that this shall suffice us to know. What more is there? Absurd somnolent persons, struck broad awake by the subterranean concussion of Civil and Religious Liberty all over the World, meeting together to establish a republican career of freedom, and compile official papers out of Rollin,—are not a subject on which the historical mind can be enlightened. The historical mind, thank Heaven, forgets such persons and their papers, as fast as you repeat them.

Besides, these Gaucho populations are greedy, superstitious, vain; and, as Miers said in his haste, mendacious every soul of them! Within the confines of Paraguay, we know for certain but of one man who would do himself an injury to do a just or true thing under the sun: one man who understands in his heart that this Universe is an eternal Fact,—and not some huge temporary Pumpkin, saccharine, absinthian; the rest of its significance chimerical merely! Such men cannot have a history, though a Thucydides came to write it.—Enough for us to understand that Don This was a vapouring blockhead, who followed his pleasures, his peculations, and Don That another of the same; that there occurred fatuities, mismanagements innumerable; then discontents, open grumblings, and, as a running accompaniment, intriguings, caballings, outings, innings: till the Government House, fouler than when the Jesuits had it, became a bottomless pestilent inanity, insupportable to any articulate-speaking soul; till Secretary Francia should feel that he, for one, could not be Consonant to such a set of Vowels; till Secretary Francia, one day, flinging down his papers, rising to his feet, should jerk-out with oratorical vivacity his lean right-hand, and say, with knit brows, in a low swift tone: "Adieu, Senhores; God preserve you many years!"—

Francia withdrew to his chacra, a pleasant country-house in the woods of Ytapúa not far off; there to interrogate Nature, and live in a private manner. Parish Robertson, much about this date, which we grope and guess to have been perhaps in 1812, was boarded with a certain ancient Donna Juana, in that same region; had tertulias of unimaginable brilliancy; and often went shooting of an evening. On one of those-But he shall himselí report:

'On one of those lovely evenings in Paraguay, after the south-west

wind has both cleared and cooled the air, I was drawn, in my pursuit of game, into a peaceful valley, not far from Donna Juana's, and remarkable for its combination of all the striking features of the scenery of the country. Suddenly I came upon a neat and unpretending cottage. Up rose a partridge; I fired, and the bird came to the ground. A voice from behind called out "Buen tiro"-"a good shot." I turned round, and beheld a gentleman of about fifty years of age, dressed in a suit of black, with a large scarlet capote, or cloak, thrown over his shoulders. He had a maté-cup in one hand, a cigar in the other; and a little urchin of a negro, with his arms crossed, was in attendance by the gentleman's side. The stranger's countenance was dark, and his black eyes were very penetrating, while his jet hair, combed back from a bold forehead, and hanging in natural ringlets over his shoulders, gave him a dignified and striking air. He wore on his shoes large golden buckles, and at the knees of his breeches the same.

'In exercise of the primitive and simple hospitality common in the country, I was invited to sit down under the corridor, and to take a cigar and maté (cup of Paraguay tea). A celestial globe, a large telescope and a theodolite were under the little portico; and I immediately inferred that the personage before me was no other than Dr. Francia.'

Yes, here for the first time in authentic history, a remarkable hearsay becomes a remarkable visuality: through a pair of clear human eyes, you look face to face on the very figure of the man. Is not this verily the exact record of those clear Robertsonian eyes and seven senses; entered accurately, then and not afterwards, on the ledger of the memory? We will hope so; who can but hope so! The figure of the man will, at all events, be exact. Here too is the figure of his library; -the conversation, if any, was of the last degree of insignificance, and may be left out, or supplied ad libitum :

'He introduced me to his library, in a confined room, with a very small window, and that so shaded by the roof of the corridor, as to admit the least portion of light necessary for study. The library was arranged on three rows of shelves, extending across the room, and might have consisted of three-hundred volumes. There were many ponderous books on law; a few on the inductive sciences; some in French and some in Latin upon subjects of general literature, with Euclid's Elements, and some schoolboy treatises on algebra. On a large table were heaps of law-papers and processes. Several folios bound in vellum were outspread upon it; a lighted candle (though placed there solely with a view to light cigars) lent its feeble aid to illumine the room; while a maté-cup and inkstand, both of silver, stood on another part of the table. There was neither carpet nor mat on the

VOL. VII.

D

brick floor; and the chairs were of such ancient fashion, size and weight, that it required a considerable effort to move them from one spot to another.'

Peculation, malversation, the various forms of imbecility and voracious dishonesty went their due course in the Government-offices of Assumpcion, unrestrained by Francia, and unrestrainable :-till, as we may say, it reached a height; and, like other suppurations and diseased concretions in the living system, had to burst, and take itself away. To the eyes of Paraguay in general it had become clear that such a reign of liberty was unendurable; that some new revolution, or change of ministry, was indispensable.

Rengger says that Francia withdrew 'more than once' to his chacra, disgusted with his Colleagues; who always by unlimited promises and protestations, had to flatter him back again; and then anew disgusted him. Francia is the Consonant of these absurd 'Vowels;' no business can go on without Francia! And the finances are deranged, insolvent; and the military, unpaid, ineffective, cannot so much as keep out the Indians; and there comes trouble, and rumour of new war, from Buenos-Ayres ;-alas, from what corner of the great Continent come there other than troubles and rumours of war? Patriot generals become traitor generals; get themselves 'shot in market-places;' revolution follows revolution. Artigas, close on our borders, has begun harrying the Banda Oriental with fire and sword; 'dictating despatches from cow-skulls.' Like clouds of wolves,--only feller, being mounted on horseback, with pikes, the Indians dart-in on us; carrying conflagration and dismay. Paraguay must get itself governed, or it will be worse for Paraguay! The eyes of all Paraguay, we can well fancy, turn to the one man of talent they have, the one man of veracity they have.

In 1813 a second Congress is got together: we fancy it was Francia's last advice to the Government suppuration, when it flattered him back, for the last time, to ask his advice, That such suppuration do now dissolve itself, and a new Congress be summoned ! In the new Congress the Vocales are voted out; Francia and Fulgencio are named joint Consuls: with Francia for Consul, and Don Fulgencio Yegros for Consul's cloak, it may be better. Don Fulgencio rides about in gor

geous sash and epaulettes, a rich man and horse-subduer; good as Consul's cloak ;-but why should the real Consul have a cloak? Next year in the third Congress, Francia, by 'insidious manœuvering,' by 'favour of the military,' and, indeed, also in some sort, we may say, by law of Nature,-gets himself declared Dictator: for three years,' or for life, may in these circumstances mean much the same. This was in 1814. Francia never assembled any Congress more; having stolen the constitutional palladiums, and insidiously got his wicked will! Of a Congress that compiled constitutions out of Rollin, who would not lament such destiny? This Congress should

have met again! It was indeed, say Rengger and the Robertsons themselves, such a Congress as never met before in the world; a Congress which knew not its right hand from its left; which drank infinite rum in the taverns; and had one wish, that of getting on horseback again, home to its fieldhusbandry and partridge-shooting again. The military mostly favoured Francia; being gained-over by him,—the thief of constitutional palladiums.

With Francia's entrance on the Government as Consul, still more as Dictator, a great improvement, it is granted even by Rengger, did in all quarters forthwith show itself. The finances were husbanded, were accurately gathered; every official person in Paraguay had to bethink him, and begin doing his work, instead of merely seeming to do it. The soldiers Francia took care to see paid and drilled; to see march, with real deathshot and service, when the Indians or other enemies showed themselves. Guardias, Guardhouses, at short distances were established along the River's bank and all round the dangerous Frontiers: wherever the Indian centaur-troop showed face, an alarm-cannon went off, and soldiers, quickly assembling, with actual death-shot and service, were upon them. These wolfhordes had to vanish into the heart of their deserts again. The land had peace. Neither Artigas, nor any of the firebrands and war-plagues which were distracting South America from side to side, could get across the border. All negotiation or intercommuning with Buenos-Ayres, or with any of these war-distracted countries, was peremptorily waived. To no

Congress of Lima,' 'General Congress of Panama,' or other

general or particular Congress, would Francia, by deputy or message, offer the smallest recognition. All South America raging and ravening like one huge dog-kennel gone rabid, we here in Paraguay have peace, and cultivate our tea-trees: why should not we let well alone? By degrees, one thing acting on another, and this ring of frontier Guardhouses' being already erected there, a rigorous sanitary line, impregnable as brass, was drawn round all Paraguay; no communication, import or export trade allowed, except by the Dictator's license, -given on payment of the due moneys, when the political horizon seemed innocuous; refused when otherwise. The Dictator's trade-licenses were a considerable branch of his revenues; his entrance-dues, somewhat onerous to the foreign merchant (think the Messrs. Robertson), were another. Paraguay stood isolated; the rabid dog-kennel raging round it, wide as South America, but kept out as by lock-and-key.

These were vigorous measures, gradually coming on the somnolent Gaucho population! It seems, meanwhile, that, even after the Perpetual Dictatorship, and onwards to the fifth or the sixth year of Francia's government, there was, though the constitutional palladiums were stolen, nothing very special to complain of. Paraguay had peace; sat under its tea-tree; the rabid dog-kennel, Indians, Artiguenos and other war firebrands, all shut-out from it. But in that year 1819, the second year of the Perpetual Dictatorship, there arose, not for the first time, dim indications of 'Plots,' even dangerous Plots! In that year the firebrand Artigas was finally quenched; obliged to beg a lodging even of Francia, his enemy;—and got it, hospitably, though contemptuously. And now straightway there advanced, from Artigas's lost wasted country, a certain General Ramirez, his rival and conqueror, and fellow-bandit and firebrand. This General Ramirez advanced up to our very frontier; first with offers of alliance; failing that, with offers of war; on which latter offer he was closed with, was cut to pieces; and a Letter was found about him, addressed to Don Fulgencio Yegros, the rich Gaucho horseman and Ex-Consul; which arrested all the faculties of Dr. Francia's most intense intelligence there and then! A Conspiracy, with Don Fulgencio at the head of it; Conspiracy which seems the wider spread the farther one investigates it; which has been brewing