1 8 SOUTH AMERICAN HORSES. 



this respect, it struck us that they formed the raw 

 material for the most mobile light cavalry in the world. 



Many of the "Gauchos" (the white plainsmen of 'the 

 Pampas) will also eat mares' flesh, following the Indian 

 custom in this respect; and some of them are even 

 said to prefer certain cuts of it to beef; but apart from 

 all sentimental considerations, horseflesh has a peculiar 

 flavour that renders it distasteful to the European 

 palate; still it is by no means bad, and is quite eatable, 

 on a pinch. On the great plains of South America, 

 where horses are so cheap and numerous, mares are rarely 

 used as beasts of burden; many natives considering it 

 cruel to work them, even in a country where 

 sentimentality of this kind can hardly be said to be 

 prevalent, and mares instead of being worked are 

 killed. No doubt their supposed inferiority, and also 

 the enormous numbers of horses of all descriptions 

 has led to this practice of slaughtering these animals, 

 for the value of their hides, fat, and bones. In the 

 great "Saladeros" of Buenos Ayres and elsewhere 

 mares were formerly slaughtered by thousands, and 

 probably are so still, just for the value of the animal 

 products of the carcase, though each of them would, 

 if landed in Europe, represent a value in most cases, 

 of from 20 to ^"40, and even ^50. Cattle were also 

 killed in the same way, and their flesh was salted, dried 

 and turned into " Charqui, " a hard indigestible substance 

 like leather, but which was very useful for travellers 

 crossing the pampas, and which we have often eaten. 



Nothing astonishes a new comer to the Plate River 

 more than this extraordinary waste of valuable stock, 

 by the wholesale destruction of mares, and a curious 

 fact in connection with the natural history of the horse, 



