VOYAGE TO MONTE VIDEO.
The general conclusion, which seems to be fully established, is that the southern hemisphere is not colder than the northern, and that all arguments based upon an opposite assumption must be set aside.
Among the passengers on board the Iberia were a large proportion of ladies and children, the families of English merchants settled in Chili. They had been miserable enough during the three or four days before entering the Straits. The weather had been very severe, and, large as is the vessel, heavy seas constantly broke over her upper deck, so that even the most adventurous were confined to the cabins, very many to their berths. The change to quiet waters and brighter skies acted like a charm, and the spirits of the passengers rose even more than the barometer. The children naturally became irrepressible, and left not a quiet corner in the whole ship. Having first invaded the smoking-cabin and made it the chief depôt for their toys and games, they next took possession of a small tent rigged up on the upper deck, to which the ejected smokers had retired. There are moments in such a voyage when one thinks that half a gale of wind with a cross sea would not be altogether unwelcome.
If such a perverse wish did arise in any breast, it was certainly disappointed. The voyage to Monte Video was uneventful, and offered little of special interest, but the weather was throughout fine. On the second day we met a slight breeze from the north, causing a decided rise of temperature and a fall of the barometer, but only a few drops of rain fell; and then, after returning to the normal temperature, the thermometer rose steadily as we advanced daily about four degrees of latitude. It may be worth while to give the following extract from my notes, observing that on board ship temperature observations are merely rough approximations. Those best admitting comparison are made about a quarter of an hour after sunset, the precise hour, of course, varying with the latitude, of which I give only a rough estimate.
| Date. | Time. | Latitude. | Barometer. | Thermometer (Fahr.). |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 16 | Sunset | 52° 30′ | 30·06 in. | 37·5° |
| ” 17 | Noon | 50° | 29·68 ” | 48·5° |
| Sunset | 29·70 ” | 48·0° | ||
| ” 18 | Noon | 46° | 29·90 ” | 50·5° |
| Sunset | 29·90 ” | 45·2° | ||
| ” 19 | 9 a.m. | 29·90 ” | 52·0° | |
| Noon | 42° | 29·86 ” | ||
| Sunset | 29·88 ” | 48·0° | ||
| ” 20 | 10 a.m. | 38° 20′ | 29·88 ” | |
| Sunset | 29·83 ” | 54·0° |
Favoured by clear weather, we occasionally had glimpses of projecting headlands on the Patagonian coast, and especially on the 19th, when we made out the promontory of San José on the south side of the wide and deep Bay of San Matias, and later in the same day sighted some hills on the north side of the same gulf near the mouth of the Rio Colorado, the chief of Patagonian rivers.[37] As far as I could discern, the sea-birds that approached the ship were the same species which had visited us on the Pacific coast, cape pigeons being as before the most numerous and persevering.
ESTUARY OF LA PLATA.
At sunrise on the shortest day we were approaching the city of Monte Video. Covering a hill some three hundred feet in height, and spreading along the shore at its base, the town presents a rather imposing aspect. It looks over the opening of the vast estuary of La Plata, fully sixty miles wide, into which the great rivers of the southern half of the continent discharge themselves. From the detritus borne down by these streams the vast plains that occupy the larger part of the Argentine territory have been formed in recent geological times, but the alluvial deposits have not yet filled up the gulf that receives the two great streams of the Paranà and the Uruguay. It would seem, however, that that consummation is rapidly approaching. Extensive banks, reaching nearly to the surface at low water, occupy large portions of the great estuary, and the navigable channel is so shallow that large ships are forced to anchor twelve or fourteen miles below Buenos Ayres, and even at Monte Video cannot approach nearer than two miles from the landing-place.
A small steam-tender came off to convey passengers to the city, and, with very little delay at the custom-house, I proceeded to the Hotel de la Paix, a French house, to which I was recommended. In spite of the irregularity of the ground, the city is laid out on the favourite Spanish chess-board plan, in quadras of nearly equal size. The main streets run parallel to the shore, and, being nearly level, are well supplied with tramcars; but the cross streets are mostly steep and badly paved. The flat roofs of the houses, enjoying a wide sea-view, are the favourite resort of the inmates in fine weather, and many of them have a mirador, roofed in and windowed on all sides, whence idle people may enjoy the view sheltered from sun or rain. A stranger is at once struck by one marked difference between the towns on the Atlantic coast and those on the western side of South America. Here people live free from the constant dread of earthquakes, and do not shrink from making their town houses as high as may be convenient; but the towns become more crowded, and one misses the charming patios of the better houses of Santiago and Lima.
To a traveller fresh from Peru and Chili and Western Patagonia, the region which I now entered, with its boundless spaces of plain and its huge rivers, appears by comparison tame and unattractive to the lover of nature. It is true that the industrial development of the last quarter of a century has been almost as rapid here as in the great republic of North America. The great plains are now traversed by numerous lines of railway, and steamers ply on the greater rivers and several of their tributaries. A naturalist may now accomplish in a few weeks, and at a trifling cost, expeditions that formerly demanded years of laborious travel. The southern slopes of the Bolivian Andes, stretching into the Argentine States of Salta, Oran, and Jujuy, are easily reached by the railway to Tucuman; and yet easier is the journey by the Paraguay river steamers that carry him over seventeen hundred miles of waterway to Cuyabà, in Central Brazil, the chief town of the great province of Matto Grosso. But the time at my disposal was strictly limited, and the coming glories of Brazil haunted my imagination, so that I had no difficulty in deciding to make but a brief halt in this part of the continent, limiting myself to a short excursion on the river Uruguay and a glimpse of Buenos Ayres.