very pretty Spanish ones, who had been carried away by the Indians when
young, and could now only speak the Indian tongue. From their account
they must have come from Salta, a distance in a straight line of nearly
one thousand miles. This gives one a grand idea of the immense
territory over which the Indians roam: yet, great as it is, I think
there will not, in another half-century, be a wild Indian northward of
the Rio Negro. The warfare is too bloody to last; the Christians
killing every Indian, and the Indians doing the same by the Christians.
It is melancholy to trace how the Indians have given way before the
Spanish invaders. Schirdel [21] says that in 1535, when Buenos Ayres
was founded, there were villages containing two and three thousand
inhabitants. Even in Falconer's time (1750) the Indians made inroads
as far as Luxan, Areco, and Arrecife, but now they are driven beyond
the Salado. Not only have whole tribes been exterminated, but the
remaining Indians have become more barbarous: instead of living in
large villages, and being employed in the arts of fishing, as well as
of the chase, they now wander about the open plains, without home or
fixed occupation.
I heard also some account of an engagement which took place, a few
weeks previously to the one mentioned, at Cholechel. This is a very
important station on account of being a pass for horses; and it was, in
consequence, for some time the head-quarters of a division of the army.
When the troops first arrived there they found a tribe of Indians, of
whom they killed twenty or thirty. The cacique escaped in a manner
which astonished every one. The chief Indians always have one or two
picked horses, which they keep ready for any urgent occasion. On one
of these, an old white horse, the cacique sprung, taking with him his
little son. The horse had neither saddle nor bridle. To avoid the
shots, the Indian rode in the peculiar method of his nation namely,
with an arm round the horse's neck, and one leg only on its back. Thus
hanging on one side, he was seen patting the horse's head, and talking
to him. The pursuers urged every effort in the chase; the Commandant
three times changed his horse, but all in vain. The old Indian father
and his son escaped, and were free. What a fine picture one can form
in one's mind,--the naked, bronze-like figure of the old man with his
little boy, riding like a Mazeppa on the white horse, thus leaving far
behind him the host of his pursuers!
I saw one day a soldier striking fire with a piece of flint, which I
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