Page:Civilization and barbarism (1868).djvu/240

196 Ayres. Those who have since seen him triumphing in every direction, can judge if he was very presuming to take this conquest for granted. We might chime in with the moralists who so often attribute the fall of empires to the merest accidents; but if it was an accident to catch a great general with a lasso, it was not accidental that the men who did it should have used such means, being as they were of true gaucho nature, though converted into a political element.

Facundo, having so cruelly revenged the death of General Villafañe, marched upon San Juan to prepare an expedition against Tucuman, where the army had retired after the loss of its general had destroyed all hope of accomplishing anything. On his arrival, all the Federal citizens went out to receive him as they had done in 1827; but Facundo was not fond of repetitions. He therefore sent one company in advance of the assembled citizens, and another behind them; then entered the city himself by a different route, leaving his officious hosts prisoners in the street, where they passed the whole day and night, lying down among the horses' feet if overpowered with sleep.

When he reached the public square, he stopped his carriage, put an end to the noise of the bells, and ordered all the furniture of the house provided for him by the city, to be thrown into the street, carpets, curtains, chairs, tables, mirrors, all heaped in confusion in the middle of the square; nor would he go in until sure that nothing remained but the bare walls, a little table, a single chair, and a bed. While this was going on, he called a child who was passing by his carriage, and asked him what his name was, and when he