With his death it may be said that the history of Argentina as a Spanish colony has fairly begun. It is true that the Governorship of Buenos Aires was both smaller and larger than the present Argentine Republic--larger as comprising Uruguay, and considerably smaller in the absence of Patagonia and much other territory. In fact, there were three Governorships--Buenos Aires, Paraguay, and Tucuman--and these were looked upon as a single colony, although each one was an administrative entity, dependent upon the Crown and independent of its neighbours. Our narrative will necessarily ignore the interesting history of Paraguay and embrace the other two provinces. The above narrative has few of the exciting episodes which marked the history of the conquest of Mexico or Peru, but the history, though less dazzling, is less sullied by crimes, and the two figures of Garay and Hernan Darias afford examples of disinterested toil for the common welfare which in that age was rare indeed except among a small proportion of the clergy. And as the earlier years of Argentina were less turbulent, so have the latter years been more blessed with prosperity than has been the case with other South American States. The colonisation of South America proceeded upon lines very different from those pursued in the northern continent. The latter was the objective of men who belonged, for the most part, to the Anglo-Saxon race, and who came not for adventure or any kind of gain, but to escape from uncongenial institutions and live their own life. As far as possible they avoided contact with the natives, and neither desired, nor, in fact, maintained, intimate relations with the mother country. But in spite of the circumstances of their exile, they carried with them most of the institutions of their own land, and continued to develop on the lines of their brothers on the other side of the Atlantic. The Spaniards did not, indeed, treat the natives in South America with humanity; on the contrary, in the mining regions their cruelty was notorious, and they were frequently at war with the old inhabitants. But in Argentina and many other places they showed no disinclination to intermarry; they made, as we have seen, systematic settlements of Indians, which assumed that the conquered race was an integral part of their own body politic, and in some respects their policy was statesmanlike and even humane according to the standards of the time. The result was a fusion of races, and the various nations which sprang up were as much Indian as Spanish. How the Argentine nation was evolved it will be the business of the succeeding historical chapters to show, as it will be that of the remainder of this volume to display the country and the people as they actually are after four centuries of growth. FOOTNOTES: [20] Purchas, "His Pilgrimage," xiv. 546. [21] R. Hakluyt, Extra Series, xi. 252. [22] Or 1537 or 1538, according to various authorities.