306 



Monthly Review of Literature, 



[MARCH, 



December 1810, with some supplies from 

 Aux Cnyes, he landed at Venezuela, and 

 traversing ths plains to the Oronoco, seized 

 upon Angostura, on the banks of that river, 

 and there fixed the seat of his new govern- 

 ment. Hither, in a few months, he was 

 pursued by the royalists, and an harassing 

 and destructive warfare wa carried on for 

 eighteen long, trying months; till at last, 

 wearied with this useless waste of his re- 

 sources, he resolved to make one despenite 

 effort to cross the mountains, which separate 

 Venezuela from New Grenada, and sur- 

 prise the Spaniards in that, province. In this 

 effort he succeeded, and forcing the Spa- 

 niards to an action, defeated them at the 

 Pontanode Bargas, on the 6th July 1819, 

 and on the 7th of the following month, gained 

 the great and decisive battle of Boyaca, and 

 thus opened a way to the capital. In the 

 numerous conflicts which ensued, the inde- 

 pendents were eminently, though not uni- 

 formly, successful ; and at last, on taking 

 Porto Cabello by storm, on the 9th Novem- 

 ber 1823, the Spaniards were completely, 

 and, we hope, finally exterminated from the 

 country. 



The desolation to which this unhappy 

 country has been reduced, must be manifest. 

 The contest has been a peculiarly sanguinary 

 one plus qu;,m civile. The most barbarous 

 cruelties have been practised on both sides ; 

 and the very worst features of revenge, in 

 hot blood and in cold, are visible through 

 the whole portentous struggle. " Her towns 

 have been laid in ruins,'' says the writer be- 

 fore us, " and her provinces depopulated ; 

 her agriculture has languished, the working 

 of her mines, an important source of her 

 wealth, has been suspended for want of 

 hands to carry on the necessary operations,, 

 and the commerce of her maritime cities has 

 been completely paralized by the diminished 

 quantity of her produce, and the contracted 

 demand for the supplies of foreign merchan- 

 dize." " But such is the fertility of the 

 soil," continues the writer, " the salubrity of 

 her climate, and. the facility with which the 

 necessaries of life are procured, thar, under 

 the fostering care of a provident and patriotic 

 government, a very few years will suffice to 

 recruit her exhausted population, repair her 

 losses, and spread over her lands that abund- 

 ance, with which nature so prodigally re- 

 wards the exertions of man in those favoured 

 climes." 



Columbia, however, is not yet at rest. No 

 more attacks are to be apprehended from 

 without Spain will trouble her no more 

 but she is herself divided. The territory, in 

 fact, is far too extensive the population too 

 thinly an ^ remotely distributed, to be brought 

 conveniently under one superintendence. New 

 Grenada and Venezuela wish to separate ; 

 and in each, some are for one form of govern- 

 ment, and some for another. Bolivar is 

 hostile to the federative, and Paez the ad- 

 vocate for separation. Too probably, uothieg 

 but a military govemmen t,and perhaps two, 



will be able to keep things quiet; and irre- 

 proachable as has been Bolivar's conduct, 

 and temperate as appears to be his character, 

 he will probably be driven, even in his own 

 defence, or in conviction of its necessity for 

 the peace of the country, to carry the bayonet 

 into the government and play the despot. 



The finances of the government are in a 

 most deplorable condition ; and without an 

 entire change in the system of administra- 

 tion, matters cannot go on. The whole 

 concern is conducted on too expensive a 

 scale. It is not that the official personages 

 are individually too highly pai.l, but that 

 they are far too numerous we say not pre- 

 cisely for the occasions, but for the resources 

 of the country. The expences of a people, 

 Bot amounting to three millions, actually 

 surpass those of the United States, with 

 a population quadrupling that number. 

 The revenues seem to amount to about six 

 millions of dollars more, probably, cannot 

 be raise;! and the scale of expences swells 

 up to fifteen millions. Each department, 

 and there are twelve of them, sends four 

 members to the senate; now each of these, 

 an \ each of- the hundred representatives, are 

 paid nine dollars a day during the annual 

 sitting of congress varying from ninety 

 to one hundred and twenty days and -their 

 travelling expenses ; and from Bagota, the 

 present seat of government, to Angostura, 

 the distance is 1,200 miles; to Curcuma, as 

 many; to Guayaquil, 1,000 ; and to Car- 

 thagena, 900. 



The government has shewn itself ex- 

 tremely anxious to recover its credit in this 

 country; and different funds, it seems, have 

 been appropriated for this purpose; but of 

 what use is such an appropriation, when the 

 revenue falls so very far short of the more 

 immediate, and more imperative demands of 

 the domestic administration ? No more money 

 can be borrowed. Borrowing to pay borrow- 

 ings is a financial manoeuvre that ceases to be 

 any longer relished, at least by the lender. No, 

 no; Columbian bonds sanguine as the writer 

 before us seems to be are not, a,nd cannot 

 be worth the price of so much unsoiled 

 paper for years to come. It is just possible, 

 that fifty years hence supposing all along 

 the government of Columbia filty years 

 hence will trouble themselves about the 

 matter the value of the bonds may begin 

 to mount up again. As matters are, a few 

 months, and the keenest effor is of the keenest 

 jobber, will be completely baffled in any 

 attempt to keep up any assignable value to 

 these miserable scraps of spoilt paper. 



Very little is generally known, we be- 

 lieve, of the English officers atd soldiers, 

 who have, from first to last, gone into the 

 Columbian service. The volume before us 

 gives an interesting, and we have no doubt 

 a very authentic account of the matter. The 

 number far exceeds the notion we had formed 

 of them. Six thousand have actually em- 

 barked from this country ; and at the end of 

 1823, not more than 160 survived we say 



