Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
a whole day's riding to be done before one reaches the place - if one is lucky enough not to
lose oneself completely. However, in spite of these useless answers, I made a point of asking
every passer-by, even if it was only to break the monotony of lonely hours without hearing a
human voice. Like most mortals, these people are very inquisitive and curious, and they usu-
ally asked me where I came from and where I was going My stock answer to these questions
was that I came from the south, and that I was on my way north, which always seemed to sat-
isfy their curiosity, and wishing me '
que le vaya bien
' (good luck to you) in a peculiar singing
bass voice they would spur on their mounts.
It was no easy matter to follow the right trail, and more than once we had to retrace our
steps a long way when I realised that we had gone wrong. Such incidents did not improve my
temper, and as we were returning I usually went through a special vocabulary from
alpha
to
omega
, and I am certain that if the horses had realised what it was all about they would have
nodded approval with every step.
Several rivers had enough water to make fording a ticklish proposition, and on one occa-
sion the horse I was riding lost his footing and the strong current carried both of us down into
a pool below the shallow rapids where we had attempted to cross. Luckily the two of us came
out of it with only a thorough soaking and a good fright, and after all, this was only one of the
many lessons we had to learn, lessons that can only be learnt by experience. The pack-horse
was luckier than we had been and had enough sense to go on until he reached the other side
safely, where we once more joined company.
By this time the horses and myself were the best of friends, or
amadrinado
as the gauchos
callit.Thebell-mareofa
tropilla
(troop)iscalled
madrina
intheArgentine,fromwhichnoun
this pretty adjective
amadrinado
is derived. In order to appreciate fully the friendship of a
horse, a man has to live out in the open with him for some time, and as soon as the anim-
al comes to a region that is strange to him he will never go away from his master but will
look for his company and in case of danger seek his protection. By this time both my horses
were so fond of me that I never had to tie them again, and even if I slept in some lonely hut
I simply turned them loose at night, well knowing that they would never go more than a few
yards away and that they would be waiting for me at the door in the early morning, when they
always greeted me with a friendly nicker.
Ostriches are very common in these parts, but as they are often hunted they are extremely
shy. These birds belong to the South American variety
(Rhea Darwini)
and are smaller than
the African kind. The females lay the huge eggs in a common nest that has been roughly
scratched out in some hidden-away place, and there as many as thirty eggs may be deposited.
Once the laying season is over one of the males takes charge of the hatching and later of the
raising of the young. The females and other males take not the slightest notice of the eggs or
theyoung,andoncethelayingisdoneallbuttheonemalegobacktotheirnormallife.Should
anybody disturb the nest during the temporary absence of the male which hatches them, he
will immediately find it out on his return. Should there be one egg missing, and even if this
