Sugar, coffee, and sweetmeats, are supplied from Rio de Janeiro and other parts of the Brazilian coasts by small traders. Some articles of jewellery are also brought from thence, and the returns are made in dollars, hides, and tallow, which are forwarded generally to Europe.
The inhabitants were by no means opulent before the English took the garrison, but through the misfortunes of the latter at Buenos Ayres, and the losses of our commercial adventurers by ill-judged and imprudent speculations, they were considerably enriched. The great prospects indulged in England, before the expedition to the Plata, of immense profits by trade to that river, have generally ended in ruin; very few, indeed, of the speculators have escaped without considerable loss. Property, once litigated, might be considered in a fair way for confiscation; and in case of its having been deposited until certain questions were decided, restitution was generally obtained at the loss of one half. It frequently happened that goods detained in the Custom-houses, or lodged in private stores in the river, were opened, and large quantities stolen. The party on whom suspicion seemed most reasonably to fall was the consignee, who, even with a few cargoes, was generally observed to get rich very rapidly. Not contented with the profits accruing from his commission, he seldom scrupled to take every advantage which possession of the property afforded him, to further his own interests at the expence of his correspondent. The dread of a legal process could be but a slight check upon him, for in the Spanish courts of justice, as well as in others, a native and a stranger are seldom upon equal terms. Other circumstances have occurred to enrich the inhabitants of Monte Video. It is a fact, which I afterwards ascertained, that the English exported thither, goods to the amount of a million and a half sterling, a small portion of which, on the restoration of the place to the Spaniards, was re-shipped for the Cape of Good Hope and the West Indies; the remainder was for the most part sacrificed at whatever price the Spaniards chose to give. As their own produce advanced in proportion as our’s lowered in price, those among them who speculated gained considerably. The holders of English goods sold their stock at upwards of fifty per cent. profit immediately after the evacuation of the place.
The climate of Monte Video is humid. The weather, in the winter months (June, July, and August), is at times boisterous, and the air in that season is generally keen and piercing. In summer the serenity of the atmosphere is frequently interrupted by tremendous thunder-storms, preceded by dreadful lightning, which frequently damages the shipping, and followed by heavy rain, which sometimes destroys the harvest. The heat is troublesome, and is rendered more so to strangers by the swarms of mosquitoes, which it engenders in such numbers that they infest every apartment.
The town stands on a basis of granite, the feldspar of which is for the most part of an opaque milk-white color, in a decomposing state; in some places it is found of a flesh-red color and crystallized. The mica is generally large and foliated, in many places imperfectly crystallized. It is obvious that the excessive quantity of mud in the harbour and throughout the banks of the river cannot have been formed from this stratum. The high mount on the opposite side of the bay, which is crowned with a Light-house, and gives name to the town, is principally composed of clay-slate, in laminæ perpendicular to the horizon. This substance appears much like basalt in texture, but its fracture is less conchoidal; it decomposes into an imperfect species of wacké, and ultimately into ferruginous clay, from beds of which water is observed to flow in various parts of the mountain.
The vicinity of Monte Video is agreeably diversified with low gently sloping hills, and long valleys watered by beautiful rivulets; but the prospects they afford are rarely enlivened by traces of cultivation; few enclosures are seen except the gardens of the principal merchants. The same defect appears in a north-east direction from the town, where similar varieties of hill, valley, and water prevail, and seem to want only the embellishment of sylvan scenery to complete the landscape. Some wood, indeed, grows on the margin of the Riachuelo, which is used for the building of hovels and for fuel. There is a pleasant stream about ten leagues from Monte Video, called the Louza, the banks of which seem to invite the labor of the planter, and would certainly produce abundance of timber[2]. It is to be remarked that the almost entire want of this article here, occasions great inconvenience and expense: wood for mechanical purposes is extremely scarce, and planks are so dear that hardly one house with a boarded floor is to be found.
In this vicinity the farms are of great extent; few are so small as six miles in length, by a league in width. Such is the scarcity of wood, that the land-marks, when not already designated by nature in a chain of hills, a rivulet, or a valley, are made by ranges of stones of a peculiar form. The quintas (or farms owned by gentlemen), with the country houses built upon them, as rural retreats for their proprietors, resident in Monte Video, were extremely pleasant and agreeable; the gardens were full of fine flowers and fruits, and every thing about these establishments indicated so much peace, harmony, and good neighbourhood, as to make an impression on the mind of a stranger equally pleasing and indelible. But the scene, alas! has been changed through the intestine discords produced by a revolutionary war; and the colony has been reduced from a state of happiness to one of distress and wretchedness. The inhabitants of the interior, having been instigated to plunder each other until nothing remained, ranged themselves under the banners of the predatory chieftain Artigas, and formed a desperate banditti, who robbed and frequently murdered all they met; drove the peaceable inhabitants from their farms, plundered their houses, took away their cattle, reduced the rich to poverty, and the poor to wretchedness, almost so as to desolate this once florishing colony. A man, who but a few months before possessed 100,000 head of cattle, was driven from his estate, and obliged to purchase, at the price of one shilling per pound, the meat which he had formerly left in the slaughter-house, having killed his beasts merely for their hides; so that the necessaries of life which were once to be procured almost gratuitously, became extravagantly dear; and the horrors of approaching famine were superadded to those of anarchy and spoliation.
Reverting to the former order of things, I could name more than fifty individuals of Monte Video, whose estates were from twenty to fifty miles in length, by ten or twenty in breadth, with cattle in such numbers as are almost incredible. An estate of this kind, consisting of a varied extent of hill, plain, and valley, is called a fazenda, as distinguished from the quinta, which bears a closer resemblance to the English farm, being a portion of land, generally selected near the house, for the culture of wheat, beans, Indian corn, melons, fruit trees, &c.
The farm house is almost destitute of furniture; the couch consists of a raw hide, stretched and suspended, on which is placed a flock bed; strangers most commonly sleep on a mat, or dried hide, spread upon the ground.
At a small distance from Monte Video, herds of deer, and flocks of ostriches are to be met with; the eagle is often seen, and sometimes the tiger. Soon after the time when the troops of Artigas drove the cattle from the mountain opposite, two tigers swam across the bay, penetrated at night into the town, and killed two or three of the inhabitants ere they were attacked and destroyed. They were supposed to have been driven by hunger in search of food.