town of Recife de
Pernambuco, or the Reef of Pernambuco, built by the Dutch, under Maurice
of Nassau, and by them called Maurice Town. It is a singular spot, well
fitted for trade; it is situated upon several sand banks, divided by
salt water creeks and the mouth of two fresh water rivers, connected by
three bridges, and divided into as many parts; Recife, properly so
called, where are the castles of defence, and the dock-yard, and the
traders; Sant Antonio, where are the government house, the two principal
churches, one for the white and one for the black population; and Boa
Vista, where the richer merchants, or more idle inhabitants, live among
their gardens, and where convents, churches, and the bishop's palace,
give an air of importance to the very neat town around them.

All this I knew before I landed, and thought I was pretty well prepared
for Pernambuco. But no previous knowledge could do away the wonder with
which one must enter that very extraordinary port. From the ship, which
is anchored three miles from the town, we see that vessels lie within a
reef on which the sea is perpetually breaking, but till I was actually
within that reef, I had not the least idea of the nature of the harbour:
the swell going ashore would have seemed tremendous, had we not been
prepared for it, and made our passage of three miles a very long one. We
approached the sandy beach between Recife and Olinda so nearly, that I
thought we were going to land there; when coming abreast of a tower on a
rock, where the sea was breaking violently, we turned short round, and
found ourselves within a marvellous natural break-water, heard the surf
dashing without, and saw the spray, but we ourselves were sailing along
smoothly and calmly, as if in a mill-pond. The rock of which the reef is
formed, is said to be coral; but it is so coated with barnacle and
limpet above barnacle and limpet, that I can see nothing but the
remainder of these shells for many feet down, and as deep into the rock
as our hammers will break. It extends from a good way to the northward
of Paraiba to Olinda, where it sinks under water, and then rises
abruptly at Recife, and runs on to Cape St. Augustine, where it is
interrupted by the bold granite head, that shoots through it into the
ocean: it then reappears, and continues, interruptedly, towards the
south. The breadth of the harbour here between the reef and the main
land varies from a few fathoms to three quarters of a mi