213 



salted. It is not from the advancement of agri- 

 culture, or the progressive encroachments on 

 the pastoral lands, that the hates have dimi- 

 nished so considerably within twenty years, but 

 rather from the disorders of every kind that have 

 prevailed, and the want of security for property. 

 The impunity extended to the skin-stealers, and 

 the accumulation of vagabonds in the savannahs, 

 preceded that destruction of the cattle which 

 the successive wants of armies^ and the inevit- 

 able ravages of civil war have so deplorably in- 

 creased. A very considerable number of goat- 

 skins is exported to the Island of Marguerite, 

 Punta Araya, and Corolas ; sheep abound only 

 in Carora and Tocuyo *. The consumption of 

 meat being immense in this country, the dimi- 

 nution of animals has a greater influence than 

 in any other district on the well-being of the 

 inhabitants. The town of Caraccas, of which 

 the population in my time was one-tenth of that 

 of Paris, consumed more than half the quan- 



only 4 to 5 arrobes of tasajo or tasso. In 1792, the port of 

 Barcelona alone, exported 98,017 arrobes to the Island of 

 Cuba. The average price is 14 realms de plata, and varies 

 from 10 to 18. (There are 8 reales in a piastre.) Mr. Ur- 

 quinasa estimates the total exportation of Venezuela in 1809, 

 at 200,000 arrobes of tasajo. 



* See above, Vol. i, p. 237 ; Vol. Hi. p. 361, 365 j Vol. iv, 

 J). 210, 338, 341, 383 ; Vol. v. p. 75, 715, 802, 803. 



