INTRODUCTORY. 



3 



Buenos Ayres, July 14, 1850. 



To Don Jose Pardo, 



Minister of the Peruvian Republic, near the Government of Chili. 



Sir : In a journal of this capital of the 2d inst., I have seen a tran- 

 script of a letter from you to the editor of a periodical of this place, in 

 which you say, under date of the 25th of April last, that you have 

 received special notice of the discovery, in the province of "Carabaya," 

 of the ore and washings of gold. In consequence, the government of 

 Peru invites all who desire it to take advantage, and make use of the 

 natural productions of these regions, where emigrants of all nations 

 shall have all the political and religious guarantees necessary in the 

 exercise of their industry. 



This announcement fills me with pleasure, because it is an evidence 

 of the elevation of ideas which obtains in the government, and which 

 will carry this part of Upper Peru to the height of prosperity to which 

 it is called by its topographical and territorial position ; and particu- 

 larly because it has in its midst navigable rivers which connect it with 

 the Atlantic. I allude to the navigation of the Amazon. 



I have been now engaged some ten years in the thought and study 

 of the political, social, and commercial relations concerning this matter, 

 as is shown in my many publications which have circulated in Europe 

 and America. These show the pains I have taken with the government 

 of Louis Philippe, King of France, in order to open a new line of com- 

 mercial communication between Cayenne and French Guyana and the 

 republics of Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Venezuela. 



But I have always thought that our America, by the intelligence of 

 its people, was to make a great social and commercial change ; and I 

 have always thought that this change would operate by means of its 

 gigantic and navigable rivers. This conception is corroborated by the 

 announcement of the discovery of the gold regions of Carabaya. Its 

 upper parts, which belong to the Andes, feed sheep of the most exquisite 

 wool ; and as it goes on descending, vegetation springs up with a fecun- 

 dity and ease unknown in the Old World. The land is cut up with 

 mountain torrents, whose banks contain gold, and which unite to form 

 the river " Purus," one of the greatest tributaries of the Amazon. 



Of this river, our celebrated botanist, D. Tadeo Ha-enke, in a special 

 report, says: "Purus, or Cachivara, is a river of the first order. It 

 arises in the cordillera of Vilcanota, a little to the east of the mountains 

 of Carabaya, from which descend many considerable streams, rich in 

 gold." To the testimony of this wise naturalist I add that of Conda.- 



