166 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



[Feb. 23, 189a. 



'he Sfiotknim ^aui[iBi 



ON THE PAMPAS OF ENTRE RIOS.— VI. 



In the sixties Gen. Urquiza brought with him from 

 somewhere in the South, a band of Indians called 

 Christoes, or Christ's Indians, so called because they were 

 supposed to have embraced Christianity, and become de- 

 vout Catholics, but a more villainous, tiiieAdng band of 

 cut-throats it would be hard to find. They always kept 

 up their tribal relations, some leaving the main band 

 for a while and working on the estancias, but always re- 

 turning to theii' tribe sooner or later. At times thirty or 

 more of them would start off on a kind of a raid, visiting 

 an estancia, and hanging aroimd as long as tliey could get 

 anything to eat. At these times they would commit 

 many thefts before returning to Flores, their i-endezvous, 

 and several times committed murders. One afternoon 

 they met an old man who traveled around the camp in an 

 ox cart selling bread, and thinking he had money, they 

 murdered him. The poor old fellow had been at my 

 house in the morning, and at that time had a dollar and a 

 half, and probably had not more than two dollars when 

 kiUed. I had an adventure with them myself that made 

 me very nervous for a time. I had been into the town of 

 Conception for three hundred Bolivian dollars which we 

 required to pay for shearing our sheep. I took with me a 

 trusty man and a horse with saddle-bags. On our return, 

 and when within five miles of home, I said to Benancio 

 that we must make a detour to the right so as to leave the 

 pulqueria well to oui- left for fear the Christoes might be 

 there. This we did, and after riding slowly along for a 

 couple of miles we reached a high sweU in the pampas, 

 and to our dismay rode right into the midst of the very 

 band we were trymg to avoid. As soon as I saw them I 

 spm-red up tlie horses and passed through them as rapidly 

 as possible, not however without having to respond to 

 their slang phrases of gTeeting. One more inquisitive 

 than the rest asked me what I had in my saddle-bag-s, try- 

 ing at the same time to strike them with his whip, I told 

 him they were nails, and gave the horse a pull so that his 

 blow fell upon his rump, which caused him to prance and 

 try to get away. This was fortunate for me, for I let him 

 run a httle, just keeping alongside, and apparently mak- 

 ing great efforts to stop him. I was very uneasy in my 

 mind after this meeting, for I feared tbey suspected I had 

 money and might make an attempt to get it. They stop- 

 ped and seemed to be having a pow-wow as we rode rapidly 

 towards home. That night Benancio and my dogs 

 slept in the house with me, and I had my gun and revol- 

 ver where I could lay my hands on them. As an addi- 

 tional precaution, I put a strong pole across the room from 

 the door to the window, both of whicJi opened in. The 

 night passed quietly, and the next mornmg I carried the 

 money to a pulqueria, the owner of which had a safe, and 

 acted as banker for the estancieros of the neighborhood, 

 and I took particular pains to let every one know that I 

 had carried the money away. These Christos were great 

 drunkards, and one that I had as a vaquero I discharged 

 on that account and drove him away one night. He was 

 so drunk that he could just sit on his horse and that was 

 all. The next morning I went very early before dayhght 

 to an outlying puesto to count the sheep, and as I neared 

 the place I saw some dark object in the sheep corral mov- 

 ing around the whe fence. I found it was the di-unken 

 Christo I had discharged the night before. His horse had 

 broken his way into the corral through the wire fence, 

 and had been travehng aroimd inside all night. When 

 the horse would stop the fellow would spm- him, and he 

 thought he was traveling across the pampa. I met with 

 quite an exciting adventure one day while visiting one of 

 the ectancias of Gen. Urquiza. This place was managed 

 by Nico Coronel, one of Urquiza's most trusted followers, 

 and an officer in his army. There had been a grand 

 round-up of the cattle, and branding and sealing was go- 

 ing on. I rode down to the corral, dismounted from my 

 horse and climbed up on the cross-pole of the corral, 

 where I could see all that was going on without being in 

 the way. The little five-year-old boy of Coronel saw me 

 there and trotted down and stood under me looking 

 through the cracks of the corral. A particularly large 

 and tierce buU had just been handled and was standing 

 swavintr himself from side to side in a laerfect rage and 

 looking" for a victim. I will say here that these South 

 American cattle will rarely attack a man on horseback, 

 especially if he has a lasso or strap to swing around his 

 head, but if approached on foot they are very dangerous, 

 and will gore and trample you without a moment's 

 warning. This bull, not seeing any victim in the corral , 

 jumped the bar, and soon as outside saw the child and 

 made for him. I reached down and Mfted the little fel- 

 low up into my arms, and at the same time his father, 

 knowing his danger, had also jumped his horse over the 

 bar and rushed toward him. The bull then turned on 

 Coronel and made a vicious thrust at him. I saw Coro- 

 nel throw up his leg, and thought he had been gored, but 

 the next instant saw him leap from his horse and stab the 

 bull to the heart before he could recede for another charge. 

 The horse was terribly gored just behind the foreleg, and 

 died in a little while. This aU happened in a few moments, 

 and the result was a dead horse, a dead bull, and a badly 

 scared boy. Coronel called for another horse, and in a 

 short time was back in the corral working away as if 

 nothing had happened. For my part, I did not get over 

 the excitement for quite a while. Attending cattle is 

 dangerous business, and many men get hurt while so en- 

 gaged. They frequently meet with bad falls while run- 

 ning the cattle, from their horses getting into vizcacha 

 holes. Sometimes they are gored by infuriated animals 

 that turn upon them. The lasso is apt to get foul, and 

 many terrible hurts are caused in this way. I attended 

 one of my men who had his foot nearly cut off at the 

 ankle joint by the lasso taking a turn around his leg. It 

 resulted in his losing his leg above the knee. The mana- 

 ger of an estancia has to act as physician and surgeon to 

 man and beast, and he is frequently called on as arbitra- 

 tor in quarrels about marks of cattle and other questions. 

 The prevailing religion of Entre Eios is Roman Catholic, 

 but there are no churches outside of the large towns, and 

 rehgious duties are very much neglected. 



Gen. TJrquiza, who I mentioned as governor, was a very 

 wealthy and independent man, frequently defying the 

 home government, and having a great hold on the affec- 

 tions of the people of his province. He lived in a beauti- 

 ful hacienda called Flores., where he had fine [garden 



filled with rare flowers, fruits and trees. As giving some 

 idea of the vast mmiber of sheep he owned, his secretary 

 told me in 1863 that the reiDorts of senaling of lambs that 

 had come in gave the number as 300,000. In 1870 he was 

 assassinated by several of his army officers, foremost 

 among whom was Nico Coronel, with whom I was well 

 acquainted, he being the man whose child I saved from 

 the bull. They went to Flores and gained admission 

 through the treachery of the guards and shot the old man 

 and his daughter Lola, who defended her f a,ther when aU 

 of his troops had deserted him. The great drawback to 

 the progress of the Argentine Confederacy is the number 

 of attemj)ted revolutions and rebeUions they are constant- 

 ly having first in one province and then in another. I see 

 by the newspaper accounts that one is now going on in 

 Corrientes. During my sojourn there were two, both of 

 which put me to great inconvenience and loss from the 

 stealing of my horses and killing cattle. The last rebel- 

 lion was in 1864, and I was not only stripped of my horses, 

 but my men also. I was left ^vith an old sore-backed horse 

 that it was the height of cmelty to use, one old lame man, 

 four women and myself to look after 15,000 head of stock. 

 I just let the cattle and horses go, and turned aU my ener- 

 gies upon the sheep. Terrible storms sweep over the 

 pampas called j)amperos. They came from the southwest, 

 and are most always preceded by a dust storm which can 

 be seen coming for miles. When the storm breaks it is al- 

 most impossible to stand against it. The wind blows 

 about fifty to sixty miles an hour, and the rain falls in 

 torrents. The temperatm-e becomes rapidly lower and 

 the cold is chiUing and penetrating. These pamperos 

 frequently ,clo immense damage to the shipping in the 

 roads at Buenos Ayres. It is to resist the force of these 

 storms that all the buildings iu Entre Rios are made one 

 story high. In conclusion, I will say that I went to South 

 America with my health much impaired and weighing 

 llSlbs, and after a life there of nearly five years, I re- 

 turned with muscles of iron and a constitution thatseemed 

 able to bear anything and weighing 1751b3. 



Edward A. Eobinsojs. 



Baltimore, January. 



A DESERT HOME. 



Among the books that charmed my boyish fancy was 

 one known as "The Desert Home." It was by Captain 

 Mayne Reid, an author, perhaps, unknown to the present 

 generation of smaU boys, but whom I shall always re- 

 member as one of the most delightful of writers of boys' 

 stories. His books were often exciting, but scattered all 

 through the adventures in which they abounded Avere 

 bits of information, especially on woodcraft and natirral 

 history, which were very instructive. I know now, as I 

 did not when I first read them, that his statements on 

 this latter subject were acctu-ate, for he had draAvn them 

 from the best authorities of his time; and his books, 

 though jierhaps they did deal too much in Indian fights, 

 though his villains were perhaps too vile and his heroes 

 possibly too perfect, were yet wholesome in tone and good 

 reading for young people. The lesson taught by them 

 was always a good one. 



"The Desert Home," to my mind, was one of the most 

 dehghtf ul of his books. In a general way, its plan was not 

 unlike that of the "Swiss Family Robinson." Like that 

 book, it dealt with tlie adventures of a family who were 

 separated by misfortune from the rest of the world, but 

 while the Swiss family were cast away at sea and at last 

 found themselves on a desert island, the adventures 

 detailed in the "Desert Home" took place on the plains of 

 the far West. The story, as I remember it, was some- 

 thing like this: 



In the early days of the California excitement a family 

 whose fortune had somehow suffered shipwreck, started 

 with an emigrant train to cross the plains on then way to 

 the land of gold. They were well firoAided with the neces- 

 saries for such a. jom-ney, and the father and mother were 

 people of intelligence, culture and perseverance. For a 

 time all went well with the travelers, but by and by mis- 

 fortunes began to overtake them, and one accident or 

 another delayed them. They feU ' behind the train with 

 which they were travehng, were unable to overtake it, 

 and at last lost it entirely; then they got off the trail and 

 lost themselves. Through want of water their draught 

 animals began to die, and they themselves to suffer. Still 

 they pushed on, heading always toward the West, toward 

 the mountains where water might be found. By this time 

 their j)rovisions had begnn to run low. Game was scarce 

 and they began to suffer from hunger. Their progress 

 was very slow, for then- animals were now reduced to an 

 ox and a horse which were unequahy yoked to their single 

 wagon. They began to despah, but still they pushed on, 

 scorched and bhnded by the fierce rays of the summer 

 sun and parched by the sand-laden wind which, like the 

 hot breath of some great furnace, blew imceasingly in 

 then" faces. Day after day the httle company ]3ushed on, 

 day after day the cries of the children for water and food 

 grew fainter, the countenance of the mother more drawn 

 and haggard, that of the fatlier more gaunt and hollow- 

 eyed. Their animals, perishing with thirst, could hardly 

 draw their wagon; death stared them in the face. 



Suddenly one day, after they had given up all hope, 

 there opened up at their feet a glimpse of what seemed 

 another world. They had been travehng over the level, 

 bare, waterless plain, when suddenly they saw beneath 

 them a beautiful green vaUey. Through meadows rich 

 with luxuriant gi-ass, and dotted here and there with 

 clumps of tall cotton woods, flowed a broad stream of 

 hving water. Scattered over these meadows, and some- 

 times half hidden by groups of willows, were feeding 

 buffalo, elk and deer. There, almost within their reach, 

 was food in plenty, and what they longed for so much 

 more than food, water. The scene gave them renewed 

 life; even the horse and the ox seemed to gain vigor, and 

 stepped forward with a brisker motion. A way was soon 

 foimd down the steep slope, and in a few hours they had 

 gamed the bank of the stream. Here, their immediate 

 wants satisfied, the elders stretched then- Aveary limbs on 

 the ground in the grateful shade of the taU trees, the little 

 ones, their past sufferings forgotten, romped merrily in 

 the grass, while the animals at a httle distance, browsed 

 contentedly knee deep in the luxuriant herbage. For 

 some days they remained in this happy vaUey, intending 

 after they had laid in a stock of provisions and then- 

 animals had become strong again to continue then- journey 

 to Cahfornia. This intention they never carried out. 

 AVhile they were camped here their ox was killed by a 

 panther, which left them only a single animal — the horse. 



After much consideration they determined to remain at 

 least over the winter in this lonely valley, and here was 

 established their desert home. 



AU this is but the prologue to the main story, that of 

 their life in this oasis. They built houses and barns, 

 made gardens, planting them with seeds wliich they liad 

 brought with them for use in California, tiUed fields, 

 sown with corn and wheat, transplanted and cultivated 

 bushes and trees of wild fruits. They captured and tamed 

 wild horses of the .plains from the herds that visited the 

 vaUey to drink at the stream; they caught and domesti- 

 cated buffalo calves, which gave them steers for ])lowiug, 

 cows to furnish milk and butter. Gradually, too, they 

 accumulated smaU herds of elk, of deer and of antelope, 

 which fed contentedly in the wide pastures that they 

 had fenced, and on which they could draw for food in 

 case of need. Wild turkeys, wUd grouse, and wild geese 

 and ducks were in due time added to their hst of pets, so 

 that before they had hved many years in the valley they 

 were abundantly provided with domestic animals, aU of 

 them drawn from the wild creatures native to the soU. 



In this prhnitive, but comfortable home, far from the 

 haimts of man, this httle family hved for many years. 

 The cluldren, strong, healthy and innocent, grew up to 

 manhood and womanhood, knowing no society save then- 

 own and with no more knowledge of the great world 

 than could be drawn from the few books that they pos- 

 sessed, and from the recoUections of their father and 

 mother. 



Some years ago I was traveling through the roughest 

 moimtatns of the extreme Northwest. I was alone, riding 

 one horse, and with my slender camp equipage packed 

 upon another. For many days I had jom-neyed in soh- 

 tude, making my way by as straight a course as possible 

 toward the point I desired to reach. Sometimes the traU 

 led through the dense forest, where the trees and under- 

 brush stood so close that the horses could with difficulty 

 force their way among them. Sometimes a narrow game 

 trad led along the steepest mountain sides, again a rough 

 cheveaux de frise of pUed uj) down timber turned me 

 back, or I would jom-ney over level flats yeUow with 

 ripened grass, where, here and there, the cinnamon pines 

 raised their stately red columns toward the sky. 



Day after day I traveled onward, my two horses being 

 my only companions. At rare intervals I saw a grouse or 

 a snowshoe rabit. Once I saw two deer, and on one oc- 

 casion a stately big-horn stood on a pinnacle of rock 

 above the trail and looked curiously down at me as I 

 passed beneath him. One day, after I had been travehng 

 in this way for nearly a month, diu-ing which I had seen 

 no hmnan face, I rode out on a bare bench of the momi- 

 tain which overlooked a river vaUey. There, on the 

 banks of the stream, I saw, to my astonishment, a cluster 

 of low log buildings. Near them a garden and cultivated 

 fields, and beyond long lines of fence inclosing ample 

 pastures, in which grazed horses and cattle. From the 

 central budding rose a cm-hng line of blue smoke, show- 

 ing that the house was inhabited, and through the fields I 

 coiUd see long, straight fines of bright green, wliich 

 showed where irrigating ditches ran. 



The sight catised me great surprise, for I had heard of 

 no settlements in that part of the counti-y. Riding down 

 the long hill toward the houses, 1 soon began to see evi- 

 dences that this settlement had been made many years 

 ago. Deep trails were worn in the hillside where cattle 

 and horses fassed up and do^m between the rich bunch 

 grass pasturage on the hills and the water in the valley 

 below. When I reached the bank of the stream I made 

 my camp, and then led my horses up to the house to ask 

 permission to turn them into one of the fields, wiicre they 

 would be readily found in the morning. This was my 

 ostensible reason for going to the house. My real one 

 was to have an excuse for speaking with the settlers and 

 learning something about them. As I rounded the corner 

 of the house, looking for the door whic'h I must knock for 

 entrance, I came suddenly upon a group of smaU chUdren 

 of aU sizes and ages, from a boy of twelve down to the 

 tiniest of flaxen-hahed toddlers. At my appearance they 

 ceased their various occupations for an instant, staring at 

 me in wUd-eyed wonder, and then hke a flock of staa-tled. 

 bu-ds scattered, and in a moment were lost to sight. 

 There remained before me only one of the children, a 

 stm-dy, bright-faced boy, seemingly the oldest of the 

 group, whose large black eyes met mine frankly and 

 boldly, and lying on the step before the door, a great gray 

 wolf, Avhich, as the chUdren disappeared, sat up on its 

 haunches, yawned lazUy, displaying two alarming rows 

 of white teeth, and then, noticing a sti-anger, grirmed 

 threateningly at me. I explained to the lad my errand, 

 and he went into the house and j)resently appeai-ed at the 

 door with his mother. To her I ijrefeiTed my request for 

 pasturage, which was at once gTanted. Late in the [day I 

 was invited to partake of the afternoon meal at the house, 

 and after sui^per I heard the stoi-y of this settlement. 

 This story reminded me of the book wliich I Jiave referred 

 to in the early part of this letter — the "Desert Home." 



In the year 1860 the owner of this ranch, who, for the 

 purposes of this narrative, we wiU caU Mr. Morrison, came 

 into these mountains as a prospector. His search for gold 

 was only moderately successful, and he buUt a cabin, 

 brought his wife here, and here she has hved for twenty- 

 five yeai-s without having been during aU this time a mUe 

 from the house. 



Here eleven children had been bom and reared, taught 

 how to read and write by their sweet-faced mother; had 

 grown up leading a free, natm-al, open-au- hfe, which in- 

 sured to them perfect health and strength. Their com- 

 panions were the -wUd creatures of the mountains and the 

 streams. They had captured wolf puppies which they had 

 reared and tamed; domesticated deer fed near the house, 

 and often walked into the open door begging for a piece 

 of bread; m a little pond near the house, formed by the 

 widening of an irrigating ditch, a tame beaver was at 

 work, and when 1 came in sight disappeared under the 

 water with a resounding slap of his tail, but soon came 

 up again, and having cautiously i-econnoitered with only 

 his nose above water, and obsei-ved that I was in company 

 with a f amfliar friend, he lost aU fear and crawled out on 

 the bank to be petted. On the waters of this pool floated 

 a number of maUard ducks and green -winged teal, as care- 

 less of our presence and as free from fear as an y barnyard 

 fowls could be. On the ground in I'lout of tlie house 

 hopped a tame magpie, which now ga^ e uttoi ance to the 

 famihar twittering caU of his species, oi- agaii). spoke with 

 the utmost distinctness the names of two or tiiree of the 

 chUdren. Sometimes standing on a taU fence pole, but now 

 and then makmg swift dashes down into the grass to seize 



