Don Antonio Viedma, who took a lively interest in the settlement he had formed at San Julian's, in vain raised his voice against this determination, and endeavoured to show that the grievances of the settlers were but the natural difficulties to be expected in the infancy of all new colonies; that they knew the worst of them, and many of their remedies; that a further experience of the seasons had shown that the lands, so far from being unfit for cultivation, as amongst other things was alleged, were quite sufficiently productive to support them in after-years without further aid from Buenos Ayres; and as to the expenses, the heaviest were already incurred; whilst the fisheries alone promised sources of wealth and revenue to the mother country, as well as to the neighbouring viceroyalty. But these arguments met with little attention, and came too late to alter the determination of the higher powers. The same jealous policy which led the Spanish Government to cause the coast of Patagonia to be surveyed, equally influenced them in withholding from publication the results, which remained carefully hid from all inspection in the archives of the Viceroyalty, though I cannot but think, had the reports even of Viedma himself been given to the world, they would have been the best possible security to his Catholic Majesty against the curiosity or encroachments of foreign nations. Not only did they all tend to show that the coast itself was full of dangers, but they also proved that the interior of the land was, throughout, a steril and desolate waste, scarce of water and vegetation: a region fit enough for the wild beasts which had possession of it, but very little adapted for the supply of any of the wants of man. I cannot conceive what temptations such possessions could possibly have offered to any European power whatever, nor can it, I think, create surprise that Spain herself abandoned them. With respect to the fisheries, had there been any real spirit of enterprise in the people of Monte Video and Buenos Ayres, they might have monopolized them; but no such spirit existed, and they were suffered to fall into the hands of the more adventurous sailors of England, North America, and France. They equally neglected the importation of salt, though a more necessary article to them, perhaps, could hardly have been placed within their reach; and after Viedma's voyage it was well known that any quantity of it, of an excellent quality, could be obtained either at San Joseph's, Port Desire, or San Julian's. All that was necessary was to collect it at the proper season, in the months of January, February, and March, when it is hard and dry, and consequently in the fittest state for shipping.