JOURNEY TO LAKE ARGENTINO 187 



On the breeze came the " Honk, honk " of geese mixed with 

 the thmner notes of snipe. Ducks, too, were there, and the snipe 

 in wisps of thirty. Presently, as I sat writing, a guanaco came in 

 sight, and later a flock of cayenne lapwings ( Vanellus cayennensis). 

 I might have been, as far as the aspect of things was concerned 

 (save for the guanaco) in Uist and going home to a warm fireside, 

 instead of journeying on and on for many days and weeks to come 

 over the endless pampa and into the distant Cordillera. 



At this lagoon also I saw a condor (Sarcorhanipus gryphus), 

 and before this had seen a couple when at Mrs. Hardy's. It must 

 have been near this spot that Darwin shot his condor, which he 

 speaks of as measuring eight and a half feet from wing-tip to wing- 

 tip, and four feet from head to tail. 



By the middle of the next day (January 28) we reached a 

 lagoon with a threshold of green meadowy marsh, a relief after a 

 long pull over a waterless and bare stretch of country, and there 

 took a needed half-hour of rest. On our second starting we 

 managed to wander into a desert of basalt or lava, and could only 

 advance very slowly and with difficulty.* Nor could we find water 

 for a long time ; at length we came in sight of a big pool 

 lying ruffled in the saffron lights of the sunset. Upon its margin 

 or in the water were flamingos {Phoenicopterus ignipalliatus), 

 upland geese (Chloephaga magellanica), thirty-four bandurias 

 {Theristicus caudatus). There were also guanaco within sight. 

 Here we camped, and found yet another deep and rocky lagoon, 

 on which were many divers which I could not identify. A heavy 

 wind was blowing, which died down at night and gave occasion 

 for hundreds of sandflies to rise and worry us. Each day, as we 

 marched on, the Cordillera seemed to be advancing, as it were, 

 towards us. 



We woke to find the next' day pale with thin sunlight glinting 

 across the prospect of basalt, low bushes and far horizons. We 

 were now well beyond Mystery Plain, which formed the limit of 

 Darwin's expeditions up the river, and which he named with a 



* A guide who applied to me at Santa Cruz warned me that, if we went without him, 

 we would have great difficulty at this point. He asked ten dollars a day for his services, 

 which I, however, declined. 



