GENERAL VIEW OF THE PROVINCES OF VENEZUELA.
DIVERSITY OF THEIR INTERESTS.
CITY AND VALLEY OF CARACAS.
CLIMATE.
In all those parts of Spanish America in which civilization did not
exist to a certain degree before the Conquest (as it did in Mexico,
Guatimala, Quito, and Peru), it has advanced from the coasts to the
interior of the country, following sometimes the valley of a great
river, sometimes a chain of mountains, affording a temperate
climate. Concentrated at once in different points, it has spread as
if by diverging rays. The union into provinces and kingdoms was
effected on the first immediate contact between civilized parts, or
at least those subject to permanent and regular government. Lands
deserted, or inhabited by savage tribes, now surround the countries
which European civilization has subdued. They divide its conquests
like arms of the sea difficult to be passed, and neighbouring
states are often connected with each other only by slips of
cultivated land. It is less difficult to acquire a knowledge of the
configuration of coasts washed by the ocean, than of the
sinuosities of that interior shore, on which barbarism and
civilization, impenetrable forests and cultivated land, touch and
bound each other. From not having reflected on the early state of
society in the New World, geographers have often made their maps
incorrect, by marking the different parts of the Spanish and
Portuguese colonies, as though they were contiguous at every point
in the interior. The local knowledge which I obtained respecting
these boundaries, enables me to fix the extent of the great
territorial divisions with some certainty, to compare the wild and
inhabited parts, and to appreciate the degree of political
influence exercised by certain towns of America, as centres of
power and of commerce.
Caracas is the capital of a country nearly twice as large as Peru,
and now little inferior in extent to the kingdom of New Grenada.*
(* The Capitania-General of Caracas contains near 48,000 square
leagues (twenty-five to a degree). Peru, since La Paz, Potosi,
Charcas and Santa Cruz de la Sierra, have been separated from it,
contains only 30,000. New Grenada, including the province of Quito,
contains 65,000. Reinos, Capitanias-Generales, Presidencies,
Goviernos, and Provincias, are the names by which Spain formerly
distinguished her transmarine possessions, or, as they were called,
Dominios de Ultramar (Dominions beyond Sea.)) This country which
the Spanish government designates by the name of Capitania-General
de Caracas,* (* The captain-general of Caracas has the title of
"Capitan-General de las Provincias de Venezuela y Ciudad do
Caracas.") or of the united provinces of Venezuela, has nearly a
million of inhabitants, among whom are sixty thousand slaves. It
comprises, along the coasts, New Andalusia, or the province of
Cumana (with the island of Margareta),* (* This island, near the
coast of Cumana, forms a separate govierno, depending immediately
on the captain-general of Caracas.) Barcelona, Venezuela or
Caracas, Coro, and Maracaybo; in the interior, the provinces of
Varinas and Guiana; the former situated on the rivers of Santo
Domingo and the Apure, the latter stretching along the Orinoco, the
Casiquiare, the Atabapo, and the Rio Negro. In a general view of
the seven united provinces of Terra Firma, we perceive that they
form three distinct zones, extending from east to west.
We find, first, cultivated land along the sea-shore, and near the
chain of the mountains on the coast; next, savannahs or pasturages;
and finally, beyond the Orinoco, a third zone, that of the forests,
into which we can penetrate only by the rivers which traverse them.
If the native inhabitants of the forests lived entirely on the
produce of the chase, like those of the Missouri, we might say that
the three zones into which we have divided the territory of
Venezuela, picture the three states of human society; the life of
the wild hunter, in the woods of the Orinoco; pastoral life, in the
savannahs or llanos; and the agricultural state, in the high
valleys, and at the foot of the mountains on the coast. Missionary
monks and some few soldiers occupy here, as throughout all Spanish
America, advanced posts along the frontiers of Brazil. In this
first zone are felt the preponderance of force, and the abuse of
power, which is its necessary consequence. The natives carry on
civil war, and sometimes devour one another. The monks endeavour to
augment the number of little villages of their Missions, by taking
advantage of the dissensions of the natives. The military live in a
state of hostility to the monks, whom they were intended to
protect. Everything presents a melancholy picture of misery and
privation. We shall soon have occasion to examine more closely that
state of man, which is vaunted as a state of nature, by those who
inhabit towns. In the second region, in the plains and
pasture-grounds, food is extremely abundant, but has little
variety. Although more advanced in civilization, the people beyond
the circle of some scattered towns are not less isolated from one
another. At sight of their dwellings, partly covered with skins and
leather, it might be supposed that, far from being fixed, they are
scarcely encamped in those vast plains which extend to the horizon.
Agriculture, which alone consolidates the bases, and strengthens
the bonds of society, occupies the third zone, the shore, and
especially the hot and temperate valleys among the mountains near
the sea.
It may be objected, that in other parts of Spanish and Portuguese
America, wherever we can trace the progressive development of
civilization, we find the three ages of society combined. But it
must be remembered that the position of the three zones, that of
the forests, the pastures, and the cultivated land, is not
everywhere the same, and that it is nowhere so regular as in
Venezuela. It is not always from the coast to the interior, that
population, commercial industry, and intellectual improvement,
diminish. In Mexico, Peru, and Quito, the table-lands and central
mountains possess the greatest number of cultivators, the most
numerous towns situated near to each other, and the most ancient
institutions. We even find, that, in the kingdom of Buenos Ayres,
the region of pasturage, known by the name of the Pampas, lies
between the isolated part of Buenos Ayres and the great mass of
Indian cultivators, who inhabit the Cordilleras of Charcas, La Paz,
and Potosi. This circumstance gives birth to a diversity of
interests, in the same country, between the people of the interior
and those who inhabit the coasts.
To form an accurate idea of those vast provinces which have been
governed for ages, almost like separate states, by viceroys and
captains-general, we must fix our attention at once on several
points. We must distinguish the parts of Spanish America opposite
to Asia from those on the shores of the Atlantic; we must ascertain
where the greater portion of the population is placed; whether near
the coast, or concentrated in the interior, on the cold and
temperate table-lands of the Cordilleras. We must verify the
numerical proportions between the natives and other castes; search
into the origin of the European families, and examine to what race,
in each part of the colonies, belongs the greater number of whites.
The Andalusian-Canarians of Venezuela, the Mountaineers* (*
Montaneses. The inhabitants of the mountains of Santander are
called by this name in Spain.) and the Biscayans of Mexico, the
Catalonians of Buenos Ayres, differ essentially in their aptitude
for agriculture, for the mechanical arts, for commerce, and for all
objects connected with intellectual development. Each of those
races has preserved, in the New as in the Old World, the shades
that constitute its national physiognomy; its asperity or mildness
of character; its freedom from sordid feelings, or its excessive
love of gain; its social hospitality, or its taste for solitude. In
the countries where the population is for the most part composed of
Indians and mixed races, the difference between the Europeans and
their descendants cannot indeed be so strongly marked, as that
which existed anciently in the colonies of Ionian and Doric origin.
The Spaniards transplanted to the torrid zone, estranged from the
habits of their mother-country, must have felt more sensible
changes than the Greeks settled on the coasts of Asia Minor, and of
Italy, where the climates differ so little from those of Athens and
Corinth. It cannot be denied that the character of the Spanish
Americans has been variously modified by the physical nature of the
country; the isolated sites of the capitals on the table-lands or
in the vicinity of the coasts; the agricultural life; the labour of
the mines, and the habit of commercial speculation: but in the
inhabitants of Caracas, Santa Fe, Quito, and Buenos Ayres, we
recognize everywhere something which belongs to the race and the
filiation of the people.
If we examine the state of the Capitania-General of Caracas,
according to the principles here laid down, we perceive that
agricultural industry, the great mass of population, the numerous
towns, and everything connected with advanced civilization, are
found near the coast. This coast extends along a space of two
hundred leagues. It is washed by the Caribbean Sea, a sort of
Mediterranean, on the shores of which almost all the nations of
Europe have founded colonies; which communicates at several points
with the Atlantic; and which has had a considerable influence on
the progress of knowledge in the eastern part of equinoctial
America, from the time of the Conquest. The kingdoms of New Grenada
and Mexico have no connection with foreign colonies, and through
them with the nations of Europe, except by the ports of Carthagena,
of Santa Martha, of Vera Cruz, and of Campeachy. These vast
countries, from the nature of their coasts, and the isolation of
their inhabitants on the back of the Cordilleras, have few points
of contact with foreign lands. The gulf of Mexico also is but
little frequented during a part of the year, on account of the
danger of gales of wind from the north. The coasts of Venezuela, on
the contrary, from their extent, their eastward direction, the
number of their ports, and the safety of their anchorage at
different seasons, possess all the advantages of the Caribbean Sea.
The communications with the larger islands, and even with those
situated to windward, can nowhere be more frequent than from the
ports of Cumana, Barcelona, La Guayra, Porto Cabello, Coro, and
Maracaybo. Can we wonder that this facility of commercial
intercourse with the inhabitants of free America, and the agitated
nations of Europe, should in the provinces united under the
Capitania-General of Venezuela, have augmented opulence, knowledge,
and that restless desire of a local government, which is blended
with the love of liberty and republican forms?
The copper-coloured natives, or Indians, constitute an important
mass of the agricultural population only in those places where the
Spaniards, at the time of the Conquest, found regular governments,
social communities, and ancient and very complicated institutions;
as, for example, in New Spain, south of Durango; and in Peru, from
Cuzco to Potosi. In the Capitania-General of Caracas, the Indian
population is inconsiderable, at least beyond the Missions and in
the cultivated zone. Even in times of great political excitement,
the natives do not inspire any apprehension in the whites or the
mixed castes. Computing, in 1800, the total population of the seven
united provinces at nine hundred thousand souls, it appeared to me
that the Indians made only one-ninth; while at Mexico they form
nearly one half of the inhabitants.
Considering the Caribbean Sea, of which the gulf of Mexico makes a
part, as an interior sea with several mouths, it is important to
fix our attention on the political relations arising out of this
singular configuration of the New Continent, between countries
placed around the same basin. Notwithstanding the isolated state in
which most of the mother-countries endeavour to hold their
colonies, the agitations that take place are not the less
communicated from one to the other. The elements of discord are
everywhere the same; and, as if by instinct, an understanding is
established between men of the same colour, although separated by
difference of language, and inhabiting opposite coasts. That
American Mediterranean formed by the shores of Venezuela, New
Grenada, Mexico, the United States, and the West India Islands,
counts upon its borders near a million and a half of free and
enslaved blacks; but so unequally distributed, that there are very
few to the south, and scarcely any in the regions of the west.
Their great accumulation is on the northern and eastern coasts,
which may be said to be the African part of the interior basin. The
commotions which since 1792 have broken out in St. Domingo, have
naturally been propagated to the coasts of Venezuela. So long as
Spain possessed those fine colonies in tranquillity, the little
insurrections of the slaves were easily repressed; but when a
struggle of another kind, that for independence, began, the blacks
by their menacing position excited alternately the apprehensions of
the opposite parties; and the gradual or instantaneous abolition of
slavery has been proclaimed in different regions of Spanish
America, less from motives of justice and humanity, than to secure
the aid of an intrepid race of men, habituated to privation, and
fighting for their own cause. I found in the narrative of the
voyage of Girolamo Benzoni, a curious passage, which proves that
the apprehensions caused by the increase of the black population
are of very old date. These apprehensions will cease only where
governments shall second by laws the progressive reforms which
refinement of manners, opinion, and religious sentiment, introduce
into domestic slavery. "The negroes," says Benzoni, "multiply so
much at St. Domingo, that in 1545, when I was in Terra Firma [on
the coast of Caracas], I saw many Spaniards who had no doubt that
the island would shortly be the property of the blacks."* (* "Vi
sono molti Spagnuoli che tengono per cosa certa, che quest' isola
(San Dominico) in breve tempo sara posseduta da questi Mori di
Guinea." (Benzoni Istoria del Mondo Nuovo ediz. 2da 1672 page 65.)
The author, who is not very scrupulous in the adoption of
statistical facts, believes that in his time there were at St.
Domingo seven thousand fugitive negroes (Mori cimaroni), with whom
Don Luis Columbus made a treaty of peace and friendship.) It was
reserved for our age to see this prediction accomplished; and a
European colony of America transform itself into an African state.
The sixty thousand slaves which the seven united provinces of
Venezuela are computed to contain, are so unequally divided, that
in the province of Caracas alone there are nearly forty thousand,
one-fifth of whom are mulattoes; in Maracaybo, there are ten or
twelve thousand; but in Cumana and Barcelona, scarcely six
thousand. To judge of the influence which the slaves and men of
colour exercise on the public tranquility, it is not enough to know
their number, we must consider their accumulation at certain
points, and their manner of life, as cultivators or inhabitants of
towns. In the province of Venezuela, the slaves are assembled
together on a space of no great extent, between the coast, and a
line which passes (at twelve leagues from the coast) through
Panaquire, Yare, Sabana de Ocumare, Villa de Cura, and Nirgua. The
llanos or vast plains of Calaboso, San Carlos, Guanare, and
Barquecimeto, contain only four or five thousand slaves, who are
scattered among the farms, and employed in the care of cattle. The
number of free men is very considerable; the Spanish laws and
customs being favourable to affranchisement. A master cannot refuse
liberty to a slave who offers him the sum of three hundred
piastres, even though the slave may have cost double that price, on
account of his industry, or a particular aptitude for the trade he
practises. Instances of persons who voluntarily bestow liberty on a
certain number of their slaves, are more common in the province of
Venezuela than in any other place. A short time before we visited
the fertile valleys of Aragua and the lake of Valencia, a lady who
inhabited the great village of Victoria, ordered her children, on
her death-bed, to give liberty to all her slaves, thirty in number.
I feel pleasure in recording facts that do honour to the character
of a people from whom M. Bonpland and myself received so many marks
of kindness.
If we compare the seven united provinces of Venezuela with the
kingdom of Mexico and the island of Cuba, we shall succeed in
finding the approximate number of white Creoles, and even of
Europeans. The white Creoles, whom I may call Hispano-Americans,*
(* In imitation of the word Anglo-American, adapted in all the
languages of Europe. In the Spanish colonies, the whites born in
America are called Spaniards; and the real Spaniards, those born in
the mother country, are called Europeans, Gachupins, or Chapetons.)
form in Mexico nearly a fifth, and in the island of Cuba, according
to the very accurate enumeration of 1801, a third of the whole
population. When we reflect that the kingdom of Mexico contains two
millions and a half of natives of the copper-coloured race; when we
consider the state of the coasts bordering on the Pacific, and the
small number of whites in the intendencias of Puebla and Oaxaca,
compared with the natives, we cannot doubt that the province of
Venezuela at least, if not the capitania-general, has a greater
proportion than that of one to five. The island of Cuba,* (* I do
not mention the kingdom of Buenos Ayres, where, among a million of
inhabitants, the whites are extremely numerous in parts near the
coast; while the table-lands, or provinces of the sierra are almost
entirely peopled with natives.) in which the whites are even more
numerous than in Chile, may furnish us with a limiting number, that
is to say, the maximum which may be supposed in the
capitania-general of Caracas. I believe we must stop at two
hundred, or two hundred and ten thousand Hispano-Americans, in a
total population of nine hundred thousand souls. The number of
Europeans included in the white race (not comprehending the troops
sent from the mother-country) does not exceed twelve or fifteen
thousand. It certainly is not greater at Mexico than sixty
thousand; and I find by several statements, that, if we estimate
the whole of the Spanish colonies at fourteen or fifteen millions
of inhabitants, there are in that number at most three millions of
Creole whites, and two hundred thousand Europeans.
When Tupac-Amaru, who believed himself to be the legitimate heir to
the empire of the Incas, made the conquest of several provinces of
Upper Peru, in 1781, at the head of forty thousand Indian
mountaineers, all the whites were filled with alarm. The
Hispano-Americans felt, like the Spaniards born in Europe, that the
contest was between the copper-coloured race and the whites;
between barbarism and civilization. Tupac-Amaru, who himself was
not destitute of intellectual cultivation, began with flattering
the creoles and the European clergy; but soon, impelled by events,
and by the spirit of vengeance that inspired his nephew, Andres
Condorcanqui, 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 Venezuela 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 civilization of the natives. Caracas,
Maracaybo, Cumana, and Coro, have nothing Indian but their names.
Compared with the three capitals of equinoctial America,* (*
Mexico, Santa Fe de Bogota, and Quito. The elevation of the site of
the capital of Guatimala is still unknown. Judging from the
vegetation, we may infer that it is less than 500 toises.) situated
on the mountains, and enjoying a temperate climate, Caracas is the
least elevated. It is not a central point of commerce, like Mexico,
Santa Fe de Bogota, and Quito. Each of the seven provinces united
in one capitania-general has a port, by which its produce is
exported. It is sufficient to consider the position of the
provinces, their respective degree of intercourse with the Windward
Islands, the direction of the mountains, and the course of the
great rivers, to perceive that Caracas can never exercise any
powerful political influence over the territories of which it is
the capital. The Apure, the Meta, and the Orinoco, running from
west to east, receive all the streams of the llanos, or the region
of pasturage. St. Thomas de la Guiana will necessarily, at some
future day, be a trading-place of high importance, especially when
the flour of New Grenada, embarked above the confluence of the Rio
Negro and the Umadea, and descending by the Meta and Orinoco, shall
be preferred at Caracas and Guiana to the flour of New England. It
is a great advantage to the provinces of Venezuela, that their
territorial wealth is not directed to one point, like that of
Mexico and New Grenada, which flows to Vera Cruz and Carthagena;
but that they possess a great number of towns equally well peopled,
and forming various centres of commerce and civilization.
The city of Caracas is seated at the entrance of the plain of
Chacao, which extends three leagues eastward, in the direction of
Caurimare and the Cuesta de Auyamas, and is two leagues and a half
in breadth. This plain, through which runs the Rio Guayra, is at
the elevation of four hundred and fourteen toises above the level
of the sea. The ground on which the city of Caracas is built is
uneven, and has a steep slope from north-north-west to
south-south-east. To form an accurate idea of the situation of
Caracas, we must bear in mind the general direction of the
mountains of the coast, and the great longitudinal valleys by which
they are traversed. The Rio Guayra rises in the group of primitive
mountains of Higuerote, which separates the valley of Caracas from
that of Aragua. It is formed near Las Ajuntas, by the junction of
the little rivers of San Pedro and Macarao, and runs first eastward
as far as the Cuesta of Auyamas, and then southward, uniting its
waters with those of the Rio Tuy, below Yare. The Rio Tuy is the
only considerable river in the northern and mountainous part of the
province.
The river flows in a direct course from west to east, the distance
of thirty leagues, and it is navigable along more than three
quarters of that distance. By barometrical measurements I found the
slope of the Tuy along this length, from the plantation of
Manterola* (* At the foot of the high mountain of Cocuyza, 3 east
from Victoria.) to its mouth, east of Cape Codera, to be two
hundred and ninety-five toises. This river forms in the chain of
the coast a kind of longitudinal valley, while the waters of the
llanos, or of five-sixths of the province of Caracas, follow the
slope of the land southward, and join the Orinoco. This
hydrographic sketch may throw some light on the natural tendency of
the inhabitants of each particular province, to export their
productions by different roads.
The valleys of Caracas and of the Tuy run parallel for a
considerable length. They are separated by a mountainous tract,
which is crossed in going from Caracas to the high savannahs of
Ocumare, passing by La Valle and Salamanca. These savannahs
themselves are beyond the Tuy; and the valley of the Tuy being a
great deal lower than that of Caracas, the descent is almost
constantly from north to south. As Cape Codera, the Silla, the
Cerro de Avila between Caracas and La Guayra, and the mountains of
Mariara, constitute the most northern and elevated range of the
coast chain; so the mountains of Panaquire, Ocumare, Guiripa, and
of the Villa de Cura, form the most southern range. The general
direction of the strata composing this vast chain of the coast is
from south-east to north-west; and the dip is generally towards
north-west: hence it follows, that the direction of the primitive
strata is independent of that of the whole chain. It is extremely
remarkable, tracing this chain* from Porto Cabello as far as
Maniquarez and Macanao, in the island of Margareta (* I have
spoken, in the preceding chapter, of the interruption in the chain
of the coast to the east of Cape Codera.), to find, from west to
east, first granite, then gneiss, mica-slate, and primitive schist;
and finally, compact limestone, gypsum, and conglomerates
containing sea-shells.
It is to be regretted that the town of Caracas was not built
farther to the east, below the entrance of the Anauco into the
Guayra; on that spot near Chacao, where the valley widens into an
extensive plain, which seems to have been levelled by the waters.
Diego de Losada, when he founded* the town, followed no doubt the
traces of the first establishment made by Faxardo. At that time,
the Spaniards, attracted by the high repute of the two gold mines
of Los Teques and Baruta, were not yet masters of the whole valley,
and preferred remaining near the road leading to the coast. (* The
foundation of Santiago de Leon de Caracas dates from 1567, and is
posterior to that of Cumana, Coro, Nueva Barcelona, and
Caravalleda, or El Collado.) The town of Quito is also built in the
narrowest and most uneven part of a valley, between two fine
plains, Turupamba and Rumipamba.
The descent is uninterrupted from the custom-house of the Pastora,
by the square of Trinidad and the Plaza Mayor, to Santa Rosalia,
and the Rio Guayra. This declivity of the ground does not prevent
carriages from going about the town; but the inhabitants make
little use of them. Three small rivers, descending from the
mountains, the Anauco, the Catuche, and the Caraguata, intersect
the town, running from north to south. Their banks are very high;
and, with the dried-up ravines which join them, furrowing the
ground, they remind the traveller of the famous Guaicos of Quito,
only on a smaller scale. The water used for drinking at Caracas is
that of the Rio Catuche; but the richer class of the inhabitants
have their water brought from La Valle, a village a league distant
on the south. This water and that of Gamboa are considered very
salubrious, because they flow over the roots of sarsaparilla.* (*
Throughout America water is supposed to share the properties of
those plants under the shade of which it flows. Thus, at the
Straits of Magellan, that water is much praised which comes in
contact with the roots of the Canella winterana.) I could not
discover in them any aromatic or extractive matter. The water of
the valley does not contain lime, but a little more carbonic acid
than the water of the Anauco. The new bridge over this river is a
handsome structure. Caracas contains eight churches, five convents,
and a theatre capable of holding fifteen or eighteen hundred
persons. When I was there, the pit, in which the seats of the men
are apart from those of the women, was uncovered. By this means the
spectators could either look at the actors or gaze at the stars. As
the misty weather made me lose a great many observations of
Jupiter's satellites, I was able to ascertain, as I sat in a box in
the theatre, whether the planet would be visible that night. The
streets of Caracas are wide and straight, and they cross each other
at right angles, as in all the towns built by the Spaniards in
America. The houses are spacious, and higher than they ought to be
in a country subject to earthquakes. In 1800, the two squares of
Alta Gracia and San Francisco presented a very agreeable aspect; I
say in the year 1800, because the terrible shocks of the 26th of
March, 1812, almost destroyed the whole city, which is only now
slowly rising from its ruins. The quarter of Trinidad, in which I
resided, was destroyed as completely as if a mine had been sprung
beneath it.
The small extent of the valley, and the proximity of the high
mountains of Avila and the Silla, give a gloomy and stern character
to the scenery of Caracas; particularly in that part of the year
when the coolest temperature prevails, namely, in the months of
November and December. The mornings are then very fine; and on a
clear and serene sky we could perceive the two domes or rounded
pyramids of the Silla, and the craggy ridge of the Cerro de Avila.
But towards evening the atmosphere thickens; the mountains are
overhung with clouds; streams of vapour cling to their evergreen
slopes, and seem to divide them into zones one above another. These
zones are gradually blended together; the cold air which descends
from the Silla, accumulates in the valley, and condenses the light
vapours into large fleecy clouds. These often descend below the
Cross of La Guayra, and advance, gliding on the soil, in the
direction of the Pastora of Caracas, and the adjacent quarter of
Trinidad. Beneath this misty sky, I could scarcely imagine myself
to be in one of the temperate valleys of the torrid zone; but
rather in the north of Germany, among the pines and the larches
that cover the mountains of the Hartz.
But this gloomy aspect, this contrast between the clearness of
morning and the cloudy sky of evening, is not observable in the
midst of summer. The nights of June and July are clear and
delicious. The atmosphere then preserves, almost without
interruption, the purity and transparency peculiar to the
table-lands and elevated valleys of these regions in calm weather,
as long as the winds do not mingle together strata of air of
unequal temperature. That is the season for enjoying the beauty of
the landscape, which, however, I saw clearly illumined only during
a few days at the end of January. The two rounded summits of the
Silla are seen at Caracas, almost under the same angles of
elevation* as the peak of Teneriffe at the port of Orotava.* (* I
found, at the square of Trinidad, the apparent height of the Silla
to be 11 degrees 12 minutes 49 seconds. It was about four thousand
five hundred toises distant.) The first half of the mountain is
covered with short grass; then succeeds the zone of evergreen trees,
reflecting a purple light at the season when the befaria, the
alpine rose-tree* (* Rhododendron ferrugineum of the Alps.) of
equinoctial America, is in blossom. The rocky masses rise above
this wooded zone in the form of domes. Being destitute of
vegetation, they increase by the nakedness of their surface the
apparent height of a mountain which, in the temperate parts of
Europe, would scarcely rise to the limit of perpetual snow. The
cultivated region of the valley, and the gay plains of Chacao,
Petare, and La Vega, form an agreeable contrast to the imposing
aspect of the Silla, and the great irregularities of the ground on
the north of the town.
The climate of Caracas has often been called a perpetual spring.
The same sort of climate exists everywhere, halfway up the
Cordilleras of equinoctial America, between four hundred and nine
hundred toises of elevation, except in places where the great
breadth of the valleys, combined with an arid soil, causes an
extraordinary intensity* of radiant caloric. (* As at Carthago and
Ibague in New Grenada.) What can we conceive to be more delightful
than a temperature which in the day keeps between 20 and 26 degrees
(Between 16 and 20.8 degrees Reaum.); and at night between 16 and
18 degrees (Between 12.8 and 14.4 degrees Reaum.), which is equally
favourable to the plantain, the orange-tree, the coffee-tree, the
apple, the apricot, and corn? Jose de Oviedo y Banos, the
historiographer of Venezuela, calls the situation of Caracas that
of a terrestrial paradise, and compares the Anauco and the
neighbouring torrents to the four rivers of the Garden of Eden.
It is to be regretted that this delightful climate is generally
inconstant and variable. The inhabitants of Caracas complain of
having several seasons in one and the same day; and of the rapid
change from one season to another. In the month of January, for
instance, a night, of which the mean temperature is 16 degrees, is
sometimes followed by a day when the thermometer during eight
successive hours keeps above 22 degrees in the shade. In the same
day, we may find the temperature of 24 and 18 degrees. These
variations are extremely common in our temperate climates of
Europe, but in the torrid zone, Europeans themselves are so
accustomed to the uniform action of exterior stimulus, that they
suffer from a change of temperature of 6 degrees. At Cumana, and
everywhere in the plains, the temperature from eleven in the
morning to eleven at night changes only 2 or 3 degrees. Moreover,
these variations act on the human frame at Caracas more violently
than might be supposed from the mere indications of the
thermometer. In this narrow valley the atmosphere is in some sort
balanced between two winds, one blowing from the west, or the
seaside, the other from the east, or the inland country. The first
is known by the name of the wind of Catia, because it blows from
Catia westward of Cabo Blanco through the ravine of Tipe. It is,
however, only a westerly wind in appearance, and it is oftener the
breeze of the east and north-east, which, rushing with extreme
impetuosity, engulfs itself in the Quebrada de Tipe. Rebounding
from the high mountains of Aguas Negras, this wind finds its way
back to Caracas, in the direction of the hospital of the Capuchins
and the Rio Caraguata. It is loaded with vapours, which it deposits
as its temperature decreases, and consequently the summit of the
Silla is enveloped in clouds, when the catia blows in the valley.
This wind is dreaded by the inhabitants of Caracas; it causes
headache in persons whose nervous system is irritable. In order to
shun its effects, people sometimes shut themselves up in their
houses, as they do in Italy when the sirocco is blowing. I thought
I perceived, during my stay at Caracas, that the wind of Catia was
purer (a little richer in oxygen) than the wind of Petare. I even
imagined that its purity might explain its exciting property. The
wind of Petare coming from the east and south-east, by the eastern
extremity of the valley of the Guayra, brings from the mountains
and the interior of the country, a drier air, which dissipates the
clouds, and the summit of the Silla rises in all its beauty.
We know that the modifications produced by winds in the composition
of the air in various places, entirely escape our eudiometrical
experiments, the most precise of which can estimate only as far
as .0003 degrees of oxygen. Chemistry does not yet possess any
means of distinguishing two jars of air, the one filled during the
prevalence of the sirocco or the catia, and the other before these
winds have commenced. It appears to me probable, that the singular
effects of the catia, and of all those currents of air, to the
influence of which popular opinion attaches so much importance,
must be looked for rather in the changes of humidity and of
temperature, than in chemical modifications. We need not trace
miasms to Caracas from the unhealthy shore on the coast: it may be
easily conceived that men accustomed to the drier air of the
mountains and the interior, must be disagreeably affected when the
very humid air of the sea, pressed through the gap of Tipe, reaches
in an ascending current the high valley of Caracas, and, getting
cooler by dilatation, and by contact with the adjacent strata,
deposits a great portion of the water it contains. This inconstancy
of climate, these somewhat rapid transitions from dry and
transparent to humid and misty air, are inconveniences which
Caracas shares in common with the whole temperate region of the
tropics--with all places situated between four and eight hundred
toises of elevation, either on table-lands of small extent, or on
the slope of the Cordilleras, as at Xalapa in Mexico, and Guaduas
in New Granada. A serenity, uninterrupted during a great part of
the year, prevails only in the low regions at the level of the sea,
and at considerable heights on those vast table-lands, where the
uniform radiation of the soil seems to contribute to the perfect
dissolution of vesicular vapours. The intermediate zone is at the
same height as the first strata of clouds which surround the
surface of the earth; and the climate of this zone, the temperature
of which is so mild, is essentially misty and variable.
Notwithstanding the elevation of the spot, the sky is generally
less blue at Caracas than at Cumana. The aqueous vapour is less
perfectly dissolved; and here, as in our climates, a greater
diffusion of light diminishes the intensity of the aerial colour,
by introducing white into the blue of the air. This intensity,
measured with the cyanometer of Saussure, was found from November
to January generally 18, never above 20 degrees. On the coasts it
was from 22 to 25 degrees. I remarked, in the village of Caracas,
that the wind of Petare sometimes contributes singularly to give a
pale tint to the celestial vault. On the 22nd of January, the blue
of the sky was at noon in the zenith feebler than I ever saw it in
the torrid zone.* (* At noon, thermometer in the shade 23.7 (in the
sun, out of the wind, 30.4 degrees); De Luc's hygrometer, 36.2;
cyanometer, at the zenith, 12, at the horizon 9 degrees. The wind
ceased at three in the afternoon. Thermometer 21; hygrometer 39.3;
cyanometer 16 degrees. At six o'clock, thermometer 20.2; hygrometer
39 degrees.) It corresponded only to 12 degrees of the cyanometer.
The atmosphere was then remarkably transparent, without clouds, and
of extraordinary dryness. The moment the wind of Petare ceased, the
blue colour rose at the zenith as high as 16 degrees. I have often
observed at sea, but in a smaller degree, a similar effect of the
wind on the colour of the serenest sky.
We know less exactly the mean temperature of Caracas, than that of
Santa Fe de Bogota and of Mexico. I believe, however, I can
demonstrate, that it cannot be very distant from twenty to
twenty-two degrees. I found by my own observations, during the
three very cool months of November, December, and January, taking
each day the maximum and minimum of the temperature, the heights
were 20.2; 20.1; 20.2 degrees.
Rains are extremely frequent at Caracas in the months of April,
May, and June. The storms always come from the east and south-east,
from the direction of Petare and La Valle. No hail falls in the low
regions of the tropics; yet it occurs at Caracas almost every four
or five years. Hail has even been seen in valleys still lower; and
this phenomenon, when it does happen, makes a powerful impression
on the people. Falls of aerolites are less rare with us than hail
in the torrid zone, notwithstanding the frequency of thunder-storms
at the elevation of three hundred toises above the level of the
sea.
The cool and delightful climate we have just been describing is
also suited for the culture of equinoctial productions. The
sugar-cane is reared with success, even at heights exceeding that
of Caracas; but in the valley, owing to the dryness of the climate,
and the stony soil, the cultivation of the coffee-tree is
preferred: it yields indeed but little fruit, but that little is of
the finest quality. When the shrub is in blossom, the plain
extending beyond Chacao presents a delightful aspect. The
banana-tree, which is seen in the plantations near the town, is not
the great Platano harton; but the varieties camburi and dominico,
which require less heat. The great plantains are brought to the
market of Caracas from the haciendas of Turiamo, situated on the
coast between Burburata and Porto Cabello. The finest flavoured
pine-apples are those of Baruto, of Empedrado, and of the heights
of Buenavista, on the road to Victoria. When a traveller for the
first time visits the valley of Caracas, he is agreeably surprised
to find the culinary plants of our climates, as well as the
strawberry, the vine, and almost all the fruit-trees of the
temperate zone, growing beside the coffee and banana-tree. The
apples and peaches esteemed the best come from Macarao, or from the
western extremity of the valley. There, the quince-tree, the trunk
of which attains only four or five feet in height, is so common,
that it has almost become wild. Preserved apples and quinces,
particularly the latter,* (* "Dulce de manzana y de membrillo," are
the Spanish names of these preserves.) are much used in a country
where it is thought that, before drinking water, thirst should be
excited by sweetmeats. In proportion as the environs of the town
have been planted with coffee, and the establishment of plantations
(which dates only from the year 1795) has increased the number of
agricultural negroes,* the apple and quince-trees scattered in the
savannahs have given place, in the valley of Caracas, to maize and
pulse. (* The consumption of provisions, especially meat, is so
considerable in the towns of Spanish America, that at Caracas, in
1800, there were 40,000 oxen killed every year: while in Paris, in
1793, with a population fourteen times as great, the number
amounted only to 70,000.) Rice, watered by means of small trenches,
was formerly more common than it now is in the plain of Chacao. I
observed in this province, as in Mexico and in all the elevated
lands of the torrid zone, that, where the apple-tree is most
abundant, the culture of the pear-tree is attended with great
difficulty. I have been assured, that near Caracas the excellent
apples sold in the markets come from trees not grafted. There are
no cherry-trees. The olive-trees which I saw in the court of the
convent of San Felipe de Neri, were large and fine; but the
luxuriance of their vegetation prevented them from bearing fruit.
If the atmospheric constitution of the valley be favourable to the
different kinds of culture on which colonial industry is based, it
is not equally favourable to the health of the inhabitants, or to
that of foreigners settled in the capital of Venezuela. The extreme
inconstancy of the weather, and the frequent suppression of
cutaneous perspiration, give birth to catarrhal affections, which
assume the most various forms. A European, once accustomed to the
violent heat, enjoys better health at Cumana, in the valley of
Aragua, and in every place where the low region of the tropics is
not very humid, than at Caracas, and in those mountain-climates
which are vaunted as the abode of perpetual spring.
Speaking of the yellow fever of La Guayra, I mentioned the opinion
generally adopted, that this disease is propagated as little from
the coast of Venezuela to the capital, as from the coast of Mexico
to Xalapa. This opinion is founded on the experience of the last
twenty years. The contagious disorders which were severely felt in
the port of La Guayra, were scarcely felt at Caracas. I am not
convinced that the American typhus, rendered endemic on the coast
as the port becomes more frequented, if favoured by particular
dispositions of the climate, may not become common in the valley:
for the mean temperature of Caracas is considerable enough to allow
the thermometer, in the hottest months, to keep between twenty-two
and twenty-six degrees. The situation of Xalapa, on the declivity
of the Mexican mountains, promises more security, because that town
is less populous, and is five times farther distant from the sea
than Caracas, and two hundred and thirty toises higher: its mean
temperature being three degrees cooler. In 1696, a bishop of
Venezuela, Diego de Banos, dedicated a church (ermita) to Santa
Rosalia of Palermo, for having delivered the capital from the
scourge of the black vomit (vomito negro), which is said to have
raged for the space of sixteen months. A mass celebrated every year
in the cathedral, in the beginning of September, perpetuates the
remembrance of this epidemic, in the same manner as processions
fix, in the Spanish colonies, the date of the great earthquakes.
The year 1696 was indeed very remarkable for the yellow fever,
which raged with violence in all the West India Islands, where it
had only begun to gain an ascendancy in 1688. But how can we give
credit to an epidemical black vomit, having lasted sixteen months
without interruption, and which may be said to have passed through
that very cool season when the thermometer at Caracas falls to
twelve or thirteen degrees? Can the typhus be of older date in the
elevated valley of Caracas, than in the most frequented ports of
Terra Firma. According to Ulloa, it was unknown in Terra Firma
before 1729. I doubt, therefore, the epidemic of 1696 having been
the yellow fever, or real typhus of America. Some of the symptoms
which accompany yellow fever are common to bilious remittent
fevers; and are no more characteristic than haematemeses of that
severe disease now known at the Havannah and Vera Cruz by the name
of vomito. But though no accurate description satisfactorily
demonstrates that the typhus of America existed at Caracas as early
as the end of the seventeenth century, it is unhappily too certain,
that this disease carried off in that capital a great number of
European soldiers in 1802. We are filled with dismay when we
reflect that, in the centre of the torrid zone, a table-land four
hundred and fifty toises high, but very near the sea, does not
secure the inhabitants against a scourge which was believed to
belong only to the low regions of the coast.