"That is true; they call him, in Buenos Aires, Pigacha, but his real name among his own people is the Venado; he is blind of the right eye. I hope that is sufficient description," I added.
"I believe so," answered he; "and I promise you if I meet him I shall recognise him. But here we are."
In fact, at twenty paces before me appeared a rancho, the complete outline of which the first shades of night prevented me from making out, but the sight of which, after a fatiguing day, and especially after the wild life to which I had been so long condemned, rejoiced my heart in giving rise to the hope of that frank and cordial hospitality which is never refused in the pampa.
Already the dogs hailed our arrival with their deafening bark, and leaped furiously around our horses. We were obliged to give them a taste of the whip, and soon our horses stopped before the entrance to the rancho, where a man was standing with a lighted torch in one hand, and a gun in the other. This man was tall, with bold features, and a bronzed complexion lit up by the ruddy reflection of the torch which he held above his head gave me a good idea, with his athletic form and wild appearance, of the true gaucho of the pampas. On perceiving my companion, he bowed deferentially.
"I hail you, most pure Mary," he said.
"Conceived without sin."
"Can we enter, Don Torribio?"
"Enter, Señor Don Zeno Cabral; this house and all it contains belongs to you."
We dismounted without asking anything further, and after a young man of eighteen or twenty, half-naked, who had run out at the call of his master or father—I did not get to know which—had taken the bridle of our horses and had led them away, we entered, followed by the dogs who had so noisily announced our arrival, and who, instead of being hostile to us, leaped around us with signs of pleasure.
This habitation, like all those of the gauchos, was a hut of earth intermingled with reeds, covered with straw; constructed, in fact, with all the primitive simplicity of the desert.