TTumble-Bees and other Matters. 159 
But what can we say of the common deer of the 
pampas (Cervus campestris), the male of which gives 
out an effluvium quite as far-reaching although not 
so abominable in character as that of the Mephitis? 
It comes in disagreeable whiffs to the human 
nostril when the perfumer of the wilderness is not 
even in sight. Yet it is not a protection; on the 
contrary, it is the reverse, and, like the dazzling 
white plumage so attractive to birds of prey, a 
direct disadvantage, informing all enemies for 
leagues around of its whereabouts. It 1s not, there- 
fore, strange that wherever pumas are found, deer 
are never very abundant; the only wonder is that, 
hike the ancient horse of America, they have not 
become extinct. 
The gauchos of the pampas, however, give a 
reason for the powerful smell of the male deer; 
and, after some hesitation, I have determined to 
set itdown here, for the reader to accept or reject, 
as he thinks proper. I neither believe nor dis- 
believe it; for although I do not put great faith 
in gaucho natural history, my own observations 
have not infrequently confirmed statements of 
theirs, which a sceptical person would have regarded 
as wild indeed. To give one instance: I heard a 
gaucho relate that while out riding he had been 
pursued for a considerable distance by a large 
spider; his hearers laughed at him for a romancer ; 
but as I myself had been attacked and pursued, 
both when on foot and on horseback, by a large 
wolf-spider, common on the pampas, I did not join 
in the laugh. They say that the effluvium of (0, 
campestris is abhorrent to snakes of all kinds, just 
M 
