Argentina Part 3

FOOTNOTES:

[20] Purchas, "His Pilgrimage," xiv. 546.

[21] R. Hakluyt, Extra Series, xi. 252.

[22] Or 1537 or 1538, according to various authorities.

[23] "A man of indefatigable courage and a rare prudence, he joined with these qualities the experience of serving in many glorious campaigns" (Funes, i. 287).

[24] "History of Brazil," i. 349.

[25] "Ensayo de la Historia Civil," p. 318.

CHAPTER IV

THE SPANISH DOMINION

The subsequent history of Argentina during the Spanish dominion does not present much incident, and indeed it is not an uncommon practice for historians of Latin-American countries to make a single leap from the Conquest to the Revolution. But to the real student of history there is much that is of interest in the record of the attempt of Spain to govern a mighty empire and the rapid decay of her power. In the next chapter the Spanish colonial system will be examined; in the present it will be observed in operation. Much will be said about the illiberal restrictions which here receive only incidental notice, but however short-sighted they may have been, at least they could not prevent Argentina from thriving. A considerable trade sprang up between Cordoba and the Andine territories now known as Chile and Bolivia; nor was it only in material well-being that progress was made. At Cordoba, also, a university was founded in 1613, and the town became a seat of learning and a centre of Jesuit influence. For some years peace reigned, but in the second quarter of the seventeenth century it received two serious disturbances. The first was a dangerous Indian war with the powerful nation of the Calchaquies.

This people had lived from time immemorial in the valleys of Rioja and Catamarca, and had been under the suzerainty of the Incas. As the Spaniards around the River Plate became more powerful they made aggressions upon the Calchaquies, and by the end of the sixteenth century had partly subdued them. Many of these Indians were sold into slavery, and many more were forced to settle about Santa Fe and Rosario, but the spirit of the remainder was still unsubdued, and they awaited an opportunity of recovering their independence. It was about the middle of the century that they made their expiring effort. A leader named Bohorquez came forward and claimed to be the descendant and heir of the Inca kings. He is said to have been a mere impostor of humble Andalusian origin, but it is seldom easy to find out the exact truth about pretenders. Funes doubts whether he was in his right mind. "But the light of reason appeared when he took his first steps in deceit, an art to which he was naturally inclined."[26] He and his wife were greeted with the honours due to the Inca kings, the revolt spread, and he caused the Spaniards endless trouble. The Calchaquies, whom he claimed to represent, were a hardy race, and down to modern times have shown good fighting qualities, and they were inflamed by resentment against the intruding Spaniards, who had undoubtedly oppressed them. Bohorquez first came forward in 1656, and though he appears to have possessed nothing better than the showy qualities of a bold charlatan, he brought about a dangerous war. Don Alonso Mercado, who had been appointed Governor of Tuc.u.man the year before, was obstinate and overbearing, and, strangely enough, began by patronising and encouraging the impostor. The Jesuits, who were always anxious to redress Indian grievances, also supported him, and the revolt a.s.sumed such serious proportions that the Governor soon had to abandon his former att.i.tude and took up arms against him. The Indians, who, with simple credulity, accepted all the claims of Bohorquez, made a long and heroic resistance, but the Spanish power was too great. The pretender was defeated, and the Spaniards, aware that there could be no safety for the northern provinces as long as Bohorquez was alive, spared no effort to track him down, and were eventually successful.

Bohorquez was taken to Lima and put to death, and the Calchaquies were placed under a military Deputy-Governor, who was subordinate to Tuc.u.man. Their martial spirit, however, did not die out, and in the nineteenth century they proved themselves one of the most spirited of the warlike races of South America.

The other trouble of the seventeenth century was more serious and involved more bloodshed. We have seen that there was considerable jealousy between the Spanish and Portuguese in South America. In 1580 Portugal had been united to Spain, but this change did not make the relations any more harmonious, for there was a standing cause of quarrel between the two nations. The Portuguese had founded in the temperate Brazilian uplands the city of So Paulo, and the inhabitants known as Paulistas, were a turbulent people and had an intense hatred of the Jesuits. The Jesuits, supported by the Spanish Government, protected the Indians and devoted themselves to their general welfare, but the chief business of the Paulistas was to capture Indians and sell them into slavery. They looked with covetous eyes upon the Reductions, as the Jesuit settlements were called, for here was the raw material of their industry in the shape of hundreds of thousands of submissive Indians. Accordingly, in 1629 they picked a quarrel with the Jesuits and attacked the Reduction of San Antonio, where they committed great ravages, killing and capturing mult.i.tudes of the helpless Indians. The Jesuits, who were not loved by the Governor of Paraguay, were compelled to evacuate Guayra and the scope of their benevolent labours was largely curtailed. This cruel and devastating war continued for many years and caused widespread ruin and loss of life until, in 1638, the Jesuits appealed to the Court of Spain, requesting that their wrongs might be redressed and that they might arm their helpless converts against the oppressor. The appeal was successful. "The King," says Southey,[27] "confirmed all the former laws in favour of the Indians: he declared the conduct of the Paulistas, who had carried away more than thirty thousand slaves from Guayra, and had begun the same work of devastation in the Tape and on the Uruguay, to be contrary to all laws, human and divine, and cognisable by the Holy Office. The enslaved Indians were ordered to be set at liberty, and directions given to punish those who should commit these crimes in future, as guilty of high treason. A more important edict, because more easily carried into effect, provided that all Indians converted by the Jesuits in the province of Guayra, Tape, Parana, and Uruguay, should be considered as immediate va.s.sals of the Crown, and not on any pretext consigned to any person for personal service. Their tribute was fixed, but not to commence till the year 1649, by which time, it was presumed, they might be capable of discharging it. And the King not only granted permission to the Jesuits to arm their converts, but sent out positive orders to the Governors of Paraguay and the Plata to exert themselves for the protection of the Reductions." But in 1640 Portugal regained her independence and the marauding Paulistas left a lasting mark on the map of South America. Undoubtedly but for their incursions the whole valley of the Parana would have been Spanish instead of Portuguese, but, as it was, the Spaniards had to retire behind the river Iguazu.

Emboldened by this success, the Portuguese ever kept in view the design of extending their dominions still further southward. In 1680 the Governor of Rio de Janeiro sent an expedition by sea and built a fort, which he named Nova Colonia, opposite the city of Buenos Aires.

Thus the disputed territory of Uruguay was for the first time occupied by Europeans. The establishment of this hostile post caused great annoyance to the Governor of Buenos Aires, and he succeeded in capturing it upon several occasions, but the Home Government, in view of European politics, had no wish to offend Portugal, nor did it consider that the possession of almost uninhabited tracts was worth the risk of complications. It thus happened that Nova Colonia was always restored to the Portuguese eventually. It became a most prosperous port, for it was the seat of the contraband trade, and by its means the Argentines were able to export hides to Brazil.

Doubtless it was beneficial to them, however much it may have interfered with the illicit gains of Spanish Governors. It remained in the possession of the Portuguese until 1777.

The contraband trade was indeed the chief feature of the domestic history of Argentina in the sixteenth century, and its tendency was to raise important international questions. The fight against the Spanish monopoly became every year keener as the various countries of Europe became more settled and secure and began to devote their energies to trade. In 1616 the monopoly received a heavy blow by the discovery of a way into the Pacific without pa.s.sing through the guarded Straits of Magellan. This was made by the Dutchman, Schouten,[28] who named Cape Horn after Hoorn, his birthplace. Immediately numerous Dutch and English ships took advantage of the new route and a great trade sprang up. As we have seen, the Governors of Buenos Aires played a prominent part in this trade, and no earthly power was able to prevent the economic law from taking effect. The case of Villacorta, a Governor who was discovered to have sent away three million dollars' worth of prohibited goods to Flanders, ill.u.s.trates the helplessness of the artificial law. He was dismissed at the moment, but not long after he reappears as Governor of Tuc.u.man. But, however illegally, trade went on and Argentina flourished. A traveller[29] who visited Buenos Aires in 1769 says that its chief trade was with Chile and Peru, and that it sent to them "cotton, mules, some skins, and about 400,000 Spanish pounds' weight of the Paraguay herb, or South Sea tea, every year." In fact Argentina, like the other Spanish colonies, advanced steadily in wealth and population during the eighteenth century, until progress was abruptly checked by the Revolution. But her history from the founding of Nova Colonia to the appearance of the English before Buenos Aires is remarkably barren in incident.

It was, of course, the fate of colonies to be p.a.w.ns in the wars between powerful European States. Spain was a princ.i.p.al in the great war of the Spanish Succession, which was ended in 1713 by the Peace of Utrecht. Two of the articles were of importance to the Spanish possessions. By the _Asiento de Negros_ England obtained the right to send yearly to the Spanish colonies twelve hundred negro slaves, and Buenos Aires was named as one of the establishments for that traffic, while by the _Navio de Permiso_ she was permitted to send out yearly to the South Seas a ship with 650 tons of merchandise. These concessions, of course, greatly stimulated the contraband trade, for the colonists were as eager to buy as the English merchants were to sell, nor had the Spanish officials the will or the power to prevent many interlopers following in the wake of the privileged ships. Parish[30] remarks that it was "a trade which supplied the most pressing wants of the colony, and the profits of which were shared by the native capitalists. If they (the officials) did occasionally make a show of exercising their right to visit the ships, it was an empty threat, little heeded by men who were looked upon with almost as much dread as the buccaneers who had so long been the terror of all that part of the world."

Under the Bourbons and under the skilful administration of Alberoni, the fortune of Spain revived, and the colonies benefited in a corresponding degree.

In 1726 the Spaniards seized and fortified Montevideo which had been founded by the Portuguese a few years previously; this was an important step, for it declared that, in spite of Nova Colonia, the territory now known as Uruguay should be Spanish. The new town rapidly became wealthy and second only to Buenos Aires.

There can be little doubt that historians have considerably exaggerated the weakness and decay of Spain during the eighteenth century. Her comparative strength is proved by the fact that she maintained her trade regulations which were only contravened surrept.i.tiously. The attempt of England to overthrow them by force shows how great was the resistive power of this unenterprising but still formidable empire. The War of Jenkins's Ear may be considered as a rehearsal of the struggle for the New World which occupied a great part of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and which is still unfinished.

Therefore, although the war is in itself trivial and ineffective, its purport is not so; it was the battle of the new spirit against the old, of the trader against the official, of the active against the pa.s.sive. If here and elsewhere the latter had conquered, we might have had, in place of our modern hives of industry, vast thinly populated regions dotted with little, self-sufficient villages, which possibly were destined to be overrun by a more restless and energetic yellow race.[31]

Undoubtedly the English had not a shadow of right on their side; they were encouraging the breaking of treaties and flagrant political dishonesty. But under the brutal economic codes of the time there was no law but the law of the stronger; England might take if she had the power and Spain might keep if she could. The turbulent English mobs, clamouring for war, were shrewder than Walpole, shrewder than Burke, for they knew that to an island and trading people outlets for their commerce were matters of sheer necessity.

The Spaniards strongly disliked the Asiento Treaty, and, as is well known, English merchants, under cover of the privilege, carried on extensive smuggling operations against which the Spanish _guarda costas_ retaliated vigorously. It was in 1731 that they perpetrated upon Captain Jenkins the outrage which was to make so great a stir some years later. It may be added that Jenkins did really lose his ear on the high seas, and that the insinuations that the whole affair was a fabrication are themselves quite without foundation.[32] However, not for nearly seven years was there any attempt to make political capital out of it, although the smuggling question remained a constant source of irritation between the two countries. It was at the beginning of 1738 that circ.u.mstances were favourable for an outbreak, for a powerful opposition was longing to bring about the fall of Walpole, and his position was weakened by the death of Queen Caroline.

No weapon could be more effectual than the accusation of being insensible to the claims of national honour and of tamely suffering insults from Spain. On March 30th Carteret, in the House of Commons, carried an address against the right of search, and Walpole, who was anxious on all grounds to settle the matter, expedited the negotiations which had been for some time proceeding with Spain on the subject of compensation. In January, 1739, the terms of the agreement were published to the following effect. The Spaniards were willing that damages against themselves should be a.s.sessed to the amount of 200,000, but, on the other hand, the English Government acknowledged a counterclaim of 60,000, on account of the destruction of the Spanish fleet by Byng in 1718. With this and other possible deductions and abatements, the compensation seemed rather meagre, and the whole question of right of search being left to a Commission's decision, there was nothing in the findings that could be agreeable to Englishmen. A storm at once rose. The Prince of Wales voted against the Government.

Young Pitt thundered against Walpole. The Prime Minister had to give way. His colleagues were in favour of war, and, as often happened in such struggles, Admiral Vernon was despatched, long before a declaration of war, "to destroy the Spanish settlements and to distress their shipping." The national feeling continued to rise, and great were the manifestations of popular joy on the occasion of the formal declaration of war on October 23rd. "They now ring the bells," said Walpole, "they will soon ring their hands."

Meanwhile Vernon, though his force was small, lost no time, and having appeared off Porto Bello with six ships on November 20th, he captured it the next day, and the news of this success (which did not reach London till March, 1740), was received with extravagant demonstrations of rejoicing. In the spring Vernon was menacing Cartagena, and on March 24, 1740, captured Chagre. The home authorities appear to have been extremely dilatory, for it took them a whole year to send effectual reinforcements, and then their value was seriously discounted by the fact that General Wentworth had succeeded to the command of the land forces. This officer was thoroughly incompetent, and no exhortations of Vernon could rouse him to energy, and owing to his mismanagement the a.s.sault upon Cartagena of April 9th was a complete failure. The armament departed about a week later, having lost at least eight thousand men, and in July an attempt upon Santiago in Cuba failed likewise, owing to Wentworth's incompetence. Little more of note occurred on that side, and it is here proper to mention that Vernon was in nowise to blame for the unfortunate results, and that, with an efficient colleague, there seems no reason to doubt that he would have made a great name for himself in the annals of the British Navy. Nor should Smollett, because he happens to be a famous novelist, be accepted as a judge of the strategy of the expedition. He had, in fact, infinitely less materials for forming a judgment than a private at Waterloo had for criticising Wellington's dispositions.

The haphazard general management is well ill.u.s.trated by the only brilliant achievement of the war--the Anson circ.u.mnavigation. Anson, with six ships manned by Chelsea pensioners and raw recruits, was ordered to the Pacific, and set sail on September 18, 1740. Although his little squadron dwindled to three, he rounded the Horn, and subsequently burnt Paita in Peru, and played havoc with Spanish commerce. He crossed the Pacific, captured a great treasure-ship, and returned by the Cape of Good Hope to England, which he reached June 15, 1744. He brought home treasure amounting to 500,000, and this was paraded through the streets of London in thirty-two wagons.

It would be difficult to say when the War of Jenkins's Ear ended, or what were its results. Carlyle[33] says: "What became subsequently of the Spanish War, we in vain inquire of History-Books. The War did not die for many years to come, but neither did it publicly live; it disappears at this point: a River Niger, seen once flowing broad enough, but issuing--Does it issue nowhere, then? Where does it issue?... Forgotten by official people; left to the dumb English Nation." Doubtless it was not forgotten by the people; they soon showed once more their eagerness to break down the monopoly, and this curious war is noteworthy both as striking the real keynote of a long series of vast struggles, and also as showing the great _vis inertiae_ of Spain. Southey[34] remarks that the history of the War of Jenkins's Ear proves the strength of Spain in South America, and points out that an event in the war contributed indirectly to the prosperity of the River Plate settlement. When it was known that Anson was fitting out his celebrated squadron, the Spanish Government for its part also despatched six ships and three thousand five hundred men to protect the settlement. They delayed a long time there and, it is said, eventually not more than one hundred of the crews returned home, the greater part remaining to settle in the country.

Not less important than these hostilities against English and Portuguese (who from their near neighbourhood were almost equally dangerous in the contraband trade) was the loss to South America of that body which had been the conscience of Spanish America, which had protected the Indians, instructed the ignorant, and turned the wilderness into fertile fields. For a long time the civil power in Roman Catholic countries had been jealous of the influence wielded by the Jesuits. As their object was to suppress everything opposed to the Roman Catholic system as they understood it, so every element that felt itself menaced naturally rose in self-defence, and the Jesuits found themselves friendless in Europe. Their downfall was princ.i.p.ally due to the able and astute Pombal, the Prime Minister of Portugal, who considered that his country was depressed by a too powerful hierarchy, and his machinations were greatly a.s.sisted by circ.u.mstances in the River Plate settlements.

Colonia had long been a trouble to the Spaniards, diminishing their trade and insulting them by its propinquity, and in 1750 they made overtures for an exchange. The offending port was to be surrendered and the Portuguese were to receive in exchange a large portion of the Jesuit Missions, _i.e._, the territory called La Guayra and about 20,000 square miles to the east of the Uruguay River. This included seven Jesuit Reductions, and the Society and the Indians strenuously resisted the transference. Although the story of the Jesuits belongs rather to Paraguay than Argentina, it is for many reasons necessary to refer to that wonderful and benevolent despotism which they exercised in the Parana settlements, and also to relate the circ.u.mstances of their expulsion from South America--a matter of great importance to all the colonies.

The Jesuits did not commence effective work in Paraguay earlier than the beginning of the seventeenth century. In the days of the conquest attempts had been made by them to convert the natives and to further general missionary work, but the circ.u.mstances had not been favourable.

It was in 1610 that two members of the Order, Cataldino and Mazeta, founded the settlement of Loreto on the Upper Parana. An unfriendly critic[35] remarks: "They began by gathering together about one hundred and fifty wandering families, whom they persuaded to settle, and they united them into a little township. This was the slight foundation upon which they have built a superstructure which has amazed the world, and added so much power at the same time, that it has brought so much envy and jealousy upon their society. For when they had made this beginning, they laboured with such indefatigable pains, and with such masterly policy that, by degrees, they mollified the minds of the most savage nations,[36] fixed the most rambling, and subdued the most averse to government. They prevailed upon thousands of various dispersed tribes of people to embrace their religion, and to submit to their government; and when they had submitted, the Jesuits left nothing undone that could conduce to their remaining in this subjection, or that could tend to increase their number to the degree requisite for a well-ordered and potent society, and their labours were attended with amazing success."

The Jesuit establishments are one of the many meritorious acts of Saavedra who, seeing with concern the depression of the Indians and recognising their value to the Spanish Crown, appealed to the King, whereupon Phillip III., in 1609, issued royal letters patent to the Order of Jesuits for the conversion of the Indians. It is true that the Jesuits drew considerable wealth from their obedient subjects. They exported hides in large quant.i.ties and had a monopoly of the production of _mate_. Their method of government also would have been unsuitable to a race of harder fibre,[37] for they jealously excluded their Reductions from the external world, allowing no European to enter, and the Indians were kept constantly at work at the agricultural pursuits which the Jesuits themselves had greatly improved. But in those days it was rare indeed for any settlers to pay any regard to the welfare of the uncivilised races whom they encountered, and it must be remembered that the Jesuits were practically the only Christian missionaries in the period between the Reformation and the middle of the eighteenth century.

All honour, then, is due to them for their devotion and philanthropy.

When the peaceful Indians heard of the great disaster that had overtaken them in their abandonment to their old enemies the Portuguese, there was consternation, but they were remorselessly driven from their homes.

However, the Jesuits protested strongly, and in the end the Spanish Government was induced to annul the treaty. Nevertheless, the Indians never recovered their losses and the West of Rio Grande became permanently Portuguese, in spite of the abrogation of the treaty. The result would, no doubt, have been different had their powerful protectors remained in the country.

The officials at Buenos Aires cared much about Colonia and little for the Reductions or the fate of the Indians, and the Jesuits were accused of having brought about the recision of the treaty. Any pretext was now welcome, for their destruction was contemplated. As we have seen, the able Pombal had resolved to expel them from Portugal, and in 1759 he trumped up against them a charge of attempting to a.s.sa.s.sinate the King, and issued a decree for their deportation from Portugal. France eventually followed this example, and in 1767 even the Spanish King was induced to do the same, while in 1773 Pope Clement XIV. decreed the entire suppression of the Order.

In Argentina the Jesuits were seized and deported. It was expected that the Indians, who were armed, would make a serious resistance, but they were as sheep having no shepherd, and rather than remain in their old abodes to be harried by new masters they migrated to Entre Rios and Uruguay. But the work of the Jesuits has not perished, for they and the conventual orders were the first to give an example of humanity in the treatment of inferior races.

This great change was quickly followed by another. In 1776 the Vice-royalty of Buenos Aires was created, that is, the four countries now known as Argentina, Bolivia, Paraguay, Uruguay, were detached from the Vice-royalty of Peru, under Don Pedro Cevallos, sometime Governor of Buenos Aires. This step was a recognition of the importance of Buenos Aires, to which all observers testify. All the efforts of the Spaniards to force the trade of Europe over the Isthmus of Panama and the Andes had failed, and Buenos Aires was now to fulfil its destiny as the metropolis of Spanish America. The new Governor brought a large force, for there had been serious trouble with Portugal. As the latter was too weak to resist, and as the news of peace between the two countries followed almost immediately, there was no difficulty in coming to terms, and Colonia was finally made over to Spain. The result of this important treaty was that Spain was left in undisputed possession of Uruguay and Portugal of Brazil in its present form, for she recovered Rio Grande and Santa Catharina. Free trade was established between Buenos Aires and Spain, and Argentina made wonderful industrial advances. The rest of the century was uneventfully prosperous, but great events were in the wind, and they were destined to have a powerful influence on Spanish America. The easygoing paternal rule was to come to an end, and a long period of bloodshed and turbulence was to succeed. As was the case in every other part of the world, the motive power was supplied by the French Revolution.

FOOTNOTES:

[26] Funes, vol. iii. 73.

[27] "History of Brazil," ii. 322-3.

[28] Drake in 1578 visited the south of Tierra del Fuego, and discovered that there was a pa.s.sage round, but he did not himself make the voyage round Cape Horn.

[29] Bourgainville (See J. H. Moore), "Collection of Voyages and Travels," 266.

[30] "Buenos Ayres," 59.

[31] Carlyle has an accurate perception of the gravity of the issue.

"The Jenkins's Ear Question, which then looked so mad to everybody, how sane has it now grown to my Const.i.tutional Friend! In abstruse ludicrous form there lay immense questions involved in it; which were serious enough, certain enough, though invisible to everybody. Half the World lay hidden in embryo under it. Colonial-Empire, whose is it to be? Shall Half the World be England's, for industrial purposes; which is innocent, laudable, conformable to the Multiplication-table at least, and other plain Laws? Or shall it be Spain's for arrogant-torpid sham-devotional purposes, contradictory to every Law?"

("History of Frederick the Great," xii. 12, -- 3).

[32] See Sir J. K. Laughton, _English Historical Review_, October, 1889.

[33] See Sir J. K. Laughton, _English Historical Review_, October, 1889.

[34] "History of Brazil," iii. 300.

[35] "An Account of the Spanish Settlement in America," 340-1.