Spanish and Portuguese South America during the Colonial Period; Vol. 2 of 2

by Robert Grant Watson

By the Treaty of Madrid, which followed that of Badajoz, France obtained from Portugal a cession of territory on the side of Guyana. As the limits of this cession were subsequently annulled, the frontier reverting to the Oyapok, no advantage would be gained by detailing them. Brazil fortunately remained at peace when the revolutionary war was renewed: but that war was to have a momentous influence on the destinies of the great Lusitanian colony, bringing about as it did the removal of the Braganzas from Portugal to Rio de Janeiro. By this event the last-named city became the seat of government of the Portuguese dominions; and there can be no doubt that it was owing mainly to the presence of the royal family that, whilst the Spanish dominions in South America, on their separation from the mother-country, became divided into as many as nine separate states, the empire of Brazil has remained one and undivided to the present day.

That vast empire had continued to make marked progress during the eighteenth century. Amongst the old captaincies none, it is said, had undergone greater change than had Pará, where the people had been reclaimed from their former chronic state of turbulence and insubordination. The slavery of the Indians was at an end, which was one great step in advance, although it was reserved for another century to witness, as it may be hoped, the extinction of negro slavery. As regards the Indians, however, the regulations decreed by Pombal for their protection had been disregarded. That statesman had wished that the aborigines should be placed on a position of equality with the Brazilians of Portuguese race—a measure which might possibly have been carried out by the aid of the Jesuits, but which with their expulsion became impossible. As it was, the Indians were governed with a high hand by the directors, who had been appointed with the view simply of guiding them.

The aldeas or settlements established by the Jesuits had undergone great depopulation, owing to the marking out of the limits as laid down in the treaty. In so vast a country, and with such imperfect means of transport, it was inevitable that the work of marking out the borders should be a tedious one, and many natives, who were required for the service of the commissioners, sank in the course of years from the labours imposed upon them or from the fevers to which they were exposed. On the departure of the Jesuits the Indians found themselves emancipated from all moral restraint. The directors did not care to exercise any, nor did they show them an example, whilst the new priests were without power. The bishop of Pará, who between the years 1784 and 1788 went over his extensive diocese, laments the decay of the aldeas and the degraded condition of the Indians.

There were twelve towns at the close of last century on the left bank of the Amazons under the government of Pará, amongst them being Faro to the far west, Obidos, Alemquer, Montalegre, Outeiro, Almerin, Mazagam, Villa Vistoza, and Macapa. The settlements on the southern side of the great river were more numerous and more important. They included Samtarem, which in 1788 contained 1300 inhabitants, and Villa Franca, which contained a similar number; also Mundrucus, so called from the tribe of that name who had begun to cultivate the arts of civilization. Towns and settlements were likewise increasing upon the river Zingu. Vieiros, Souzel, and Pombal contained in 1788 about 800 inhabitants each; whilst Gurupa, which was considered the key of the Amazons, contained 400 of European blood. Melgaço, Oeyras, and Portel were likewise considerable settlements inhabited by Indians in the same captaincy. Cameta was, with the exception of Pará, the largest town in the State, containing about 6000 white inhabitants. The communication between this place and Pará was carried on by one of those natural canals which are so narrow as only to afford a passage for canoes.

The province of Rio Negro, after the edict by which the Jesuits were removed, seems to have suffered no detriment from that measure. Its most remote establishment was distant from Pará four hundred and eighty-five leagues, which, in ascending the river, was accounted a journey of nearly three months.

Pará itself had become a populous and flourishing city, the cathedral and the palace being built on a grand scale. The Jesuits’ College had been converted into an episcopal palace and a seminary, which boasted professors of Latin rhetoric and philosophy. The city possessed a judicial establishment, a theatre, a hospital, a convent of Capuchins and likewise one of Carmelites. Ships for the navy were constructed at Pará, and timber was exported to Lisbon for the use of the arsenals. Amongst its exports were Oriental and other spices, cacao, coffee, rice, cotton, sarsaparilla, copaiba, tapioca, gum, India-rubber, chestnuts, hides, and molasses.

It unfortunately happened that the Portuguese sent to this magnificent province were of the lowest description, and who, on finding themselves in so luxuriant a locality, gave way forthwith to incurable indolence. Bishop Brandam draws a dark picture of their mode of life, and a still darker one of that of their slaves. There was a brighter side, however, to the picture of society as it existed at this time at Pará. The establishment of a wealthy colonist was so extensive as often to exceed in number the population of a town. For instance, that of Joam de Mores included more than three hundred persons, thirty sons or daughters, with their children, sitting down every day at the family dinner-table. The estate contained a pottery, a sugar-plantation, and several nurseries of cacao. The negroes were treated like children, and were well looked after. Such treatment of slaves, however, in this province, was the exception.

Passing to the adjoining captaincy of Maranham, S. Luiz was accounted the fourth city of Brazil in commercial importance, the number of ships leaving it annually towards the close of the century being nearly thirty, the result of the cultivation of rice and cotton. The population of the city was estimated at twelve thousand. The Carmelites, the Mercenarios, and the Franciscans had each a convent here. The opulent merchants possessed large estates and numerous slaves, some of them having as many as a thousand or fifteen hundred. Alcantara, on the opposite side of the bay, was a large and prosperous town, as was Guimaraens, ten leagues to the north. The interior of the province was ill peopled.

Many rivers enter the sea in this captaincy, some of which are navigable for a considerable way, and the banks of all of which are more or less peopled. The most important of these is the Itapacura, the territory between which and the Paraïba was in great part peopled by a population of European blood or by domesticated Indians, by means of whom large quantities of rice and cotton were raised.

Although the course of the Tocantins was well known in Goyaz and Pará, it was not until the year 1798 that an attempt was made to trace its connection to Maranham, for the purpose of opening up a communication by water between the two provinces in which it respectively rises and ends. But although the effort of the Government failed, the communication was established by means of a runaway Indian, who had made his way in a canoe bound for Goyaz. A settler named Barros, into whose territory the Indian penetrated, then built a canoe on which he embarked with the Indian and three slaves upon the river Manoel Alves Grande; this stream in a day and a half carried them into the Tocantins, on which in due time they met a vessel from Pará. After this successful expedition, Barros was employed in opening up a communication along this important route. Throughout Maranham the cultivation of cotton had, for the most part, superseded that of the sugar-cane. The captaincy produces an abundance of fruit of the finest quality. The navigation of the coast of Brazil is so difficult, on account of both wind and current setting in at certain seasons from the south, that it was easier for Pará and Maranham to communicate with Portugal than with Bahia or Rio de Janeiro; for which reason the bishops of Pará and S. Luiz were suffragans of the Patriarch of Lisbon.