A Five Years' Residence in Buenos Ayres, During the years 1820 to 1825: Containing Remarks on the Country and Inhabitants; and a Visit to Colonia Del SacramentoLove, George Thomas
History
A Five Years' Residence in Buenos Ayres, During the years 1820 to 1825: Containing Remarks on the Country and Inhabitants; and a Visit to Colonia Del Sacramento
Love, George Thomas
Buenos Aires (Argentina) -- Description and travel; Colonia del Sacramento (Uruguay) -- Description and travel
Englishmen married to Spanish females have been, in a degree, obliged to
conform to the Catholic ceremonies of marriage. The over-scrupulous will
start at this; but, if they have ever been in love, they will readily
conceive that these oaths of form may be swallowed with as much ease as
many of the absurd ones of our Custom-House. The difference of religion,
in liberal minds, cannot in any way disturb domestic harmony: we differ
only in forms.
So great were religious prejudices not many years ago, that a lady would
have hesitated, and her family interfered to prevent a marriage with one
of "heretic creed." The alteration is a credit to their understandings;
it evinces that they are neither bigots nor fanatics. A generation of
children are now springing up, half English, half Creolian, speaking
both languages; their fathers teaching them English, their mothers
Spanish. Could we look a few years forward, and see these youngsters
grown to maturity, loving the land of their birth, and having a yearning
towards that of their fathers, what important consequences may not
result, in cementing friendships between nations that once regarded each
other with a rooted dislike.
Englishmen who have married in this country, I should presume, intend
making it their adopted land. It is an alternative that would cause
me to pause: I could not consent to lose the hope of again seeing my
paternal home. Now, if I could fancy such an event, as taking my Buenos
Ayrean wife with me to London, lodging her in some fashionable mansion
near Grosvenor Square, or in the Square itself--visiting the Opera and
all the Theatres--pointing out to her Rossini, Catalani, our Braham,
Stephens, Kean, and Macready, and explaining their different talents,
poor Rosquellas, and the Señoras Tani, would be quite forgotten; and,
instead of a ride on the Barracca Road, or to San José de Flores, San
Isidro, &c. conducting her along the Queen's Road to Putney, Richmond,
or Windsor--taking a stroll with her in Kensington Gardens--Heavens!
whither will my imagination lead me? and why cannot I persuade some
kind-hearted Creolian to give me his daughter, and two hundred thousand
dollars, in return for the fond love I should lavish on her?
The marriages of English people have been performed by captains of
vessels of war, or in the presence of two or three merchants, whose
signatures are said to be sufficient acts of parliament. The residence
of a consul will obviate some of these difficulties.
The British community, in Buenos Ayres, lost one of its chief ornaments,
by a melancholy suicide, which took place in December, 1824--that of
Mr. Dallas, who cut his throat with a razor: disappointment in business
is stated to be the cause. He has not left his equal in Buenos Ayres;
his character fully warranted that expressive term in the English
language--a perfect gentleman.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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