The population of _Bahia_ and the surrounding coast is said to have numbered, in the middle of the seventeenth century, some three thousand five hundred souls, not including a garrison of two thousand five hundred. A few years later, however, _Bahia_ is described as having fine streets, grand squares, well-built houses, and splendid churches. At the close of the century it is said to have possessed two thousand houses, built of stone. It owed its prosperity, amongst other causes, to its being a place of safety for the new-Christians, who were persecuted with such cruelty in Portugal and Spain. Superstitious as were the Brazilians, even they successfully resisted the establishment of the Inquisition amongst them. If the new Christians were, in _Brazil_, a despised race, they could at any rate count on opportunities of gaining wealth and of retaining it when gained. _Bahia_ possessed abundant sources of riches; amongst others its whale fishery, which at one time was considered the most important in the world. At the close of the century it was rented by the Crown for thirty thousand dollars. The staple commodity was sugar. In general, a scanty population was scattered along the shores and in the islands; and here and there we read of a place, such as _Porto Seguro_, possessing a population of fifty inhabitants. The numbers, on the whole, are so scanty that it seems strange that the Portuguese could have at the same time contended successfully with a foreign invader and with hostile tribes in the interior. _Espirito Santo_ had five hundred Portuguese in its district; whilst the population of _Rio de Janeiro_ was estimated at five times that number, exclusive of a garrison of six hundred. As a city it was inferior to _Bahia_; it was, however, advancing rapidly in wealth. It owed the eminence which it soon attained, and which it retains amongst the cities of _Brazil_, to its situation relatively to the mines which were soon to be discovered. _Ilha Grande_ and the island of _S. Sebastian_ possessed, in the middle of the century, no more than one hundred and fifty inhabitants each; the population of _Santos_ was rather greater. _S. Paulo_ boasted some seven hundred inhabitants; its neighbourhood, however, must have contained a considerable number, amongst whom were enlisted the terrible bands of freebooters, who carried desolation and destruction to the frontiers of _Paraguay_, and one band of whom penetrated as far as to the province of _Quito_, where, having encountered the Spaniards, they escaped down the _Amazons_ on rafts. The earliest gold found in _Brazil_ was gathered at _S. Vicente_ in 1655, where it was coined. _S. Vicente_, at this time, had two thousand inhabitants. To the south of this place there was a small settlement at _Cananea_, and a still smaller one at _Santa Catalina_.