PERIODICAL WOKKS. 35g 



by that of the Mcrcurio Peruana^ (Peruvian Mercury), com- 

 prising history, literature, pubhc notices, &c. &c. the first 

 number of which appeared on the 2d of January, 1,791. A 

 quarto sheet of closely printed text was given twice a week, 

 so as to form three volumes annually. Its learned editor. 



* Little need be said about this publication, of the merit or demerit of which, as 

 it has furnished the chief materials for the present work, the reader will be enabled 

 to form his own judgment. It will probably be grateful to him to know the degree 

 of encouragement afforded to literary pursuits in Peru, where letters have within a 

 few years been very assiduously cultivated by all ranks of society. Independently 

 of the general sale, there were, in the first instance, two hundred and sixteen sub- 

 scribers, in the number of whom were comprehended the viceroy, archbishop, 

 members of the royal audience, and many other distinguished personages, to the Pe- 

 ruvian Mercury, which, in the course of a month after its promulgation, received 

 an augmentation of a hundred and thirty-three subscribers, making in the whole 

 three liundred and forty-nine. From several hints thrown out by the editor, as well 

 as from the list of subscribers, of the reduced number of two hundred and forty- 

 one, prefixed to the second volume, it appears to have met with considerable oppo- 

 sition in Lima, more especially from the church, on account of the freedom intro- 

 duced into the discussion of a variety of subjedts of polity, &c. The name of the 

 patriotic viceroy, Don Francisco Gil y Lemos, still stands as the distinguished 

 patron of the work ; but that of the archbishop of Lima no longer appears. In pro- 

 portion as it became known in the interior, the remote subscribers compensated in a 

 great measure for the falling off of those in the capital, and swelled the list, at the 

 commencement of the third volume, to the am.ount of three hundred and ten names. 

 That the authors of the Peruvian Mercury were not adluated by selfish motives, bur, 

 on the other hand, by the love of their country, as they profess, in engaging in this 

 undertaking, appears by the low price of the subscription, in a kingdom where 

 money is so cheap and plentiful, and every article of life proportionally dear. Four- 

 teen reals only, or 5s. 3d. English, were demanded of the subscribers per month, 

 notwithstanding the numbers were in general accompanied by commercial and me- 

 teorological tables, lists of shipping, with their cargoes, &c. &c. which were not, 

 Siay more than the occasional supplements, separately charged. 



Don 



