The three girls, attired in gaucho costume, set out on horseback, and not with side-saddles, to cross the Cordillera of the Andes. The trip was successful. They entered Chili without meeting any obstacle to mar their happiness, and after having passed a few weeks with friends, started to return to the Argentine Republic. The guides warned them of coming temporales, but they had tarried from home too long to protract their stay; perhaps to be obliged to remain in Chili until the winter’s snows were gone. They entered the mountains, and somewhere near the Cumbre pass, a storm broke upon them, and only two of the females escaped with their lives.
Each church in Mendoza had several bells, which were far from melodious, having a tinkling sound, and the manner in which they were rung reminded me of our national air. But the people were well satisfied with these discordant sounds, and one of the priests, who had returned from a visit to England, on being asked how he liked that country, replied,—
“England is a fine country, superior to ours in everything save one—the English do not know how to chime their bells.”
A theatre of two stories in height had been built under the supervision and at the expense of a certain “scientific gentleman,” and though the building was but a whitewashed structure, it raised the gentleman to enviable fame. He was pointed out to me as a profound man, a geologist and astronomer, and furthermore the government would not raise a wall or dig an acquia without first consulting Don Carlos’s opinion. Though a native of the country, he assumed to be an Italian, but did not succeed in convincing the people to that effect when I left Mendoza. I was told that the don had acquired his principal knowledge of engineering, &c., while assisting Lieutenant Archibald Macrae, of the United States Naval Astronomical Expedition, two or three years before, in taking the altitudes of certain places in the Andes. Don Carlos occasionally turned aside from his researches in science, and amused himself, or became the amuser of the more talented portion of the Mendozinos. Once he collected an eager crowd of people by mounting the roof of a house, and pretending, by means of the needle of the compass, to determine the course and distance of a comet, which, with fiery tail, looked so ominously as to cause many of the gaucho population to believe that the town was about to be destroyed.
I was convinced that the Mendozinos were the most peaceable and hospitable people of the republic, and showed more respect to foreigners than was customary where the old dogmas and customs of the Spanish prevailed. I could not perceive any difference between the higher classes of this town and those of Buenos Ayres in the matter of complexion.
They had as light skins as any Spaniard that I had met in the last named city, and generally retained the purity of blood. The lower classes differed, however. They were of every type that exists in the republic west of Paraná and south of latitude 28°, being composed of peons of the different provinces, while the blood of the Indian and negro courses through the veins of many. They were very immoral and exceedingly ignorant, but were kind-hearted and courteous to strangers. Much time was wasted in dancing and other frivolous amusements. The females of all grades embroidered with skill, and showed great taste in the selection of their patterns. The bonnet was not worn, but a shawl, covering the head and falling gracefully about the form, supplied its place, the temperature being so mild and uniform that no warmer head covering was needed.
I noticed that the ladies painted their cheeks in an extravagant manner; a custom that we should not suppose would have gained entrance to such an isolated place. In San Juan, one hundred and fifty miles to the north, I saw nothing of this, and was told that it was of rare occurrence.
Mendoza was a very healthy place at the time I was there. I learned that many persons, troubled with complaints that usually end in consumption, after residing there a few years were restored to health.
But there was one form of disease which was said by the physicians to be incurable, and which in our own country would lead to a desertion of the site.
This was the goitre of the medical fraternity, and, as I have before mentioned, is known among the people as the coté. The disease appeared in the form of a large swelling on the throat, which was caused by the mineral qualities of the River Mendoza.[3] The canals that supplied the citizens of the town ran through nearly every street, and each family procured their water from them.