It was in the autumn of the year 1824 that I determined on revisiting Buenos Ayres, after an absence from it of four years; and, as there are two very different modes of travelling thither from Mendoça, where I had been for some time sojourning, I chose that which my inclination for novelty and adventure, rather than my desire for ease and convenience, pointed out for the traveller who pays too much deference to the undeniable attractions of these latter, will be pretty sure to miss much of that spirit-stirring excitement in which the main pleasure and advantages of travel, both actual and prospective, consist.

The two modes of travelling to which I have alluded are, by the regular post road, and by the Ox-carts which traverse the vast and pathless Pampas. It will be readily conjectured, from what I have hinted above as to my turn for deviating from the beaten track, that the latter of these modes of reaching my destination was the one I chose.

In performing this journey by the ox-carts, it is customary for many parties to unite, and start at the same period; keeping together as one body during the whole journey for without this precaution (and sometimes even with it) the traveller is not safe from the attacks of the roving Indians who infest many portions of the route, and particularly the Pampas themselves.

The equipage which I engaged for my exclusive use was simply a twowheeled cart, drawn by six oxen. 16 ATHENEUM, VOL. 2, 3d series.

The cart consisted of a frame of timber, of which the pole or perch was twenty-four feet long, and nine inches square, of very hard massive wood, and not unlike, in size and weight, the beam of a house. The two side pieces were of the same form, but only thirteen feet long. On this frame was erected a rude tilt of sticks, arched at the top, and seven feet high; the sides being closely thatched with rushes, and the top covered with raw hide, so as to be quite impervious to the weather. Under this monstrous erection was placed an axle of lance wood, lashed to the bottom with raw hide; the spindle arms being about two feet six inches long, and eight inches thick. The wheels of this vast machine were of corresponding dimensions, being about nine feet high, and with massive naves and fellies, and put together (notwithstanding the rudeness of the tools employed in the work) in a manner that would not have disgraced an English wheelwright. Behind the car lashed an earthen water jar, holding twenty-five gallons; and underneath, a spare axle, fellies, spokes, &c., in case of accident.

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The oxen were yoked to the cart two and two, by thongs of raw hide, the foremost yoke being not less than fourteen feet distant from the pole; and the whole of them were managed by a driver sitting in front of the machine, and directing the animals by means of two goads; the one of great length and slung to the roof of the

cart, the other much shorter, and used only for the wheel oxen. The drivers pique themselves greatly on their skill in the use of these goads, which consist of light cane and willow wands, armed with iron points, and bound from heel to point with pack thread, rubbed over with blood by way of ornamental varnish: they are also sometimes adorned with feathers, &c.

I have been thus particular in describing my vehicle, because, in placing one of them before the reader, I make him acquainted with the exact character of the whole sixteen of which our caravan consisted. For this conveyance, I engaged to pay 120 dollars for the journey from Mendoça to Buenos Ayres-a distance of three hundred leagues: and, for the additional sum of a few dollars, I was to be supplied with a riding horse or mule, whenever I chose that mode of conveyance.

Before starting, I should mention, that the crew of these land ships, as they are called, ("Barcos de Tierra,") consisted simply of the driver of each cart; a general director or bailiff (called a Capataz ;) a supercargo; a carpenter; four men called Boyeros, whose duty it was to attend to the oxen during the halts, and collect them together when needed; and lastly, three Manseros, or Muleteers, to perform the same office to the horses and mules. The passengers on this occasion (including four mulatta girls who had been purchased as slaves by some residents of Buenos Ayres) made our company amount, in all, to forty-three persons.

It was on a fine sunshine morning, the 20th of August, 1824, that our troop started from Mendoça. The scene was an interesting one. The friends of all the party were present, waving hands and handkerchiefs, pronouncing and receiving farewells, pressing forward to deposite little presents and remembrances, and exhibiting the numerous tokens of interest and anxiety which a long, and in some respects hazardous journey, so na

turally excites. As for myself, my cart was presently so loaded with tokens of good-will from my Mendoça friends, that I was at last obliged to decline receiving any more.

Our line of march occupied about a quarter of a mile in length; for, besides the oxen attached to the carts, there were many spare ones intended to supply the place of any that might fall lame, and also a considerable number of bulls to supply food for our company, which the entreprenues of the troop engaged to furnish during the whole journey, the drivers and other employés eating nothing whatever but beef, without vegetables, bread, or even salt. So that, including horses and mules, we were attended, at starting, by not less than two hundred and thirty head of cattle.

So

At first, we got on very indifferently, from the draught oxen being fresh from grass, and consequently somewhat wild and unmanageable. that during the first day, we did not advance more than four leagues from the town. I was not long in discovering that I had done well in providing the means of riding on horseback; for I found that the cart I had engaged was useless except as a baggage waggon, on account of the almost unbearable violence of the motion, occasioned by the rudeness of its construction. On the second day, our troop was in motion long before sunrise; and I was struck with the remarkable skill with which each driver singled out, and caught his own set of oxen, notwithstanding the darkness which prevailed. Our road, during the second day, lay through a sandy desert covered with coarse shrubs; and at night-fall, we had not made more than four additional leagues in advance. But after the third day, our progress increased; for we now began to travel during the night also; proceeding for four hours regularly, and then resting for one hour. The only sleep I was able to procure during the actual journey was at these brief periods of halting, except when I chose to ride forward in advance of

the troop, and lay down to snatch a few minutes rest till they reached me. On the third evening we slept at the village of Retamo; and from this time the rate of our progress increased to about ten leagues in the twentyfour hours. From Retamo to San Luis, we met with the air-plant in great abundance (Flor del Ayer) growing on the low scrambling bushes and shrubs with which this whole district abounds. On the night of the 27th of August, we rested in the middle of a most beautiful wood of chanar trees; and nothing could be more pic turesque and romantic than the appearance of our whole troop, shown by the light of the numerous fires which blazed everywhere about us. The golden colored bark of the chanar trees reflected the lights which flickered upon its shining surface; and as the various groups of our party lay reclining beside the fires, in their striking and singular costumes-each group being partially hidden from the rest by the stems of the numerous trees which embowered and surrounded us on all sides-the whole presented the semblance of a scene in some romantic melo-drame, or of a horde of banditti carousing after some perilous enterprise. The ground was covered here and there with patches of a thick heath, which served us as couches to rest on; and as the night was warm, we here spent the most agreeable hours since the commencement of our journey.

On the next day, the 28th, we reached the banks of the great river Desaguadero, and nothing could be more striking than the contrast which presented itself to the scene just described. The place seemed the very abode of barrenness. It reminded me of the Dead Sea shores, or the fabled banks of the infernal river itself. No vestige of pasture, or of any green thing, grew on the precipitous banks of this forlorn stream; the black, deep, and salt waters of which went rushing hoarsely along, at a depth of twenty feet below where we stood. On our appearance, a few

wretched huts ejected from their doorways about a dozen squalid looking human beings, in the garb of women, whose coarse black elf-locks streaming down their backs, and their yellow cadaverous countenances, reminded me of those horrifying beings conjured up on the "blasted heath" with which (like the present) they were so strictly in keeping, and which

"Looked not like inhabitants of earth,

And yet were on it."

They had nothing to offer us for sale; nor did there appear to be any means of their furnishing even themselves with subsistence, not even a root or a vegetable; nothing but a few halfstarved goats, which looked as miserable as their keepers. Even the sun itself seemed to "disdain to shine" upon this realm of wretchedness and gloom. Close at hand lived the ferryman, whose appearance and bearing completed this singular scene. The sight of him and his dwelling, at once realized in my mind a description I have somewhere read of "Felon Care." Suspicion was in every look and accent, and sordid grasping avarice seemed to hold possession of his whole soul. On entering the dark den which formed his dwelling, we found the centre occupied by a round solid table, like a butcher's chopping block. Besides this, nothing was clearly distinguishable on account of the almost impenetrable darkness; but in one corner I thought I could perceive the remnant of a broken musket. His ferry-boat was formed by two canoes lashed together, and surmounted by a stage about twenty feet long.

On the 31st of August we reached San Luis de la Punta, in which abode of ruin and desolation we were detained three days. This is one of the most wretched places that can be conceived as the abode of men. It does not contain a single white-washed building; the Plaza is in ruins; the Cathedral fallen to the ground; and though the Piazza still stands in front of the Town-Hall, the roof which connected it with the main building no longer exists but as a mass of ru

paces slowly, backwards and forwards, and seems to increase by his appearance, rather than dissipate, the desolation of the scene.

On the third day from the period of our entering San Luis de la Punta, we sallied forth from it, and by nightfall reached the banks of the beautiful Rio Quinto, where we rested. On the following morning, instead of keeping with the general troop, I rode on a-head, in company with the supercargo, a respectable and intelligent young man, named Blas Valdor. Passing an isolated mountain called El Morro, we reached the Portezuelo; and here there opened upon our view a most beautiful grassy plain, extended interminably on every side as far as the eye could reach, and free from a single bush, shrub, or any other object whatever to intercept the view; except that on a rising ground, just at the verge of the horizon, we could distinguish a human dwelling, which proved to be the house of a wealthy landholder, with whose agreeable family we spent three days.

Quitting this hospitable roof, we reached, on the 9th of September, the Villa del Rio Quinto, the cultivated lands appertaining to which town are irrigated by the beautiful river from which it takes its name. This place is within the jurisdiction of Cordova, and contains a population of four thousand souls.

On the 13th of September we reached the Punta Del Sauce, a most wretched town situated on the river Quarto, and forming the frontier line of the Indian territories, called Las Pampas, an uninhabited plain, forty leagues in breadth, extending from the Rio Saladillo to Melinque. During the whole route from San Bernardo hither, we had been infested almost incessantly by flights of locusts, so numerous that they sometimes literally intercepted the light of the sunthrowing a shadow upon the ground as if a dense cloud was passing.

They

rose in almost unbroken masses before our horses' feet as we galloped onwards,

faces with our ponchos, to ward off the blows, which might otherwise have proved seriously injurious, especially if they had struck the eyes-for the locusts were of great size and weight. The town of Punta del Sauce we found in a most ruinous condition, consequent on repeated attacks of the Indians for purposes of plunder; but still, it was not without an appearance of considerable activity arising out of the commercial pursuits of the inhabitants. It contained no less than six shops for the sale of European goods of various kinds-for which returns are made in mare and other hides. A shop (or pulperia) in the Pampas is distinguishable from a great distance in every direction, by means of a flag which is fastened to a high pole stuck in the ground, as a sign. The governor of this town was a brave young man, who had fifty militia under his command, at the head of whom he occasionally scoured the country in a circle of a hundred miles, on the look-out for the roving Indians with which these plains are infested. Though these expeditions sometimes last for more than a month, the party take with them provisions for the two first days only; trusting for the future supply to the wild animals they may be able to take as they proceed. The flesh of ostriches is that which they prefer before any other; then that of mules; after that, of horses and mares; and lastly that of deer. Black cattle are never to be met with in these plains; but sometimes (though rarely) a lion is killed, and its flesh looked upon as delicious food. At this town we observed a ruined mud fort, mounted with a one pound swivel, but so honey-combed as to threaten much more danger to the firer than to the party aimed at. There was also a long four pounder lying on the ground, but useless from having been spiked in the war of the Montenero.

On leaving Punta del Sauce all population ceases; except that you meet with here and there a scattered hut, called a Puesto, inhabited by men