Personal Narrative Of Travels To The Equinoctial Regions Of America During The Years 1799-1804 - Volume 1 - By Alexander Von Humboldt And Aime Bonpland.
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The Numerous Communications With Commercial Europe, With
The Caribbean Sea (Which We Have Described As A Mediterranean With
Many Outlets), Have Exercised A Powerful Influence On The Progress
Of Society In The Five Provinces Of Venezuela And In The Island Of
Cuba.
In no other part of Spanish America has civilization assumed
a more European character.
The great number of Indian cultivators
who inhabit Mexico and the interior of New Grenada, impart a
peculiar, I may almost say, an exotic aspect, on those vast
countries. Notwithstanding the increase of the black population, we
seem to be nearer to Cadiz and the United States, at Caracas and
the Havannah, than in any other part of the New World.
When, in the reign of Charles V, social distinctions and their
consequent rivalries were introduced from the mother-country to the
colonies, there arose in Cumana and in other commercial towns of
Terra Firma, exaggerated pretensions to nobility on the part of
some of the most illustrious families of Caracas, distinguished by
the designation of los Mantuanos. The progress of knowledge, and
the consequent change in manners, have, however, gradually and
pretty generally neutralized whatever is offensive in those
distinctions among the whites. In all the Spanish colonies there
exist two kinds of nobility. One is composed of creoles, whose
ancestors only from a very recent period filled great stations in
America. Their prerogatives are partly founded on the distinction
they enjoy in the mother-country; and they imagine they can retain
those distinctions beyond the sea, whatever may be the date of
their settlement in the colonies. The other class of nobility has
more of an American character. It is composed of the descendants of
the Conquistadores, that is to say, of the Spaniards who served in
the army at the time of the first conquest. Among the warriors who
fought with Cortez, Losada, and Pizarro, several belonged to the
most distinguished families of the Peninsula; others, sprung from
the inferior classes of the people, have shed lustre on their
names, by that chivalrous spirit which prevailed at the beginning
of the sixteenth century. In the records of those times of
religious and military enthusiasm, we find, among the followers of
the great captains, many simple, virtuous, and generous characters,
who reprobated the cruelties which then stained the glory of the
Spanish name, but who, being confounded in the mass, have not
escaped the general proscription. The name of Conquistadares
remains the more odious, as the greater number of them, after
having outraged peaceful nations, and lived in opulence, did not
end their career by suffering those misfortunes which appease the
indignation of mankind, and sometimes soothe the severity of the
historian.
But it is not only the progress of ideas, and the conflict between
two classes of different origin, which have induced the privileged
castes to abandon their pretensions, or at least cautiously to
conceal them. Aristocracy in the Spanish colonies has a
counterpoise of another kind, the action of which becomes every day
more powerful. A sentiment of equality, among the whites, has
penetrated every bosom. Wherever men of colour are either
considered as slaves or as having been enfranchised, that which
constitutes nobility is hereditary liberty - the proud boast of
having never reckoned among ancestors any but freemen. In the
colonies, the colour of the skin is the real badge of nobility. In
Mexico, as well as Peru, at Caracas as in the island of Cuba, a
bare-footed fellow with a white skin, is often heard to exclaim:
"Does that rich man think himself whiter than I am?" The population
which Europe pours into America being very considerable, it may
easily be supposed, that the axiom, 'every white man is noble'
(todo blanco es caballero), must singularly wound the pretensions
of many ancient and illustrious European families. But it may be
further observed, that the truth of this axiom has long since been
acknowledged in Spain, among a people justly celebrated for
probity, industry, and national spirit. Every Biscayan calls
himself noble; and there being a greater number of Biscayans in
America and the Philippine Islands, than in the Peninsula, the
whites of that race have contributed, in no small degree, to
propagate in the colonies the system of equality among all men
whose blood has not been mixed with that of the African race.
Moreover, the countries of which the inhabitants, even without a
representative government, or any institution of peerage, annex so
much importance to genealogy and the advantages of birth, are not
always those in which family aristocracy is most offensive. We do
not find among the natives of Spanish origin, that cold and
assuming air which the character of modern civilization seems to
have rendered less common in Spain than in the rest of Europe.
Conviviality, candour, and great simplicity of manner, unite the
different classes of society in the colonies, as well as in the
mother-country. It may even be said, that the expression of vanity
and self-love becomes less offensive, when it retains something of
simplicity and frankness.
I found in several families at Caracas a love of information, an
acquaintance with the masterpieces of French and Italian
literature, and a marked predilection for music, which is greatly
cultivated, and which (as always results from a taste for the fine
arts) brings the different classes of society nearer to each other.
The mathematical sciences, drawing, and painting, cannot here boast
of any of those establishments with which royal munificence and the
patriotic zeal of the inhabitants have enriched Mexico. In the
midst of the marvels of nature, so rich in interesting productions,
it is strange that we found no person on this coast devoted to the
study of plants and minerals. In a Franciscan convent I met, it is
true, with an old monk who drew up the almanac for all the
provinces of Venezuela, and who possessed some accurate knowledge
of astronomy. Our instruments interested him deeply, and one day
our house was filled with all the monks of San Francisco, begging
to see a dipping-needle.
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