With This Entire Want Of Principle
In Many Of The Leading Men, With The Country Full Of
Ill-Paid Turbulent Officers, The People Yet Hope That A
Democratic Form Of Government Can Succeed!
On first entering society in these countries, two or three
features strike one as particularly remarkable.
The polite
and dignified manners pervading every rank of life, the
excellent taste displayed by the women in their dresses, and
the equality amongst all ranks. At the Rio Colorado some
men who kept the humblest shops used to dine with General
Rosas. A son of a major at Bahia Blanca gained his
livelihood by making paper cigars, and he wished to accompany
me, as guide or servant, to Buenos Ayres, but his
father objected on the score of the danger alone. Many
officers in the army can neither read nor write, yet all meet
in society as equals. In Entre Rios, the Sala consisted of
only six representatives. One of them kept a common shop,
and evidently was not degraded by the office. All this is
what would be expected in a new country; nevertheless the
absence of gentlemen by profession appears to an Englishman
something strange.
When speaking of these countries, the manner in which
they have been brought up by their unnatural parent, Spain,
should always be borne in mind. On the whole, perhaps,
more credit is due for what has been done, than blame for
that which may be deficient. It is impossible to doubt but
that the extreme liberalism of these countries must ultimately
lead to good results. The very general toleration of
foreign religions, the regard paid to the means of education,
the freedom of the press, the facilities offered to all
foreigners, and especially, as I am bound to add, to every one
professing the humblest pretensions to science, should be
recollected with gratitude by those who have visited Spanish
South America.
December 6th. - The Beagle sailed from the Rio Plata,
never again to enter its muddy stream. Our course was
directed to Port Desire, on the coast of Patagonia. Before
proceeding any further, I will here put together a few
observations made at sea.
Several times when the ship has been some miles off the
mouth of the Plata, and at other times when off the shores
of Northern Patagonia, we have been surrounded by insects.
One evening, when we were about ten miles from the Bay
of San Blas, vast numbers of butterflies, in bands or flocks
of countless myriads, extended as far as the eye could range.
Even by the aid of a telescope it was not possible to see a
space free from butterflies. The seamen cried out "it was
snowing butterflies," and such in fact was the appearance.
More species than one were present, but the main part belonged
to a kind very similar to, but not identical with, the
common English Colias edusa. Some moths and hymenoptera
accompanied the butterflies; and a fine beetle (Calosoma)
flew on board.
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