The Distance Is
Twenty Leagues, Through A Country Covered With Fine Grass,
But Poorly Stocked With Cattle Or Inhabitants.
I was invited
to sleep at Colonia, and to accompany on the following
day a gentleman to his estancia, where there were some
limestone rocks.
The town is built on a stony promontory
something in the same manner as at Monte Video. It is
strongly fortified, but both fortifications and town suffered
much in the Brazilian war. It is very ancient; and the
irregularity of the streets, and the surrounding groves of
old orange and peach trees, gave it a pretty appearance.
The church is a curious ruin; it was used as a powder-
magazine, and was struck by lightning in one of the ten
thousand thunderstorms of the Rio Plata. Two-thirds of
the building were blown away to the very foundation; and
the rest stands a shattered and curious monument of the
united powers of lightning and gunpowder. In the evening
I wandered about the half-demolished walls of the town. It
was the chief seat of the Brazilian war; - a war most injurious
to this country, not so much in its immediate effects,
as in being the origin of a multitude of generals and all
other grades of officers. More generals are numbered (but
not paid) in the United Provinces of La Plata than in the
United Kingdom of Great Britain. These gentlemen have
learned to like power, and do not object to a little
skirmishing. Hence there are many always on the watch to
create disturbance and to overturn a government which as yet
has never rested on any staple foundation.
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