INTRODUCTION. 



35 



extensive family connexion. A variety of reasons 

 may be given, why an American nobility, does not 

 occupy the same space in society, as the nobility of 

 Europe; the principal, probably is, the want of that 

 veneration for remote ancestry, arising from peculiar 

 circumstances in Europe, but which cannot be trans- 

 ferred to the new continent: another not less powerful 

 is, that they do not surround a throne. The revolu- 

 tion, however, has been much affected by feuds be- 

 tween great and rival families, in nearly all those 

 viceroyalties where nobility existed; it was the case 

 at 8t. Fee, in Chili, and Caraccas; the rock on which 

 the revolutions of these several countries have uni- 

 formly split, has been the dissensions of two or 

 more powerful families, who by their ambition of rul- 

 ing, aff4irded an opportunity to the common enemy of 

 subduing them. Much greater injury to the cause has 

 proceeded from this rivalry, than from the circum- 

 stance of the different casts or classes of population. 

 The latter is generally considered the great draw- 

 back. In the progress of the contest, experience 

 however, has shown in more instances than one, that 

 it is rather apparent than real; all of them have re- 

 peatedly united against the Spaniards; and should 

 they ultimately succeed, it would be found less diffi- 

 cult permanently to reconcile their different interests, 

 than is generally imagined. The prejudice with re- 

 spect to the Indians and those of mixed blood, will be 

 easily removed; with respect to the Africans, and the 

 mixtures of that race, the inconvenience will only be 

 seriously felt in the province of Caraccas and Peru. 



The proportion of negroes in Spanish America, 

 was by no means great, excepting in Caraccas and 



