DON FELIX D'AZARA. 33 



in advancing to which, we regret it is necessary to 

 stop for an instant, and allude to an attack upon its 

 character which, as we conceive, has been most 

 unjustly made. 



Mr. Southey, in his " History of Brazil," when 

 making the freest use of our author's work on the 

 very different provinces of Paraguay and Buenos 

 Ayres, not unfrequently introduces such statements 

 as the following . " What Azara says on the sub- 

 ject is to be received with great suspicion." " Azara 

 repeats a silly charge against the Jesuits, which he 

 wishes to make the reader believe, though he evi- 

 dently does not, and certainly could not believe 

 himself; but it came in aid of one of his theories, 

 and therefore he would not lose it." " Azara says 

 so and so," " but this I have no doubt is false." 

 (Vol. ii. 336, 343, 351.) Language such as this 

 (reflecting far more on the individual who uses it 

 than on him to whom it is applied), unsupported by 

 the slightest proof, so far as we have observed, in 

 any part of Mr. Southey's massy tomes, merits, in our 

 opinion, severe censure. We shall meet these grave 

 charges, for the present, by merely quoting a few 

 sentences from Azara's works (written of course with- 

 out any particular reference to the Poet Laureate), 

 which very much bear the stamp of sincerity and 

 truth. In writing to his French editor, he says, " I de- 

 rive a particular satisfaction from labouring at this 

 work, animated not by the aim and ambition which 

 frequently stimulates authors, viz. the desire of im- 

 mortalizing themselves, but simply by the pleasure 



