MODE OF TRAVELLING. 



5S 



use no precaution, but must just run the gauntlet, 

 and take his chance, which, if calculated, is a good 

 one. 



If he fall in with them, he may be tortured and 

 killed, but it is very improbable that he should 

 happen to find them on the road ; however, they 

 are so cunning, and ride so quick, and the country 

 is so uninhabited, that it is impossible to gain any 

 information about them : besides this, the people 

 are so alarmed, and there are so many constant 

 reports concerning them, that it becomes useless to 

 attend to any, and I believe it is just as safe to ride 

 towards the spot at which one hears they are, as to 

 turn back. 



The greatest danger in riding alone across the 

 Pampas, is the constant falls which the horses get 

 in the holes of the biscachos. I calculated, that, 

 upon an average, my horse fell with me in a 

 gallop once in every three hundred miles; and 

 although, from the ground being very soft, I was 

 never seriously hurt, yet previous to starting one 

 cannot help feeling what a forlorn situation it Vv'ould 

 be, to break a limb, or dislocate a joint, so many 

 hundred miles from any sort of assistance. 



