The inhabitants, who amount to 10,000, are in general not rich, possessing little activity or enterprise; many of them pride themselves, on account of being descended from the conquerors of the country. Some trade is carried on among them with the West India islands in mules, hides, goats, coarse pottery ware, cheese, &c. which are all brought from the interior. Their chief commercial relations are with Curaçoa, from which island, they are distant only a day's sail.
Coro contains but few negroes, as the laborious work is performed by the Indians who inhabit the suburbs. Such is the scarcity of water, that the city is supplied from a distance of two miles, by means of mules and asses, laden with that necessary aliment.
The streets of Coro are regular, but the houses are mean, and the city is not paved, its public buildings being a church, and a small convent of Franciscans. The local government is lodged in a council, of which the commandant of the place is president.
Its port lies open from north to north-east and neither its accommodations, nor the commodities it trades in, are sufficient to render it a place of much resort.
The peninsula, which lies to the north of Coro, is called Paragoana, and the isthmus is about a league in width, from which the peninsula stretches from south-west to north-west for twenty leagues. It is inhabited by people of colour and Indians, who breed great quantities of cattle on it, which they ship off clandestinely to Curaçoa, that island being supplied from this place with meat and vegetables, by open boats, which cross over daily.
Coro is 80 leagues west of Caraccas, 65 north of Maracaybo, and 33 north-west of Barquisimeto.
The next place of note in the government of Venezuela, is Porto Cavello, or Puerto Cabello, 30 leagues north-east of Caraccas, in 10° 20' north latitude, and 69° 11' west longitude. It lies in a fine harbour, in the Golfo Triste, near Curaçoa, to the neighbourhood of which island it owes its importance.
Burburata, a village and harbour, a league to the east of Porto Cavello, was originally the port of Venezuela, and was founded for that purpose in 1549. The harbour of Puerto Cabello, being well adapted for carrying on a contraband trade with Burburata, its shores were soon settled by fishermen, and many Dutch smugglers erected huts there. Such was the boldness and enterprising spirit of these people, that all the efforts of the Spaniards were unable to check them, and they continued their unlawful trade under the eyes of the local authorities. When the Guipuscoa company obtained their final charter, they ejected the most troublesome of these people by force, built a town, a wharf, and forts for its defence; and they also erected immense warehouses, some of which still remain.
The site of this town was a small peninsula, the neck of which was almost under water; this isthmus was cut through, a canal formed, and the town detached from the suburbs.
The exterior buildings are by far the most numerous, they are however built very irregularly, and the island town is chiefly occupied by the forts and warehouses; the communication between the two being by a bridge over the canal, at the end of which is placed a gate that is always closed at night.