revolution of Buenos Ayres, we may be allowed to believe that he embraced that party as much through personal ambition and with a view to obtain a situation, as through hatred of the revolutionary principles, and love for the rights of the throne. It is possible that, since he found considerable advantages in defending the cause of absolute power, he may be now sincerely attached to that cause which has made his military and pecuniary fortune, and which has perhaps carried him farther than he ever had intended to go. He is now major-general, and possesses immense riches. He not long ago extended his views even to the viceroyalty, and it is said that he had powerful supports at Madrid, since the king had recovered the plenitude of his monarchical power.

SOUTH AMERICAN MINING.

BRASILIAN MINES.

Never, since the bold attempts of Columbus and Gama, has the New World been, in respect to the Old, the object of greater enterprizes, greater hopes, or less apprehension. The revolution, which separates from the mother-country the colonies whence the former derived her splendor, has produced, in every part of the globe, an interest and activity unparalleled in the history of the universe. In this revolution, the absolute governments of a part of the world see the cause of the decline and termination of their tyranny; in this revolution, the people of all countries discover an inexhaustible source of riches and prosperity. On one side, a few individuals give way to the irritation of their pride and malignant passions, because they can find no more nations to plunder and massacre; on the other side, these nations, freed from the yoke of oppression, wish to be mutually happy, and are calling upon each other, from the two extremities of the earth, to renew the ties of that original confraternity which is founded on the identity of their wants, their pains and their pleasures. However, if the genuine principles of universal morality are paramount to the theories of exclusive privileges and national distinctions, the attention is not less, now than formerly, attracted to the accumulation of riches; and it is unques

tionable, that the love of wealth and that of liberty are equally exercising their sway over the mind and imagination of modern nations; but with this remarkable difference, that the people of Europe desire no other encouragement to their speculations than peace and commerce; and that, for this part of those metals, which is useless to the Americans, they offer, in exchange, the produce of their industry, their agriculture and their manufactures, together with their coined money, which, to the Americans, must be objects of such great necessity. America, therefore, must gain by this traffic, for, by opening, at this time, her mines to European capitalists, she, in reality, gives only the sign to receive the thing; whereas, a short time since, her gold, her silver, her precious stones, were applied to the exclusive purpose of paying for the state of ignorance, misery, superstition, idleness and pride, in which she was kept by the systematic tyranny of her oppressors.

This New World, however, to the discovery of which, navigation, geography, astronomy, medicine, natural history, and other branches of knowledge are so much indebted; this New World, from which some crowns have derived all their lustre, their power, and their riches; and whose internal recesses European rapacity thought it had completely explored, appears to have given up only its surface to the fury of its oppressive masters, for the purpose of reserving the real treasures concealed in its bosom, for free men, who wish to exercise over America no other ascendancy than that arising from genius and from the superiority of their arts. The intervention of such men, founded on VOL. I. No. 3.

voluntary and reciprocal advantages, is in unison with the respect due to the liberties of America, and powerfully cements her independence.

Wherever the thirst of gain leads to some new attempt, the chances of success are multiplied in the direct ratio of the means employed to obtain it. Hence, the superabundance of English capital-the cosmopolitan principle of which naturally induces it to select any country in which its growth may be protected and productive-directs its course to the mines of the New World; and, with such a degree of affluence, that the friends of England may have reasonably entertained some fear, respecting the future prosperity of their country. In fact, the new and numerous undertakings, which are every day formed, for working the American mines, absorb immense sums, the loss of which would be dreadful indeed; for, by ruining individuals, it certainly would involve the destruction of commerce in general; and the facility with which the hope of immense gain insinuates itself into every bosom, and opens every purse, appears, in our apprehension, to accuse, in some degree, the public prudence. It is not that we have any particular reason for anticipating sinister results; we have, on the contrary, very powerful inducements to hope that complete success will crown all, or at least, many of the enterprises of this kind; we must however say, that the British public are in the dark on this subject, and that we consider it the duty of all persons connected with them, unreservedly to speak the language of truth, and to endeavour to point out to them their real interests, without wounding those of any one.

With this view, we have employed all the means

in our power to obtain the most correct ideas and the most exact information concerning the South American mines, the system of which we shall develop in a series of articles, particularly devoted to this purpose. In these articles, we shall refute, with equal force and impartiality, both the exaggerated and delusive hopes which may mislead persons who engage their capital in the working of the American mines, and the ill-founded fears which some discontented men endeavour to excite, in respect to these enterprises, the greatest evil of which, probably is, in the eye of morose censors, that the directors have not been disposed to favour them with some shares.

·

The objects separately to be examined in the system of the South American mines, may be reduced to three:

1. The situation and products of the different mines before 1810, a period at which internal troubles and the war of independence interrupted the working of them, principally at Mexico, Peru, and Buenos Ayres;

2. The present situation of these mines, their product, and their means of amelioration;

3. The authority with which the directors of the different companies are invested; the nature of their contracts with the American governments, or with the immediate proprietors; in fine, the foundation on which repose the interests of the shareholders, who entrust to them their fortune.

The following is a list of the foreign mines &c. which we shall consider in succession. We shall confine ourselves, in this article, to the examination of what concerns the Brasilian mines, to which we shall