148 A BOOK-LOVER'S HOLIDAYS 



adopted Christianity in the excessively prim- 

 itive form known to the gauchos, came out to 

 live with the whites, and followed the ordinary 

 occupations, he seemed to be promptly ac- 

 cepted as a white man, no different from any 

 one else. The Indians, by the way, now have 

 property, and are well treated. Nevertheless, 

 the pure stock is dying out, and those that sur- 

 vive are being absorbed in the rest of the popu- 

 lation. 



The various accidents we met with during 

 the forenoon delayed us, and we did not take 

 breakfast — or, as we at home would call it, 

 lunch — until about three o'clock in the after- 

 noon. We had then halted at a big group of 

 buildings which included a store and a govern- 

 ment telegraph office. The store was a long, 

 whitewashed, one-story house, the bedrooms in 

 the rear, and all kinds of outbuildings round 

 about. In some corrals near by a thousand 

 sheep were being sheared. Breakfast had been 

 long deferred, and we were hungry. But it 

 was a feast when it did come, for two young 

 sheep or big lambs were roasted whole before a 

 fire in the open, and were then set before us; 

 the open-air cook was evidently of almost pure 

 Indian blood. 



On we went with the cars, with no further 



