CAUSES OF DISCONTENT. 267 



ters of, the Spanish Americans. As an in- 

 stance of this kind of feeling, a report is 

 quoted, which was made to the King by his 

 fiscal, upon the petition of the city of Me- 

 rida de Maracaybo, in Venezuela, to found 

 an university : the opinion of the fiscal was, 

 that " the petition was to be refused, be- 

 cause it was unsuitable to promote learning in 

 Spanish America, where the inhabitants ap- 

 peared destined by nature to work in the mines'' 

 After a pretended solemn deliberation of the 

 Consulada, or Board of Trade, in Mexico, the 

 members informed the Cortes, that the 

 Indians were a race of monkeys, filled with vice 

 and ignorance; automatons unworthy of repre- 

 senting or being represented.'' 6th. That not- 

 withstanding the original compact made 

 between the King and the first settlers in 

 Spanish America, which stipulated that 

 in all cases of government, justice, adminis- 

 tration of finances, commissions, &c., the 

 first discoverers, then the Pacificadores, and 



