GULFS AT7D BATS. 131 



rantages ot those vast masses of triangular continents, 

 which, like Africa and the greater part of South America, 

 ore destitute of gulfs and inland seas. It cannot be 

 doubted, that the existence of the Mediterranean has been 

 closely connected with the first dawn of human cultivation 

 among the nations of the west, and that the articulated 

 form of the land, the frequency of its contractions, and the 

 concatenation of peninsulas, favoured the civilization of 

 Greece, Italy, and perhaps of all Europe westward of the 

 meridian of the Propontis. In the New World the un- 

 interruptedness of the coasts, and the monotony of their 

 straight lines, are most remarkable in Chili and Peru. The 

 shore of Columbia is more varied, and its spacious gulfs, 

 such as that of Paria, Cariaco, Maracaybo, and Darien, 

 were, at the time of the first discovery, better peopled than 

 the rest, and facilitated the interchange of productions. 

 That shore possesses an incalculable advantage in being 

 washed by the Caribbean Sea, a kind of inland sea with 

 several outlets, and the only one pertaining to the New 

 Continent. This basin, whose various shores form portions 

 of the United States, of the republic of Columbia, of Mexico, 

 and several maritime powers of Europe, gives birth to a pecu- 

 liar, and exclusively American system of trade. The south- 

 east of Asia, with its neighbouring archipelago, and above 

 all, the state of the Mediterranean in the time of the 

 Phoenician and Greek colonies, prove that the nearness of 

 opposite coasts, not having the same productions, and not 

 inhabited by nations of different races, exercises a happy 

 influence on commercial industry and intellectual cultiva- 

 tion. The importance of the inland Caribbean Sea, bounded 

 by Venezuela on the south, will be further augmented 

 by the progressive increase of population on the banks of 

 the Mississippi ; for that river, the Eio del Norte, and the 

 Magdalena, are the only great navigable streams which the 

 ( 'aribbean Sea receives. The depth of the American rivers, 

 their immense branches, and the use of steam-boats, every- 

 where facilitated by the proximity of forests, will, to a 

 certain extent, compensate for the obstacles which the uni- 

 form line of the coasts, and the general configuration ot 

 the continent, oppose to the progress of industry and civili- 

 zation. 



