A CHILEAN RONDEO 119 



gauchos, and more remotely to our own cow- 

 boys. 



As we neared the ranch, shpping down broad, 

 dusty, tree-bordered roads beside which irri- 

 gation streams ran, we began to come across 

 the huasos gathering for the sports. They rode 

 singly and by twos and threes, or in parties of 

 fifteen or twenty. They were on native Chilean 

 horses — stocky, well-built beasts, hardy and 

 enduring, and on the whole docile. Almost all 

 the men wore the light manta, less heavy than 

 the serapi, but hke it in shape, the head of the 

 rider being thrust through a hole in the middle. 

 It would seem as though it might interfere with 

 the free use of their arms, but it does not, and 

 at the subsequent cattle sports many of the 

 participants never took off their mantas. The 

 riders wore straw hats of various types, but 

 none of them with the sugar-loaf cones of the 

 Mexicans. Their long spurs bore huge rowels. 

 The mantas were not only picturesque, but gave 

 the company a look of diversified and gaudy 

 brilliancy, for they were of all possible colors, 

 green, red, brown, and blue, solid and patterned. 

 The saddles were far forward, and the shoe- 

 shaped wooden stirrups were elaborately carved. 



The men were fine-looking fellows, some with 

 smooth faces or mustaches, some with beards. 



