A VOYAGE TO 



Every where in the skirts of the town^ much of the 

 Indian race is visible; generally a very poor, harm- 

 less, and indolent people. They -commonly speak 

 nothing but Spanish, and but for their complexion, and 

 inanimate countenances, they could not be distinguish- 

 ed from the lower orders of the Spanish Americans, 

 such as the laborers, carters, countrymen, gauchos, 

 &c. It would be worth inquiring into the cause, 

 why none of the aborigines are found, in this manner, 

 near any of our towns, which possess the population 

 and opulence of Buenos Ayres. It surely does not 

 arise from their having been treated with more kind- 

 ness here, or more pains having been taken in their ci- 

 vilization; or because the nations in the vicinity were 

 more numerous? I am inclined to attribute it to two 

 causes; the first is, that the early settlers on this river 

 were soldiers, and having few Spanish women with 

 them, they were compelled, like the Romans, to pro- 

 cure wives from their neighbors, which laid the ground- 

 work for a more friendly intercourse between them and 

 the natives; and this continued even after the flourish- 

 ing state of the colony enticed emigrants of both sex- 

 es from old Spain. Or it may be, that these Indians 

 are of a less wild and untamable character, than those 

 of North America. But the principal reason, is the 

 number of Indians that have found their way hither 

 from the missions of Paraguay, since the expulsion 

 of the Jesuits, and also from the provinces of Peru, 

 where they were a civilized people on the first disco- 

 very and conquest. In forming our ideas of the abo- 

 rigines of South America only by what we know of 

 those of the n*t>rth, we may be led astray. Against 

 Indians and Spaniards, we have strong prejudices in 



