ADULTERATION OF CACAO. 



the fourth year, abundant crops. "Wherever the soil is not 

 exhausted, the fruit lias become by cultivation larger and 

 bitter, but also later. 



On seeing the produce of cacao gradually dimmish in 

 Terra Firma, it may be inquired, whether the consumption 

 will diminish in the same proportion in Spain, Italy, and 

 the rest of Europe ; or whether it be not probable, that by 

 the destruction of the cacao plantations, the price will 

 augment sufficiently to rouse anew the industry of the 

 cultivator. This latter opinion is generally admitted by 

 those who deplore, at Caracas, the diminution of so ancient 

 and profitable a branch of commerce. In proportion as 

 civilization extends towards the humid forests of the inte- 

 rior, the banks of the Orinoco and the Amazon, or towards 

 the valleys that furrow the eastern declivity of the Andes 

 the new planters will find lands and an atmosphere equally 

 favourable to the culture of the cacao-tree. 



The Spaniards, in general, dislike a mixture of vanilla 

 with the cacao, as irritating the nervous system ; the fruit, 

 therefore, of that orchideous plant is entirely neglected in 

 the province of Caracas, though abundant crops of it might 

 be gathered on the moist and feverish coast between Porto 

 Cabello and Ocumare; especially at Turiamo, where the 

 fruits of the Epidendrum vanilla attain the length af eleven 

 or twelve inches. The English and the Anglo-Americans 

 often seek to make purchases of vanilla at the port of La 

 Guayra, but the merchants procure with difficulty a very 

 small quantity. In the valleys that descend from the chain 

 of the coast towards the Caribbean Sea, in the province of 

 Truxillo, as well as in the Missions of Guiana, near the 

 cataracts of the Orinoco, a great quantity ol vanilla might 

 be collected; the produce of which would be still more 

 abundant, if, according to the practice of the Mexicans, the 

 plant were disengaged, from time to time, from the creeping 

 plants by which it is entwined and stifled. 



The hot and fertile valleys of the Cordillera of the coast 

 of Venezuela occupy a tract of land which, on the west, 

 towards the lake of Maracaybo, displays a remarkable 

 variety of scenery. I shall exhibit in one view, to close 

 this chapter, the facts I have been able to collect -espectmg 



