I have often distinguished
it from a long distance, and have always known
that the struggle was then drawing to a close. The whole
sight is horrible and revolting: the ground is almost made of
bones; and the horses and riders are drenched with gore.
[1] I call these thistle-stalks for the want of a more correct
name. I believe it is a species of Eryngium.
[2] Travels in Africa, p. 233.
[3] Two species of Tinamus and Eudromia elegans of A. d'Orbigny,
which can only be called a partridge with regard to its habits.
[4] History of the Abipones, vol. ii. p. 6.
[5] Falconer's Patagonia, p. 70.
[6] Fauna Boreali-Americana, vol. i. p. 35.
[7] See Mr. Atwater's account of the Prairies, in Silliman's
N. A. Journal, vol. i. p. 117.
[8] Azara's Voyages, vol. i. p. 373.
[9] M. A. d'Orbigny (vol. i. p. 474) says that the cardoon
and artichoke are both found wild. Dr. Hooker (Botanical
Magazine, vol. iv. p. 2862), has described a variety of the
Cynara from this part of South America under the name of
inermis. He states that botanists are now generally agreed
that the cardoon and the artichoke are varieties of one plant.
I may add, that an intelligent farmer assured me that he had
observed in a deserted garden some artichokes changing into
the common cardoon. Dr. Hooker believes that Head's vivid
description of the thistle of the Pampas applies to the
cardoon, but this is a mistake. Captain Head referred to the
plant, which I have mentioned a few lines lower down, under
the title of giant thistle. Whether it is a true thistle I do
not know; but it is quite different from the cardoon; and more
like a thistle properly so called.
[10] It is said to contain 60,000 inhabitants. Monte Video, the
second town of importance on the banks of the Plata, has
15,000.
CHAPTER VII
BUENOS AYRES AND ST. FE
Excursion to St. Fe - Thistle Beds - Habits of the Bizcacha -
Little Owl - Saline Streams - Level Plain - Mastodon - St.
Fe - Change in Landscape - Geology - Tooth of extinct
Horse - Relation of the Fossil and recent Quadrupeds of North
and South America - Effects of a great Drought - Parana -
Habits of the Jaguar - Scissor-beak - Kingfisher, Parrot,
and Scissor-tail - Revolution - Buenos Ayres State of
Government.
SEPTEMBER 27th. - In the evening I set out on an
excursion to St. Fe, which is situated nearly three hundred
English miles from Buenos Ayres, on the banks of
the Parana. The roads in the neighbourhood of the city after
the rainy weather, were extraordinarily bad. I should never
have thought it possible for a bullock waggon to have
crawled along: as it was, they scarcely went at the rate of a
mile an hour, and a man was kept ahead, to survey the best
line for making the attempt. The bullocks were terribly
jaded: it is a great mistake to suppose that with improved
roads, and an accelerated rate of travelling, the sufferings of
the animals increase in the same proportion. We passed a
train of waggons and a troop of beasts on their road to
Mendoza. The distance is about 580 geographical miles, and
the journey is generally performed in fifty days. These
waggons are very long, narrow, and thatched with reeds;
they have only two wheels, the diameter of which in some
cases is as much as ten feet. Each is drawn by six bullocks,
which are urged on by a goad at least twenty feet long: this
is suspended from within the roof; for the wheel bullocks a
smaller one is kept; and for the intermediate pair, a point
projects at right angles from the middle of the long one.
The whole apparatus looked like some implement of war.
September 28th. - We passed the small town of Luxan
where there is a wooden bridge over the river - a most
unusual convenience in this country. We passed also Areco.
The plains appeared level, but were not so in fact; for in
various places the horizon was distant. The estancias are
here wide apart; for there is little good pasture, owing to
the land being covered by beds either of an acrid clover,
or of the great thistle. The latter, well known from the
animated description given by Sir F. Head, were at this
time of the year two-thirds grown; in some parts they were
as high as the horse's back, but in others they had not yet
sprung up, and the ground was bare and dusty as on a turnpike-
road. The clumps were of the most brilliant green, and
they made a pleasing miniature-likeness of broken forest
land. When the thistles are full grown, the great beds are
impenetrable, except by a few tracts, as intricate as those
in a labyrinth. These are only known to the robbers, who
at this season inhabit them, and sally forth at night to rob
and cut throats with impunity. Upon asking at a house
whether robbers were numerous, I was answered, "The thistles
are not up yet;" - the meaning of which reply was not at
first very obvious. There is little interest in passing over
these tracts, for they are inhabited by few animals or birds,
excepting the bizcacha and its friend the little owl.
The bizcacha [1] is well known to form a prominent feature
in the zoology of the Pampas. It is found as far south as
the Rio Negro, in lat. 41 degs., but not beyond. It cannot,
like the agouti, subsist on the gravelly and desert plains of
Patagonia, but prefers a clayey or sandy soil, which produces a
different and more abundant vegetation.
