142 ST. FE CHAP. 



tion of the inhabitants. The animals roamed from their 

 estancias, and, wandering far southward, were mingled together 

 in such multitudes, that a government commission was sent 

 from Buenos Ayres to settle the disputes of the owners. Sir 

 Woodbine Parish informed me of another and very curious 

 source of dispute ; the ground being so long dry, such quantities 

 of dust were blown about, that in this open country the land- 

 marks became obliterated, and people could not tell the limits 

 of their estates. 



I was informed by an eye-witness that the cattle in herds of 

 thousands rushed into the Parana, and being exhausted by 

 hunger they were unable to crawl up the muddy banks, and 

 thus were drowned. The arm of the river which runs by San 

 Pedro was so full of putrid carcasses, that the master of a 

 vessel told me that the smell rendered it quite impassable. 

 Without doubt several hundred thousand animals thus perished 

 in the river : their bodies when putrid were seen floating down 

 the stream ; and many in all probability were deposited in the 

 estuary of the Plata. All the small rivers became highly saline, 

 and this caused the death of vast numbers in particular spots ; 

 for when an animal drinks of such water it does not recover. 

 Azara describes ^ the fury of the wild horses on a similar 

 occasion, rushing into the marshes, those which arrived first 

 being overwhelmed and crushed by those which followed. He 

 adds that more than once he has seen the carcasses of upwards 

 of a thousand wild horses thus destroyed. I noticed that the 

 smaller streams in the Pampas were paved with a breccia of 

 bones, but this probably is the effect of a gradual increase, rather 

 than of the destruction at any one period. Subsequently to 

 the drought of 1827 to '32, a very rainy season followed, which 

 caused great floods. Hence it is almost certain that some 

 thousands of the skeletons were buried by the deposits of the 

 very next year. What would be the opinion of a geologist, 

 viewing such an enormous collection of bones, of all kinds of 

 animals and of all ages, thus embedded in one thick earthy 

 mass ? Would he not attribute it to a flood having swept over the 

 surface of the land, rather than to the common order of things ? ^ 



' Travels, vol. i. p. 374. 



2 These droughts to a certain degree seem to be almost periodical ; I was told 

 the dates of several others, and the intervals were about fifteen years. 



