--Castro and Rosas--The mentality of a South American--"The
Liberator"--The Basques and their national game--Love of English
people for foreign words--Yellow fever--Life on an Argentine
_estancia_--How cattle are worked--The lasso and the
"bolas"--Ostriches--Venomous toads--The youthful rough-rider--His
methods--Fuel difficulties--The vast plains--The wonderful bird-life.


Any one desirous of seeing an exceedingly beautiful, and comparatively
unknown, corner of the world, should take the fortnightly
Inter-colonial steamer from Trinidad, and make the voyage "up the
islands." The Lesser Antilles are very lovely, but there is something
rather melancholy about them, for they are obviously decaying in
prosperity; the white planters are abandoning them, and as the
coloured people take their place, externals all begin to assume a
shabby, unkempt appearance. I am speaking of the conditions anterior
to 1914; the great rise in the price of sugar since then may have
resulted in a back-wash of prosperity affecting both the Windward and
the Leeward Islands.

I should always myself classify the West India islands according to
their liability to, or immunity from, the various local drawbacks.
Thus Barbados, though within the hurricane zone, is outside the
earthquake zone, and is free from poisonous snakes. Trinidad, only 200
miles away, is outside the hurricane area, but is most distinctly
inside the earthquake zone, is prolific in venomous snakes and enjoys
the further advantage of being the home of the blood-sucking vampire
bat. Jamaica is liable to both hurricanes and earthquakes, but has no
poisonous snakes. St. Vincent, St. Lucia and Martinique are really
over-full of possibilities, for, in addition to a liability to