At Last, Patagonia / i? 
slowly dragged on, a mounted man appeared driv- 
ing a small troop of horses towards the river. We 
hailed him, and he rode up to us, and informed us 
that we were only about a mile from the river, and 
after hearing our story he proceeded to catch 
horses for us to ride. Springing on to their bare 
backs we followed him at a swinging gallop over 
that last happy mile of our long journey. 
We came very suddenly to the end, for on 
emerging from the thickets of dwarf thorn trees 
through which we had ridden in single file the 
magnificent Rio Negro lay before us. Never river 
seemed fairer to look upon: broader than the 
Thames at Westminster, and extending away on 
either hand until it melted and was lost in the blue 
horizon, its low shores clothed in all the glory of 
groves and fruit orchards and vineyards and fields 
of ripening maize. Far out in the middle of the swift 
blue current floated flocks of black-necked swans, 
their white plumage shining like foam in the sun- 
light; while just beneath us, scarcely a stone’s 
throw off, stood the thatched farmhouse of our 
conductor, the smoke curling up peacefully from the 
kitchen chimney. <A grove of large old cherry trees, 
in which the house was embowered, added to the 
charm of the picture; and as we rode down to the 
gate we noticed the fully ripe cherries glowing like 
live coals amid the deep green foliage. 
