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CHARÇAS.

This is one of the most important of the four provinces of Upper Peru, principally by reason of its climate, which is accounted the mildest of that part of America. This province is known by three names; Charcas, Chuquisica, and La Plata; but the name it is most commonly known by is the first. It has many other incidental advantages to recommend it for instance, its university; the superior education of its inhabitants; their admirable conduct and manners; the river Pilcomayo, which, in this neighbourhood, runs into the Paraná, &c. &c; but, having no statistical accounts of the province, we omit all conjectural statements. We are in the same predicament with respect to

LA PAZ,

In which province terminates the territory belonging to the United Provinces of Rio de la Plata. It was founded in 1548 in a ravine in the ridge of the Andes, in 16° 50′′ south latitude, and in 313° 30′′ of east longitude from Teneriffe.

The four great provinces of Upper Peru above mentioned are now entirely free from the Spanish domination, to which they will never return: and it is very unlikely that they will ever again require

to be emancipated by the armies of the United Provinces, as was the case three or four times during the war of Independence. It is not now as it was then. Every place which surrounds Upper Peru, by land as well as sea, is at present under the influence of American power. It may perhaps now occur that those provinces may adopt the old plan of establishing an intermediate state, formed by a part of the territory and population of the states of Peru and of Rio de la Plata, in which case it is the intention to fix the capital in Cuzco. Whether these provinces be added to Peru, or compose a part of the United Provinces, to which they have belonged since their origin, the interior and exterior commerce of the United Provinces cannot but be extended; and by the liberty of those provinces, and the complete termination of the war, in all likelihood it will be doubled in three or four years. This consequence will ensue, whatever may be the plan acted upon by the provinces of Upper Peru, even in the event of their separating from their first association. Should that last case take place, there is not the least cause for disquiet. Just motives exist to induce a hope that whatever they definitively resolve with regard to their destiny, will be realized in the most pacific manner without the smallest opposition on the part of the United Provinces, which are now thoroughly convinced

that reason attracts more durably than force; and that it is of less moment for them to extend the sphere of an armed and compulsory influence, than to secure the guarantees of order and peace within their own territory, and among the sister states, (from all which reasoning, however, Brazil is entirely excepted!) since by these means they will maintain commercial relations of much more value than they could obtain by extending their territory in America by the addition of four or five hundred leagues of land.

GENERAL OBSERVATIONS.

The extent and fertility of the land in each of the provinces of which we have treated, and the system adopted in Buenos Ayres for its distribution among foreigners and natives, which will probably be followed by all the states, have answered the most sanguine expectations. That system is to let the lands belonging to the public, at quit-rent contracts, to any individual offering, be it in one, two, or more lots, for breeding establishments or farming. (See the table of Measures.) The conditions of these contracts are confined, on the part of the Government, to giving possession of the land and signing a document for a determinate number of years, which in general is not less than eight or ten; and, on the part of the individual, to the pay

ing each year of a rent of eighty dollars for the square league--an amount which in all probability will be speedily diminished, in order to offer the greatest possible advantages to persons emigrating. Agreeably to the laws of the country, two conditions are added to the contract: 1st. That all the improvements which, during that time, are made on the land, belong to the renter, and are transferable to his heirs and successors. 2dly. That, in the event of that estate being sold by the Government, the possessor will be preferred to all other persons, however weighty may be the pretensions of the new claimant. It may not be improper to observe that the system of quit-rents does not preclude the power to grant gratuitous concessions of land, or to pay for them at different periods. Particular cases may occasion these measures, either as regards those lands, the peopling of which is of the greatest importance, or which require greater efforts to make them productive, or because the kind of labour promised to be undertaken deserves a powerful protection.

This system has been adopted for reciprocal convenience.

At a moment when the state is, as it were, newly born to credit, and when it is indispensable for it to make use of that credit, in order to obtain the capital which it is intended to expend in the construction of harbours, canals, bridges, roads,

cities, and other works, which will facilitate internal and external commerce in all its branches, and expend it to the utmost extent of which, in such a country, it is susceptible-on such a state it is incumbent, as well as on all others which act on the principles of good faith, to keep up a public property, in order to hold out a guarantee to its creditors or loan-holders. But while it secures that advantage, it also behoves the State to possess itself of an internal revenue, which may serve to forward the operations that it has begun to carry into effect, in order to diminish the obstacles and reduce the duties which impede importation, until it can, if such a thing be possible, do away entirely with the system of the Custom-house; and also to lay a ground-work for a stability in revenues and resources which may not be liable to be disturbed by any power possessing a superior marine force. Nor must we overlook another advantage which the nation derives from the adoption of this principle; namely, to favour, in an essential manner, all the foreigners who may expose themselves to the inconveniences of a long voyage, for the purpose of establishing themselves in that country.

Every thing seems to promise that the emigration to the United Provinces will be very considerable; and this cannot but eventually be essentially serviceable to a country where population is

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