GENERAL. 11 



flaying and cutting up at the same time ; — these flayers, 

 wild-looking fellows, dressed or half-dressed in various 

 bright colours, scarlet predominating ; the gaily capari- 

 soned horses of the butchers, many of them glistening 

 with silver trappings ; rude carts, ruder-looking drivers, 

 and various coloured horses ; the background of pens, 

 still half full of cattle, all contributing colour and artistic 

 grouping, make up, if not a pleasingly picturesque and 

 gay scene, at least, illuminated by the oblique rays of the 

 morning sun, a very sparkling and brilliant one, and novel 

 in the extreme to Europeans. 



The ' emissaries' of the sausage-makers, dogs and swine, 

 serve as the scavengers, aided by clouds of gulls and 

 hawks ; the snow-white and grey plumage of tlie swoop- 

 ing whirling thousands of the winged inhabitants of the 

 Pampas, ever moving in the sunhght, adding not a little 

 to the brightness and singularity of the effect. 



m. 



The aspect of the country or 'campo' of Buenos Ayres, 

 and its geological character, is altogether different from 

 that of the Republic of the Uruguay, or Banda Oriental. 



The province of Buenos Ayres, excepting far away 

 south, where there is a spur, or high range, is one vast 

 level plain — a rich alluvial soil without wood — except 

 here and there, where one or two trees, or a small planta- 

 tion, mark the site of an ' estancia ' house, or a ' puesto' 

 or station. A solitary ' ombu ' tree, with its enormous 

 trunk and great arms, its dark green and dense foliage, 

 affords, here and there, shade to a group of cattle or 

 horses, or to the weary traveller : a plain clothed in rich 

 herbage, watered by sluggish streams,. shallow lakes and 



