ABSTRACT
Race mixture played a decisive role in the formation of the Braztlian people. Slavery corrupted both master and slave, fostered harmful attitudes with respect to the dignity of labor, and retarded the economic development of Brazil. In the Portuguese South American dominions, circumstances have directed that there should be no division of castes, and a very few of those degrading and most galling distinctions which have been made by all other nations in the management of their colonies. Slavery played as important a role in the social organization of colonial Brazil as did race mixture in its ethnic make-up. Some masters have the custom of giving their slaves one day a week to plant for themselves, sometimes sending the overseer along to see that they do not neglect their work; this helps to keep them from suffering lrunger or from daily milling about the house of the master to beg him for a ration of flour.
