V 



299 



ridian line at Quito, and to officers* who went 

 from Valparaiso to Buenos Ayres to join the ex- 

 pedition of Malaspina. It is pleasing to recall 

 to mind the advantages, which the sciences 

 almost accidentally reaped from those commis- 

 sions of boundaries, which were burdensome to 

 the state, and less frequently dissolved than for- 

 gotten even by the very men who had claimed 

 their formation. 



Those persons who know the uncertainty of 

 the American maps, and have seen those uncul- 

 tivated lands between the Jupura and the Rio 

 Negro, the Madeira and the Ucayale, the Rio 

 Branco and the coasts of Cayenne, which up to 

 our own days have been gravely disputed in 

 Europe, can never be sufficiently surprised at the 

 perseverance, with which the property of a few 

 square leagues is litigated. These disputed 

 grounds are generally separated from the culti- 

 vated part of the colonies by deserts, the extent 

 of which is unknown. In the celebrated con- 

 ferences of Puente de Caya-f- the question was 

 agitated, whether, in fixing the line of de- 

 marcation three hundred and seventy Spa- 

 nish leagues;}; to the west of the Cape Verd 

 islands, the pope meant, that the first meridian 



* Don Jose de Espinosa, and don Felipe Bauza. 

 f From the 4th of Nov. 1681, to the 22d of January, 

 1682. 



% Or 22° 14', reckoned on the equator. 



