Cabeza de Vacca had also made his adventurous overland journey from St. Catherine's, and after settling himself in the government of Assumption, had conducted various expeditions of discovery, always in hopes of finding an easy way to the gold countries. In one of these he found traces of the adventurer Garcia, a Portuguese, who, under the orders of Martim Affonso de Souza, had, with five companions, undertaken to explore the interior of South America. This man had by some means so conciliated the Indians, that he was followed by a very considerable army, and is said to have penetrated even into Tarija. He is believed to have perished by the hand of one of his own followers, but no particulars were ever known of his fate.
During the next ten years, nothing remarkable occurred with regard to Brazil, except the founding of the city of St. Salvador's, by Thome de Souza, the first Captain General of Brazil, who carried out with him the first Jesuit missionaries. For the site of his new town De Souza fixed upon the hill immediately above the deepest part of the harbour of Bahia, which is defended at the back by a deep lake, and lies about half a league from the Villa Velha of Coutinho and Caramuru.
The temporal concerns of the new colony, derived inestimable advantage from the friendship and assistance of the patriarch Caramuru: as to the spiritual, it was indeed time that some rule of faith and morals should find its way to Brazil. The settlers had hitherto had no instructors but friars, whose manners were as dissolute as their own, and who encouraged in them a licentious depravity, scarcely less shocking than the cannibalism of the savages. These latter are said to have eaten the children born by their own daughters to their prisoners of war,—a thing so unnatural, that it only gains credit because the Portuguese sold as slaves even their own children by the native women. The apostle of Brazil, as he may in truth be called, and chief of the six Jesuits who accompanied Souza, was Nobrega, the cotemporary and rival in the race of disinterested services to his fellow creatures of St. Francis Xavier; and, with regard to his steady attempts to protect as well as to convert the Indians, another Las Casas.
Brazil was becoming an object of importance to the crown of Portugal. The new settlement of Bahia was established on the king's account, and at his expense 1000 persons had been sent out the first year, 1549. In four months there were 100 houses, six batteries, and a cathedral: a college for the Jesuits, a palace, and a custom-house were begun; the whole was defended by a mud wall. The next year supplies of all kinds arrived from Lisbon, and the year after that several female orphans, of noble family, were sent out as wives for the officers, with dowries in negroes, kine, and brood-mares.
About this time, a Spanish expedition destined for the river Plata miscarried; one of the ships was wrecked off St. Vincent's, and to Hans Staade, one of the crew who survived and after various adventures fell into the power of the Indians, we are indebted for the most authentic and particular account of the Brazilian Savages.[9] It is curious that the Indians of the new world, should so very far exceed all the savage tribes of the old in barbarity. But it is certain that no authentic accounts of cannibals have ever been brought from Africa; whereas, none of the early writers on Brazil and its inhabitants have failed to dwell upon their love of human flesh, as characteristic of the people.
The year 1552 is distinguished by the arrival of the first bishop in Brazil. His see was fixed at St. Salvador's, or, as it is generally called, Bahia. In the next year, Thome de Souza retired from his government, and was succeeded by Don Duarte da Costa, who was accompanied by seven jesuits, among whom was the celebrated Anchieta.[10] The chief of the order, Loyola, was still alive, he erected Brazil into a new province, and appointed Nobrega and Luis de Gran, who had been principal at Coimbra, joint provincials. From that moment the labours of the fathers for the real good of the country commenced. And whatever may be the opinions entertained, as to their politics and ultimate views, there is not a doubt but that the means they employed to reclaim and civilise the Indians, were mild, and therefore successful; that while they wrought their own purposes, they made their people happy; and that centuries will not repair the evil done by their sudden expulsion, which broke up the bands of humanised society which were beginning to unite the Indians with their fellow creatures.
In 1553, the first school was established in Brazil, by Nobrega, in the high plains of Piratininga, about thirteen leagues from the colony of San Vicente. Anchieta was the school-master. The school was opened on the feast of the conversion of St. Paul, and the establishment, and the infant colony rising round it, received the name of the saint. St. Paul's has since grown to be one of the most important towns in Brazil. Its rich minerals, its iron-works, and other manufactures, but, above all, the high and free spirit of its inhabitants, who have taken the lead in every effort for the good of the country, distinguish it above all the southern towns of Brazil.
Anchieta, while he taught Latin to the Portuguese and Mamalucos,[11] and Portuguese to the Brazilians, learnt from these last their own tongue, and composed a grammar and dictionary for them. He had no books for his pupils, so that he wrote on separate leaves, in four different languages, the daily lesson for each. He served as physician, as well as priest and school-master, and practised and taught the most useful domestic arts. But the colony had, like all the others, to fight for its early existence; it was attacked by the Mamalucos of the neighbouring settlement of St. André, who regarded the instruction of the Indians as a step towards abolishing their slavery, and exclaimed against it as an infringement of what they called their right to the services of the natives. They engaged by other pretences some of the neighbouring tribes to assist them, but they were met and defeated by those of St. Paul's.
Meantime some disputes having arisen between the Governor and the Bishop, the latter resolved to return to Lisbon, but was wrecked on the coast at a place called the Baixos de San Francisco, and there seized, and with one hundred other white persons put to death by the Cahetes. The revenge of the Portuguese was horrible, the Cahetes were hunted, slaughtered, and all but exterminated.
In the year 1557, Joam III. died. His appointment of Mem de Sa, before his death, to the government of Brazil, prevented the country from immediately feeling the evils which a regency generally entails even in an established government, but which are sure to fall with tenfold weight upon a rising colony.