400 
TUPAC- AHAKTT. 
fifteen millions of inhabitants, there are m that n umbel 
at most three millions of Creole whites, and two hundred 
thousand Europeans. 
'When Tupac- Amaru, who believed himself to be the legi- 
timate heir to the empire of the IncaB, made the conquest of 
several provinces of Upper Peru, in 1781, at the head of 
forty thousand Indian mountaineers, all the whites were j 
filled with alarm. The Hispano- Americans felt, like the | 
Spaniards born in Europe, tnat the contest was between 
the copper-coloured race and the whites ; bctw sn barbarism 
and civilization. Tupac- Amaru, who himseT was not des- 
titute of intellectual cultivation, began with flattering the 
creoles and the Buropean clergy; but soon, impelled by 
events, and by the spirit of vengeance that inspired his 
nephew, Andres Conaorcanqui, he changed his plan. A 
rising for independence became a cruel war between the 
different castes ; the whites were victorious, and excited by 
a feeling of common interest, from that period they kept 
watchful attention on the proportions existing in the different 
provinces between their numbers and those of the Indians. 
It was reserved for our times to see the whites direct this 
attention towards themselves ; and examine, from motives of 
distrust, the elements of which their own caste is composed. 
Every enterprise in favour of independence and liberty puts 
the national or American party in opposition to the men 
of the mother-country. When I arrived at Caracas, the 
latter had just escaped from the danger with which they 
thought they were menaced by the insurrection projected 
by Espana. The consequences of that bold attempt were 
the more deplorable, because, instead of investigating the 
real causes of the popular discontent, it was thought that 
the mother-country would be saved by employing vigorous 
measures. At present, the commotions which have arisen 
throughout the country, from the banks of the Rio de la 
Plata to New Mexico, an extent of fourteen hundred leagues, 
have divided men of a common origin. 
The Indian population in the united provinces of Vene- 
zuela is not considerable, and is but recently civilized. All 
the towns were founded by the Spanish conquerors, who 
could not carry out, as in Mexico and Peru, the old civili- 
zation of the natives. Caracas, Maracaybo, Cumana, and 
