"At this season water sports are also common, and Dory racing affords a very general amusement; and on these occasions large sums are freely betted both by owners and slaves. This species of diversion has no small share of utility at tached to it, as it contributes to render the latter highly expert in a kind of exercise that is inseparably connected with the labour in which they are principally engaged.

"The Dory is usually formed of mabogany or cedar, generally from a soli piece; its length is from 25 to 50 feet; and so buoyant and safe is this sort of vessel found, that persons accustomed to the management of it often fearlessly venture out to sea in it, and in weather when it might be unsafe to trust to vessels of much larger kind. It is worked with paddles instead of oars, and the fastest and best manned rowing boats have universally failed in a competition with it, and the negro paddlers of Honduras.

The Pit-pan is another water vehicle much used in this country, and for celerity is preferred to the former; but this can only be employed in smooth water. It is formed of the same materials, the shape alone constituting the dif

fend the passenger from the sun by day and the dews of night; precautions that are extremely necessary; for in journeying to the distant mahogany works, an abode for some time must frequently be taken up in them, and when any exposure in an unhealthy climate might be attended with evil consequences."

In giving the natural history of this settlement, Captain Henderson has evinced uncommon minuteness and accuracy; and the naturalist will meet with numerous interesting varieties in the different kingdoms. The remainder of the volume is occupied with an account of the manners, customs, and country of the Mosquito Indians, and terminates with a meteorological table kept at Balize in the bay of Honduras.

We have dwelt the longer on this little volume, not merely on account of the importance of the British settlement to which it relates, but also because it brings before the English reader a variety of curious and valuable information, in an unassuming, yet agreeable manner. We cordially recommend the work to the attention of our readers.

Southey, Part I. 4to.

There are few provinces in literature, which Mr. Southey has not successfully invaded: of his poetical talents our present volume contains some brilliant specimens; and most of our readers, we apprehend, are well acquainted with

the

the versatile powers of his creative fancy. We have to consider him as the historian of an interesting portion of the globe, concerning which we have hitherto received but little authentic information.

Although Mr. Southey's work professes to be a History of Brazil, "something more than the title promises, is comprised in the present work. It relates the foundation and progress of the adjacent Spanish provinces, the affairs of which are in latter times inseparably connected with those of Brazil. The subject may therefore be considered as including the whole tract of country between the rivers Plata, Paraguay, and Ore lane, or the Amazons, and extending eastward towards Peru, as far as the Portugueze have extended their settlements or their discoveries."

Before we proceed in an account of this volume, it may be proper to observe that Mr. S. has diligently availed himself of every authentic information which he could procure; and, by a careful comparison of his materials, has produced a highly interesting publication.

Mr. Southey thus states the nature of his undertaking: "The history of Brazil is less beautiful than that of the mother country, and less splendid than that of the Portugueze in Asia; but it is not less important than either. Its materials differ from those of other histories: here are no tangles of crooked policy to unravel, no mysteries of state iniquity to elucidate, no revolutions to record, nor victories to celebrate, the fame of which remains among us long af ter their effects have past away.

Discovered by chance, and long left to chance, it is by individual industry and enterprize, and by the operation of the common laws of nature and society, that this empire has risen and flourished, extensive as it now is, and mighty as it must one day become. In the course of its annals, disgust and anger will oftener be felt than those exalted feelings, which it is more grateful for the historian to excite. I have to speak of savages so barbarous that little sympathy can be felt for any sufferings which they endured, and of colonists in whose triumphs no joy will be taken, because they added avarice to barbarity; ignoble men, carrying on an obscure warfare, the consequences of which have been greater than were produced by the conquests of Alexander or Charlemagne, and will be far more lasting. Even the few higher characters which appear have obtained no faine beyond the limits of their own religion, scarcely beyond those of their language. Yet has the subject its advantages: the discovery of extensive regions; the manners and superstitions of uncivilized tribes; the efforts of missionaries, in whom zeal the most fanatical was directed by the coolest policy; the rise and the overthow of the extraordinary dominion which they established; and the progress of Brazil from its feeble beginnings, to the im portance which it now possesses, these are topics of no ordinary interest."

Brazil was accidentally disco vered seven years after the first voyage of Columbus. Vicente Yanez Pinzon, who had accompanied

panied that celebrated navigator, obtained a commission for himself and his nephew Arias, to go in search of new countries, and to trade in any which Columbus had not previously appropriated. In Dec. 1499, they set sail with four caravals from the port of Palos, and were driven by storms from the Cape de Verd is ands to Cape St. Augustin's on the Frazil coast, on Jan. 26, 1500. They landed and took possession of the country for the crown of Castile. Proceeding thence, they coasted round northwards to the country of Maranham, and the mouth of the vast river Amazon. But before Pinzon could return to Europe, a fleet was fitted out at Lisbon, under the command of Pedro Alvarez Cabral. Its destination was for the East Indies, but being driven out of its course by a tempest he arrived on the coast of Brazil three months only after Pinzon had first discovered it. Cabral took possession of the country in the name of the crown of Portugal, and called it Santa Cruz, which name however was, in a few years, merged in that of Brazil, by which this territory is still known, though no satisfactory etymology has hitherto been assigned for such appellation.

Cabral was soon followed by the celebrated navigator Amerigo Vespucci; to whom the honour is due of having formed the first set tlement in the country. "It does not appear that any farther attention was at this time paid to it. No gold had been found, and it produced no articles of commerce which could be thought worthy the notice of a government, whose coffers were overflowing with the

produce of the spice trade, and the riches of the African mines. But the cargo of Brazil which Vespucci had brought home, tempted private adventurers, who were content with peaceful gains, to trade thither for that valuable wood; ard this trade became so well known, that in consequence the coast and the whole country obtained the name of Brazil, not

withstanding the ho'ier appellation which Cabral had given it. Parrots and monkeys also were brought home for the ladies. It was convenient for these traders to have agents living among the natives, and adventurers would not be wanting who would willingly take up their abode with friendly savages, in a plentiful and delightful country, where they were under no restraint. These were not the only colonists. Portugal had taken possession of Brazil, and meant to maintain it. It was the system of the Portuguese government to make its criminals of some use to the state; a wise system if wisely regulated; in that kingdom it obviously arose from the smallness of its territory, and lack of population to support its extensive plans of ambition. Hi. therto they had been degraded to the African frontier, and more recently to India also. In thesesituations they certainly served the state; yet this service was not without heavy disadvantages. The usual offences which were thus punished, were those of blood and violence: ferocious propensities, which were not likely to be cor rected by placing the offenders in situations where they night indulge them with impunity, and consider the indulgence as meri

torious.

torious. This system was immediately extended to Brazil:-the first Europeans who were left ashore there were two convicts. In Africa or in India the exile was sent to bear arms with his countrymen, who would not regard him as disgraced, because they were obliged to associate with him. To be degraded to Brazil was a heavier punishment; the chance of war could not enrich him there, and there was no possibility of returning home with honour for any signal service. They were in one point of view better disposed of, inasmuch as in new colonies ordinary men are of greater value than they can be elsewhere, but they became worse subjects. Their numbers bore a greater proportion to the better settlers; and they were therefore more likely to be encouraged in iniquity than reformed by example; to communicate evil than to learn good. Their intercourse with the savages produced nothing but mischief: each made the other worse; the cannibals acquired new means of destruction, and the Europeans new modes of barbarity. The Europeans were weaned from that human horror at the bloody feasts of the savages, which ruffians as they were, they had at first felt, and the natives lost that awe and veneration for a superior race which might have been improved so greatly to their own advantage."

"The first settler in Bahia was Diogo Alvarez; who with that spirit of enterprize which was then common among his countrymen, embarked to seek his fortune in strange countries. He was wrecked upon the shoals on

the north of the bar of Bahia. Part of the crew were lost, others escaped this death to suffer one more dreadful: the natives seized and eat them. Diogo saw that there was no other possible chance of saving his life. than by making himself as useful as possible to these cannibals. He therefore exerted himself in recovering things from the wreck, and by these exertions succeeded in conciliating their favour. Among other things he was fortunate enough to get on shore some barrels of powder and a musket, which he put in order at his first leisure, after his masters were returned to their village; and one day when the opportunity was favourable, brought down a bird before them. The women and children shouted Caramuru! Caramuru' which signified a man of fire and they cried out that he would destroy them; but he told the men, whose astonishment had less of fear mingled with it, that he would go with them to war and kill their enemies. Caramuru, was the name which from thenceforward he was known by. They marched against the Tapuyas; the fame of this dreadful engine went before them, and the Tapuyas fled. From a slave Caramuru became a sovereign. The chiefs of the savages thought themselves happy if he would accept their daughters to be his wives; he fixed his abode upon the spot where Villa Velha was afterwards erected, and soon saw as numerous a progeny as an old patriarch's ris ing round him. The best families in Bahia trace their origin to him.

"At length a French vessel came into the bay, and Diogo resolved

to

to take that opportunity of once more seeing his native country. He loaded her with brazil, and embarked with his favourite wife Paraguazu, the Great River. The others could not bear this abandonment, though it was only to be for a time; some of them swam after the ship in hopes of being taken on board, and one followed it so far, that before she could reach the shore again her strength failed her and she sunk. They were received with signal honour at the court of France. Paraguazu was baptized by the name of Catharina Alvarez, after the Queen, and the King and Queen were her sponsors. Her marriage was then celebrated. Diogo would fain have proceeded to lortugal, but the French would not permit him to go there. These honours which they had shown him were not to be gratuitous, and they meant to make him of use to them in his own dominions. By means however of Pedro Fernandez Sardinha (then a young man who had just completed bis studies in Paris, and afterwards the first bishop of Brazil) he sent the information to Joan III. which he was not per mitted to carry, and exhorted him to colonize the delightful province in which his lot had beeu so strangely cast. After some time he covenanted with a wealthy merchant to take him back, and leave him the artillery and ammunition of two ships, with store of such things as were useful for traffic with the natives, in return for which be undertook to load both vessels with brazil. The bargain was fairly performed, and Diogo having returned to his

territories, fortified his little ca pital.

"But the Portuguese government, wholly occupied with the affairs of India, thought little of a country in which, whatever profits were to be acquired, must come from agriculture, not from commerce with the inhabitants; for coDImerce was what they sought as eagerly as the Spaniards hunted for gold.

Brazil was left open

like a common, and all the care which the court bestowed upon it was to prevent the French from trespassing there, by representations of their ambassador at Paris, that were never regarded, and by treating them as enemies whenever they met them. Individuals meantime being thus left to themselves, settled in the harbours and islands along the coast; and little towns and villages were growing up."

We shall not trouble our readers with the dates or succession of the other different settlements, or the particulars of their first founders: for these we refer them to the work itself, which will amply repay the perusal. It may be observed however, that thirty years clasped after the discovery and settlement of Brazil, before the Portuguese government bestowed any serious attention on its colonies in the western world. At length, this country became of sufficient importance “ to obtain some consideration at court, and in order to forward its colonization, the same plan was adopted which had succeeded well in Madeira, and in the Azores,—that of dividing it into hereditary captaincies, and granting them to such persons as were willing to

embark