A
FIVE YEARS’ RESIDENCE
IN
BUENOS AYRES,
DURING THE YEARS 1820 TO 1825:
CONTAINING
REMARKS ON THE COUNTRY AND INHABITANTS;
AND A VISIT TO
COLONIA DEL SACRAMENTO.

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PREFACE.

At a time when the rich and fertile provincesof South America are daily becoming increasedobjects of commercial consideration—when theirriches and advantages are constantly forming thebases of fresh speculations—and when, under thesecurity offered to person and property by theliberal institutions of a free and independentgovernment, communication with them is everyhour becoming more extended,—an illustrationof their local affairs, customs, manners, andpeople, cannot but be interesting.

Of these provinces, the one which forms thesubject of the following Remarks is far from beingthe least important. Without adverting to thefertility of the soil, and the general healthiness ofthe climate, the prospects which Buenos Ayrespresents in a mercantile point of view, forming,as she does, from her situation, the medium ofcommunication with the whole interior of thisvast continent, must ever render her an object ofconsiderable importance to a commercial nationlike England. Nor is she less a source of interestto the politician and the philanthropist. ToBuenos Ayres is due the credit of setting the- iv -noble example to the other provinces, of burstingasunder the shackles of a despotic mother-country,whose selfish policy had long immured them underthe deepest veil of ignorance and degradation, debarringthem from any communication with therest of the world, in order that she might reapthe exclusive advantage of those treasures withwhich Nature had enriched them. Nor has BuenosAyres confined herself to example merely,but, from the moment of having secured her ownindependence, she has never ceased to encourageand assist the other states in throwing off thesame degrading yoke.

It is true, that preceding works have thrownmuch light on these countries, and the subjectsI have here handled have been treated byabler pens than mine; but, besides the expensivenessof those works, which renders them inaccessibleto a great class of readers, the subject is sonew, and embraces such a wide field of research,that an abundant harvest still remains for freshlabourers. Having confined myself to one portionof this vast territory, I have been able to enter intoa minuter detail of many things that have beencursorily passed over by preceding writers; and,finally, having resided in the country which is thesubject of these Remarks during the last fiveyears, my means of observation have been neitherfew nor limited.

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CONTENTS.