202 



cao is important, not merely as an object of external trade, 

 but also as food for the inhabitants. The interior consump- 

 tion will consequently increase with the population, and it is 

 to be hoped that the proprietors of the cacao plantations 

 will soon find new encouragement in the increase of national 

 prosperity. (See above, Vol. iii, pp. 191 — 195 j Vol. iv, 

 pp. 231 — 242.) The cacao of the provinces of Caraccas, 

 Barcelona, and Cumana, of which the finest quality is found 

 at Uritucu (near San Sebastian), Capiriqual, and San Boni- 

 facio, is far superior to the cacao of Guayaquil ; it yields only 

 to that of Soconusco (Juarros, Compendio de la hist, de Gua- 

 timala, 1818, Tom. ii. p. 77) and of Gualan, near Omoa, 

 which scarcely enters into the commerce of Europe. 



Coffee. The small table-lands of from 250 to 400 toises 

 high, that are frequent in the provinces of Caraccas and Cu- 

 mana (in the Cordilleras of the shore and of Caripe), contain 

 temperate situations extremely favourable to this plant. 

 When it had been cultivated only 28 years, in 1812, the pro- 

 duce amounted to nearly (50,000 quintals. (See, on the 

 consumption of coffee in Europe, Vol. iv, pp. 65 — 72). 



Cotton. That of the vallies of Aragua, Maracaybo, and 

 the gulf of Cariaco, is of a very fine quality, but the average 

 exportation was not more than 2 J millions of pounds. (Vol. 

 ii, pp. G9, 101, 191 ; Vol. iv, pp. 123— -126 \ and Urquinaonctj 

 Relation de la Revol. de Venezuela, 1820, p. 31.) 



Sugar, Fine plantations were formed at the beginning of 

 this century, in the vallies of Aragua and Tuy, near Guatiore 

 and Caurimare ; but the exportation was very trifling. (Vol. 

 iv, pp. 83—86, and pp. 177—182). I have often in the course 

 of this work directed the attention of the reader to the pre- 

 ponderance which the cultivation of colonial productions will 

 progressively acquire in Spanish America over that of the 

 smaller West India Islands. 



