3. Historic Use of Transport Mules in Southeast Brazil

“Without the mule, the century of gold would not have been possible.”5 Alfredo Ellis Junior (1950, p. 73)

As an agent of landscape transformation in Southeast Brazil, it is

noteworthy to first identify how the mule arrived to influence such change. The

following chapter traces the arrival of the mule in South America onward to its

arrival in São Paulo. Thereafter, key events and phases in Brazil’s history are

detailed from the perspective the mule played in those transformational periods in

the geographic and economic landscapes. Among the most notable periods in

Southeast Brazil are the key phases of gold mining in Minas Gerais and the

production of coffee in the Paraiba Valley of Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo.

Throughout, discussion envelops the introduction and dissemination of some

exotic African plant species due to mules’ pasture grazing needs. Finally, the last

section focuses on the mule’s role in providing energy to the growing metropolis

of Rio de Janeiro.

3.1. Domestication and Arrival in South America

As it is incapable of reproduction, the mule and its history in South America

is actually the story of its two parent offspring arriving from other continents.

The horse, while plentiful as a wild creature upwards of 15,000 years ago, was

believed to be extinct in North America approximately 10,000 years ago due to a

combination of climatic change and over-hunting (CLUTTON-BROCK, 1992).

As a domesticated creature, the earliest horse remains have been found at

archeological sites in Ukraine dating to around 6000 years ago marking the time

when man first began to employ the horse for survival. Similarly, and possibly

5 Original quote: “Sem o muar não teria sido possível o século do ouro.”

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due to the difficulty in controlling them, the wild asses of both the Asian and

African breeds (Equus africanus and Equus hemionus) were not domesticated

during the initial wave of mammal domestication 9000 years ago. Only later

burial sites in present-day Iraq dating back to 4500 years ago indicate donkey

fossils intermixed with human skeletons presumably time-stamping their

domestication (CLUTTON-BROCK, 1992). In both instances, the horse and

donkey, and by correlation, the mule, are thus exotic species to the Americas.

The arrival of the horse and the donkey to the Americas accompanied

Christopher Columbus’s arrival in 1492, although the southwardly expeditions of

Francisco Pizzaro from Mexico into present-day Peru officially reintroduced the

previously extinct horse onto the South American continent (CLUTTON-

BROCK, 1992). Pizzaro set out to conquer the Incan Empire in 1532, and carried

with him in his expedition a number of horses. These domesticated horses,

however, were often freed by pillaging raids conducted by indigenous

populations, and the number of feral horses in South America grew significantly

upon finding suitable grasslands in Argentina. The growth of the untamed horse

multiplied so quickly in South America in the 16th century, Paraguay issued an

edict in 1596 dictating any captured wild horse was now the property of he who

had made the effort to catch it (Ibid., p. 149).

In regards to the jumento, the donkey first arrived on the continental

mainland due to Father Juan de Zumárraga, the first Roman Catholic bishop of

Mexico. Zumárraga is said to have brought two burros with him upon landing in

Mexico in December of 1528, as seen in the below timeline that initiates a

chronology of mules in Brazil (Table 2) (CRIVELLI, 1912; BROOKSHIER,

1974). Zumárraga further sought to increase the donkey population in the

Americas writing back to the King of Spain to send more of these animals on

future ocean crossings. In addition to realizing their economic worth in the

resource rich environment of the Americas, Zumárraga was also kindhearted in

his effort to relieve the burden placed on enslaved Indians to do the burro’s task of

transporting materials around the mission (BROOKSHIER, 1974). Similarly,

after arriving in Mexico, the burro accompanied its Spanish conquerors in

spreading south throughout the continent.

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Table 2: Timeline depicting the mule's arrival and influence in Southeast

Brazil's colonial and imperial history

3.2. The Mule’s Arrival in Southeast Brazil

The mule arrived in Southeast Brazil not from overseas import by the

Portuguese, but rather an overland route that marked the landscape and the

economy. As mining operations throughout neighboring Spanish-controlled

colonies closed down at the end of the 17th century, transport mules serving the

area were purchased, or appropriated, and brought to southern Brazil (MILAN,

2011). From there, and after several years exploring and opening an overland

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route northward, Cristoval Pereira de Abreu left from near Laguna, Santa Catarina

in 1730 with a herd of 3000 horses and mules in direction of Southeast Brazil

(GOULART, 1961). This original herd of mules passed through São Paulo and

reached present day Minas Gerais after 18 months, satisfying the demand for

cargo animals supporting expanding gold mining operations in Minas Gerais and

Goiás.

Later, this original overland route north shifted its origin from Santa

Catarina to Rio Grande do Sul, quickly altering the local economy. Speaking to

mule breeding operations for export northward to Minas Gerais, Fábio Kühn, a

professor and historian at the Federal Rio Grande do Sul University, indicated

“when Brazilians perceived that it was a lucrative activity, they built breeding

farms near Viamão. The mule cost ten times more than the horse or the cow in

that era”6 (MILAN, 2011). This northward mule migration opened the 1,200

kilometer route from Viamão, Rio Grande do Sul to the animal trading market in

Sorocaba, enabling commerce between the two regions (Figure 11). In

transforming the landscape with effects lasting until present-day, the first 715

kilometers of Highway 116 overlay this original path extending from just north of

Viamão to just south of Curitiba. Writing of the importance of this interstate trail,

the Historian Alfredo Ellis Júnior (1950, p. 76) wrote in his article, O ciclo do

muar, that “perhaps the road from Rio Grande to São Paulo has been the most

important in the history of Brazil, because without it there would not have been

the coffee era nor the uniting of the nation.”7 Ellis Júnior wrote this claim with

the historical context of knowing how critical the eras of gold and coffee would be

on the Brazilian economic landscape, of which the mule was an ideally important

actor.

6 Original quote: “Quando os brasileiros perceberam que era uma atividade lucrativa, construíram fazendas de criação de muares nas proximidades de Viamão. O gado muar chegava a custar dez vezes mais que o equino e o bovino na época.” 7 Original quote: “Talvez a estrada do Rio Grande a São Paulo tenha sido a rota de maior importância na história do Brasil, pois sem ela não teria havido o ciclo do café e nem a unidade nacional teria sido levada a cabo.”

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Figure 11: Northward mule migration from Rio Grande do Sul to Sorocaba, São Paulo. Source: Google Maps, Milan (2011)

3.3. Gold and the Estrada Real in Minas Gerais, 18th Century

In the late 1690s, São Paulo bandeirantes began discovering traces of gold

in the rivers near the town of Ouro Preto, in Minas Gerais (ENCYCLOPAEDIA

BRITANNICA, 2015). As word of the discovery spread, the opportunity for

riches quickly triggered a rush of individuals to the region, and mules answered

the central problem of resupplying prospectors from the port cities.

The demand for food, shelter, and materials to the miners, or mineiros as

residents of the state are known, drove the economy and the resupply from the

coast to the interior. Over time, the flow of mules increased carving out the

original overland path between the mines of northern Minas Gerais near the city

of Diamantina and the port city of Paraty in Rio de Janeiro state, a total distance

of 1,400 kilometers (Figure 12) (SANTOS, 2001). Later, a second route was

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opened between Guanabara Bay in Rio de Janeiro and Ouro Preto called the

Caminho Novo, or New Path, while the previous trail was subsequently referred to

as Caminho Velho, or the Old Path. Writing on the mule’s critical importance

along this path, Goulart (1961) indicated ox or horse-pulled wagons were

incapable of traversing the long distances over the terrain; furthermore, horses

could not support the heavy loads being asked of the mule.

Figure 12: Estrada Real crossing Minas Gerais, São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. Source: Instituto Estrada Real

In showing how the mule’s metabolic needs marked the landscape of the

region, along the interior of Brazil the mines of northern Minas Gerais and the

central plains were insufficient to supply the salt demands of the growing mule

and human population, which served as a problem impeding the colonial

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economy’s growth8 (LIFCHITZ, 1950). Salt, therefore, was imported from the

coasts on the backs of the mules who consumed it, and due to the lack of salt licks

in the interior, often drove the cost of a small spoonful of salt to exorbitant values

often approaching the price of the gold being panned for. According to Silva et al

(2015), this lack of salt also affected cattle ranching in Goiás, neighboring state to

Minas Gerais. There, after taking months for the salt to arrive from the coast, in

some regions salt was worth more than the animal itself being raised for slaughter

at the market.

In addition to the necessity of sodium chloride in the metabolism of these

animals, salt also performed an important role in the domestication and control of

animal caravans. Mules were accustomed to eating salt always in the same place,

o cocho, and were summoned with a standard call from their owner. This habit

made it possible to care for and control animals where fences were fences did not

exist; this habit extended even to beef cattle.

Fortunately, this salt crisis was alleviated in 1801 when the Portuguese

empire liberated the salt trade in Brazil from its monopolistic dominion, and

shortly thereafter, entrepreneurs established salt flats to serve the demand. In

1822, a German army officer established the first private salt enterprise in the Rio

de Janeiro state coastal town of Cabo Frio, and this city still produces salt today

(JOÃO, 2012).

At the conclusion of the gold mining era in the 1790s, mules continued to

work as transport vehicles in the region, but mule caravans now moved in a

different direction as mule troops traversed southward to the Silver River region

encompassing Paraguay, Uruguay and Buenos Aires, Argentina (ELLIS JÚNIOR,

1950, p. 74). Sugars being produced in Rio de Janeiro now flowed southward

along the original northward mule migration path to Rio Grande do Sul. Mules

8 Particular to the mule’s physiology, salt aids in the digestion process, helping balance sodium chloride and potassium levels in the kidneys. Salt’s importance in equines is paramount such that despite all modern technology in creating processed feeds, many breeders and mule trainers still recommend grazing access to high quality mineral salt in block or loose form that mules instinctively know when to consume (Smith, 2009). Furthermore, interviews with tropeiros in Itatiaia National Park confirmed the mule’s need for this precious mineral; collectively they indicated the mule becomes weak and chilled without it. In their analysis, salt helps reduce the toxicity of the plants ingested in the pasture or while foraging in the forest. As a homemade cure, one tropeiro indicated the remedy was administering a roasted mixture of salt and previous fire ashes.

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enriched the Spanish-American colonies south of Brazil via this international

trade, and the southern most state, Rio Grande do Sul, benefitted greatly. As the

state benefitted greatly from its lucrative mule business, the historian Ellis Júnior

(1950) speculated the mule was but one contributing factor to the Rio Grande do

Sul’s later attempt at independence during the Farroupilha Revolution in 1835.

Influencing the economic landscape from that era to this one, the practice of mule

breeding continues today, aiding the local economy in Minas Gerais and

providing a connection to the mule’s origin in the region.

3.3.1. Modern mule breeding along the ancient Estrada Real

The Fazenda do Vau, visited during research in the area, is located outside

the town of Lagoa Dourado in the state of Minas Gerais along the Caminho Velho

or “Old Path” linking the mines of Minas Gerais to the port of Paraty. Today, the

farm breeds horses, mules and donkeys for sale throughout Brazil; unlike the 19th

century, the majority of bred mules now are shipped via truck to the northeast,

with a large number going to the state of Pará (RENATO, 2015).

Relating to Brazil’s era of gold, though, the farm considers its finest

achievement the creation and sustainment of the Pega breed of donkeys, later used

in breeding mules. In 1810 a Portuguese priest named Torquato Jose de Almeida

brought to Brazil seven male and two female donkey species of Egyptian and

Italian heritage for genetic crossing with local varieties (SOUSA, 1999). In that

era, donkeys were common in all of Europe and Asia. According to the legend

passed down amongst generations in the Resende family that owns the farm,

Father Torquato inspiration for importing an Egyptian breed was biblical. Jesus’s

escape to Egypt is detailed in the Book of Matthew, Chapter 2, Verses 13-18, and

this story was chronicled by various painters, including Fra Angelico, with Jesus

riding atop a donkey (Figure 13).

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Figure 13: 15th century painting of Mary, Joseph, and Jesus's escape to Egypt atop a donkey. Source: Fra Angelico.9

However, the Catholic Church denied Father Torquato’s request to work

also as a breeder (SOUSA, 1999). The Egyptian donkeys, already in Brazil, then

were sold to a local breeder, Colonel Eduardo José de Resende.10 Colonel

Resende, with his Egyptian-Italian offspring, then crossed favorable traits of local

male Brazilian donkeys with his Egyptian female donkey. His creation, honed

over time, became known as the Pega breed, and his descendants continue

breeding the strain at the Fazenda do Vau. However, during the Brazil’s golden

era, from the Pega breed of donkey came uniquely “engineered” Brazilian mules,

designed specifically to serve the transportation needs of the nearby mines. As

9 Found at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fra_Angelico_005.jpg 10 Dom Pedro II, the last emperor of Brazil, who greatly expanded the economic capabilities and prestige of the country during his 58-year rule in the mid 19th century, anointed Resende a Coronel. In tracing the lineage, Coronel Resende was the grandfather to the current owner of the farm, Paulo Resende.

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the current chief breeder at the farm, Paulo’s son Renato states the mules “great

advantage over horses is their durability, in equal parts their resistance to illness

as well as their abilities in plowing and over long distance journeys” 11 (SOUSA,

1999). Despite mining operations slowing down in Minas Gerais at the beginning

of the 19th century, the mule’s advantages would be required again in southeast

Brazil, as plantation owners cleared large swaths of forest to support Brazil’s

newest cash crop.

3.4. The Coffee Era in the Paraiba Valley, 1820-1880

A new era was building at the beginning of the 19th century as coffee

started overtaking the landscape, expanding outward from Rio de Janeiro. In his

seminal work on the history of coffee in Brazil, História do Café no Brasil,

Afonso Taunay (1939) outlined coffee’s importance in Brazil’s economic growth

and the mule’s critical role in facilitating the country’s development. In

particular, while interviewing Barão de Pati do Alferes, a coffee baron in Rio in

1848, Taunay wrote the mule carried on its back “millions” of arrôbas of coffee

(Portuguese imperial measurement equal to 15 kilograms) towards the ocean. In

return, the mule brought back sugar, brandy, vegetables, chickens, lard, and pork

to feed both the slaves who predominantly worked the land and the finer appetites

for European luxuries of the coffee barons who ran the plantations (ALGATÃO,

2010). Displaying its versatility, the mule also carried inland wines, decorated

mirrors, and iron balconies forged in England and Belgium (GOULART, 1961).

Taunay (1939) summarized that without mules, he did not think it would not have

been possible to be a coffee plantation owner in the high plains.

As coffee became the principal crop in Brazil’s agriculture, mules grew in

number as evidenced in the transaction registries at the Sorocaba market. From

1820 to 1830 as coffee began its significant expansion, transactions involving

mules accounted for only half of the total deals with trade of cattle and horses

making up the majority of the remaining trade (KLEIN, 1990). However, as

coffee flourished in the subsequent decades, this percentage rose to nearly 80

11 Original quote: “A grande vantagem sobre o cavalo é justamente a resistência que os burros e as mulas têm, tanto em relação a doença quanto aos serviços de tração e cavalgadas de longa distância.”

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percent during the 1850s and 1860s as over 55,000 mules passed through the

market at the mule’s peak in 1869 (Table 1). The train’s arrival in Brazil

throughout the 1870s, though, significantly curtailed the mule’s influence and

importance.

Table 3: Average estimated mules arriving in Sorocaba Fair and percent market share

Source: Klein, 1990.

By 1880 with the train having established itself on the mule’s primary

transport routes, the number of mules sold in the market had dropped 91% from

its 1850s peak to only slightly more than 5,000 per year (KLEIN, 1990).

Furthermore, the mule’s market share dropped to about 33% as horses and cattle

again became the predominantly traded animals in the Sorocaba fair. In some

regards, the train’s displacement of mule transport was due to simple economies

of scale. According to Goulart (1961), when compared to transport by train,

shipping via mule for a single arrôba cost about five times more in Rio de Janeiro

and São Paulo and nearly seven times greater when originating in Minas Gerais.

3.5. Molding the Physical Landscape of Brazil

It was during these eras of mining and coffee that the geographic influence

of the mule can still be seen in the landscape today. The botanist Auguste de

Saint-Hilaire (1976) traveled along paths in the Paraiba Valley in the state of São

Paulo in 1822, noted, even then, the heterogeneity of the landscape:

The alternating coffee plantations, virgin forests, corn fields, barns, mountains and valleys, these ranches, farms, and these small dwelling surrounded by the negro

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sheds and caravans that come and go, all give evidence of a region with great variety.12

Meanwhile, these trails used by mules in the transport of goods, were far

from being the only routes connecting two points. A series of parallel paths,

extensions, shortcuts, and alternate mountainous trajectories filled the ridgelines

of Southeast Brazil with numerous tracks. If in the plains areas no traces remain

of these ancient routes, in the Serra do Mar and the Serra da Mantiqueira, as well

as the costal massifs of Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, and Minas Gerais, numerous

paths of these types are found. These trails are being largely buried, retaken, and

completely covered over by forest vegetation. On steeper higher altitude slopes,

the trail cutouts are more evident, but over flat plains, discerning the original trail

is more difficult. Some trails have been reduced in length (approximately 10-15

kilometers as found within the Pedra Branca massif in Rio de Janeiro), while

others are considerably longer at up to 80 kilometers in length. This latter

distance is the case in the trail connecting the Serra da Bocaina, SP to the coast in

Mambucaba, RJ, known colloquially today as the Trilha de Ouro, or Trail of

Gold, of which more specific features continue to mark the landscape today.

12 Original quote: “Esta alternativa de cafezais e matas virgens, roças de milho, capoeiras, vales e montanhas, esses ranchos, essas vendas, essas pequenas habitações rodeadas das choças dos negros e as caravanas que vão e vêm, dão aos aspectos da região grande variedade.”

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Figure 14: Trail of Gold connecting São Jose do Barreiro to Mambucaba and ports in Paraty. Source: Google Maps, Wikiloc user GPS trackfile

The Trail of Gold, with several extensions and junctions, passes through the

dominion of the dense mountain and lower mountain rainforest, in various

advanced states of regeneration. While close to 80 kilometers long, from the sea

it initially follows along the Mambucaba river, passing through Serral Geral and

Frade, where it then splits going to the towns of Silveiras, São José do Barreiro

and Resende. The average width is approximately 2.5 meters throughout the trail,

and it is paved with large stones, some measuring up to 1 square meter and

presumably moved into place by slaves, permitted under Brazilian law until

abolished in 1888 (Figure 15). Given this irregularity in surface condition, the

trail was unusable for ox-led wagon. Its primary benefactor therefore was the

mule, and there exist numerous reports of mule caravans transporting coffee from

the Paraiba River Valley to São Paulo (LAMEGO, 1963). However, as the train

arrived to São Jose do Barreiro in 1892, this path ceased to function as the major

shipping lane for coffee production in the region. Despite this, even today the

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trail still functions as mules are found transporting bananas from upper elevations

along the Mambucaba river to the coast.

Figure 15: Trail aspects of the Trilha de Ouro between Mambucaba, RJ and São José do Barreiro, SP. Source: Rogério Oliveira

An important point is these trails did not act only as a simple passage

through uninhabited forests and mountain ranges. They were vectors towards a

lateral occupation, in part connected to use of the path. This occupation, since its

infancy, was responsible for modifications in the structure of the residual forest

that persist until today. It is very probably that the procuring of food, as much for

humans as for mules, was the source of this occupation:

From the heights of the Mantiqueira, descended offshoots of the Verde River, already on lands within Minas Gerais, passing by pine trees, whose fruits sustained the miners. At the end of the 17th century, it was already common to have fields of corn, beans, and other foodstuffs that, together with domesticated animals, were sold for exorbitant prices (COSTA, 2009).13

It is worth highlighting that this path, more than a simple connecting

pathway between the littoral and the interior, also served as a starting point for

exploring the use of the land all along its trajectory. Along practically all of this

13 Original quote: Do alto da Mantiqueira, descia-se as vertentes do Rio Verde, já em território de Minas Gerais, passando-se pelos pinheirais, cujos frutos sustentavam os mineiros. Em fins do século XVII, já eram comuns as roças de milho, feijão e outros gêneros alimentícios que, junto com animais domésticos, eram vendidos por preços exorbitantes.

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passage, secondary forests in an advanced state of regeneration comprise these

sections of the Atlantic Forest.

Another significant point about these paths pertains to the necessity of

pastures for the mules passing through the area. According to Oliveira and

Solórzano (2014), the direct utilization of tropical forest biomass was often hardly

palatable to both humans and fauna that did not evolve with the ecosystem, such

as the bovines and equids brought by colonizers. The reason being this biomass is

formulated by a large number of secondary compounds, most frequently the

tannins such as terpenoids, alkaloids, and glycosides (COLEY e BARONE, 1996).

The path the fauna took, along its evolution towards the formation of chemical

defenses, was an attempt to move away from, or intoxicate herbivores; high

concentrations of tannins and sclerophyll can construct barriers to the alimentation

of non-specialized herbivores (SILVA, 2009). This is exactly the case of the

herbivores brought by colonizers: horses and mules. Therefore, proceeding along

the Serra do Mar would be possible if, at regular intervals, there existed pastures

with species of palatable grasses for the mules. Saint-Hilaire (1976, p. 47)

referred to as much in 1822 regarding the movement of animal caravans and the

necessity of rest, pasture, and corn:

The farm where I stopped was situated exactly at the base of a mountain ridge and as the caravans, passing through towards the mountain, made a forced stop, there were a great fluctuation of mules […] and the owner was of such importance that everyone had to run to him, and the corn he sold, despite it being more expensive than in other places.14

Figure 16 presents a pasture not utilized, but with evidence of being used in

the past as a resting area for mules during the crossing from the valley to the

coast. Generally these pastures were of an African species, known locally as

capim-gordura, (Melinis minutiflora P. Beauv.), extremely palatable to mules

(SILVA et al., 2015). Capim-gordura’s first documented use in Brazil occurred

during the 17th century in fields surrounding Rio de Janeiro as pasture for horses.

14 Original quote: A fazenda onde parei fica situada, exatamente, na raiz da serra e como as tropas que passam pela montanha aí fazem parada forçosamente, há grande movimento de mulas [...] e o proprietário vale-se da necessidade que todos têm de recorrer a ele, e o milho se vende, mais caro que em outro lugar.

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In addition, there exist references to capim-gordura in the Brazilian Cerrado since

the beginning of the 19th century, as it was one of the primary exotic grasses cited

by European travelers in descriptions of rural landscape in the Cerrado in that era.

From there, though, the exotic African plant spread throughout regions of

commerce in Southeast Brazil, often involuntarily whether via the merchandise

itself, on the clothes of colonizers, or even as fixed to the skin of transport

animals, whether cattle, horses or mules (SILVA et al., 2015).

Figure 16: Pasture surrounded by forest on the Trilha de Ouro from São Jose do Barreiro to Mambucaba. In the upper areas of the pasture is seen a cutout of the same trail. Source: Rogério Oliveira

3.6. Supplying Rio de Janeiro’s Growth in the 19th Century

As mules played important roles in the economic development of the

southeast both during the gold rush of the 18th century and the coffee boom of the

19th century, within Rio de Janeiro the mule also served a central role both in

altering the physical landscape and enabling economic expansion. In the mid

1800s, the city of Rio began to develop rapidly as a center of economic

development. The city at that time was home to vast network of sugar mills, all of

which relied heavily on the Pedra Branca and Tijuca forests within present-day

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city boundaries to supply firewood to power the mills. In addition, as growth

continued, the city began to rely heavily on carvoeiros. These carvoeiros were

run-away slaves, or ex-slaves after slavery was abolished in Brazil 1888, who

transformed the landscape by making charcoal out of felled trees. (FRAGA e

OLIVEIRA, 2012).

Residents in Rio relied on charcoal energy for many uses, and the mule

was critical in the transportation chain from the massifs worked by the carvoeiros.

Rio’s citizens used charcoal to prepare foods, power operations in textile and glass

industries, produce tools and utensils, and lay the transportation network building

outwards from the city. It also enabled horseshoe production in blacksmith shops

across the city to fit the fleet of mules crossing from urban dwellings and factories

to nearby forests (FRAGA e OLIVEIRA, 2012). Charcoal was carried on the

back of mules throughout the 18th and 19th centuries supplying energy to Rio. The

French painter Jean Debret depicted this facet of everyday life in the city as seen

in the 1827 painting depicted in Figure 17. However, in a cruel twist of history,

mule-transported charcoal primarily supplied the energy necessary to power

locomotives beginning to operate across the southeastern states in 1870s,

ultimately marking the beginning of the end of the mule’s historic apex in

transforming Brazil’s landscape.

Figure 17: Charcoal transportation in Rio de Janeiro mountains via mules Source: Jean Bapiste Debret, 1827

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As a transport animal, the mule significantly impacted the development of

Brazil during two major economic cycles marking gold mining operations in

Minas Gerais and coffee growing in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo. During these

times, the mule continued to support the growth of Rio de Janeiro’s energy needs,

up until the train displaced the mule as the sensible means of shipping

economically in the 1870s. Since those eras, mule use for transport has declined

sharply, compounded by the 20th century introduction of highways and truck

transport. However, the mule is still effectively used in a few regions around

Southeast Brazil, and as such, continues to transform the landscape even in

modern day.