136 ST. FE CHAP. 



of the country are ludicrously strange, but too disgusting to be 

 mentioned. One of the least nasty is to kill and cut open 

 two puppies and bind them on each side of a broken limb; 

 Little hairless dogs are in great request to sleep at the feet of 

 invalids. 



St. Fd is a quiet little town, and is kept clean and in good 

 order. The governor, Lopez, was a common soldier at the 

 time of the revolution ; but has now been seventeen years in 

 power. This stability of government is owirig to his tyrannical 

 habits ; for tyranny seems as yet better adapted to these 

 countries than republicanism. The governor's favourite occu- 

 pation is hunting Indians: a short time since he slaughtered 

 forty-eight, and sold the children at the rate of three or four 

 pounds apiece. 



October t^th. — We crossed the Parana to St. Fd Bajada, a 

 town on the opposite shore. The passage took some hours; as 

 the river here consisted of a labyrinth of small streams, separated 

 by low wooded islands. I had a letter of introduction to an 

 old Catalonian Spaniard, who treated me with the most 

 uncommon hospitality. The Bajada is the capital of Entre Rios, 

 In 1825 the town contained 6000 inhabitants, and the province 

 30,000 ; yet, few as the inhabitants are, no provijDce has suffered 

 more from bloody and desperate revolutions. They boast here 

 of representatives, ministers, a standing army,, and governors: 

 so it is no wonder that they have their revolutions. At some 

 future day this must be one of the richest countries of La Plata. 

 The soil is varied and productive ; and its almost insular form 

 gives it two grand lines of communication by the rivers Parana 

 and Uruguay. 



I was delayed here five days, and employed myself in 

 examining the geology of the surrounding country, which was 

 very interesting. We here see at the bottom of the cliffs, beds 

 containing sharks' teeth and sea-shells of extinct species, passing 

 above into an indurated marl, and from that into the red clayey 

 earth of the Pampas, with its calcareous concretions and the 

 bones of terrestrial quadrupeds. This vertical section clearly 

 tells us of a large bay of pure salt water, gradually encroached 

 on, and at last converted into the bed of a muddy estuary, into 

 which floating carcasses were swept. At Punta Gorda, in Banda 



