2z6 



A VOYAGE TO 



acquire habits of gambling and intoxication, as the 

 higher classes of the people, numbers of whom fall 

 victims to those seductive vices;'' but he afterwards 

 proceeds to give them a very different character, and 

 in a note, relates the following anecdote: ^^I once ob- 

 served a party playing in the neighborhood of a chapel, 

 after mass had been said, when the clergyman came 

 and kicked away the cards, in order to put an end to 

 the game. On this, one of the peons rose up, and re- 

 tiring a few paces, thus accosted the intruder: Father, 

 I will- obey you, as a priest, but (drawing his knife) 

 you must beware how you molest our diversions. The 

 clergyman knew the desperate character of these men 

 too well to remonstrate, and retired very hastily, not a 

 little chagrined.'' He observes again, that the state 

 of society among them, weakens those ties which natu- 

 rally attach men to the soil on which they are accus- 

 tomed to subsist. He also relates a plan which had 

 been concerted between two of the peons, to rob and 

 murder him, under a pretext of assisting him to make 

 his escape, but the plan was fortunately discovered by 

 the person under whose chai^ge and protection he had 

 been placed. In fact, from all the information I could 

 collect, from persons who had a perfect acquaint- 

 ance with these peons, or gauchos, there seemed to 

 be no difference of opinion, as to their leading cha- 

 racteristics. And when we consider their origin, and 

 mode of life, it would only be surprising that they 

 should be otherwise. We must reflect, that this is a 

 vast country, almost as thinly inhabited as the exten- 

 sive plains of the Missouri, in which criminals and fu- 

 gitives from justice, and deserters from the service, 

 were considered so penfectly safe, that it was thought 



