The town of St. Joze, which took the Lady of O. for its patroness, is in a state of mediocrity, agreeably and well situated. Mipibu was its first name, and it is nearly thirty miles south of the capital, fifteen from the ocean, and three from the lake Groahyras. The inhabitants are agricultural Indians and whites.
About four miles from it is the small povoaçao of Papary, near the lake of Groahyras, with a chapel of Our Lady of O. and inhabited by whites, who are employed in fishing.
About two hundred and fifty miles to the east-north-east of Cape St. Roque is the island of Fernando de Noronha, discovered by a Portuguese of that name, being ten miles long, of proportionate width, generally mountainous and stony, with so few and such small portions of land susceptible of cultivation, that it could not maintain a diminutive colony. In order to impede a contraband trade with foreign nations, a detachment is maintained here, supplied and annually exchanged from Pernambuco. Some criminals are sent here to pass the period of their degradation, who cultivate a small portion of mandioca, with some fruits from the continent, and breed some cattle, sheep, and goats. The rigid prohibition by the government of the entrance, till recently, of any female to this island with the colony, is a circumstance highly discreditable to their policy. A brother-in-law of General Rego returned from the government of this island when I was at Pernambuco, and from him I understood that females were now admitted into the colony. Rats are here exceedingly numerous, also the rolla bird. There are a great number of wild mountain cats, descended from those which had fled from the houses; they carry on a continued warfare against the rolla. It has good water, and eight or ten small forts, destined to defend those places where a disembarkation might be effected. In the year 1738 King John V. ordered these fortifications to be constructed, after the expulsion of the pirates who had established themselves here. Ships falling short of water occasionally visit this place for a supply.
To the north, and separated from it by a narrow channel, is the island of Ratos, (Rats,) three miles long, less stony, and more woody than the other, and where the degradados have formed plantations of the cotton tree. It is remarked that the animals from which this island derives its name did not exist here some few years ago. In the channel there is a hollow stone, where the sea bursts forth with a loud noise.
CHAP. XX.
PROVINCE OF SIARA.
Colonization—Boundaries—Indians—Taken by the Dutch—Restored—Mountains—Mineralogy—Zoology—Phytology—Rivers and Lakes—Povoaçoes.
It is not recorded whether the territory of this province had any other donatories besides the unfortunate Joam de Barros and Luis de Mello, nor is the precise epoch known of the foundation of the prezidios, or garrisons, from which commenced the colonization that existed upon the coast in 1603, when Captain Pedro Coelho de Souza, arrived there by orders of the governor of the state, with eighty Portuguese and eight hundred Indians, in various caravels, for the purpose of destroying the alliance Mons. Bombille, a Frenchman, had formed with the celebrated Mel Redondo, principal chief of the Serra Hibiapaba, from which considerable injury resulted to the prezidios. He received some people from them to enable him the better to execute the project, which he accomplished by subjecting this Indian to the Portuguese crown. On his return, Pedro Coelho entered the river Jaguaribe, merely with the intention of making some observations; but discovering a great number of advantages which it presented, he determined to commence a city there with his party: and having ordered his family to join him from Parahiba, he continued occupied in the foundation of the colony with the name of Nova Lisboa, (New Lisbon;) but shortly afterwards he was obliged by the Indians to desist from the undertaking, and returned to Parahiba.
Duarthe d’Albuquerque Coelho, writer of the war of Pernambuco, where he was donatory, affirms from ocular testimony, that Martim Soares Moreno, who belonged to the principal prezidio of Siara, came in the year 1631, to succour him against the Dutch, with an auxiliary force of Indians, in whose language he was well versed, and was named the first governor of that prezidio by the King: it being also certain that he commanded it in 1613, when, leaving in his place Estevam de Campos, he accompanied Jeronymo d’Albuquerque in the first attempt against the French who were established in the island of Maranham; but it does not appear whether he was the commandant or not at the period when Capt. Pedro Coelho arrived there. The district, however, was colonized very slowly, in consequence of the deficiency of good ports, and those advantages calculated to attract a numerous colony.
This province, which took the name of one of its small rivers, in consequence of the first establishment being founded near its embouchure, is confined on the north by the ocean, on the south by the cordillera of Ararippe or Cayriris, which divides it from that of Pernambuco, on the east by the provinces of Rio Grande and Parahiba, and on the west by that of Piauhy, from which it is separated by the Hibiapaba serra. It is computed to be about three hundred miles at its greatest length and width.
The whole was principally in the power of the numerous nation of Potiguaras, (although there were the Guanacas and Jaguaruannas,) divided into various hordes. The main part of them were Christianized by the exertions of the Jesuits, for which purpose they had an hospicio in Aquiraz, whose ruins are now called Collegio. The first catechists of this people were two Capuchin missionaries left here by Frey Christovam, from Lisbon, the first friar of Para, at the entreaties of Martim Soares Moreno.