l6 PATAGONIAN EXPEDITIONS : NARRATIVE. 



the northward, Sierra Ventana raised its hoary head of gray quartzite, 

 sentinel like, 3,000 feet above the surface of the surrounding plain, and 

 formed the only interruption upon the level surface of the seemingly 

 limitless expanse of country, that stretched far as the eye could see to the 

 south, west and north, its dull color due to the scanty covering of brown 

 withered grass, otherwise entirely unrelieved. 



Time did not permit our visiting Punta Alta, where Darwin had a half 

 century before discovered the remains of Megatherium, Megalonyx, 

 Scelidotherium, Mylodon, Toxodon, and a host of other equally interest- 

 ing and long since extinct animals. Everywhere in the immediate 

 vicinity of the port the beach consisted of mud flats. Some two miles 

 inward, however, workmen were engaged in digging a large well for the 

 railroad company and from a bed of marl some eight feet below the sur- 

 face I secured a considerable number of shells belonging to several 

 species, apparently not differing from those now found in the waters of 

 the bay. 



Early in the afternoon the warning whistle blew for us to come on 

 board, and we immediately repaired to the mole, where we found that the 

 Villarino had taken her position alongside one of the larger freight steam- 

 ers. We were soon aboard, and as the company of soldiers before alluded 

 to, together with their officers, had already embarked, we were not long 

 in getting under way and steaming out of the port of Bahia Blanca by 

 the long narrow canal by which we had entered it. The company of sol- 

 diers just mentioned was composed of about sixty men, and a dirtier, 

 more shiftless and less sightly aggregation of human beings it has never 

 been my lot to see. Their clothing, luggage, and persons were all in a 

 filthy condition. I am speaking now of the rank and file only, for in jus- 

 tice to the officers it must be said that their appearance was always quite 

 the opposite from that of the men, and I never could understand why 

 these officers were so lax in enforcing discipline and cleanliness in the 

 ranks. Whatever the cause, the Argentine soldiers and sailors, when 

 compared with the standard maintained in our army and navy, are pain- 

 fully lacking in that prepossessing appearance which characterizes our men, 

 by reason of their neat, well-fitted uniforms, tidy appearance and erect 

 military bearing. 



Our next stop was at San Bias, the name given to a small land-locked 

 bay, some sixty miles north of the mouth of the Colorado River. The 



