Humble-Bees and other Matters, 159 
But wliat can we say of the common deer of the 
pampas (Oervus campestris), the male of which gives 
out an effluvium quite as far-reaching although not 
so abominable in character as that of the Mephitis ? 
It comes in disagreeable whiffs to the human 
nostril when the perfumer of the wilderness is not 
even in sight. Yet it is not a protection ; on the 
contrary, it is the reverse, and, like the dazzling 
white plumage so attractive to birds of prey, a 
direct disadvantage, informing all enemies for 
leagues around of its whereabouts. It is not, there- 
fore, strange that wherever pumas are found, deer 
are never very abundant ; the only wonder is that, 
like the ancient horse of America, they have not 
become extinct. 
The gauchos of the pampas, however, give a 
reason for the powerful smell of the male deer; 
and, after some hesitation, I have determined to 
set it down here, for the reader to accept or reject, 
as he thinks proper. I neither believe nor dis- 
believe it ; for although I do not put great faith 
in gaucho natural history, my own observations 
have not infrequently confirmed statements of 
theirs, which a sceptical person would have regarded 
as wild indeed. To give one instance : I heard a 
gaucho relate that while out riding he had been 
pursued for a considerable distance by a large 
spider; his hearers laughed at him for a romancer ; 
but as I myself had been attacked and pursued, 
both when on foot and on horseback, by a large 
wolf-spider, common on the pampas, I did not join 
in the laugh. They say that the effluvium of 0. 
campestris is abhorrent to snakes of all kinds, just 
