Sugar is the principal product of Itaparica; but the greater part of the poultry, vegetables, and fruit, consumed in Bahia, are also from the island, and lime is made here in considerable quantities from the madrepores and corals found on the beach. This island used to furnish the neighbourhood with horses. When the English fleet and army stopped here, on the way to the Cape of Good Hope, the horses for the cavalry regiments were procured here. However, there is nothing remarkable in Itaparica but its fertility; the landscape is the same in character with that of Bahia, though in humbler style; but it is fresh and green, and pleasing. After dining in a palm-grove, and walking about till we were tired, we re-embarked to return; but the tide was unfavourable; we drifted among the rocks, where Coutinho, the first founder of the colony of Bahia, was wrecked and afterwards murdered by the natives, and we were in consequence four hours in returning home.
26th, 27th, 28th, passed in pleasant enough intercourse with our countrymen, though neither of us were well enough to go much on shore, therefore our friends came to us. There are eighteen English mercantile houses established at Bahia, two French, and two German. The English trade is principally carried on with Liverpool, which supplies manufactured goods and salt, in exchange for sugars, rums, tobaccos, cottons, very little coffee, and molasses. Lately, sugars have been shipped, on English account, for Hamburgh to a great extent, and I believe part of the returns are in German or Prussian woollen-cloths. The province of Bahia, by its neglect of manufactures, is quite dependent on commerce. But the distance from the sea of the province of Minas Geraes, has induced the inhabitants to weave not only enough coarse cotton cloths for home consumption, but even to become an article of trade with the other captaincies.
In the province of Esperitu Santo, cotton sail-cloth is made; but the chief trade of this place is slaving. This year no less than seventy-six slave-ships have sailed, without reckoning the smugglers in that line.
Sunday, 28th.—Mr. Pennell had kindly fixed to-day for giving us a party in the country, and accordingly some of our young people were to go and assist in putting up tents, &c.; but a miscalculation of tide and time, and a mistake as to the practicability of landing on part of the beach beyond the light-house, occasioned a variety of adventures and accidents, without which I have always heard no fête champêtre could be perfect. However that may be, our party was a pleasant one. Instead of the tents, we made use of a country-house called the Roça, where beauty of situation, and neatness in itself and garden, made up for whatever we might have thought romantic in the tents, had they been erected. It is the fashion to pave the courts of the country-houses here with dark pebbles, and to form in the pavement a sort of mosaic with milk-white shells. The gardens are laid out in alleys, something in the oriental taste. The millions of ants, which often in the course of a single night leave the best-clothed orange-tree bare both of leaves and flowers, render it necessary to surround each tree with a little stucco wall, or rather canal, in which there is water, till they are strong enough to recover if attacked by the ants. In the garden at Roça, every shrub of value, either for fruit or beauty, was so fenced, and there were seats, and water channels, and porcelain flower-pots, that made me almost think myself in the East. But there is a newness in every thing here, a want of interest on account of what has been, that is most sensibly felt. At most, we can only go back to the naked savage who devoured his prisoner, and adorned himself with bones and feathers here. In the East, imagination is at liberty to expatiate on past grandeur, wisdom, and politeness. Monuments of art and of science meet us at every step: here, every thing, nature herself, wears an air of newness, and the Europeans, so evidently foreign to the climate, and their African slaves, repugnant to every wholesome feeling, show too plainly that they are intruders, ever to be in harmony with the scene. However, Roça is beautiful, and all those grave thoughts did not prevent us from delighting in the fair prospect of
"Hill and valley, fountain and fresh shade;"
nor enjoying the scent of oleander, jasmine, tuberose, and rose, although they are adopted, not native children of the soil.
Of the Portuguese society here I know so very little, that it would be presumptuous to give an opinion of it. I have met with two or three well-informed men of the world, and some lively conversable women; but none of either sex that at all reminded me of the well-educated men and women of Europe. Here the state of general education is so low, that more than common talent and desire of knowledge is requisite to attain any; therefore the clever men are acute, and sometimes a little vain, feeling themselves so much above their fellow-citizens, and the portion of book-learning is small. Of those who read on political subjects, most are disciples of Voltaire, and they outgo his doctrines on politics, and equal his indecency as to religion; hence to sober people who have seen through the European revolutions, their discourses are sometimes disgusting. The Portuguese seldom dine with each other; when they do, it is on some great occasion, to justify a splendid feast: they meet every evening either at the play, or in private houses, and in the last case gamble very deeply. The English society is just such as one may expect. A few merchants, not of the first order, whose thoughts are engrossed by sugars and cottons, to the utter exclusion of all public; matters that do not bear directly on their private trade, and of all matters of general science or information. Not one knew the name of the plants around his own door; not one is acquainted with the country ten miles beyond St. Salvador's; not one could tell me even the situation of the fine red clay, of which the only manufacture, pottery, here is made: in short, I was completely out of patience with these incurious money-makers. I was perhaps unjust to my countrymen: I dare say there are many who could have told me these things, but I am sure none did tell me, and equally sure that I asked information of all I met with. But a woman is not, I believe, considered as privileged to know any thing by these commercial personages. The English are, however, hospitable and sociable among each other. They often dine together: the ladies love music and dancing, and some of the men gamble as much as the Portuguese. Upon the whole, society is at a low, very low scale here among the English. Good eating and good drinking they contrive, to have, for the flesh, fish, and fowl are good; fruits and vegetables various and excellent, and bread of the finest. Their slaves, for the English are all served by slaves, indeed, eat a sort of porridge of mandioc meal with small squares of jerked beef stirred into it, or, as their greatest luxury, stewed caravansas; and this is likewise the principal food of the lower classes even of the free inhabitants. In the fruit season, pumpkins, jackfruit, cocoa-nut, and melons, nearly take place of the mandioc. The huts of the poor are formed of upright poles, with branches of trees wattled between, and covered and lined either with cocoa-leaf mats, or clay; the roofs are also thatched. The better houses are built either of a fine blue stone, quarried on the beach of Victoria, or of brick. They are all white-washed: where the floor is not laid with wood, a fine red brick, six to nine inches square, and three in thickness, is used, and they are roofed with round red tiles. The houses are generally of one story high, with a room or two above by way of a look-out house. Under the house is generally a sort of cellar, in which the slaves live; and really I have sometimes wondered that human beings could exist in such.
Friday, 2d November.—Several of our people having yielded to the temptations of some worthless persons in the town, who induce sailors to desert in order that they themselves may profit by the premium given for the discovery of deserters, and having consequently swam on shore, the frigate has been moved up the harbour as far as Bom Fim, and it is intended to take her up still higher. I am glad of the opportunity of seeing more of this beautiful bay, and shall endeavour to land on the Ilha do Medo, or the point of Itaparica, where the first adventurers from Europe underwent hardship that appear hardly credible in our modern days. We also wish to examine the harbour within the funil or passage between the two islands, and into which the river or creek of Nazareth, which supplies Bahia with great part of the mandioc flour consumed there, runs.
Saturday, 3d November.—Our plan of proceeding farther up the harbour is suspended for the present. The disputes between the European Portuguese and the Brazilians in the city, seem to be about to come to a crisis. Early this morning, we learned that troops were assembling from all quarters, and that therefore it was advisable, for the protection of the British property and the persons of the merchants, that the ship should return to her station opposite to the town. The first provisional junta has lost several of its members, two of them being gone as delegates to Lisbon, and others being absent on account of ill health or disgust. The party opposing this junta talk loudly of independence, and wish at least one-half of the members of the provisional government to be native Brazilians. They also complain bitterly, that instead of redressing the evils they before endured, the junta has increased them by several arbitrary acts; and assert that one of the members who has a great grazing estate, has procured a monopoly, by which no man can supply the market with beef without his permission, so that the city is ill supplied. Such a ground of complaint will always excite popular indignation, and it appears now to be at its height. There has already been some skirmishing, in which, however, I hear there have been only three men killed. The Brazilian artillery occupies Fort San Pedro; the governor, and the wreck of the junta, have the town and the palace. The governor, indeed, has arrested several, I think seventeen persons, in an arbitrary manner; among these, two of my acquaintance, Colonel Salvador[72] and Mr. Soares, and have put them, some on board the Don Pedro, some on board transports in the bay, for the purpose of transporting them to Lisbon. Some of these persons are not permitted to have any communication with their families; others, more favoured, are allowed to carry them with them. These are not the means to conciliate. We have sent on shore to offer shelter to the ladies, and Captain Graham has agreed upon certain signals with the consul, in case of increased danger to his family.
Sunday, November 4th.—On looking out at daylight this morning, we saw artillery planted, and troops drawn up on the platform opposite to the opera house. I went on shore to see if Miss Pennell, her sister, or any of our other friends would come on board; but they naturally prefer staying to the last with their fathers and husbands. Notwithstanding the warlike movements of these last two days, it appears most likely that the chiefs of the opposite parties will agree to await the decision of the cortes at Lisbon, with respect to their grievances, and at least a temporary peace will succeed to this little disturbance.