It is now necessary to review what had been going on during the last few years in the mining districts. The experience of fifteen years having according to general opinion proved the injurious nature of the capitation tax, the offer was accepted of the people of _Minas Geraes_ to make up the annual assessment to one hundred _arrobas_, should the royal fifths be less than that amount. In the year 1753, the fleet from _Rio de Janeiro_ was believed to bring home gold, silver, and goods to the amount of three millions sterling. In that year the fifths from _Minas Geraes_ amounted to nearly £400,000. The bullion and jewels which were sent to Lisbon in the following year were estimated at a million _moidores_. On an average of sixteen years the royal fifths exceeded one hundred _arrobas_; but when the trade had been opened to single ships, the average production of gold was found to decrease,--probably from the conviction or experience that trade was on the whole more profitable than mining. The temptation to evade the payment of the royal proportion was so strong that not even the severe laws in force were sufficient to overcome it. Gold might circulate within the captaincy before it had been stamped and before the royal fifth had been taken; but it was unlawful to carry it beyond the border until it should have paid the duty and passed through the mint. Gold-dust, which was the only circulating medium in _Minas Geraes_, was found to be so debased by the traders before it reached the mint that there was usually a loss upon it of 10 or 12 _per cent._ in addition to the 20 _per cent._ duty, a desire to avoid which loss, even more than to avoid the duty, led to the frequent practice of endeavouring to smuggle it across the frontier. When it had once reached the cities, goldsmiths were readily found either to convert it into bars or to work it into jewellery. The knowledge of these practices naturally led to a law against jewellers, whose presence had long been forbidden in _Minas Geraes_, and was now no longer tolerated in the sea-ports. The less productive province of _Goyaz_ yielded in some years a capitation tax of forty _arrobas_. This advanced province had to bear the burden of a war with a brave tribe, called the _Cayapos_. The province of _Minas Geraes_ was likewise exposed to incursions from other native tribes; but, notwithstanding occasional disturbances, the interior of _Brazil_ continued on the whole to make steady progress towards civilization. [Sidenote: 1767.]