INTRODUCTION. 51 
new ship which had been partly promised to Captain Guise. On the 
arrival of the O'Higgins, however, on the 16th of June, Captain 
Forster, the senior officer, was appointed to her, and she was named 
Independencia or Nuestra Seiiora del Carmen. Some other slight 
changes took place in the squadron, and every exertion was made to 
refit and victual it, in order to resume the blockade of Callao. 
While the navy was thus harassing the enemy’s coast, the army of 
the south, under General Belcarse, was gradually gaining ground. 
The war there was, however, carried on in a more desperate manner. 
The royalist Benevedeis, in particular, had rendered his name odious 
by many atrocities, and particularly by the murder, in cold blood, of 
an officer sent by Freire to him with a flag of truce, and of the whole 
party that was with him, as well as other prisoners ; they were cut down 
with sabres to save the waste of powder. General Sanchez was little 
behind him in cruelty. The latter had evacuated Talcahuana. Freire 
had taken Chillan, and success every where attended the patriots. 
(See Gazette, March 13th, 1819.) The most conciliatory proclam- 
ations were addressed to the Indians, who were invited as brothers to 
join the cause of independence, and hopes were entertained of their 
uniting with the patriots against the Spaniards. The domestic govern- 
ment seemed also to be settling into tranquillity. The adherents of 
the Carreras were, for the time at least, silenced. No foreign nation 
interfered between the mother country and the colonies, but all 
seemed to look with complacency on a change which promised a free 
commerce to the Pacific. 
It is singular, that the experience of centuries has not been able 
to teach any nation that it is impossible to confine gold and silver, 
beyond a certain portion, within any particular state; or that so con- 
fined, they do not render the country any richer ; because the mo- 
ment there is more than sufficient for the purchase of other articles, 
the gold and silver becomes totally valueless. This applies particu- 
larly, where the precious metals are the chief products of the country. 
Yet even the reformed governments of South America, lay so heavy 
a duty on the exportation of gold and silver, that it would amount 
H2 
