SPAIN. 
sea, directs its course to Toledo, passes by Talavera, Alcan¬ 
tara, Abrantes, and Santarem, losing itself finally in the sea, 
near Lisbon. 
The sources of the Guadiana are found north of Alcaraz, 
in La Mancha, at the pools of Ruidera, well known to the 
admirers of Don Quixote. The course of the river is first 
to the north-west, for eight leagues. It is then absorbed by 
the soil, and disappears for seven leagues. The first gather¬ 
ing of its waters, after their subterraneous dispersion, takes 
place near Daymiel. The spot is called Ojos (Eyes) de 
Guadiana. The stream now proceeds to Ciudad Real, the 
head town of the province of La Mancha, to Merida, Badajoz, 
Mertola, in Portugal, and, re-entering the Spanish territory, 
terminates in the ocean at Ayamonte. In its course to this 
point, the Guadiana passes over a space of more than one 
hundred leagues. 
The stream of Guadiana, near Villarta, is only at the 
height of 710 yards above the sea. It is not navigable 
higher than Mertola, in Portugal. 
The Guadalquivir occupies the centre of the plain which 
lies between the Sierra-Morena and the chain of Granada, 
where it takes its source to the north-east of Jaen. The 
chief towns oh its banks are Andujar, Cordoba, Seville, and 
San Lucar (Templum Luciferi). At the ferry near Men- 
gibar, on the road from Madrid to Granada, the Guadalqui¬ 
vir is 203 yards above the sea. The Guadalquivir is navi¬ 
gable for large vessels up to Seville; but its bed being con¬ 
stantly raised and obstructed by growing shallows, the navi¬ 
gation is extremely tedious. 
On the subject of population, the data are greatly 
deficient in accuracy. We subjoin, however, the Table 
published by Antilion from documen.s in the possession of 
the Commissioners for the Encouragement of Trade in 1803. 
PROVINCES. 
Total of In¬ 
habitants. 
Surface in 
square 
leagues, 20 
to a degree. 
Inhabit¬ 
ants to 
square 
league. 
Province of Madrid 
228,520 
110 
2,078 
Guadalaxara 
121,115 
163 
743 
Cuenca 
294,290 
945 
311 
Toledo 
370,641 
734 
505 
Mancha 
205,548 
631 
326 
Avila 
128,061 
215 
549 
Segovia 
164,007 
290 
566 
Soria 
198,107 
341 
581 
Burgos 
470,588 
642 
734 
Estremadura 
428,493 
1,199 
357 
Kingdom of Cordoba 
252,028 
348 
724 
Jaen 
206,807 
268 
772 
Seville 
746,221 
752 
992 
Granada 
692,924 
805 
861 
Colonies of Sierra Morena 
6,196 
108 
57 
Kingdom of Murcia 
383,226 
659 
582 
Arragon 
657,376 
1,232| 
534 
Valencia 
825,059 
643 
1,283 
Principality of Catalonia 
858,818 
1,003 
856 
Island of Majorca 
140,699 
112 
1,256 
Minorca 
30,990 
20 
1,550 
Ibiza and Formentera 
15,290 
15 
1,019 
Kingdom of Navarre 
221,728 
205 
1,082 
Province of Biscay 
111,436 
106 
1,051 
Guipuzcoa 
104,491 
52 
2,009 
Alava 
67,523 
90i 
746 
Principality of Asturias 
364,238 
308! 
1,180 
Province of Leon 
239,812 
493 
486 
Palencia 
118,064 
145 
814 
Salamanca 
209,988 
471 
440 
Valladolid 
187,390 
271 
692 
Zamora 
71,401 
133 
537 
Toro 
91,370 
165 
590 
Kingdom of Galicia 
1,142,630 
1,330 
859 
10,351,075 
15,005! 
690 
447 
The water carriage in Spain is reduced to the inconsidera* 
ble portions which have been constructed of the intended 
canals of Arragon and Castille, to the slow and laborious na¬ 
vigation of the Ebro from Zaragoza to Tortosa, performed 
almost exclusively, for the conveyance of wheat, and to the 
floating of timber down that river, the Tagus, the Xucar, 
the Segura, and the Guadalquivir. This last river, on which 
a steam-boat, built and worked under the direction of a 
British engineer, affords of late, an easy and speedy commu¬ 
nication between Seville and San Lucar, is the only one 
from which Spain derives any considerable advantage in 
point of trade. 
It may be reckoned among the unfortunate combination 
of circumstances which have hitherto checked the internal 
prosperity of Spain, that the navigable part of its finest 
rivers belongs to another kingdom. The Tagus and the 
Douro may be said to exist for the exclusive advantage of 
Portugal. 
During the short and ill-fated union of the two peninsular 
crowns, the engineer Antonelli undertook to open the navi¬ 
gation of the Tagus as far as Toledo, and completed that 
useful work in 1558. After the separation of Portugal from 
Spain, several plans have been presented to the Spanish go¬ 
vernment for removing the obstacles which obstruct the bed 
of that river from Alcantara to Toledo, and even from the 
latter town to Aranjuez, which, by means of canals, was to 
be joined with Alcala. Surveys were made by order of the 
government, from which, as Antilion observes, no benefit 
accrued to the country except an accession of topographical 
knowledge, and the fruitless conviction that the communica¬ 
tion of La Mancha with the ocean was opposed, chiefly by 
moral and political obstacles. 
The Ebro, under the Roman dominion, is said to have 
been navigable up to Logrono, a distance of 65 leagues in¬ 
land. In the 12th century, the emperor Don Alonzo or¬ 
dered gallies to be sunk near Zaragoza, as a defence against 
the Moorish navy. Zurita relates, that, in the fifteenth cen¬ 
tury, King Don Juan sailed down the Ebro from Navarre 
into Arragon. We find, however, the Cortes of the latter 
kingdom, under Charles II. of Spam, towards the end of the 
seventeenth century, deliberating upon plans for expediting 
the navigation of the Ebro near the sea. A survey was made 
for the same purpose in 1738, but with no practical result. 
The grand canal of Arragon was at length begun under 
Charles III., the grandfather of the present king; and were 
it completed, it would stand a splendid monument of the 
spirit of the nation. It is, however, much against the prac¬ 
tical utility of the public works undertaken in Spain, that by 
a natural disposition of the people, they are all begun upon 
a scale which would require the wealth and power of impe¬ 
rial Rome for their completion. The little that exists of the 
canal of Arragon might, if we believe Antillon, compete with 
the works of that period; but, instead of reaching the sea 
through the Ebro, and terminating in an artificial harbour, 
as was intended, it has been carried on for the space of eigh¬ 
teen leagues only, and contributes but little to the internal 
navigation of the country. Whether it is more favourable to 
agriculture, by the copious irrigation which it affords in its 
course, is, we find, a point in dispute among the Spaniards. 
Jovellanos, in his excellent Informe sobre la Ley Agraria, 
mentions the farmers’ complaints against the canals for irri¬ 
gation. It is hard, indeed, upon all landowners within a 
certain distance to be forced to pay a tax for irrigation, whe¬ 
ther they have or not the means, the skill, or the inclination, 
to avail themselves of the proffered benefit. The farms, for 
instance, near the canal of Arragon, from Zaragoza to Sas- 
tago, pay one-fifth of their corn, and one-seventh of all other 
produce, for irrigation. Lands newly brought into tillage, 
pay only one sixth of the corn, and one-eighth of the other 
produce. 
Such complaints, it seems, were louder in the vicinity of 
the canal of Castille, where the Spanish practice of allowing 
the fields to lie fallow every other year was still adhered to, 
notwithstanding the abundance of water. This canal begins 
at Alar del Rey, in the province of Burgos. It is fed by the 
Pisuerga, 
