We made our camp a little way from theirs, and our hounds strayed over to them and stayed with their waggons, deserting us altogether. As for ourselves, we were most kindly entertained by the Italian engineers, and enjoyed the luxuries of a tin of butter, biscuit, bread, tea, milk, sugar and some cognac. Flies abounded and bothered us as we ate our meal on a packing-case, an ostentatious comfort which made us feel very civilised.

We were now in the valley of the Chico, which is a large stream with a swift current, its cañadon bordered with bare ridges. It felt like old times to be in a river valley once more, reminding us of those we had passed through on our way to Lake Buenos Aires. We saw geese again, of which I shot two, and also a pigeon. The valley here was very rich with red seed-bearing grass, and beyond, nearer to the water, a glorious green pantano, dotted with deep clear pools.

Before parting with the Italians they presented us with some sugar and I gave them some tea and tobacco. The valley through which we marched continued to be very fertile. The grass was like that of an English meadow with sweet far-off scents, but lacking the dewiness of our English scents of wood and wold.

On January 7 we travelled eleven leagues, taking a short cut through a bare cañadon of dry mud-hills. Leaving this behind us we again came in sight of the River Chico and crossed a high pampa of yellow tussocks and gravel. The morning dawned hot with the usual accompaniment of mosquitoes and sand-flies. As we sighted the river this heat gave place to a fresh rain-smelling wind, inexpressibly grateful.

In the afternoon, as we rode along, there appeared against the sky a keen peak of rock—Sierra Ventana. We had long been looking forward to our first glimpse of it, knowing it would be a sign that we were nearing civilisation. Blue, distant, perhaps thirty miles away, behind the basalt hills, it raised its strange castle-like head, only the castle is of nature's building, not man's. I think we all welcomed this token of the old kindly inhabited world again, after our months spent on houseless plains and inhospitable mountains.

A herd of guanaco some twenty strong showed at almost the same moment. I galloped forward, feeling glad that our dinner no longer depended on my shot. I was a mere sportsman once more. The doe I shot had fat on her, the first we had seen during our wanderings, "just as we've got the chance of fat mutton, too," as someone remarked. Rain fell at night, and the wind blew, but with the razor-edge of cold off. We camped in some flowering grasses with the bare steppes of the pampa on one side and the dark hills on the other; behind these, among some bright streaks in the stormy billowy sky, the Sierra Ventana thrust up its crest.

Later we came upon a bush-shelter of some tender of sheep and cattle. It was a forlorn little place—just a hut of poles and bushes and skins by the river bank. It was doorless, and the dweller must have been a very small man, judging by his bed, which was a hole in the earth, pillowed with a broken wooden cargo-saddle. On one of the props was fastened a card with the word "Salido" (Gone out). A bag of canvas, old and stained, was tied up to the roof, a cracked tiny mirror hung from the central pole. He seemed to have no provisions, only a bag of yerba. He had recently killed a lion, for we found its skull. We saw some half-wild cattle near by. It was a grey evening, and, as always when out of the river valleys, the scene around was colourless basaltic desolation.

Our next day's march took us across four fords, and by evening we reached an estancia, where I was kindly received and given afternoon tea. Estancia is a word with a fine sound. It may, however, mean anything from a real house, full of comfort, to a mud hut. This estancia was a delightful change to us; we could sit on chairs and saw prints on the wall and a sideboard once more. The night fell very cold, with an empty heaven overhead, but its lower arcs set with slate-blue cloud.

On the 11th we hit civilisation after a march of over forty miles, the last part of which lay across a travesia. Civilisation took the form of an undersized drinking-shop perched on the rim of the bare pampa. How we had longed for civilisation—and now we had found it! I sat writing in a room with pink fly-blown walls and green fittings of the grimiest. Four Gauchos of the lower sort were playing cards for beans and shrieking over their game. The little innkeeper, a small, dark, aquiline, black-bearded Argentine, in a dirty white vest and a black neck-rag, held rule inside. Any camp is better than these antennæ of civilisation, that seem to have touched and always to bear onwards with them things unclean and repulsive. Jones' homely face was good to see, when he came in and said, "I should like to be away from here."

I realised suddenly how I loved the camp and the cold clean hills, when I heard the raucous music of that unlovely place. It was scarcely a pleasure to see cognac advertisements again, and to smell the dregs of yesterday yet awash on the greasy grey metal counter! A concertina was playing the old aching tunes that always seem to carry with them tags of vice and crime.

Santa Cruz town is situated on the banks of a large estuary formed by the junction of the rivers Santa Cruz and the Southern Chico before they fall into the Atlantic. It is a straggling place, a collection of wooden houses with roofs of corrugated iron. The chief export is wool, which in the season lies in long rows of bales upon the shore ready to be embarked. The town lies beyond sandhills, which separate it from the sea. Concertinas and jack-boots ring in its galvanised-iron huts; mules, horses, dogs, and cattle house in its formless plazas. It is a place which you hate and like at one and the same time. You long to get away from it while you are there, yet find yourself looking back sometimes and wishing to see again its vague streets and its drag-net agglomeration of humanity.

CHAPTER XIII
JOURNEY TO LAKE ARGENTINO

Dividing expedition—Darwin's trip up the Santa Cruz—Provisions—Shoeing horses—Pampa grass and marsh grass—Start for Lake Argentino—Burbury and Bernardo—Visit various estancias—Negro—Suspicious wayfarers—Hospitality—Cañadon of the Santa Cruz—Dry pampa—Sunsets—Game and wildfowl—Flamingos—Sandflies—Mystery Plain—Lake Argentino—River del Bote—Mount Viscachas—Lonely lagoon—Death-place of guanaco—Neigh of guanaco—Large herds—Thorny grass—Description of Lake Argentino—A tragedy of wild life—Condors—Numerous birds and beasts of prey—Severities of winters—Snowfall—Burmeister Peninsula—Lake Rica or South Fjord—Bad weather—The Wild Man of Santa Cruz.

I spent a few days in Santa Cruz making arrangements to divide my expedition into two parts, leaving Scrivenor with the peones to collect fossils and specimens in the neighbourhood of the River Santa Cruz, where most interesting deposits exist, while I with Burbury and a peon, whom I picked up at Santa Cruz, recrossed the continent to the lake-region.

In a huge country like Patagonia, to explore and to collect at the same time is practically out of the question, but by dividing our forces I hoped to achieve both ends more satisfactorily.

The lake which I now wished to visit is the last very large piece of water in the long chain of Andean lakes and lagoons. It is a little to the south of 50° S. lat. From this lake, Lake Argentino, the River Santa Cruz flows eastwards and empties itself into the Atlantic, the settlement of Santa Cruz being situated at the mouth of the river. It was by following the course of this river upwards for some 140 miles that Darwin made his only serious expedition into the interior of Patagonia. His party found the passage of the river both dangerous and laborious, and Captain FitzRoy decided to return to Santa Cruz on the fifth day, after they sighted the snowy summits of the Cordillera. Thus they never reached Lake Argentino.

We also followed the course of the river, but on horseback instead of by boat, and thus for the early part of our journey we passed through the identical country traversed by Darwin.

We were able to put everything on two cargueros, and even then they were not very heavily loaded. I took two madrinas, the Zaino mare and Mrs. Trelew, with their respective troops, the horses numbering in all twenty-one. During their rest in Santa Cruz they had attained to quite fair condition, and were in consequence ready for the road. It was necessary to shoe such as would permit the operation, as their hoofs had been worn down by the basalt fragments which had strewed our path from the north. The operation, by the way, was one which we had to perform ourselves, as the blacksmith at Santa Cruz, on being asked to do it, said he preferred the trade of building wooden houses, but consented to lend us his forge and tools for three dollars a day. We had some difficulty in finding shoes to fit, and I warn any future traveller against the nails which they keep for shoeing purposes in the settlement.

The short harsh grass usually to be had on the pampa is certainly a very much better food for horses destined to travel long and hard journeys than the beautiful meadowy vegas of the Cordillera, which look so inviting. The richer grass of the latter naturally fattens them in a wonderfully short space of time, but the first hard day's march cuts up their condition like so much butter.

We left Santa Cruz on January 22. I was accompanied by Burbury and a Swede, Bernardo Hähansen, who proved in the event to be a useful and courageous fellow. Our first march took us to Mr. Campbell's estancia. We saw a good number of guanaco and some ostriches on the way, which at first lay across the open pampa, afterwards diving into a deep cañadon some seven and a half leagues long. The little Blanco showed his appreciation of the excellent food he had been enjoying by behaving badly. On arrival we found Mr. Campbell was away from the farm repairing fences, so we were obliged to await his return. When he came, he took us up to the house, where we had some tea. We remained at the estancia for the night, and next day went on about three leagues over good pampa to Messrs. Cressard and Dobree's. The manager, Mr. John Noble, received us kindly. The cook at this farm, a former New Zealand hand, had come with us to Puerto Madryn in the Primero de Mayo, and said he would have applied to go with us had he known how to cargo horses. As he cooked very well I should have been glad to have received his application. On January 24 we reached Clementi's estancia. We were accompanied on the march by an old Irish sailor with a Hibernian cast of countenance. The señora asked us into the house and at once gave us hot milk and bread, which was very grateful after a long day in the saddle. The valley near by was full of sheep, and several healthy-looking children were playing about the buildings. Here also I saw the first and only negro I met with in Patagonia. The sight of his face gave me a sudden vivid recollection of Hayti. A long-bearded Argentine patriarch, whom I descried first in the half-lights of the kitchen during the evening, looked a very Abraham and most venerable, but daylight on the morrow robbed him of all romance.

On this day (the 25th) we pushed on to the Sub-prefecto's estancia. It consisted of the usual corrugated iron shanty and barn. We marched on the following morning and reached La Ultima Casa, where we were hospitably entertained by Mrs. Hardy. She was indeed very kind. Her husband had been an Englishman, but she herself was an Argentine. It is certainly a fact in Patagonia that the Argentines are far more ready to show hospitality than are our own countrymen. One hardly wonders, however, at people being a little cautious and suspicious, as the wayfarer is not always a wandering angel in Patagonia, or, for that matter, in any thinly populated country that is being newly opened up. Therefore we were the more grateful to our hostess of La Ultima Casa. At the shanty of another farmer, a Scotchman, we had had the door bolted against us, and been told to await his home-coming if we wished to enter the house.

We ate our meal at Mrs. Hardy's sitting on up-turned boxes, and she brought out some magazines for our reading. Hers was a strange existence, poor old lady! She appeared to be regarded or—it comes to the same thing—thought she was regarded a little in the light of an Ishmaelite by her neighbours, who were trying (she told me) to acquire her land. Her position did not seem to be prosperous. The casa had the usual corrugated roof, and her one window could boast no glass. From this main building a sort of barn jutted out to the left. Later on, I decided that this annex, which I at first took to be a barn, must be the old lady's private sanctum, for from it she produced five magazines, some lions' claws, a skunk-skin rug, some hen's eggs, and the hen herself. A regular widow's cruse of a place. The blackened roof of the kitchen was supported by four beams lengthways and four across, these last shiny as if tarred with the smoke of many winters. An old step-ladder in the corner answered the uses of a cupboard, cups and so forth being kept on a couple of wooden shelves, and lumps of sheep's fat decorated the room. We sat on the old wooden bedstead with its pile of sheepskins for bed-clothes and wrote our diary. Our hostess, who wore her hair in two plaits hanging down at each side of her face, sat on a case and talked while she drank the inevitable maté through a bombilla. She asked us to remain over a second day, which was most good of her, but we had to continue our journey.

We marched until about three o'clock, when, coming up to an empty shanty, we took shelter in it for a while, as it happened to be very hot. Later we started again, and made a long march across a pampa above the cañadon of the Santa Cruz, which is here two miles or more in breadth. Speaking of this cañadon, I cannot do better than give Darwin's words: "This valley varies from five to ten miles in breadth: it is bounded by step-formed terraces, which rise in most parts one above the other to the height of 500 feet, and have on the opposite sides a remarkable correspondence."

The river winds considerably as it flows through the cañadon, the sides of which are very bare and grassless, excepting where springs break through and flow down the cliff-side, their course being marked by a line of vivid green. The pampa above, along which we travelled, was made up of bare yellow levels, broken here and there by strips and patches of a very dark green bush, so dark as to seem almost black. We found a good deal of difficulty in getting to a camp with water, as the pampa was very dry, so we prolonged our march till 7.15 P.M., when we came upon a shallow and turbid stream running down in a southerly direction from the barranca. In the end we had to descend into the cañadon of the river. Not far from the spot which we chose for camping lay the bodies of some eighty guanaco with their skins on, which had died during the previous winter.

The landscape immediately on the banks of the Santa Cruz is arid and hopeless in the extreme, but one can never forget the glory of Patagonia, its wonderful sunsets, which gleam out over the dull-hued empty wastes in a splendour of colour. So on that night as I stood in the shadow that steeped all my side of the river, the other bank was lit up with a translucent glow of sunset as delicately yellow as if it shone through the petals of a buttercup.

On January 27 we started along the cañadon, which continued to be desolate and rather stony. We saw many guanaco, living and dead. After a time we made for the pampa above, from where we looked once again upon the Cordillera, gleaming very dim and faint on the horizon. Finding a lagoon with some grass about it, we off-saddled for an hour. Later we marched on rather more slowly than usual, and camped in such a place as a wildfowler might see in dreams of the night. A lagoon of sword-blue water, but in shape like an arrowhead, rimmed in with low green rushes, above these yellow tussocks of coarse grass bending in the wind, behind all a bare promontory arched over by a sad evening sky. On the breeze came the "Honk, honk" of geese mixed with the thinner notes of snipe. Ducks, too, were there, and the snipe in wisps of thirty. Presently, as I sat writing, a guanaco came in sight, and later a flock of cayenne lapwings (Vanellus cayennensis). I might have been, as far as the aspect of things was concerned (save for the guanaco) in Uist and going home to a warm fireside, instead of journeying on and on for many days and weeks to come over the endless pampa and into the distant Cordillera.

By the middle of the next day (January 28) we reached a lagoon with a threshold of green meadowy marsh, a relief after a long pull over a waterless and bare stretch of country, and there took a needed half-hour of rest. On our second starting we managed to wander into a desert of basalt or lava, and could only advance very slowly and with difficulty.[22] Nor could we find water for a long time; at length we came in sight of a big pool lying ruffled in the saffron lights of the sunset. Upon its margin or in the water were flamingos (Phoenicopterus ignipalliatus), upland geese (Chloephaga magellanica), thirty-four bandurias (Theristicus caudatus). There were also guanaco within sight. Here we camped, and found yet another deep and rocky lagoon, on which were many divers which I could not identify. A heavy wind was blowing, which died down at night and gave occasion for hundreds of sandflies to rise and worry us. Each day, as we marched on, the Cordillera seemed to be advancing, as it were, towards us.

We woke to find the next day pale with thin sunlight glinting across the prospect of basalt, low bushes and far horizons. We were now well beyond Mystery Plain, which formed the limit of Darwin's expeditions up the river, and which he named with a strong desire to push on and find out what lay on its farther side.

On the 29th we made a long march. After some couple of hours' going we saw ahead of us clear pampa instead of the rocky stone-strewn surface of the region we had been passing through of late. Over this pampa, though it was tussocky and uneven, we were able to advance at a good rate towards a line of hills that rose in the west. As we approached we saw that they stood up ridge behind ridge, and over these we rode, passing many good camping-grounds and seeing herds of guanaco, but no wood or bush for fire. At last we got to the top of the last ridge of all, and there, standing in the teeth of a strong wind, we looked down upon Lake Argentino lying below us, and backed by the peaks and snow summits of the Cordillera.

Although there were many cañadones and grass of the richest, we could find no water, and so went on and on.

Presently, as we were descending towards the lake, we reached a lagoon, but found no feed there for the horses, so we were forced to leave it behind, although the troop was tired and we had been for several hours in the saddle. I perceived traces of horses at some distance, and we therefore left the bank of the lagoon and cut across the pampa heading for them. We wandered on through bare hills, which fell in perplexing folds, curve within curve, and at last we reached the River del Bote, which has but one ford by which we could cross. This we found, worked the troop over, and then encamped.

Day by day we had been leaving behind us the seemingly limitless pampas and were now drawing close to the full blue range of minaret-shaped mountains. Each march was adding to their height and making clearer the details hidden in the hedge-sparrow-egg hue of their distances. First we came in sight of Mount Viscachas one morning when, bearing a little too far out upon the pampa, we struck a tract of very bad going. The ground was covered with thorny bushes and basalt fragments, and here and there harsh tussocks of grass sprouted from the blackened wilderness of stones. The night we passed beside the lagoon on the high pampa left an impression on my mind as one of the most desolate and forbidding of camps. Flocks of flamingos were standing in the upland pool, and round about upon the little promontories that thrust out into the wind-whipped water bandurias were huddled in close order, while as the evening began to fall a wisp of snipe flew over, wailing most mournfully. Few things, indeed, seem to me to bring out into keener prominence the loneliness of a place than the cry of snipe heard in the windy gloaming. There is some suggestion of human sorrow in the sound.

So we had journeyed westward, having always upon the south the yellow pampa, and beside us on the north the river running through its deep cañadon, while every dawn the vast phalanx of the Andean peaks seemed to have moved nearer, as though the great mass of mountain was marching slowly and surely towards us like the battle-front of some destroying army.

Again we came upon a second death-place of guanaco, which made a scene strange and striking enough. There cannot have been less than five hundred lying there in positions as forced and ungainly as the most ill-taken snapshot photograph could produce. Their long necks were outstretched, the rime of weather upon their decaying hides, and their bone-joints glistening through the wounds made by the beaks of carrion-birds. They had died during the severities of the previous winter, and lay literally piled one upon another. A brown, almost chocolate-coloured, lagoon washed close to the front rank of the dead, and those in the rearmost line had evidently lain down to die while in the very act of descending the tall barranca for water. The mortality among guanaco in a really hard winter is tremendous. They die in batches, absolutely in hundreds. At that season they come down to the lower grounds for warmth and water, but desert them in the summer and take to the high pampa, where, as I have described in another place, the Indians hunt and slay them in great numbers for their pelts. The cry of the guanaco is a noise unique. It is something between a bleat, a laugh, and a neigh. Often the old macho of a herd would come to the high ground nearest to our camp, and from it neigh defiance at us, while the rest of the point would satisfy their curiosity by staring from a safer distance.

Upon the high pampa, across which, bearing north-west, we passed, we found guanaco to be extraordinarily plentiful, and fatter than any we had hitherto met with in our wanderings through the country. Upon this pampa was no firewood at all, nothing save rolling grass which pricked you with minute thorns, so that a walk through it left your putties spined like a porcupine. To stalk in this grass, where the guanacos were unusually wild, and long periods of crawling were necessary to attain success, one had to carry a piece of guanaco-skin in the left hand, which took up the grass spines that must otherwise have entered the palm of the hunter.

Our first glimpse of Lake Argentino was a strongly-marked and vivid picture as seen from the rim of the high pampa when we surmounted it. A great eye of blue water—for the sun was bright—set beneath white pent-house brows of the mountain range. A tremendous wind was blowing out of the north-west, and we could see the great southern lake was in a turmoil of short and angry seas. Deep channels cut away into the depths of the Cordillera at the western end, and at the eastern side the waters flowed out into the swift current of the River Santa Cruz. Farther along the northern shore the cañadon of the River Leona was also visible. We could not then guess how glad we should one day be to reach the haven of that river mouth. Beyond the lake, and partly surrounding it, the Cordillera raised their jagged line of peaks against the sky. From the bases upwards towards the higher altitudes the mountains were black with forests. Three large icebergs floated on the water at the farther side, one of which had drifted into shallows near the shore. No sign of life was to be observed anywhere in the great hollow stretching beneath us.

To my mind Argentino is a far more beautiful lake than Buenos Aires. After a long look we began to descend into the lower land by a sharp cleft that led down into a deep cañadon. It was, owing to a recent landslip, a nasty piece of travelling, and the horses, disliking it, broke back more than once, the Zaino overo taking the lead as usual.

Emerging from this cleft we came on one of Nature's tragedies. Upon the side of the slope was a guanaco, fallen (when I first caught sight of it) upon its knees, and making frantic efforts to rise. Three huge condors were poised a few feet above the head of the unfortunate animal. I galloped towards them, and as I came near the guanaco fell over upon its side, still moving convulsively. At once one of the condors lit on the ground beside it. I cannot have been more than a minute approaching, and as I came close the condor rose into the air to some distance. A thin stream of blood was trickling down the surface of the rock upon which the guanaco lay, and the poor creature was jerking its legs and body. During the moment which I had taken to ride up the condor had torn out its eyes! The guanaco was evidently dying of scab, and had thinned down into a mere skeleton.

I own to a horror and a loathing of the condor. Seen against the pale hue of the sky, its stately flight and grand spread of motionless wing made it seem a noble bird, but near by it shared the repulsive appearance of other carrion-eaters. In size it is enormous. I shot one off Hellgate measuring nine feet three inches across the outstretched pinions. It rivals the vulture in its ability to quickly discover and arrive upon the scene of a feast, and is in the habit of gorging itself until it becomes practically powerless, and it is possible to slay it afoot with a stick. It is one thing to be well mounted on a good horse and to watch, as you ride along, the far specks in the intense blue, or to admire them wheeling in wide graceful circles with quiescent wings, but quite another aspect of them would be borne in upon you if your horse chanced to stumble, and left you, say, with a broken leg upon the empty pampa; long before help might come, or, indeed, if you were alone, would be at all likely to come, you would make a terribly close acquaintance with the methods a condor adopts when meat—be it dead or wounded—falls under his power of beak and claw.

Patagonia is certainly a wonderful country for birds and beasts of prey. You may travel leagues upon leagues and see no sign of life save chimangos (Milvago chimango), caranchos (Polyborus thaurus), and condors (Sarcorhampus gryphus) in the air and upon the bushes, and at your feet the tracks of lion and of fox and of skunk. Sometimes this fact strikes you with peculiar force. The landscape made up of thorny bushes and spike grass jagged rocks, and white and grey slime, in which live the puma, the wild-cat, and the fox; the air inhabited by birds of prey. What do they live upon, these creatures, there are so many of them? How do they eke out existence? Sparse herds of guanaco (I am now alluding to the sterile portions of the country, such as lie about the north shore of Lake Buenos Aires and also part of the north shore of Lake Argentino), a few small birds, and abundant rodent life of the smaller species—that is all. Curiously enough, in the richer lands of Patagonia, it seemed to me that, though there was more game, there were fewer birds and beasts of prey.

In the winter and in the spring the country, as far as wild life is concerned, is but a thin and gaunt place. Nothing that wanders carries any fat, for the food has been reduced to a minimum. It is on this sterile battlefield of nature that living creatures enter into a death-grapple with the conditions of life, and swing to and fro in a contest whose outcome is only decided when the dark days of storm are over; for at this season the richer lands are often under snow, and it is about the bare margins of lakes and lagoons that the game gathers and remains.

All the way up the River Santa Cruz we were able to recognise the points marked and named by Darwin, until finally his party was forced through lack of provisions to turn back just when he had arrived within reasonable distance of the great lake. He named this last prospect he looked out over in Patagonia, "Mystery Plain." Now it no longer is mysterious, but Darwin's map remains to this day the best chart made of the river.

His description and his opinion of the country are sufficiently dismal, but he passed through a waste and empty land, before colonising on the coasts had reached its present state, or much of the country within reach of the sea had been partitioned, as it now is, into sheep farms. And it must be admitted that the neighbourhood of the Santa Cruz is somewhat sterile, and would be likely to give a false idea of Patagonia as a forbidding land to a stranger who knew no more of the country than the coast and this boulder and sand-strewn river valley. This cañadon is, in fact, covered with glacial detritus.

Leaving the shore of the lake well to our right we rode parallel with it for some miles, crossed the Rivers Calafate and de los Perros, and finally arrived upon a peninsula which culminates in Mount Buenos Aires. This peninsula is called the Burmeister Peninsula. Here, many days' ride into the interior, and under the very shadow of the Andes, lives an English pioneer, Mr. Cattle, whom we visited, and who was kind enough to help me in every way and to give us hospitality.

During the first night we spent upon the shores of Lake Argentino there was a heavy snowfall on the tops of the nearer mountains.

Taking our horses, we made our way to the south-west along the shores of Lake Rica. We were forced to make détours, as the steep banks were cut up by innumerable rifts, at the bottom of nearly every one of which streams of varying size emptied themselves into the fjord. Heavy forests clothed the slopes of the hills almost to the margin of the water. Very little animal life was to be observed. I picked up a number of iron-ore stalactites on the shores and also from the mud of the shallow water near them. When approaching the end of this South Fjord—as Lake Rica should properly be called—of Lake Argentino we crossed a river or rather, I should say, a torrent, that after a riotous course between very steep cliffs flowed over a rocky bed into the South Fjord. This river would have been, I should say, impassable at an earlier date in the season.

Our advance was finally stopped by cliffs which descended clear to the water's edge. We camped on the shingle at the foot of the cliffs just short of the spot where their bases plunged under the level of the water, and all night long we could hear the rushing thunder of masses of ice breaking from the parent glaciers and crashing down into the fjord.

The weather now completely broke up. Rain fell in, close steady lines all across our outlook over the western fjord, and the drenched forests behind us tossed and creaked in the wind. Nothing more dismal and depressing can be imagined than this forest-land dim with lowering skies and a downpour of rain. For four days the heavy rain, sometimes mixed with sleet, continued to fall, and through it we rode back to the Burmeister Peninsula.

It was upon the shores of Lake Argentino that a great Gaucho, perhaps I should say the greatest of all Gauchos, one Ascensio Brunel, at one time found a hiding-place. We visited the spot later on, but here I may as well tell some part of the story of his life. He was very generally known for many years as the "Wild Man of Santa Cruz," and his history was an extraordinary one—one of those smears of high and vivid colour which circumstance occasionally paints in upon the dull humdrum picture of the daily life of a district.

Let us set out his antecedents.

He and his brother were Gauchos. They lived in camp, and were partners in a small business. Cattle, sheep, and horses formed their stock.

Once they went together on a long journey, and became acquainted with a lady, whom we will call Bathsheba. They both loved her; yet she was another's.

The two brothers descended upon that other and slew him. Then they made off with the lady to the wilder districts. There they quarrelled about her. Ascensio waited until his brother happened to be away tracking horses in a particularly wild part, and then he rounded up the remainder of the stock, and he and the lady fled yet deeper into the interior. For a space they covered their tracks and escaped the brother.

In the course of time the lady left her lover, as ladies will, and he, his brain turned by some strange passion, went mad.

When we strike his trail again he was known as the "Wild Man of Santa Cruz."

He began to steal horses, found the sport to his liking, and stole more. Unable to use or keep them, he merely drove them to some sleepy hollow, where he killed them in hundreds. (We once counted eighty-three of these skeletons in one place.) He dressed in the skins of pumas from head to foot. His saddle was of puma-skin, and armed only with boleadores he ranged the land stealing. His career was a long one, and he became such a Gaucho as has never been known. To-day he might be heard of as lifting a dozen horses on the Santa Cruz River; a week later he was spiriting away tropillas in Chubut.

He had the run of 300,000 square miles, the whole of Patagonia was his farm, his stock what he could steal.

You may remember that I described a meeting with Indians, a tribe who lived in tents of guanaco-skins on the River Mayo. The Wild Man paid them a visit, and stole a hundred mares; and they, discovering it, rode down his trail and caught him. They took him alive and haled him as a prisoner to the nearest settlement, where he was put in gaol.

He escaped, made straight back, and lifted another big batch of the Mayo Indians' horses.

Again they pursued him, but he was fain to escape, being mounted on a very good horse. At last, only one Indian continued to hold on his trail, and he, when he neared the wild figure clad in puma-skins, grew afraid and turned back.

The Wild Man rode on, and also out of our story and all human ken. That was four years ago. He has not been heard of since. But I daresay that the Mayo Indians could finish off the story with a different ending.

CHAPTER XIV
THE DOWN-STREAM NAVIGATION OF THE RIVER LEONA

Boat necessary for farther exploration—Steam-launch on shores of Lake Viedma our only hope—Start to find her—Difficulty of crossing Santa Cruz River—River Leona—Old camp—Hills and guanaco-tracks—Lake Viedma—Finding launch—Damaged by wanderers—Down-stream trip discussed—Repairing launch—Our one chance of penetrating Cordillera—Risks of down-stream passage—Gathering firewood—Cold work—Launch of Ariel—Aspect of Leona River—Good intentions—Califate fuel—Desolate evening—Getting up stream—Start in bad weather—Obliged to put back—Second start—Sucked into current of Leona—Bernardo puts on steam—Rain—Stop for the night—Dangers of Leona channel—Second day's trip—Launch turns in squall—Rushing down stream—Racing ahead of the current—Awaiting the finish—Reach after reach—Rounding a cliff—Choice of many channels—Narrow passage—Safe—Sup off armadillo—"If."

As it was impossible to make any further exploration without a craft of some sort, I began to cast about for materials for boat-building or, rather, for boat-repairing. There were a couple of canvas boats on the spot, left on the shore by a Commission some three years previously, with which I thought perhaps something might be done. But these, on examination, proved to be so worn with the stress of weather, and when launched shipped so much water, that it seemed hardly practicable to use them for our purpose, the more especially as their holding capacity made it impossible to take more than a small quantity of provisions.

I next heard of a boat on the River Santa Cruz, but that was also in very evil plight, added to which the odds were against our being able to get her up to Lake Argentino, owing to the fact that the River Santa Cruz was in flood and the current more than usually fierce.

Note.—The author regrets the comparative absence of illustration to this chapter. The launch shipped so much water through her broken plate and in other ways that the photographs taken were destroyed.

I have mentioned in an earlier chapter the boat which Dr. Moreno had during his last expedition in the year 1897 brought, at much cost and labour, to Lake Viedma. There lay our hope. It was a steam-launch, and the Argentine Commission had packed her up carefully and snugly on the shore; but, although we knew nothing of her present condition, we were aware that the chances against her remaining undisturbed for that period of time were small, as Lake Viedma is not difficult of access, and in all probability wandering bands of Indians or Gauchos had got at the boat, stripped off her covering of canvas, and looted such of her contents as seemed to possess any value in their eyes.

However that might be, this launch appeared to be our only resource, and I was lucky indeed to have been given leave to use her if necessary. On my speaking to Cattle on the matter, he was kind enough to offer to accompany me. Burbury possessed a good knowledge of engineering, which would be of invaluable service to us, and, as it happened, Bernardo, in the course of his adventurous career, had had some experience in the engine-room of a Brazilian steamer.

So on February 15 we set out for Lake Viedma, with the idea of bringing the launch, if possible, down the River Leona, which is the connecting waterway between the Lakes Viedma and Argentino.

To travel from our starting point at the foot of Mount Buenos Aires to Lake Viedma it was necessary to skirt Lake Argentino until the southern outlet of the Leona was reached, and then to follow that river to its source in Lake Viedma. The distance was about eighty miles more or less, and included the fording of the River Santa Cruz.

Our party was made up of four men and twenty-one horses, and upon one of the packs we took a light canvas collapsible boat and a pair of oars with which to negotiate the Santa Cruz.

On the following evening we arrived on its southern bank. There we found an old Commission boat that was used as a ferry, but it was beached, with the usual contrariety of things, on the wrong side of the stream, which is from one hundred and fifty to two hundred yards wide at this spot and runs with a swift current. Many a Gaucho has lost his life in attempting to cross lower down.

Next morning it was still dark when the plume of smoke rose from our camp-fire of califate-wood, and as we sat round it waiting for the asado to cook, we smoked (a bad habit when indulged in before breakfast, against which one would warn everybody else) and drank maté. It was a cool dawn I remember that developed later into a hot day. We put the collapsible boat together, and Cattle, after a mishap with a rowlock, brought the old and leaky ford-boat across, as we needed her to transport our baggage. We piled the cargo into her, and such weak places as we could deal with we strengthened.

The theory was to take the filly through the river behind the boat, trusting that the old black bell-mare would follow her offspring, and the troop in its turn follow the mare, as had occurred on the occasion of our former crossing of the river near the settlement of Santa Cruz.

So we dragged the reluctant and much-protesting filly down to the riverside, conveyed the boat a few hundred yards up-stream, and then Bernardo and I got aboard and shoved off. I had put a collar round the filly's neck, and by this supported her in the wake of the boat. All would have gone well had not one of the rowlocks, worn by weather and worm-eaten, struck work and smashed. Left with but one oar the current took charge of us. Soon the unfortunate filly began to turn over in the water like a catherine-wheel, and I was unable to help her much, as I was holding a rowlock in place with one hand and supporting the filly with the other. Eventually we were obliged to put back, and were lucky enough to make the south bank just in time, for at that part of the shore there is but a small stretch upon which it is possible to land; immediately below high cliffs descend sheer to the water.

After this we resolved to drive the troop over before us, but although they had had a long-journey experience of river-crossing they did not care to face the Santa Cruz. In spite of our efforts they broke back five or six times. Once we nearly had them in the water, when the little Zaino got away and galloped up the bank. At last, however, by dint of bellowing and brandishing oars or anything that came handy, we succeeded in convincing them that the south shore of the Santa Cruz had become unhealthy to remain upon, and so they swam over. We started at once with a boatful of gear, and landed barely in time to defeat the ambitious intentions of the leading spirits of the troop, who on getting out of the water decided to make off and regain a life of freedom.

As soon as we got the baggage over we saddled-up and rode through a very sandy tract of land, and by evening made our camp under a bare hillside by the River Leona.

I believe that a German expedition had once encamped there. Both wheat and beans were growing near the long-deserted camp-fire. No doubt the seed had fallen from some of the provision-bags of the Germans. There was also a miniature corral formed of bushes.

On the next day we made a very long and tiresome march, which led us into more than one difficult place. We rode on league after league over the worst sort of ground, including the descent of two or three really bad barrancas. Bernardo, who acted as guide, became shy after awhile of telling us that Lake Viedma lay only two leagues ahead. As the day wore on we rather pressed the question, and he grew correspondingly coy in his replies.

One of the barrancas led us into a sort of maze of conical mud hills, confusedly huddled together. Through them lay a tangle of guanaco-tracks, which mostly ended on the tops of the hills. The troop followed these tracks in various directions, and you were surprised at all points by the startled faces of the horses glaring down at you over unexpected bluffs. The going was very heavy, and deep holes betrayed the horses' feet. Altogether it was some time before the troop was put through.

Late in the evening we reached the shores of Lake Viedma, and found the launch. She was lying behind a bare and very low promontory. The Commission which had used her three years previously had packed her up with care in canvas and raised her on rollers. But I was sorry to find that needless and wanton damage had been inflicted upon her by some roving passers-by. They had torn off the canvas covering and appropriated many important tools, including quite a number that could have been of no possible use to any save a party meaning to use the launch herself. A few of these missing details we picked up in the adjacent bushes, where the irresponsible unknowns had thrown them.

As to the condition of the boat, her three-years sojourn on an isolated beach had not improved it. Her boiler was in rather a bad state with rust, and one of her plates was cracked. Originally built for a pleasure-launch, the Argentine Commission had raised her gunwales and decked her in; without these alterations she could not have lived in the rough waters of the lakes of Patagonia.

The evening and the surrounding scenery were equally grey and depressing, but with an ostrich, and a guanaco I had shot in the morning, we made ourselves very comfortable round the fire, while we talked over our contemplated voyage down the Leona. Cattle, whose knowledge of the subject under consideration was of immense help, agreed with me in thinking the thing could be done.

Next day Burbury, who was, as I have said, a very fair engineer, set to work with Bernardo's help to get the launch into working order, while the rest of us went to cut and gather fuel.

The two canvas boats which belonged to the launch were later found a couple of leagues down the shore, but a bit of wind began to blow, so it was impossible to bring them up, and in the event they had to be left where they were.

In making ready the launch Burbury was much hampered by having only a small supply of screws to draw upon. Time and exposure had dealt hardly with her, her pump was strained as well as being imperfect, some portion of it having been taken away. The craft was about thirty-five feet long with a displacement of about three parts of a ton. She was by no means an ideal boat for the kind of navigation that lay before us, for which a good wooden craft would have been much more safe and handy. Had her length been less it would have been another advantage, as the seas upon the lakes are very short. Weather-worn as she was, however, she represented our sole chance of getting really deep into the unpenetrated Cordillera. It was a case of take it or leave it, and which of the two it was to be gave me some thought that night.

I could not conceal from myself that it was a peculiarly risky affair taking her down the River Leona. The up-stream navigation of the river had been made by the launch when the Commission brought her up-stream, towing her through the difficult places from the bank. But that, of course, was a very different matter.

The Leona is a comparatively large river, very cold, and running, when in flood, from five to eight knots an hour, with, in places, a very strong rip. There are a good many rocks and shoals, but at the time I write of the water was high, snow-fed by the warmth of the preceding months, and therefore with luck we might hope to slip over most of the reefs in safety. This was fortunate, as what with the cold, the eddies and the cross-currents the chance of a swimmer reaching the bank was not great.

Should the current, however, get the launch broadside on, we would have to give her full steam ahead, and charge down the unknown and rock-set river. Besides, the channel was, we knew, very hard to follow, for among the islands the stream divided into four or five arms, and we had no guide to help us to choose the main channel.

The risks were very real and looked large enough in my eyes that night, but in case I should be charged with foolhardiness in deciding to carry out our design, I think I may say that the average man would have decided as we did. Few, after so many weary miles and months, coming at last to such a crucial moment, would very closely consider the risks, since outside of running them the single course open was to turn back defeated, leaving one of the most interesting unexplored portions of the Cordillera unvisited and untrodden.

In the course of the next day or two we worked hard at the launch and in gathering firewood. On the 18th we got the boat afloat after eight hours of hard labour, for during her three years rest she had sunk deep into the shingle and sand. It was quite impossible to use the horses, as they would not pull forward into the lake, and thus into the water, so we got at the work ourselves. About mid-day a wind sprang up, and the water, fed by the melting snows, was perishingly cold. It seemed for a time as if we should never succeed in getting her afloat, and as we had not been able to bring up either of the canvas boats, wading was very much the order of the day, and after every few stretches of work we were uncommonly glad to take spells in the sleeping-bags to warm our half-frozen limbs. Hot cocoa, also, was kept going from time to time.

At length we got her off into the little shallow bay, where the waves were breaking, for a wind was rising out of the north-west.