Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1898-11-26

Spanish cut throats of his time, had a deep
regard for the saints, and he named the
city after the Virgin Maria de Rueuos
Aires, whose aid he had invoked for his ex-
petition before leaving Spain.
In the sixteenth and seventeenth CEN
turtles Asuncion, Paraguay and Cordoba, a
days ride by train west of here were far
better places than Buenos Ayres. The town
long remained 4 settlement OF mud HITS.
although lots so yards front and three
miles deep could be bought for a suit of
old clothes. In the seventeenth century
some of the central blocks of the city were
sold for white horse and guitar. To-
day the average value of the land per
square yard is over 80. and the house
property is said to be worth over 10000,
900 in gold.
When our Declaration of Independence was
signed there We're only 81 .oOn people in this
region and only 5000 in Buenos AyreS. The
colony. however begun to make money out
of negroes and chiefly out of negro slaves.
The best families then lived in matched
hutS, but they ate their meals from dishes
of solid silver, being waited upon by their
own negroes. When John Quincy Adams
was President Buenos Ayres had ~ W,o peo-
pie. During General Grants first term liz
the White House il had less than LIS. 600
and when Cleveland began his second adj
ministratiou, six years ago, its citizens
numbered :3l.o00. Its great growth has
thus been within the past thirty years.
4 City of Shreds and Patches
Buenos Ayres is a queer city. A city
made up of shreds and patches both as to
architecture and man. As to man, it has
people of nearly every race. Three hun
dren thousand of its residents are Italians.
10000 are Spanish, about $4,000 French and
the remainder Germans, English and Ar
gentines. The Argentines proper do not
probably number over l5o,W9, and they
are the only real citizens in the sense that
they vote and take part in the govern
ment. The rest prefer to keep out of poll
tics and the army. for the foreign resi-
dent here has every property right of the
citizen, with none of his military obliga-
tons.
Most of the foreigners stick to their old
nationalitfes, although some of them would
not dare to go home to vote. The Argen-
- tine is one of the few countries which
have no eXtradition treaties Criminals
from everywhere have taken advantage of
this, and ii is said that there are more
men living under assumed names here than
in any city of the world. This is especially
so as to the emiGrants from Italy, and until
recently it was to some of those from
our country.
year or ago it is said, four Amer
leans We're chatting together in one of the
cafes of Buenos Ayres. when three Of the
crowd began for some reason to jeer al HE
fourth. He grew angry and said:
We'll, gentlemen, you may sneer at me
if you please, but I want you 70 uader-
stand that there is at least one Of the
United States that l dare go back 10 with
out fear of the sheriff. | know none of you
can say as much
This. however. is rather hard on the Amer
leans. Years ago, before we lost our mer-
chant marine, the Americans were among
tie most prominent of the foreigners Ierc,
and those who have been coming within re-
cent years are men of high standing. Some
of them have large interests here, and at
present the Americans as a class are much
respected,
Alphabetically Buenos Ayres is patch
v ork city. have rooms high up in one OF
its biggest hotels. They are high in price,
Arg 9ntine dollars = day. l am on the