52 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL, 102 



To this end on certain holidays they lay on a table or elsewhere excel- 

 lent suits of clothes or other valuable articles of clothing, and the 

 Negroes come out of it with clothes, and their masters with riches. 

 This exchange is forbidden along with others, under heavy penalties 

 for the masters. This brief account of the pearl fisheries must suffice, 

 to allow us to describe in the following chapter, the city and province 

 of Cumana. 



Chapter VIII ( !) 



Of the City of Cumana in Nueva Andalucia, and of Other Things 

 in Its District and State. 



131. The city of Cumana was founded by Capt. Gonzalo de 

 Ocampo in the year 1520, when he came to punish the Cumana 

 Indians for their destruction of the Franciscan convent and murder 

 of the friars ; and to make the punishment more lasting, and as the 

 case demanded, he established the city on the seacoast of the Spanish 

 Main, at present called Nueva Andalucia, at 9° 30' N. To its N. lies 

 the island of Margarita at a distance of 12 leagues; Caracas in the 

 Province of Venezuela is over 50 leagues to the W. along the coast, 

 and the island of Trinidad 50 leagues to the E, 



132. The city will contain 200 Spanish residents, plus Negroes, 

 mulattoes, Indians, and servants. It has a parish church and a 

 Dominican convent with a few friars, and a shrine under the patron- 

 age of Our Lady of Carmen, which serves as a hospital for the care 

 of the indigent sick. The city and its districts have a warm climate 

 and abound in supplies ; its ordinary bread is made of Indian corn 

 and cassava, which is made out of yucca; there are quantities of 

 cattle and swine, and in this district they grow and harvest a great 

 amount of tobacco, which is the chief staple of the country. They 

 have other crops and native fruits which are highly regarded, and 

 sugarcane and sweet potatoes. 



133. It lies on the Gulf of Cariaco, which runs 20 leagues inland 

 and is a league wide ; around it are numerous valleys, drained by 

 streams of sweet crystal-clear water, on whose banks the residents 

 of Cumana have their ranches where they raise quantities of cattle, 

 swine, and horses ; they grow abundance of Indian corn and yucca. 

 This city enjoys a profusion of excellent fish. It has Royal Officials ; 

 His Majesty appoints a Governor with the title of Captain General 

 for its good administration and to dispense justice in the city and its 

 provinces. 



134. It has two Spanish villages in its district, one of them San 

 Felipe, lying 24 leagues inland and counting some 40 Spanish resi- 



