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III Report on Bolivia, 1827
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 December 2009
Extract
Maps 170
Introduction 173
Text 182
Chapter III A Review of the Present State of the Mines, and of their Former Produce 182
Chapter IV A Review of the Commercial Relations, Foreign and Domestic 213
Chapter V A Short View of the Present Political State of Bolivia, Embracing the History of the Country Since its Independence, its Government, Laws and Institutions 240
Appendices 264
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Royal Historical Society 1974
References
page 173 note 1 Foreign Office memorandum to C. M. Ricketts, London, 5 July, 1825, P.R.O., F.O. 61/5. Ricketts was appointed as Consul General for Peru in succession to Thomas Rowcroft (apptd. 10 October, 1823), killed accidentally after dark by patriot sentries outside Lima in December 1824.
page 174 note 1 See British Consular Reports on the Trade and Politics of Latin America, 1824–1826, ed. Humphreys, R. A. (Camden, 3rd ser., lxiii, 1940)Google Scholar, which provides a detailed and invaluable study of the documents from the Spanish American states despatched to London in that three-year period. The edited 1827 Report on Bolivia which follows thus forms a short supplement to Humphreys's volume.
page 174 note 2 Ibid., Document vi, 27 December, 1826, pp. 107–206 (P.R.O., F.O. 61/8).
page 174 note 3 Ibid., Document vii, 30 May, 1826, pp. 207–25 (P.R.O., F.O. 61/7).
page 175 note 1 C. M. Ricketts to George Canning, Lima, 30 May, 1826, P.R.O., F.O. 61/7. In the event, Pentland took a different route into Bolivia, via Arequipa, Puno and Lake Titicaca to La Paz, Oruro, Potosi, Chuquisaca, Cochabamba, back to La Paz, and thence down again into Peru by way of the Tacna oasis to the port of Arica. He returned by sea to Callao, arriving at Lima in May 1827. Pentland was later to return to Bolivia following his appointment (1836–9) as Britain's first Consul General there.
page 175 note 2 Pentland travelled alone on behalf of the British Government, not in the company of Woodbine Parish, Consul General at Buenos Aires, as stated in the D.N.B.
page 177 note 1 J. B. Pentland, On the general outline and physical configuration of the Bolivian Andes; with observations on the line of perpetual snow upon the Andes, between 15° and 20° South latitude', Journal of the Royal Geographical Society of London, v (1835), pp. 70–89.Google Scholar
page 177 note 2 The enclosures comprise:
1. Section or profile of the Peruvian Andes and of the adjoining provinces of Peru and Bolivia, between the 14th and 16th parallels of South latitude.
2. Section or profile of the Peruvian Andes and of the adjoining provinces of Peru and Bolivia, between the 16th and 18th parallels of South latitude.
3. Section or profile of the provinces of Bolivia bordering in the Andes (road from Peru to Buenos Ayres) from the shores of the Lake of Titicaca to the town of Salta and the plains of Buenos Ayres, between the 16th and 25th parallels of South latitude.
4. Plans and elevations of Peruvian ruins, Lake Titicaca.
5. Table of the geographical position of the most remarkable places in Bolivia, and in the neighbouring provinces of Lower Peru determined by astronomical observations.
6. Table showing the height above the sea of the most remarkable places of Bolivia, and of the adjoining provinces of Lower Peru, as determined by J. B. Pentland.
7. Table exhibiting the present division of the Bolivian Republic into Departments, Provinces and Cantons.
8. Statement showing the quantity of silver produced by the mines of Upper Peru from the earliest period, exhibiting the amount of duties paid to the Crown of Spain on this metal, and the amount of silver registered at the Treasury of Potosí from 1545 to 1824 compiled from official documents [Appendix I].
9. Statement exhibiting the total quantity of silver produced by the mines of Upper Peru from the earliest period, including the amount estimated to have been exported by contraband and the quantity furnished by the other mines of those provinces not included in Enclosure 8 [Appendix II].
10. Statement exhibiting the amount of the precious metals coined at the Mint of Potosí from 1800 to 1826 [Appendix III].
11. Law respecting the duties to be levied on importations through Cobija (Chuquisaca, 24 February, 1827).
12. República Boliviana: Colección oficial de Leyes, Decretos, y Órdenes del Gobierno (Chuquisaca, 21 01, 1827)Google Scholar.
13. Constitución de la República Boliviana (Chuquisaca, 25 11, 1826).Google Scholar
page 179 note 1 Pentland does not appear to have visited the towns of Santa Cruz de la Sierra or Tarija, and only brief descriptions of them are included. Tarija's determination to be incorporated into Bolivia had originally been challenged by Argentina (and by Bolívar), but it was effective by September 1826.
page 179 note 2 I.e. from Gran Colombia, the name of the extensive new state which Bolivar had established on the boundary of the colonial Viceroyalty of New Granada. It soon broke up, however, into three separate components: Colombia, Venezuela and Ecuador. Sucre was born at Cumana, Venezuela.
page 183 note 1 Earlier, Pentland had written, ‘The negro population is chiefly confined to the eastern provinces of the Dept. of La Paz, where they were formerly introduced as slaves; they are employed in the cultivation of the coca plant… The total number of negroes throughout Bolivia scarcely reaches 7000, of whom 4700 are slaves. By the 11th Article of the Constitution, slavery is abolished throughout Bolivia, and by a subsequent law Congress has extended this enactment of the Constitution, and regulated the mode in which those who remain in the state of slavery … are to gradually emancipate themselves by indemnifying their owners from the proceeds of their labour for the loss sustained by their freedom’ (Report, chap. ii). The slaves in Bolivia had been introduced, or escaped, from Lower Peru where they had worked mostly on the sugar estates. Apart from those living close to the Brazilian border, Bolivia's very small negro population is still concentrated in the headwater valleys of the Beni river between Tipuani, Coroico and Suapi.
page 184 note 1 The rate of exchange of the U.S. dollar was then $5 to £1. The Bolivian silver peso at this period also had an exchange value of about 5 to the Pound Sterling, so that the terms dollar and peso could be, and were, used interchangeably.
page 184 note 2 arroba: a unit of weight, about 25 lbs.
page 184 note 3 John Begg, a British merchant, with headquarters in Lima and agencies at Arica, Tacna and Arequipa.
page 184 note 4 real: a small Spanish silver coin, 8 to the dollar or peso. About 6d.
page 186 note 1 16½ inches of mercury in barometric reading approximates to an altitude of 18,000 feet. Above this height, the human body is no longer able to compensate indefinitely for lack of oxygen, and no permanent human settlement is recorded anywhere in the world at such altitudes.
page 186 note 2 Mark (marco): a unit of weight for gold and silver, 8 Spanish ounces (equalling 8.112 English ounces avoirdupois).
page 186 note 3 Infra, pp. 201–2, 231–2.Google Scholar
page 187 note 1 The carbonized plant remains of the Corocoro group, seen by Pentland, were not found subsequently to indicate the presence of coal measures.
page 188 note 1 José Gabriel Condorcanqui, adopting the title Tupac Amarú II after his sixteenth-century Inca ancestor, led a major revolt against the Spaniards which began near Cuzco in November 1780. Indian rebellion against harsh treatment, abuse, taxation and forced labour broke out in many Andean centres, but was concentrated in Upper and Lower Peru. After initial victories, resistance was crushed in May 1781.
page 189 note 1 Exports of tin from Oruro and Huanuni (normally via Arica) were maintained at almost exactly the same levels, however, for several years and began to rise in the second half of the nineteenth century. When the railway from Antofagasta on the Chilean (formerly Bolivian) coast at length reached Oruro in 1892, tin exports increased dramatically and soon assumed their dominant role in the Bolivian economy. See Fifer, J. V., Bolivia: Land, Location, and Politics since 1825 (Cambridge, 1972), pp. 49, 68–71, 245–9.Google Scholar
page 190 note 1 The discovery of silver at Potosí proved to be one of the greatest mineral strikes of all time. Studies of the city, its mines and production include Hanke, L., The Imperial City of Potosí (The Hague, 1956)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hanke, L. and Mendoza, G. (eds.), Bartolomé Arzáns de Orsúa y Vela's History of Potosí, 3 vols. (Providence, R.1., 1965)Google Scholar; Diffie, B. W., ‘Estimates of Potosí Mineral Production 1545–1555’, Hispanic American Historical Review, xx, 1940, pp. 275–82CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Cobb, G. B., ‘Supply and Transportation for the Potosí Mines, 1545–1640’, Hispanic American Historical Review, xxix, 1949, pp. 25–45 Google Scholar; also, ‘Potosí, a South American Mining Frontier’, in Greater America, Essays in honor of Herbert Eugene Bolton (Univ. of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1945), pp. 39–58 Google Scholar; Lynch, J., Spanish Colonial Administration, 1782–1810. The Intendant System in the Viceroyalty of the Rió de la Plata (London, 1958)Google Scholar, passim. Alexander von Humboldt's estimate of average annual silver production at Potosí, 1779–89, was 3,676,330 pesos. See Essai Politique sur le Royaume de la Nouvelle-Espagne (2nd ed.; iii, Paris, 1827), p. 377.Google Scholar
page 191 note 1 This was the Nordenflycht mission (led by Baron von Nordenflycht, a Swedish mineralogist), which visited some of the principal mining centres in Upper and Lower Peru between 1789 and 1793. The experienced German mining engineer and metallurgist, Anton Zacharias Helms, a senior member of the party, criticized the workings at Potosí: ‘All the operations at the mines of Potosí, the stamping, sifting, washing, quickening and roasting the ore are conducted in so slovenly, wasteful, and unscientific a manner.’ Flooding was a major problem, and advice was given on drainage techniques as well as on improved methods of amalgamation. The mission was most unpopular among the local mine-owners. See Helms, A. Z., Travels from Buenos Ayres, by Potosí, to Lima (English translation, London, 1806, first published Dresden, 1798), pp. 39–50 Google Scholar. Also, Buechler, R. M., ‘Technical Aid to Upper Peru: the Nordenflicht Expedition’, Journal of Latin American Studies, v (1973), pp. 37–77.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
page 192 note 1 Edmond Temple, secretary of the Potosí, La Paz and Peruvian Mining Association, called it ‘One of the nine hundred and ninety-nine speculations of the all-speculating year 1825’. The Company was launched in London on 27 April, 1825, its capital said to be £1,000,000 and its purpose ‘to work mines of gold, silver, platina, quicksilver, copper, and other minerals in the provinces of Potosí and La Paz, and generally in Upper and Lower Peru’. The company's President was Juan García del Río, the Vice-President General James Paroissien, both of whom had been officially commissioned by Peru in 1821 to encourage European interest and investment in Peruvian mining enterprises. Paroissien had seen Potosí in 1810 when he joined the first unsuccessful Argentine expedition to liberate Upper Peru from Spain. The new company failed in 1826, quickly bankrupted by ignorance of local conditions, prodigal spending and transport difficulties; its general incompetence and misfortune resulted in considerable loss of confidence in the region among potential investors overseas. For details, see Temple, E., Travels in various parts of Peru, including a year's residence in Potosí, La Paz, and Peruvian Mining Association, drawn up at the request of the shareholders, by their late Secretary Edmond Temple (London, 1829)Google Scholar; also Humphreys, R. A., Liberation in south America, 1896–1827. The Career of James Paroissien (London, 1952)Google Scholar. Temple records meeting Pentland in Potosi (i, p. 300), although Pentland makes no mention of this in his report. Also infra, pp. 208–11.Google Scholar
page 192 note 2 paco: a brown iron oxide containing particles of silver. The name is probably derived from ‘alpaca’ (Span., from Quechua, paco) because of the similarity in colour, rodado: scattered fragments of ore
page 195 note 1 An antimonial sulphide of lead and copper, named after Count Bournon, the French mineralogist who first described the rock in Cornwall in 1804.
page 195 note 2 In 1784–7, improved methods of amalgamation were developed in Saxony by Ignaz Born. These involved the treatment of the silver ore with mercury, salt, roasted iron or copper pyrites, and water in closed containers, instead of in the open air. The Saxon method, therefore, was largely one of mechanical improvement whose chief advantages were marked reductions in the consumption of mercury and salt, as well as considerable saving in physical effort and processing time. Also supra, p. 191nGoogle Scholar. and infra, p. 204.Google Scholar
page 196 note 1 Infra, pp. 221–4.Google Scholar
page 196 note 2 Peter Simon Pallas (1741–1811), the German naturalist and traveller, who made the discovery while on the celebrated scientific expedition from St. Petersburg into Siberia, 1768–74.
page 197 note 1 In all, three expeditions were despatched from Buenos Aires between 1810 and 1815 in an effort to liberate Upper Peru from Royalist control, and retain the region's economic and strategic advantages within the Argentine sphere. Balcarce and Castelli led the 1810 expedition, Belgrano that of 1812–13, and Rondeau the final expedition in 1815. Hostility aroused in Upper Peru by the savage conduct, particularly of the first Argentine expedition, the great distances and altitudes involved, the unexpected strength of the Royalist forces in Upper Peru, and existing heavy commitments in Chile and the Banda Oriental (Uruguay) all combined to deter Buenos Aires from mounting any further liberating campaigns in the region.
page 201 note 1 Mercury for the mining industry in Upper Peru came from the famous quick-silver deposits at Huancavelica in Lower Peru, where in 1570 Spain had established a State monopoly in production and distribution of this metal on which the amalgamation process for obtaining silver and gold from medium- and low-grade ores depended.
page 201 note 2 The situation had deteriorated during the Revolutionary period. The trebling of the price of Peruvian quicksilver by 1819 had been accompanied by severe new credit restrictions on mining and mercury-amalgamation enterprises in Upper Peru. As the wars of independence continued, Potosi's Bank of San Carlos, founded by royal decree in 1782, recalled many loans in the early 1820s, thus accelerating the economic collapse of the region. See Wittman, Tibor, ‘Andean Nations in the Making’, Etudes Historiques (Hungarian Academy of Sciences, 1970), pp. 157–82.Google Scholar
page 204 note 1 Supra, p. 195, n 2. Bern's Saxon method of amalgamation had called for a multiple-barrel machine in which rotating shafts turned wooden barrels containing the mixture.
page 208 note 1 The Company's agent was Capt. Joseph Andrews, who recorded his experiences in Journey from Buenos Ayres, through the Provinces of Córdova, Tucumán, and Salta, to Potosí, thence by the deserts of Caranja to Arica, and subsequently, to Santiago de Chili and Coquimbo, undertaken on behalf of the Chilian and Peruvian Mining Association in the years 1825–26, 2 vols. (London, 1827).Google Scholar
Andrews modified and extended his itinerary, visiting Potosí and its mines between 15 October and 17 November, 1825. There he met Bolivar, Sucre and ‘all the heroes of the Andes’, ii, pp. 88–130. Later (pp. 197 and 203), Andrews records making the acquaintance of Pentland between 27 January and 2 February, 1826, when they travelled together in Chile on a return journey between Valparaiso and Santiago. Pentland had been instructed by Consul General Ricketts, who had arrived in Lima on 15 January, 1826, to make a short survey in Chile. Andrews noted, ‘I now left Santiago in company with Mr. Pentland, before spoken of, who took an occasional shot when the carriage halted, in pursuit of his professional objects. For my own part I was too gloomy to enjoy any thing, brooding over the loss of my own humble efforts in the company's service, and seeing nothing propitious in prospect.’
page 208 note 2 Supra, pp. 191–2.Google Scholar
page 210 note 1 Including Paroissien, who died at sea en route for England from Chile, 23 September, 1827. See Humphreys, , Liberation in South America, p. 161.Google Scholar
page 210 note 2 According to Edmond Temple, Travels, i, p. 401 Google Scholar, President Sucre's comment on the Company's failure had been, ‘I know not on which side folly is most glaring, or which party is most to blame—whether those who raised and dispatched this expedition without money, or those who embarked in it and left their homes without considering how they were to be supported, much less how they were to carry their gigantic plans into effect! Los señores Ingleses must have been reading the history of El Dorado with a little more credulity than it deserves, if they imagined that the precious metals were to be obtained without labour and expense; for, although it is true that they abound in this country, they cannot be had for nothing, any more than the materials of which we build our houses.’
Bolívar had ruled (2 August, 1825) that mines not worked for a year and a day were forfeited to the State which could then derive revenue from their sale or lease. On this subject, see also Miller, J., Memoirs of General Miller in the service of the Republic of Peru, 2 vols. (London, 1828, enlarged edit. 1829), ii, pp. 256–9 and 271–2Google Scholar; and Ovando-Sanz, G., ‘British Interests in Potosí, 1825–1828; unpublished documents from the Archivo de Potosí’, Hispanic American Historical Review, xlv (1965), pp. 64–87.Google Scholar
page 212 note 1 Supra, p. 187n.Google Scholar
page 213 note 1 Pentland had earlier noted that it was from the coca trade that the wealthy merchants in La Paz derived their principal income.
page 213 note 1 Pentland had earlier noted that it was from the coca trade that the wealthy merchants in La Paz derived their principal income.
page 214 note 1 Madapollam was a cotton cloth, intermediate between a calico and a muslin, which took its name from Madhavapalam on the delta of the Godavari river, south India.
page 215 note 1 Pentland noted that thirteen missions had originally been founded in the old Jesuit Mission-Reserve Province of Moxos (Mojos), and ten in the Province of Chiquitos, lying to the south and south-east. By decree of 18 November, 1842, the Province of Moxos formed the basis of Bolivia's new Beni Department. The Province of Chiquitos remained in the Department of Santa Cruz, which was officially created (with those of Chuquisaca, La Paz, Cochabamba, and Potosi) on 23 January, 1826.
page 217 note 1 The northward movement of Argentine livestock into Bolivia (mules, horses, cattle, sheep, and asses), via Jujuy and Salta, quickly revived, however.
page 217 note 2 The Department of Oruro had been created by decree of 5 September, 1826.
page 218 note 1 Cotero's headquarters were at Arequipa, Peru, where according to C. M. Ricketts's report to Canning, 27 December, 1826 (F.O. 61/8) this merchant had monopolized trade ‘owing to his influence with Viceroy La Serna; and the consequence of the high prices which he charged on his goods was that the merchants of Buenos Aires were enabled to supply the articles required in Upper Peru at a cheaper rate’. Cotero had temporarily been able to boost the port of Quilca, Reports, p. 173 Google Scholar and infra. The Pacific ports were in fact reopened to Upper Peru after 1810.
page 220 note 1 Trade between Upper and Lower Peru was not completely severed after the former's transfer to the Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata. The import of food stuffs, textiles and fibres from Lower Peru, the through-trade in imported foreign manufactured goods, and the export of small quantities of minted gold and silver from Potosi all remained legitimate. But the prohibition in July 1777 on the export of gold and silver bullion from Upper Peru except through Buenos Aires effectively channelled most of the trade of those provinces, including the return flow of European imports, through that port. See Lynch, , Spanish Colonies Administration, 1782–1810, pp. 40–5.Google Scholar
page 220 note 2 Disputed ownership of the Banda Oriental (which became the independent State of Uruguay on 25 August, 1828) led to Brazil's declaration of war agains Argentina in December 1825, and its blockade of the Plate river ports.
page 221 note 1 Argentina had refused to recognize Bolivia on the grounds that it was still occupied by Colombian troops and that its new President, Sucre, was a foreigner. The principal points of discord, however, were that an independent Upper Peru violated the general principle of uti possidetis de jure 1810, and, more particularly, that Bolivia's ownership of the Province of Tarija was still disputed.
page 221 note 2 Bolivia had offered to exchange its portion of Lake Titicaca north of the Tiquina Strait, together with the Copacabana peninsula and Apolobamba (Caupolicán) province, for ownership of Peru's provinces of Arica and Tarapacá. If agreed, this would have given Bolivia a Pacific seaboard totalling some 600 miles (to 18°S), in order to include the plain and port of Arica on which the whole transaction pivoted. Not surprisingly, President Sucre's proposals were rejected by Peru under Andrés Santa Cruz.
page 221 note 3 For a discussion of Bolivia's struggle at this time to establish a port on the Pacific, see Fifer, , Bolivia, pp. 36–51.Google Scholar
page 222 note 1 Francis Burdett O'Connor, Sucre's Irish aide-de-camp, could have had no evidence for these last statements. Cobija is one of the driest sites on the Atacama coast; quantities of fresh water, food and fodder had always to be imported from the Calama oasis in the interior, or coastwise from Arica and Valparaiso.
page 222 note 2 Infra, p. 227.Google Scholar
page 222 note 3 Law dated 24 February, 1827.
page 222 note 4 Merchants were to complain, however, that the heavy losses, delays and damage to goods suffered during the six hundred-mile journey between Cobija and the Andean towns rendered the port unacceptable to them on virtually any terms. Cobija was particularly remote from the major commercial centres of La Paz and Cochabamba whose trade ties were with Arica and Arequipa.
page 223 note 1 Pentland's comment echoes one of President Sucre's oft-repeated pronouncements designed to bring pressure to bear upon Peru to cede Arica to Bolivia: ‘Bolivia's acquisition of Arica is of the utmost importance. It will be a magnificent port for Bolivia, especially with a good road to Cochabamba. But if Peru retains it, we may declare Cobija a free port which will cause Arica to decline.’ Sucre to Bolivar, Chuquisaca, 11 May, 1826, Cartas de Sucre al Libertador, ed. O'Leary, D. F., 2 vols. (Madrid, 1919), ii, 1826–30, pp. 8–9 Google Scholar. The unlikelihood of such a prospect was clear both to Lima and to Sucre, whose pleas fell on deaf ears.
page 223 note 2 Since the trail is trans-Andean, this presumably meant well graded.
page 223 note 3 East-west trade between northern Argentina and what in time became the Chilean desert remained small until the nitrate boom revolutionized the economy of Atacama, 1880–1918. Then, the trailing west of mules, cattle and hides from the Chaco lands of northern Argentina, Paraguay and eastern Bolivia flourished, together with the movement of peón labour to the nitrate and copper works. It was not to become a trade route to Europe for Argentine products, however.
page 225 note 1 Such a comment reveals how steadfastly so many in Chuquisaca and Potosi continued to ignore the commercial dominance, of La Paz and Cochabamba. Transport costs to these last two cities, as set out below, clearly favoured Arica, while time was vital factor. Merchandise could be pack-muled from Arica to La Paz in 7 or 8 days; the journey from Buenos Aires took at least 6–8 weeks.
page 226 note 1 The first section of this route, along the altiplano, is level, but the trail continues through the Cordillera de los Frailes and the sierras surrounding Potosi, and is steep and gruelling. Pentland had followed the route, so would seem to have written ‘Potosi’ in error here instead of ‘Oruro’.
page 227 note 1 The possibilities of cheap transport by canal and canalized river for heavy, bulky commodities had always to be considered in this pre-railway age. There were even wholly impracticable schemes to negotiate parts of the Cordillera Occidental and the Eastern Cordillera by flights of locks. No system of linked canal transport on Lake Poopó and the rivers Desaguadero and Laja was ever implemented, although projects continued to be studied until well into the twentieth century, and dredging of the Desaguadero took place.
page 228 note 1 Steam navigation on Lake Titicaca began in June 1871 with the launching at Puno of a small steamer built by Cammell Laird. It had been taken to Peru under its own steam, dismantled at the coast and then hauled in part by rail (Arica-Tacna), and finally by mule up to the lake, where the vessel was reassembled. A second vessel was launched in March 1872. The railway reached Puno from Mollendo and Arequipa in 1874. Coal supplies were imported ( supra, p. 187n). Nevertheless, the world's first commercial steam navigation had begun on the Hudson (1807) and the Clyde (1812), and by 1826–7 its future importance was recognized.Google Scholar
page 228 note 2 Navigation of the Amazon-Madeira-Guaporé routeway to the Mato Grosso goldfields had been developed by the Portuguese in the eighteenth century, and their claims were strengthened by a series of frontier posts and forts along the banks, particularly of the Guaporé. This river and the upper Madeira formed part of the boundary between Spanish and Portuguese possessions in South America delimited by the Treaty of San Ildefonso, 1777.
Pentland's failure to record the interruption to navigation caused by the Madeira-Mamoré falls was a serious one, and reflected the Andean regions' ignorance of the continental interior. (See Figs. 2 and 3, and Introduction, p. 177).
page 231 note 1 Discussing French supplies, Ricketts had reported to Canning, Lima, 27 December, 1826 (P.O. 61/8, and Humphreys, , British Consular Reports, p. 134 Google Scholar) that ‘a merchant made an advantageous speculation by bringing a set of very rich cavalry clothing and equipments for 400 men; the cost was, I learn, 200,000 dollars, and General Bolivar purchased it for the corps of Lancers in Bolivia’.
page 233 note 1 Officially declared a free port by decree of 22 January, 1825.
page 234 note 1 A mass of refined silver, moulded in the shape of a pineapple or cone, and usually weighing between 20 and 60 lbs.
page 235 note 1 The demand and price for Peruvian bark were shortly to soar, however, to the benefit of La Paz and Arica which handled the Bolivian, and much of the Peruvian, trade. Cochabamba became an important subsidiary centre in the 1850s and 1860s. After that, wild South American bark ceased to be economic in competition with Indian and S.E. Asian plantation production developed from seeds and seedlings collected in Peru by Clements Markham, at the request of the India Office.
page 236 note 1 In 1836 machinery for handling alpaca wool was invented by Sir Titus Salt, the Bradford mill-owner, and hitherto unsaleable bales were quickly in demand.
page 236 note 2 Species of Epidendrum (Dragon's-mouth orchid) are noted only for the beauty of their flowers. Vanilla comes from the seed pods of a different American orchid, Vanilla planifolia (syn. V.fragrans).
page 240 note 1 The February decree had placed the Assembly at Oruro, to begin on 29 April, 1825, but Royalist resistance in Upper Peru did not end until early that month. Because of this, and also because of Bolivar's opposition to the ‘self-determination’ decree, arrangements were postponed. Forty-eight, not fifty-four delegates were elected to the Assembly, of whom thirty-nine had reached Chuquisaca in time for the inauguration on 10 July, 1825. Indeed, of the two elected delegates from Santa Cruz only one had arrived by 6 August, Independence Day, so that forty-seven delegates took part in the voting upon the future of Upper Peru. See Arnade, C. W., The Emergence of the Republic of Bolivia (Gainesville, Florida, 1957) pp. 183–205.Google Scholar
page 241 note 1 Throughout the debate, no support was expressed for union with Argentina. Two delegates from La Paz, however, had voted for union with Lower Peru, giving Upper Peru's lack of a good seaport as one of their reasons for maintaining the old political ties. But both agreed to sign the Declaration of Independence in order to make it a unanimous document.
page 241 note 2 The new State adopted the name República Bolívar on 11 August, 1825, amending it to Bolivia on 3 October, 1825.
page 242 note 1 This drew attention to the contrasted situation in Peru. In December 1826, C. M. Ricketts had reported to Canning that ‘the Spanish capitalists in Peru were all persecuted, and ultimately banished, and the consequence has been that the capital which existed has disappeared with its possessors, the European Spaniards’ (F.O. 61/8). But Sucre's amnesty was not to survive long in Bolivia, infra, p. 248n.Google Scholar
page 242 note 2 The 25 May became a significant day in Bolivia's history when at Chuquisaca, in 1809, the authority of the Viceroy of the Río de la Plata was openly challenged. Traditionally, this marks the beginning of the country's fight for independence, although the uprisings of 1809 were quickly put down.
page 243 note 1 Bolívar's draft Constitution for Bolivia, presented in May 1826, was designed as a model for other South American republics. The proposal for a life-time Presidency with strong, though not absolute, executive power was monarchy in disguise, and was one of the articles later rejected.
page 244 note 1 Mariano Enrique Calvo, an influential creole lawyer of Chuquisaca, who at various times had been a prominent figure in both the Royalist and Patriot causes between 1809 and 1825.
page 248 note 1 Sucre's departure in 1828, however, was to put an abrupt end to local tolerance of his policy of selecting foreigners for new and critical Bolivian Government appointments whenever such men appeared to him to offer the best, or only prospect for competent, stable administration. Facundo Infante was among those swept from office that year by a wave of xenophobia and intrigue, and by the growing impatience of some to see Bolivians in senior administrative positions.
page 251 note 1 Able-bodied male Indians, usually between the ages of 18 and 50, were required to pay tribute with the exception of chiefs (caciques), their eldest sons, and those who were senior local officials (alcaldes). Lynch, , Spanish Colonial Administration, 1782–1810, pp. 128, 199–200 Google Scholar, notes certain other exemptions within the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata.
page 255 note 1 Such reasoning by Bolivian authorities at this time reveals the controlling influence of former colonial ties with the Viceroyalties of Peru and the Río de la Plata, underlined by a familiarity only with the more densely settled Andean regions. Frontier defence is thought of exclusively in terms of Peru and Argentina. In future years, however, it was with Chile, Brazil and Paraguay, on the lowland perimeter, that the most serious boundary conflicts were to develop.
page 256 note 1 Pentland uses the term ‘curate’ here in the sense of parish priest (cura), and ‘vicar’ as his substitute or representative.
page 260 note 1 Despite the inaccuracy of this statement, after such a promising start it is saddening to record Bolivia's present adult literacy still, at only c. 32%, one of the lowest in Latin America.
page 261 note 1 Excepting Santa Cruz de la Sierra and Tarija. Supra, p. 179 Google Scholar n. 1.
page 262 note 1 This was formally proposed by Sucre in April 1827, but rejected. Bolivar favoured a union with Peru, while between 1836 and 1839 the Peru-Boli Confederation was to be established under Andrés Santa Cruz. In com with all such projects for, or attempts at, federation, however, for the majori proved unpopular in theory and unworkable in practice.