_alcabala_ hardly improved the market conditions for national manufactures. The result was a further expansion of imports, while exports were confined to a moderate output of gold and silver from New Granada and a small trade in plantation products, chiefly cacao, tobacco and coffee. The trade gap was bridged by the illegal export of precious metals and by foreign borrowings, the latter procured in adverse conditions, badly employed and unreliably serviced. This eventually led to a limitation of imports by natural process.

In these conditions there was some reaction against the early optimism of free trade opinion towards ideas of protection and state intervention, as could be seen in the thought of Juan García del Río and José Rafael Revenga, though protection in itself could do little for Colombiawith only one citizen.'

# Chapter 11

## JOURNEY OF DISILLUSION

## _Rebels and Invaders_

There were few choices now, only further trials by battle. If 1828 was a bad year worse were to come. The chronology, the policies and the itineraries of the time are complex, and the observer has to track Bolívar closely to follow his mind and movements. But the logic of events is clear. In 1829 the juxtaposition of external shock and internal revolt produced a classic state of crisis, a turning point when things were on a knife–edge. Attack from Peru encouraged dissidents in Colombia, these challenged the regime, and the exodus from the doomed state began. Bolívar was struggling in that fatal year. The war on nature which he had proclaimed in Caracas during the earthquake