We shall now start our two authors fairly from Buenos Ayres, a place not much to the taste of either. To Mr. Miers the first specimen of South American handicraft was, as he says, ominous and depressing.' This was the cart which conveyed him and his party through the shoal water ashore, constructed of rough sticks and strips of hide, without any seat, and dragged by two horses, one mounted by an Indian-looking rider of strange appearance.' Then, on landing, he mistook the habitations of an industrious, civilized, and free people,' for prisons, as they had no glass sashes, and the open windows were all defended by iron gratings. He obtained good lodgings, however, in a respectable family, and thus describes the first day's entertainment, which may serve as a sample comment ils donnent à manger at Buenos Ayres :—

At dinner, we were placed side by side, at the top of the family table, the usual seat of guests, according to the Spanish custom. Three black female slaves waited at table: we had about twenty dishes, of different sorts, one brought on as soon as another was removed; we had bread and vermicelli soup, different kinds of stews, and bouillis of beef, roast veal, salads of lettuce, and dishes of different vegetables, dressed in oil. Our hosts wished to press upon us plates served from every dish in succession-they were extremely solicitous to make us eat more than we wished. After dinner one of the slaves said a long, unintelligible grace; upon the conclusion of which all the family crossed themselves upon their foreheads, mouths, and breasts the cloth was not removed, but was kept for the dessert, which consisted of a profusion of ripe figs, peaches, nectarines, apples, pears, and oranges; nothing but water was drunk at dinner, or afterwards; a bason and towel were brought, in which all the company washed their hands in the same water, it being first presented to us; they then rose from the table, and retired to their siesta, or afternoon's sleep.'-Miers, vol. i.

The Cornish miners were rather more fastidious in the eating way than Mr. Miers seems to have been; but, perhaps, things had got worse in the course of six or seven years. Captain Head

says

Now, at Buenos Aires, artisans will find provisions very dear; and although they receive more money than in England, they will not be able to live there so well. The lodgings, which are always unfurnished, are shockingly dirty, filled with all sorts of vermin; and, after all, they are extremely dear. Beef is sold in such a mangled state, that when the Cornish miners first arrived, they often returned from the butchers' carts without buying the meat, being unable to make up their minds to eat it. The fowls at Buenos Aires are also very bad, for they feed upon raw meat; occasionally, I have seen them hopping out of the carcass of a dead horse; and we all fancied that the eggs tasted of beef. The pigs are also carnivorous.

Raw

Raw beef is cheap; but fuel, pepper, salt, bread, water, &c., are all so exorbitantly dear, that the meat, when cooked, positively becomes expensive; and every article of clothing is eighty per cent. dearer than in England.'-Head, pp. 300, 301.

As soon as it was discovered, on the Stock Exchange, that the poor silly people of Buenos Ayres had neither milk nor butter, though in possession of numerous herds of cows, it was considered as a glorious occasion for creating a Milk and Butter Association; one, at least, as promising as a former Birmingham speculation of sending skates and warming-pans to the same place, among an assorted cargo of notions, as brother Jonathan would call them; and the following is Captain Head's account of this dairy concern:

We had all sorts of English speculations in South America, some of which were really amusing. Besides many brother companies which I met with at Buenos Aires, I found a sister association of milkmaids. It had suddenly occurred to some of the younger sons of John Bull, that as there were a number of beautiful cows in the United Provinces of Rio de la Plata, a quantity of good pasture, and as the people of Buenos Aires had no butter to their bread, a Churning Company would answer admirably; and before the idea was many months old, a cargo of Scotch milkmaids were lying becalmed under the line, on their passage to make butter at Buenos Aires. As they were panting and sighing, (being, from heavy rains, unable come on deck,) Neptune, as usual, boarded the ship, and the sailors who were present say that his first observation was, that he had never found so many passengers and so few beards to shave; however, when it was explained to him, that they were not Britannia's sons, hut Jenny Bulls, who have no beards, the old god smiled and departed. The people at Buenos Aires were thunderstruck at the unexpected arrival of so many British milkmaids; however, private arrangements had been made, and they, therefore, had milk before it was generally known that they had got cows. But the difficulties which they experienced were very great: instead of leaning their heads against patient domestic animals, they were introduced to a set of lawless, wild creatures, who looked so fierce that no young woman who ever sat upon a three-legged stool could dare to approach, much less to milk them!-But the Gauchos attacked the cows, tied their legs with strips of hide, and as soon as they became quiet, the shops of Buenos Aires were literally full of butter. But now for the sad moral of the story-after the difficulties had been all conquered, it was discovered, first, that the butter would not keep!-and, secondly, that, somehow or other, the Gauchos and natives of Buenos Aires. .. liked oil better!!'-Head, pp. 303, 304.

......

Captain Head finds even the water bad, the houses damp and comfortless, and the streets dirty; the men and the women, he says, are equally indolent, rarely seen walking together; we have under

stood,

stood, indeed, that they never walk at all, but pay their visits and go a-shopping on horseback; that there is not a smith, carpenter, or bricklayer, of them all, who has not his every-day horse to carry him to his work, and another for Sundays and gala days-even the beggars are mounted at Buenos Ayres. At the theatre the two sexes, we are told, are wholly separate the ladies occupying the boxes, and the men the pit, where slaves, common sailors, merchants, and soldiers, all members of the same republic, are (and this is as it should be) mingled together in one cheerless mass.' The supply of the town with provisions, it would seem, is at the mercy of the Gaucho, (the peasant of the Pampas,) who is as indolent and indifferent as the town's-people. A total want of arrangement is perceptible in everything. If (says Captain Head) one has been taken out to dinner in a carriage, and in the evening ventures to inquire why it has not arrived, the answer is, that it is raining, and that those who let carriages will not allow them to go out if it rains.'-Long life to liberty and equality!

The church is said to have been the great sufferer all over South America by the revolution; at Buenos Ayres the convents have been suppressed, the altars have lost their plate, the candles are yellow, the pictures mere daubs, and the images are dressed in coarse English cotton. Occasionally,' says Captain Head,' an old mendicant friar is seen dressed in grey sackcloth and covered with dirt; but, as he walks through the street looking on the ground, his emaciated cheek and sunken eye show that his power is crushed, and his influence gone.' The sad consequence,' he adds, is, that at Buenos Ayres there is very little religion at all.' The following, however, proves that fanaticism, at least, is not abolished:

'Once a year the men and women are called upon to live for nine days in a sort of barrack, which, as a great favour, I was allowed to visit. It is filled with little cells, and the men and women, at different times, are literally shut up in these holes, to fast, and whip themselves. I asked several people seriously whether this punishment was bona fide performed, and they assured me that most of them whipped themselves till they brought blood.'—Head, p. 27.

Greatly, however, as the revolution may have diminished the power of the priests at Buenos Ayres itself, our traveller soon found that they still swarm in the other towns of the Viceroyalty, practising and encouraging laziness and immorality. At Mendoza, they are stated to lead a most dissolute life, most of them having families; and several living openly with their children.' Their chief amusement, it seems, is cock-fighting on Thursdays and Sundays. Captain Head visited their arena. It was crowded with priests, who had each a fighting-cock under his arm, and it

was

was surprising to see how earnest and yet how long they were in making their bets.' By Mr. Miers's account, the priesthood are guilty of the greatest baseness and immorality in every part of the country, and the first to encourage gaming and every species of licentiousness. He says:

It is the custom throughout South America, and more especially in these united provinces, for every haciendado to build upon some central part of his estate a pulperia and a chapel close together; the latter as the means of drawing custom to the former, which forms no trifling branch of profit. On a feast-day, the people within a certain distance, repair to the pulperia, which is generally provided with two rooms, one for the mere gauchos, the other for their betters. Drinking and gaming are carried on without intermission until the bell announces that the elevation of the host is at hand; in an instant they all rush out of the pulperia, leaving the stakes, which are sometimes considerable, on the table, and with demure faces kneel before the host, the elevation of which is about to save their souls from damnation: they groan and cry aloud to the Virgin to protect them, and, in their momentary devotion, might be taken by a by-stander for penitent and sincere Christians. But the moment the service is concluded, they rush out again; and those who have left their stakes undecided, flock back with precipitation to protect their property: in a moment all their religion is forgotten, all are occupied in betting and drunken revelry, in which the friar, who has been the organ in effecting the momentary penitence and sorrow, and has saved their souls from perdition, stands foremost in the general debauch, which is continued till late at night.'

In Chile, they have lost nothing whatever of their insolence and intolerance, and very little of that influence which they have always exercised, more especially over the female mind, in that most wicked and detestable practice of extorting confessions of their little wanderings and weaknesses, and worming out of them secrets, which lay whole families at the mercy of these unprincipled vagabonds. In vain may the congress of Panama preach up religious toleration, unless these priestly drones are sent away to the armies or the mines-otherwise, it will only be that sort of religious toleration which the Governor of San Juan granted by his 'Carta de Mayo,' that famous Carta which the priests, after confining its author in a dungeon, so soon caused to be burnt by the public executioner, amidst the acclamations of the people. The streets of Santiago,' says Captain Head, are crowded with a set of lazy, indolent, bloated monks and priests.' He is indignant that the men should all touch their hats to these drones-who, he says, may be seen talking openly with women of the most abandoned class of society-and that the common people, though they laugh at their immorality,

immorality, persist in going to them for images and pictures, and in sending their wives and daughters to confession.

During the day one constantly meets a calesh drawn by two mules, driven by a dirty boy in a poncho, and followed by a line of inhabitants with their hats off, each carrying a lighted candle in a lantern: every individual in the streets kneels, and those who have windows towards the streets (who are generally the females I have described) are obliged to appear with a lighted candle. In the inside of the carriage sits a priest, with his hands uplifted and clasped. In this system of depravity the great sinner pardons the little one. Sins are put into one scale, and money into the other, and intent upon the balance, both parties forget the beauty and simplicity of the religion which they nominally profess.'-Head, pp. 192, 193.

But to return to Buenos Ayres. Captain Head gives the following account of the manner in which the Gauchos slaughter cattle in the corral, or large inclosed space, which is divided into a number of pens:

'I several times had occasion to ride over this field, and it was curious to see its different appearances. In passing it in the day or evening, no human being was to be seen: the cattle, up to their knees in mud, and with nothing to eat, were standing in the sun, occasionally lowing, or rather roaring to each other. The ground in every direction was covered with groups of large white gulls, some of which were earnestly pecking at the slops of blood which they had surrounded, while others were standing upon their tip-toes, and flapping their wings, as if to recover their appetite. Each slop of blood was the spot where a bullock had died; it was all that was left of his history, and pigs and gulls were rapidly consuming it. Early in the morning no blood was to be seen; a number of horses, with the lassos hanging to their saddles, were standing in groups apparently asleep: the mataderos were either sitting or lying on the ground close to the stakes of the corral and smoking segars; while the cattle, without metaphor, were waiting until the last hour of their existence should strike; for as soon as the clock of the Recolata struck, the men all vaulted on their horses, the gates of all the cells were opened, and in a very few seconds, there was a scene of apparent confusion which it is quite impossible to describe. Every man had a wild bullock at the end of his lasso; some of these animals were running away from the horses, and some were running at them; many were roaring, some were hamstrung, and running about on their stumps; some were killed and skinned, while occasionally one would break the lasso. The horse would often fall upon his rider, and the bullock endeavour to regain his liberty, until the horsemen at full speed caught him with the lasso, tripping him off the ground in a manner that might apparently break every bone in his body. I was more than once in the middle of this odd scene, and