150 BAFIIA BLANCA TO BUENOS AYRES. 



the toldos, there were three ranches ; one inhabited 

 by the Commandant, and the two others by Span- 

 iards with small shops. 



We were here able to buy some biscuit. I had 

 now been several days without tasting anything be- 

 sides meat : I did not at all dislike this new regimen, 

 but I felt as if it would only have agreed with me 

 with hard exercise. I have heard that patients in 

 England, when desired to confine themselves exclu- 

 sively to an animal diet, even with the hope of life 

 before their eyes, have hardly been able to endure it. 

 Yet the Gi-aucho in the Pampas, for months togeth- 

 er, touches nothing but beef. But they eat, I ob- 

 serve, a very large proportion of fat, which is of a 

 less animalized nature ; and they particularly dis- 

 like dry meat, such as that of the Agouti. Di'. 

 Richardson* also has remarked, "that when people 

 have fed for a long time solely upon lean animal 

 food, the desire for fat becomes so insatiable, that 

 they can consume a large quantity of vmmixed 

 and even oily fat without nausea :" this appears to 

 me a curious physiological fact. It is, perhaps, 

 from their meat regimen that the Gauchos, like 

 other carnivorous animals, can abstain long from 

 food. I was told that at Tandeel, some troops 

 voluntai'ily pursued a party of Indians for three 

 days without eating or drinking. 



We saw in the shojDS many articles, such as 

 horsecloths, belts, and garters, woven by the In- 

 dian women. The patterns were very pretty, and 

 the colours brilliant ; the workmanship of the gar- 

 ters was so good that an English merchant at Bue- 

 nos Ayres maintained they must have been manu- 

 factured in England, till he found the tassels had 

 been fastened by split sinew. 



Septemher ISih. — We had a very long ride this 

 * Fauna Boreali-Americana, vol. i., p. 35. 



