Santa Cruz de la Sierra, with its territory, though bordering on the eastern confines of Peru, is within the dominions of Paraguay. Its longitude is 314°, its latitude 21°. It has its own governour and bishop, to whom are subject the towns of the Chiquitos, savages for many years instructed by the Jesuits in religion, humanity, and the useful arts, amid their distant woods. In 1766, the ten towns of the Chiquitos, founded by men of our order, contained 5173 families, and 23,788 souls; but the number of deaths far exceeds that of births. Whether this paucity of issue is to be attributed to the climate, the water, their food—especially the land-tortoises they use so much—or to a natural sterility in the parents, let the learned judge. I have frequently heard, that had not the Jesuits yearly brought a multitude of savages from the woods, the towns must long since have been depopulated. In each of the cities of Tucuman and Paraguay, the followers of St. Dominic, St. Francis, and St. Pedro de Nolasco, as well as the Jesuits, have their own establishment. Nuns of various orders dwell in Cordoba and Buenos-Ayres, but no where else. The Spaniards account Tucuman the poorest country in America, because it is destitute of gold, notwithstanding its numerous herds of cattle of every description. This province has been honoured with the presence of St. Francis Solano. When he was called away to Paraguay, many whole states were left without a single priest. Francis Victoria, of the order of St. Dominic, first bishop of Tucuman, in 1581 found only five secular priests and a few religious, with not one presbyter who understood the language of the natives, though the province abounded in Indian colonies. Solicitous for the glory of God, this bishop wrote to request Father Juan Atienza in Peru, and Joseph Anchuela in Brazil, to send him a few Jesuits already tried by previous exertions in the Christian cause. Fathers Leonardo Arminio, an Italian; Juan Saloni, a Spaniard; Thomas Fields, an Irishman; Manuel Ortega, and Estevam de Grao, Portugueze, were sent by sea from Brazil, and being taken by the English, were for some time infamously treated, and at last exposed to the winds and waves in an open boat; but Providence happily guiding them, reached the port of Buenos-Ayres. From Peru, Fathers Francis Angulo and Alphonso Barzena had been already despatched into Tucuman. The last of these was created vicar-general by Victoria, who esteemed him so highly as openly to declare that he would himself vacate the bishopric could Barzena benefit by his abdication. To these have succeeded men of our order, one after another, for nearly two centuries. Summoned by the bishop and royal governour, sent from Europe by their Catholic sovereigns, and dispersed in every corner of Paraguay's immense extent, how strenuously they have toiled for God and their King, it is not my business to relate. Thousands of savages won over to God and the King, colonies founded on