VI 
SIERRA VENTANA 
ii 3 
foreigner, previous to my visit, had ascended this mountain ; 
and indeed very few of the soldiers at Bahia Blanca knew 
anything about it. Hence we heard of beds of coal, of gold 
and silver, of caves, and of forests, all of which inflamed my 
curiosity, only to disappoint it. The distance from the posta 
was about six leagues, over a level plain of the same character 
as before. The ride was, however, interesting, as the mountain 
began to show its true form. When we reached the foot of 
the main ridge, we had much difficulty in finding any water, 
and we thought we should have been obliged to have passed 
the night without any. At last we discovered some by looking 
close to the mountain, for at the distance even of a few hundred 
yards, the streamlets were buried and entirely lost in the 
friable calcareous stone and loose detritus. I do not think 
Nature ever made a more solitary, desolate pile of rock ;—it 
well deserves its name of Hurtado , or separated. The 
mountain is steep, extremely rugged, and broken, and so 
entirely destitute of trees, and even bushes, that we actually 
could not make a skewer to stretch out our meat over the fire 
of thistle-stalks. 1 The strange aspect of this mountain is 
contrasted by the sea-like plain, which not only abuts against 
its steep sides, but likewise separates the parallel ranges. The 
uniformity of the colouring gives an extreme quietness to the 
view ;—the whitish-gray of the quartz rock, and the light 
brown of the withered grass of the plain, being unrelieved 
by any brighter tint. From custom one expects to see in the 
neighbourhood of a lofty and bold mountain a broken country 
strewed over with huge fragments. Here Nature shows that 
the last movement before the bed of the sea is changed into 
dry land may sometimes be one of tranquillity. Under these 
circumstances I was curious to observe how far from the parent 
rock any pebbles could be found. On the shores of Bahia 
Blanca, and near the settlement, there were some of quartz, 
which certainly must have come from this source : the distance 
is forty-five miles. 
The dew, which in the early part of the night wetted the 
saddle-cloths under which we slept, was in the morning frozen. 
The plain, though appearing horizontal, had insensibly sloped 
1 I call these thistle-stalks for the want of a more correct name. I believe it is 
a species of Eryngium. 
I 
