The river St. Francisco, whose description we left off at the confluence of the Carinhenha, only receives from thence to its entrance into the ocean, five streams of any importance, namely, the Rans, the Parimirim, the Verde, on the right, the Correntes, one hundred miles below the first, and the Rio Grande, one hundred and forty lower on the left, continuing from thence northward, with many small windings, being of considerable width, and having many islands and some currents which do not impede navigation. Its margins are flat, and in some parts so low, that at the inundations, they are submerged for more than seven miles. Below the confluence of Rio Grande, its course bends towards the east, and then to the east-south-east, preserving the same width for a long way, to the aldeia of Vargem Redonda, where the navigation terminates from above, and the lateral lands begin to rise. Its channel gradually becomes narrower, and the current is rapidly impelled between blue and black rocks, to the small aldeia of Caninde, (the boundary of the navigation from the ocean,) which is seventy miles below the other. In this interval there are various large falls, of which the most interesting and famous is that of Paulo Affonso. Between these falls canoes navigate during the summer season. Through Caninde it continues to run between stony banks, thinly covered with soil and an impoverished vegetation, being one hundred fathoms in height, the width of the river not exceeding a sling’s throw for the distance of ten miles, to the mouth of the Jacare, where its elevated and rugged banks terminate. Its bed in this part is overspread with cleft reefs, appearing like the relics of a majestic sluice or dock.

Three leagues below is the small island of Ferro, where the margins begin to diminish in elevation, and the river to augment in width, exhibiting crowns of white sand, the resort of the ash-coloured and white heron, and where myriads of black diving birds assemble; forming themselves like a net, they encircle the fish in shoal places, not infested by the dreaded piranha fish. Here the sea-mew, and other aquatic birds, make their nests in small holes, their young being hatched by the heat of the sun.

Six leagues below the island of Ferro, is that of Oiro, also small, high, and rocky, crowned with a hermitage of Nossa Senhora of Prazeres. These are the only islands met with in the space of one hundred miles from Caninde to the town of Penedo, where the small range of hills that borders the left bank of the river terminates. Two miles below Villa Nova, the elevation of the right margin also has its bounds, and the river begins to divide its course, forming a great number of islands, generally low, and abounding with woods, giving them an agreeable aspect. They possess portions of fertile soil, where some rice, maize, mandioca, sugar, and hortulans, are cultivated. Some are sandy, others are composed of grey clay, with a bed of black above, about a foot in depth and above this another, of yellow earth, from three to four spans in thickness. The whole are submerged at the period of the overflowings of this great river. The cassia tree is here numerous, and extremely beautiful while blooming with its rosy flowers. It affords a sort of husky fruit, two spans in length, and of proportionable thickness, and abounds on both margins of the river for about thirty-five miles above the town of Penedo. This river, so deep in the interior of the continent, disembogues by two mouths of very unequal size; the principal one is on the north, being near two miles wide, with so little depth that the smacks can enter it only at high water, and there wait for the full tides to get out. The navigation from the falls, upwards, is performed in barks and ajojos, which are two or more canoes moored together with cross pieces of timber above. All produce descending the river below the falls is disembarked at Vargem Redonda, a district of the parish and julgado of Tacaratu, and transmitted on oxen to the port of Caninde, or Piranhas, which is two miles lower down. The navigation from hence to Penedo, is solely by the ajojos, and upwards always with a sail. The wind is favourable from eight o’clock of the day to the following morning’s dawn, but not without variation according to the age of the moon and the state of the weather; always increasing at evening, and frequently becoming quite calm before midnight. These craft descend always with a strong current, whilst there is no wind to produce an agitation of the water. When the breeze is high the current diminishes, and the river rises above a span. Fish is more abundant above the falls, which difference, the oldest men say originated in the extirpating system of fishing with what are called tapagens, a mode of enclosing them, and which was unjustly countenanced by the chief magistrates, who drew from this abuse considerable revenues, which disappeared without leaving to the public one signal of its expenditure. The most valuable fish of this river are the sorubin, which grows to the size of a man; the mandin, four feet in length, and proportionably thick, with large beards; the pira, two feet long; and the piranha, which is short and thick, with very sharp teeth, and fatal to all living creatures that come within its reach. None of these fish have scales. The camurin, with a white stripe on both sides; and the camurupin, are both thick and scaly.

The dogs, as if by a natural instinct, do not approach the waters that are muddy, but drink only at those parts where there is a current, from an innate dread of the piranhas, which lurk about with destructive intent in the dead waters.

The Correntes, which has a course of about one hundred and forty miles, issues from a lake, and runs first under the name of Formozo, receiving another river of the same name, and afterwards the Eguas, Guara, and Arrojado. It affords navigation for a considerable space, and disembogues into the St. Francisco ten miles below the chapel of Bom Jesus da Lappa. All the branches mentioned issue from the skirts or proximity of the serra of Paranan. Some run through auriferous countries, where mining has originated only a few years, and which has been the occasion of founding in the vicinity of the river Eguas a chapel of Our Lady of Glory, whose parish contained six hundred and eighty-four families, with one thousand nine hundred and ninety-eight adults, in the year 1809; many being breeders of cattle, others agriculturists.

The Rio Grande, whose original name is not known, and for which the present one was substituted, in consequence of the ridiculous and prevailing custom in the Brazil of designating many large rivers, of various districts, by the term of Rio Grande, (Large River,) thereby creating a confusion of names, has fifty leagues of course, and originates in the serra of Paranan, near the register of St. Domingos, about five leagues from the source of the Guara, a branch of the Correntes. After flowing a considerable way, the Mosquito joins it, and five leagues lower the Femeas, which rises fifteen miles from Serra Tabatinga; twelve miles further it is entered by the Ondas, which originates eight miles from the preceding, and nearer the Sobrado, an arm of the Tucantines, and runs rapidly through a gold and diamond country. Fifteen miles below, it receives the Branco, navigable to the situation of Tres Barras, so called in consequence of the union with it of the Riachao and the Janeiro, which enter in front of each other; seventy miles lower also on the left, the Preto joins, which is one of its largest tributaries, and rises in the skirts of the Serra Figuras, which is a continuation of that of Mangabeiro, from whence issue the other branches mentioned, excepting the Riachao. Its first name is the river of Doirados, and its current of clear water is rapidly impelled through a winding bed, edged with steep margins. It passes near the village of Formoza, which has a hermitage of Senhor do Bom Fim, and by the parish of St. Ritta, which is forty miles below the other, and the same distance above the mouth of the river. The Rio Grande, which enters the St. Francisco fifty miles below the confluence of the Preto, is navigable to the mouth of the Ondas, and without falls to the Branco, passes the parish of St. Anna de Campo Largo, which is thirty-five miles above the embouchure of the Preto; it is well stored with the sorubin, crumatan, large doirados, the piranha, piau, martrinchan, and other sorts of fish. Its water has a very different colour from the river which receives it, and remains unchanged for a considerable distance after entering the St. Francisco.

The towns of this ouvidoria are,

The town of Barra do Rio Grande is at the northern angle of the confluent which affords it the name, is in a state of mediocrity, well supplied with meat and fish, and has some commerce. The church is dedicated to St. Francisco das Chagas; and the number of its inhabitants is included in one thousand and thirty-six families. The passage of the St. Francisco, here a mile wide, is much frequented.

Pilao Arcado, created a town in 1810, is one hundred miles below the preceding, and is well situated near a small hill upon the margin of the St. Francisco, its only resource for water, and whose greatest inundations always visit it with some injury. The church, dedicated to St. Antonio, is new, and solidly built with bricks and lime. The houses are generally earth and wood, and many of them covered with straw. It has three hundred families, which are increasing, and, with those of its vast district, comprise five thousand inhabitants, who cultivate mandioca, maize, vegetables, good melons, and water-melons, upon the margins of the river. The land around it is generally wild and sterile, and alone appropriated to the breeding of cattle, which are subject to the horrible mortality, produced by frequent droughts. There are a great many small lakes, at various distances from the river, all more or less brackish, and upon whose margins the salt, formed by the ardent heat of the sun, appears like hoarfrost. The water of these lakes (and even soft water) filtered through a contiguous earth in wooden vessels, or leather finely perforated, and exposed on boards to the weather, in eight days of heat crystallizes, becoming salt as white as marine salt. Although in lands which have proprietors, they are, like auriferous soils, reputed common to all those who wish to benefit by them, and are a great resource for the poor, almost all the salt here produced is transmitted to the centre of Minas Geraes.