South America. W. H. Koebel
a seventeenth-century engraving.
The Portuguese, for their part, assert that the territories of Brazil were first sighted by their great navigator, Pedro Alvarez Cabral. The discovery was in one sense something of an accident. It was necessary for the seamen who were setting their course for the East Indies to steer well to the west, in order to avoid the zones of calms which prevail in the neighbourhood of the African coast. Cabral appears to have steered so boldly into the west that he fell in with the coast of Brazil. This was in 1500. Word of this event was sent to Portugal, and the enterprising little kingdom, at that time at the height of her maritime power, made preparations to colonize the country.
The auspices under which the Spaniards and the Portuguese arrived in the New World were curiously different. The Spaniards were frankly in quest of gold, and in many cases ransacked the fertile agricultural lands in search of minerals which were non-existent. The Portuguese, on the other hand, had no reason to suspect the presence of precious metals in their new colony, and it was in the first instance for its vegetable products that the land, so rich in minerals, became famed.
It was only natural that the pioneer Portuguese should have been struck with the admirable quality of the valuable Brazilian woods. Shipments of timber were the first to be sent from the new colony to the Mother Country. It was from this very wood that Portuguese South America took its name, since much of it, being of a brilliant red colour, was known in the Portuguese language as "brasa."
Just about this time the Portuguese fitted out the most imposing fleet which had ever left their shores. It was commanded by one of the greatest of Portuguese explorers, Vasco da Gama, and was destined to sail round the Cape of Good Hope to the Indies—the new and marvellous land of spices. The fleet was worthy of its commander; it was made up of no fewer than thirteen vessels, and was manned by some 1,200 men.
With pomp and ceremony this imposing Armada sailed away from the blue waters of the Tagus, and, rounding the sunlit bluff, stood away to the south. It made the Canaries in the usual way, passed the Cape Verde Islands, and struck out to the west, lighting on the Brazilian coast in latitude 17° south—that is to say, not far from the spot where stands the present town of Bahia. From this point Vasco da Gama sailed southward, keeping touch with the coast. He eventually established communication with the Indians, who were, as was usual in these latitudes, quite naked, their bodies being painted, and who wore great bones in their ears and in their slit lips and noses.
A criminal, one of the type which seems to have been brought out for purposes such as this, was landed in order to dwell among the natives, to test their temper and habits—a somewhat precarious profession this! After a while the fleet sailed from the place they named Port Seguro, leaving two of these criminals or degradados—professional pioneers—behind. These "were seen lamenting and crying upon the beach, and the men of the country comforting them, demonstrating that they were not a people devoid of pity."
This was the scene which presented itself to the eyes of the more fortunate mariners as they sailed away. Nevertheless, the criminals seem to have survived. No small advertisement, this, of the courtesy of the Indian tribe, for the people composing it must have belonged to one of the coastal races who afterwards were grimly famed for their ferocity.
As a matter of fact, human instruments of the kind, which, it must be admitted, were of small merit, played no small part in the colonization of Brazil. In some respects these unfortunate folk were undoubtedly useful. They resembled the candles carried by underground miners. If the candle continued to burn, all was well; but if the candle went out, there was obviously danger in the air. Quite a number of these human candles went out in the course of the early Iberian explorations. In a sense there was sufficient justice in this, since they were criminals whose offences had been usually those of murder and violence. If, therefore, they escaped in the first instance with their lives, their penitence had been consummated, and they were free to take advantage of the land.
People of this kind had been set ashore to pave the way for their betters in Africa and in India, and this system was now extended to Brazil. When friendly relations were once established, it may be imagined that the influence of these criminals upon the savages was not of the best. According to Southey: "The Europeans were weaned from that human horror at the blood-feasts of the savages, which, ruffians as they were, they had at first felt, and the natives lost that awe and veneration for the superior races, which might have proved so greatly to their advantage."
In 1503 the Portuguese sent out an important expedition under Duarte Coelho. This leader explored the country in the neighbourhood of the Bay of Bahia. After this he proceeded southwards, and landed men in order to establish a small colony.
The first really important attempt at colonizing the country was undertaken by Martin Affonso de Souza. This navigator set out from Portugal in command of many ships and men. Like Coelho, he struck the Brazilian coast at Bahia; but, instead of proceeding to the south, as his predecessor had done, he remained for some while at the spot. It is said that when De Souza landed he fell in with a Portuguese of the name of Correia. This worthy is supposed to have formed one of Cabral's expedition. For some reason or other he was marooned at that place. The Indians, instead of slaying him, had conceived a great veneration for this white man, who had, as it were, dropped from the clouds into their midst. The marooned sailor had become a kind of professional adviser, whose counsel was sought by the natives on every important occasion. Many of the early navigators maintain that the comparatively easy colonization of this portion of the Brazilian coast was due to the presence of the much-esteemed Correia.
Bahia rapidly became the most important of these early Portuguese settlements. In the first instance it was, of course, extremely difficult for the few bands of daring Portuguese to make any practical impression on the huge slice of coast which had fallen to their share. The experiences of the first colonists, moreover, were destined to differ considerably from those of the pioneer Spaniards. The latter had their field of exploration practically to themselves. The Portuguese, on the other hand, found rivals in the South Seas almost as soon as the prows of their ships had pierced the waters. The Dutch eventually were destined to become by far the most formidable of these; but in the first instance the chief friction occurred with the French.
Just at this period the Gallic sailors awoke to a strong interest in Brazil, and the French vessels carried numbers of warlike and industrial adventurers to the tropical shores. Even before 1530 a French factory had been established at Pernambuco, but a circumstance of far greater importance was that these French rovers discovered the magnificent harbour of Rio de Janeiro, sailed into the narrow entrance between the lofty peaks, and founded a colony there before the Portuguese had obtained the opportunity of a permanent footing in that place.
The leader of these troops was Nicolas Durant de Villegagnon, and his men comprised a number of Huguenots who were abandoning France. Villegagnon's own character appears to have been complex and curious in the extreme. He was apparently a true blade of the old swashbuckling type; he employed religion for such ends as he might have in view at the moment, regarding its tenets cynically, tongue in cheek. Thus he came out in command of the Huguenots, ostensibly himself a Huguenot; but his convictions appear to have changed on various occasions, and he is seen now as their abettor, now as their oppressor. In the end he clearly showed himself antagonistic to the convictions of his followers, and took to denouncing them as heretics. With the exception of this leader, the circumstances and motives of the expedition were somewhat similar to those which caused the first emigration of the English Puritans to North America.
Once established in Rio de Janeiro, the Huguenots succeeded in making friends with the Indians of the neighbourhood, who became their firm allies and proved of great assistance to the French in their struggles against the Portuguese, who came down in force to evict the intruders. The Huguenots were defeated in 1560 by Mem de Sa, the third Governor of Brazil; but, although dispersed for a while, the power of the invaders was by no means broken. Shortly afterwards they came together again, and succeeded in establishing themselves more firmly than before in the place. They were again fiercely attacked by the Portuguese, but the number of islands in the bay afforded excellent points of defence, and it was not until 1567 that the Portuguese sea and land forces combined were able to expel the last Frenchmen from the mountains which lay about the harbour of