CHAPTER I

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PONCE DE LEON

NOTE.--This book was first published in 1878, and has long been

out of print. The work has been recognized as the best and most

accurate description yet written of the British Invasion, and

the rise of the Argentine Republic.

PONCE DE LEON

The Rise of the Argentine Republic

by

AN ESTANCIERO

BUENOS AIRES LONDON

MITCHELL'S BOOK STORE T. WERNER LAURIE

530 CANGALLO 578 CLIFFORD'S INN

1910

Al Gran Pueblo Argentino ¡Salud!

CONTENTS

BOOK I

THE BABYHOOD OF A GREAT NATION

CHAP. PAGE

Prologue 3

I. Father and Son 5

II. How Don Gregorio Lopez sought an Answer to the

Question of the Day 11

III. Concerning the danger of Friendship with an Enemy 20

IV. Showing how a Patriot may also be a Traitor 29

V. Perdriel 36

VI. In which it appears that a lesson may be well taught

and yet not learned 47

VII. The 12th August, 1806 53

BOOK II

THE PROWESS OF A YOUNG GIANT

Prologue 61

I. At the Quinta de Ponce 63

II. The Yeomanry of Buenos Aires 71

III. Arming the Slaves 78

IV. Standing alone 85

V. An Evening in the month of June 93

VI. The Landing of the English 100

VII. The Baptism of Fire 110

VIII. Los Corrales de La Miserere 117

IX. The Night of Sorrow 121

X. The Council of War 131

XI. The Pathways of Death 141

XII. The Afternoon of the 5th July 152

XIII. The Capitulation of the 6th July 158

Epilogue to Books I. and II.: The Monuments and the

Rewards of Victory 162

Appendix: The Court Martial 163

BOOK III

THE UNKNOWN FUTURE

Prologue 167

I. At the Quinta de Don Alfonso 169

II. The Episode of the fair Mauricia 175

III. Watch and Wait 187

IV. The raising of the Veil 193

V. To our Friends the English! 202

BOOK IV

THE DAWN OF FREEDOM

PART I.--THE BRIGHTENING OF THE EASTERN SKY

Prologue 213

I. Magdalen 215

II. How Don Gregorio Lopez a second time sought an Answer

to the Question of the Day 223

III. Several ways of looking at one Question 227

IV. How the Spaniards also proposed to themselves a

Question, and how Don Carlos Evaña prepared an Answer 234

V. How the Viceroy took Counsel with Don Roderigo 242

VI. The Eve of a great Even t 249

VII. The 1st January, 1809 258

VIII. Evaña's Dream 267

IX. The Day after 273

X. America for the Americans 279

BOOK V

THE DAWN OF FREEDOM

PART II.--THE MISTS OF THE EARLY MORN

Prologue 287

I. The two Viceroys 289

II. The Tertulia at the House of my lady Josefina 298

III. La Junta de los Comandantes 307

IV. How Don Carlos Evaña attacked the Wild-duck, and

routed them with great slaughter 313

V. How the Viceroy placed a sword in the hands of the

enemies of Spain 323

VI. ¡Caducó la España! 331

BOOK VI

LIBERTY

Prologue 347

I. How the last Tie was broken 349

II. How Don Gregorio Lopez for the third time sought an

Answer to the Question of the Day 356

III. The Opening of the month of May 360

IV. Dias de la Patria 367

V. The 25th May, 1810 375

VI. Lions in the Path 383

VII. The first Fight in the War of Independence 388

VIII. How General Liniers lost an important Ally 397

IX. La Cabeza del Tigre 401

X. Once more in the Porch together 408

GENERAL EPILOGUE

I. The Viceroyalty of Buenos Aires 419

II. The Year 1810 420

III. Paraguay 422

IV. The Banda Oriental 422

V. The Army of Upper Peru 424

VI. The Sovereign People 427

VII. The Congress of Tucuman 433

VIII. Independence 434

BOOK I

THE BABYHOOD OF A GREAT NATION

PROLOGUE

The Argentine Republic drew her first faltering breath in a time of

universal tumult. Europe was in a blaze from the confines of Russia to

the Atlantic; the air reeked with blood, the demon of war strode

rough-shod over a whole continent, at each step crushing some ancient

nation to the dust. The peoples of Europe, down-trodden for ages, rose

in their misery and barbarism against their oppressors and wrote out

their certificate of Freedom in characters of blood; they asserted their

right to be men not slaves, and their voice as that of a mighty trumpet

reverberated throughout the earth. In the hearts of the Spanish Creoles

of America that voice found an echo.

* * * * *

Spain arrogated to herself unlimited power over the nations she had

founded, witting not that they were nations. Though they were of her own

bone and her own blood, she knew them not as children, but as

bond-slaves, who existed to do her bidding.

* * * * *

The voice of France in the first throes of her great agony sounded in

the ears of these bond-slaves, and in secret conclave they whispered one

to another, asking one another wistfully, whether they were men and not

slaves. To this whispered question for long there was no answer, for

Spain was to them as their mother.

* * * * *

Can a mother sin in the eyes of her own child?

PONCE DE LEON

CHAPTER I

FATHER AND SON

"Thank God I am not a Spaniard."

"Marcelino! my son! what new heresy is this?"

"It is no new heresy at all, my mother; it is a fact. Thank God I am not

a Spaniard. I am an American, and the day will come when we Americans

will show the world that we are men and not slaves."

"Marcelino! Be comforted, my son; it is the fortune of war. You at any

rate did your duty, and did not fly till you were left alone. I should

have mourned for you if you had been killed. My heart would have been

desolate, my son, if I had lost you; now I have you yet, and I am proud

of you."

As the stately lady spoke thus, she laid her hands upon her son's

shoulder, while he sat gloomily on a low chair; and bending over him,

kissed him fondly on the cheek; then, still leaning on him, she raised

one hand to his head, running her taper fingers through the tangled

locks of curly black hair which covered it. As she thus caressed him,

the look of sullen gloom gradually vanished from his face; he looked up

at her with eyes the counterparts of her own in their lustrous

blackness, but differing from hers as those of an eager, passionate man

differ from those of a compassionate, tender-hearted woman.

"Mother," he said, raising his hand to his head, and taking her hand in

his own, "sit down and let us talk, for I am going."

"Going! at such a time as this!" answered she, drawing a stool towards

her, and seating herself on it beside him, still resting with one hand

upon his shoulder, and leaning upon him.

"Yes, mother, going. There will be no more fighting here now, our

citizens do not like that work, they told us so to-day pretty plainly

when we tried to make them stop and meet the English in the suburbs."

"Going! but where will you go?"

"Anywhere where I can be of more use than here. I cannot stop to see the

disgrace of my native city. To-morrow the English will march in in

triumph, with their flags flaunting in the air, and their music playing

before them. They will march through these streets of ours I tell you,

mother; the English flag will fly from the flag-staff in the fort

to-morrow, and Buenos Aires will be an English city. Our Buenos Aires,

my mother, will be an English city, an English conquest."

"To what God sends there is nothing but resignation, Marcelino."

"God has nothing to do with it, mother; Spain has decreed that we are

slaves and not men. Had we been men, do you think a handful of English

could take a city like this?"

"They took us by surprise, when we were not ready for them. Wait till

Sobremonte has time to collect troops, he will soon drive them back

again to their ships."

"Sobremonte! If you had seen him at the fort to-day, mother, you would

not have much hope from him. The most helpless old woman would have been

as much use as he was to-day. The only man to whom we can look now is

Liniers. Sobremonte and all the rest will give up their swords and swear

fidelity to Great Britain to-morrow."

"So your father told me just now, Marcelino; he says it is the only

thing they can do."

"He is a Spaniard, and thinks as a Spaniard; of course he must go with

the rest. Thank God I am not a Spaniard."

"The Spaniards will soon drive the English out again. Huidobro will send

troops from Monte Video, or they will send an army from Spain."

"And why should we look to Spain? Are there not plenty of us to drive

away not one thousand but ten thousand English? But what has Spain ever

done for us that we should fight her battles for her? We have no quarrel

with these English; for my part I should like to be good friends with

them; but give up my country to them, and let them rule over us--never!"

"No, we will never do that, Marcelino; but you spoke just now of

Liniers. What can he do?"

"He is a brave man, and a soldier; with the few troops he had he beat

off the English when they tried to land at Ensenada; so they came

nearer, and landed at Quilmes, and our army fled from them like sheep.

If Liniers will head us we will soon get enough paisanos together to

drive these English into the sea."

"Sobremonte will not permit him to do anything of the kind. What can

gauchos do with their lassoes and boleadores against troops?"

"Liniers is not a Spaniard, he is a Frenchman, and would care very

little for Sobremonte if he had men behind him; and men he will have for

the asking, that I can promise him."

"All that is nonsense, Marcelino; you must not go away, you must stop

here with me, you will ruin yourself with these strange ideas. Do not

leave me; promise me that you will not go away."

* * * * *

So talked a mother and a son together in the city of Buenos Aires on the

evening of the 26th June 1806. An army of invaders had landed on the

coast, and was now encamped close to the city; the soldiers of Spain had

fled before them. On the morrow these invaders proposed to themselves to

march into the city, and to take possession of it in the name of the

King of Great Britain.

Marcelino Ponce de Leon was the eldest son of one of the Spanish

grandees, who ruled over the Viceroyalty of Buenos Aires; but his

mother was a Creole, the daughter of a Creole, and Buenos Aires was his

native city.

About the year 1780, Don Roderigo Ponce de Leon left Spain for Buenos

Aires in the employ of the Spanish government. Don Roderigo was a scion

of the noble house of Ponce de Leon, whose great ancestor, his namesake,

the Marquis of Cadiz, is famed in song and story as the chief of those

mighty warriors whose valour crushed for ever the power of the Moors in

Spain. He it was who captured the fortress of Alhama, the first victory

in that long series of victories which left Ferdinand and Isabella joint

sovereigns of the whole of Spain. A victory chronicled in the _Romance

mui dolorosa del sitio y toma de Alhama_, in which the distress and

consternation of the Moors is vividly set forth:

"Por las calles y ventanas,

Mucho luto parecia,

Llora el Rey como fembra,

Que es mucho lo que perdia,

¡Ay de mi! ¡Alhama!"[1]

Don Roderigo was proud of his ancestry, but in the diplomatic service of

Spain he had in his youth travelled in France and in England. He had

mingled with the young nobles of the Court of Versailles, whose talk was

of the rights of man, witting not that they themselves stood in the way

of these rights, and would presently be overwhelmed in that mighty flood

of revolution which reduced their theorising to practice; who talked of

liberty as of a glorious dream, and later on stood aghast when their

dream became a reality. In London he had met men of sterner mould, who

could even smile at the defeat of the arms of their own country, and

think it no misfortune, since this defeat had given birth to a new

nation, whose constitution based itself upon the will of the people; to

a nation of freemen, who made laws for themselves, who appointed

themselves their rulers, and obeyed them willingly. As he walked in the

streets of that great city, he found himself among a people who, in

comparison with his own people, were free; among a people who thought

for themselves, and who spoke their thoughts openly, none daring to stay

their utterance. When he returned to Spain, he looked around him upon

the stalwart men and graceful women, whose nationality was the same as

his own, and he said within himself, Are not these equal to those

others? cannot they think and act for themselves? Yet he saw that they

were as children, following blindly the behests of such as had authority

over them; then, in spite of the traditions of his class, his heart was

sore within him at the degradation of his own country. Out of the

fulness of his heart he spoke, and there were many who listened to him,

till the great lords, the elders of his family, looking seriously into

the matter, saw therein much danger to their own order, and finding that

opposition but strengthened those pestilent errors which he had learned

in his travels in other countries, they washed their hands of him by

procuring him an honourable post in the colonies.

He came to Buenos Aires, and was received with the distinction his own

talents and great connections warranted him to expect, but at first no

important trust was given into his hands, and he soon felt that his

mission to South America was nothing more than an honourable but

indefinite exile.

Before he had been two years in Buenos Aires he married Doña Constancia

Lopez y Viana, a daughter of Don Gregorio Lopez. This gentleman was a

wealthy Creole who had immense estates in various parts of the province

of Buenos Aires, where he reared vast herds of cattle, whose hides and

tallow yielded him a very sufficient revenue. The manners and customs of

the Argentines in those days were very simple, the harsh restrictions on

commerce and on intercourse with the rest of the world preserved them

from luxury. When living on one of his estancias Don Gregorio was little

better housed and fed than his peons, but he ruled over them with an

iron hand; short of life and death his power was absolute over most of

them, for most of them were slaves. His residence in the city was a

large rambling mansion, one storey high, with flat roofs and large

patios. Here he spent most of his time, surrounded by a crowd of

dependants of all ages and conditions; to all he dispensed with a lavish

hand, exacting only in return implicit obedience.

Don Gregorio had been twice married, his first wife had left him one son

who bore his own name; the children of his second wife had added their

mother's surname to his, and were known as the Lopez y Viana family;

among them Don Roderigo Ponce de Leon had found his wife Constancia.

They had lived happily together up to the year 1806, in which this story

opens, having three sons, Marcelino, Juan Carlos, and Evaristo, and one

daughter, Dolores, who differed greatly in appearance from all the rest

of the family, having grey eyes shaded with long dark lashes, and hair

of a bright chestnut colour which flowed over her shoulders in broad

curls almost to her waist, surrounding her if she stood in the sunshine

with a halo of glistening gold. This peculiarity endeared her to her

father, who saw reproduced in her the traditional features of the

ancient house of Ponce, features which time and intermarriage had almost

obliterated in their family.

Though Don Roderigo was an outcast from his own family, though new

interests and new ties bound him to America, yet he remained at heart a

Spaniard, he felt himself one of the dominant race, and could not look

upon a native American as his equal. His haughty manners estranged him

somewhat from his wife's family, but recommended him to the then

Viceroy, who soon forgot the unfavourable report he had received of him,

and advanced him from one post to another, till at the close of the last

century many thought that the highest post open to any Spaniard in the

colonies would at the next change be his.

About that time there arrived in Buenos Aires a naval officer, who had

distinguished himself in the service of Spain, and sought promotion and

further opportunity for distinguishing himself by service in her

colonies. This man was not a Spaniard by birth. Don Santiago Liniers y

Bremond was a Frenchman of noble origin, driven by the misfortunes of

his country and his class into foreign service. Of an ardent and lively

temperament, with distinguished manners, and a high reputation for

military skill, he had the art of gaining popularity wherever he went,

and soon became a great favourite with the warm-hearted Creoles of

Buenos Aires, and not less so with their Spanish rulers, who entrusted

him with some of the highest commands at their disposal.

Between Liniers (he dropped his second surname in America, and is known

to history as General Liniers) and Don Roderigo an intimacy sprang up

which quickly ripened into friendship. Long and earnest were the

conversations they held together concerning the events then passing in

Europe. As they talked together the warm aspirations of his youth came

back to Don Roderigo, visions passed before his eyes of the glorious

future that might yet await him, should Spain follow the example of the

other peoples and rise and emancipate herself. That she might do so he

believed possible, but he saw that it could only be possible after a

fierce struggle, in which he could and would bear an honourable part.

Liniers listened willingly to the warm confidences of his friend, though

he was far from feeling sympathy with his ideas, but Don Roderigo found

others who did sympathise with him, more especially among the better

educated of the Creoles. Before many years passed his opinions were

known in Madrid, the favour which had been extended to him was

withdrawn, and he found himself a marked man in the country which he had

hoped before long to rule. His friend Liniers also fell into disfavour,

and from being Commandant-General of the Navies of Spain in La Plata he

was relegated to the command of a small garrison at Ensenada, which post

he still held at the time of the invasion of the English under

Beresford.

Marcelino, the eldest son of Don Roderigo, inherited from his mother

much of her pliant Creole nature, and his amiable disposition rendered

him a favourite with all those with whom he came in contact, but he had

also inherited much of the courageous enterprising spirit of his father,

and his character had been further modified by his friendship with a man

some few years older than himself, who had been sent to Europe to

complete his education and had returned early in the year 1805 deeply

imbued with the revolutionary ideas then prevalent in France, where he

had spent the greater part of his time during his absence from Buenos

Aires.

This friend, Don Carlos Evaña by name, was the only son of a wealthy

Creole, who, falling under the displeasure of the Spanish authorities,

had died in a dungeon, leaving his then infant son to the guardianship

of Don Gregorio Lopez.

Marcelino Ponce de Leon had received what was in those days considered a

very superior education, had spent three years at the University of

Cordova, was well read in the Latin classics, could speak French

fluently, and had some knowledge of English. He had returned from

Cordova without taking a degree, when his father had wished him to visit

Europe, but Marcelino listened to the earnest entreaties of his mother

and remained at home, safe, as she thought, from the contagion of those

new ideas which she had been taught to look upon with dread.

* * * * *

Mother and son sat far into the night talking earnestly together, the

mother daring not to leave him lest he should go she knew not whither,

and finding her influence totally unavailing to turn him from what she

considered his mad purpose. So they sat on a cold June night in an

uncarpeted, fireless room, in which the darkness was made visible by the

dull flame of a shaded lamp; so they sat, wrestling together for the

mastery; love and tenderness on the one side, love and reverence on the

other, equally fearful of giving pain, equally determined not to yield.

As the clock in a distant chamber chimed the midnight hour, the husband

and the father stood before them. A well-built man of medium stature,

with dark-brown hair and eyes, and with a clear, almost ruddy

complexion. His son, as he stood up on his entrance, seemed taller by

the head, but was more slimly built.

"Marcelino is going," said Doña Constancia; "he will not submit to these

English."

"He may stay and yet not submit," answered Don Roderigo. "Sobremonte has

fled; they cannot occupy the whole city, and cannot know who are in it,

save those who present themselves. I have orders to present myself and

shall do so," he said somewhat bitterly, "but there is no reason why you

should do so too, unless you wish it."

Marcelino Ponce de Leon remained that night in his father's house, and

the next day he heard the sound of the English trumpets and drums from

afar off, but he saw them not.

The next day, the 27th June 1806, 1500 British troops under the command

of General Beresford marched into the city, a city of 70,000

inhabitants, with their drums beating and their colours flying, and took

peaceable possession thereof; General Beresford establishing his

headquarters at the fort and hoisting the English flag upon the

flag-staff. Most of the local authorities hastened to give in their

submission, and Buenos Aires became an English city.

[1] "And from the windows, o'er the walls,

The sable web of mourning falls,

The King weeps as a woman o'er

His loss, for it is much and sore.

Woe is me! Alhama!"

Byron's translation--last verse.

CHAPTER II

HOW DON GREGORIO LOPEZ SOUGHT AN ANSWER TO THE QUESTION OF THE DAY

Buenos Aires became an English city, and throughout the city there was

shame and despair; men exchanged fierce looks one with another,

muttering low words in their anger, and women wept. And presently a

question went circling round from household to household, at a safe

distance from the British bayonets:

"What shall we do?"

To this question no man answered, but each one looked to some other who

should answer for him.

It was the evening of the third day since the triumphal entry of the

British, the badly lighted and unpaved streets were almost deserted, it

was bitterly cold, and a thin, drizzling rain was falling. Here and

there figures muffled in large cloaks wended their way about the

streets; several such figures passed along the street in which stood the

house of Don Gregorio Lopez, and entered by the great double door which

stood half open. Beyond the door was a covered passage called a

"zaguan"; from the centre of the roof of this zaguan there hung a lamp,

under which a tall negro paced up and down. Each man as he passed the

doorway and entered the zaguan paused and threw back the fold of his

cloak which covered his face, saying to the negro in a low voice:

"España."

"Pass forward to the second patio," answered the negro to each one.

Each man as he heard the answer replied by a slight inclination of the

head, and again muffling his face in his cloak, walked across the

brick-paved patio to a second zaguan, where another lamp was swinging.

Here he was met by a youth to whom he said one word:

"Rey."

"Good-night and pass forward," answered the youth.

One after another they passed forward through this zaguan to a second

patio, where each man paused till he was accosted by another youth, who

led him to a door on the left hand, which he opened, ushering him into a

large, well-lighted room, with a long massive table running down the

centre, and chairs ranged all along the walls.

In half-an-hour a numerous company were assembled in this room, they had

removed their hats, but most of them kept on their cloaks. This room was

the dining-room of Don Gregorio Lopez, these men there assembled were

citizens of Buenos Aires, invited by him to confer together upon what

answer should be given to the question which occupied all minds:

"What shall we do?"

Don Gregorio had taken such precautions as he thought necessary to keep

the meeting a secret from General Beresford, and also from such citizens

as were not specially invited. Those whom he had invited were not only

citizens of Buenos Aires but were exclusively men of American birth.

They walked up and down the room in couples, or stood in groups

conversing together in low tones.

To each man as he entered the room Don Gregorio had extended his hand in

cordial welcome; as the room filled he passed from group to group saying

a few complimentary words, or asking an adroit question on any subject

upon which they might happen to be speaking, but carefully avoiding the

question which had called them together. Don Gregorio was a stout-built

man of medium stature, with short hair which had once been black, but

was now plentifully sprinkled with grey, he had small dark eyes, heavy

eyebrows, and bushy grey whiskers, his lip and chin being clean shaven.

He wore a coat of brown cloth with brass buttons, the tails of which

sloped away from his hips, till they came almost to a point behind his

knees, his waistcoat came down over his hips, and was open in front,

showing a large frill of the finest cambric, on each side of which hung

the ends of the white lace cravat which enveloped his throat. Both

waistcoat and small-clothes were of black cloth, and he wore black silk

stockings with massive gold buckles in his shoes. He had a strong, deep

voice, and looked about him with the air of one having authority, but

his manners were exceedingly affable. On the present occasion his face

wore an air of great satisfaction; each question addressed to him he

answered in carefully subdued tones, accompanying his words with

frequent inclinations of the head and with approving smiles.

Again the door opened, a youth stepping in announced:

"Don Manuel Belgrano," and a man of middle height, with a high forehead

and a thoughtful expression on his face, which gave him the appearance

of being older than he really was, entered the room.

Don Gregorio, who was at that moment standing in the centre of a group

of his guests conversing with them, swung round on his heel as he heard

the name, leaving the sentence which was on his lips incomplete, and

walked towards the door with both hands stretched out to welcome the

new-comer. Conversation instantly ceased; and as the name Belgrano

passed from mouth to mouth, the hands hidden away under the cloaks

issued forth and clapped themselves together, while a low murmur of

"Viva Belgrano!" too low to be a cheer, went round the room.

Manuel Belgrano was at this time a man of mature age. Born in Buenos

Aires in the year 1770, he had in his sixteenth year gone to Spain,

where he passed several years studying at the University of Salamanca,

and afterwards at Valladolid, but his studies embraced a wider range of

subjects than were taught at these seats of learning. Of a generous and

thoughtful temperament, he had eagerly imbibed the ideas spread

throughout Europe by the French Revolution, had learned to look upon all

men as equal, and to hate all manner of tyranny and oppression. When he

left Spain, in the year 1794, he thought only of how he might make his

studies of service to his own countrymen. He took with him his

appointment as secretary to the "Consulado" of Buenos Aires, a body

entrusted with the official supervision of the mercantile relations of

the colony with the mother-country, and in this post had distinguished

himself by his efforts to ameliorate the effect of the ruinous

restrictions which were at that time imposed upon all commercial

intercourse. Not content with his official duties, he had further

exerted himself to establish a Nautical School, and a School of Design,

which under his able supervision flourished rapidly, and promised great

benefits to the colony. But his efforts found little support among his

own countrymen, encountered great opposition from the jealousy of the

Spanish authorities, and both schools were eventually closed by a

positive order from the Court of Aranjuez, in which the Consulado was

severely censured for having permitted them to be established.

On the occupation of the city by the British army, Belgrano had been

summoned by General Beresford to deliver up the archives of his

department, but had not only refused to do so but had also refused to

give in his own formal submission to the new authorities, saying that he

was responsible to the Viceroy, could only receive orders from him, and

would rejoin him so soon as he could discover where he had gone.

"You come late, my friend," said Don Gregorio, "but I knew you would not

fail us, so I waited for you."

"I had much to do, I was busy with my preparations, for I have no time

to lose," answered Belgrano, shaking hands with several friends of his

who pressed round him.

"What are you about to do?"

"To fly. You do not know what happened me to-day, I will tell you. When

General Beresford first sent for me I obeyed him, and when I refused to

give up to him the official seal and the archives of the Consulado,

saying that I could only obey an order from the Viceroy, he accepted my

excuse and dismissed me with much politeness and consideration. I

believe he thought that Sobremonte would present himself in a day or

two. But Sobremonte has gone off no one knows where, and many of us, as

you know, have given in our papers to the English general. This

afternoon he sent to me an order to present myself at once. To present

myself is to submit. I will not submit, therefore I must fly, and that

at once. You, my friends, will judge me. Do I not act rightly?"

"Perfectly! perfectly!" echoed from all sides; and again a low murmur of

"Viva Belgrano" ran round the room.

"But before you go you will spare us an hour or two," said Don Gregorio.

"You have more experience than many of us who are older than you, and

your counsel may be of great service to us."

"Assuredly," replied Belgrano. "I do not see what you can do for the

present but just quietly submit; you have----"

"Submit! we submit!" exclaimed Marcelino Ponce de Leon, who was one of

those present. "For each one man that they have we can put ten, why then

should we submit?"

"They are trained soldiers, and are well armed. Do you know what my men

said to me when we got the order to retreat? They said, 'It is well, for

this sort of work is not for us.'"

"They said well," said another who stood by, Don Juan Martin Puyrredon

by name. "They know what they are worth, your city militia, they do not

like the cold steel, and it appears that these English do not waste time

shooting at a distance, they like the bayonet better," he added with a

scornful laugh.

"Give us time to arm a few hundred paisanos, and the militia may remain

in their houses," said Marcelino. "We will drive the English into the

river without their help."

"The paisanos are brave men, but they cannot fight against trained

troops," answered Belgrano quietly.

"If our men were trained they would stand their ground as well as any

men," said another, named Don Isidro Lorea, who was a captain in the

city militia.

"They had arms and had nothing to do but to stand still and use them the

other day," said Puyrredon, "but they did not even do that. You set to

work firing before the English came within range, and then when they

came nearer you ran. All the effective resistance that the English met

was at the Puente Galvés, where Don Marcelino stopped them for an hour

or two by burning the bridge."

"When the English charged them with the bayonet your partidarios ran

quick enough," replied Lorea in an angry tone. "And Don Marcelino it

appears may thank his horse that he got away at all."

"Don Marcelino bore himself like a brave man," said Don Gregorio, laying

his hand upon the shoulder of his grandson, and speaking in a loud

voice, which had the effect of putting a stop at once to the dispute.

"It matters not now what has been done. What we shall do is what you

have done me the honour to come here to discuss quietly among ourselves.

Do me the favour, my friends, to arrange yourselves round the room; and,

Don Manuel, come with me to the head of the table."

So saying, Don Gregorio walked to one end of the table, where he seated

himself in an arm-chair, with Don Manuel Belgrano at his right hand and

Marcelino Ponce de Leon at his left; the latter having some sheets of

paper and pens and ink before him, while the rest seated themselves on

chairs round the room, with the exception of one group who remained

standing round Don Juan Martin Puyrredon at the far end.

When all were settled in their places, Don Gregorio rose from his seat,

and with many signs of hesitation, for he had never before attempted to

make a speech, began:

"Señores, my friends, I have invited you to meet in my house with one

sole object; our city is in the power of foreigners, our Viceroy has

fled, such troops as we had are dispersed. What shall we do? Shall we

submit to these foreigners, to these heretics who are the enemies of

Spain, and of our Holy Church?"

"No, no!" arose in answer from all sides.

"You have all of you read the proclamation of this Beresford, in which

he offers us freedom in the exercise of our religion, freedom of

commerce, and reduction of taxation, styling himself governor of this

city of ours by the authority of his Majesty the King of Great Britain.

The advantages he offers us are great; shall we not, then, accept this

Beresford as our governor?"

"No, no!" again rose in answer.

"Then if we will neither be bribed into treachery to our legitimate

king, nor tamely submit, we must fight and drive these English back to

their ships. But it was easier to keep them out than to drive them out

now they are in."

"It will be difficult, but we will do it," said Puyrredon.

"It will be done, I doubt not," continued Don Gregorio. "Let us then

consider carefully the means we should adopt. As yet the first requisite

is wanting to us--not one of us here present is a soldier who has seen

service. There is one whom I hoped to have seen here, who has served in

Europe, and only the other day showed us that he has not forgotten what

he learnt there. With a handful of men he beat off all the English army,

with their fleet to back them, at Ensenada, and now he has retired

without the loss of one man. You know who I mean--Don Santiago Liniers.

My son set off yesterday to confer with him, and to bring him here to us

to-night; as yet he does not appear, but even in his absence we may

agree to appoint him our chief, and when he comes he will tell us what

to do."

At that moment there came a knock at the door, which had been locked

when Don Gregorio took his seat at the head of the table; one of those

near at hand opened it, and gave entrance to the youth who had acted as

usher. He walked up to Don Gregorio, and spoke to him in a low voice.

"Tell him to give his name," said Don Gregorio.

"He refuses, but says he must see you."

"Go you, Marcelino, and see if you know him. He may be some messenger

from Liniers."

Marcelino went out, but quickly returned, bringing with him a tall man

of middle age, with strikingly handsome features. The stranger entered

first, and throwing aside his cloak and hat disclosed the undress

uniform of a field-officer.

"Don Gregorio, I kiss your feet," said he, bowing to that gentleman.

"Señores todos, felices noches," he added, as he cast a quick, searching

glance round the room.

"No fear; all are friends," said Marcelino, as he closed the door.

"Liniers! Liniers!" exclaimed many of those present, as they rose from

their seats to bid him welcome, and to congratulate him upon his recent

feat of arms, while Don Gregorio left his place at the table and walked

towards him with outstretched hand.

"My friend, I am glad to see you," said Don Gregorio. "A number of my

friends have come here together this evening to consult upon what

measures we shall adopt now that the authorities have either submitted

to the English or have fled. You are a soldier; this is not the first

time you have seen service; we should be glad to hear your opinion."

"And what do these gentlemen say?" answered Liniers, walking up to the

table, and leaning his hand upon it, while an expression of anxious

thought came over his handsome features.

"There are some who say that we ought to organise the militia of the

city and the partidarios into an army at some safe distance from the

city, and then attack the English, and crush them before any

reinforcement can reach them. There are not 2000 of them, but to form an

army we require a chief."

"And something more too than a chief," replied Liniers, with a

complacent smile, "something more than a chief; time is wanting. Do you

think one could make soldiers of your militia in a week?"

"What we want in discipline we will make up by numbers," said Don Isidro

Lorea. "The other day we had no leader, if we had had one the affair

would have been very different."

"We were mustered at the fort, and marched off anyhow," said Belgrano;

"what more could we expect than what happened? I agree with you, Don

Santiago, time is wanting before we can hope to do anything with the

militia."

"Then there are others," continued Don Gregorio, "who say that we should

do nothing at all at present, but wait until our Viceroy can collect

troops sufficient. There is a strong force in Monte Video, and small

detachments are scattered about the provinces."

"And they are the most sensible men," said Liniers.

"I am going to rejoin the Viceroy if I can find him," said Belgrano.

"Come with me, Don Santiago, he will give you authority to collect

troops."

"Better go to Monte Video," said Marcelino Ponce de Leon; "Huidobro can

give you both men and arms. You may be back by the end of the month, and

we will have an army ready for you by then."

During all this time there was one man there who had hardly spoken to

any. He sat on a chair beyond the end of the table, with his cloak

folded round him, his arms crossed over his chest, listening quietly to

all that was said, neither assenting to nor dissenting from anything

that was proposed, his quick, dark eyes alone showing the interest he

took in the discussion. His high, square forehead betokened him a man of

powerful intellect, while his pale, olive complexion, and the delicacy

of his long, thin hands bespoke him a student. As he sat he seemed to be

only of medium stature, and slightly built; now he rose and stood beside

the table, stretching himself to his full height, half-a-head taller

than any other man there present, and spoke as follows:--

"Señores, I have listened quietly to all that has been said. Were you

Spaniards I would applaud your patriotism, I would praise your brave

determination to risk your lives in an unequal conflict against men

trained to arms. Were I a Spaniard I would join you, and would think my

life well lost could I spend it in thrusting out from my country an

audacious invader. But this soil on which I stand is not Spain, neither

am I a Spaniard, nor are you, my countrymen, Spaniards. You, I, all of

us are Americans, the soil upon which we stand is American soil, the air

which we breathe is American air. True we are of Spanish blood, our

ancestors were Spaniards, they crossed the ocean and spent their lives

in conquering a new world. We are the sons of those gallant men who

built up the seats of new nations on a new continent; day by day we

spread ourselves further over these wide plains, drawing riches from

their luxuriant pastures; we explore the mighty rivers which bring down

to us the wealth of other provinces; and for whom do we so labour and

spend our lives? For Spain! What has Spain ever done for us that we

should spend our lives in her service? Spain sends us rulers and

tax-gatherers, who live here in plenty and go back to Spain laden with

riches for which we have toiled. Spain forces upon us her merchandise

when we could buy better and cheaper elsewhere, and so robs us of the

fruit of our labours. Spain sends us priests to instruct our youth in

knowledge which is of no avail, to prevent the spread of anything like

real education, and to keep our consciences in bondage to a slavish

superstition. This is what Spain has done for us up to now, and will do

for us to the end.

"There are men among you who have travelled in other lands as I have

done, who have seen the great uprising of the people which now shakes

the earth. Returning to their own land, they have sought to do something

to enlighten the ignorance of their own countrymen, they have sought to

raise them from the barbarism in which they live. How have their efforts

prospered? They have been reviled as infidels, they have been

stigmatised as rebels, and have been fortunate when they have escaped

fines and imprisonment as dangerous to the State. Why then should we

risk our lives for Spain? This land which our fathers conquered and we

possess is our land, it is nothing but a worn-out tradition which holds

us in bondage to Spain. Give ear to me, my countrymen, and know that

this disaster which has fallen upon our city is no disaster, but is the

first step towards our deliverance. There are many among you would think

it sacrilege to stretch out your hand and tear down the flag under which

you were born, under which you have lived, but if a foreigner tear it

down for you and cast it forth from our country he in no wise injures

you, he does but free us from a tyranny under which we have groaned for

centuries.

"We cannot look upon these English as friends, for they come to take our

country into their possession, but neither need we fear them as enemies.

They could not hold their own colonies in subjection when they rose

against them, although half the colonists were their friends, as many of

you to-day are the friends of Spain. How then shall they bring us into

subjection among whom they have not one friend to aid them? This

enterprise of these English is rash folly which will recoil upon their

own heads, but they may do us good service in driving out from among us

these Spanish rulers who have too long tyrannised over us.

"Why should we fear these English? Far distant from their own country,

they can but obtain a temporary footing on our soil. Let these dogs of

war, the paid agents of tyranny and misrule, rend each other in their

struggle for a dominion which is not theirs. Let the Spaniards and the

English fight out their quarrel by themselves, while we steadfastly

prepare to assert against either or both our own dominion on our own

soil, the inalienable right of all free-born men to make their own laws

and govern themselves. I have spoken!"

As the speaker ceased he struck the table with his hand, and looked

round him proudly, as though he would defy anyone to dissent from any

word he had spoken, and a deep silence fell upon all.

To most there present these words and ideas were entirely new. They had

listened in wonder, now they looked one at another in doubt and dismay;

what had been said was nothing less than treason, and they knew not but

that in listening, merely, they were themselves traitors.

But there were others there to whom these ideas were far from new, they

were ideas which they themselves had cherished, but had hidden in their

hearts, saying to themselves that the time had not yet come. Don Manuel

Belgrano sat with his elbows on the table, covering his face with his

hands. Marcelino Ponce de Leon made strokes on the paper which lay

before him with a pen which had no ink in it, ever and anon glancing up

at the speaker, and as quickly again dropping his eyes to the paper,

while his thoughts wandered to a time not long past when Don Carlos

Evaña had told him how he had met in London an exile from Venezuela, who

had spoken to him just such words as these.

And there was one there present upon whom these words had a different

effect to what they had on any other. This was not the first time that

Don Santiago Liniers had heard such words as these; they carried him

back in memory into the far-off past, when he had learned to look upon

men holding such opinions as impious in the sight of God, outcasts among

men, and had hated them with a bitter hatred, envenomed since then by

the losses he had suffered at their hands. In silence he listened,

leaning upon the back of a chair; there was to him a fascination in the

sound of that deep sonorous voice which spoke treason in accents of firm

conviction. His heart sank within him, and as that voice ceased, a cold

shiver, for which he could not account, ran through his frame. He looked

up at the speaker, and met the glance of a pair of dark eyes fixed

sternly upon him; again the cold shiver ran through him, he turned away

his gaze and looked anxiously around him, eager to note the effect of

these words on others.

Then rose Don Gregorio Lopez from his seat, and leaning with both hands

upon the table before him, said in a low voice, and speaking with great

deliberation:

"My friends, each man has a right to entertain such ideas as he please,

but we are not met together this evening to discuss ideas. I am sorry to

see that there is much division of opinion amongst us; it is thus

impossible that we unite cordially together in any one plan of action.

The object for which I invited you to meet me this evening has thus

failed. For my part I say, 'Out with these English!' Those who think as

I do will each act as he thinks best, in his own way, to bring about

this result."

"Afuera Los Ingleses! Fueran!!" was the answer from all sides. After

which the meeting resolved itself into groups, in which men talked

eagerly together for some minutes, discussing together their several

plans, and announcing their intentions. Then the door being thrown open

they gradually dispersed to their several homes.

Don Carlos Evaña was one of the last to leave. As he shook hands with

Don Gregorio, the latter said to him:

"Ah, Carlos! you boys learn many ideas in your travels, but, believe me,

it is at times dangerous to expose them so publicly."

"And believe me," answered Don Carlos, "that the day is not far off when

these ideas of mine will be the law of a new nation in America."

As he went out he was joined by Marcelino.

"Will you take no part with any of us?" asked Marcelino.

"To raise again that emblem of tyranny which has been torn down? Not I.

Have you so soon forgotten the lessons we have learned together?"

"I have not forgotten them, Carlos; but how shall I think of them when a

foreigner rules in my native country?"

"All tyrants are foreigners, Marcelino. When once we are fairly rid of

our tyrants then it will be time enough to turn out these English. If it

were to gain our country for ourselves none would be more forward than

Carlos Evaña."

"Let us turn out the English, and then we will work together."

"You do not know it, but these English are our best friends, Marcelino."

"Such friends are better at a distance," replied Marcelino.

CHAPTER III

CONCERNING THE DANGER OF FRIENDSHIP WITH AN ENEMY

The fort, where General Beresford had taken up his quarters, was an

edifice of imposing appearance but of no great strength, situate in the

centre of the river-face of the city. Its eastern front, which

overlooked the river, was a semicircular pile of brickwork, rising from

the water's edge some sixty feet above the average level of the river,

and was pierced with embrasures from which the black mouths of cannon

protruded. It was built in the massive style adopted by the Spaniards,

but its chief strength consisted in the shallowness of the river, which

prevented the near approach of any hostile squadron. In the rear of this

semicircular casemate stood some brick buildings in which the Viceroy

and his principal officers had apartments. Beyond these buildings was a

flat, open space, which served as a parade ground, in the centre of

which rose the flag-staff, on which the standard of Great Britain had

now replaced the gaudy flag of Spain. The whole of these buildings and

the parade ground were surrounded by a low brick wall, which was again

surrounded by a wide, dry ditch, crossed in the centre of the western

front of the fort by a drawbridge which through a wide gateway gave

entrance to the stronghold from the Plaza de Los Perdices.

This Plaza was a wide, open space, about 150 yards across, where the

country people daily brought their game, fruit and vegetables for sale

to the citizens; it was thus the market place of the city. This wide,

open space still exists, and is now known as the Plaza Veinte y Cinco

de Mayo, but it is no longer used as a market. To the west of the Plaza

de Los Perdices, facing the fort, stood two rows of shops, the flat

roofs of which were prolonged over the causeways both in front and

rear, and resting upon square brick pillars at the edge of the

causeways, formed arcades, cut off from the buildings at the north and

south the Plaza by roadways, which were the continuations of the two

central streets of the city.

Between the two arcades there was an open space crossed by a towering

arch of brickwork, having the appearance of a gigantic gateway, which

gave passage from the Plaza de Los Perdices to the Plaza Mayor, which

lay beyond. These two arcades with the archway were known as the

"Recoba Vieja."

The Plaza Mayor was equal in size to the other, and was surrounded by

buildings; half the western face being occupied by the "Cabildo" or

Government House, a lofty building two storeys high, with balconies

projecting in front of the windows of the upper storey, which storey

also projected over the causeway in front of the Cabildo, resting upon

massive brick pillars, and so forming another arcade, which occupied one

half of this side the Plaza. Half the northern side the Plaza was

occupied by the cathedral; the rest of the buildings around were

ordinary houses mostly one storey high, those on the south side being

also fronted by an arcade which covered the causeway, and gave the name

of the "Recoba Nueva" to that side the Plaza.

The centre of the Plaza was unoccupied and unpaved, but carriages and

horsemen being restricted to the sides, it was maintained in tolerably

level condition, affording a pleasant promenade for the citizens in

fine weather. All the buildings in both Plazas were of brick, plastered

and whitewashed, the cathedral being surmounted by a mighty dome. The

houses had large doorways and windows, but the latter were protected by

iron railings.

General Beresford took up his quarters in the fort, where he occupied

the apartments of the fugitive Viceroy; British soldiers occupied the

casemates and the barracks of the troops, their scarlet uniforms were

continually to be seen crossing the parade ground, and were by day

plentifully sprinkled about the adjacent Plazas. Most of his troops

Beresford cantoned in the houses about the Plaza Mayor; one strong

detachment occupied the Cabildo. His enterprise so far had been attended

with great success, but he did not disguise from himself that his

situation was extremely critical, his force was too small to do more

than overawe the city. All that he could do was to strengthen his

position as much as possible and wait for reinforcements.

In furtherance of this plan he constructed temporary platforms and

planted thirty guns on the parade ground at the fort, whose fire swept

the Plaza de Los Perdices and commanded all its approaches; he drew

breastworks across the entrances to the Plaza Mayor, and established a

line of outposts, one strong detachment being stationed at the Retiro to

the extreme north of the city, where on the high ground fronting the

river stood a large edifice which had been built about a century

previously by some English slave merchants, and used by them as a

storehouse for their human merchandise. This storehouse had been more

recently used as a barrack by the Spanish garrison of Buenos Aires. In

front of it there was a large space of open ground some squares in

extent; to the north of this open space stood a bull-ring, a large

circular edifice very strongly built round an open arena. From this

bull-ring the open space in front of the barracks was sometimes named

the Plaza Toros, but its more usual name was the Plaza del Retiro.

Further, General Beresford sought in every way to conciliate the

good-will of the inhabitants, preserving the strictest discipline among

his soldiery, and paying liberally for all supplies. And the inhabitants

of Buenos Aires apparently bore him no ill-will, treating him rather as

a guest than as a conqueror, inviting him and his officers to tertulias

at their houses, and accepting such hospitality as he could offer them

in exchange. Conspicuous among the householders for their friendly

treatment of the English were Don Gregorio Lopez and his son-in-law Don

Roderigo Ponce de Leon.

The Marquis of Sobremonte, Viceroy of Buenos Aires, in his hurried

flight from the city, had an excuse in his anxiety to save the public

treasure, which amounted to nearly a million and a half sterling in

bullion and specie. At the Villa Lujan, a country town some fourteen

leagues west of Buenos Aires, he was overtaken by a detachment sent by

Beresford in pursuit, and fled without any attempt at resistance,

abandoning the greater part of the treasure. The British detachment met

with no opposition from the country people either in its march upon

Lujan or on its return to the capital, and Beresford, after reserving

sufficient specie for the pay and support of his troops for several

months, embarked one million sterling on board the frigate _Narcissus_,

which sailed at once for England.

The ground plan of the city of Buenos Aires resembles a chessboard, all

the streets running either perpendicular to the course of the

river--that is, due east and west, or parallel with it--that is, due

north and south, crossing each other at right angles at distances of 150

varas. The city is thus cut up into square blocks of houses, each block

being styled a manzana. Between the two streets which run out westwards

from the Plaza Mayor, the two central streets of the city, and ten

squares distant from this Plaza, one entire block was left vacant of

buildings, and was in those days a mere open space of waste ground.

At the northern corner of the eastern side of this vacant space stood

the house of Don Isidro Lorea. Don Isidro was a captain in the city

militia. On the morning of the 26th June, when the English were

advancing upon the city, he had mustered his men, had marched them to

the fort, and had placed himself and them at the orders of the Marquis

of Sobremonte. Later on he had marched them into the suburbs, and upon

the near approach of the invaders had fled with them in confusion and

dismay back to his own home. Don Isidro's ideas on military matters

were vague in the extreme; previous to that day he had never seen a gun

fired in anger; but he was no coward, and when the first effects of his

terror had passed over he bitterly upbraided himself for his

pusillanimity. Tears had stood in the eyes of his wife, Doña Dalmacia,

as she had watched him march away, and she had spent the time during

his absence on her knees in a neighbouring church, praying earnestly

for his safety; but when he returned to her safe, sound, and

vanquished, then those same eyes looked upon him in utter scorn and

contempt, and his heart quailed within him even more than it had

quailed at the sight of the British bayonets.

During those days of shame and despair which followed, Don Isidro

nourished within his breast wild schemes of revenge and retaliation, and

he eagerly associated himself with those who planned together the

destruction of the small British force which held their city in thrall.

Yet weeks passed and nothing was attempted. As Don Gregorio Lopez had

told them, their first necessity was a leader, and he to whom they all

looked as a leader had gone from them. Liniers had gone to Monte Video

to seek the aid of Huidobro, who commanded in that city, telling them to

make what preparations they could in the meantime, and that he would

look to them for help on his return.

It was now the last week in July, a cold, clear, starlight night. In

defiance of the orders of General Beresford, and in despite of British

patrols, there was much going to and fro in the streets of the city that

night; a rumour had gone forth that Huidobro, a man of very different

stamp to Sobremonte, had received Liniers with open arms and had at once

placed all his disposable military force under his command, and that

Liniers was coming back with what speed he could. This news created a

great ferment throughout the city, each man wishing to know the

certainty of what he had only vaguely heard, and seeking information

from others who were no better informed than himself.

The house of Don Isidro Lorea was divided into two distinct parts, the

part occupying the corner of the block being used as the almacen (a

general store), of which the main entrance looked upon the open ground,

while several windows opened upon the adjacent street. The other half

was the dwelling-house, and had a separate entrance, a massive doorway

opening on the waste ground, which gave entrance through a zaguan to a

large, brick-paved patio, surrounded by the principal rooms of the

household. Three windows to the left of the doorway gave light to the

principal room of all, the sala, at one end of which there was a smaller

room known as the ante-sala, which was frequently used by Don Isidro as

his private office. All the exterior windows of both house and almacen

were guarded by massive iron "rejas," bars set in the brickwork, which

prevented all clandestine entrance into the house.

On this night the door of the dwelling-house was fast closed, but anyone

rapping with his knuckles at the door of the almacen would have found it

open to him forthwith. Many did so knock on that night, and passing in,

went out again by a side door into the patio of the dwelling-house, and

thence to the sala, or to the ante-sala, as seemed to them good. The

folding doors between the two rooms were thrown wide open, so that the

two rooms were as one, and there was much passing to and fro between

them. The sala was a large, richly furnished apartment, with

spindle-shanked chairs and tables, and much gaudy frippery in the way of

ornament. Here Doña Dalmacia sat in state, with a heavy velvet mantle

thrown over her shoulders. She was a stout, handsome woman, something

over thirty years of age, but was of that class of woman who preserves

her good looks till long past maturity, her complexion being of that

clear olive which looks perfectly white by candlelight, while the beauty

of her chiselled features and dark flashing eyes age might impair, but

would not destroy. Here she sat in state, talking eagerly and proudly

with the men who thronged around her--chiefly young men, who had but one

thought in their hearts, but one subject upon which they could

converse--the expulsion of the English.

"Ah, Don Marcelino," she said in clear ringing tones, as Marcelino Ponce

de Leon entered the room, "I have not seen you for weeks, but I know you

have not been idle; tell me what have you done. The day is very near

now."

"I kiss your feet, Misia Dalmacia," answered Marcelino, as he bowed low

before her. "We have not lost our time; we have collected and armed

nearly 1000 men, and they are near at hand when they are wanted. I have

come in to hear what is doing, and to you I come first."

"You have done well, for I can tell you something which will rejoice

you. Isidro has a note from Liniers dated a week back, he was then

leaving Monte Video with 1000 troops, all fully equipped, and has

probably by this reached Colonia. Vessels will meet him there to bring

him to Las Conchas, so he may be here any day now."

"Viva, Liniers!" said Marcelino; "he will find us ready, and then----"

His flashing eyes and clenched hands supplied the hiatus in his words.

"But, Don Marcelino, be cautious yet," said Doña Dalmacia. "We have done

what we can to amuse these English, but this Beresford is a crafty fox,

and has his suspicions."

"And there are traitors among us who sell news to him for gold," said a

short, stout man, who stood near by, Don Felipe Navarro by name, a

brother of Doña Dalmacia.

"Yes, you must not let anyone know where your men are," added Doña

Dalmacia; "only be ready. If Beresford hears of your preparations he

will attack you before Liniers can land."

"Let him," said Marcelino disdainfully. "We will be ready for him if he

ventures outside the city. We have formed an encampment at the Quinta de

Perdriel, if he comes there we will know how to send him back again."

"That is very near," said Doña Dalmacia.

"The less distance we have to march when the day comes the better,"

answered Marcelino. "But you city people, what have you done?" added he,

turning to Don Felipe Navarro.

"Every house will send out a soldier, and every azotea will be a battery

when the fire commences," replied Don Felipe.

"We have two cannon hid in the almacen, and plenty of ammunition," said

Doña Dalmacia. "Isidro has all his arrangements complete. This house is

the headquarters for all the neighbourhood, and when he fires off two

rockets, at any hour of the day or night, 200 men will meet here."

A mulatta girl entered the room bearing a silver salver with cups of

chocolate, which she handed round to the guests, and as they sipped the

chocolate Marcelino listened to many a strange tale about the English.

Don Isidro Lorea was very anxious to get rid of the English, but while

they were there his tradesman's instincts prompted him to cultivate

friendly relations with them. He had never before found such good

customers, and in the daytime Doña Dalmacia had frequently parties of

officers in her sala, with whom she conversed in very roundabout

fashion, finding much amusement in teaching them to suck mate, and

gleaning what information she could from them concerning the

dispositions and intentions of their chief. Many shrewd remarks she

made, and heartily she laughed as she told of the ludicrous mistakes

they made in attempting polite speeches to her.

"But withal," she said, "they are not bad sort of people; it gives

sorrow to me to think that they are enemies and--heretics."

"Little it matters to me that they are heretics," said Marcelino. "For

my part I believe there is more than one way to heaven."

"Your friend Don Carlos Evaña appears very intimate with them," said Don

Isidro, who had come from the outer room as they were speaking.

Don Isidro was of short stature and of light, active build, with very

clear complexion, aquiline nose, and jet-black hair and beard, the

latter falling in glossy waves down on to his chest. His manners were

very polished, and he had a great habit of gesticulating with his hands

as he talked.

"Ah! Don Isidro, buenas noches," said Marcelino, as he turned quickly

and gave him his hand; "I thought you were not at home. Yes, I should

think it probable that Don Carlos would be intimate with them, but what

of that?"

"It is not well that a man should be intimate with the enemies of his

country."

"Don Carlos has told us that in this affair he will take no part. He has

lived in England and speaks their language well. Doña Dalmacia tells me

that you are all doing what you can to amuse them; he is better able to

amuse them than any of you."

"We amuse the officers, but the general seems to care little for

amusement, he is doing all he can to strengthen his position, and seems

to know exactly where to meet us. I tell you, Don Marcelino, there are

traitors amongst us."

As Don Isidro said this he stretched out both his hands with the palms

upwards and stamped his foot on the ground, looking somewhat defiantly

at Don Marcelino. The latter flushed to the roots of his hair, but

smiling to conceal his annoyance, he answered in a light tone:

"It may be so, of that kind of people there are always too many. Find

them out and shut their mouths for them, that is all the advice I can

give you."

"If you and the others would have taken my advice, the Señor Evaña would

have been forced to leave the city, and there would be one traitor the

less walking amongst us to-day. What does he here, aiding us in nothing,

and holding conferences every day with the English general?"

"How!" said Marcelino, now really angry. "Have you yet that absurd idea

in your head? I tell you again, Don Isidro, that as I know my own honour

so I know that of my friend Carlos Evaña. To walk among you and to tell

of your preparations to the English is to be a spy, and if you apply

that word to my friend you will answer to me."

"I know you, Don Marcelino, and I know that there is not one man amongst

us of a sounder heart than you, but every man is liable to be deceived,

and your friendship blinds you to----"

"Isidro!" said Doña Dalmacia interrupting her husband. "Basta! in these

circumstances it is not meet that those who are working in the good

cause should quarrel."

"The intimate friend of General Beresford----"

"Isidro!" exclaimed Doña Dalmacia, again interrupting her husband.

"Thou also!" said Don Isidro; then shrugging his shoulders, and clapping

his hands on his hips, he made a low inclination with his head to Don

Marcelino and returned to the ante-sala.

Marcelino returned his salutation with rigid formality; then taking Don

Felipe Navarro by the arm he led him to a retired corner of the sala,

where he questioned him earnestly concerning the treachery thus plainly

imputed to his friend.

"One thing is certain," said Don Felipe, "Don Carlos is very intimate

with General Beresford, hardly a day passes but he spends some hours

with him, and they have often long private conversations together. We

have our spies, and know everything that the English do, but we do not

know what the general and Don Carlos find to talk about."

"I will ask him, and you may be sure he will tell me. But from what you

say Don Carlos makes no effort to hide his friendship for the English

general."

"Not the slightest."

"Then that is proof at once. Spies walk in darkness, and do not go to

visit their employers in broad daylight."

"But Don Carlos makes no secret of his opinions. He counsels us to make

friends of the English, and openly speaks of freeing us with their help

from Spain. That is treason against our lord the king."

"Against the king I say nothing; but Spain is our tyrant, and Spaniards

come here only to plunder us. Don Carlos shows his patriotism by his

enmity to Spain, and his patriotism is guarantee that he will never

prove false to us who are his countrymen."

"But further, he is an enemy to the holy mother Church, he never goes to

Mass, and scoffs at the priests; he is an infidel, a heretic--from a man

like that one may suspect anything."

"One should suspect no man without proofs," said Marcelino, turning

away. Then after taking leave with great cordiality of Doña Dalmacia and

of those about her he went on to the ante-sala.

"Don Isidro," said he, "I am going to see my friend Don Carlos Evaña. I

shall tell him plainly that he is suspected, and advise him to avoid the

society of these English for the present."

"You will not find him," said Don Isidro; "Beresford gives a dinner

to-day at the fort to the authorities, and to some of our principal men;

naturally his great friend will be there."

"I doubt it," said one of the visitors, who had been talking to Don

Isidro; "Don Carlos never goes anywhere where he is likely to meet

Spaniards."

"My father will be at the fort," said Marcelino.

"I know he is, and the two Don Gregorios also," said another; "I saw

them go together."

"Then I will go and see my mother. I have avoided our house whenever I

have been in the city, for I feared to compromise my father."

"You have done well," said Don Isidro. "More than once I have been asked

by English officers whether I knew anything of the eldest son of Don

Roderigo Ponce de Leon. If you go to-night you will see some of them

there, there are always English officers there in the evenings,

tertulias are things of every day. As your father will not fight them,

Doña Constancia does her part in amusing them."

"Hum!" said Marcelino. "I do not wish to meet any of them until we meet

sword in hand."

"No fear," said another; "the officers will be all on duty to-night."

"I will go at any rate," said Marcelino. "I may meet Carlos there, so

good-night to you all until _the_ day."

But Don Isidro would not let him depart thus coldly, he sprang to his

feet, and grasping him warmly by the hand said:

"Before many days we will meet again; meantime, warn your friend that he

keep within his own house and I guarantee you that no harm shall come to

him."

Marcelino found no difficulty in reaching his father's house, his name

was his passport. He walked boldly along the streets, met several

patrols of British soldiery, was questioned by them, but was immediately

permitted to pass on, as he gave his name, speaking in English, and told

them where he was going. As he drew near he heard sounds of music; in

the first patio he found several English soldiers muffled in their grey

great-coats, unarmed, walking up and down and joking in a rough,

good-humoured way with the mulatta girls and negresses, the servants of

his father's household.

"What are you women doing here?" asked Marcelino sternly.

"The night is fine, and the Señora permits us to watch the dancing,"

answered one.

"It is Don Marcelino," whispered another. "What joy for the Señora; I

will run and tell her."

"Stay where you are; I want to see who are here first." So saying

Marcelino went up to one of the sala doors, and opening it softly

looked in.

His mother was seated on a sofa at the far end, conversing gaily with an

English officer, whose massive epaulets showed him to be one who held a

high command. Other ladies sat about the sides of the room, most of whom

had one or two cavaliers in attendance, while the centre of the room was

filled with a crowd of dancers, of whom some half-dozen wore the scarlet

uniforms of Great Britain. The dance was one of those formal square

dances then much in vogue, and a flush of pleasure spread over

Marcelino's face as he looked upon the graceful forms flitting to and

fro. As he looked there came a pause in the dance, and the smile that

was on his face vanished in a frown. At the head of the room, standing

conspicuously side by side under the full glare of a chandelier of wax

lights, were two upon whom his gaze was riveted at once. One was a

British officer, in the scarlet jacket and tartan trews of a Highland

regiment. He had the yellow hair, clear skin, blue eyes, and reddish

whiskers of a Lowland Scot. The other was his own sister Dolores.

One looking casually upon these two might have taken them for brother

and sister, there was so much likeness between them, but a second look

would have shown an essential difference. Dolores Ponce de Leon was

remarkable for the small size of her hands and feet, and for the

delicate moulding of her features. The hands and feet of her partner,

though well formed, were large, and his features were somewhat

coarse--there was more of strength than of elegance in his appearance.

No one after a careful scrutiny could have taken them for brother and

sister, they were types of two branches of one great race, the

Anglo-Saxons of Great Britain, the Goths of Spain.

Again closing the door, Marcelino walked away to his own room in an

inner part of the house, saying to the same girl to whom he had before

spoken--

"When these go, tell my mother that I have returned."

When he reached his own room he clapped his hands, at which summons an

aged negro presented himself.

"Ah! Patroncito Marcelino," said the old negro as he saw him; "so much

as the Señora has hoped for you, and no one could tell where you were.

The Patron said you would be back in a few days, but now it is weeks. In

what can I be of service to your Señoria?"

"Have you seen Don Carlos Evaña to-day?"

"I saw the Señor Evaña not half-an-hour ago, when I went in with a tray

of dulces."

"Go and tell him that I am come, but do not let anyone else hear what

you say."

CHAPTER IV

SHOWING HOW A PATRIOT MAY ALSO BE A TRAITOR

The meeting between Marcelino Ponce de Leon and his friend Don Carlos

Evaña was very cordial; they embraced like brothers. Then Don Carlos

proceeded to question Marcelino concerning all that he had done during

the past three weeks. To every question Marcelino answered unreservedly,

Evaña listening to him with a tender light playing in his usually stern

eyes, and an approving smile upon his lips.

"How I envy you," he said, as the other paused, his face glowing with

enthusiasm.

"Why do you not join us? You are more clever and braver than I am. Ah!

how willingly I would serve under you. The chiefs we have are zealous

enough but very few of them have any brains. I have no experience, but I

can see the follies they do; one man like you were worth more than all

the rest put together."

"Of all those you have named to me, Don Juan Martin and yourself seem

the only ones at all fitted to command," replied Evaña. "Why are you

only a subordinate?"

"There is so much jealousy among them, all want to command, so I thought

I should set a good example by showing how to obey."

"Would there were more like you," said Evaña, with a sigh.

"There would be one more and one better than me, if you would only join

us," replied Marcelino.

"It may not be, I have vowed my life to one work, the Independence of my

native country. So long as Spain claims dominion over these provinces I

have only one aim in life, and there is only one enemy against whom I

will raise my hand."

"Yet, cannot you see, Carlos, that in this struggle with the English we

shall train our men and make soldiers of them, and so prepare them for a

fiercer struggle which must come later on?"

"What you have told me teaches me, even if I did not know it before,

that the worst misfortune which can happen to us is to triumph over

these English."

"How so? We shall at any rate gain experience and confidence in our own

strength."

"And ignorance of our own weakness; that is the danger I foresee," said

Evaña. "It will be painful to me to see my own countrymen defeated by a

foreigner, but believe me, Marcelino, it will be the greatest good that

can happen to our country, if it teach us that success can only be

gained by self-abnegation."

"Let the Spaniards then be our teachers, not these English, who are

strangers to us."

"I have talked much with their General Beresford during the last month,"

said Evaña.

"So I have been told," said Marcelino abruptly.

"You have been told? My wise countrymen with their childish plots, and

their schemes which anyone can see through, object to my intimacy with

the English general. Is it not so?"

"It is, Carlos. Is it well that you should be a friend to the enemy of

your country?"

"I seek to destroy that enemy by making him our friend."

"The English have taken our city by force, so long as they behave

themselves as conquerors we must look upon them as enemies."

"You will find them stern enemies to grapple with. Your preparations

only make my work more difficult. Beresford may listen to reason, but he

will meet force with force, and he is well informed of all your

movements."

"Yes, Carlos, there are traitors amongst us, and it was about that I

wished to talk with you. Do not go any more to visit General Beresford;

shut yourself in your own house, or leave the city, there are many

suspect you."

"Suspect me! And of what?"

"Of being a spy of the English."

"A spy! Me a spy of the English! Can you sit there quietly, Marcelino,

and say that to me?" exclaimed Evaña, springing to his feet.

"I know you, Carlos, therefore I can sit here quietly and tell you of

it, for I know that it is false. I did not sit quietly when they told

me."

"Who are they?"

"Nay, that I will not tell you, this is no time for quarrels among

ourselves. But I have told them that whoever applies that word to you

shall answer to me for the slander. Yet I ask you for your own sake to

hold no more conversations with the English general. You only expose

yourself to calumny, and your efforts will be all in vain. We cannot

look upon these English as friends so long as they hold our city."

"Then you will turn them out if you can, and will make enemies of them,

for they will not forgive a defeat. You will give yourselves back bound

hand and foot to the Spaniards."

"Carlos, my friend, believe me, it is too late to reason now. Liniers is

near at hand, and the whole city and province is ready for a rising. If

Beresford had come here offering us friendship and alliance against

Spain we might have joined him, or at least remained neutral, now it is

too late."

"Too late! no, it is not too late yet. I will see Beresford again for

the last time. He knows of all your preparations, for he has his spies,

though I am not one of them, but he makes light of what you can do, the

man he fears is Liniers, and it is against him that he is on the watch.

I will show him that your aid to either side will turn the scale, then

perhaps he may decide at once for an alliance with _us_."

The two friends talked little more together that night, the room door

was opened by an eager hand, Doña Constancia and Dolores came in, and in

the joy of meeting them again Marcelino thought no more of the projects

of his friend Evaña, but spoke only of the speedy expulsion of the

English from their city.

The next day, in the forenoon, Don Carlos Evaña left his house and

walked through the city to the Plaza Mayor, and thence to the fort,

where he inquired for General Beresford. On his way he had met and

passed many of his countrymen; sometimes they stood in groups at street

corners, or at the doors of almacenes talking together, sometimes they

were walking hurriedly along; on all their faces there was only one

expression, an expression of suppressed excitement and anticipation.

With some of them he exchanged salutations, some of them looked another

way, affecting not to see him, none of them accosted him; he felt

himself thrust out from among them, he knew that he had no share in the

one thought which occupied all hearts, and his heart grew bitter within

him.

"A spy!" he muttered to himself, as he folded his cloak more closely

round him; "when I do but seek to prevent them forging fresh fetters for

themselves. The fools!"

"There goes Evaña to visit the friend," said one as he turned into a

street leading to the Plaza Mayor; and they to whom this man spoke gave

him no salutation, and looked after him, as he passed on, scowlingly.

General Beresford was writing, but was not particularly occupied for the

moment, and rose smilingly to meet Evaña as he entered his apartment,

stretching out his hand to him in welcome. Evaña took his hand somewhat

coldly, and laying his hat on a table seated himself.

"You do well to keep your cloak on," said Beresford, walking up and

down, and stamping his feet upon the tiled floor. "There is one thing of

which you Porteños have no notion, and that is how to make yourselves

comfortable in cold weather. Look here at this large, half-empty room

without a fireplace, how can you expect a Christian to live in such a

room in such weather as this? Why in England the horses are better

lodged than you are here. There is not a window that fits tight, and as

for the doors, they seem made on purpose to let the wind in instead of

keeping it out. It comes in from both doors and windows in little gusts

which would give a horse his death of cold, to say nothing of a man."

"Yet we don't die quicker than other people, that I can see," replied

Evaña; "our city is noted for its healthiness."

"That you owe to the Pampero, as you call this south-west wind, which

clears the air for you about once a month, and a very good wind it is in

its way, but of the best things it is possible to have too much. It was

awfully cold when I inspected the troops this morning; some of the men

looked blue with the cold and could hardly hold their muskets, this wind

goes through you like a knife. I don't object to it on the parade ground

once in a way, but I do object to it most decidedly in my own room. I

must have something done to these windows, hear how they rattle."

"Unless you make up your mind quickly to some decisive action they will

not annoy you much longer," replied Evaña.

"Ha, ha, my friend!" said Beresford; "that is your little game, is it? I

thought you looked unusually solemn this morning. That Frenchman of

yours, Liniers, is coming with a pack of Spanish curs behind him to

pitchfork me into the sea. When may we expect his Excellency?"

"I think you know when to expect him better than I can tell you."

"Well, perhaps I do, but you see I am not trembling in my shoes yet."

"You are not afraid of Liniers, and you have no cause to fear _him_."

"Then who is this dreadful enemy who is more to be feared than the

mighty Liniers?"

"The people of Buenos Aires."

General Beresford paused in his walk up and down the room and looked

earnestly at Evaña, and a grave look came over his face as he slowly

answered:

"You mean what you say?"

Evaña merely bowed his head in reply, and Beresford renewed his pacing

up and down, evidently in deep thought. Then pausing again he resumed:

"I know it. This apathy, of which you have spoken to me so much, is a

mask. I have sources of information of which you know nothing. I know

that these shopkeepers have their deposits of arms, and that hordes of

gauchos are assembling outside. It will be necessary to give them a

lesson, and yet you would fain have persuaded me that they were my

friends."

"They might have been."

"And my allies, too? I want no such allies. Liniers would send them

flying with one volley of musketry, as I did a month ago."

"That they fled from you then was because they had no heart in the

cause. Why should they fight for Spain? I tell you that if you fight

them again you will find them a much more stubborn foe. Shopkeepers you

call them and gauchos!" said Evaña, rising to his feet; "you will find

that whatever be their occupation they are men. The next time you set

your bull-dogs on them they will not turn like frightened sheep, but

will meet you foot to foot and hand to hand. Do I not know them? They

are my countrymen! What have you done since you have been here but

insult them? Even your civility and the strict discipline you keep

among your men is an insult to them. One does not waste polite speeches

on a friend, nor are soldiers kept to their quarters when they are

living in a friendly city. You have your outposts keeping watch upon

all their movements; you have your patrols, who prevent free transit

about the streets at night. Every means you take to show them that they

are conquered; but they know that they are not conquered--they know

that they have never measured their strength with you yet. You despise

them, but I tell you that if you persist in making them your enemies

you will find them more dangerous than Liniers and his Spaniards. They

will not drive you into the sea, but they will tear you to pieces where

you stand."

"Sit down, sit down, do not get excited," said Beresford quietly. "I am

not afraid of the raw levies they can bring against me, but I have no

wish to try their strength. What I have done in the way of outposts and

patrols is a necessity."

"You are a soldier, and act on military rules," said Evaña, resuming his

seat. "If you wish success to your enterprise, you must learn to be a

diplomatist as well as a soldier."

"And with whom shall I treat? To whom can I address myself?"

"To the people, in a public declaration that you make war only on the

Spaniards."

"Even if I could make such a declaration--for which allow me to remind

you that, as I have told you before, I have no authority--my words would

be but as words spoken to the wind. Who is there that can give me any

answer, or can come forward to treat with me?"

"No one," answered Evaña, with a sigh; "but your words would not be

spoken to the wind, they would speak to the hearts of men, and would

disarm those who are now arming against you."

"Look you, Señor Evaña, the Home Government knows nothing of this

expedition; it is an affair entirely arranged by Sir Home Popham and

myself. We have taken your city from the Spaniards, and intend to hold

it until we get instructions from England. Our Government has no wish to

take possession of this country, but they wish to open these rivers to

our commerce. Go you and two more of your principal men to England, and

arrange an alliance for yourselves with Great Britain. You will be well

received by Mr Fox; he is an enthusiast about liberty of the people, and

so forth. With Pitt you would have had no chance, but there is no

telling, these Whigs might like the idea of a liberal crusade in South

America, and of serving the Spaniards as the French served us. I do not

see why you should not be independent of Spain; you are quite strong

enough to stand by yourselves, if you only knew it."

"I do know it, and I know that without our aid you cannot hold our city

against Liniers and his Spaniards, therefore I come to show you how you

may make an alliance with us."

"You know it yourself, but your countrymen do not know it; they have

grown up from childhood with a blind reverence for Spain. Nine-tenths of

them would think it treason to enter into any alliance with me,

therefore I will not ask it of them; all I ask of them is that they keep

neutral."

"To remain neutral would be to forfeit our rights as men. My countrymen

will not tamely look on while you and the Spaniards arrange between you

who is to rule over us. We claim the casting vote in the dispute. Offer

us your aid to achieve our independence, we will treat with you, and you

shall be our guest; if you refuse it, you are but a foreigner and an

enemy, and we will thrust you forth."

"With whom shall I treat? With you? You have no influence with them;

first, because you are little known, and secondly, because you are my

friend. With the municipality? Its powers are ill-defined; I could but

treat with its members as with private individuals, besides which they

are Spaniards. With Don Gregorio Lopez, or with any other of the

wealthy Creoles? What I might arrange with them might be all cancelled

by the first popular government you might appoint. No, Señor Evaña, you

are a man who has studied much in books, but you have not studied men as

I have. I can make no treaty, except with some recognised authority, and

no such authority exists among you. A declaration from me as general of

the British army it is beyond the scope of my commission to give; but

you know my opinion concerning the feasibility of achieving your

independence, and I have told you that the Government of Great Britain

would be likely to look upon the project with favour, if it were

properly represented to them. Now is the time for you to strike a blow

for your independence yourselves; turn your armed levies against Liniers

when he arrives with his Spaniards, then you will make yourselves my

allies, though there can as yet be no treaty between us. You shake your

head, you cannot do it! Then allow me to tell you, my friend, that you

were born too soon. Men who will not fight for their own freedom are not

yet ripe for independence."

To this Evaña answered nothing for a space, but rising from his chair,

commenced to walk with hasty strides about the room, while Beresford,

seating himself at his desk, took up his pen and went on calmly with

some writing on which he had been engaged when Evaña entered. Ten

minutes so elapsed, then Evaña stopped in front of Beresford, and laying

one hand on the table, said:

"Can I, then, promise that you will aid us?"

"I can promise nothing officially, personally, there is nothing I should

like better."

"Too late! too late!" said Evaña, in a bitter tone. "Our men are eager

for the struggle, nothing but an open declaration from you will now give

me any influence with them."

"Yea, there is something else may bring them to their senses," said

Beresford, laying down his pen. "They were panic-struck when they first

saw me, now they have got used to the sight of red coats, and they have

got back some stomach for fighting, they want a lesson to cure them of

their new mania for playing at soldiers. They have had the folly to

collect a strong force of their levies not far from here, right under

my nose, as it were, but where they are I do not exactly know. Where

are they?"

"Nay, do not ask me," replied Evaña.

"Though you will not tell me I shall easily find it out, and you may

tell them, if you like, that I am going to beat up their quarters; but I

would advise you to do nothing of the kind, unless you think they would

wait for me."

"So that you may massacre them with your disciplined troops."

"There shall be no unnecessary bloodshed, I shall merely disperse them

and send them off to their homes, where they will be much more safe than

in trying to help Liniers to hoist the Spanish flag on that staff

outside there. Plenty of them will die if they try to do that."

"If I can bring six or eight of our principal men here, will you tell

them that you will do your best to aid us in freeing ourselves from

Spain?"

"I will tell them what I have told you, that I myself would gladly join

you if I had a commission to that effect, and that I believe the British

Government would receive the idea very favourably. But I tell you now,

that you will not get six or eight men to listen to me, whom I would

care to speak to."

"Not now perhaps, but they may," replied Evaña, with some hesitation.

"Yes, when they have had a lesson to show them their weakness."

"You will give them that lesson, you say?"

"Yes, but Liniers should be at Colonia by now, if my advices are

correct. There is no time to lose if we are to come to any understanding

together. Once Liniers joins them, to me all are alike Spaniards."

"Will you promise me that your troops shall not fire upon them?"

"I do not think I shall go myself, I shall probably send Colonel Pack,

his orders will be to disperse them. If he finds it necessary he will

fire, not otherwise."

Evaña turned from him and walked to the far end of the room, where he

stood for some moments at a window, gazing with dreamy eyes out upon the

parade-ground, where British sentries in long grey coats paced between

the Spanish guns which had so recently changed owners; upon the Plaza de

Los Perdices, where the market-people moved to and fro among their

stalls; and further yet upon the towers and domes of the churches of his

native city.

"The day is close at hand," said he to himself. "This man does not see

his danger, though I tell him of it. He will fight like a lion at bay,

but that flag with the red and blue crosses will come down, and that

hated flag, the flag of tyranny, will go up there again. If there were

division among them he might have some chance, and as he says there is

no time to lose, even to-morrow Liniers may land and it will be too

late, to-day is already the last day in July. Besides, I shall not save

them any way, he has spies."

As he said this, his whole frame trembled with suppressed passion.

"Yes, they want a lesson, the fools," he muttered through his teeth.

Then turning back to Beresford, he looked him sternly in the face.

"The Quinta de Perdriel, do you know where that is?"

"Yes," answered Beresford.

"There it is that your pupils await you."

A smile flitted over the face of the English general as he bowed in

reply. Evaña without another word left the room and walked with hasty

strides away to his own home.

CHAPTER V

PERDRIEL

Don Carlos Evaña spent the afternoon, evening, and night of the 31st

July shut in his own apartments, seeing no one, studying not at all,

reading by fits and starts, and knowing nothing of what he read,

thinking always. He could not sleep; before dawn he mounted to his

azotea, hoping by exercise to weary himself to sleep.

His house stood in the same block as that of Don Gregorio Lopez. As he

looked round him he saw a stout figure wrapped up in a thick woollen

poncho, standing on the azotea of Don Gregorio's house, he crossed two

other houses and went up to him, it was Don Gregorio himself.

"Buenos dias, Carlos," said Don Gregorio; "you are early abroad in spite

of the cold."

"Milagro!" replied Evaña; "it is a frequent custom of mine to pass the

night in study, and then to breathe the morning air before I go to bed."

"A most abominable custom, my friend," said Don Gregorio. "The night is

made dark on purpose that men may sleep, when the sun shines then is the

time for all work."

"I find the quiet of night very favourable to study, one is not liable

to interruption when all others are asleep."

"That is one of the ideas you have brought with you from the Old World.

Like many of your ideas it is out of place in the New."

"My ideas are out of place solely because they are new," replied Evaña;

"but the new will be old when their time comes."

"True. Some day you will be as old as I am, Carlos; perhaps, I should

say, for if you pass your nights without sleep continuously you will

never reach my age. If you ever do, you will know by then that all rapid

and violent changes are out of place, not only in the Old World but in

the New also."

"Violent changes are at times necessary, Don Gregorio. Without violence

change is frequently impossible, and change is one of the conditions of

our existence."

"Change is one of the laws of Nature," replied Don Gregorio; "but the

changes of Nature proceed gradually. Watch them in the trees; from bud

to leaf, from leaf to flower, from flower to fruit, then fall the leaves

and the tree rests for the winter. When spring comes again another

series of change commences, and from year to year the tree increases in

size and beauty."

"Till the day comes," said Evaña, as Don Gregorio paused, "when a storm

tears up the old tree by the roots and it gives place to younger trees.

Your simile does not hold good, Don Gregorio; even Nature finds violence

a necessity at times to remove some obstruction to her invariable law of

progress. These fierce storms which at times sweep over our city cause

great damage and suffering while they last, but without them neither

trees nor men would flourish."

"True, but Nature does not work blindly, she knows what will be the

result of the storms she sends upon us. Do you know, Carlos, what will

be the result of the storm you would fain raise amongst us?"

"I do. The result will be the birth of a great nation."

"If the nation is to be, it is born already, but it is not yet strong

enough to walk alone."

"And therefore requires assistance," said Evaña.

"We shall know before long what sort of assistance we may expect from

your friends the English. I was awakened an hour ago by their trampling

along the street; they do not treat us very much like friends."

"Some patrol, I suppose."

"No patrol at all, but an expedition."

"A reconnaissance, probably, into the suburbs."

"A reconnoitring party would not take guns with them."

"Guns!" said Evaña, with an involuntary shudder of apprehension; "what

direction did they take?"

"Westward. I have no doubt that they have gone to wake up our friends at

Perdriel. Marcelino is there, so, as you may imagine, I am very anxious.

It is that has brought me so early to the azotea."

Evaña turned away sick at heart. Marcelino was in danger, the English

must anticipate resistance, or they would not take guns with them. Evaña

knew the daring spirit of his friend; with raw levies of men, the whole

brunt of the fighting, if there were any, would be borne by such as he.

He had brought this danger upon him, he had not even attempted to warn

him of it. Marcelino had reposed such confidence in him that he had told

him of all their plans, and had confided in him as though he were one of

themselves, though he had openly refused to join them. He had stood

forth alone to defend him when treachery was imputed to him; he had

taken as an insult to himself a calumny which was a calumny no longer.

Evaña shivered, but it was not with cold, as he folded his cloak more

closely round him. Two or three turns he took on the azotea, then going

back to Don Gregorio, the two paced up and down for some time in

silence, side by side. In thoughts and ideas they were wide apart, but

one great anxiety was common to both, and though they spoke no more they

were well content to be together, the presence of each was to the other

as a mute sympathy.

Presently, as the dawning day broke over the city which lay around them,

there came to them from afar off the crackling sound of an irregular

fire of musketry, which lasted about ten minutes, when there came the

louder report of a cannon, then all was still. As minute after minute

passed and there was no further sound of fighting, Evaña breathed more

freely.

"It is all over now," said he to Don Gregorio.

"So it appears," replied the elder gentleman. "Thank God, there has not

been much of it."

"I will go and see what has happened," said Evaña.

"Do, Carlos, and bring me word as soon as you return."

Evaña descended at once to his own house, and going to an inner patio

where his horse was tied under a shed, he saddled him himself, led him

out into the street, mounted, and rode off. As he passed along he saw

many men looking out from the doors of their houses, stopping the

market-people or the milkmen as they trotted in on their mules and

raw-boned horses, and questioning them. He drew rein once or twice and

listened to what was said, but the information he thus gleaned amounted

to nothing at all, so pressing his horse to a sharp canter he went on

more rapidly, had passed the suburbs and was among the quintas, when

again he heard the sound of musketry. This time it was no longer the

irregular dropping fire of skirmishers, it was the regular file firing

of trained infantry hotly engaged, and presently mingled with it came

the thunder of artillery.

Evaña drove his spurs into his horse's flanks and galloped on at full

speed, but ere he reached the scene of action the firing had ceased, and

light clouds of grey smoke drifting away were all that he could see of

the recent conflict. Passing a hollow without slacking speed, he was

soon on the open ground, and Perdriel lay before him.

Pickets of grey-coated infantry were marching away from him, while

beyond the plain was dotted with flying horsemen. Now and then one of

these pickets would halt, there was a shimmer of glistening steel as

their muskets fell to the "present," there was a flash of fire and a

light cloud of smoke, then on marched the infantry as before. Further

and further away galloped the horsemen, and Evaña saw that the rout of

his own countrymen was complete.

He knew that it would be so, he had said that their victory would be a

misfortune, but the sight was not pleasant to him. He felt that he would

rather himself have been one of those panic-stricken horsemen, flying

for their lives after hazarding them for their country, than be as he

now was, a passive spectator of the scene.

He galloped on till he reached the spot where he saw for the first time

the immediate result of the "pastime of kings." Around him on the

frosted grass lay some threescore of his own countrymen, dead or dying.

Some lay peacefully stretched out on their backs or faces as though they

were asleep; some with their limbs doubled up beneath them, and their

bodies twisted into strange contortions; some lay crushed under their

dead horses. Some few there were who were sitting up, striving in a

helpless manner to stanch the blood from some deep wound which was

draining their life away. Forcing his frightened horse to carry him into

the midst of this scene of horror, Evaña, his heart wildly beating with

a terror hitherto unknown to him, gazed eagerly around looking for

something which he felt he could willingly give up his own life not to

find, the body of his friend Marcelino. His search was unsuccessful, the

bodies lying round him were all those of swarthy, long-haired,

coarsely-dressed paisanos. Turning rein, and heeding nothing the cries

of the wounded who called wildly upon him for assistance and for water,

he again drove his spurs into his horse's flank and galloped to the

quinta, which he saw was occupied by British troops.

* * * * *

Two hours before dawn that morning was a mustering of men in the Plaza

Mayor, no drums beat to arms, no trumpets sounded; silently the men took

their places in the ranks, each man with his firelock on his shoulder,

and his cartridge-box strapped on outside his grey overcoat, but without

knapsack. They were in light marching order, and had been told off the

night before for some special service which required secrecy and speed.

There were about 500 of them, and they had two guns with them.

When all was ready the officer in command, who was mounted on a small

horse, gave the word to march, and away they went at a quick step along

the quiet, darksome streets out westward. Light sleepers were awakened

from their dreams by the heavy tramp of armed men, and the rumbling of

the wheels of cannon. Windows were opened, and men half asleep gazed

forth from between the "rejas" on the long lines of grey-coated figures,

who went swiftly by in the darkness, their eyes dwelling more especially

with a sort of dreamy fascination upon the sloped barrels of the

muskets, and on the polished bayonets which glinted in the clear rays of

the stars.

After marching about a mile and a half the detachment emerged from the

main city into the suburbs, where the streets were no longer continuous

lines of houses, but were bordered by gardens and orchards, then the

street itself merged into a broad track, along which here and there, on

either hand, stood detached buildings, some of them large, square,

solidly-built houses, with flat, battlemented roofs, and with

reja-protected windows; but more of them were mere huts of mud and

wattle, with thatched roofs and no windows, save perhaps a square hole

in the wall closed at night-time by a wooden shutter. When there were no

houses there the road was bordered by a shallow ditch, on the inside of

which, on the top of the mound formed by the earth which had been thrown

out of the ditch, was planted an irregular fence of aloes, whose broad,

sharp-pointed leaves presented a formidable obstacle in the way of any

intruder. These fences enclosed the gardens of the men who furnished the

Plaza de Los Perdices with its daily supply of fruit and vegetables,

these thatched houses were their dwellings. Some of them were already

stirring as the troops passed, and were busy fixing panniers of raw hide

upon the backs of long-eared mules, or filling these panniers with such

produce as their gardens could produce at that season. The unwonted

appearance of troops marching on the road caused them no surprise; they

were men who were not in the habit of being astonished at anything. They

paused for a moment in their work to look after the troops, observing

one to another:

"The English! What do they, that they get up so early?"

Then straightway resuming their occupations they thought no more of

them.

About a mile the grey-coated soldiers marched through these fenced

gardens, which joined on to one another, or were separated only by an

occasional roadway, till they came to a new region of "quintas," which

were only gardens such as those they had passed, but on a larger scale,

divided one from another by wide open spaces of pasture-land. Here they

frequently saw horses picketed, or cows lay chewing the cud, and gazing

upon them with soft, sleepy eyes. The road was nothing but a broad,

beaten track running between these quintas, cut up with deep ruts made

by the wheels of heavy carts, but firm under foot, hardened to the

hardness of stone by the frosts of winter. At some of these quintas boys

were already driving up cows from the pasture towards rows of white

posts standing outside the quinta fences, where other cows were tied,

and women were busy milking.

In a hollow the troops were halted. At the head of the column had

marched the light company of the 71st Highlanders, under the command of

its captain, who had two lieutenants with him. As they halted, the

commanding officer rode up to the head of the column.

"Gordon," said he, to one of the lieutenants, "you have been here

before, and know something of the ground. We are close to Perdriel now,

I believe."

"Yes, sir. It is just over the rise lying a little to the left of the

road."

"Take twenty men with you and go forward, and see what you can make

out."

The young officer touched his Highland bonnet, and then with twenty men,

who carried their arms at the trail, marched swiftly away up the slope

and disappeared. In about half-an-hour he returned alone.

"I have left my men hidden under the fence of a small quinta," he said.

"The enemy are encamped just beyond in the open, to the left of the

Quinta de Perdriel."

"Do they cover much ground?"

"They seem to have a great many horses picketed all about, they stretch

as far as I could see, but they have not many bivouac fires, and those

are close up to the quinta."

"Is the ground all open between here and there?"

"This small quinta where I have left the men is all that is in the way,

and it will hide our approach. On both sides of it the ground is quite

open."

"Have they no outposts or videttes?"

"None that I could see."

"Then the sooner we are on to them the better. Lead on straight for this

small quinta you tell me of."

In low, gruff tones the word "march" passed from front to rear, and

again the small column was in motion, winding along like a grey serpent

up the slope, over the crisp, frozen grass, where each footprint left a

black mark on the glistening surface, bringing on with it in the rear of

the column the two guns, like a serpent which carries a double sting in

its tail.

The stars had faded away out of the heavens, the eastern sky was tinged

with ruddy gold, birds hopped about in the short grass, or flew hither

and thither chirping a welcome to the new-born day, for the birds do not

sing in Buenos Aires, as this column of armed men, strong in their

discipline, blindly obedient to the command of an experienced leader,

marched swiftly and stealthily towards their prey.

And what was their prey? A body of men nearly twice their own number, as

strong of arm and as stout in heart as they, but men who knew no

discipline, and were strangers to the use of arms; men who knew just as

much of war as did their leaders, that is to say, just nothing at all,

and thus had no confidence or trust in them, but would perchance follow

where they led, if they saw no faltering in them, and had no personal

antipathy to them.

As the composition of these two bodies of men was distinct, so also were

the objects which had brought them together. The British soldier did his

duty, and asked no questions; he was ready to shoot, stab, or knock on

the head anyone he was told; his life was just as precious to him as

that of any other man was to that other, but he had sold his services,

and his life, if need be, to his native country for a small modicum of

pay and a pension, if he lived long enough to earn it. He had nothing to

think of but to do his duty blindly, and it was his habit so to do it;

he fought the battles of his native country wherever she liked to send

him, and obeyed her implicitly, she being represented to him by whatever

officer happened for the moment to be in command of him. To these men

who formed this column of 500 soldiers, General Beresford represented

the might and majesty of Great Britain; he had told them to go forth and

scatter his enemies with fire and steel, and they intended to do it; why

these other men were the enemies of Great Britain they never troubled

themselves to inquire, they did their duty as they were accustomed to.

The men who were now encamped in and about the Quinta de Perdriel were

no trained soldiers gathered together to fight the battles of their

country, they were hardy yeomen, men whose lives were mostly spent on

horseback and in the open air. A cry had gone forth among them that a

band of foreigners had invaded their native country, had taken their

chief city, and had chased away their Spanish rulers; men whom they knew

had called upon them to assemble and take up arms to drive out these

invaders. Such a call had never before been made upon them, but they

obeyed it cheerfully, and had come together as though to some festive

gathering, their hearts swelling with a strange, unwonted pride. That

they had a country which was theirs, and from which it was their duty to

drive any foreign invader, was an idea which was quite new to them,

their hearts for the first time beat with patriotism.

Their leaders were mostly young men, to whom patriotism was not

altogether a novelty, they were eager and enthusiastic, and waited

longingly for the day when they might display their devotion to their

country by feats of arms, and might seal it, if necessary, with their

blood.

Neither of these two opposing forces represented a perfect army; the

distinguishing qualities of both in combination have characterised all

the armies of all nations, who have at any time in the history of the

world earned for themselves immortal fame by their prowess both in

victory and defeat.

As the column emerged from the hollow upon the level plain they heard a

confused murmur of voices which came to them from a distance through the

clear morning air, the patriot levies were already astir. As they drew

near the quinta, under whose fence Lieutenant Gordon had left his men,

they heard a shout and saw some of the Highlanders rush out from their

concealment. The approach of the column had been perceived by a small

party which had passed the night at this quinta, the horses of which

were picketed inside the fence. Several men had mounted hurriedly and

were now trying to make their escape. The Highlanders ran to the

tranquera on the south side the quinta, and stopped their exit by that

passage, making prisoners of two who tried to burst through; but there

was another exit in the western fence where the hedge had been broken

down by stray cattle, by which others made good their escape, and

galloped off to the main camp.

The column immediately deployed and advanced in line, with one company

and the two guns in reserve. The Highland light company on the right had

orders to advance upon and occupy the further quinta itself, the main

body keeping more to the left, where the blue smoke curling up in long

spirals from the watch-fires gave token of an encampment.

The Quinta de Perdriel was a large enclosure, one half of which was

planted with trees. The buildings consisted of a large, flat-roofed

house, stretching round two sides of a patio. Another side of this patio

was shut in by a low wall with an iron gateway in the centre, which ran

in a line with the fence, and the remaining side was occupied by a

confused group of ranchos which stretched back some fifty yards into the

quinta. The shape of the enclosure was an oblong, the fence was the

usual shallow ditch backed by an aloe hedge, along which arose here and

there the tall stems on which it is said that the aloe carries a flower

once only in every hundred years. The hedge was in many places eight

feet high and quite impenetrable, but there were numerous gaps through

which a man might easily force his way if he could scramble up the bank

and did not mind a few scratches. The quinta house and out-buildings

stood on the southern face of the enclosure; the attacking column

approached it from the south-east, and the encampment lay beyond,

outside the western fence.

A horseman rode at full gallop into the patio of the quinta, other

horsemen rushed madly about the encampment; all shouted the same warning

cry:

"Los Ingleses! Los Ingleses!!"

In an instant all was confusion, men sprang to the backs of their horses

without stopping to saddle, and galloped off to drive up the horses

which were feeding in troops all over the plain; others seized their

arms and collected in groups, not knowing what to do, and having no one

to tell them. The leaders ran together in the large patio of the quinta,

shouting contradictory orders which no one obeyed. The doors and windows

of the flat-roofed house were closed, and the iron entrance-gate was

shut. Women crowded into the ranchos, shrieking and dragging their

children with them. Among all this confusion one man alone preserved his

coolness and presence of mind, Marcelino Ponce de Leon, who at the first

shout of alarm mounted to the azotea and made a rapid inspection of the

approaching enemy; then descending again to the patio--

"Don Juan Martin," said he, addressing one of the chief leaders, "run

you outside and mount all the men you can collect together, while we

keep them out of the quinta."

Don Juan Martin Puyrredon mounted his horse, which stood at hand ready

saddled for him, and causing the iron gate to be opened galloped off at

once; and collecting the groups of armed men, who waited in the open,

not knowing what to do, told them to take up their saddles and retreat

with him behind the quinta, where by this time a good number of horses

had been driven together.

"Now those who have muskets up to the azotea," said Marcelino, as

Puyrredon galloped off.

"I will defend the gate," shouted one excited young man, drawing his

sword, and giving it a wild flourish in the air, "who will help me?"

In a moment he was surrounded by volunteers. Then Marcelino, calling on

a number of others by name to follow him, ran off through the trees

which surrounded the house towards the eastern fence of the quinta. He

was only just in time, the Highlanders were already on the other side,

but had halted while search was made for some way of passing through it.

A random volley of pistol and carbine shots was the first notice they

had of a foe more formidable than thorny aloes.

The captain in command gave the word "Forward!" and Lieutenant Gordon

shouting, "Come on, 71st, follow me!" ran quickly over the intervening

ground, and picking out the lowest place he could see in the hedge

before him jumped clean over the ditch and into the hedge, whence he

slipped and fell on his knees inside. In an instant he was on his feet

again, and with two or three dexterous cuts with his claymore cleared a

way for his men to follow him through the fence; the next moment a blow

on the head stretched him on the ground, but ere it could be repeated

the Highlanders came springing in through the gap and entrance was won.

Marcelino made one desperate rush with such men as he could get to

follow him, to try and drive them back; but his men with their swords

and facones could not stand against the muskets and bayonets of the

Highlanders, they were beaten off, and Marcelino broke his own sword in

the scuffle. As they retired Lieutenant Gordon drew up a few of his men

in line, and rushed after them with levelled bayonets, when they fled at

once to the shelter of the trees. Here Marcelino again tried to make a

stand, but the Highlanders had now cut several passages for themselves

through the aloe hedge, and poured in by dozens. In five minutes the

light company had the whole of the quinta to the rear of the house in

their possession.

Meantime the main body of the British force had driven everything before

them in the open, capturing a quantity of arms and horse-gear, and

several carts containing provisions and ammunition. They now turned

their attention to the flat-roofed house, whence a desultory fire had

been opened upon them, threw out skirmishers, who ran up to the ditch

and fired upon all who showed their heads above the parapet of the roof

or who stood unprotected in the patio or among the out-buildings. Then

finding the iron gate fast locked and the key gone, one of the guns was

brought up, and at the first discharge shattered it so severely that it

was easily pulled down and the troops poured into the patio.

Marcelino, who had retreated to the house and had taken the command

there, had withdrawn the men from the azotea, for towards the quinta

there was no parapet to the roof, and the light company spread among the

trees had them at their mercy. He now turned his attention to

strengthening the doors and windows and spoke of holding out to the last

extremity, and of allowing the house to be knocked to pieces about his

ears rather than surrender, but he had only about forty men with him and

their ammunition was nearly all expended. They looked blankly one at

another, and as he was but one of themselves they waited only for a

pretext to throw off the authority which he had given himself over them.

By interior doors the rooms of the house all communicated, but most of

the garrison were collected in the principal room, waiting in gloomy

silence for what might happen, marvelling that the English left them so

long without molestation. After about twenty minutes of this anxious

waiting, they heard again hoarse voices of command and the rapid tramp

of marching men. Cautiously opening the shutters of the windows they

looked out and saw that only a small detachment was left in possession

of the patio, while a strong force of the enemy was manoering in the

open.

Don Juan Martin Puyrredon, having got from Marcelino Ponce de Leon some

idea of what to do, did it with considerable energy, and having

collected five or six hundred of his men and brought them into something

like order, now returned to the scene and at once made a swoop upon the

small British force which was drawn up to receive him. The British

officer had formed his men in line two deep, with his right resting on

the quinta fence, the two guns in the centre in reserve, and a few

sections thrown back on his left to guard against any attempt to take

him in the rear.

Waving his sword, and riding some two lengths ahead of his men, Don Juan

Martin brought them on at a gallop, their sabres and the blades of their

lances glistening brightly in the rays of the rising sun, while their

many-coloured ponchos fluttered and danced in the morning breeze. When

about 200 yards distant he shouted the word: "Charge!" and bowing to his

horse's neck and driving in his spurs he dashed at full speed at his

enemy. His men answered with a wild yell, and throwing themselves almost

flat on their horses' backs broke their ranks and followed him, a

disorganised mob of horsemen, rushing at headlong speed upon a slender

line of grey-coated soldiers, who stood motionless to receive them,

motionless, but quite ready, with their firelocks grasped tight in their

hands, their teeth set, and their eyes gleaming with excitement. Scarce

fifty yards intervened between them and the foremost horsemen, when from

the lips of that one horseman who sat so quietly in his saddle in the

centre of the line of soldiery came one low word addressed to the bugler

who stood beside him; the notes of the bugle rang out clear on the

frosty air, down went those shining barrels, a flash of fire and smoke

ran from one end to the other of the line, and then began again in one

continuous roll. At the same time the Highland company who had remained

in the quinta, and had been drawn up behind the fence, hidden by the

leaves of the aloes, opened a rapid flanking fire upon the horsemen.

Horses and men rolled over in dozens. Don Juan Martin Puyrredon was one

of the first to fall. His horse was shot under him. Half-stunned and

dazed, he staggered to his feet; then one of his men drawing rein beside

him, he mounted up behind him, and rode out of the press.

But other brave leaders were not wanting. Shouting words of

encouragement to their men, they led them through the smoke right on to

the British bayonets; but it was no use, they could make no impression

on that stolid line of infantry. If they spurred their horses against

the bayonets of the first rank, it only made them an easy mark for the

bullets of the second. One strong squadron of them had outflanked the

infantry, and wheeled round to attack them in the rear. Upon these the

guns were brought to bear, two rounds of canister at short range emptied

many of their saddles, and scattered them in hopeless confusion. The

struggle did not last five minutes. The level ground around the British

position was strewed with men and horses, most of them quiet in death,

some few groaning and writhing with the agony of mortal wounds.

Don Juan Martin Puyrredon having procured another horse, rallied yet

again a confused crowd of the stragglers and with them made another

attempt to take his enemy in flank; but his men no longer followed him

with reckless impetuosity; as they saw the gunners again wheel round

their pieces to oppose them they turned and fled. Don Juan Martin drew

rein within fifty paces of the British bayonets; clenching his hand he

raised it and shook it at them in fierce despair, then turned and

trotted slowly away. More than one musket came sharply up to the

shoulder as he thus defied the soldiery, but the officer in command

shouted to them in clear ringing tones:

"Do not shoot him! He is a brave fellow that."

His men echoed his opinion by bursting into a hearty "Hurrah!"

Leaving the artillery and Highlanders in possession of the quinta, the

officer in command started at once with the rest of his men in pursuit.

Split up into pickets of about twenty men each, they spread rapidly over

the open ground beyond the quinta, firing upon any groups who ventured

to let them come within range. But the panic-stricken horsemen made no

further attempt to molest them. Such groups as attempted to rally, broke

up and fled as the infantry came down upon them at the double; in

half-an-hour not a single horseman remained in sight.

Some threescore, dead or mortally wounded, lay upon the plain, five dead

men lay on the flat roof of the azotea. The British detachment had two

men killed and about a dozen wounded.

The lesson which General Beresford had thought it necessary to teach had

been taught by one well experienced in such kind of teaching; whether it

had been learnt or not was quite another question.

Meantime, as the first volleys of musketry shook their windows, the

garrison of the flat-roofed house had whispered one to another that now

was their time to escape. In vain Marcelino prayed them to hold out till

Don Juan Martin had driven off the English, they had imbibed a wholesome

fear of these English and would not listen to him. They opened a side

door and rushed forth; the officer in command of the picket which

occupied the patio made no attempt to stop them, they ran at once for

the trees and were soon safe from all pursuit. All save one, who stood

alone in the open doorway, with his arms crossed over his chest and the

stump of a broken sword in his hand, listening intently to the sounds of

the fierce contention which raged outside, of which he could see nothing

from where he stood.

As these sounds died away his lips closed tightly together, and as the

ringing sound of a British cheer came to him through the smoke, which

was lightly drifting away over the tree-tops, he threw the stump of the

broken sword from him and bowed his head as though he resigned himself

to some bitter fate.

"Porkey Oosty no va?" said a voice close at hand, speaking in very

barbarous Spanish, but yet in words which Marcelino could understand.

He looked round and saw a young English officer standing on the paved

causeway which surrounded the house, looking curiously at him.

"Will not you stop me?" answered Marcelino in English.

"Stop you? no; our orders are to send you away from here."

Marcelino looked at him attentively, he had seen him before somewhere,

presently he remembered where that was. This was the young officer who,

to his astonishment and that of his men, had jumped in among them over

the aloe fence not an hour before; also the same officer whom he had

seen standing under the glare of the wax-lights beside his sister in his

mother's sala only two nights ago.

"You will not stop here, you will go back to the city?" he said.

"I believe so," replied the officer.

"Then will you do me a favour?"

"I shall have much pleasure."

"You visit at the house of Don Roderigo Ponce de Leon?"

"Yes, frequently," answered the young officer, his face lighting up with

pleasure.

"I will write a line for Doña Constancia if you will carry it for me."

"Certainly I will," answered the other, who began to have some idea of

who he was speaking to.

Marcelino drew a pocket-book from his breast and wrote in pencil a line

only to say that he was safe, signing it only with one letter, M. Then

tearing out the leaf, he folded it up and handed it to Lieutenant

Gordon, saying:

"There is no treason in it, but it may give ease to an anxious heart."

"She shall have it as soon as I can get off," replied the other.

They shook hands cordially together, and Marcelino raising his hat

turned away, and walked off deliberately but rapidly through the quinta.

"He is her brother, or I am a Dutchman," said Lieutenant Gordon to

himself, as he watched him till he disappeared among the trees; "and a

fine fellow, too; what a pity we should have to fight those fellows!"

CHAPTER VI

IN WHICH IT APPEARS THAT A LESSON MAY BE WELL TAUGHT AND YET NOT LEARNED

As Marcelino left the quinta on one side, Evaña galloped in by the gate

on the other. The Highland officer in command knew him slightly, having

seen him frequently in company with General Beresford, and seeing his

agitation divined the object of his visit, and invited him to dismount.

"Are there any killed here?" asked Evaña.

"Several," replied the officer.

The men were collecting the bodies of the slain from among the trees and

from the azotea, and laid them in the patio side by side; some wounded

also they removed within the house. Eagerly Evaña scrutinised them one

by one as the soldiers brought them forward; as they brought the last

his heart gave a bound of joy, Marcelino was not among them.

"There are some wounded outside," said he to the officer; "I will go and

see if I can assist them."

"I will send a party to collect them and bring them here," replied the

officer.

But without waiting for aid, Evaña remounted his horse, rode back to the

scene of horror which lay without, and set to work to aid the wounded to

the best of his ability, tearing strips from the clothing of the dead to

bind up the wounds of those for whom there was yet hope.

One man he saw lying on his face with a leg hid under the body of his

dead horse. As he passed him the man turned his head slightly to look at

him; he was not dead. Evaña knelt down beside him to see if he was past

all aid; he could see no wound on him.

"Speak," said he to him, "where are you wounded?"

"Leave me," answered the man; "for God's sake, leave me. I am not

wounded, but if they know that I am alive they will kill me."

"I am alive, and they do not kill me," said Evaña. "Don't be a fool; the

fight is over now, get up and help me with these wounded."

Then taking up a lance-shalt which lay by, Evaña pushed it under the

body of the fallen horse, and using it as a lever raised the dead animal

sufficiently to let the man draw his leg out from underneath. He

staggered to his feet, and limped about, his leg was bruised but he was

otherwise unhurt.

"Ah! I am lost! Here come the heretics," he exclaimed, as Evaña chafed

his leg for him to restore the circulation; then he threw himself again

flat on the ground, saying, "Mount your horse and fly while you can."

Evaña looked round and saw a party of Highlanders headed by an officer,

and carrying stretchers, coming towards him from the quinta. As they

drew near he saw with pleasure that the officer was one he knew,

Lieutenant Gordon; he had met him more than once at the house of Don

Roderigo Ponce de Leon.

"Señor Evaña, good-morning; you are well employed," said the lieutenant.

"I have come to help you. Most of them appear to be killed, if there are

any wounded we will carry them inside."

"There are few," answered Evaña sadly; then giving him a kick in the

ribs, he said to the man lying at his feet, "Get up, you fool, and help

us."

The man rose at once to his feet, glaring savagely at the new-comers,

but when he saw that they only smiled and looked curiously at him, he

set to work very willingly with the rest, and in a short time such

wounded as there remained any hope for were removed to the quinta. All

the beds in the house were brought into requisition for them, and they

were placed in the care of the women and a few men belonging to the

quinta who had taken no part in the fighting and had not fled with the

rest.

When the wounded were all sent off, Evaña commenced a search among the

dead; they were all swarthy, roughly dressed paisanos. The man whom he

had rescued from the fallen horse knew several of them and told him

their names, which Evaña at once took down in his pocket-book, and then

inquired of him if he knew anything of Don Marcelino Ponce de Leon, or

had seen anything of him that day.

"Is he a tall young man with black hair and a short black beard?"

"Yes."

"Always very dandy in his dress, like one of the city?"

"Yes."

"Then I think I know who you mean; I saw him yesterday. He was always

wanting us to do exercise and was never satisfied, and very much a

friend with Don Juan Martin. I did not see him to-day, but there was

some fighting in the quinta, perhaps he was there."

"I will go at once and inquire there," replied Evaña, walking towards

his horse.

"And what shall I do?" asked the man. "Are you going to leave me here

among these?"

"Take your recao and bridle off your horse and follow me; if I cannot

get you another horse I will give you mine."

When they reached the quinta Evaña found many others there who had come

from the city to see what had happened, to whom the Highlanders were

offering stray horses which they had captured for sale. He bought one

for two dollars and gave it to the man who had followed him, who lost no

time in saddling and mounting.

"Patron," said he to Evaña, as he settled himself in the saddle, "you

have saved my life. My life, my services, and all that I have are at

your disposal. I am only a poor gaucho, but you have only to speak, and

I will do whatever you wish for you."

He still thought that the English had only removed the wounded to the

house so that they might cut their throats at their leisure, and that

they would have killed him at once had not Evaña been there to speak for

him.

"Vaya con Dios," replied Evaña, and as the man galloped off he smiled,

remembering that he had neither told him his name nor where he came

from, so that he knew not where to apply for his services should he

require them.

Evaña dismounted in the patio of the quinta and then went in search of

Lieutenant Gordon, whom he found inside the house superintending the

arrangements for the comfort of the wounded.

"Señor Gordon," said he, drawing him to one side, "I have come here in

search of a friend of mine, who I have reason to believe was one of the

garrison of the quinta this morning. I am very anxious about him."

"What was his name?" asked the lieutenant.

"I do not wish to mention his name," replied Evaña.

"Was it the same as this?" asked the other, drawing from his

waistcoat-pocket a small piece of paper folded into the form of a letter

and addressed to--

La Sra:

Doña Constancia Lopez y Viana.

"No," answered Evaña, as a thrill of joy shot through him; he recognised

the handwriting of his friend.

Lieutenant Gordon looked at him for a moment with a puzzled expression

on his face, then--

"Ah; I forgot," said he, "women do not change their names in this

country when they marry. Of course, but you recognise that writing?"

"Yes, it is his."

"Then he is all safe, I spoke with him not an hour ago. He went away the

last of them all. But it is not his fault that he is safe, if they had

been all like him we should not have got in so easily."

"If they were all like him you would not have got in at all," replied

Evaña warmly, at which the young officer smiled and shrugged his

shoulders.

"Excuse me," continued Evaña, "but that note is to his mother. If you

will permit me I will take it to her at once."

A look of disappointment came over Lieutenant Gordon's face, he seemed

loth to part with the letter, but after pondering a little he handed it

to Evaña, saying:

"Yes, you had better take it, you can go at once, but I may probably be

here all day."

Evaña put it carefully into his pocket-book.

"You will not mention his name to anyone," he said, turning to go away.

"No fear," answered Gordon. "No one spoke to him but myself, and as he

did not mention his name there will be no need to tell it, but probably

no questions will be asked."

As Evaña rode out of the gate he met the commanding officer returning

from the pursuit, and stopped to speak with him. He recognised him as

Colonel Pack, General Beresford's second in command.

"I shall remain here till the afternoon," said the colonel, in reply to

a question of Evaña's. "They have carried off most of their wounded with

them; those fellows are deuced difficult to unhorse, but we have some

here, I believe, and it will be well if you can send me some native

surgeon to look after them."

This Evaña promised to do, and then started at once for the city at a

quick gallop.

At the house of Don Roderigo Ponce de Leon he found all in a state of

great anxiety. Vague rumours of a fierce fight that morning, in which

the slaughter had been immense, were current among them. Some said that

Liniers had arrived in the night, and had been completely defeated;

others, that he had cut to pieces the entire English detachment sent to

oppose him, and was now advancing upon the city; others, that the

English had fallen upon the levies at Perdriel, and had massacred them.

Many not belonging to the household were there, seeking information, or

giving information upon which no reliance could be placed. Among them

Doña Constancia wandered restlessly, listening to all, but believing

nothing of what was said.

The entrance of Evaña into the sala, booted and spurred, and flushed

with his rapid gallop, caused a general cessation of talk. Taking out

his pocket-book he drew from it the folded paper and handed it to Doña

Constancia with a reassuring smile.

"Gracias à Dios!" exclaimed she, as she read the few words written by

Marcelino. "He has spared my son to me yet again."

Her daughter Dolores, leaning on her shoulder, read the words with her;

then throwing her arms round her mother's neck, and hiding her face in

her bosom, she burst into tears.

"Yes; thank God that Marcelino is safe," she murmured; "but why should

they fight when they might be such good friends?"

Evaña heard the low words, and a tender look came over his usually stern

features as he gazed upon her; then turning away he gave Don Roderigo

and the others a rapid account of what he had seen and heard that

morning. As he spoke Doña Constancia came and stood beside her husband,

resting her crossed hands upon his shoulder, while Dolores leaned upon

her father with his right arm thrown round her.

"Then Marcelino was not engaged with the cavalry?" said Don Roderigo.

"No; he appears to have been in the quinta all the time. I believe they

made some attempt to defend the place. Mr Gordon spoke very highly of

the way he had behaved."

"And the Señor Gordon intended to have brought this note himself?" said

Doña Constancia.

"Yes; and he seemed much disappointed that he was not able to do so."

"You will find him for me, and will bring him here, Roderigo?" said Doña

Constancia.

"I will," said Don Roderigo, "We shall hear all the particulars from

him. But have you no idea, Don Carlos, where Marcelino has gone to?"

"No; but as their levies seem to be completely dispersed, he will

probably wait at no great distance until we see what Liniers can do."

"He will go and join Liniers now, and they will fight again," said

Dolores.

"God protect us!" said Doña Constancia. "Have we not already thought of

this?"

There was great ferment throughout the city all that day. It soon became

generally known that the partidarios under Don Juan Martin Puyrredon had

suffered a severe defeat at the hands of the English, but instead of

losing heart at the news the townsmen murmured among themselves vows of

vengeance, and the name of Liniers passed frequently from lip to lip; in

him was now all their hope.

Late in the afternoon many of them were gathered together in the

dining-room of Don Gregorio Lopez. Don Carlos Evaña had made another

effort to bring them to look favourably upon the English; the only

answers he received were fierce threats and upbraidings: the threats he

treated with contempt, the upbraidings he suffered in silence.

"Take my advice, Don Carlos," said Don Gregorio Lopez, "leave off

talking to us in that strain; your ideas are all very well in your

study, here they are quite out of place. However ready we might have

been to accept the friendship of the English, the time has now gone by.

The sword is drawn, and we have thrown away the scabbard."

"There is war between us now, and war to the knife," said Don Isidro

Lorea, who was one of those present. "They have attacked us, and have

murdered our brothers with their cannon; this question can now only be

settled by fire and blood."

"It is folly to talk to us of Spanish tyranny," said another. "Do the

Spaniards ever send their men to shoot us and bayonet us when we are

asleep? On the contrary, the Spaniards have often shed their blood in

our defence, they have made war upon the Indians for us, and their ships

destroyed the English pirates who infested the Parana in the days of our

grandfathers."

"I have been at Perdriel to-day," said another. "I helped to put the

dead into the carts we sent out for them. For each dead man I touched I

vowed that I will kill an Englishman. Wait until Liniers comes; if he is

strong enough, then we will show them the mercy they showed to our

countrymen to-day; those of them who can swim off to their ships may

escape, the rest die. If he is not strong enough for them, then we will

kill them all the same, but more slowly, with the knife."

"If you had listened to me before, this disaster would never have

happened," said Evaña. "The partidarios were armed, therefore their

encampment was a challenge. General Beresford does not make war upon

peaceable citizens."

"Basta, Don Carlos," said Don Gregorio. "In attacking the partidarios he

has made war upon us. We are men; if we cannot fight him we know at

least how to die with honour. Come with me, I have something to say to

you in private."

Don Gregorio took Evaña with him into a smaller room, and locking the

door, he seated himself.

"Do you know what these say of you?" said he.

"Sufficient evil, I make no doubt," answered Evaña.

"More than sufficient, my friend. They say you have reasons for thus

speaking in favour of the English."

"Reasons! of course I have. I love my country, and would see her free

and great. I know that she can only become so by the help of these

English."

"I know you love your country. There are some who say that you love

English gold better."

"I know they say that too," answered Evaña, looking straight at Don

Gregorio.

"I know you better, Carlos," said Don Gregorio. "But men make traitors

of themselves for ideas as well as for gold. To say the least, your

frequent interviews and friendship with the English general are not in

good taste at this juncture."

"You know the reason why I have sought his friendship, Don Gregorio."

"I do; but you must now see that it is too late."

"I fear it is."

"I know it is, and I request you as a personal favour to myself to see

him no more."

Evaña made an impatient gesture as he answered:

"I have already made a considerable impression upon him, he has even

assured me that he would be very willing to join us in a war for our

independence, and that the British Government would look favourably upon

a project for an alliance with us. Shall I then leave the work half

done?"

"It is not half done; this morning's work has undone it all. Even I

would not now make peace with the English on any condition short of

their immediate departure from the country. Listen to one who is older

than you, Carlos, and knows much more of his own countrymen than you do.

I tell you that all alliance between us and the English is at present

impossible. Promise me that you will see him no more."

"What must be, must be," said Evaña with a sigh. "I will not visit him

again for fifteen days; by then we shall have seen what Liniers can do."

"That is well, Carlos; I am content," said Don Gregorio. "Now I have

another request to make of you. For the fifteen days be my guest, I will

give you a quiet room, and you shall send for what books and things you

like from your own house, for anything that you wish you have nothing to

do but to ask."

"You wish me to be your prisoner; can you not trust me, Don Gregorio?"

asked Evaña sadly.

"Trust you? of course I do; your word is better security to me than any

prison, you are as a son to me; I propose this for your own safety."

"What! not content with calumny, they would assassinate me too!"

exclaimed Evaña.

"I fear it," said Don Gregorio.

"Fear not, against assassins I will trust to my own right arm."

"As you will," answered Don Gregorio, then unlocking the door, he

grasped his hand warmly, and they walked out together.

Evaña went straight to his own house, and shut himself up in his own

rooms to ponder upon the failure of this scheme, and to devise a fresh

one, while throughout the city Don Gregorio Lopez, Don Isidro Lorea, and

many others were eagerly consulting together about how they might best

assist the operations of General Liniers and avenge the disaster of

Perdriel.

CHAPTER VII

THE TWELFTH AUGUST, 1806

Colonia is a small town situated on the eastern bank of the estuary of

La Plata, right in front of Buenos Aires. In the year 1806 it was

fortified, having walls built of massive blocks of granite, and bastions

on which cannon were planted.

On the afternoon of the same day on which Colonel Pack dispersed the

levies of the partidarios at Perdriel, Liniers reached Colonia at the

head of 1000 men, who had been placed under his command by General

Huidobro, the Governor of Monte Video. Two days afterwards he embarked

with this force on board such craft as he could collect together, and on

the 4th August landed at Las Conchas on the other side of the river,

some nine leagues north of Buenos Aires.

Volunteers flocked to his standard. In a few days he saw himself at the

head of over 4000 men, with whom he marched upon the capital. To the

west of the city was a wide, open space of ground, known as the Plaza

Miserere, of which General Liniers took possession.

The city remained all this time very quiet. General Beresford found no

difficulty in procuring provisions for his men, the shops were open,

business went on as usual, and the markets were well supplied; but since

the affair of the 1st the English officers had been invited to no more

tertulias, and when they adventured to pay complimentary visits to the

houses of any of their native friends they were conscious of being

received with great coldness by the men, while the ladies were generally

invisible altogether. One officer alone found himself an exception in

this matter. When Lieutenant Gordon visited the house of Don Roderigo

Ponce de Leon he experienced no lack of cordiality, and the ladies

especially seemed never to tire of listening to what he could tell them

of the black-haired young man who had opposed his entrance to the Quinta

de Perdriel, and whom he had not detained when the fight was over.

The city was quiet because it was ready, and only awaited the signal to

rise in arms and drive out its conquerors. Every man had provided

himself with a weapon of some kind; many of the militia had stolen out

at night with their arms and accoutrements, and had joined the force

under the command of General Liniers. Don Isidro Lorea had not left

town, and was as attentive as ever to his business, but he had always

two rockets at hand in one corner of his almacen, his sword and a brace

of loaded pistols lay ever on a small table in his ante-sala, covered

over by some embroidery work of his wife Doña Dalmacia, who had regained

all her confidence in him, and was prodigal of her caresses.

General Beresford was a prey to great inquietude. The dispersion at

Perdriel seemed to have failed altogether in its object; the city gave

him no trouble, but he knew that the hardy yeomen of the country,

undeterred by their defeat, had joined Liniers by hundreds. Under

skilful management their reckless valour would not be thrown away, and

their numbers made them dangerous. Moreover, he had seen nothing since

the last day of July of his friend Don Carlos Evaña, and on sending to

his house to inquire for him he had been informed that he had left the

city. Without his intervention any attempt to come to an arrangement

with the townspeople was impossible. On the 10th he received a summons

from Liniers to surrender at discretion within fifteen minutes. General

Beresford did not require fifteen minutes to make up his mind, he could

only have one answer to such a summons, which was a prompt refusal.

On the morning of the 11th Liniers moved from the west to the north of

the city, and drove in the British detachment which was stationed at the

Retiro. Beresford despatched at once a reinforcement to retake the

position, but this force was driven back by a tremendous fire of

artillery and musketry, which was directed upon the troops as soon as

they debouched from the shelter of the streets. After this Beresford

drew in his other outposts, and stood on the defensive in the two

central plazas, where the fort served him as a citadel in case of a

reverse.

Then Don Isidro Lorea buckled on his sword, thrust his two pistols into

his belt, kissed his wife, and taking his two rockets in his hand

sallied out into the open ground in front of his house. There he fired

off these rockets one after the other. Ere their sticks had reached the

ground, doors opened in houses near at hand, and armed and eager men ran

out to join him. In half-an-hour he had his 200 men drawn up, the two

guns he had hidden in his almacen brought out and mounted, and waited

only for orders to march upon the Plaza Mayor. But no orders came.

Liniers contented himself with the advantage he had already gained that

day, and took his measures with the great precaution. He established a

line of outposts which completely surrounded the British position on the

land side, but he kept the bulk of his troops in the suburbs, and

deferred further operations until the next day.

Few of the militia retired to their homes that night, they made great

fires at the street corners and bivouacked in the open air. By sunrise

next morning they were all again under arms and impatient of the delay,

the reason of which they could not understand.

Don Isidro Lorea had planted his two guns at the end of the street which

led from the south side the open space to the Plaza Mayor, and had told

off parties of his men to occupy the adjacent azoteas. At sunrise he

drew up his small force on the open ground and looked eagerly for the

arrival of a reinforcement which Liniers had promised to send him. An

hour he waited; his men began already to murmur loudly, when at last a

welcome shout announced the arrival of those who were to share with them

their task that day.

Don Juan Martin Puyrredon rode in by one street at the head of a column

of his fierce partidarios, the yeomen of Buenos Aires; Don Marcelino

Ponce de Leon at the same moment rode in by another at the head of

another column of horsemen. Marcelino's conduct at Perdriel had won him

warm approbation from all who had shared with him the dangers of that

skirmish, and Don Juan Martin had made him his second in command. Their

losses by deaths, wounds, and desertion at Perdriel were already more

than made up by the volunteers who had joined them since.

As they debouched upon the open ground, both columns halted and the two

commanders rode forward to speak with Don Isidro. Their consultation was

long and somewhat angry; Don Juan Martin wished Don Isidro to take his

guns out of the way so that he might advance at once upon the Plaza with

his horsemen, but Don Isidro insisted upon leading the column of attack

himself, and protested that without the guns it would be impossible to

destroy the breastwork which the English had thrown across the end of

the street. The dispute waxed warm, but it was at last decided that Don

Isidro with his two guns and a small party of infantry should march down

the street leading to the right hand the Plaza Mayor, that Don Juan

Martin should follow him with his cavalry in the centre of the street,

that the rest of the infantry should keep pace with the cavalry along

the side-walks, and that Don Marcelino with his column of cavalry should

advance by the parallel street one square to the left, and either

attempt to force a way into the Plaza for himself or support the other

column as he might judge best.

The arrangements were hardly completed ere a spattering fire of musketry

was heard from the northern quarter of the city; Liniers was evidently

moving though he had as yet sent no orders. At the sound of the musketry

the impatience of the men became ungovernable, they were tired of seeing

their chiefs talking together and to all appearance wasting their time,

they broke up the conference with loud snouts of "Avancen! Avancen!" It

seemed as though very little more would have made them break their ranks

altogether and rush without leaders upon the enemy. Even the horses of

the cavalry seemed to share the general impatience, they curveted,

champing their bits and neighing with excitement.

The signal to march was received with loud "Vivas." Some score men,

slinging their muskets, laid hold of the guns and trundled them

along. Don Isidro with a small party of his best men marched in

front, and close behind came Don Juan Martin Puyrredon, sitting his

restive black horse with ease in spite of his plunging at the head of

as fine a body of men as any country in the world could furnish.

Tall, square-shouldered, and spare of flesh, they were formed equally

for strength and endurance; in the saddle they knew no fatigue, they

feared no danger; they were horsemen, to each man his horse was as a

part of himself, and being a part of himself was a necessity.

Similar scenes among the native levies were at the same time going on

all over the city; everywhere the cry went up, "Avancen! Avancen!" And

Liniers, seeing that his army was getting out of hand, gave the signal

to advance, and at once moved with his regular forces from the Retiro

upon the central Plazas.

Don Isidro Lorea had the honour of opening the attack; halting his

guns one square from the British breastwork, he opened fire with

round shot upon the slight defence; the guns were served by eager

hands and the fire was rapid, and, in spite of the musketry from the

azoteas flanking the breastwork, a breach was soon made. Don Juan

Martin Puyrredon wanted no more; shouting to the gunners to wheel

their pieces to one side, he waved his sword to his men, and putting

spurs to his horse dashed at full speed down the street. His own men

and the infantry followed him pell-mell, the British bayonets and

clubbed muskets were of no avail against his fiery onset, he burst

through the small detachment which guarded the ruined breastwork and

made his way to the centre of the Plaza; his men poured in after him,

and the infantry forcing their way into the houses on either hand

drove the British troops from the azoteas.

At the same time another party of militia, headed by Don Felipe Navarro,

had burst into the houses in the block on the south side the Plaza

Mayor, and crossing the azoteas now attacked the British troops who were

stationed on the roof of the Recoba Nueva. The struggle was a short one;

in a few minutes these troops were all either killed or prisoners.

Meantime Don Marcelino Ponce de Leon had advanced with his column to the

cross street level with the corner where Don Isidro had planted his

guns. Here he halted, and, after a careful inspection of the breastwork

which barred his entrance to the Plaza, dismounted half his men and sent

their horses to the rear. These men he joined to a detachment of

Liniers' troops who had advanced thus far by the cross street from the

Retiro, and bursting in the doors of the houses on the east side the

street, he mounted at once to the azoteas and led them against a British

picket posted at the far corner which looked upon the Plaza and

commanded the approaches to two breastworks. His Spanish troops poured

in a volley at close quarters, then his own men rushed forward

brandishing sabres and facones, and shouting wild cries of defiance. The

British defended themselves with desperation, and were aided by a heavy

fire from the next block and from the roof of the cathedral, where other

parties of British troops were stationed, but they were outnumbered ten

to one, and in five minutes the few who were not killed or disabled

threw down their arms and surrendered.

Marcelino left the troops in possession of the azotea lately occupied by

the British with instructions to screen themselves for a space as well

as they could from the fire directed upon them from the cathedral, but

to concentrate their own fire upon the party of the enemy who held the

breastwork, as soon as he should give the signal. This breastwork was

merely a line of barrels set on end across the street, topped with a row

of sacks filled with sand, to demolish which would be easy if it could

be reached. The dismounted cavalry left the azotea and collected in the

patio of the house to the right of the breastwork, the door of which

opened about twenty yards up the street, while Marcelino returned, put

himself at the head of the rest of his men, and led them on at a trot.

As he reached the street corner he waved his sword, it was the signal

agreed upon. The Spanish troops sprang from the sheltering parapets,

under which they had crouched, and opened a deadly fire upon the British

detachment posted at the breastwork; the dismounted cavalry opened the

door of the house, poured into the street, and rushing upon the

barricade with their facones in their teeth, tore away in a twinkling

the sacks and barrels from the centre of the roadway. Marcelino, who was

by this time half-way down the square, again waved his sword and put

spurs to his horse, his men answered him with fierce shouts and yells,

and utterly regardless of the fire directed against them from the azotea

on their right, which struck many of them from their saddles, rushed

with headlong fury for the opening before them. Don Juan Martin

Puyrredon had not spurred his horse fifty yards into the Plaza on one

side, ere Marcelino and his column poured into it on the other, while

another body of militia charged and took almost unopposed the breastwork

which crossed the street beside the cathedral.

The partidarios spread themselves over the Plaza, sabring and lancing

the scattered groups of soldiery, who, attacked on all sides, and

overwhelmed by a plunging fire from the roof of the Recoba Nueva, strove

in vain to reform their broken ranks. A strong party of the 71st

Highlanders drawn up in front of the archway of the Recoba Vieja yet

presented a firm front, and kept up a steady fire upon the horsemen as

they continued to pour into the Plaza, till the ground in front of the

Cabildo was strewn with men and horses.

"A mi! Muchachos! A mi!!" shouted Don Juan Martin Puyrredon, as he saw

the deadly effect of this steady fire.

Marcelino brought up a number of his men in tolerable order, and, Don

Juan Martin joining them with those who had answered to his shout, put

himself at their head and charged right upon the centre of the

Highlanders. The rest of his men who were spread about the Plaza joined

in the general rush, nothing could withstand their onset, they beat down

the Highlanders under their horses' feet and galloped over them. A

sergeant who carried the regimental colour was cut down by Don Juan

Martin, who snatched the flag from his hand as he sank upon the ground,

and waved it over his head in triumph.

"Save the flag!" shouted a Highland officer, as he rallied some of his

men under the archway.

The men lowered their bayonets and rushed desperately upon the

triumphant horsemen; for a moment they drove them back, and the officer

springing upon Don Juan Martin, seized the staff of the flag with both

hands and almost tore him from his saddle. But Puyrredon still clung

fiercely to his prize, and Marcelino, who was close at hand, drew a

pistol from his belt and fired. The officer made one more frantic effort

to free the flag from the clutch of his foe, then fell back senseless.

As he fell, Marcelino recognised in him the young officer who had taken

the note from him to his mother on the day of the fight at Perdriel. He

sprang to the ground at once, and calling upon two of his men to help

him, lifted him up and carried him out of the press.

The success of the Highlanders was only for a moment, they were

surrounded, their order was lost, their leader apparently slain;

standing back to back and using their bayonets freely, about one half of

them forced a passage through the archway and rejoined their comrades in

the Plaza de los Perdices.

Meantime in this Plaza General Beresford had had enough to do to

withstand the onset of Liniers and his trained troops, aided by swarms

of militia and armed citizens, who after desperate fighting had

dislodged the British from most of the houses commanding the Plaza, and

now opened a galling fire upon them from the azoteas. Beresford saw that

his only chance lay in holding the fort until succour could reach him

from the squadron. As rapidly as possible he passed his men in at the

gate and raised the drawbridge. Some of the reckless horsemen who had

captured the Plaza Mayor dashed after him as he retreated, but the fire

of the guns on the parade ground quickly drove them back again to the

shelter of the Recoba Vieja.

Liniers lost no time in bringing up all his guns, and covered the

azoteas around the Plaza with infantry. For two hours the firing was

kept up on both sides, but with little result, when Beresford showed a

flag of truce, and the firing ceased. But Liniers refused to enter into

any negotiation with him, calling upon him to surrender at discretion.

While Beresford hesitated the troops and levies of all arms poured into

the Plaza, hundreds of them sprang into the ditch of the fort, and

clamoured for an immediate assault. Then the British flag was hauled

down from the flag-staff, the Spanish flag was run up in its stead, the

gate opened, the drawbridge was lowered, and General Beresford walked

out alone to deliver up his sword to Liniers in token of surrender.

Liniers putting aside the proffered sword opened his arms and clasped

him to his breast, the air was rent with the acclamations of the

multitude, and the British troops drawn up within the fort grounded arms

in silence.

The loss of the British in this affair was 400, between killed and

wounded; that of the victors is variously estimated, but must have been

at least the same number.

BOOK II

THE PROWESS OF A YOUNG GIANT

PROLOGUE

The first tottering steps of a child, held up by the hands of its nurse,

are not strictly speaking steps at all, they consist of a series of

kicks with the heels upon the floor, and are in no way conducive to

progression. The day that the child first stands alone, the day he first

successfully balances his weight upon his feet unaided, is an epoch in

his history. Once having learned the strength of his limbs, to use them

and to walk is a necessary sequence.

The flight of the Viceroy Sobremonte, the rout of the Spanish troops,

left the people of Buenos Aires alone in face of the enemy. They armed

themselves, they chose their own leader, they turned upon the enemy and

crushed him.

Buenos Aires was no longer a servile dependant upon Spain; in her hour

of trial she had triumphed by her own strength, the trial and the

triumph taught her what she knew not before, they taught her that she

could stand alone. Having learnt that she could stand alone, she essayed

to walk.

Sobremonte had fled to the provinces, he returned with an army, but

Buenos Aires knew him not and had already rulers of her own. The city

called together a "Congress of Notables"; of these "Notables" only

one-fourth were natives, but the Congress acted under the eyes of the

people and obeyed their behests. The leader chosen by the people in

their hour of trial was again chosen by them in their hour of triumph,

and entrusted with the task of forming their rude levies into an army.

Liniers, though he had no such title, became virtually the dictator of

Buenos Aires, and Buenos Aires prepared herself to renew the struggle

with Great Britain, looking no longer to Spain for protection but

trusting in her own strength.

CHAPTER I

AT THE QUINTA DE PONCE

About three leagues from Buenos Aires, and about half-a-mile to the west

of the great southern road which led to the Guardia Chascomus, stood the

Quinta de Ponce. The house was a small one with a sloping roof of tiles

and with a verandah running round three sides of it. There were also

three smaller houses detached, built of mud and wattle, with thatched

roofs. The ground belonging to the quinta was fenced in and carefully

cultivated, all round the fence ran a double row of poplars, and many

other trees grew about in clumps. The house stood at one corner of the

quinta, some twenty yards away from the fence; all about that corner the

ground was laid out as a garden, where flowers grew in wild luxuriance.

Within the house was furnished with great simplicity; numerous doors and

windows shaded by green jalousies provided for ample ventilation; the

verandah and the many trees which grew around it protected it from the

glare of the summer sun. It was well adapted for a summer residence, and

had been built for that object by Don Roderigo Ponce de Leon, whose

family regularly spent there the hot months of the year.

A cluster of similar quintas on a smaller scale stood around the Quinta

de Ponce, divided from each other by roads bordered by poplars. Beyond

these quintas on every side was open pasture-land, stretching away to

the southward in long undulations, dotted here and there by the lonely,

treeless house of some native "hacendado." To the north the towers and

domes of Buenos Aires could be seen marking themselves clearly out on

the horizon, to the south-east at a nearer distance the sun-rays were

reflected from the white-walled houses of the small town of Quilmes.

This group of quintas formed a sort of oasis, on which the traveller,

bound on some far journey into the depths of the treeless Pampa, looked

back with a sort of tender gratitude as he passed by, it was his last

glimpse of the world of men as he galloped on towards the world of

Nature.

It was a sultry evening towards the end of November, the sun had sunk

behind a dense bank of clouds on the horizon; though the sky overhead

was yet clear there was evidently a storm brewing somewhere, but the

weather occasioned no inquietude to three persons who were sitting under

the front verandah of the Quinta de Ponce. These three were Doña

Constancia, the wife of Don Roderigo, Dolores his daughter, and

Lieutenant Gordon of the 71st Highlanders, who had been their guest

since the preceding 12th August--their guest, but at the same time a

prisoner of war.

When Marcelino had found, after the fighting ceased that day, that

Gordon's wound was not mortal he had him carried at once to his father's

house, where under the care of the surgeon of his own regiment he

rapidly recovered, but still remained there as a guest, and when in the

spring the family left town for the quinta he went with them, hoping in

the fresh country air soon to regain his former strength and activity.

Marcelino and he were fast friends, and with all the household he soon

became a favourite. Lounging there in an easy-chair under the verandah

he did not look like a prisoner of war, nor did he feel like one either,

talking gaily with the two ladies who were his companions.

Doña Constancia had an embroidery-frame before her, but her daughter

seemed to have nothing particular to do, as she sat on a low stool

beside her, laughing at some absurd mistake in Spanish which Gordon had

just made, for in spite of the best of teaching the young soldier was by

no means yet a proficient in the language of the country. No man could

wish for better teachers than he had. Doña Constancia, tall and stately,

was a model of matronly beauty, and the clear, rich tones of her voice

as she spoke sounded like music to the ear; her daughter, much smaller

in person, and differing greatly from her in features and complexion,

Gordon had already learned to look upon as the fairest specimen of

womankind he had ever met. In voice alone she resembled her mother; it

was the same voice, but much younger, and had a silvery ring in it which

at present amply compensated for the want of depth in tone which could

only come with maturity.

It is said that the most speedy way in which a man can learn a foreign

tongue is to listen to it as spoken by a beautiful woman. Gordon had had

ample opportunity of hearing Spanish so spoken, and already spoke it

himself with considerable fluency, but not with perfect correctness, and

so not unfrequently made ludicrous mistakes, at which Dolores laughed.

Porteña ladies do not generally laugh at the mistakes in language made

by inexperienced foreigners, their innate good-breeding makes them very

tolerant of inaccuracies; but Dolores did laugh at the mistakes made by

Lieutenant Gordon, and her laughter was a sign of the mutual confidence

existing between them. Besides which Dolores was very fond of laughing,

and Gordon liked to hear her laugh, and to see the merriment lighting up

her face and shining in her deep grey eyes, half veiled by the long dark

lashes which fell over them.

"Why do you laugh so much, Dolores?" said Doña Constancia; "I feel sure

that when you try to talk English you make far worse mistakes than Mr

Gordon does in Spanish."

"Indeed she does, Doña Constancia," said Gordon, "fifty times worse."

"And then you laugh at me," said Dolores, still laughing; "and it is

quite right that you should laugh. If you looked grave and dismal, as if

you were some teacher, I should not like it at all, and would never try

to speak a word of English."

"I will laugh as much as you like if you will only set to work to learn

to read English. I found in my trunk to-day a prize that I will give

you as soon as you can read one page of it without making more than

three mistakes."

"A prize! Oh! I will be very good and very diligent; but what is it?"

"It is a book."

"An English book?"

"Yes; it is a novel called 'Evelina.' All the young ladies in England

read it, and in my country too."

"A novel!" said Doña Constancia, somewhat gravely; "I do not wish

Dolores to read novels. I never read a novel."

"You never read a novel, Doña Constancia," said Gordon. "Well to be sure

you have no novels in Spanish, or hardly any other books either, that I

can see."

"Oh yes, we have," said Dolores. "Papa has plenty of books in town.

Marcelino is always reading them, and is always wanting me to read with

him. I used to try just to please him, but oh! I used to get so tired.

Long, prosy tales about people that I never heard of, nor ever want to

hear of; about Cortes and Pizarro, and Boabdil el Chico, and the Duke of

Alva, and the King of Jerusalem, and I don't know how many more.

Marcelino says that they were once all real people, and that I ought to

know what has happened in the world before I was born, but I would

rather read those legends of the saints that Padre Jacinto lends me

sometimes, though Marcelino tells me that they are all false. Padre

Jacinto was very angry with him for telling me that, but Marcelino knows

more than Padre Jacinto does."

"Those legends are sanctioned by the Church, Lola," said Doña

Constancia, "and so it is very right that you should read them, but you

have no need to tell Padre Jacinto what Marcelino says about them."

"Or about him either," said Dolores. "Marcelino says that if he had a

house of his own he would never allow a padre to come inside his doors."

"Those are the French ideas that Marcelino has learnt from Don Carlos

Evaña," said Doña Constancia sadly. "He will learn better some day."

"But nearly all the young men who are at all clever have just the same

ideas, mamma," replied Dolores. "Don Carlos would not speak to a priest,

and used to say all kinds of things about them. Padre Jacinto says that

if they talk that way and never go to Mass they will never go to heaven

when they die, but for my part, if it is only men like Padre Jacinto can

go to heaven, I would rather go--somewhere else with Marcelino."

"Hush, Dolores! you do not know what you are saying," said Doña

Constancia. "It is getting so dark that I can hardly see to work any

longer. Let us walk down the road a little, Marcelino is late this

evening."

"Papa said he would try and come out this evening, so I suppose

Marcelino has waited for him," said Dolores.

Doña Constancia wore an immense tortoise-shell comb at the back of her

head, secured in the thick folds of her luxuriant hair, over this she

threw a light shawl of black lace, the ends of which she brought

forward over her shoulders. This was the "mantilla," a style of

head-dress which suited well the stately beauty and graceful figure of

Doña Constancia. Her daughter threw a similar light shawl over her head,

but she wore no comb, and her hair, arranged in large plaits, formed a

golden background to the interlaced flowers and leaves of black silk

which made up the gossamer-like web which she used as a head-covering.

"If your Padre Jacinto could read English I do not think he would object

to Dolores reading 'Evelina,' Doña Constancia," said Gordon, as they

walked down the road side by side. "My sisters have both read it, and

were delighted with it. In fact the book is a present to me from one of

them."

"But then he cannot read English. What is it about?" asked Dolores.

"It is about a young English lady, who was brought up very quietly in

the country, and describes what she saw and felt in London when she went

there for the first time, and about the balls and theatres she went to."

"I am sure then I might read that," said Dolores. "I should so much like

to know what the young ladies in England are like. Are they at all like

us, Mr Gordon?"

As the lieutenant looked at the fair questioner, he thought that if they

were all like her England would be a very Eden to live in, but he

answered:

"There are of all kinds there, bad and good, as everywhere else, but

they do not dress with so much taste as you do, and when they walk in

the open air they wear hats with feathers in them instead of

'mantillas'; but sometimes they put on most horrible bonnets, which hide

their faces, so that one cannot see what they are like."

"How absurd!" said Dolores. "But are they pretty?"

"Oh yes! There are more pretty girls there than in any other country in

the world."

At this Doña Constancia and Dolores both laughed very heartily.

"You say that with enthusiasm, Mr Gordon," said Doña Constancia.

"I suppose he has good reasons for being enthusiastic," said Dolores.

"Does not your heart beat quicker when you think of them, Mr Gordon?"

"Hardly," replied the lieutenant; "for in spite of all your kindness to

me it reminds me that I am a prisoner of war."

"Do not think of that, you will not be a prisoner always," said Doña

Constancia. "You will be able to go back some day and see the pretty

English girls you think so much of."

"I am very sorry I said that," said Dolores. "But you should not think

you are a prisoner when you are with us. You are our guest, not a

prisoner, and I hope you will stop long enough with us for me to learn

to read 'Evelina,' and then I shall know what the English ladies are

like."

They had reached the end of the road between the poplars, and now stood

for a space gazing over the open plain which stretched before them for

no great distance ere it mingled with the fast-falling shades of night,

appearing to mount upwards, as though it were the slope of some

hillside, and to shut them in within a very near horizon. Lieutenant

Gordon bent his ear to the ground and listened.

"I can hear them," he said; "they will soon be in sight; but there are

more than two of them, and they are galloping very quickly."

"We will stop here, mamma, shall not we? Then they will dismount, and we

will all walk back together," said Dolores.

They waited, and presently the footfalls of horses at a rapid pace could

be heard by them without bending to the ground. Then out of the darkness

appeared four figures, who saw them and drew rein as they came closer.

"Grandpapa and Uncle Gregorio also," said Dolores, clapping her hands.

Two more horsemen came behind, and the first four dismounting gave their

horses in charge to these two, who were peons.

"Your blessing, papa," said Dolores, running up to Don Roderigo, and in

another minute she was in his arms.

"Your blessing, papa," said Doña Constancia, gliding in her usual

stately manner up to Don Gregorio Lopez, who answered a few low words

and kissed her gravely on the forehead.

Then there was more kissing and saluting among the others, Gordon having

his due share of the latter, after which they all turned to walk

together to the house, Don Roderigo leading the way with his wife

leaning on one arm, while his daughter clung to the other talking

eagerly with him. Marcelino, walking beside his mother, conversed with

her in low tones. The other three followed, Don Gregorio the elder

occasionally addressing some complimentary observation to the

lieutenant, but his son walked on beside them in silence.

When they reached the quinta the whole party halted under the front

verandah. The main room of the house, which served both as sala and

dining-room, was brilliantly lighted up and the table laid out for

supper, and the windows and doors being open a flood of light poured

upon them which contrasted somewhat dazzlingly with the darkness from

which they had emerged. The four new-comers all wore light ponchos and

were booted and spurred. Dolores ran inside to see that extra covers

were laid for the unexpected guests, Doña Constancia followed her more

slowly; as she went Gordon saw her turn and gaze wistfully upon him; at

the same time he noticed an unusual gravity upon the faces of the

others, even his fast friend Marcelino seemed anxious not to meet his

eye.

"My friend Gordon," said Don Roderigo, turning abruptly towards him as

his wife disappeared, "I have an unpleasant duty to perform. We have

advices that the British Government on hearing of the capitulation of

Buenos Aires prepared at once to send out a strong reinforcement; the

British fleet yet remains cruising off Monte Video, there is little

doubt that they will make another attempt to take our city. Under these

circumstances the 'Reconquistador'[2] has determined that all our

English prisoners shall be sent into the interior. I have asked for an

exemption for you, and have offered to guarantee your security, but I

can only give that guarantee on one condition: that you pledge me your

word of honour that you will make no attempt to escape, that if your

countrymen land you will hold no communication with them, and that while

you remain with us you will reside wherever I may direct."

Lieutenant Gordon turned pale as he heard this, then flushed crimson,

and as Don Roderigo ceased speaking answered at once:

"I can have only one answer, Don Roderigo," he said. "You have all

treated me with such kindness that I have never felt that I am a

prisoner among you. Your offer to stand guarantee for me is a fresh

kindness, for which I can never be sufficiently grateful. I should be a

scoundrel and a fool to reject it, so I give you my word as you require.

I will make no attempt to escape, and will hold no communication with my

countrymen except through you or with your permission."

"Palabra de Ingles?" said Don Gregorio the younger in a harsh voice.

"The word of a soldier and a gentleman," replied Lieutenant Gordon.

"Then you will continue to be our guest?" said Don Roderigo, grasping

his hand warmly. "You will always take care that either Marcelino or

myself know where you are, and for the present, at least, I will place

no restriction upon your movements; go and come as you please amongst

us."

"I am very glad," said Marcelino, coming forward and embracing him; "I

was afraid you would refuse."

The lieutenant, albeit not much accustomed to embracing, responded

cordially to his caress, and then the elder Don Gregorio took his hand,

saying:

"We will do what we can to make your time as a prisoner pass pleasantly

amongst us. Do you think you are strong enough yet for a gallop? If you

are, I am on my way to one of my estancias, and invite you to accompany

me."

"I shall have great pleasure in going with you, I feel quite strong

again now, and have a great curiosity to see something of your life on

the Pampas, but I have neither saddle nor horse."

"I will find you a saddle," said Marcelino; "as for a horse, that can

always be found. Leave all that to me; we will make a gaucho of you

before we let you go back to your own country."

Marcelino and Lieutenant Gordon had shared one room between them since

they had been living at the quinta. As they retired for the night, so

soon as they were alone together, Gordon seated himself on the side of

his bed and asked his friendly gaoler:

"Why did you think that I would not give my parole to your father?"

"I was afraid you might have thought it your duty to lose no chance of

rejoining your army."

"My parole does not prevent me from doing all I can to procure my

release by exchange; but if you sent me up the country no one would know

anything of me."

"Then when the English come, if they take any officer of ours prisoner

they will give him back for you?"

"Probably so."

"And then you would go back to them and would fight against us?"

Gordon hesitated, looking wistfully at his friend ere he answered:

"I should have to do my duty, but do not let us suppose anything like

that. Have you heard nothing of your friend the Señor Evaña? You told me

you thought he had gone to England."

"No, I have heard nothing from him since I received that letter from

Monte Video that I told you of. If he has gone to England I shall not

hear again from him for months."

"General Beresford has declared publicly that he considers it the true

policy for England to aid you natives in freeing yourselves from Spain."

"Yes, General Beresford has been very incautious, and has no right to

complain that he is now a prisoner at Lujan, instead of being free on

parole in Buenos Aires; many good men are in prison now for listening to

him."

"And you think you are not ready yet for independence?"

"No, we are not. You have met Don Manuel Belgrano at our house in town I

think?"

"A soft-eyed man, with a long nose, and neither beard nor whiskers, who

talks English and French?"

"Yes, that is he. He is now major of the Patricios, and no officer is

more active than he is in drilling the men, or more zealous in urging

all of us to prepare for another struggle with the English. He is no

friend to Spain, yet he says, 'The old master or none at all,' and so

say all of us."

"When Sobremonte comes back the first thing he will do will be to disarm

your militia."

"Disarm the Patricios and Arribeños![3] He had better not try to do

that."

"He will, you will resist it, and then will commence your war of

independence."

"I hope you are not a true prophet; if we strike the blow too soon we

shall fail. As I said before, we are not ripe for independence."

"And so long as the Spaniards rule over you they will take care that you

never do ripen, so that your hope of independence is a dangerous dream."

"Dangerous it may be, but it is no dream," said Marcelino, rising

excitedly to his feet; "I know my own countrymen and I have faith in the

future of my native country. No great work can be performed without

danger; there are heroes amongst us who fear no danger; let the danger

come, they will teach us how to meet them. I tell you, my friend, before

these black hairs of mine have turned grey you will see the rise of a

great Republic on the shores of La Plata."

"In establishing it you will do your share of the work nobly," answered

Gordon. "May God help you, for I believe you have a hard task before

you."

"Do you believe there is a God?" asked Marcelino, reseating himself and

looking steadfastly at his friend.

"I do, as surely as I see you sitting there before me."

"I think there is too; but I do not think that he takes any interest in

the affairs of men."

"That is most illogical," replied Gordon. "In all God's works around us

we see the greatest evidence of care and foresight in preparing this

world for our habitation, how then shall he care nothing for us who are

his chiefest work?"

"I wish I could think as you do. Do you know, one of the first days when

you were ill at our house I went in to look at you, you were delirious,

I thought you would die, and the thought made me very miserable; I would

have done anything to save you and could do nothing. I fell down on my

knees by your side, I don't know why, and I prayed wildly to God that he

would let you live. It is in moments like that that one feels that there

is really a God. When I thought what I was doing I jumped up again to my

feet ashamed of my weak folly, but I went away quite happy for I felt

sure that you would live. Do you think that God would listen to a prayer

addressed to him in that way?"

Tears swam in Gordon's eyes at this new proof of his friend's care for

him.

"Those are just the prayers that God does listen to," he answered. "When

men can do nothing then they feel their dependence upon God and trust

entirely to him. That is simple faith, and is just what God requires of

us."

"Some men would call it superstition," said Marcelino.

"You acknowledge that there is a God, and you know that he must be

infinitely greater and more powerful than you are, therefore to trust in

him is no superstition. To trust in dead men or in ceremonies of man's

devising, that is superstition."

"Who shall mark the line between faith and superstition?" asked

Marcelino.

"It is impossible to do it, for it is a purely mental line in the mind

of each individual. I know Protestants in my own country who carry their

horror of ceremonies to such an extent that their worship of God can

hardly be considered as worship at all, yet many of them are most

fearfully superstitious; and I believe there are good Christians among

you who go through all the ceremonies of the Romish Church, whose faith

is very slightly tainted with superstition. Yet faith and superstition

are quite distinct from one another."

"But your religion is all taken from your Bible, which is a bundle of

old books written by the Lord knows who or when. Does it teach you

anything about faith?"

"The one lesson which the Bible teaches is simple faith, the rest is

mainly historical."

"Some day I will read the Bible, I have one somewhere, Evaña brought it

for me from England as a curiosity," said Marcelino. "I should like to

know more about this faith you tell me of. If the Bible is really a

message from God, as some people say it is, everyone ought to read it.

If religion is faith in God, then it is a study fit for men and may well

be the guiding principle of a man's life."

[2] A complimentary title given by the people to General Liniers

after the victory of the 12th August.

[3] One of the first measures adopted by General Liniers on assuming

the command in Buenos Aires, was to organise the native militia

into four battalions of infantry. The first and second battalions

were composed of Creoles of Spanish descent, the third was

composed of negroes and mulattoes, all natives of Buenos Aires;

these three battalions formed the regiment of the "Patricios."

The fourth battalion was composed of provincials and was known as

the "Arribeño" regiment.