In previous chapters I have expressed my feelings of surprise and disappointment at the unlooked-for dulness of the so-called “Paris of South America.” Never shall I forget the deadness of our first night in Buenos Ayres—a deadness that struck us like a nipping wind, chilling to the bone all hope of bright and entertaining evenings. It was an impression which the succeeding months, when we maintained a hungry and pathetic quest for social interest, did but little to remove. Perhaps it was due in some degree to the grossly exaggerated and misleading pictures of the city spread abroad by writers more intent on flattery and official patronage than on the simple narration of the truth. Almost alone among the many who have written on the life of Buenos Ayres, M. Jules Huret has ventured to hint at the appalling dulness of the social life and the lack of interest, especially for those of the younger generation.
The most vital factor in determining the social life of any community is, perhaps, the position of the womenfolk. In this respect, there is probably no city in the world on which so much has been written, yet concerning which the untravelled reader entertains more erroneous ideas. For this we have chiefly to thank the sensational journalism of Europe and North America, which, on the flimsiest of bases, has built up in the public mind the conception of Buenos Ayres as the metropolis of Vice, the world’s mart of the White Slave Traffic. Bearing in mind much of what has been written on this unsavoury topic, and more that is circulated world-wide in irresponsible gossip, the visitor might expect to find the outward conditions of New York, London and Paris reproduced on a many-times magnified scale. Nothing could be further from the truth. There are no large cities that I have visited in Europe or North America,—and I have visited most of them—outwardly so free of social offence as Buenos Ayres and the other great cities of South America. By comparison, New York, Chicago, New Orleans, even Washington and Philadelphia, would seem sinks of iniquity. Go to the races at Palermo, visit any theatre in Buenos Ayres, with two or perhaps three exceptions, dine at any of the few restaurants where a good meal is obtainable, wander the streets at any hour of the day or night, and you will never have a moment’s embarrassment from the social pest which obtrudes itself so flauntingly in New York or London. This is one of the few things they regulate better in Buenos Ayres. All places of public resort are barred to the demi-mondaine, and as she is officially known, this makes for a certain surface cleanliness of society, which is doubtless a delusion so far as the essential morals of the people are concerned, and may be written down an organised hypocrisy, but the outward evidences are as stated and not otherwise.
Furthermore, I know of no cleaner journalism than that of South America. Even the papers of the Anglo-Saxon world compare unfavourably in this respect; yes, those we deem highly “respectable”! One might expect to find among a Latin people something of the Continental levity in the treatment of this subject, but for propriety and sobriety, I do not believe it would be possible to better the journals, even of the lighter class, which are published in Buenos Ayres. They are almost absurdly respectable; the result, it may be, of a very obvious lack of humour in the people. A further consideration is the intense devotion of the Argentine to family life, and to family life of an almost Moorish exclusiveness, so that, with very few exceptions, almost any publication issuing in Buenos Ayres may safely pass from the hands of the parents into those of the youngest children.
This will be something of a revelation to many of my readers, but when I come to deal with “The Argentine at Home,” the factors which make for this outward cleanliness of social life will become apparent.
On the other hand, the position of the Argentine woman, which so vitally affects the social life of the country, corresponds in no way to Anglo-Saxon notions, and explains much of the dulness, artificiality, and insincerity it is my immediate business to describe. I remember very well reading in the pages of M. Huret’s admirable work Del Plata á la Cordillera de los Andes:
An Argentine assured me that, on meeting in the street a lady whom he had known in his youth, and whom he is entitled to address familiarly (á la cual tutea), he is careful not to stop and speak to her, lest in doing so he might compromise the lady.
Indeed, this Argentine informed the French writer that in such a case he preferred not to notice the lady at all, but to look away from her! Here, surely, is a suggestive fact. The statement seemed to me so remarkable that I raised the point with various Argentines, and always had it confirmed, one gentleman assuring me that he would not even go so far as to pause for a moment to speak in the street with his sister-in-law if she were unaccompanied. He thought it was an extremely foolish social custom but considered it was one to which every gentleman was bound to conform.
Marble Fountain in the Gardens of the Paseo Colón.
