Portalegre, at the mouth of the river Mucury, of which it originally had the name, is a small town, without any thing remarkable; but the extensive navigation of the river and the fertility of its surrounding lands promise it future augmentation. Its church is dedicated to St. Joze; and its inhabitants, besides other necessaries, produce and export a considerable quantity of farinha, with some flax of ticum, and timber. In its district there are minerals of iron. From this town, a road runs to Villa do Principe in Minas Geraes.
The town of St. Mattheus, without regularity, upon gently elevated ground, on the right margin, and fifteen miles above the bar of the river so called, does not yet exceed mediocrity, but is well supplied with fish and good water. Many circumstances, however, concur to warrant the expectation of its becoming flourishing, when the Indians are reduced. Its inhabitants hitherto respire air infected by the neighbouring swamps, which occasionally produce fevers, terminating sometimes in death. They cultivate feijao, rice, Indian corn, cotton, the sugar cane, and above all mandioca, the farinha of which is exported to a great extent. Many other branches of agriculture would flourish in this district, the fertility of which is perhaps unequalled, and not materially infested with ants. The water-melon is here excellent, and oranges and lemons are abundant.
Belmonte is a town situated in the angle of the mouth of the river, which took its name, and which injures it occasionally, at the period of the greatest floods. It was first an aldeia of Christian Indians, and consists of three streets, in a line, with houses generally of earth. The church is called Our Lady of Carmo, and the people are of all complexions.
On the margin of the river Doce, near the outlet of the lake Juparana, is the increasing aldeia of Linhares, to which a vicar was appointed in 1815, in consequence of its inhabitants becoming numerous. With the view of impeding the invasions of the savages, as well as commencing new povoaçoes, were recently established the detachments of Arcos, near the margin of the river Belmonte, above the great fall; Aveiro, upon the river St. Cruz; Aquiar, in the district of Villaverde; Linhares, on the river Frade; Cunha, on the Cramimuan; Vimieyro, on the Jucurucu; Obidos, in the district of Alcobaca; Caparica, upon the river Peruhype; Araujo, upon the Mucury; Itahunas, upon the Guaxindiba, which discharges itself four miles north of the St. Mattheus; and Galveas, above the town of St. Mattheus, upon the margin of the river of that name. All the parochials of this province are in the jurisdiction of the bishopric of Rio de Janeiro.
In front of the bar of the river Caravellas, and forty miles from the coast, are the islands of St. Barbara, generally known by the name of Abrolhos, four in number, and a short distance from each other; the largest and most easterly is two miles in length, and has some vegetation. Portions of a large shoal, which extends two hundred miles from east to west, in consequence of the dangers which they present to navigators, were called Abrolhos (“open the eyes.”) There is no water found upon these islands, and they are generally covered with marine birds. Upon these shoals the fishing of the garoupas is pursued, producing the next branch of exportation to farinha; this is a fish which does not exceed two palms in length, is very thick, of a green colour, without scales, has little bone, is very white, and is esteemed savory when fresh.
CHAP. XV.
PROVINCE OF BAHIA.
Boundaries—Caramuru—First Donatory—Cruel War of the Indians—The Capitania forsaken—Return of the Donatory—Shipwreck—Slaughter of all but Caramuru—Governor General—Foundation of St. Salvador.—Comarca of the Ilheos—Originally a Capitania—Extent—Fertility—Mountains—Mineralogy—Phytology—Zoology—Rivers and Lakes—Povoaçoes—Comarca of Jacobina—Extent—Mineralogy—Mountains—Rivers—Phytology—Zoology—Povoaçoes—Comarca of Bahia—Extent—Mountains—Mineralogy—Phytology—Zoology—Islands—Rivers—Povoaçoes—St. Salvador—Churches and Convents—Public Buildings—Sepulchre of Caramuru’s Wife—Negroes—Commerce—Produce—Exports in 1817 and 1818—State of Society—Adoption of a new Constitution.
This province, which comprehends almost all the territory of the ancient capitania of its name, with that of the Ilheos, is bounded on the north by the provinces of Seregippe d’el Rey and Pernambuco; on the south, by those of Porto Seguro and Minas Geraes; on the west, by the province of Pernambuco, from which it is separated by the St. Francisco; and on the east, by the Atlantic Ocean. It extends from 10° to 16° south latitude, comprising three hundred and fifty miles from north to south, and about two hundred and forty miles in width from the coast to the town of Urubu, situated upon the margin of the St. Francisco.
Tradition and history announce four remarkable events anterior to the foundation of the capital, from which the colonization of the province commenced:—the shipwreck of Diogo Alvez Correa, that of a Castilian ship, the disembarkation of its only donatory, Francisco Peyreyra Coutinho, and his unfortunate end. None of the writers on this subject have assigned any distinct epoch to those circumstances, and the discordancy which obtains amongst them veils their relations in obscurity. The Jesuit Vasconcellos was the first who published, one hundred and fifty years after their occurrence, the adventures of Diogo Alvez Correa, the Caramuru,[26] almost in the shape of a novel, and which subjects this portion of the early history of this province to incoherencies and doubts. The said Jesuit who asserted that he wrote from circumstantial documents, says he does not know whether the vessel of the shipwrecked Caramuru was proceeding to India or the capitania of St. Vincente, as he pretends that the latter was then in progress of colonization, by Martim Affonso de Souza, which, from concurring testimony, is an affirmation not founded in truth; Correa’s shipwreck having occurred in 1510, upwards of twenty years previous to that event; and the vessel was unquestionably either one of those included in the contract for Brazil wood, or in the progress of an exploration of the coast, and did not belong to any of the armaments destined for India.
The epoch of Correa’s shipwreck, who was a person of noble birth, and his being the first European settler at Bahia, is confirmed by the evidence of Herrera, who, in describing the misfortunes that attended the St. Pitta, one of two Spanish ships that sailed from St. Lucar, in September, 1534, (from which it would appear also, the shipwreck of the Spanish vessel before alluded to, happened in the year 1535,) says, “onde hallaron un Portuguez, que dixo, que avia veynte y cinco ãnos, que estava entre los Indios.”[27] A person now living at Porto Seguro has in his possession an ancient manuscript, which affirms that Gaspar de Lemos, on proceeding to Lisbon with despatches of Cabral’s new discovery, entered the river Ilheos and the Bay of All Saints; where some sailors went on shore, and were suddenly attacked by the Indians; that Diogo Alvez Correa, not having time to embark with his companions, fled to a place where he was soon found by those savages. This would make Correa the Caramuru’s residence near Bahia, to have commenced in 1500; but, as this circumstance is not alluded to in the authentic statements of Cabral’s expedition, it would still appear more probable that Correa was thrown amongst the Indians, in consequence of the shipwreck alluded to in 1510.