The country I passed over from Natal, never can, in any state of civilization, or from any increase of population, be rendered a fertile track; but it might be, without doubt, much improved, if proper wells were sunk, reservoirs made for rain water, and trees planted; much might be done. The plains I crossed are of three kinds; those of which the soil is a loose sand, producing the acaju, the mangaba and several kinds of palm or cabbage trees; upon them the grass is short, and of a kind which is not reckoned nourishing; in these situations are likewise produced several creeping plants, similar to those growing upon the common lands, near the sea-shore, in England, and the trees are thinly scattered. The fruit of the acaju or cashew tree, and of the mangaba, are most delightful, and are doubly acceptable in crossing the sands upon which they are to be met with. The former has been often described; the latter is a small round fruit, and is not unlike a crab-apple in appearance, but it is sweet, and is unfit to be eaten until it drops from the tree; the pulp is fibrous but soft, and three seeds or kernels are contained in it, of which the taste approaches that of almonds. The palm or cabbage trees[38] also afford fruits, which are eaten when other food fails; but these are insipid. These plains are the _taboleiros_, of which there exists also another kind, which are covered with brushwood, of stinted height, from the nature of the soil, but it is close and higher than a man on horseback. The road lies, in many places, through it; but as it does not afford any shade, and prevents the wind from alleviating the intenseness of the heat; it is here that the power of the sun is fully felt. This brushwood is, however, not too thick to prevent cattle from breaking their way through it, and feeding among it. The third description of plains are those of a better kind of soil, which produce good nourishing grass, but upon these no trees grow; small shrubs and briars alone are to be seen, and oftentimes not even these. They are, in parts, stony, and have rising ground upon them, which is not sufficiently high to deserve the name of a ridge of hills; but is enough to break the ocean-like flatness and immensity which these plains sometimes present to the traveller; after proceeding for hours, the same distance still seems to remain for him to traverse. These are the _campinas_. I passed over some spots covered with high trees, which in our own country would be called woods of considerable extent; but in Brazil, they could not be accounted of sufficient magnitude to compose a distinguishing feature in the naked regions which I traversed. The impression which a recollection of this portion of land left upon my mind, is of a flat uncovered country.