Note 91 — Chapter XII · BUENOS AYRES.

The English and foreign merchants residing in this city have established an English club-house, where a limited number of beds is provided for bachelor members. This fine establishment is conducted by a committee of gentlemen, and contains every possible convenience, including a reading and news-room, as well as one for billiards; and, in fact, economy, comfort, and every facility of commercial intercourse, have been consulted in all its arrangements. The foreign population of this city includes a great number of shopkeepers, who form quite a little Paris of elegant shops. Hatmakers, tailors, coiffeurs, modistes, and bootmakers predominate amongst the French; merchants, storekeepers, publicans, and boarding-house keepers amongst the English; and amongst the Italians, warehousemen and captains of small craft trading to the inland ports on the mighty Plata. The immigration of Irish to this place must have been on a very extensive scale, since all the hotel and boarding-houses, which are invariably European, have them in their employ. They are also to be found in great numbers on the farms in the neighbourhood of the capital, which are held by Englishmen, and which supply the city regularly with butter, eggs, and milk. The difficulty in finding a washerwoman is indescribable, and would scarcely be credited. I had to send my servant in all directions before he could find one, and then I discovered that I could enlist her in my service only on these conditions—first, that I should await her leisure, and next that I should pay at the rate of three or four royals for each article!—Bonelli.