COUNTRY SPORTS AND LIFE IN CHILE. 169 



in 'him. Of their extraordinary performances, of which 

 everyone hears before he has been in the country a week, 

 I need only say that they do not bear investigation ; they 

 are on a par with those ideas about the noble savage, 

 nature^s nobleman, &c._, &c. I am surprised to see so 

 accurate a thinker as Canon Kingsley fall into this error. 

 As was pointed out a short time ago in the Fields most 

 Government clerks could beat the best red man that 

 ever stepped. I was once an actual spectator of the fact 

 of several ordinary Government clerks, with no pre- 

 tensions to running, beating easily the pick of 8000 

 ludians, who were as wild as hawks. I was at Van- 

 couver's Island, some years ago, on the occasion of 

 Her Majesty's birthday ; several thousand Indians from 

 all parts, some from very remote places, attended the 

 poir-ivow. Some sports were got up, amongst others 

 flat races from 100 yards to one mile ; for this latter 

 distance two noble savages entered, with awful names 

 and hardly any clothes on ; they were outpaced from the 

 first and easily beaten by three or four clerks in the 

 time, if I remember correctly, of about five and a half 

 minutes; both of the nobles were considerably done 

 up, and spent the rest of the day in the bottom of their 

 canoes, having evidently had quite enough of it. 



A young Chileno once, expiating on the excellences of 

 his horse, assured me that he had gone 150 miles in one 

 day on that same horse. I answered his foolishness by 

 ofiering to bet him a good sum that he could not yHcle 

 100 miles in one day, with as many horses as he chose to 

 take, let alone one horse doing it. Of course he did not 

 take the bet ; few people have any idea of what riding 

 100 miles on an average hot day is like; I know I have 

 found from seventy-five to eighty quite enough for me. 



