in cash: this commonly consists of demi-doubloons, worth eight Spanish dollars. Upon each demi-doubloon, the king gets a piastre or dollar for the alloy, and for the coinage. The mint at Rio Janeiro is one of the finest buildings existing. It is furnished with all the conveniences necessary towards working with the greatest expedition. As the gold comes from the mines at the same time that the fleets come from Portugal, the coinage must be accelerated, and indeed they coin there with amazing quickness.
The arrival of these fleets, and especially of that from Lisbon, renders the commerce of Rio Janeiro very flourishing. The fleet from Porto is laden only with wines, brandy, vinegar, victuals, and some coarse cloths, manufactured in and about that town. As soon as the fleets arrive, all the goods they bring are conveyed to the custom-house, where they pay a duty of ten per cent to the king. It must be observed that the communication between the colony of Santo Sacramento and Buenos Ayres being entirely cut off at present, that duty must be considerably lessened; for the greater part of the most precious merchandizes which arrived from Europe were sent from Rio Janeiro to that colony, from whence they were smuggled through Buenos Ayres to Peru and Chili; and this contraband trade was worth a million and a half of piastres or dollars annually to the Portuguese. In short, the mines of the Brasils produce no silver, and all that which the Portuguese got, came from this smuggling trade. The negro trade was another immense object. The loss which the almost entire suppression of this branch of contraband trade occasions, cannot be calculated. This branch alone employed at least thirty coasting vessels between the Brasils and Rio de la Plata.