Bolivia from the agitations which pervaded Colombia and Peru.

Just before the Peruvian revolu. tion, Sucre concluded a treaty with Ortiz Ceballos, the plenipotentiary of Peru in Bolivia; by which, the latter country, on condition of assuming five millions of the Peru. vian debt, acquired an important accession of territory in the mari. time provinces of Tarapacá, and Arica, belonging to the Peruvian department of Arequipa, and form. ing the nearest communication from Potosi to the ocean. It is not likely that this treaty was ratified immediately; for soon afterwards the new government of Peru sent letters of recall to her ministers in Bolivia and Chili, probably distrusting men who had been appointed by Bolivar, and were, perhaps, subservient to his views. This furnishes no ground to apprehend a rupture between Bolivia and Peru; the latter having formally acknowledged the independence of the former; and being in no condition to prosecute a war with the experienced and skilful Sucre, if her rulers were so foolish as to be disposed to do it. Lower Peru must very naturally feel a desire to be re-united to Upper Peru, from which, in the ca. pricious despotism of Spain, it was so arbitrarily severed, contrary to all the obvious principles of asso. ciation, and subjected to the Viceroy of Buenos Ayres. It would

Still

be no wise surprising, therefore, if in the various changes which these countries may be destined to undergo, the two Perus should, at no remote period, be confederated under a single government.

But the continued refusal of the congress of the Rio de la Plata to recognise the independence of Upper Peru, is eminently absurd, and injudicious. The provinces of the Rio de la Plata, when their union was apparently the closest, were held together by a rope of sand. After fifteen years of independence, they had proved unable to agree upon a constitution of government. And they seem to have proceeded upon a false principle, in seeking to force particular provinces to continue associated with Buenos Ayres, contrary to their respective interests and inclinations. Their denial to Bolivia of the right of constituting its own government, is nothing but an act upon paper; because, even if the war of the Banda Oriental were at an end, it would be impossible for the provinces of the La Plata to compel Upper Peru to join their confederacy. They complain, to be sure, of the annexation to Bolivia of Tarija, a portion of the province of Salta; but we have not facts sufficient to judge which party, if either, is blameable in the transaction.

Our latest intelligence from general Sucre left him at Oruro, on the 24th of April, on his march

from La Paz, to Chuquisaca and Potosi; carried thither, no doubt, by the political conspiracy above mentioned. It is stated in the Gazette of Colombia, as an article of news officially communicated, that Sucre persisted in the intention, which, as we have seen, he had repeatedly expressed, of leaving Bolivia to be governed by her own citizens. His resolution was taken

to convoke an extraordinary congress during the then current year, for the purpose of resigning his authority into their hands, and restoring himself to Colombia. With this object in view, he had solicited of the Colombian government temporary leave of absence from his military duties for the space of three years, with permission to reside in the departments of the south.*

Ar the last advices CHILE continued in an unsettled condition. Our account of this country for 1826 closed with the choice of D. Manuel Blanco Encalada as provisional, and the vote of congress resolving to organize the republic according to the federal system. But ere two months had expired, the chief magistrate retired from his office in disgust, assigning the distracted state of affairs, and the inveteracy of the factions which agitated the country, as the causes of his resignation. In the course of his address he said:

"I had hoped that congress, sensibly alive to the critical position of affairs, and the exhausted state of the treasury, would lend their active co-operation, and unite in perfect harmony with the executive, for the purpose of calling into action those indispensable resources that were so imperiously

demanded for meeting the urgent and daily necessities of the state, which have been a source of unceasing perplexity to the govern. ment from the first moment of its installation. What has been the state of the public treasury, from that period to this, will sufficiently appear from the repeated representations made by the executive to congress. It is, therefore, quite nugatory again to allude to the lamentable appearance it presents, and which has been already submitted to the consideration of the representatives, without ever producing the effects that might reasonably be expected, and which were equally demanded by necessity, reason, and sound policy.

"The cause that has induced me to adopt the resolution of tendering my resignation, is the alienation and neglect manifested by all par. ties towards the executive power,

which has been left to the mercy of public opinion, without aid or hope, to steer its course amidst a thou. sand hidden rocks, which must ultimately be its destruction. Some other individual, more fortunate than he who addresses you, or more experienced in the science of making nothing out of something, may succeed one, whose unhappy fate it has been to struggle with insuperable difficulties; at one time to oppose dangerous innovations, at another to discountenance the most absurd and inexplicable theories; now to foil the intrigues of party, now to calm the ardour of passions neither elevated nor generous."

This it must be confessed, is a melancholy picture of confusion and disorder. Indeed the pecunia. ry embarrassments of the govern. ment of Chile seem to fall but little short of those, which oppress the other republics of the south. They seem to be wholly unacquainted with the principles of finance; and instead of adopting decisive mea. sures for permanently arranging their revenues, so as eventually to obtain relief from the debts with which the war of the revolution left them encumbered, they have re. course to temporary expedients and improvident shifts, which only serve to plunge them deeper and deeper in misfortune. The mode provided by Chile for paying the Chilian bondholders in London, fairly illus. trates the mischievous nature of

their financial system. In order to meet the interest punctually as it became due, the government conveyed to a mercantile company the monopoly of certain articles of general consumption, in considera. tion of which the company undertook to discharge the interest of the national debt regularly as it accrued. It would not have been easy to maintain such a monopoly in Chile, even under the Spanish system of administration; but the difficulties attending it were augmented in a tenfold degree, under a government, which relied altogether upon its popularity in the public opinion for its very exis. tence. The consequence it is easy to imagine. In the hands of the government, the monopoly would have been odious; in the hands of a body of private speculators it was likely to prove intolerable. Hence the company, beginning to apprehend they should derive no gain from their present bargain, declared that they could not discharge the interest of the debt, un. less the government should grant a large extension of their exclu. sive privilege. And as the executive dared not comply with this demand, the Chilian bondholders re. mained unpaid, like the creditors of Peru and Colombia.

Notwithstanding the prostration of the public credit abroad, the proceedings connected with the new organization of the executive would