29

H.—l7

The people show great taste in the arrangements of their stores, and particularly the shopwindows; from a butcher's shop to a confectioner's and a lace-store fine taste is visible everywhere. A walk along Florida Avenida, the principal shopping-street, a fine asphalt street with no street-cars on it, is one of the delights of Buenos Aires, and one never tires of it. If for a week you miss this promenade you hardly know the street, for the appearance of the stores has been greatly changed in the meantime by a complete change of the decorations. The manner of living is Continental, not even English —a cup of coffee with a roll in the early morning; breakfast at 11 to 12.30 (which is a meal in courses), and dinner at 7.30, the principal meal of the day. This is the custom among all classes, high and low; and there is another custom (it is strange how soon you fall into it), tea or coffee or "matte" (a species of steeped herb — " yerba "), pressed into a peculiar little gourd used as a bowl and drawn out of it with a hollow silver tube called a " matte-stick," a sample of which I have brought home with me. The Spanish language, which is the national language, is spoken everywhere; but, as might be expected in a cosmopolitan city, French, Italian, English, and German are spoken almost everywhere, particularly French. As English money and Englishmen have done more than any to develop the country, have built, own, and run nearly all the railways, many of the great estancias, and other businesses, particularly commercial, the English have a large say. The telephone service is in the hands of private companies; the capital invested is over $10,000,000 gold; there are about twelve thousand subscribers. There are no really long-distance lines, except one recently opened to Rosario district. The city has a very extensive system of water and drainage works, costing nearly $40,000,000 gold, discharging the sewerage fifteen miles distant, and the storm-waters by great sewers, now being completed, into the river in front of the city. The city waterworks take their water above the city, where it is never contaminated. The water of the River Plate is good but of a reddish colour or muddy. It is clarified in settling-basins before being delivered to the distributing-reservoir, built on one of the highest points of the city. The distributing-reservoir is a work of art, and well worth seeing; it is covered with glazed tiles over which is pressed brick. These works altogether have made Buenos Aires one of the healthiest cities in the world, as the death-rate proves. The Government is soon to extend the works at a cost of five or six millions gold. Ten years ago, upon the completion of the main works, the mortality per 1,000 was 30; now it is 16J. This compares very favourably with other large cities. London has 19.2, Glasgow 21.6, New York 19.7, Philadelphia 17.7, Boston 19.0. Buenos Aires is well provided with newspapers. They have all told over one hundred and fifty monthly, weekly, and daily papers. There are five small English papers published, three German, one Russian, and one Basque; the balance are composed of 119 Spanish, eleven Italian, and nine French. There have also been established lately three periodicals in the Scandinavian language, also two more in Basque, one in Hebrew, and one in Arabic. It is said, and I believe truly so, that the national daily newspapers are as keenly alive to the necessities of modern thirst for daily information as in any country in the world. The supply of cable and telegraphic news from all parts of the world is really excellent. This latter may be said more particularly of that wonderful Spanish paper La I'rensa. I only wish I could show a photograph of this wonderful newspaper institution. This building is one of the grandest structures in Buenos Aires. It stands in a prominent position facing the grand street Avenida Le Mayo. The Prensa building is devoted entirely to the morning paper. Of course, if the Wellington people received fifty thousand copies of it some morning instead of the Post and Times, it would not be of much use to them. I think I can say that there are no newspaper-offices in the world that can compare with this building in elegance and convenience in all its interior appointments. The room where guests from foreign countries are received is the most delightful sight I have ever seen. The stairs leading into the main entrance and the main banister is a masterpiece, being constructed in the most elegant design from solid blocks of granite and beautiful marble. The reception-room is such a masterpiece I could hardly describe it and give it justice. The Harbour. I must say something about the wonderful harbour of Buenos Aires, which is a revelation to any person who has never seen it. Particularly noteworthy are the new docks, which are very extensive, and lie along the immediate front of the city and connected with it. They were designed by the well-known English firm of engineers, Hawkshaw and Hayter, and carried out under the supervision of Mr. James Dobson, the resident engineer. The concessionaire was an Argentine. In 1885 the National Government began the construction of very large docks at Buenos Aires; hitherto all the business had been done from the anchorage, about twelve miles from the city, the intervening space being a great mud bar, the water from a depth of 25 ft. gradually shoaling to the shore-line at the city. This was so flat that it was necessary often to transfer the passengers and goods from the lighters, in which they had come from the vessels, to small boats and then to great wheel carts that went out a long distance in the water to meet the lighters. In order to reach the docks from the sea, a channel has had to be excavated in the mud from the anchorage. This channel (the North one) is at low tide 21 ft. deep and 330 ft. wide, and about five miles and a half long from its intersection with a channel, which already existed byprevious dredging from the other end of the port, at the mouth of a small, sluggish stream called the Jtichuelo. The tide of 2 ft. or 3 ft., depending largely upon the direction and force of the wind and very uncertain, permits vessels drawing about 23J ft. to enter the port by the North Channel. The new port was connected with the older port, and now both channels are being used, and the depths in them are about as stated above.