72 ON THE DIFFERENT SPECIES OF ILEX, ETC. 



considerable surplus above their own requirements ; and they now made 

 cotton cloths for their garments, in lieu of the woollon ponchos obtained 

 from Cordova. The Dictator for many years was assiduous in his en- 

 deavours to establish permanently this system of industry, which neces- 

 sarily supplanted in great measure the trade in Yerba ; he even em- 

 ployed coercive measures in order to carry it into effect ; and in 1829 

 he decreed that the possessor of every house or farm should sow a certain 

 quantity of maize, upon the product of which every one was bound to 

 contribute 4 per cent, to the state, no excuse being allowed ; and those 

 who sought to evade this obligation became subject to heavy penalties. 



To a policy of restraint, which in a more advanced state of society 

 would not have been tolerated, it was certainly one well calculated, in 

 the actual state of Paraguay, to attain the objects he had so much at 

 heart, and in which he gradually succeeded. The good results of these 

 wise measures are well attested by the prosperous advancement of the 

 country up to the present time. His success naturally raised up against 

 him a host of irreconcileable enemies in all the Argentine Provinces, 

 who strove to blacken his character and vilify his conduct. All these 

 Provinces, suffering under the extinction of the trade in Yerba, were 

 leagued against the policy of Francia ; but their attention being too 

 much occupied in their constant internecine wars, they had little time 

 or force to spare in the attempt to revolutionize Paraguay. At length, 

 however, the Governor-in-chief of Entrerios, having made peace with 

 the other provinces, turned his attention to that object, and endeavoured 

 at the same time to establish settlements at the former Jesuit Missions 

 (then almost depopulated), with the view of cultivating the trade in 

 Yerba. And we now come to a knowledge of the state of affairs that 

 existed when the celebrated Bonpland visited the River Plate, and how 

 the subsequent phases of his life became connected with the history of 

 the trade in Yerba. 



The fall of the Emperor Napoleon and the re-establishment of the 

 Bourbon dynasty in France were events most galling to Bonpland, and 

 he resolved to seek an abode in one of the republican States of South 

 America. Accordingly he reached Buenos Ayres in 1817, with a nominal 

 appointment of Professor of Natural History in that capital. In 1819, 

 Bonpland established himself near Candelaria, one of the old Jesuit 

 Missions on the left bank of the Parana, contiguous to Paraguay, where 

 he formed a considerable establishment, chiefly, as I understood, with a 

 view to the production of and trade in Yerba, under the special auspices 

 and protection of the Governor-General Artigas, who, as I have before 

 mentioned, intended ultimately to carry out his designs against Para- 

 guay. * * * * 



From his long residence in the country, and his great experience in 

 all that relates to the preparation of Yerba, no one had better oppor- 

 tunities than Bonpland to identify the real species from which that arti- 

 cle of consumption is manufactured. 



The system of the merchants in their agreement with the ' habilita- 



