1050 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1805. 



in such a mawkish way, or rather in 

 no way at all that I can call cook- 

 ing ; it is so messed up with lish, 

 eggs, onions, oil, and garlic, that it 

 requires the stomach of an Esqui- 

 maux to relish what they set even 

 before me, that am an invalid. 1 1 is 

 to no purpose I endeavour to make 

 my friend father Jerome understand 

 the meaning of roast beef : 1 might 

 as well talk of friccaseed hare to an 

 Abyssinian. 



" The fish here are delicious, pro- 

 vided they were not spoilt in the 

 cooking ; but the people mix so ma- 

 ny heterogeneous spices with their 

 abominable oil, to make what they 

 call sauce, that the real flavour of 

 the fish is lost in the sousing : how- 

 CTer, I do all J can to swallow their 

 salmagundi ; though my rebellious 

 stomach will Sometimes, in spite of 

 good manners, and even hunger, 

 persist in refusing to admit such dain- 

 ties. The beautiful gold fish that 

 we admire so much in Europe are 

 caught in shoals in the Plata : some 

 of them a foot long, and proportion- 

 ably large ; one oi" these I was ia- 

 y on red with to-day for dinner, 

 cooked in plain water, and served 

 up to me without any other sauce 

 than pure unadulterated butter, in- 

 stead of oil : understand me riifht 

 though ; I do not mean butter such 

 as we in Europe use, made from 

 cream, but the fat of an ox melted 

 down and refined, not unlike what 

 our cookmaids call dripping. Yon 

 smile, but 1 assure you it makes an 

 excellent substitute for real butter; 

 indeed any thing is preferable to their 

 everlasting oil. This was the best 

 flinncr I have made since I arrived 

 ;n this part of America. The fish is 

 d-Jlicatcly swct-t, and the nearest to 

 it I ever i;igttd in England is the red 

 niiijlet. 



" The fishermen say, that when 

 the pampero blows the gold fish hide 

 themselves in the sands or holes of 

 the rocks, and are never seen till 

 thetcmpest occasioned by this dread- 

 ful wind is entirely subsided. Of this 

 pampero, 1 am told, that it rises ia 

 the mountains of Cordillera, and 

 crossing the plains of Las Pampas, 

 nine hundred miles in length — dur- 

 ing the whole of which it does not 

 meet a single tree or shrub to ob- 

 struct its progress — proceeds with 

 increasing fury till it reaches the 

 banks of La Plata, when, collecting 

 itself into a kind of stream or cur- 

 rent, it rushes with incredible vio- 

 lence down the river, sweeping all 

 before it ; and unless the vessels in 

 the harbours are secured with more 

 than ordinary care they are sure of 

 being driven from their moorings, 

 and greatly damaged, if not lost, on 

 the shoals in the river. It is this 

 wind that has caused so many banks, 

 by raising the sand fTom the plains 

 and hurling it into the stream, where 

 meeting with more or les-s objects to 

 check its progress, it lodges or shifts 

 about at the caprice of the wind. 

 These sands, by daily increasing, 

 have destroyed the harbour of Bue- 

 nos Ayres : no vessel can approach 

 nearer to the town than three or 

 four leagues distance ; the merchan- 

 dise must of course be conveyed to 

 land in small craft, made on purpose 

 to navigate a little shallow river 

 which conveys the goods to the town 

 from the mouth of the harbour ; and 

 even these lesser vessels — which are 

 made long, narrow, and high, but 

 so constructed as to require but a 

 very trifling draft of wate? — arie 

 obliged to take a winding course, 

 and double two or three points of 

 land round which the little river 

 Hows. Several plans for deepening 



and 



