Excerpt from In Jesuit Land, the Jesuit Missions of Paraguay The author entered the Jesuit Missions last year from the south, in the train. I, who write this retro spect (or perhaps introduction), entered them from the north, riding a certain White horse that I had in those days, some thirty or more years ago, having set out from Asuncion. The writer travelled, possibly, two days. I rode a fortnight, swimming the rivers, Sleeping sometimes in native huts, sometimes alone beside my horse out on some little plain, for it was dangerous to approach a wood, as tigers swarmed. The country was almost uninhabited, and if you met a stranger, he usually was one of that kind one does not care to meet alone, unless you have a horse such as my Blanco was, who could turn on a hand kerchief, as the saying used to go, and stop in two or three Sharp bounds when at full speed. Then, indeed, one felt more confident, for a good horse imparts his spirit to his rider, just as a bold rider gives his courage to his horse. When I arrived at what is now Posadas, and then was called La Candelaria, we crossed the Uruguay, on a great flying bridge, and I remember seeing a Brazilian mount his horse, which blazed with silver trappings, and jump him from the bridge into the water, which was about two feet in depth. When the horse felt the water, he started bucking; but the Brazilian sat like a statue in his saddle, holding his gun in his right hand. I see him now, occasionally, in my mind's eye, and hear the splashing of his horse's feet; and when I see him, all the years roll back, and I am Sitting on my Blanco, waiting my turn to spur him off the bridge. These were the humours of the road in those days, and the trail I followed led me through Caacupe, Quinde, and Santa Rosa, and SO by Itapua, to the frontier. The country that I travelled through was that in which the Paraguayan Missions once flourished, and formed, with all the faults of the administration of the Jesuits, as nearly an Arcadia as any place on earth. Naturally, an Arcadia is a matter of opinion, and controversy has raged fiercely about the missions on the Parana. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.