158 A BOOK-LOVER S HOLIDAYS 



his own fierce and wary prowess cannot exist 

 under such conditions, and the cow -hands must 

 be men recklessly ready to fight for their cattle. 

 The Paraguayans of the class who sought em 

 ployment in the western interior of Brazil bore 

 a fighting, and somewhat murderous, reputation. 

 They were a daredevil set, and under men of 

 masterful type they did hard and dangerous 

 work for their employers. 



The ordinary ranches where we stopped 

 were of a different type. The houses were of 

 one story, with thick, white walls. The few 

 rooms were furnished only with rough tables 

 and benches and rings for the hammocks. The 

 unglazed windows were fitted with solid wooden 

 shutters. Outbuildings stood near by; one per 

 haps for a kitchen; sheds for skinning or for the 

 few stores; cabins in which the ranch-hands 

 lived with their families. Palm-trees, or bananas 

 with huge, ragged leaves, or trees unlike any 

 familiar to our experience, might stand near by, 

 close to the big cow corrals. On the poorer 

 ranches the houses were nothing but log skeletons 

 thatched with palm-leaves. 



On these ranches the &quot;camaradas,&quot; the cow 

 hands, in whose company we hunted, were all 

 native Brazilians, of the same type as the men 

 whom subsequently we took with us on our 



