22 Idle Days in Patagonia. 
give two or three days to all these wood and metal 
friends of his, to give a fresh edge to his chisels, 
and play the dentist to his saws; to spread them 
all out and count and stroke them lovingly, as a 
breeder pats his beasties, and feed and anoint 
them with oil to make them shine and look glad. 
This was preliminary to the packing for transporta- 
tion, which was also a rather slow process. 
Leaving my friend at his delightful task I 
rambled about the neighbourhood taking stock of 
the birds. It was a dreary and desolate spot, with 
a few old gaunt and half-dead red willows for only 
trees. The reeds and rushes standing in the black 
stagnant pools were yellow and dead; and dead 
also were the tussocks of coarse tow-coloured grass, 
while the soil beneath was white as ashes and 
cracked everywhere with the hot suns and long 
drought. Only the river close by was always cool 
and green and beautiful. 
At length, one hot afternoon, we were sitting on 
our rugs on the clay floor of the hut, talking of our 
journey on the morrow, and of the better fare and 
other delights we should find at the end of the day 
at the house of an English settler we were going to 
visit. While talking I took up his revolver to 
examine it for the first time, and he had just begun 
to tell me that it was a revolver with a peculiar 
character of its own, and with idiosyncrasies, one 
of which was that the slightest touch, or even 
vibration of the air, would cause it to go off when 
on the cock—he was just telling me this, when off 
