26 Mr. E. Gibson on the Or)i\tholoyy of [Ibis, 



all Devonshire men, be was a keen shot and somewhat of a 

 collector, and it liaving occui'red to him in the interval that 

 he wonid like a pair of Chilian Eagles [Geranodeius nielano- 

 IciicusW^xW.) for the hall at home, he boi'rovved my gun and 

 cartridge-belt, and went in their quest. At sundown he 

 duly returned with a fine pair of the birds in question 

 (there were then known to be two or more pairs in the 

 lonely fastnesses of the Rincones), and forty Brown Pintails 

 "for the larder.' ''How did you do it?" I inquired, 

 referring to tlie latter item, and was rather taken aback on 

 observing that there were only four cartridges missing from 

 the belt he returned to me. " Well/' he replied, '" I had got 

 the two Eagles all right, and was riding home when I 

 observed a large flock of Pintails at a pool of water in the 

 o})en camp, so I managed to stalk within range somehow, 

 and gave them the first barrel 'sitting' and the second 

 as they rose. Two dozen of the spoil I left with Pedro 

 Gomez, the cattle capataz, who had accompanied me through 

 the llincones, and the remainder you see." The total 

 result was tlierefore sixty-four Duck for two shots. On 

 another occasion a guest at the Yngleses — also a good shot 

 and one who knew of old the " lay of the land '' — went off 

 for a day's shooting, accompanied by a peon. About 

 niidday the boy returned, with a request for another hundred 

 cartridges, and the message that *' Don Jorge said it would 

 be advisable to send one of the small ' lamb-carts ' to a 

 certain point later in the afternoon, as he already had more 

 birds than the two horses could conveniently carry." I 

 have no record of what the bag aggregated in this case, but 

 it was duly obtained by legitimate wing-shots (not firing 

 into the brown) and by one gun. 



In parenthesis I would remark that our '• big shoots " 

 Mere always a worry to me in connection with the disposal 

 of the game. The Gaucho, as I have stated before, is 

 contemptuous of everything but beef or mutton — fish and 

 birds are beneath his notice. The sheplnerds of foreign 

 nationalities — Spaniards, Basques, Italians, French or Scan- 

 dinavians — do not altogether share this prejudice, but dislike 



