Such were the stories—some true, and many, like that of the Irishman, utterly fabulous—that were told me by the different individuals upon whom I called during my short stay in Buenos Ayres. In the course of my inquiries I learned that a train of wagons would shortly leave Rosario, a small town upon the River Paraná, about two hundred miles north of Buenos Ayres, for Mendoza, a town situated at the base of the Andes, and I resolved to visit the place in time to catch the caravan. A steamboat plied between the city of Buenos Ayres and Rosario, but as it was not to sail for a fortnight, I had ample time for surveying the adjacent country, and even for making a flying visit across the Plata to the Banda Oriental.

The State of Buenos Ayres usually monopolizes the attention of visitors to the region which is known as the Argentine Confederation, on account of her favorable situation on the seaboard, her possession of the only maritime port in the vast confederacy, and the predominating influence which these advantages have secured to her in peace as well as in war. The state contains an area of fifty-two thousand square miles, and is, consequently, but little larger than the State of New York. Her population, according to an estimate formed some ten years since, amounted to some three hundred and twenty thousand souls; of whom one hundred and twenty thousand are inhabitants of the city, while the remainder are sparsely distributed over the extensive plains that commence a few miles from the coast, and, running inland, stretch across and far beyond the limits of the state. The population of the city itself is composed of a great variety of types and colors, among which, however, the whites are rapidly predominating; as every year introduces new blood from Europe and North America, while parties interested are doing their best, in connection with the government, to divert a portion of the Irish immigration from the United Slates towards their own province. The government furnishes immigrants with land free of charge, but an extortionate price is not unfrequently paid, in the end, for a farm.

The study of the mixed races which inhabit, not only this province, but also the entire region between the Paraná and the Cordillera, has as yet received but little attention from the student of ethnology. The lines of demarcation, however, between race and race, are clear and distinct; and the future ethnographer of this region will have no difficulty in tracing the population, through its intermediate stages of gauchos, zambas, mestizos, etc., to its origin with the immigration from Old Spain and other European countries, and to the aboriginal and negro stocks.

Throughout the state the soil is richly alluvial to a depth of two or more feet, beneath which lies a stratum of clay, differing in kind and quality according to its location. Thus strata of white, yellow, and red clays have been discovered in different regions of the same province, furnishing the population with abundant material for the manufacture of tiles, bricks, and innumerable articles of pottery.

For nearly two hundred miles west of the La Plata, the soil produces a luxuriant growth of herbage, which is choked, however, in many places, by extensive forests of gigantic thistles, which grow to such a height that men, passing through them on horseback, are hidden by the lofty stems. So heavy is this growth that, at times, the thistle fields are impassable to man, and serve to the wild animals of the pampas as an undisturbed lair. These thistles are fired, from time to time, by the gauchos; after the ground that they covered has been burnt over, a fine sweet crop of grass starts up, upon which the cattle feed luxuriantly.

A native author, of eminent accuracy, who has carefully studied the statistics and resources of the province of Buenos Ayres, has published the following estimate of the value of real estate and other property in the country, in 1855:—

State of Buenos Ayres, its Extent, Value, &c

Fifty-two thousand miles of uncultivated lands, at $1000 per square mile,$52,000,000
Six million head of cattle, at $6 per head,36,000,000
Three million mares, at $1 per head,3,000,000
Five million sheep, at $1 per head,5,000,000
Half a million swine, at $1 per head,500,000
Houses, &c., in the country,10,000,000
Total value,$106,500,000

The following statement, derived from the Buenos Ayres Custom House, for the first six months of 1854, may serve as a means of estimating the number of horned cattle in the state:—

Hides exported in six months, 1854,759,968
Deduct quantity received from the provinces,121,166
Total exports of Buenos Ayres hides, in six months,638,802
Add a corresponding six months’ exports for balance of the year,638,802
Estimated export for 1854,1,277,604