At times, indeed, we confess there come over our minds the most painful misgivings on this subject; for the South Americans, in fact, are really Spaniards, let them say what they will;-their language, religion, and manners, as well as their education, moral and political, are all the same; and we should have much greater hopes of them were the reproaches so liberally used by their former masters, as to the contamination of their blood, better founded than any one can take them to be. It is, indeed, impossible to meet a Spaniard, or one of his descendants, without an involuntary feeling of personal regard; there is something so gentle and friendly in his address, with a slight touch of the gracefulness of oriental manners left him by the Moors, that the individual irresistibly engages our good will, and makes us forget those defects in his character which are the real causes of the downfal of his nation. But the South Americans, as well as the Spaniards, are unfortunately destitute of those habits of business which give this country, and North America, so great an ascendancy over the rest of the world: they have a positive delight in procrastination, punctuality is pain to them, and they are almost always more willing to submit to what is disagreeable than to take the trouble of shaking it off. This indolence, however it may have been originally produced, is the real cause of the deep disgrace which has come upon them; and until they spread a great deal more canvass, they must be left, as a matter of course, far astern of other nations. We do not think this is yet properly felt in England, for we hear, in many companies, the most lavish praises of the patience and uncomplaining fortitude with which the refugees from the Peninsula bear their fate. Now, although we should be sorry to say anything to check the tide of public charity which keeps these poor people alive, it is impossible to deny that this very indifference to personal comfort, and respectability of station individually, is the real cause of their national misfortunes. When half a dozen of Spaniards live in a garret in London upon what would not feed a couple of Englishmen, and not only exist but are comfortable, or, at all events, patient and tranquil, they are sustained, we conceive, by exactly the same class of feelings which enables the great mass of their countrymen to bear the tyranny established at home. In the Castilian idiom, this is called pride, or dignity-in English, it is apathy. Let us change places for a moment: suppose as many English refugees in Madrid as there are Spaniards in London: would they be content to smoke their segars, and say 'Sessa-let the world slide,' were a government like that of Ferdinand VII., and a protecting army like that of the Dauphin, established here?

At

At the very time when the Report of Ulloa and Juan was issuing from the London press, a work upon the same subject, with exactly similar pretensions as to authenticity, was making its way into the world in Madrid. The first, however, is edited by, and printed at the expense of, an Englishman; while the other comes forth from the discreet hands of a monk of the order of San Juan, and at the cost of his Catholic Majesty's exchequer.

This work (which is also named at the head of our paper) professes to be a collection of all the voyages and discoveries by sea made by the Spaniards since the close of the fifteenth century; illustrated by documents hitherto unpublished, concerning the nautical history of Spain, and the establishments formed by that nation in the Indies. The introduction, though very dull, is learned, and contains a valuable history of the progress of maritime discovery; and we learn from it that the original papers by which the voyages of Columbus, Cortes, and others are to be accompanied, have been found in the archives of Madrid, and are all forthwith to be printed verbatim, and with the spirit of perfect truth. This being the case, Mr. Barry, it appears, might have saved himself the labour and the expense of printing the Noticias Secretas,' as there can be no doubt that the Catholic king's faithful vassal, Don Martin Fernandez de Navarete, is much too candid to refuse to Ulloa and Juan the important illustration which their celebrated voyage receives from the report which we have been discussing, and which of course must pass through his hands. There are, however, certain expressions towards the end of the introduction, which incline us to think that Mr. Barry's copyright will not be invaded by any Spanish pirates. The sentences which leave this impression upon our minds, and which we would have Mr. Barry consider attentively before he trusts his neck again in Spain, are as follows:

By the publication of the works alluded to, the genuine history of the New World will be made known-the truth will stand forth in all its brilliancy, to dispel the clouds of error and of prejudice, and the effects of that mischievous system which falsifies the principles of legitimacy and good order in one quarter of the world, and tramples under foot the most sacred of all rights in another, to the destruction of those maxims of peace, brotherly love, and union, which ought to extend over the whole earth. The Indians in South America will look back with gratitude from those terrible scenes which are now acting around them, to the tender solicitude and the unceasing care with which the kings of Spain always watched over their interests and happiness.'Coleccion de los Viages, &c.

In support of these assertions, we are favoured with the dying speech of the Isabella, who, calling her husband and some of

her

her sons about her, enjoined them to see that the Indians, after her death, were not treated with injustice or cruelty. We grievously suspect her Most Catholic Majesty's conscience must have been pricking her at that fatal moment, when the immeasurable distance which had heretofore seemed to exist between a throne and a mud-hut, had been narrowed to two small steps. A number of other royal authorities, equally valuable, are cited for the same purpose in this curious introduction; and even Dr. Robertson is dragged in to make out a case. That historian's evidence, however, like that of the prince of all witnesses, his countryman Cuddie Headrig, is but little to the purpose of the interrogators; for he merely says, that, in the laws promulgated for the government of the Indians, he could perceive no traces of that cruel system attributed to the Spaniards.' Nothing can be more true; for the 'Leyes de las Indias' are a model of all that is generous-but, in point of fact and practice, they were quite as ineffectual as if their framers had been legislating for the inhabitants of the moon. Then follows a bitter philippic against the Creoles or Spanish Americans, who it seems have been seduced from their allegiance by the fantastical arguments and selfish policy of trading nations, whose sophisticated reasonings have plunged them into the lowest state of misery.-(p. cx.) In the enumeration of the various benefits conferred on the inhabitants of South America by the Spaniards, it is pleasant enough to encounter the word repartimiento.-(p. cxii.)

Comparisons, our author seems to forget, are as odious in Spanish as in other idioms; yet nothing can be a better proof of his gallantry in the use of his weapons than his daring appeal to the world on the subject of colonization.

'Did the English,' he asks, treat the Canadians better than we did the Indians? or were the inhabitants of those colonies now called the United States a bit better off? What was done in Jamaica ?—how many millions have fallen victims to powder and cold iron (polvora y hierro) in Hindostan ?'

But the most unfortunate use of this argument is where he loses his temper altogether, and roars out, Shall we compare Robespierre with Hernan Cortes, and Marat with Pizarro?' Now, for our parts, we see no objection to this comparison, except that the loss is all on the side of the Frenchmen.-We can imagine the delight with which a genuine bigot of the Escurial would listen to the following sentences of page cxiii :

'It was from this destructive volcano (the French revolution) that those flashes of lightning came forth which dazzled the eyes of Spain, Naples, Piedmont, and Portugal. But this will all pass like a dream, and leave nothing but sorrow and remorse behind. Experience

is the greatest of all undeceivers; and the day is fast approaching when the veil will be torn from their eyes, and the South Americans will curse, in the bitterness of their hearts, those strangers who have laboured to tyrannize over and impoverish them-especially by the establishment of commercial relations (trafico mercantil), and the introduction of machinery (ingeniosas invenciones); thus separating them from their mother-country, filling them with hatred and vengeance against their European brethren, corrupting their manners, concealing or falsifying the good actions of their ancestors, and all because they well know that a corrupt and effeminate population will be the more easily enslaved.'

This trash is sufficient to show the bitter mortification with which the Spaniards view the rising prosperity of South America, and the obstinacy which makes them still cling to the empty shadow of colonial power. We confess we are not charitable enough to feel any great compassion for their distress upon this occasion; if we regret anything, it is the long forbearance our government displayed in not sooner acknowledging the independence of the countries in question, merely because they conceived that the mother-country ought to lead the way. How different has been the conduct of England from that of Spain, in circumstances precisely similar! When our great American colonies revolted, we certainly endeavoured to subdue them by force of arms, and, fortunately for all parties, we failed; but as soon as the contest became hopeless, though our military hold of the country was still considerable, we at once sent out commissioners to acknowledge the independence of the States;-we shook hands, like generous foes, mutually pleased to end hostilities; and from that hour (for one silly interruption may be easily forgotten) have been useful friends to each other. Spain, however, cannot be made to see the advantages of yielding to this spirit of mutual forgiveness and oblivion; but after being beat out of every corner of the country, and sulkily refusing to enter into any amicable relations, still ministers to her false pride by a pertinacious refusal to acknowledge the independence of immense territories, long since, to all intents and purposes, as free from her influence, as if they had never belonged to her.

We turn, however, from this pettish behaviour, to give it no worse name, to a much more important topic-the probable advancement of the New States in political importance. We have seen what the sons of Englishmen can do when left to themselves in a new country: the experiment remains to be tried with the descendants of Spaniards. Our expectations, we confess, have fluctuated greatly upon this subject. We have sometimes felt serious apprehensions, that their indolence, the spiritless moderation of their wants, and the consequent absence of those influences

a

which might have urged them to the acquisition of better habits; will for a long time retard their progress. On the other hand, the possession of political power, and the unrestricted enjoyment of the benefits of commerce, must introduce, we should hope, higher tastes and higher objects of industry and ambition; whilst free intercourse with foreigners, and the consequent dissemination of the literature of other countries, will extend their knowledge, and improve their manners; and by teaching them that there is no road to national importance but that of public and private virtue, bring them to respect in themselves, and to encourage, for their own sake, those principles of honour, without which their mines of gold and silver, even were they a hundred times richer than they seem to be, would fail to give them the slightest weight in the scale of nations.

We cannot conclude without returning for a moment to the "Noticias Secretas.'-We do so, for the purpose of expressing our regret that the able and judicious editor has been very sparing of his notes, and our hope that he may be less so when he gives us his English translation of the book. He has, we well know, much to say that would at the present time interest all, and that might perhaps benefit many. That, in his edition of the Spanish Report, he has abstained from any considerable discussions on the present state of the countries to which it refers, was, upon the whole, perhaps, wise; but surely such silence cannot be called for in a book expressly intended for the English public. It is no secret that Mr. Barry (who, being a Catholic, had been educated in Spain, and who had, at an earlier period of life, travelled extensively in the Spanish Colonies) was the person chosen to conduct one of the greatest of the recent schemes for applying English capital to the improvement of the new states; and that in this capacity he made a tour which lasted nearly three years, and embraced almost every district of Spanish America, in which a traveller could consider himself as safe. It is also well known that he has returned home in the full belief, that every attempt on the part of Englishmen to conduct mining speculations, or agricultural speculations, or indeed any speculation whatever, (except a petty business of money dealing in sea-ports may be called one,) in those states, until the governments are more settled than they now are, and the people more unlike their fathers, must be attended with ruinous consequences. In a word, we know (we have, of course, proper authority to make such a statement) that Mr. Barry's opinion on this subject is quite as strong as that of Mr. Miers; and that of Peru, in particular, he speaks altogether as unfavourably as the other does of Chile. We would fain believe, that the view which Mr. Barry takes of these matters is too

dark ;