The principal productions of Brasil are tobacco, wood, sugar, salt, and hides. The culture of tobacco, which forms a considerable branch of the revenue, oc cupies only a small part of the year ; and the labour is so easy, that a single negro can manufacture annually about two thousand pounds weight. The tobacco is put up in rolls of from 200 to non pounds each, and is exported to Europe, and to Higher and Lower Guinea.
Timber forms the natural staple of a yet uncultiva ted country ; and no region in the wo •Id produces finer forests than those of Brasil. The principal woods, as we have already observed, lie on the Rio Grande, in the captaincy of Porto Seguro. One species, called the sifipipira, resembles the teak of India, which is well known to be superior to any European woo,: for firm ness and dui ability. There are also the peroba, e,raubu, and louro, which resemble species of oak and larch. There are, besides, lighter kinds of wood, similar to fir ; not to mention logwood, mahogany. brasil, and au infinity of ornamental and dying woods. The govern ment, however, according to its usual system, as soon as it appeared that profits were likely to be derived from timber, assumed to itself the exclusive mono poly of that article. The consequence is, that every person who becomes proprietor of a forest, begins with destroying all the finest of the trees, which would otherwise be seized by the intendant, whose odious visits it is desirable to avoid. Notwith standing this oppressive system, excellent vessels are still built in Brasil, at about half the price which they would cost in Europe. The privilege which Britain has obtained, of cutting timber from these noble forests, and of building ships on the spot, may thus prove of incalculable importance.
Sugar is cultivated to a great extent in Brasil. In the time of Pirard, about the middle of the last century, it formed the principal riches of the country. In the course of 150 leagues along the coast, from 25 leagues beyond Fernambuco, to 25 leagues beyond the bay of All Saints, Pirard counted above 400 sugar mills, each of which manufactured annually about 100,000 arobas of sugar.* The number of cows produced in Brasil is so great, that they are, for the most part, slaughtered merely for the sake of their skins, many thousands of which are annually exported. The immense number of carcases which are thus left to be devoured by birds and wild beasts, would afford room for an extensive track in pro visions, were not the salt trade prohibited by the mono polising spirit of the government.
In Bajo, near Cabo Frio, salt is gathered in such abundance, that whole ships might be loaded with it. " In the country of the Mines, or Minas Geraes," says Da Cunha, " salt becomes so indispensible a necessary, that not only men, but cattle, and other animals, require it for their food. In every place where a high mountain extends from the sea to the mines, salt must be given to the cattle, else they would often refuse their usual fodder. The fields, near these mines, produce, indeed, plenty of grass ; but not salt enough to feed the cattle. Thus large tracts of land must be lost, or the cattle must have salt, which is much higher in price than they themselves.
It is remarkable, too, that, in the interior parts of these countries. where nature has impregnated the soil with salt, quadrupeds and birds flock together, to eat of this earth. A combination of so many animals, of various species and colours, on one single spot, and the different tones which they utter, exhibits a most diverting spec tacle to the curious observer.
Salt, a product so indispensibly requisite to keep and preserve meat and fish, is uncommonly dear in those parts. The quantity necessary to salt an ox, costs, in many places, twice or three times as much as the ox itself. Such, too, is the case with fish. In the province of Rio Grande, a bullock costs 700 reis (about four shillings and six pence English), a horse from 6 to SOO reis, the largest and fattest oxen 1600 reis per head (10 shillings and 8 pence,) a cheese weighing 9 pounds 160 reis (one shilling), a pound of butter 40 reis (three pence), Ste.
The salt trade being prohibited throughout Brasil, the exclusive privilege for this useful branch of coin inerce is farmed out to one individual, who pays for it the sum of 48,000,000 of reis, every year, into the royal treasury. This farmer gets annually from Bra sil ninety-six millions of reis, of which forty-eight mil lions go to the queen's treasury, and an equal sum remains for himself, his agents, and receivers, even af ter deducting all the principal expences of the salt, including freight and carriage. But much more con siderable are the profits he draws from the inner parts of those districts, where the herds are more numerous, the demand for salt consequently greater, and the price of that article enhanced in proportion to the expence of carriage over the many mountains which are there to be met with.