Spanish missions,

1693.

Spanish missions. General results.

Dutch Cuyuni horse-trade prohibited by Spain, and abandoned.

Spanish missions. Results in fifteen years.

Spanish missions, 1724.

Suay and Caroni, 1724.

By 1693, the stock raising had grown to such proportions, that the Essequibo Dutch were travelling six weeks up from Kykoveral to the savannas of the Cuyuni to buy horses.*

The result of all this missionary activity was that roads were opened through apparently impenetrable forests; towns and churches were founded; plantations laid out, and stock farms established.†

This trade in horses in the Cuyuni continued without restriction until 1702. In that year the Spaniards prohibited it; and though it was attempted to be kept up by the Dutch, they were compelled to abandon it altogether by 1707.‡

All this time missionaries continued to pour in; and as a result of the settlement in Guiana in 1686-87 of a number of Capuchin Fathers, five thousand Indians were baptized in fifteen years, five towns were founded in Trinidad and three more in Guiana. §

Finally in 1724 an entire reorganization of the missions was effected, and the plan of specific missions, each with a definite foundation, was initiated.¶

In accordance with this reorganization, two missions were formally "founded " in this year, Suay and Caroni.

* Appendix to Case, ii, 63-64.

+ Strickland (Rev. J.) Boundary question, Rome, 1896, Appendix, p. 72. In October, 1707, the commandeur complained that they could no longer be got thus from above so conveniently and in such quantity as need required. It is the last mention I have found of the importation of horses by this route. [U. S. Commission Report, i, 316.]

§ Caulin (friar A.) Historia, etc., Madrid, 1779, p. 9; see also Rodway (J.) and Watt (T.) Annals of Guiana, Georgetown, 1888. ii, 64; and Documentos para la historia de la vida pública del Libertador. [Bolivar]. 4°, Caracas, 1875, vol. i, p. 421.

It is true that ever since the year 1724 the Indians of the Province of Guayana began to show some perseverance in the Catholic Faith preached to them by the Capuchin Missionaries of Catalonia, and it may therefore be said that their true foundation dates from that time. Although the preaching of the Gospel in that Province was not begun in that year, it may be inferred from the old register of Baptisms that from the year 1664 various priests at different times attempted their pacification and conversion. [Appendix to Case, ii, 338.]

JU. S. Commission, Report, iii, 215.

To sum up the results of Spanish growth from 1648 to 1725:

In the delta of the Orinoco and in the interior Cuyuni basin there had been trading both by French and Dutch, the latter principally from Surinam and Berbice ; but the Spaniards had throughout maintained exclusive political control of both regions. Over by the Moruca and Pomeroon they had made their presence effectively felt, and Spain claimed both of these rivers as her own. Along the Orinoco, and over the sloping savannas of the Cuyuni, Spanish missions had gradually spread, their stock farms raising horses in such numbers that they not only supplied the home needs but had a surplus for export.

The Dutch Essequibo post, on the other hand, scarcely maintained itself at Kykoveral and on the adjacent banks.

Summing up and contrast with Dutch.

X.-HISTORY OF THE ESSEQUIBO COLONY.

1725-1803.

Returning to the Essequibo, the story of that colony, from 1725 until it was finally taken by the British in 1803, will now be taken

up.

History of Essequibo colony.

in 1725.

In 1725, as has before been seen, the Dutch possessions Dutch possessions were limited to the Island of Kykoveral, to a few plantations on the adjacent banks of the Essequibo, Mazaruni and Cuyuni, and to a shanty on the Wacupo.

Prior to 1725, such limited tendency to growth as the Essequibo colony may have had, had been up-stream from Kykoveral, on the Essequibo, the Mazaruni and the Cuyuni: there had, however, never been any plantations above the first falls of those rivers.

Subsequent to 1725 the tendency was all the other way. Indeed, this tendency became so marked that, little by little, the whole colony moved down nearer the mouth of the Essequibo, abandoning Kykoveral, deserting former plantations, and apparently giving up all thought of the interior except as a place for trade with the Spaniards and Indians.

In 1739-40* the garrison and seat of government were transferred from Kykoveral to Flag island (after wards known as Fort island)† at the mouth of the Essequibo.+

* Appendix to Case, ii, 89; also U. S. Commission Report, i, 201; ii, 283.

On Flag Island, now coming to be called Fort Island, there likewise grew up a cluster of buildings; the fort, the public offices and warehouses, the quarters of the garrison, the dwellings of the officers. [U. S. Commission Report, i, 202.]

But as these upper lands became exhausted, the more fertile lower reaches tempted even those who were already established above; and at

Tendency of colony downstream.

Garrison transferred to Flag is

land.

Cartabo aban

doned.

No plantations above Flag Island in 1777.

In 1740 the dozen houses which composed the hamlet of Cartabo were abandoned and fell to ruin.*

By 1748 the Cuyuni could be counted very remote.† As early as 1764, Storm van 's Gravesande could speak of "the few colonists who still live up the river,"+ meaning, as the context shows, at the old site of the colony, about the junction of the Cuyuni and Mazaruni.§ By 1773 all demands for grants of land up the river at the former site of the colony had ceased.[]

By 1777, there was, with one exception, not a sugar, coffee, or cotton plantation above Flag island; in fact, no culture whatever except a few cassava grounds.¶

the completion of the new fort on Flag Island, near the mouth of the river, and the transfer thither from Kykoveral (in 1739–40) of the garrison and the seat of government, the exodus had already become general. [U. S. Commission Report, i, 201.]

66

* After 1740, when the colonial government was removed to the new fort on Flag Island, Cartabo fell to ruin. According to Hartsinck [Beschryving van Guiana, i, p. 263], writing in 1770, when it was now in ruins," it had consisted of "twelve or fifteen houses." [U. S. Commission Report, i, 202.]

We have the honor to report that in fulfillment of your salutary intention, we have caused to be posted everywhere the announcements of the sale, on January 8 last, of the burdensome and unprofitable indigo plantation. But, to our sorrow, we must report that in this matter we could in no way attain the desired end, inasmuch as, although the conditions were arranged very favorably, not one person was willing to bid a single stiver thereon, presumably on account of the great distance and the insalubrity of the river Cuyuni. We had therefore to keep it for the Company, to whom, even for bread-grounds alone, it is worth at least two hundred rix-dollars and more. [Appendix to Case, ii, 100.]

"Nog boven in de riviere wonen." [U. S. Commission Report, i, 201, note.]

§ I have received a report from the few colonists who still reside in the upper reaches of the rivers that a few weeks ago they had seen a white man with a few Indians proceeding down the falls of the River Cajoeny and proceeding up the River Masserouny. I reproached them very much for not apprehending and sending the man to the fort, and expressly charged them that if they caught sight of others they should immediately apprehend them and send them to me, which they promised to do. [Appendix to Case, ii, 158-159; also, atlas, maps 66 and 67.]

It is now an opportune moment for closing the Court, because there are no longer any grants of land to be made; no one will ask for lands in the upper reaches of the river, and most of them are already annexed as timber grounds for the plantations below. [Appendix to Case,

ii, 221.]

¶Thus one finds above this island (which is distant only one tide from