37 2 The Naturalist in La Plata. 



violet-like amidst clustering leaves, and even when 

 showing itself still " half -hidden from the eye," was 

 thereafter to be only a tantalizing image in memory. 

 Still, my case was not so hopeless as that of the 

 imagined lapidary ; for however rare a species may 

 be, and near to its final extinction, there must 

 always be many individuals existing, and I was 

 cheered by the thought that I might yet meet with 

 one at some future time. And, even if this par- 

 ticular species was not to gladden my sight again, 

 there were others, scores and hundreds more, and 

 at any moment I might expect to see one shining, a 

 living gem, on Nature's open extended palm. 



Sometimes it has happened that an animal would 

 have been overlooked or passed by with scant 

 notice, to be forgotten, perhaps, but for some sin- 

 gular action or habit which has instantly given it 

 a strange importance, and made its possession 

 desirable. 



I was once engaged in the arduous and monoto- 

 nous task of driving a large number of sheep a dis- 

 tance of two hundred and fifty miles, in excessively 

 hot weather, when sheep prefer standing still to 

 travelling. Five or six gauchos were with me, and 

 we were on the southern pampas of Buenos Ayres. 

 near to a long precipitous stony sierra which rose 

 to a height of five or six hundred feet above the 

 plain. Who that has travelled for eighteen days on 

 a dead level in a broiling sun can resist a hill ? 

 That sierra was more sublime to us than Conon- 

 dagua, than Illimani. 



Leaving the sheep, I rode to it with three of th<? 

 men ; aad after securing our horses on the lower 



