A DAY AT BUENOS AIRES. 163
the Uruguay, River of the Missions. Broken brick would be better than nothing in streets which are not much visited by wheeled vehicles,, and these could at present be limited. Sufficient care is not taken in naming the thoroughfares : France is the great mistress of that art. As at Rio de Janeiro, the black forefinger points the direction of transit in carriage or cart : this plan^ so necessary in narrow streets, might be adopted even in London.
Buenos Aires is evidently a city j it has a civic hurry and excitement ; there is a polished manner of citizen in it ; the first glance tells us that it is not, like Monte Video, a town. The houses, especially externally, are palazzi, built by Italians, who partly follow the Spanish taste ; they appear remarkably fine and solid after the poorer architecture of the Brazil. It is wonderful, at least for these regions, how readily and speedily the tenements are run up, especially the outer shell. The streets give vistas of great length : practically, however, the City is bounded to the stranger north by the Calle del Parque, south by the Calle Bel- grano, east by the river and west by Florida, the Regent Street. Thus here again we epitomize long thoroughfares of intense weariness. This is in fact our club-land — our Pall Mall, and within these narrow limits are contained the consulate, the clubs, the cathedral, the museum, the libraries, the chief hotels, the favourite streets, and the offices of the principal periodicals.
My arrival day was lovely — it was the weather of Italy and Algiers in spring. The cool, pure, crisp air made the mere sense of life absolutely enjoyable : one would be sorry in such weather to be dead. These rarities have methinks given to the climate an undeserved good name, and once won, a good name in such matters is not readily lost.
The raging of cholera in 1867-8 shows that Buenos Aires is now by no means free, as it used to boast itself, from the
11—^
