Page:Letters from the Battle-fields of Paraguay (1870).djvu/436



LETTEE XXII.

RETURN TO BUENOS AIRES. THE CONSPIRACY.— THE

"atrocities of LOPEZ."

Buenos Aires, September 20, 1868.

My dear Z ,

Nothing remained for me after my short but most interesting visit but to run down south and to await the course of events, incertus quo fata f event. A single day sufficed for the forty-two leagues between S. Fernando and Corrientes; and a week or so at the latter afforded me a trip to the mysterious Gran Chaco. The old city was a return to civilization after a fashion,, and once more my ear was regaled with the cry of the gallo, and tortured by certain "solos and snatches of song " happily unknown to camp.

From Corrientes I embarked upon the Argentine steamer Proveedor, paying Ql. IQs. for a two days' run. Concurrence on Thursdays reduces this to half-price, whereas we Sunday travellers were charged double. The diet was the usual thing, macaroni soup without Parmesan, the eternal pu- chero, caoutchouc-like mutton, peas fit for revolver balls, mangled fowl, and hard stringy salad. I deeply regretted the succulent feeds of the 17. An awful man of dignity was the skipper, and even the unwashed purser was a swell whose smile was a matter of favour. The ship went well, but our lives were literally in the hands of the drunken sots that drove her, and who passed their time draining the bottle or dancing bear-like to the colic-causing strains of travelling Italian zampognari.


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You might have been spared this letter had Lieutenant-