8 Ldle Days in Patagonia. 
as that feeling of relief, of escape, and absolute 
freedom which one experiences in a vast solitude, 
where man has perhaps never been, and has, at any 
rate, left no trace of his existence. It was strong 
and exhilarating in me on that morning; and I was 
therefore by no means elated when we descried, 
some distance ahead, the low walls of half a dozen 
mud cabins. My fellow-travellers were, however, 
delighted at the discovery, and we hastened on, 
thinking that we were nearer to the settlement than 
we had supposed. But we found the huts un- 
inhabited, the doors broken down, the wells choked 
up and overgrown with wild liquorice plants. 
We learnt subsequently that a few venturesome 
herdsmen had made their home in this remote spot 
with their families, and that about a year before 
our visit the Indians had swept down on them and 
destroyed the young settlement. Very soon we 
turned our backs on the ruined hovels, my com- 
panions loudly expressing their disappointment, 
while I felt secretly glad that we were yet to drink 
a little more deeply of the cup of wild nature. 
After walking on some distance we found a narrow 
path leading away southward from the ruined 
village, and, believing that it led direct to the Car- 
men, the old settlement on the Rio Negro, which is 
over twenty miles from the sea, we at once resolved 
to follow it. This path led us wide of the ocean. 
Before noon we lost sight of the low sand-hills on 
our right hand, and as we penetrated further into 
the interior the dark-leafed bushes I have mentioned 
