709 



my." Joined to the difficulty which European 

 vessels find in going up the Oroonoko as far as 

 Angostura (which is much greater than that of 

 ascending the Potomac to Washington), the cir- 

 cumstance of the centre of commerce being 

 placed above the point, where the banks of the 

 river present most attraction to the activity of 

 the colonists, is extremely unfavourable to agri- 

 cultural industry. It is not even true, that the 

 town of Angostura, or Santo Thome de la Nueva 

 Guayana, was founded where cultivation began 

 in 1764 : at that period, as at present, the great 

 mass of the population of Guayana was contain- 

 ed in the missions of the Catalonian Capuchins, 

 between the Rio Carony and the Cuyuni. Now 

 this district, the most important of the whole 

 province, and in which an enemy could procure 

 necessaries of all kinds, is defended, or at least 

 supposed to be so, by Vieja Guayana, but in no 

 degree by the fortifications of the new town of 

 Angostura. 



The spot which has been proposed near San 

 Miguel is a little to the east of the confluence of 

 the Carony, consequently between the sea and 

 that part of the country which is most inhabited. 

 In going lower down, and transferring the capi- 

 tal of the province close to the mouth of the 

 Oroonoko, as Mr. de Pons proposed, the proxim- 

 ity of the Caribbees, who are easily driven away, 

 is less to be dreaded, than the possibility of an 



