132 



terials which I collected. These materials are not a total 

 enumeration made by the secular power, but partial estimates 

 only, founded partly on the statements of the clergy and 

 missionaries, and partly on considerations of the consump- 

 tion, and the greater or less advanced state of cultivation. 

 Persons employed in the government of Caraccas, and par- 

 ticularly a man well informed in financial matters, don 

 Manuel Navarete, an officer of the royal treasury at Cumana, 

 assisted me in this task. The period to which it goes up 

 renders it highly interesting. It is a point from which the 

 increase of the population since the acquisition of liberty and 

 independence, may some day be estimated. This increase, 

 we may presume, cannot be felt, till those fine countries are 

 restored to internal tranquillity. Possibly at the time when 

 this work appears, the population may be somewhat less than 

 in 1800. The armies have not been numerous, but they 

 have desolated the best cultivated countries on the coast, and 

 the neighbouring valleys. The earthquake of the 26th of 

 March, 1812 (See above, vol. iv, p. 12), the epidemic fevers 

 that prevailed in 1818 (vol. v, p. 761), the arming of the 

 blacks, so imprudently favoured by the royalist party, the 

 emigration of many wealthy families to the West India 

 islands, and a long stagnation of trade, have augmented the 

 public misery. 



Provinces of Cumana and Barcelona 110,000 souls. 



I am in possession of a numbering made in 

 1792, which is at least one sixth in error, 

 and which gives 86,083 souls, of which 

 42,615 were Indians ; namely, 27,787 de 

 doctrina, or inhabitants of villages that have 

 a vicar of the secular clergy, and 14,828 de 

 mission, or governed by missionary monks. 

 I compute in 1800 for the province of Cu- 

 mana, or New Andalusia, 60,000 : and for 

 the province of Barcelona, 50,000. 



