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Preface.
xxv

making him known in this character throughout the Republic. He shall be decorated with a sword and a golden medal ornamented with the symbols of law, justice, and courage; the medal shall be garnished with brilliants on one side, and shall have a crown of laurels and an olive branch as an emblem of gratitude, with these words: Buenos Ayres to the Restorer of the Laws. The reverse shall have his bust in cement, with utensils of agriculture and trophies of war, and the device: He cultivated his fields and defended his country."

But their hopes were sadly disappointed. For more than twenty years he held them in abject terror, such as Colonel Sarmiento has described. The rigor of his rule deceived the world, which gives the meed to success rather than to merit. When Colonel Sarmiento visited the United States in 1847, and saw the working of federal institutions, his views of government underwent a great change. He had been a Unitario from education, and antagonism of ideas to Rosas and the caudillos or country chiefs, and from 1827 had taken arms against the Federal party, which was identified with them. Forty years of separation of the provinces, during which each had had its own government, had broken every national tie, and they could not easily unite under a federal government, such as the caudillos had proposed in opposition to Rivadavia.