40 HUNTING CAMPS. 



but in that moment it had torn out both the guanaco's 

 eyes. When, after putting it out of its pain, I examined 

 the animal, I found that it was suffering from scab and 

 was so emaciated that it must have been on the point of 

 death when the condor attacked it. 



Nothing more ghastly can be imagined than the fate 

 of the solitary rider who meets with an accident in that 

 region ; such an incident forms the subject of a powerful 

 and gruesome picture which hangs in the Natural 

 History Museum at La Plata. In this picture a gaucho 

 has fallen from his horse and lies helpless on the ground 

 while the condors and other birds of prey are sitting 

 round him or wheeling in the air above his head. It 

 represents, I am afraid, a tragedy which the pampas 

 have often witnessed. 



Certainly of all game in Patagonia the wild cattle in 

 their favourite habitat, the thick forests of the southern 

 cordillera, afford the best sport and are the most difficult 

 to bring to bag, if such an expression may be used of a 

 quarry weighing close upon 2,000 Ibs. These animals 

 are said to have bred wild since their ancestors escaped 

 from the early Spanish settlements on the Valdez 

 Peninsula to the grassy hollows and forested spurs of 

 the cordillera, since when fresh blood has no doubt been 

 constantly brought in by truants from the estancias on 

 the coast. 



The wild cattle mostly frequent the forests about the 

 Andean Lakes, and those that have been free for 

 generations present a fine appearance, having lost the 

 smooth aspect of domestication and reverted to the 

 shaggy hair, lean bodies, and longer horns that mark 

 the wild strain. In the daytime they keep much to the 

 thickest forests, wandering to their edges morning and 



