196



Mr. F. E. Blaauw,



great havoc, the virgin forest being so near. Her answer was that

they poisoned them, and upon my asking her how this was done,

she told me to my horror that they did it by spreading poisoned

birds. “ We sow poisoned grain every spring, she added, and this

kills many thousands of little birds, which we use as bait ” ! I

pictured to myself all those lovely little Chilian birds lying dead in

thousands, and in the breeding season too, and it was all I could do

to restrain my intense indignation, an expression of which would

have been quite useless ; but one thing I did say, and that was to

warn her that the insect pests would be innumerable if they con¬

tinued to wantonly destroy the little birds in that manner. But she

only laughed, saying that they would get no harvest if they did not

poison the little birds. So I daresay that they will go on with it

just as in other parts they wantonly burn their forests until the

climate changes, and no more rain comes, so that parts that were

once overrun by a luxurious vegetation are now arid stone deserts.


Finding me so much interested in birds and in the few nice

shrubs near the house, the farmer’s wife advised us to return to

Puerto Varas by a cross-country road which did not touch Puerto

Montt, and which ran a great part of thew'ay through her husband’s

estate. I gladly availed myself of her advice, and having thanked

her for her hospitality, we mounted our horses, which were feeding

on the rank grasses near the house, and departed on our journey

hoping not to lose our way.


We at first crossed some grass fields, and others from which

the harvest had been gathered, after which we came to wilder

country, thickly grown with bamboo bushes, and here we came

across some nice-looking cattle that seemed mostly to feed on the

bamboo.


Very soon after having left the house I had noticed a clump

of enormous trees, which from top to bottom were covered with

beautiful large white flowers like apple-blossom. My road led me

close to this clump of trees, but I could not reach the foot of them

as the trunks were standing in an impenetrable tangle of bamboos.

They were giant specimens of Eucnjphia pinnatifolia, or Urmus

trees as they call them in those parts ; and these trees seem to

attain their greatest size in this part of Chile.



