The universal geography : earth and its inhabitants

336
AMAZONIA AND LA PLATA.
these countries is his perfect indifference to the sufferings of the brute creation ;
his comparative disregard of human life is, with such a training, not unintelli-
gible." *
Rivera, at the source of the Cufiapiru, one of the chief affluents of the Eio
Negro, forms almost a single town with the neighbouring Santa Anna de Livni-
mento on the Brazilian side. For a time Rivera was a great centre of the gold
industry, and considerable quantities appear to have been collected in the
Cunapiru and surrounding valleys. Yet a French company had to cease opera-
tions after losing millions of money in this " Eldorado."
DURAZNO COLONIA
—
SaN JoSE.
JtiiriizHO, on the River Yi, midway between Tacuarcmbo (formerly Ban Frnc-
ti(i).so) and Monte Video, has been transformed from a military colony to an agri-
cultural market. Some Indians, expelled by the Brazilian settlers in the territory
of the missions, were settled at Durazno in 1828, but instead of allowing them to
cultivate their land in peace, the authorities enrolled them as soldiers, and all
perished in the civil wars. Soriano, near the head of the Uruguay estuar}', dates
from the year 1624, and here is still seen the chapel built by Bernardo de Guzman
for the Ghana Indians, who had appealed to the Spaniards for protection against
the Charruas. No trace remains of another station which was founded by
Sebastian Cabot, a few miles farther down, near the present village of San Sahridor.
Farther down follow Higueritas {Nueva Palmini) and Carmelo {Las Vacas) at a
point on the estuary where it narrows from six miles to little over one mile, forming
an excellent harbour about the Parana confluence. At the extremity of a
headland below the island of Martin Garcia, stands the famous station of Colonia
del Sacramento, opposite Buenos Ayres. Soon after its foundation in 1679, Colonia,
which has the best anchorage in the Plate estuary below Higueritas, was seized
bv the Portuguese Manoel Lobo, and by him for a time transformed to a nest of
smugglers. On the banks of the neighbouring little Rio Martin Chico, the illus-
trious navigator Solis was killed by the Charruas.
San Jose, on the river of like name, north-west of Monte Video, was founded at
the end of the eighteenth century by some settlers from the north of Sjjain.
During the war with Brazil (1825), the Republicans had made it their capital, and
since then it has shared in all the local troubles. Nevertheless, it has steadily
prospered, like the neighbouring Florida on the Arroyo Pintado, which is spanned
by a fine viaduct on the northern railway. The village of Itiiaaiiir/o on the Rio
Santa Lucia in the same district, recalls the decisive victory of the Argentines
over the Brazilians in 1827.
Monte Video.
Moiiie Video, capital of Uruguay, dates only from the early part of the
eigliteenth century, when Zabala, Governor of Buenos Ayres, founded it as a
* Eumbold, p. 153.