J. H. CORNYN.
3. Brazil was discovered in 1500 by a companion of Columbus, Vicente Pinzon, who made no settlement, and, indeed, would not have been justified in doing so. The bull of Pope Alexander VI (4 May 1493) had bestowed upon Portugal the lands which should be found east of the line of demarcation, and commissioners of Spain and Portugal had agreed, on 7 June 1494, that the position of the line of demarcation should be changed so that it should pass, north and south, 370 leagues west of the Cape Verde Islands, instead of at a distance of only 100 leagues west of those islands, where the Pope had established it. Accordingly Spain was precluded by her own act from claiming the eastern portion of the continent of South America. A Portuguese commander, Pedro Alvarez Cabral, when on his way around the Cape of Good Hope to the Far East, in 1500, encountered severe storms which drove his vessels from their course; and through this mischance he reached the Brazilian coast in April. Mass was celebrated there on Easter Day; the country was declared a de pendency of Portugal, and a stone cross was erected. There Cabral himself embarked for India, but first sent a vessel to Lisbon with a report of this important discovery. As soon as practicable after receiving the account of his new possession, Dom Manoel placed three vessels under the command of Amerigo Ves pucci, instructing this Florentine to make good Portugal's claim to the land which a Spaniard had discovered. Thus, from the beginning, Brazil was marked out as a field for inter national competition. Vespucci's first voyage being unsuccessful, a second was undertaken with better results. He remained for five months at a point he named "All Saints,* and when it became necessary to return left 12 men as a garrison in a small fort. The impression created by the experiences of the early ad venturers was not highly favorable. Poor and unattractive, indeed, did this land seem in com parison with India and Africa. During the years that followed Portuguese merchants dis patched vessels to trade for Brazil-wood, and the Portuguese government jealously resisted French and Spanish attempts to gain a foothold or carry on commerce eastward of the line of demarcation; but the court at Lisbon continued to prefer the profits to be won along the course that Vasco da Gama had opened up. The first settlements, therefore, were not made by the government, but by grantees whom the govern ment induced to colonize by assigning to each leader a splendid possession, or "captaincyx- no less than 50 leagues of coast, with feudal powers and the privilege of extending his domain as far inland as he desired. Thus the province of Sao Paulo was settled by an expe dition under Piratininga; next Affonso de Sousa explored the coast from Rio de Janeiro (so called because it was discovered 1 Jan.
1531) to the Rio de la Plata. Lopez de Sousa received two allotments. of 25 leagues each, one being near Pernambuco and Parahyba. Fer nandez Coutinho and Pedro da Campo Tourin ho established themselves near the spot where Cabral landed. Francisco Pereiro Coutinho received a grant of a captaincy, extending from Rio Sao Francisco to Bahia. The captaincy of Pernambuco was given to Duarte Coelho Pereira; and so the most attractive portions of the coast were distributed. Cattle and sugar cane being introduced from Madeira, the systematic cultivation of the latter began. Enormous difficulties were encountered from the first by proprietors and planters. Only men of large means, among them adventurers who had amassed fortunes in India, were able to equip and maintain such a considerable force as was necessary to make these undertakings successful. The natives were, as a rule, ex tremely mistrustful, savage and little inclined toward civilization. In fact the task of civiliz ing them seemed utterly hopeless. Yet one striking exception to the general experience may be noted. The first settler in Bahia was Diogo Alvarez, a young man of noble family, who was wrecked on the shoals near that port. 'Part of the crew,' says Southey, 'were lost, others were eaten by the natives.' Diogo secured the favor of the Indians by recovering things from the wreck. Afterward he led them in battle, using his musket to such good effect that he became their sovereign, and took daughters of the chiefs of the savages to be his wives. 'The best families in Bahia,' we arc told, °trace their origin to him.' By the middle of the 16th century the captaincies of those men whose names have been mentioned, and those of other adventurers, were scattered along the coast from the mouth of the Amazon to that of the Rio de la Plata. The great mineral wealth of the country had not been discovered at that time, and the settlements were chiefly devoted to the cultiva tion of sugar. What with savages surrounding these widely separated posts; Spaniards threatening them from the rear (the Spanish troops then holding the regions afterward to be known as Paraguay and Argentina); and the French from time to time attempting to establish themselves on the coast; it was found necessary to provide for the common defense by concentrating the Portuguese power in the hands of a governor-general. The feudatories had to submit to the revocation of some of their privileges, though they remained on the soil which they owned. .