Brazil at the Dawn of the Eighteenth Century

Chapter VII: The Wood Used to Make the Rollers, and All Other Woodworking on the Plantation, Canoes and Boats, and What Is Normally Paid to Carpenters and Similar Workers

73 chapter vii y The Wood Used to Make the Rollers, and All Other Woodworking on the Plantation, Canoes and Boats, and What Is Normally Paid to Carpenters and Similar Workers Before turning from the mill to the furnaces and the cooking house, I think it necessary to discuss the timbers and wood that make up the mill and all the other woodworking on the plantation. In Brazil, it is possible to select the best types of wood, since there is no other place on Earth with an equally rich variety of select and strong wood. Only the best lei wood is used in the mill because experience has shown it to be the most suitable. Lei woods are the strongest, longest lasting, and best suited, and these include the sapucaia, sapupira, sapu­ pira-cari, sapupira-mirim, sapupira-açu, vinhático, arco, yellow jetaí, the black jetaí, the messetaúba, maçaranduba, Brazil wood, jacarandá, pau de oleo, picaí, and other similar woods.17 The wood used in the milling house, the furnace area, the cooking house, and the refining area should be maçaranduba, because it is very hard and works for everything. It is suitable for tie beams, roof beams, smaller roof beams, cross-beams or framework for the roof, dowels, and timber. This type of wood is found all around the Recôncavo and the coastline of Brazil. The large tie beams and roof beams are worth three to four milréis, sometime more depending on their length and width. These prices are for the timbers in their rough state as they arrive from the forest with only their first hewing. The rollers of the mill are made of sapucaia or of sapupira-cari; the top of the large roller is made from pau d’arco or sapupira; the pegs for the three rollers, the small wheel, and the flywheel are made of mes­ setaúba. The water wheel is made of pau d’arco, sapupira, or vinhático. The curved sections of the small wheel, the flywheel, the beams, and cross-beams are made from sapupira. The supports and stands can be made of any of the lei woods. The carts are made of sapupira-mirim, 74 The Cultivation of Sugar jetaí, or sapucaia. The water trough is made from vinhático. The canoes are made from picaí, joairana, jequitibá, utussica, or angelim. The ribbing and cross-sections of the boats are made from sapupira, landimcarvalho , or sapupira-mirim. The keel is made from sapupira or from peroba, the sheathing and broadsides from utim, peroba, buranhém, and unhuíba. The masts are made from inhuibatam, the spars from camaçari, the rudder from averno or angelima, the curves and arcs of the bow and poop from sapupira, as are the cross-beams on the deck. The barge poles are made from white mangrove, and the oars from lindirana or of jenipapo. The crates in which the sugar is packed are made from jequitibá and camaçari. If there is not enough of these two types of wood, burissica can be used for the tops and bottoms. The boards for the crates come from the sawmill already cut, and at the mill they only gather them, put them in order, and smooth the edges, as it is not necessary to have the sides in place. These are two and a half palmas high and seven and a half or eight palmas wide, and the bottom pieces are three palmas by the same length. In past years, crates were worth ten or twelve tostões, but their price is higher nowadays. The axle of the roller, in its rough natural state, cut only on the ends or hewn to eight sides, is worth forty or fifty, or even sixty milréis or more, depending upon the quality of the wood and how much it is needed. Those from Porto Seguro and Patipe are inferior because they come from the lowlands. The best are those from Pitanga and the new lands above Santo Amaro. The costs for wood for the mill are more than one thousand cruzados, not counting the water wheel. Since it is constructed with bolts and cavities, it is worth more than two hundred milréis. The carpenter on the mill receives five tostões daily if he is not also fed. If he is also given meals, then he receives a cruzado and even more these days, since all the prices have gone...