[Footnote 6:  The author writes as of the year 1740.—­E.]

Soon after this discovery, it was represented to the king of Portugal, that if diamonds should be met with in such abundance as their sanguine expectations seemed to indicate, their value and estimation would be so debased as to ruin all the Europeans who had any quantity of East India diamonds in their possession, and would even render the discovery itself of no importance, and prevent his majesty from deriving any advantages from it.  On these considerations, his majesty thought proper to restrain the general search for diamonds, and erected a diamond company, with an exclusive charter for this purpose; in which company, in consideration of a sum of money paid to the king, the property of all diamonds found in Brazil is vested:  But, to hinder them from collecting too large quantities, and thereby reducing their value in the market, they are prohibited from employing above eight hundred slaves in this search.  To prevent any of his other subjects from continuing the search, and to secure the company against interlopers, a large town, and considerable surrounding district, has been depopulated; and all the inhabitants, said to have amounted to six thousand, have been obliged to remove to another part of the country:  For as this town and district were in the neighbourhood of the diamonds, it was thought impossible to prevent such a number of people from frequently smuggling, if allowed to reside on the spot.

In consequence of these important discoveries in Brazil, new laws, new governments, and new regulations, have been established in many parts of the country.  Not long ago there was a considerable track of country possessed by a set of inhabitants called Paulists, from the name of their principal settlement, who were almost independent of the crown of Portugal, to which it scarcely ever acknowledged a nominal allegiance.  These Paulists are said to be descendants from the Portuguese who retired from the northern part of Brazil when it was invaded and possessed by the Dutch.  Being long neglected by their superiors, owing to the confusions of the times, and obliged to provide for their own security and defence, the necessity of their affairs produced a kind of government among themselves, which sufficed for their mode of life.  Thus habituated to their own regulations, they became fond of independence, so that, rejecting the mandates of the court of Lisbon, they were often engaged in a state of downright rebellion; and, owing to the mountains surrounding their country, and the difficulty of clearing the few passes leading towards it, they were generally able to make their own terms before they submitted.  But as gold was found in this country of the Paulists, the present king of Portugal, in whose reign almost all these great discoveries have been made, thought it necessary to reduce this province, now become of great importance, under the same dependence and obedience with the rest of the country, which was at length effected, though, as I was informed, with great difficulty.