44 PATAGONIAN EXPEDITIONS I NARRATIVE. 



its channel free, owing to the reduced erosive power due to the diminished 

 volume of water, which finally becomes negative. 



We arrived at the estancia on the morning of May 5th, and the follow- 

 ing morning Mr. Peterson, Senor Archerique and myself proceeded some 

 twenty miles farther up the river to visit an Indian encampment. The 

 day, like all the preceding ones since our arrival at Gallegos, was raw and 

 cold, and rendered the more disagreeable by a piercing southwesterly 

 wind. At a distance of a few miles from the ranch the river valley made 

 a considerable deflection to the northeast, and, since we judged that our 

 course lay to the northwest, we left the valley and" climbed the bluff to 

 the plain above. For miles we galloped over the barren, shingle-covered 

 surface of this perfectly level tract. If the plain back of Gallegos had 

 seemed somewhat destitute of vegetation, this was tenfold more so, and 

 I was at a loss to understand what sustenance the guanaco and rhea, 

 which appeared at intervals, could derive from the few almost leafless 

 plants which lifted their short, fleshy, thorn-covered stems above the sur- 

 face of the surrounding stones, or lay spread out in large, circular, caespi- 

 tose masses, presenting a surface almost as hard as that of the surround- 

 ing bowlders. The components of the shingle were noticeably coarser than 

 were those of the plains nearer the coast. 



It was evident from the topography of the surrounding country 

 that the river made a considerable elbow here and that, by holding 

 our course, we should again reach it at about the point where it 

 resumed its northwesterly direction. After a most invigorating 

 gallop of an hour and a half across the pampa, we came suddenly to the 

 crest of the escarpment above the river. In the valley beneath grazed 

 quietly a band of about three hundred variously colored horses belonging 

 to the Indian village, consisting of half a dozen toldos pitched at the foot 

 of the cliff some two miles farther up the valley. These toldos, made of 

 guanaco skins sewed together and stretched fur side out over poles laid in 

 crotches set in the ground, were not easily discernible, so perfectly did the 

 brown fur of the guanaco skins blend with the brown of the grass-covered 

 valley. 



At first, as we approached, there was little evidence of life about the 

 toldos. But a little later, as we drew nearer and our arrival had been 

 announced, the full population of the village was in evidence, and we were 

 greeted by from fifty to one hundred dogs representing every conceivable 



