the young ostriches from the time they are hatched until they are able to go farther for their sustenance.” The better houses of _Buenos Ayres_ were at that time adorned with hangings, pictures, and ornaments. The wealthier inhabitants were served from plate, and their establishments contained many servants or slaves, who were employed also in the cultivation of their grounds or to take care of their horses and mules. The wealth of the inhabitants at the period referred to consisted mainly in cattle, the numbers of which increased on the vast plains with wonderful rapidity. At that time hides were to be bought in the city at the rate of seven or eight _reals_ each, or at less than an English crown, and the same were sold in Europe for at least four times as much money. Cattle were used for a singular purpose in the prosecution of war, being driven to the river-side in such numbers as to defy the efforts of the enemy to penetrate through them. The merchants of _Buenos Ayres_ of the seventeenth century had the reputation of possessing considerable wealth, the fortunes of many amongst them being estimated at from two to three hundred thousand crowns. They were reputed to love their ease, and to be blessed with wives who had the credit of being as virtuous as they were lovely. For their fidelity, however, they demanded a strict return, being ready to punish by the bowl or the dagger any breach of the marriage vow on the part of the husband. Besides the Spanish population, there were in the seventeenth century in _Buenos Ayres_ a few Frenchmen, some Dutch, and some Genoese, but all these passed themselves off as being Spanish, the more surely to escape the dangers of the Inquisition. The chief edifices and institutions of the town at that period were the cathedral, the college of the Jesuits, and the convents of the Dominicans, the Recollects, and of the Order of Mercy. The merchants of Seville, who had obtained a monopoly of the supply of _Mexico_ and _Peru_, regarded with much jealousy the prospect of a new opening for the South-American trade by way of _La Plata_, and exerted their interest successfully to obtain prohibitory enactments against all trade with _Buenos Ayres_, lest it should interfere with the sale of their periodical shipments for _Panamá_. In vain the inhabitants of the former city petitioned and remonstrated; for some years the only boon they could obtain was the permission to export yearly to _Brazil_ or to the coast of _Guinea_ a small quantity of wheat, jerked beef, and tallow. In 1618 this was extended to a permission to send two vessels of a hundred tons burthen each year to Spain; but a custom-house was established at _Cordova_ to levy a duty of fifty per cent. on goods carried by that way. All commercial intercourse with other Spanish colonies in America was prohibited under severe penalties. Under this miserable commercial legislation _Buenos Ayres_ continued to languish for the first century of its existence.