d ever been
before; for though satisfied in the main with his own conduct, and
hoping that the voyage would have most beneficial effects upon his son's
behavior and disposition, he regretted most bitterly the necessity of
the measure, and felt the keenest anxiety as to its results. That son
was destined never to return.

The ship in which he was embarked was driven much farther to the
westward than is usually the case with outward-bound Indiamen, and
encountered one of those tremendous gales of wind, known to seamen by
the local name of _pamperos_, from their blowing off the immense
_pampas_, or plains, that constitute a large portion of the province of
Buenos Ayres, or, as it is now called, the Argentine Republic. The ship
was dismasted, and with difficulty succeeded in reaching the harbor of
Buenos Ayres to refit.

The city of Buenos Ayres was at that time, and I believe it is not much
better now, a nest and rendezvous of pirates, that, under the cover of
the republican flag, and the assumed character of men-of-war or
privateers, with forged commissions, committed the most barefaced and
abominable acts of piracy. The British cruisers, by capturing and
hanging a good number of them, struck a most wholesome terror into the
rest; but our government, with a fraternal affection for every mean and
insignificant patch of barren sand-beach that called itself a republic,
more worthy the _sans-culotterie_ of the French revolution, than
becoming a great and polished nation, permitted them to sell their
prizes and refit in our ports. Buenos Ayres was then a point towards
which all the scoundrels, and thieves, and murderers, of Europe and the
United States, were radiating as to a common centre.

Here, as might have been expected, Longford found plenty of congenial
companions to "whet his almost blunted purpose" of vicious propensity
and indulgence. In a drunken quarrel at the gaming-table, knives were
drawn, and Longford stabbed his antagonist-to the heart. Murders are so
exceedingly common in all the Spanish possessions and settlements in
America, that but seldom or never is any inquiry set on foot with regard
to them. The only _judicial_ formality consists in laying the dead
bodies on their backs, with a plate upon the breast of each to receive
the contributions of those who are disposed to assist in defraying the
expenses of burial. But the murdered person, in this case, was a man of
considerable consequence in the Buenos Ay