^y^ A VOYAGE TO Book VI. 



Having thus described those nine jurisdictions 

 which form the most wealthy part of the province of 

 Quito, Í shall, in the following chapters, treat of the 

 governments. 



CFIAR III. 



Account of the Governments of Fop ay an and Atacantes, 

 belonging to the Provhice of Quito. 



"E have already given a just account of every 

 thing worthv notice in the jurisdictions within 

 the audience of Quito. To render the narrative com- 

 plete, it is necessary that we now proceed to the go- 

 vernments within the limits of that audience; as they 

 jointly form the vast country of the province of Qui- 

 to. And though they generally give the name of 

 province to every government, and even to the de- 

 partments into which both are subdivided, we shall not 

 here fb'low this vulgar acceptation, it being in reality 

 tbunded only on the difference of the notiops of In- 

 dians who formerly inhabited this country, every one 

 being governed by its curaca, or despotic sovereign. 

 These nations the Yncas subdued, and obliged them 

 to receive the laws of their empire: but the curacas 

 were coní^rmcd in all those hereditarv rights of sove- 

 reignty compatible with the supreme prerogative. 

 Were we indeed to use the name of province in this 

 sense, every village must be called so ; for it may be 

 easily shown, that, in the time of heathenism, every 

 village had its particular curaca ! and sometimes, as 

 in Valles, in this jurisdiction of Popayan, in Maynas, 

 and t he Moragnon, there was not only a curaca in each 

 village, with all the appendages of governnient, but 

 the inhabitants spoke a difierent laivguage, had dif- 

 ferent laws and customs, and lived totally independent 

 of each other. But these villages and ancient pro- 

 2, vinpcH 



