21 8 THROUGH THE HEART OF PATAGONIA 



lit a huge fire, for our clothes were soaking, and essayed to 

 dry them. 



" Meantime the launch was riding out the storm as well as could 

 be expected, but taking a good deal ofwater aboard all the same. It 

 grew dark and the last we saw of her that night, her anchor was 

 holding and a big sea was racing aft. Bernardo had got on the 

 hatches and gone to bed, we supposed, for we did not see him the 

 whole time save once, and then he was bailing furiously." 



The sky was black with the promise of rain, so we heaped 

 up the big fire, filled the cooking-pots with water, and spreading 

 the poncho on the ground took our places upon it. It was not 

 such a very bad night after all. Things rarely fulfil their 

 promise of disagreeableness — things of this kind anyway. We 

 passed the night somehow with the help of our pipes and an 

 occasional brew of sugarless tea. I never desired sugar so 

 much as then. Sugarless tea is far less warming than sugared. 

 Sleep was well-nigh impossible. It was too cold for that, and, 

 besides, one or other of us was always up and trying to pick out 

 the launch from the surrounding mass of spindrift and tumbling 

 black and grey waters. 



In those latitudes the wind generally rises or falls, as the case 

 may be, with the setting or rising of the sun, and eagerly we waited 

 to see if the dawn would bring any change in our uncomfortable 

 position. But at dawn it was blowing, if anything, harder than ever. 

 The launch, however, was all right, although there was no sign of 

 Bernardo. We were driven to make a breakfast of berries from the 

 califate-bushes, of which a few mean specimens grew sparsely on the 

 hillside. It is a desolate place, that northern shore of Argentino. 



When the sun came out we lay down and slept in its liquid 

 rays. A little after midday we cooked sovc\& farina with mutton 

 fat and ate it. The gale was still tearing across the water, and we 

 began to count over our resources. W^e still had the greater part 

 of the ostrich which the hound Moses had killed on the way to 

 the River Santa Cruz, but it was an immature bird, and would 

 provide us with no more than three meagre meals. A couple of 

 handfuls of farina were yet in the bottom of the bag, we had a 

 half-tin of tea and three-parts of a plug of tobacco. 



