South America

The book carries the subtitle Observations and Impressions and is a new edition corrected and revised, with maps. The writer describes the little city of Panama standing on its promontory just beneath the Ancon hill, a mass of grey, red-roofed houses with a half-demolished Spanish fort of the eighteenth century guarding the shallow roadstead. The writer says the landscape spread out under this hill of Ancon is the finest in all the Isthmian region. The text says that over the smooth ocean plains which the Spaniards called the Peaceful Sea, Vasco Nuñez de Balboa looked eagerly out as he planned that expedition to Peru which the jealous cruelty of Pedrarias, the Spanish viceroy, cut short.

The text says the Park, called Palermo, lies on the edge of the city towards the river, and is approached by a well-designed and well-planted avenue. The writer says nowhere in the world does one get a stronger impression of exuberant wealth and extravagance. The index lists, among others, Jockey Club, Buenos Aires, John VI of Portugal and Benito Juarez.