In 1740, Gomez de Andrade, Governor for the King of Portugal in Rio de Janeiro, being one of those who was convinced that the reason why the Jesuits guarded their territories so religiously was that they had mines, bethought him of a plan. His plan, like most of those conceived on the fantastic reasons which are called ‘of State’, took no account of sentiment, and therefore, as mankind are and will ever be a thousand times more influenced by sentiment than by hard reasoning, was from the first bound of itself to fail. The colony of Sacramento upon the river Plate had for a hundred years been the source of conflict between the Spaniards and the Portuguese.[256] Situated as it was almost in front of Buenos Ayres, it served as a depot for smugglers; and, moreover, being fortified, menaced the navigation both of the Paraná and Paraguay. Slavers from England, Holland, and the German ports crowded the harbour. Arms of all kinds were stored there, and were distributed to all adventurers who meditated assaults against the crown of Spain. Twice or three times it had been taken and restored, the Indians of the missions always rendering most efficient help. At the time of which I write (1740) it had passed again by treaty under the dominion of the Portuguese, but still remained a standing menace to the Spaniards. Gomez Andrade advised the court of Lisbon to exchange it against the seven reductions[257] of the Uruguay, and thus at once to secure a country rich in gold and to adjust the frontier at the river Uruguay. Nothing appears so simple to a statesman as to exchange one piece of territory for another. A parchment signed after some international negotiations, and the whole thing is done. If, though, as happened in this case, one of the territories contains a population such as that which inhabited the seven towns upon the Uruguay, and which has conquered the country in which it lives from virgin forest, and defended it against all comers, it sometimes happens that the unreasonable inhabitants, by clinging to their homes, defeat the statesmen’s plans. Yet statesmen, once embarked in any plan, do not stick at such trifles as the affection of a people for its home, but quietly pursue their path, knowing that that which is conceived by ministers of State must in the end be beneficial to mankind. Without this patriotic abnegation of their feelings, no statesmen would be worthy of the name. Indifference to the feelings of others is perhaps the greatest proof a public man can give of his attachment to the State. After negotiations, lasting many years, in 1750 a treaty was signed between Portugal and Spain agreeing that the former should give up the Colonia del Sacramento to the Spaniards in exchange for the seven Jesuit towns upon the Uruguay, and that both nations should furnish a commission to fix the frontiers of the two nations on the Uruguay.[258] On February 15, 1750, the Spanish court sent to the Jesuits of the seven towns to prepare their