has not been found wanting. He is a native of Pernambuco, and has not degenerated from the high character of his provincial countrymen; he was educated at the university of Coimbra in Portugal. From the state of society and government in Brazil, the individual character of the person who holds any office of importance makes a most wonderful difference, and indeed in some districts a man of an active mind with some wealth, but without any appointment, has more weight than a person of a contrary disposition, although the situation of the latter might give him great power, if he thought proper to exert himself. I passed some portion of each day with the vicar and his party; the conversation never flagged, and I often thought how very superior the persons were with whom I associated, to any that my friends in England could suppose a country residence in Brazil to afford. I was myself agreably surprised at the change which I had made from Jaguaribe. Among the visitors at the vicarage was Joam Ribeiro Pessoa de Mello Montenegro, professor of drawing to the seminary of Olinda, and the friend and disciple of Dr. Manoel Arruda da Camara. This priest, during his stay at Itamaraca, crossed over to the mainland to say mass at the village of Camboa every Sunday and holiday. I accompanied him on one of these occasions, and we were paddled over in a canoe. We entered the cottage of a man of colour, the chief person of the place; a hammock was hanging in the room, and into this my companion threw himself, and three or four children of the house quickly came to him, one or two of whom he took into the hammock to play with. The females made their appearance to greet him upon his arrival; he was a favourite seemingly with all parties, great and small. Indeed I never met with any one who possessed more pleasing manners. He is generally beloved wherever he is known, but by the lower orders of people more especially, he is quite adored. I was long acquainted with him, both before and after the time of which I speak, and I never heard him make use of a harsh word to any one; his manner and his tones of voice always indicated that goodness in him greatly predominated. A free mulatto man, of the name of Bertolomeu, once said to me in speaking of this priest, “If he sees a child fall, he runs and picks it up and cleans its face, and this he does not do, because any one is in sight to see him act in this manner, but because his heart so inclines him[109].” It is much to be lamented that his exertions have not been directed to obtaining a situation in which his excellent qualities might have a wider field for display; but he is satisfied with what has been given to him.