148 
REVOLUTION AT BUENOS AYRES 
CHAP. 
colours. In the evening, the wind being not quite fair, as usual 
we immediately moored, and the next day, as it blew rather 
freshly, though with a favouring current, the master was much 
too indolent to think of starting. At Bajada, he was described 
to me as “ hombre muy aflicto —a man always miserable to get 
on ; but certainly he bore all delays with admirable resignation. 
He was an old Spaniard, and had been many years in this 
country. He professed a great liking to the English, but 
stoutly maintained that the battle of Trafalgar was merely won 
by the Spanish captains having been all bought over ; and that 
the only really gallant action on either side was performed by 
the Spanish admiral. It struck me as rather characteristic, that 
this man should prefer his countrymen being thought the worst 
of traitors, rather than unskilful or cowardly. 
1 8th and igth .—We continued slowly to sail down the 
noble stream : the current helped us but little. We met, 
during our descent, very few vessels. One of the best gifts of 
nature, in so grand a channel of communication, seems here 
wilfully thrown away—a river in which ships might navigate 
from a temperate country, as surprisingly abundant in certain 
productions as destitute of others, to another possessing a 
tropical climate, and a soil which, according to the best of 
judges, M. Bonpland, is perhaps unequalled in fertility in any 
part of the world. How different would have been the aspect 
of this river if English colonists had by good fortune first 
sailed up the Plata ! What noble towns would now have occu¬ 
pied its shores! Till the death of Francia, the Dictator of 
Paraguay, these two countries must remain distinct, as if placed 
on opposite sides of the globe. And when the old bloody- 
minded tyrant is gone to his long account, Paraguay will be 
torn by revolutions, violent in proportion to the previous 
unnatural calm. That country will have to learn, like every other 
South American state, that a republic cannot succeed till it 
contains a certain body of men imbued with the principles of 
justice and honour. 
October 20th .—Being arrived at the mouth of the Parana, 
and as I was very anxious to reach Buenos Ayres, I went on 
shore at Las Conchas, with the intention of riding there. Upon 
landing, I found to my great surprise that I was to a certain 
degree a prisoner. A violent revolution having broken out, all 
