INTRODUCTION. 



31 



tion between the American and European Spaniards, 

 until the former declared against them; and iti the pre- 

 sent contest, wherever the Indians have taken a side 

 at all, it has generally been in favor of the Ameri* 

 cans. The unsubdued Indians on the borders of the 

 settlements have shewn no particular inclination to 

 either side, except in very few instances; but they can 

 contribute but little in either scale. 



The next class in point of numbers are the Ameri- 

 can Spaniards, but who are much more important, in 

 consequence of their possessing greater privileges, bet- 

 ter education and more general wealth. Although 

 they are the great landholders of the country, their 

 influence is less than it might be, on account of their 

 careful exclusion from participation in the government; 

 it being the policy of Spain, to keep them in a state of 

 idleness and vice, as the surest means of retaining her 

 sway in these distant countries; they have, therefore, 

 been deprived of nearly all those incentives which tend 

 to elevate the character of a people. The same po- 

 licy, but a very erroneous one in this instance, has in- 

 duced her to foster enmities between the European 

 Spaniards and the Americans;* the dreadful conse- 

 quences of which, have been manifested in the inci- 

 dents of the present revolutions. There is a consi- 

 derable diversity in the character of the Americans, 

 in different parts of Spanish America; produced prin- 

 cipally, by the circumstances of the countries which 

 they inhabit. It is, perhaps, in Chili alone, that the 

 Spanish race in America, may be considered pure and 

 unmixed; which may be attributed to the constant hos- 



* For this, I have the respectable authority of Humboldt, 2 vol. 



