alf a dozen generations they had been governed
with all the short-sighted tyranny for which the Spanish Government is
famous; the resources of the countries had been crippled in order that
each day's greed might be satisfied; and the inhabitants, who, for the
most part, were the mixed offspring of Spanish and native parents,
had been kept in abject dependence and in ignorant ferocity. There
was plenty of internal hatred and strife; but no serious thought of
winning their liberty and working out their own regeneration seems to
have existed among the people of the several provinces, until it was
suggested by the triumphant success of the United States in throwing
off the stronger but much less oppressive thraldom of Great Britain.
That success having been achieved, however, it was soon emulated by
the colonial subjects of Spain.

The first leader of agitation was Francisco Miranda, a Venezuelan
Creole. He visited England in 1790, and received some encouragement in
his revolutionary projects from Pitt. He went to France in 1792, and
there, while waiting some years for fit occasion of prosecuting the
work on which his heart was set, he helped to fight the battle of the
revolution against the Bourbons and the worn-out feudalism of which
they were representatives. During his absence, in 1794, conspiracies
against Spain arose in Mexico and New Granada, and, these continuing,
he went in 1794, armed by secret promises of assistance from Pitt, to
help in fomenting them. They prospered for several years; and in 1806
Miranda obtained substantial aid from Sir Alexander Cochrane, Lord
Cochrane's uncle, then the admiral in command of the West India
station. But in 1806 Pitt died. The Whigs came into power, and with
their coming occurred a change in the English policy. In 1807, General
Crawfurd was ordered to throw obstacles in the way of Miranda, then
heading a formidable insurrection. The result was a temporary check
to the work of revolution. In 1810 Miranda renewed his enterprise
in Venezuela, still with poor success; and in the same year a fresh
revolt was stirred up in Mexico by Miguel Hidalgo, of Costilla, a
priest of Dolores. Hidalgo's insurrection was foolish in design and
bloodthirsty in execution. It was continued, in better spirit, but
with poor success, by Morelos and Rayon, who, sustaining a serious
defeat in 1815, left the strife to degenerate into a coarse bandit
struggle, very disastrous to Spain, but hardly beneficial