The copy of the privileges from which the above has been extracted is passed in the name of John Bevan. I obtained it at Pernambuco as a curiosity. If the state of government in Brazil is considered, these privileges are absolutely necessary for the prevention of oppression; and even the privilege of wearing arms is not more than is requisite, because although the laws which prohibit Portugueze subjects from carrying arms ordain severe penalties, still scarcely any man in Brazil leaves his own home without some species of weapon; and the crime which is committed in so doing is too general to be punished.
(1) Mais em seu favor do que em odio.—What occasion is there for this? Impartiality is what is required.
(2) An officer of a rank somewhat superior.
(3) An officer of government can turn an unprivileged man out of his house by placing the letters P. R. upon his door.
(4) The officer into whose hands the property of orphans falls, and of those persons who die without heirs resident upon the spot. It is difficult to reclaim what has found its way into this office.
[265] Du Tertre, in speaking of a species of Karatas, which is to be found in the islands, “dans des deserts pierreux, où il ne se trouve guere d’eau douce,” says “les paysans travaillez de la soif y courent, parce que ces feüilles sont tellement disposés, qu’elles se ferment en bas comme un verre, où on trouve quelquefois une pinte d’eau fraische, claire et trés saine, et cela a sauvé la vie à plusieurs qui sans cela seroient morts de soif.”—Histoire des Antilles, tom. ii. p. 100.
I heard this mentioned frequently whilst I was in the Sertam; but at the time we were in want of water, we were not crossing any of those lands upon which the plant grows.—Transl.
[266] Bolingbroke says, that “it is a common thing to feed swine with pine-apples. My astonishment was increased when our conductor took us to a large trench fifty rood long, and twelve feet wide, which was absolutely filled up with pine-apples; they so completely overran the estate at one time, that he was obliged to root them up for the purpose of preventing their farther extension.”—Voyage to the Demerary, &c. p. 21.
Neither pigs nor pine-apples are to be found thus by wholesale in Pernambuco.—Transl.
Barrere says “La Pitte, qui est une espéce d’ananas, fournit encore une filasse d’un bon usage. Le fil en est plus fort et plus fin que la soye. Les Portugais en font des bas qui ne cedent en rien, dit-on, par leur bonté et par leur finesse aux bas de soye.”—Nouvelle Relation de la France Equinoxiale, p. 115.