FOOTNOTES:

[12] See annexed plate, copied from the original in the account published by Ulric Schmidel, a volunteer under Mendoza, and one of the garrison besieged by the Querandis.

CHAPTER IV.
POPULATION OF BUENOS AYRES.

Statistics of the Population. Its great increase in the last fifty years. Castes into which it was formerly divided now disappearing. Numbers of Foreigners established there, especially British. Their influence on the habits of the Natives. The Ladies of Buenos Ayres; the Men and their occupations.

In the year 1767, when M. de Bougainville visited Buenos Ayres, he tells us that the number of the inhabitants did not exceed 20,000.

In 1778, the year in which the port was partially thrown open under the free-trade regulations of Spain, as they were called, a census was taken, by which it appears that the inhabitants of the city and of its campaña, or country jurisdiction, amounted to 37,679 souls, of which 24,205 belonged to the city, 12,925 to the country, and 549 were members of religious communities; divided as follows, viz.:—

Colour.City.Country.
Males.Females.Total.Males.Females.Total.
1, Spaniards and Creoles7,8217,89815,7195,0084,7249,732
2, Indians2762685448417021,543
3, Mestizoes289385674......
4, Mulattoes1,3661,7873,1535714491,020
5, Negroes1,9332,1824,115351279630
Total11,68512,52024,2056,7716,15412,925
Summary.
Population of the city 24,205
Population of the country 12,925
Ecclesiastical establishments 549
Total 37,679

To these numbers, however, some, and not an inconsiderable, addition should be made for short returns, particularly from the country districts; for, let it be borne in mind, in examining all such official estimates of the population of the Spanish colonies, that, as any attempt on the part of the authorities to take a census was sure to be regarded as the forerunner of some new exaction for the service of the mother country, so it was as certain to be evaded, especially by the lower orders of the people, and, in proportion, to fall short of the reality. In this census it does not appear that the military were included, but in that year, or the preceding one, no less than 10,000 men were sent out from Spain under the command of the Viceroy Cevallos, in addition to the ordinary forces, to carry on the war with the Portuguese: a great part of them it may be assumed never returned, and should therefore be added to the numbers of the colonists. Making, then, a fair allowance for these deficiencies in the census for 1778, the population at that time probably did not fall short of 50,000 souls; and this calculation may be rather under than over the truth.

In 1789, ten years afterwards, Helms, the German traveller, on his way to Peru, was told by the Viceroy at Buenos Ayres that the city contained between 24,000 and 30,000 inhabitants, a calculation probably founded on the census of 1778, with his own vague notion of the probable increase upon it in the interim. No mention is made by him of the population of the country.

In 1795 the Viceroy Aredondo, on delivering up the government to his successor, took occasion to allude to the great increase which had taken place in the population since the opening of the trade, and spoke of it as then amounting altogether to nearly 60,000 souls.

In 1800 Azara calculated it to be 71,668, estimating 40,000 for the city, and 31,668 for the country-towns and villages within its jurisdiction—a great increase since 1778, compared with the past, which can only be ascribed to the more liberal policy adopted by Spain, and to the extraordinary impulse thereby given to the colony. This, however, was but an indication of the further results to be anticipated from the removal of those remaining restrictions which still grievously hampered the energies of the community, and retarded the development of the capabilities of a country formed by nature to be a great commercial emporium. The British invasions in 1806 and 1807 awakened the Buenos Ayreans to a sense of their own political importance, and the subsequent struggle with the mother country for their independence opened their ports to all the world; and in nothing are the consequences more strikingly exemplified than in the extraordinary increase which since that epoch has taken place in the population, notwithstanding all the waste of war in all its forms, foreign and civil, by land and by sea.

The following Tables of the Marriages, Births, and Deaths in the city and country districts of the province for 1822, 1823, 1824, and 1825, are taken from data published under the authority of the Government; and the calculations founded upon them give the most correct idea to be procured of the extent of the population up to the close of 1825.

No. 1.—MARRIAGES.
City.Country.
1822.1823.1824.1825.1822.1823.1824.1825.
1. Whites331366357393602547513549
2. Free Coloured People1208811913581868162
3. Slaves1301121077140594841
Total581566583599723683642652
No. 2.—BAPTISMS.
City.Country.
1822.1823.1824.1825.1822.1823.1824.1825.
1.Whites19622110216321022703267225342735
2.People of Colour748816835793498532498399
Total27102926299828953201320430323134
No. 3.—DEATHS.
City.Country.
1822.1823.1824.1825.1822.1823.1824.1825.
1.Whites14481927149818121463180114461392
2.Free Coloured People591846714895350364333252
3.Slaves1141451149852749047
Total21532918232628051865223918691691
Summary.
1822182318241825
TotalMarriages1305124912251251
" Baptisms5911613060306029
" Deaths4018515741954496
Excess of Births over Deaths189397318351533

Thus it appears that the proportion of births to deaths is in the ratio of about four to three: amongst the coloured population, the births are very little more than equal to the deaths; in the city they fall much short of them; the increase, therefore, is on the white stock. The births to the marriages appear to be as nearly five to one.

The Statistical Register of Buenos Ayres assumes the annual measure of mortality to be one in thirty-two in the city, and one in forty in the country; and, taking the average of the results for 1822 and 1823, arrives at the conclusion that the inhabitants of the city amounted, at the commencement of 1824, to 81,136, and those of the country to 82,080, making in all a population of 163,216. If we calculate, according to the same rule, the mean of the results of the bills of mortality for the four years ending with 1825, it will give us a population for the city of 81,616 persons, and for the country districts of 76,640, in all of 158,256, at the close of 1825; about 5000 less than the estimate made in the Register two years before, the falling off being in the country: but this is at once accounted for by the recruiting which took place in 1825 for the war with Brazil, which must have taken off a much larger number: allowing for which, I think we may fairly assume that the total population of the city and province of Buenos Ayres at the close of that year was not far short of 165,000 souls, being, as nearly as we have the means of calculating, about double what it was twenty years before. At the time I am writing, ten years afterwards, I have not a doubt that it amounts to nearly 200,000[13].

As an additional exemplification of the increase which has taken place in the population since the time of M. de Bougainville, I annex a plan of the city, showing what were its limits in his time, and what has been added since.

From the numbers let us turn to the general composition of this population.

The census of 1778 divided it into five castes.

1. The Spaniards and their descendants born in America, generally known as Creoles.

2. The native Indians.

3. The Mestizoes—offspring of the Spaniard and Indian.

4. The Mulattoes—offspring of the Spaniard and Negro.

5. The Negroes or Africans born.

Of these five castes, however, the Indians and their Mestizo offspring formed a very small and insignificant proportion, and can only be regarded as accidentally domiciliated at Buenos Ayres in consequence of its being at that time the principal channel of communication between Peru, their proper soil, and Spain.

The City of BUENOS AYRES, in 1767 (tinted thus ■) and in 1825, (blank).

The original Indians of Buenos Ayres were a hostile race, who would hold no intercourse with their conquerors. No mixture, therefore, of Spanish and native blood took place in that particular part of South America, which could produce a distinct caste, as in the Upper Provinces and in Peru, where the more peaceable and domesticated inhabitants continue to the present day to constitute the main stock of the population. In those parts we see a striking difference in the people; the further we advance into the interior, the more scarce become the white in proportion to the coloured inhabitants. The aboriginal Indian blood decidedly predominates in the Mestizo castes, whilst the negro and his Mulatto descendants, so common on the coast, are there almost unknown. The cause of this is easily explained; for a long period very few European women reached the interior of America: the Spaniards, therefore, who settled there, were under the necessity of mixing with the natives, from which connexion has arisen that numerous race, the Mestizoes, which forms so large a part of the present population of those countries. The same difficulty in transporting their women from Europe did not occur with respect to Buenos Ayres; there the European stock was easily kept up, though for a long period it increased but slowly; and, but for the adventitious circumstance of its having been for some years a depôt for the slave-trade, under the Asiento Treaties, the population of Buenos Ayres would have been nearly free from be seen that the Indian and Mestizo no longer appear: the division made is simply into the white and the coloured population; and, although the latter still at that time amounted to nearly a fourth part of the whole, it had ceased to increase. In the four years the births barely exceeded the deaths, and whilst the proportion of deaths amongst the coloured people increased, there was a striking falling off in the number of their marriages and births, even from 1822 to 1825. The slave-trade has in fact, been prohibited since 1813, by a decree of the Constituent Assembly, consequently any further supply from the Negro stock has ceased, and it cannot be very long ere all trace of its having ever existed must be merged in the rapid increase of the whites—a result which will be greatly accelerated by the introduction of fresh settlers from Europe, who are daily arriving and domiciliating themselves in the new republic. Of the extent of this some notion may be formed when I state that the number of foreigners, who, up to 1832, had fixed themselves in the city and province of Buenos Ayres, amounted, with their wives and children, to no less than from 15,000 to 20,000 persons. Of these, about two-thirds were British and French, in about equal proportions; the remainder was made up of Italians, Germans, and people of other countries, not the least numerous of whom were emigrants from the United States, and especially from New York.

As it may interest some of my readers to know what classes of our countrymen find employment at Buenos Ayres, I have given in the Appendix an account of them, as taken from a register which I established on my own arrival there, together with the marriages, births, and deaths amongst them, as far as they could be learned for the period stated: to these I have further added a copy of the Treaty I concluded with the Government of Buenos Ayres, in 1825, securing to His Majesty's subjects in that country many important privileges, and amongst the rest the free exercise of their own religion:—a great object to so numerous a community:—I had subsequently the satisfaction of seeing it fully carried out by the erection of an English church, capable of containing 1000 persons, towards which the Buenos Ayrean Government itself contributed, by giving a valuable plot of ground for the purpose:—His Majesty's Government appointed the chaplain, and regularly defrays one half of the annual expense, the British residents paying the remainder. A Presbyterian chapel has been since built in virtue of the same privilege by the Scotch part of the community; and for the Catholics, an Irish priest is allowed to do duty in one of the national churches.

In a population so intermixed, and in such daily communication with the people of other countries, it is not surprising that national peculiarities should have very nearly disappeared. Thus the men of the better classes in Buenos Ayres are hardly to be distinguished in their dress from the French and English merchants who have fixed themselves amongst them, whilst the ladies vie with each other in imitating the last fashions from Paris: it is only in their out-door costume that any difference is apparent; then the more becoming mantilla and shawl thrown over the head and shoulders supersede the European bonnet and pelisse. Some of them are very beautiful, and their polite and obliging manners, especially to strangers, render them doubly attractive. Our countrymen have formed many matrimonial connexions with them, which has contributed, no doubt, to the good feeling with which they are so generally regarded by the natives.

Education, it is true, has not as yet made great progress amongst them, but in this improvement is taking place, and if the young ladles of Buenos Ayres do not study history and geography, they are adepts in many pleasing accomplishments; they dance with great grace, and sing and play very prettily; the piano-forte, indeed, is a constant resource morning as well as evening in every respectable house.

Amongst the men there are native poets, whose productions do honour to the Spanish language. A collection of them, called La Lira Argentina, was printed in 1823, which is well worth the notice of all lovers of Spanish verse. But the men have more advantages as respects education than the ladies: in their schools and universities they are now very fairly grounded in most branches of general knowledge, and of late years it has been much the custom amongst the better families to send their sons to Europe to complete their studies.

I should say of them in general that they are observing and intelligent, and extremely desirous to improve themselves.

Their ordinary habits are certainly a good deal influenced by climate: I cannot speak of them as an industrious people, and yet it is rare to see a man who has not some nominal occupation.

From the number of doctores, a stranger might suppose that all the upper classes were lawyers or physicians. This is not exactly the case; but, as that degree serves to mark the man who has received a liberal education, it is generally taken by those who pass through the schools, without particular reference to their future calling. Thus I have known doctores in all pursuits—ministers of state, employés of all sorts, clerks in public offices, military officers, and merchants; all attaching to it the same importance as we do, perhaps with less right, to the ordinary title of esquire as the designation of a gentleman.

Law and physic, however, do give employment to revolution in this, as in other Catholic countries, has put an end to the unconstitutional influence exercised by them in old times, and under different circumstances: the Government having taken possession of the ecclesiastical property, the officiating priests are left to depend upon a stipend, in general barely sufficient for their decent maintenance, so that there is but small inducement left for men to devote themselves to a life of celibacy.

But it is the trade and commerce of Buenos Ayres which is the great source of occupation for its extensive population; since, though the importing and exporting part of the business may be chiefly carried on by the foreign merchants, the details are for the most part left to the natives: they collect, and prepare, and bring in for sale, all the produce of the country, and retail the goods imported from foreign countries: nor is it thought at all degrading for young men of the best connexions to stand behind a counter: there they gossip with their fair customers upon a perfect equality, and in dandyism a Buenos Ayrean shopkeeper may be backed against the smartest man-milliner of London or Paris.

The mechanics and artisans form also a large class, as may be supposed, in a country where everything is wanted, and no man feels inclined to do much; it is in this line that the European has so decided an advantage over the native from his more industrious habits; for he requires no siesta, and works whilst the natives of all classes, high and low, are asleep: he cannot fail to prosper if he will but avoid the drinking-shops; but he must be resolute on that point, for it is a temptation which he finds at the corner of every street: no less than 600 pulperias are open in the city alone, as appears by the list of licences annually taken out at the police[14].

For everyone who will work there is employment, and as to real want, it can hardly exist in a country where beef is dear at a halfpenny a-pound, and where the generality of the lower orders want nothing else.