SOLDIERS OF THE ARGENTINE REPUBLIC.
"Buenos Ayres," the record says, "is the capital of the province of the same name, and also of the Argentine Republic, or Argentine Confederation, of which the province forms a part. The country has been through a series of wars which it is not necessary to describe here; from present indications it has a destiny of peace before it, though a revolution may break out at any moment. The Argentine Confederation includes fourteen provinces; it has a president, who is elected for six years, a cabinet of five ministers, a congress of two houses, a national debt, an army and a navy, together with other paraphernalia of government. It has two thousand miles of railway, and another thousand is in process of building; it has frequent disputes with Chili as to its rights in Patagonia; a population of about two millions; and herds of cattle, sheep, and horses too large for careful enumeration.
"Of late years it has encouraged emigration from Europe, and there are probably half a million people of European birth now living in the country. One fourth of these are Italians, and the rest are Spaniards, Irish, English and Scotch, Germans, Portuguese, and a few other nationalities; in the province of Buenos Ayres there are seventy thousand Italians, forty thousand of whom are in the city of that name. At every step we hear the Italian language spoken, and the signs over the shop doors bear more Italian than Spanish names. The Spaniards were the original settlers of the country, but their identity is rapidly disappearing under the influx of immigration from Europe.
A GUACHO.
"It is interesting to note the occupations of the various nationalities as they settle in this new country. The descendants of the original conquerors are generally known as Guachos, or 'countrymen;' they rarely live in the cities, preferring the wild life of the interior, where they dwell in rude huts, subsist on the flesh of cattle or wild game, and have an existence little better than semi-civilized. They are the finest horsemen in the world, if half the stories we hear of them are true, and a group of guachos ought to put to shame the best circus troupe that was ever organized.
A GUACHO ON HORSEBACK.