Page:An account of a voyage to establish a colony at Port Philip in Bass's Strait.djvu/137

( 112 ) and confusion. The mother-country, aware of the slippery tenure by which the colony is held, with all the fears of a weak despot, prohibits the erection of a printing-press.

Should the Brasils revolt from their allegiance to the parent state, which in the course of national events is by no means improbable, and to which present appearances would authorize the fixing no very distant period; the immense regions of Spanish America will doubtless pursue the same steps. This region of the globe appears, from its geographical position, to be peculiarly adapted to the growth of powerful states; while its natural divisions, and external aspect, are eminently favourable to the preservation of liberty: for though, in its extent, it