CHAPTER V.
From the Arrival of the Fleet at Rio de Janeiro, till its Departure for the Cape of Good Hope; with some Remarks on the Brazils.
Brazil is a country very imperfectly known in Europe.

The Portugueze, from political motives, have been sparing in their accounts of it.
Whence our descriptions of it, in the geographical publications in England, are drawn, I know not: that they are miserably erroneous and defective, is certain.
The city of St.Sebastian stands on the west side of the harbour, in a low unhealthy situation, surrounded on all sides by hills, which stop the free circulation of air, and subject its inhabitants to intermittents and putrid diseases.

It is of considerable extent: Mr.
Cook makes it as large as Liverpool; but Liverpool, in 1767, when Mr.
Cook wrote, was not two-thirds of its present size.

Perhaps it equals Chester, or Exeter, in the share of ground it occupies, and is infinitely more populous than either of them.

The streets intersect each other at right angles, are tolerably well built, and excellently paved, abounding with shops of every kind, in which the wants of a stranger, if money is not one of them, can hardly remain unsatisfied.