The fortunate circumstances of their situation soon becoming known, and the dangers to which persons were exposed who directed their course to Cuiaba, attracted so great a number of miners to Goyaz in the course of two years, that the necessaries which daily arrived with the numerous caravans and troops from St. Paulo, (to which city alone there was any track or road,) were inadequate to their subsistence. Every thing sold at an exorbitant price; of gold there was enough, but it could not supply sustenance. An alqueire of Indian corn cost six or seven oitavas of gold; and the same measure of the flour of mandioca ten oitavas. A milch cow, which appeared there, was bought for two pounds weight of the same metal, and a hog for twenty-eight. Two oitavas of gold were demanded for a pound of sugar; and every article of subsistence was procured only by payment in the same proportion. The dealers who conveyed the necessaries of life by a tedious journey were enriched; but the mines were still more lucrative at this period. Many were at length induced to devote a portion of their time to the cultivation of the necessaries of life, that the gold which they collected might not be consumed in payment for them. This province, in the centre of Brazil, and ranking amongst the largest in the state, is confined on the north by the provinces of Para and Maranham; on the west by Cuiaba, from which it is separated by the river Araguaya; on the south by Camapuania and the province of St. Paulo; and on the east by the provinces of Minas Geraes, and Pernambuco, which are divided from it by a cordillera, stretching north and south, stony and barren, and which alone affords passage at the largest openings, denominated _boqueiroes_; each portion taking its particular name, and the northern being the most elevated. The length of this province is about seven hundred miles, computing from the confluence of the Araguaya with the Tucantines to that of the Pardo with the Parannan, and its width proportionable. It lies between 6° and 18° of south latitude; the rains only prevail during the thunder peculiar to these climates, which commences in October and terminates in April. The aspect of this province is almost universally uneven, although in few parts mountainous, having many portions called _catingas_, not favourable to cultivation. The soil is only fertile where there are woods, with which it does not abound, if we except the districts of the capital, Meia Ponte, Pilar, and St. Luzia, by the margins of the Corumba. Admiration is excited by the wood called Matto Grosso, (Large Wood,) upwards of thirty miles in width, upon the road of Meia Ponte to the capital, about the centre of that interval, and its length extending from the river Almas to the centre of Cayaponia.