Ponce de Leon: The Rise of the Argentine Republic

by William Pilling

"Señores," said Don Gregorio Lopez, "we will entrench the city and defend it block by block against the invaders. Old as I am I encharge myself with the defence of my own quarter."

"Yet you have your plan, Don Gregorio!" said Don Martin Alzaga gaily. "I believe it comes now very much to the point."

"The plan of my young friend Evaña," replied Don Gregorio.

"Let it be whose it may, we will study it together, and we two will decide what can be done with it, but first, Señores, there are other things more urgent. The people are in despair, and night has covered the city with mourning; the first thing we have to do is to raise the spirit of the people. Once that we reinspire them with confidence, we may hope everything from their courage and abnegation, which we all know. Let us disperse the darkness of night with bonfires and illuminations; the sorrow and the shame will give place to enthusiasm."

"Well said," said Don Gregorio Lopez. "The illuminations will also attract the fugitives, who may yet be dispersed about the suburbs. It also appears that General Balviani took no part in the engagement with the English, and is yet encamped at the Puente Galvès with his division; let us send for him at once, and we shall have a nucleus upon which to reform the stragglers."

No time was lost in discussion, these propositions were at once adopted. Various members of the Cabildo sallied forth to see after the illuminations, and a mounted officer galloped away by the southern road with an order to General Balviani to retire at once upon the city.

Midnight came, the city was one blaze of light. Lights shone from the windows of every house, festoons of lamps hung across many a street; on every open space and at every street corner in the suburbs there blazed huge bonfires, encircling the city with a girdle of flames. The British sentries at the Plaza Miserere looked wonderingly upon these endless lines of fire, and listened anxiously to the rising hum of many thousand voices, which declared the whole city to be astir. That city, since sundown so dark and desolate, so sunken in sorrow and despair, was now a scene of wild excitement and of fierce resolve; men said only one to another, What shall we do? Men sought only for a leader. The defeat of the evening was an affair long past and forgotten; men thought only of the morrow, and of the stern duty which on that morrow they would surely do.

In the midst of all this excitement Balviani's division returned to the city, marching swiftly along the illuminated streets, dragging their guns with them, which guns Balviani had directed to be spiked on receipt of the order from the Cabildo for his immediate return; but to his command the artillerymen paid no heed, harnessing themselves to the guns and dragging them through pantanos and mud, when their wearied cattle dropped with fatigue, while the rain poured down upon them in torrents. Yet in spite of the rain the people crowded round them as they marched along, saluting them with shouts and with many a warm pressure of the hand. Their march more resembled the triumphant entry of a victorious army than the return of the remnant of a beaten one.

Meantime some of the elder members of the Cabildo had been occupied in a careful examination of the plan of the Señor Evaña for the defence of the city. It was improbable that the English would at once attack them, a day at least must elapse before they could bring up their entire force from the Ensenada. But the plan was much too extensive to be carried out in one day, though it was exceedingly simple; they therefore determined upon the adoption of one part of it only: to draw a line including one block of houses all round the two central Plazas; to dig a ditch across the end of every street on this line, throwing up the earth inside, and forming on it a breastwork, and a platform for a gun; to garrison strongly all the azoteas on this line, and to station a strong force at each trench. Further, they determined that all the spare arms they possessed should be distributed to such of the citizens as might apply for them for the defence of their own houses, and that all the troops they could spare, after providing sufficiently for the central garrison, should be distributed about the azoteas all round to the distance of ten squares from the Plaza Mayor, and that each block should be placed under the command of some trustworthy officer; with instructions to harass the invaders to the utmost of their power as they advanced towards the centre, but not to attempt to meet them in the streets.

Then a list was made out of the officers to whom was to be entrusted the work of constructing the various trenches and a second of those who were to command in each block, both within and without the line of entrenchments.