ACROSS THE ANDES 141 



and the Greek dramatists. Our host quoted 

 from the " NibelungenHed " and from Homer, 

 and at least two-thirds of the men at the table 

 seemed to have dozens of authors at their 

 tongues' ends. But it was the Itahan carpenter 

 who capped the climax, for when we touched on 

 Dante he became almost inspired and repeated 

 passage after passage, the majesty and sono- 

 rous cadence of the lines thrilhng him so that his 

 Hsteners were almost as much moved as he was. 

 We sat thus for an hour — an unexpected type 

 of Kaffee Klatsch for such an outpost of civih- 

 zation. 



Next morning at five we were off for our four- 

 hundred-mile drive across the Patagonian wastes 

 to the railway at Neuquen. We had been 

 through a stretch of scenery as lovely as can 

 be found anywhere in the world — a stretch 

 that in parts suggested the Swiss lakes and 

 mountains, and in other parts Yellowstone 

 Park or the Yosemite or the mountains near 

 Puget Sound. In a couple of years the Argen- 

 tines will have pushed their railway system to 

 Bariloche, and then all tourists who come to 

 South America should make a point of visiting 

 this wonderfully beautiful region. Doubtless 

 in the end it will be developed for travellers 

 much as other regions of great scenic attraction 



