appeared in Spain; these have passed by as the inseparable misfortunes of circumstances, yet not one of the provinces that surrendered, or was attached to the French domination, has been treated like Venezuela; their conduct must however have been analyzed, and characterised according to reasons, motives, and circumstances that dictated it; this must have been judged in conformity to the rights of war, and the sentiments of the nation must have been pronounced according to the statements laid before it, but not one of them has yet been declared traitorous, in open rebellion, and unnaturalized as was Venezuela; for none of them has been created a public commission of diplomatic mutineers, to arm Spaniard against Spaniard, to fan the flame of civil war, and to burn and annihilate all that cannot be held in the name of Ferdinand VII. America alone is condemned to endure the until now unheard of condition of being warred upon, destroyed, or enslaved with the very means of assistance which she destined for the liberty and common felicity of the nation of which she was led to believe for a few moments that she constituted a part. "It appears that the independence of America creates more irritation to Spain, than the foreign oppression that threatens her, for against her are in preference employed measures that have not even been adopted against the very provinces that have proclaimed the new king. The incendiary and turbulent talent of a minister of the council of Indies could not have a more dignified employment than that of again conquering Venezuela with the same arms as those of the Alfingers and the Welzers, those first tyrants of Venezuela, authorized by Charles V., and the promoters of civil war amongst her primitive inhabitants, now re-assumed in the name of a king placed on the throne against the pretensions of the family of him who let out these provinces to the German factors. Under this name of Ferdinand all the sluices of iniquity are opened upon us, and the horrors of conquest are renewed, the remembrance of which we had generously endeavoured to blot out from the memory of our posterity; under this name we are treated with more severity than those who abandoned it before we did; and under this name it is attempted to continue the system of Spanish domination in America, which has been looked upon as a political phenomenon even in the times of the reality, energy and vigour of the Spanish monarchy. And can there be found any law that obliges us to preserve it, and to suffer in its name the torrent of distresses heaped upon us by those who call themselves the agents of the peninsula? By their means this very name obtained the treasures, the obedience, and acknowledgments of America, and by means of their flagitious conduct afterwards, in the exercise of their powers, the name of Ferdinand has lost every consideration amongst us, and consequently we ought to abandon it for ever. _Ex qua persona quis