adies adopting
the unusual course of sending a deputation to welcome me.

I immediately demanded from the president a report of the condition of
the province; but before this was presented, memorials from every part
put me in possession of the causes of disorder universally prevailing.
The general complaint was, that the president had established an
autocracy, refusing the co-operation of a council, as required by the
constitution, and that under his individual authority, military
disorders of all kind prevailed, even to murder, whilst outrages of the
most revolting nature were committed amidst cheers of "Long live His
Imperial Majesty;" thus using the Imperial name as a sanction to the
perpetration of acts the most unlawful and injurious.

The President Bruce was the same individual whom, on the expulsion of
the Portuguese in the previous year, I had temporarily appointed
President to the first provisional Junta under the Empire, which body
was quickly superseded by a Government elected by the people. Possessing
influence amongst the Portuguese, of which faction--as afterwards
appeared--he was a prominent supporter, he had contrived to get himself
reinstated as head of the provincial Government, and was apparently
following the policy of the Portuguese faction in power at Rio de
Janeiro, viz. that of keeping his province in a state of confusion with
a view to disgust the populace with the Imperial rule, and so dispose
them, should opportunity offer, to favour the views of the mother
country. This policy, as has been said, was marked out by the agents of
Portugal; but Bruce, with every disposition to favour the views of the
parent state, was not the man to be entrusted with political strategy of
this nature. The fact being that, though possessed of a certain amount
of cunning, Bruce was unfit to be entrusted with authority at all--much
less to exercise that which recognises no control--so that the disorder
which prevailed was rather a natural consequence of his own want of
capacity, and arbitrary system of government. Finding every one against
him, he was gradually throwing himself on the black population for
support, promoting emancipated slaves to the rank of officers; and it
was generally acknowledged that had it not been for our opportune
arrival, both himself and the whites who remained in the city might
speedily have fallen a sacrifice to the force which had been organised
for his especial protection.

On the o