SMELLING THE ENEMY 131 



length, which was not carried as the civiHsed soldier 

 carries his lance, but was grasped in the hand a yard 

 or so from the point and allowed to trail on the ground. 

 And yet — will it be believed ? — when it came to 

 actual fighting with a body of civilised whites — 

 soldiers armed with carbine and sword — these poor 

 savages were victorious as often as not. How did they 

 do it, seeing that the lance is the least effective of all 

 weapons used in war except against an enemy already 

 broken and in retreat ? They succeeded in most cases 

 owing to the terror they produced in the white men's 

 horses. It must be understood that it was in all cases 

 solely a fight on horseback. Infantry and artillery 

 were useless owing to the extreme rapidity of the 

 movements of the Indian bands, which had to be 

 chased all over the invaded district. The Indians, 

 always better mounted than the whites, stayed to 

 fight only when it suited them, and their method 

 was to come on, widely scattered, in furious rushes, 

 lying flat on their horses' backs and necks and utter- 

 ing their piercing battle-cry. But it was the Indian 

 smell which gave them the advantage, as it produced 

 so great a terror in the enemy's horses that it was 

 impossible to control them and make them face the 

 Indians; and with a horse maddened by terror under 

 him no man could use his carbine. His only salvation 

 was to allow his horse to go — to fly from the enemy 

 with (it is needless to add) his rider on his back. 



I will here, in conclusion of this chapter, relate an 

 incident of this long-lasting frontier war which made 

 a deep impression on us in my home on the pampas 



