Travels in Brazil

by Henry Koster

My friend’s residence, in which I staid during my visit to Maranham, was situated by the water side, and almost within hail of the ships at anchor in the harbour. I was amused sometimes at the rapidity with which the fishermen paddled their canoes; these are long and of just width sufficient to allow of two men sitting abreast. I have seen in one of them as many as sixteen men in two rows, with each a paddle, which they move with quickness and great regularity. The last men upon the bench steer the canoe when necessary, placing the paddle so as to answer the purpose of a rudder; one or other of the two men steering, according to the direction which the vessel is to take. These fellows are mostly dark-coloured mulattos and blacks, and are entirely naked excepting the hats which they wear upon their heads; but when they come on shore, they partially cloath themselves. The print will give some idea of the strange appearance which they make. The nakedness of the negro slaves is also not sufficiently concealed; neither males nor females have any covering from the waist upwards, excepting on Sundays and holidays. Though the climate may not require any more cloathing, decency certainly does. I speak here of slaves who are at work in the streets, for the household servants are at least tolerably covered, and some of them are neatly and even gaudily dressed. At Pernambuco, the slaves are always decently cloathed. The criminals who are to be seen chained together, as at Pernambuco, are here more numerous; and in walking the streets, the clanking of the chains is continually striking the ear, reminding every man of the state of the government under which he resides. Such is the power of a governor, that a respectable person might be sentenced to this dreadful punishment, at least until redress could be obtained from the seat of the supreme government at Rio de Janeiro, a period of four months or more intervening.

I brought with me the horse which had carried me as far as Rio Grande on my journey to Searà, and took several rides in the neighbourhood of the city, with an English gentleman who was residing there. The roads are extremely bad, even in the immediate vicinity of St. Luiz, and our usual practice was to ride several times round the open piece of ground upon which the barracks stand. Maranham is again in this respect far behind the place I had lately left; the number of country houses is small; the paths are few, and no care is taken of them. Notwithstanding this, several persons have carriages, which are of a form similar to those used in Lisbon, and not unlike the cabriolets drawn by a pair of horses, which are to be seen in France and Flanders. The horses that may be purchased at St. Luiz are small, and few of them are well formed. Grass is scarce, and the inducements to take exercise on horseback are so few, that the number of these animals upon the island is not considerable; this too may be one cause why fine horses are not to be met with there; for if a ready sale was found for the beasts of this description, some would, doubtless, be carried from Piauhi to Maranham, which might be done with almost as little difficulty as is experienced in conveying many of them from the interior of Pernambuco to Recife.

An English gentleman with whom I was acquainted, arrived at Maranham, a short time after the opening of the trade to British shipping; he was riding in the vicinity of the city one afternoon, when he was accosted by an old woman, who said that she had heard of the arrival of an Englishman, and wished to know if it was true, as she was going to St. Luiz, and much desired to see this bicho or animal. After some further conversation upon the subject, he told her that the bicho she was speaking to, was the Englishman himself. Of the truth of this, some difficulty was found in persuading her; but when she was confident that it was so, she cried out, “Ai tam bonito,” O, how handsome. She expected to have been shown some horridly ugly beast, which it was dangerous to approach, and was consequently agreeably surprised to find that she was mistaken, and to see flesh and blood in human form, handsomely put together.

I nearly lost a number of books which I had brought with me; the box containing them was carried to the custom-house; they were taken out, and I was desired to translate each title-page, which I did. Though the works were chiefly historical, still I found that the officer who looked over them, was not inclined to let me have them, and a hint was given to me by one of my acquaintance, that they might be considered as irrecoverable; however I made immediately a petition to the governor, to be allowed to send them on board again; this was granted, and thus I regained possession. If I had delayed, I am almost certain that I should not have seen them again. Such are the difficulties which are experienced with books in the parts of Brazil which I visited, that the only resource which remains is that of smuggling them into the country[66]. I hope, however, that the enlightened minister who is now at the head of affairs, at Rio de Janeiro, will put an end to this dreadful bar to improvement.

I brought a letter from one of my acquaintance at Pernambuco to a gentleman who resided at Alcantara, a town on the opposite side of the bay of St. Marcos. My friend at St. Luiz, another young Portugueze, and myself, accompanied by two servants, agreed to hire a vessel and go over, for the purpose of making him a visit, and of seeing the place. We hired a small bark, and set sail one morning early, with a fair but light wind. The beauties of the bay are only to be seen in crossing it; the number of islands diversify the view every five minutes, from the discovery of some hidden point, or from a change in the form of the land, owing to the progress of the boat. The entrance into the harbour of Alcantara, the town itself, and the size of the vessel in which we were, reminded me much of the models of these realities. The place, the port, and our boat were all small, and of proportionate dimensions, having much the appearance of play-things. It was not like a small vessel entering a large harbour; for in our case, as there was but little water upon the bar, as much pilotage was necessary as with a large ship in coming to anchor at St. Luiz. We were about five hours in reaching the end of our voyage. The boatmen obtained for us a small cottage, near to the beach; we intended to be independent, and have our victuals cooked by our own servants; but soon after we were settled in our new habitation, the gentleman introduced himself to whom we were furnished with a letter. He said that he had heard of our arrival, and he insisted upon our removal to his house.

The town is built upon a semi-circular hill, and at first sight from the port is very pretty; but it falls short of its promise on a nearer examination. The houses are many of them of one story in height, and are built of stone; but the major part have only the ground floor. It extends back to some distance in a straggling manner, with gardens, and large spaces between each house; and many of the habitations in that situation are thatched, and some of them are out of repair. As the hill which rises from the water side is not high, and the land beyond rather declines in a contrary direction, the meaner part of the town is not seen at the first view. Alcantara is however a thriving place, and its importance increases rapidly as the lands in the neighbourhood are in request for cotton plantations. A handsome stone quay was building upon the inside of a neck of land, round which the harbour extends for small craft. The place contains a town-hall and prison, and several churches.

The evening we passed with our new friend and his partner, both of whom were pleasant men. The latter took us to a neighbouring church, to hear a famous preacher, and to see all the fashion and beauty of the place. It was much crowded, and therefore we saw little or nothing of the congregation; but the preacher, a large handsome Franciscan friar, with a fine toned and clear voice, delivered a very florid discourse, with much energy and animation. This man and one other were the only persons of those I heard preach in Brazil, who deviated from the common praises usually given to the Virgin and to the Saints. It was a good practical sermon, inculcating moral duties; but by way of conformity to established custom, he now and then mentioned the worthy in whose honour the festival was given[67]. The next day was agreeably passed in conversation; and in the evening two guitars were introduced, and some of the young men of the place came in, and added to the amusement of the party; they sang and played, and there was much sport. There was no ceremony; but the behaviour of these people was gentlemanly, and their conversation entertaining.

I heard here of a certain estate, of which the slaves were numerous, but they had become rebellious; more than one steward had been killed by them, and for some time they remained without any person to direct them, but still they did not leave the place. When things had gone on in this manner for some time, a native of Portugal presented himself to the proprietor of the estate, and offered to take charge of it if he would allow him a salary of one conto of reis, about 250l. annually (which is an enormous stipend); and if he would sign an agreement by which he should not become responsible for any slaves who might be killed in reducing the remainder to obedience. To all this no objection was made; and the man set off, accompanied by two other persons, his friends, and a guide, all of them being well provided with fire arms and ammunition. They arrived upon the scene of action one evening, and finding the door of the principal house open, took up their lodgings in it. In the morning, several of the negroes, on discovering the intentions of the persons who were in possession of the house, assembled in the area in front of it, but at some little distance. The new steward soon came to the door unarmed, not permitting his companions to appear, and called to one of the ring-leaders by name, as if nothing was amiss. The man answered and came out of the group, but said that he would not approach any nearer than the spot to which he had advanced. The steward made no reply, but quickly took a loaded musket, which stood immediately within the door, fired, and brought the man to the ground, and without delay, called to another of the slaves also by name. No answer being given, his companions came forwards, and all of them fired in among the slaves. Such was the effect of this summary manner of proceeding, that in two or three days all was quiet, and went on smoothly as had formerly been the case; a few only of the slaves absconding.

On our return from Alcantara we had a disagreeable passage, as the wind blew hard and some heavy rain fell, which made us apprehensive of not being able to fetch the harbour of St. Luiz. Our vessel had no cabin, but she was decked, and therefore as a matter of necessity we crept into the hold, in which we could not stand upright, and the bilge water occasionally reached our feet; but this produced much laughter, and we ultimately arrived in safety. Not far from the mouth of the port of Alcantara stands an island of three miles in length and about one in breadth, called the Ilha do Livramento; it is inhabited by one man and woman, who have under their care a chapel dedicated to Our Lady of Deliverance, which is visited by the inhabitants of the neighbouring shores, once every year for the purpose of celebrating by a festival this Invocation of the Virgin. My departure from Maranham sooner than I had purposed at first, prevented the fulfilment of my intention of landing and spending a day upon this spot. I know not what idea I might have formed of the island if I had more narrowly examined it, but the view I had of it at a distance was extremely beautiful. From what I heard of it, I think, that if any one was about to settle at Maranham, here it is that he should try to fix his residence.

I was introduced by my friend to a respectable family of St. Luiz. We made them a visit one evening without invitation as is the custom, and were ushered into a tolerably sized room, furnished with a large bed, and three handsomely worked hammocks, which were slung across in different directions; there were likewise in the apartment a chest of drawers and several chairs. The mistress of the house, an elderly lady, was seated in a hammock, and a female visitor in another, but her two daughters and some male relations sat upon chairs. The company, which consisted of two or three men besides ourselves, formed a semicircle towards the hammocks. There was much ceremony, and the conversation was carried on chiefly by the men, and an occasional remark was made by one or other of the old ladies. An answer was given by the daughters to a question asked, but no more, and some of the subjects touched upon would not have been tolerated in mixed society in England. A part of the formality might perhaps have worn off on further acquaintance. The education however of women is not attended to, which of necessity curtails the possibility of their entering into conversation upon many subjects, even if so to do was accounted proper. Still the ladies of St. Luiz cannot be said to be generally thus reserved, for gaming among both sexes is much practised, and is carried to great excess. A young lady in one instance, when going out with her mother to some evening company, passed through the apartment in which her father was at play with several of his acquaintance. He spoke to his daughter, asking her to take a card, which she did. She went on playing until she had lost three hundred mil reis, about 80l., and then said she had no more money. A fresh supply was afforded to her, and she accompanied her mother to their party, where most probably play was likewise the entertainment of the evening. Dancing is an amusement much too violent for the climate, and is only resorted to on some grand occasion. The love of gaming may be easily accounted for where there is little or no taste for reading, and great sums of money are amassed without any means of expending them. Living is cheap; a fine house, a carriage, and a number of servants may be had for a small sum. The opening of the trade has however given to these people a new turn of expenditure, in the facility of obtaining articles of dress and furniture.