In the twenty-four years, 1829 to 1852, Rosas {145} made federal unity a reality. He was first of all governor and leader of the _gauchos_; in 1835 he won the absolute power for five years, which term was extended by several re-elections. Before him was the anarchy of 1820 and the Unitarian bankruptcy of 1826; after him, the powerful unity of 1853 and 1860, and the triumphal progress of the Argentine democracy. Between this discord and this unity came his fruitful despotism, a necessary Terror. His dictatorship was more efficacious than the autocracy of Guzman-Blanco or the ecclesiastic tyranny of Garcia-Moreno. Porfirio Diaz and Portales, two founders of political unity, were his disciples. He was the builder of a practicable federation, because he was a _gaucho_ and could interpret the inner voices of his race; he governed as an American, without borrowing anything from European methods. Without him anarchy would have been perpetuated, and the vice-kingdom of La Plata would have been irremediably disintegrated. Like the Roman deity Janus, Rosas had two faces; he closed one epoch and opened another; a past of warfare and terror and a future of unity, peace, democratic development, and industrial progress. He defended the country against the territorial aggression of foreign coalitions, and his own power against conspiracy and revolt; against the avenging stanzas of Marmol, the aggressive journalism of Rivera Indarte, and Varela, the rude pamphlets of Sarmiento, and the meticulous dialectic of Alberdi. To Unitarian insult he opposed the bloody campaign of the _Mazorqueros_; to European tutelage, the individualism of the _gauchos_. Rivadavia was thesis, Facundo antithesis, Rosas synthesis. The first represented absolute unity; the second, anarchical multiplicity; the third, unity in multiplicity, plurality co-ordinated, union without violent simplification. Rivadavia comprehended the {146} necessity of the supremacy of Buenos-Ayres, built as it was upon the ocean that brought men and wealth; he stood for the fundamental unity of La Plata. Facundo, in the place of this premature unification, erected the autonomous province, pure and simple, but diverse. Rosas brought about the final harmony of the forces of Argentine politics. He united, like Rivadavia; he separated, like Facundo; he dominated the capital city, and moderated provincialism; he painfully founded the Confederation. His renown reached Europe; Lord Palmerston was his friend; great foreign journals, such as the Times, the _Journal des Débats_, the _Revue des Deux-Mondes_, discussed his policy and his influence. Alberdi recognised that he contributed to the repute of the Argentine abroad by his heroic defence of his territory. His cruelty was effectual, his barbarism patriotic. "_Como hombre te perdono mi carcel y cadenas; Pero como Argentine, las de mi patria, no!_"[2]