Then, almost as if Nature herself disapproved of the whole proceeding, a frightful earthquake in the following year shook many a Venezuelan town into ruins.

Everywhere the royalists took heart.

Dissensions broke out between Miranda and his subordinates.

Betrayed into the hands of his enemies, the old warrior himself was sent away to die in a Spanish dungeon.

And so the "earthquake" republic collapsed.
But the rigorous measures adopted by the royalists to sustain their triumph enabled Bolivar to renew the struggle in 1813.