hich Portugal was now reduced, was seen in its effects
on the government of Brazil. When the appointed Governors, either on
their own judgment, or in obedience to the orders of the court of
Lisbon, attempted to carry any new measure into execution which the
people disliked, it was seldom in their power to enforce it, and they
could expect little assistance from home. The Jesuits had undertaken the
defence of the Indians, and endeavoured by every means to restrain the
practice of making slaves of them, and to mitigate the lot of such as
were already enslaved. But the Franciscans and some other orders derived
equal pecuniary benefit with the hunters from the sale of slaves, and
therefore they opposed them with vehemence. Interest was on the side of
the Friars, and the most disgraceful scenes took place in various
captaincies between the parties, the Governors being either not able or
not willing to interfere with effect.

Meantime, however, the people became accustomed to canvass and to
understand public questions; their governors began to respect them as a
real part of the estate; and a value for independence, and a feeling
that to attain it was in their own power, grew out of these disorders.

Had it been possible to have purified their religion from some of its
most superstitious observances, and to reform the moral habits of the
people, the prosperity of the country would soon have been equal to its
means; but wherever slavery is established it brings a twofold curse
with it. It degrades both parties even where the slaves are imported.
How much more then, as was the case here, when they were hunted on their
own grounds, where all the details, disgusting and iniquitous as they
are, of the seeking, capturing, and bending to the yoke, pass under the
eye till the heart grows callous to the cry of the orphan, the grief of
the widow, and the despair of the parent in being torn from whatever has
been dear to them?

The history of the Jesuit Vieyra's mission to Maranham is as humiliating
to human nature, as his sincere exertions in the cause of the suffering
Indians is creditable to himself; but neither his exertions, nor the
royal authority, could baffle the selfish cruelty and avarice of the
people of that captaincy; they broke out into open rebellion in defence
of their detestable practices, and even when they returned to obedience,
there was a compromise between humanity and avarice, to which the
Indians were again sacr