50 MEMOIR OF 



guarding about twelve million of cattle, about three 

 million of horses, and a considerable number of 

 sheep. Here I do not include about two million of 

 wild oxen, and the wild horses which are innu- 

 merable. The domestic troops belong to private 

 individuals; and an average pasturage (estancia) 

 extends to four or five square leagues. Every 

 troop has a master-shepherd, called the Captain, 

 and an under one for every thousand head of cattle. 

 The former is ijsually married, the others are not ; 

 except such as are Negroes, or people of colour, or 

 those Indians who have been connected with the 

 missionary settlements. I believe that no woman 

 in this society preserves her chastity after she is 

 eight years old ; and those reputed Spanish are not 

 better than the others. The father and the whole 

 family sleep in the same chamber. As these herds- 

 men are twelve, thirty, and even a hundred miles 

 from chapel, they seldom or never go to mass. 

 They themselves often baptize their children ; and 

 I have been asked, when galloping over the plains, 

 to perform the ceremony. When they do go to 

 mass, they attend on horseback, the door being kept 

 open for their convenience. In then- houses, they 

 have usually no other fumitiire than a pitcher for 

 water, a horn for drinking, a wooden spit for roast- 

 ing their meat, and a little copper-kettle for boiling 

 the water with which they infuse their Paraguay 

 herb. They usually sit upon their heels, with their 

 limbs bent under them, or upon the skull of a horse 

 or ox. They use no kind of vegetable food, saying 



