This Awakening Of A Sentiment Of Honour In The Soul Of A Murderer Is A Psychologic Phenomenon Worthy Of Reflection.

The man who had so often shed the blood of travellers in the plains recoiled at the idea of becoming the passive instrument of justice in inflicting upon others a punishment which he felt that he himself deserved.

If, even in the peaceful times when M. Bonpland and myself had the good fortune to travel through North and South America, the Llanos were the refuge of malefactors who had committed crimes in the missions of the Orinoco, or who had escaped from the prisons on the coast, how much worse must that state of things have been rendered by discord during the continuance of that sanguinary struggle which has terminated in conferring freedom and independence on those vast regions! Our European wastes and heaths are but a feeble image of the savannahs of the New Continent which for the space of eight or ten thousand square leagues are smooth as the surface of the sea. The immensity of their extent insures impunity to robbers, who conceal themselves more effectually in the savannahs than in our mountains and forests; and it is easy to conceive that even a European police would not be very effective in regions where there are travellers and no roads, herds and no herdsmen, and farms so solitary that notwithstanding the powerful action of the mirage, a journey of several days may be made without seeing one appear within the horizon.

Whilst traversing the Llanos of Caracas, New Barcelona, and Cumana, which succeed each other from west to east, from the snowy mountains of Merida to the Delta of the Orinoco, we feel anxious to know whether these vast tracts of land are destined by nature to serve eternally for pasture or whether they will at some future time be subject to the plough and the spade. This question is the more important as the Llanos, situated at the two extremities of South America, are obstacles to the political union of the provinces they separate. They prevent the agriculture of the coast of Venezuela from extending towards Guiana and they impede that of Potosi from advancing in the direction of the mouth of the Rio de la Plata. The intermediate Llanos preserve, together with pastoral life, somewhat of a rude and wild character which separates and keeps them remote from the civilization of countries anciently cultivated. Thus it has happened that in the war of independence they have been the scene of struggle between the hostile parties; and that the inhabitants of Calabozo have almost seen the fate of the confederate provinces of Venezuela and Cundinamarca decided before their walls. In assigning limits to the new states and to their subdivisions, it is to be hoped there may not be cause hereafter to repent having lost sight of the importance of the Llanos, and the influence they may have on the disunion of communities which important common interests should bring together.

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