CHAPTER IX.
My first thought on waking the next morning was, of course, the river. During the night, in a moment of wakefulness, a steady rumbling noise, the rush of distant water, had struck on my listening ear, and I was accordingly prepared to find a further rise in the river at daylight. But the sight which now met my gaze took me by surprise notwithstanding. The whole of the lower-lying portion of the valley, as far as the eye could reach, was one sheet of water, and the flood was almost visibly rising towards those parts which yet remained dry. The river itself was no longer distinguishable, being confounded with the general mass of water, but we could plainly hear the dull roar of its mighty current, which was still sweeping down with unabated force, bearing on its curling waters huge trunks of trees, which, perhaps, but the day before had been torn from the distant Cordilleras.
On account of the high position of our camp, we were as yet far from the flood, though if it continued to rise as rapidly as hitherto, we might soon have to move further on.
Isidoro, too, was quite aghast at the dimensions the inundation was assuming. He had never seen the river so swollen before, and began seriously to doubt whether, in a fortnight even, we should be able to cross over, as there was no knowing how long the rise would continue. The snowfall of the past winter had been heavier than any of the oldest Indians could remember, and it might reasonably be supposed that the spring-floods would be proportionately unusual in volume and duration.
We passed all that day in gloomy forebodings, watching the progress of the water. At night-time it was still steadily rising. The following morning we found the flood had risen to within fifteen feet of our camp; but we had the satisfaction of finding that it was already abating, for during the night it had been several feet higher, as evinced by the marks left on the grass. Indeed, all day it kept on falling, and so rapidly that we commenced to speculate on whether the river might not eventually subside as quickly as it had risen, and allow us to cross over, after all, within the eight days we had from the first considered as the probable duration of our enforced stay at Gallegos.
The next day again brought despondency. The water seemed to have remained stationary during the night, and there was a change for the worse in the weather. The thick mist which had accompanied daybreak resolved itself, as the morning wore on, into a steady heavy rainfall, which seemed grimly resolved to reduce us to the last stage of misery and discomfort.
We covered up our furs with the packages of feathers, so as, if possible, to have something dry for bedtime; and then cowered round the drooping fire in resigned helplessness, whilst it rained and rained down upon us with merciless pertinacity.
There is nothing so trying as having to sit hour after hour in dejected silence, exposed to a cold rain-storm, which you know may possibly last for days, and from which you have absolutely no shelter, feeling, as time goes on, the damp gradually creeping through your clothes, till it at last reaches the skin and chills you to the bone, while occasional rills of water run off your back hair and trickle icily down your shivering neck, till you are thoroughly drenched and numbed and cramped with cold.
We passively sat shivering in this wretched plight till long after noon, getting up now and then to have a look at the weather or to stretch our stiffened limbs. At last the clouds began to break up, the storm collected its dying force in one last fierce downpour, and then ceased altogether, giving us just time to dry our clothes and bodies with the aid of a good fire before night came on.
The days dragged their slow length along, and at last a week, which, in the weariness of eternally watching and waiting, seemed more like a month, had gone past without any signs of a speedy abatement in the height of the river. The waters had fallen, it is true, and were still falling, but how slowly and sluggishly!
Day after day I used to climb up the tall escarpment bounding the northern plain, from the top of which a good view was to be obtained of the valley, which was now one vast sheet of water, dotted here and there with green islands, a long line of foam showing where the course of the river lay. There I would sit for hours, watching how little tufts of grass would gradually enlarge into islands, which in their turn would slowly grow and grow till they joined and formed part of the mainland, which was slowly but steadily reclaiming its lost domains from the retreating waters. This was my only occupation; I had no heart to join Isidoro on his frequent hunting expeditions; the river was my sole thought, the only topic of conversation in which I could take any interest, and beside that everything else was of the utmost indifference.
It was not that I had any actual fear of losing the steamer of the 30th, especially after the eighth day of our sojourn, during which the water had fallen with such surprising quickness that the banks of the river were in some parts beginning to uncover again. Still, occasionally, the fact that it was just within the limits of possibility that I might not be able to pass in time would obtrude itself unpleasantly on my mind; and though I would immediately triumphantly argue any such idea away, yet I felt that nothing was absolutely sure till we were actually on the other side of the river, and, pending that event, I was in a continual state of worry and restlessness.
When we had been nine days at Guaraiké, as that part of Gallegos is called by the Indians, Isidoro suggested, in view of the late rapid fall of the water, that we should go to another pass, some forty miles further up the river, which he thought might perhaps be fordable before the one we were now at.
Any change was welcome to me; I had got to know and grow weary of every line, every curve of the country, every stone almost, round our present camp, and leaving them seemed a step towards crossing the river. It was, therefore, with a comparatively light heart that I helped to drive up, pack, and saddle the horses, and soon we were off for the 'Paso del Medio,' or Middle Pass, as it is called.
As usual there was a boisterous wind blowing upon the plains, though far colder and sharper than any we had as yet experienced. In fact, the weather, instead of daily growing warmer, had been steadily becoming colder and colder, and of late snow-squalls had become of quite frequent occurrence.
Several hours' riding brought us to the Middle Pass. Before camping we rode down to inspect the state of the water. At Guaraiké we had been unable to approach the river itself, as all the land on our side had been flooded over; but here at one spot the river bent in towards the northern side of the valley, and flowed for some distance along a steep cliff, which, of course, it could not overflow, and we were thus enabled to go down to its very brink, which was in so far satisfactory as it enabled us to gauge with more exactness the rise or fall of the flood.
I drove a stake into the bank, and notched it at the water's level, and then we went back to a bush we selected for camping under. It was rather a small one, and, being upon the plain, was exposed to the full force of the wind. However, it was the most suitable place we could find, and with the aid of some drift-wood, quantities of which were lying along the banks of the river, we managed to build up a kind of one-walled hut, which formed a tolerable shelter against the wind. The latter, during the whole of my stay in Patagonia, blew almost uninterruptedly from the west, either more or less cold, according as it came from the north-west or south-west.
That evening we ate our last biscuit; our other provisions had already been exhausted, and henceforward we were reduced to a regimen of guanaco and ostrich-meat, pur et simple, without salt even, for our small stock of that necessary, notwithstanding careful nursing, had also gradually thinned away. At first the results of this exclusively meat diet were very unpleasant. However much I would eat at a meal—and the quantity of meat I consumed at times was incredible—half an hour afterwards I would feel as famished as if I had touched nothing for days; in fact, I seemed to derive no nourishment at all from my food. As time went on, however, I got more used to the change, and soon ceased to experience so phenomenal and troublesome an appetite, though, of course, I grew very weak, and had it not been for the ostriches' eggs we occasionally found, and which kept up my stamina a little, I should not have had sufficient strength to support me through the exertions I was subsequently called upon to make.
It became quite an important event when, as now and then happened, we managed to kill a puma, as we were then enabled to indulge in fat meat. On these occasions, I remember, I used to feel rather disgusted at the voracity with which we all used to gorge ourselves on the fat, without biscuit, salt, or any other condiment. But when one passes days and days, eating nothing but the leanest and most tasteless of meat, and more especially in cold weather, one feels a hankering for fat, as strong as the habitual drunkard's craving for alcohol.
The day after our arrival at the Paso del Medio, the waters commenced to retire at a rapid pace, and such improvement shortly took place in the state of things, that we quite looked forward to being able to cross in three or four days.
The water had disappeared everywhere except in close vicinity to the river, which still looked of formidable breadth, however, though its banks were for the most part uncovered. We had had several sharp frosts, and the weather had continued bitterly cold, to which fortunate circumstance we attributed the corresponding speedy abatement in the water. But now came two successive days of warm sunshine, and, though the water still continued to fall, Isidoro grew apprehensive of a fresh thaw taking place in the Cordilleras, before the effects of the first flood had subsided sufficiently to allow of our passing the river.
This new danger threatening us gave me extreme uneasiness. I had already observed how sensitive the river was to the state of the temperature, its fall varying in measure as the weather, in the preceding one or two days, had been more or less cold, and I therefore looked doubtfully forward to the morrow for the effects of the before-mentioned comparatively warm days.
Our apprehensions were unfortunately but too well founded. The next day I had no need to go down to examine the notch on the stake, to find out whether the river had fallen or risen. Without leaving our camp, which was at some distance from the valley, one could see but too plainly that a fresh flood had taken place during the night. The banks of the river had disappeared, and half the valley was under water again. Thus one night had undone all the progress of several days, and our chances of crossing the river had become as problematical as they had been ten days ago.
This was a heavy, disheartening blow to me. Now it was indeed difficult to foresee when we might be able to pass. Any attempt at calculating the event was gratuitous in the face of what had just happened. The water might rise and fall in the same manner a dozen times. The unusual fall of snow that winter might entail, and had in fact already entailed, unusual consequences. We might be kept waiting for weeks, and months even, during which my friends would be kept in a state of great anxiety and suspense as to my fate; and, apart from these considerations, now that the charm of novelty had worn off, the life of hardship and isolation I was leading had become extremely distasteful to me; a deep ennui fell upon me, which I could not shake off, and which the society of my companions was not calculated to dissipate. I impatiently longed for those refinements and associations of civilisation, from which, at the outset of my trip, I had thought it pleasant to escape.
Under the influence of all these feelings I resolved to attempt to swim the river. On the first day of our arrival at Guaraiké I had seriously entertained this plan, but I had then rejected it as being attended with considerable danger, and also because I had hoped that in a few days the river might be fordable. The danger was now, of course, still greater; but the prospect of an indefinite prolongation of my present unbearable position was so terrible that I felt ready for any enterprise, however risky, which might free me from it.
Guillaume, to whom I communicated my intentions, thought my idea was practicable, and declared himself ready to accompany me whenever I chose. He, too, was anxious to get to Sandy Point for several reasons, of which the chief one was that he had no tobacco left, and life without it, he seemed to think, was not worth living.
It was now the 18th October, and if we crossed the river by the 26th we had plenty of time to get to Sandy Point by the 1st November, on or about which day the next steamer passed for Buenos Ayres. We therefore deferred the carrying out of our plans for a few days, in order to await a fresh fall in the water.
I felt much more tranquil now that I had made up my mind to take the bull by the horns, and my companions were surprised at the sudden change of my spirits, which henceforward were more cheerful and buoyant than they had been for a long time.