fSin.l MEAT DIET. 117 



colour, taste, and flavour." Such certainly is the case with the 

 Puma. The Gauchos differ in their opinion, whether the Ja- 

 guar is good eating, but are unanimous in saying that cat is ex- 

 cellent. 



September 17 th. — We followed the course of the Eio Tapal- 

 guen, through a very fertile country, to the ninth posta. Tapal- 

 guen itself, or the town of Tapalguen, if it may be so called, 

 consists of a perfectly level plain, studded over, as far as the eye 

 can reach, with the toldos, or oven-shaped huts of the Indians. 

 The families of the friendly Indians, who were fighting on the 

 side of Eosas, resided here. We met and passed many young 

 Indian women, riding by two or three together on the same 

 horse : they, as well as many of the young men, were strikingly 

 handsome, — their fine ruddy complexions being the picture oi 

 health. Besides the toldos, there were three ranchos ; one in- 

 liabited by the Commandant, and the two others by Spaniards 

 with small shops. 



We were here able to buy some biscuit. I had now been 

 several days without tasting any thing besides meat : I did not 

 at all dislike this new regimen ; but I felt as if it would only 

 have aofreed with me with hard exercise. I have heard that 

 patients in England, when desired to confine themselves exclu- 

 sively to an animal diet, even with the hope of life before their 

 eyes, have hardly been able to endure it. Yet the Gaucho in 

 the Pampas, for months together, touches nothing but beef. 

 But they eat, I observe, a very large proportion of fat, which is 

 of a less animalized nature ; 'and they particularly dislike dry 

 meat, such as that of the Agouti. Dr. Richardson,* also, has 

 remarked, " tliat w'hen people have fed for a long time solely 

 upon lean animal food, the desire for fat becomes so insatiable, 

 that they can consume a large quantity of unmixed and even oily 

 fat without nausea :'* this appears to me a curious physiological 

 fact. It is, perhaps, from their meat regimen that the Gauchos, 

 like other carnivorous animals, can abstain long from food. I 

 was told that at Tandeel, some troops voluntarily pursued a party 

 of Indians for three days, without eating or drinking. 



We saw in the shops many articles, such as horsecloths, belts, 



* Fauna Boreali- Americana, vol. i. p. 35, 



