Rio Grande do Sul, the southernmost province of Brazil, had revolted from the Empire and set up a republic, which it was struggling to maintain. Garibaldi, who could never resist aiding republicans, equipped a small privateer, on which he and Rossetti, with twelve companions, set sail for the south. This was the opening of a life of adventure which lasted twelve years, and which, could we trace it step by step, would be found a nonpareil of heroic deeds and startling dangers. The political and social condition of South America then resembled in lawlessness that period in European history when chivalry had its rise; when, as a foil to the bullying and craft and greed of the many, stood out the courage and honor and courtesy of the few. Garibaldi, whether by sea or land, approved himself a peerless knight. Following him, we should witness now a battle of gunboats far up the river Parana, until, his ammunition having given out, he loaded the cannon with the chain cables; or, again, we should undergo the horrors of a shipwreck near the mouth of La Plata, or join in a desperate battle against great odds at some lonely Paraguayan ranch; we should traverse vast pampas, or thrid the solitude of trackless forests; we should know hunger, thirst, and cold, and be incessantly attacking or attacked; and we should realize that although these campaigns seem mere border forays when compared with the wars of modern Europe and the United States, yet they settled the fate of territories as large as France, and required those martial qualities which beget heroism in any crisis under any sky.