76 IDLE DAYS IN PATAGONIA 



There are the animal foes. Pumas infest the 

 settlement. At all seasons a few of these sly 

 but withal audacious robbers haunt the riverside ; 

 but in winter a great many lean and hungry indi- 

 viduals come down from the uplands to slay the 

 sheep and horses, and it is extremely difficult to 

 track them to their hiding places in the thorny 

 thickets overhanging the valley. I was told that 

 not less than a hundred pumas were killed annu- 

 ally by the shepherds and herdsmen. The depre- 

 dations of the locusts are on a much larger scale. 

 In summer I frequently rode over miles of ground 

 where they literally carpeted the earth with their 

 numbers, rising in clouds before me, causing a 

 sound as of a loud wind with their wings. It was 

 always the same, I was told ; every year they ap- 

 peared at some point in the valley to destroy the 

 crops and pasturage. Then there were birds of 

 many species and in incalculable numbers. To an 

 idle sportsman without a stake in the country it 

 was paradise. At one spot I noticed all the wheat 

 ruined, most of the stalks being stripped and 

 broken, presenting a very curious appearance; I 

 was surprised to hear from the owner of the 

 desolate fields that in this instance the coots had 

 been the culprits. Thousands of these birds came 

 up from the river every night, and in spite of all 

 he could do to frighten them away they had suc- 

 ceeded in wasting his corn. 



On either side of the long straggling settlement 

 spreads the uninhabited desert uninhabitable, in 



