Fuentes has created a number of interesting characters in his historical novel. He makes use of a variety of ideas, but his characters are not reduced to being spokesmen of their beliefs. They are not allegorical figures.

Baltasar Bustos is the central figure. At the offset he is a bespectacled, plump clerk at the Superior Court of the Viceroyalty of the Rio de las Plata. His myopia is symbolic. The presiding judge is the Marquis de Cabra, husband of his beloved Ofelia. To test his ideas and to win the admiration of Ofelia Salamanca, he joins the wars of independence as a soldier, despite his physical limitations. He makes himself a soldier to the extent that the gauchos on his father's huge estate do not recognize him at first, when he returns for a visit. He has become as lean and saddle-hardened as any of them. His passion...