443 



portance, especially when the flour of New 

 Grenada, embarked above the confluence of 

 the Rio Negro and the Umadea, and descend- 

 ing by the Meta and Oroonoko, shall be pre- 

 ferred at Caraccas and Guiana to the flour of 

 New England. It is a great advantage to the 

 provinces of Venezuela, that their territorial 

 wealth is not directed to one point, like that 

 of Mexico and New Grenada, which flows to 

 Vera Cruz and Carthagena ; but that they pos- 

 sess a great number of towns equally well peo- 

 pled, and forming so many various centres of 

 commerce and civilization. 



Caraccas is the seat of an audiencia (high 

 court of justice), and one of the eight archbish- 

 oprics, into which Spanish America is divided*. 



* The archbishopricks and the audiencias have not the 

 same limits as the great political divisions, which, independ- 

 ent of one another, are known under the names of viceroyal- 

 ties, and capitanias- generates. There are often two audiencias 

 in the same viceroyalty, as those of Mexico and Guadalax- 

 ara, of Lima and of Cusco j sometimes the bishops of one 

 viceroyalty are suffragans of an archbishop, who resides in 

 another political division. The bishops of Panama, Mainas, 

 Quito, and Cuenca, are subject to the archbishop of Lima, 

 and not to the archbishop of New Grenada. The eight 

 archbishops of Spanish America have their sees at Mexico, 

 Guatimala, St. Domingo, the Havannah, Caraccas, Santa - 

 Fe de Bogota, Lima, and Chuquisaca or Charcas. The 

 twelve audiencias are those of Mexico, Guadalaxara, Gua- 

 timala, the Havannah, Caraccas, Santa Fe de Bogota, 



