INDIAN TOLDO 



CHAPTER VI 



MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE TEHUELCHES 



Indian method of curing measles — Driving out tlie devil — Magellan — Patagon — 

 Long boots — Reports of travellers — One of the finest races in the world — 

 Nomadic — Hunters — Decreasing in numbers — Introduction of horses — Bolas — 

 No history — Keen bargainers but not progressive — Features — Good teeth — 

 Women — Morality — Young and old women — Half-bloods — Paisanos — Reserved 

 in character — Habits — Infants' heads bandaged — Dance — Wives bought — 

 Price of a wife — Marriage ceremony — White man in ioldos — Bad influence — 

 Connections of white men and Tehuelche women — Dress and adornment of 

 women — Work — Lazy race — High wages — Ceremonies and customs — 

 Religion — Gualicho — Fear of Cordillera — Fat hunger — Tehuelche lives on 

 horseback — Esquimaux and Tehuelche— (-Primitive peoples and their habits — 

 Food — Tobacco — Pipes — Language — Tribal government — Physical strength — 

 Decreasing numbers — Men of silence and men of uproar — Courtesy of a 

 Tehuelche. 



Snow lay in the hollows so deep that only the lean crests of the 

 higher bushes could thrust themselves through its surface. The 

 wind, which had driven the snowstorm of the morning away to the 

 east, swept drearily down out of an evening sky where neither sun 

 nor sunset hues were to be seen, nothing but a spread of cold and 

 misty grey, growing slowly overshadowed by the looming promise 

 of more snow. 



In the middle of the level white pampa two figures upon 

 galloping horses were visible. As we came nearer we saw that one 

 was that of a man clothed in a chiripa and a capa in which brown 

 was the predominating colour. He was mounted on a heavy- 

 necked powerful cebruno horse, his stirrups were of silver, and his 

 gear of raw-hide seemed smart and good. As he rode he yelled 



