TRAVELS,
&c. &c. &c.
[CHAPTER I.]
Voyage to Cadiz and thence to the Rio de la Plata. Adventures at Monte Video.—Character of the Inhabitants.—Trade.—Climate.—Geological Remarks.—Recent Changes.—Monte Video under the Portugueze.—Agriculture and Trade at the Rio de la Plata.
IN the year 1804, I was induced to undertake a voyage of commercial experiment, on a limited scale, to the Rio de la Plata. On my arrival at Monte Video, the ship and cargo were seized; I was thrown into prison, and afterwards sent into the interior, where I was detained until the taking of that place by the British troops under Sir Samuel Auchmuty. I afterwards obtained leave to accompany the army under General Whitelocke, which was sent against Buenos Ayres, and I rendered such services to the expedition, as my two years’ residence in the country enabled me to perform. At the termination of that expedition, I went to Rio de Janeiro. A letter of introduction to the Viceroy of Brazil, which was given me by the Portugueze Minister at London, gained me the notice and protection of his brother, the Condé de Linhares, who had then just arrived with the rest of the Court, and who recommended me to the Prince Regent, as a person devoted to mineralogical pursuits, and desirous of exploring the ample field for investigation which his rich and extensive territories presented. His Royal Highness was graciously pleased to further my views, not only by granting me letters to the public functionaries of the various places I wished to visit, but by ordering an escort of soldiers, and every other necessary provision for performing the journey. I had the more reason to be grateful for this munificent patronage, because I knew that a decree existed, prohibiting all foreigners from travelling in the interior of Brazil, and that no other Englishman had ever begun such an undertaking with those indispensible requisites to its success, the permission and sanction of the Government.
Observations, made, in the course of these Travels, on the country and its inhabitants, constitute the main part of the volume now offered to the public. Whatever be their faults or their merits, they relate to a subject at present extremely interesting, both in a political and a commercial point of view; they profess to develope the physical resources of a colony, which, through recent changes, is likely to become an empire; and in part, to portray the character of a nation which is now the most ancient, and has ever been the most faithful, ally of Great Britain.
As the recital of a voyage is proverbially tedious and superfluous, I shall forbear to trouble the reader with any detail of mine, and shall merely state, that, after encountering many difficulties at Cadiz, in consequence of the rupture with Spain, I sailed for the Plata, and having narrowly escaped shipwreck from a tremendous storm near the mouth of that river, entered the harbour of Monte Video.