believe that he is introduced into the foreground of Commander Bedwell’s sketch—at all events, if any reader wishes to know his appearance, the occupant of the fallen tree presents a strong resemblance to the leader of our party. Our arrangements and prospects were fully discussed; and after bidding farewell to Captain Cushing, who was to sail the next day, and to my most kind and courteous host and hostess, we parted, agreeing to meet at daylight ready for the road.

At an early hour of the morning of the 19th of April I was awoke by J’aria, and with him and my small belongings proceeded to the Corral, where the horses were being caught and loaded. Here we were joined by Gallegos, and when everything was nearly ready for the start adjourned to his house close by for a cup of coffee. The Señora seemed to regard me with great commiseration, and recounted various dismal tales of the dreadful cold winds, hardships, Indians, and other disagreeables to be encountered; her consolations were cut short by the entrance of J’aria with the news that all was ready. After a parting glass of something stronger than water, we got into our saddles, and the cavalcade, consisting of Gallegos, myself, one regular soldier, three irregulars or employés of the Government, and J’aria, with twenty-one horses, left the town. As we passed the cuartel, the guard turned out in the balcony and presented arms, and the bugler executed a musical salute. It was a fine frosty morning, and we rode on in high spirits, accompanied by two or three horsemen, who were going to spend their Sunday festa in duck shooting, and had made an early start to escort us a little way. Scarcely had we crossed the stream when one of the baggage horses kicked his load off; this was soon replaced; but when the bustle was over and the cavalcade reformed, J’aria and one of the employés, to whom I had confidingly entrusted a bottle of rum, were missing, and they did not turn up again for some time, and the bottle never again. We rode along the coast until we reached the outpost called Tres Puentes, where a narrow pass, between the forest on one hand and the sea on the other, is barred by a gate house tenanted by two men, posted there to prevent desertion; they turned out, and we lingered for a farewell chat, during which one of the sportsmen stalked and shot some ducks; at the report of his gun the regular soldier’s horse, not being used to stand fire, shied and threw him, capsizing his saddle-bags, and strewing the beach with tortillas (cakes) and coffee, with which his no doubt provident and thoughtful ‘she’ had stored them. Gallegos sat in his saddle and laughed at the scene; but as the others could not catch the horse, he gave us a proof of his dexterity with the lazo. After this little diversion we pursued our course along the beach as far as Cape Negro, where the forests terminated, and our accompanying friends bade us adieu after taking a parting glass all round; J’aria and the other absentee overtaking us in time for this part of the performance.

Our horses’ heads were then turned from the coast in a north north-west direction, and after half-an-hour’s ride a halt was called for breakfast under the lee of a sheltering hill. To the southward we viewed the counter slope of the wooded hills, below which on the other side lay Punta Arenas. A thick growth of shrubs covered the ground, but beautiful glades of luxuriant pasture were visible; one of which opened just to the south of our camping place, and others appeared east and west like oases of green. Their appearance caused me to remark that as a settler I should choose this location for my hut. Gallegos, however, replied that the pastures could not be used for the cattle of the settlement during the summer, as neither the Indians nor their own men could be trusted; the latter would desert, and the former would steal the beasts. After a pipe we remounted, and having crossed the hill we descended to the valley of a small but deep stream, called the Rio Chaunco, having forded which we ascended the opposite border slope, and entered on the Pampa, which name is universally used in Patagonia to designate the high undulating plains or plateaux, frequently intersected by valleys and ravines, or rising into successive or isolated hills, which generally occupy the crest of the country. The Indians, indeed, who know a little Castilian, apply the word Pampa indiscriminately to any tract of country hunted over by them. After a successful day’s sport, and the contentment consequent on a hearty meal, they will ask with great satisfaction, ‘Muy buena Pampa? No?’ really meaning ‘Is not the wild life the best?’ But English readers, who have derived their idea of a Pampa from Head’s delightful work, or from other experiences of the unlimited grassy or thistle covered plains which roll away for miles in the Argentine States, and offer no obstruction to the stretching gallop of the untiring gaucho, must not transfer that pleasing picture to Patagonia. The Pampas, properly so called, of Patagonia, occasionally indeed present a tolerably even and uniform succession of rolling plains covered with coarse grass, but more frequently the surface, even when unbroken by hills and suddenly yawning ravines, is sterile, with a sparse vegetation, consisting of stunted bushes and round thistle clumps; and even these are often wanting, and nothing clothes the bare patches of clay or gravel; elsewhere it is strewn with huge round boulders, and again rugged with confused heaps or ridges of bare sharp-edged rocks, many of them of volcanic origin: this more particularly applying to the northern part of the country. The only uniformity of appearance is afforded in the winter, when the white sheet of snow covers rocks, grass, and shingle; but one accompaniment is the same, whatever be the nature of the soil or surface; and the word Pampa invariably recalls to one’s shuddering memory the cutting blasts which sweep almost without intermission from various points, but chiefly from the west, over the high country, till, reaching the heated atmosphere of Buenos Ayres, the cold Patagonian wind becomes the Pampero, the sudden and terrific blasts of which cause so many disasters among the shipping. The descent from these Pampas to the valleys, or more sheltered and fertile level ground bordering the banks of the streams and rivers, is commonly termed ‘Barranca,’ or bank, from the scarped slopes, varying in depth from fifty to two or three feet, and in angle from an easy to an almost perpendicular descent, but often fissured by ravines or gullies, affording roads, down all of which, however, the native riders gallop with equal recklessness.

The Pampa we were now traversing presented an expanse of undulating or rolling plains covered with a uniform growth of coarse grass interspersed with barberry bushes, and occasional lagoons in the hollows. No living creatures except ourselves appeared on the waste. To the westward the snow-clad peaks of the mountains bordering the Sarmiento Straits greeted us with an icy blast which made my thoughts longingly revert to the cosy cabin and my late shipmates, who were, no doubt, threading the intricacies of its channels. But the good guanaco mantle kept out the wind, and our motley party pushed briskly on in good order. Lieutenant Gallegos has been already introduced: as to the others, J’aria was a small man, of rough exterior, of doubtful extraction, and more than doubtful antecedents, who looked fit for any business except good; but he served me most assiduously, and with unlooked-for care. The soldier was a fine-looking fellow, new to the Pampas, whose carbine, which he duly carried, proved a source of great embarrassment to him; and his horse being by no means too manageable, he was considerably bothered, much to the delight of the rest. Two others were hybrids, between gauchos and sailors, having, like our