Through the Heart of Patagonia

by H. Hesketh-Prichard

THE GERMANS

As I was returning unsuccessful, Burbury met me and told me that the Germans had again been giving him trouble. I was prepared for the news, as I had noticed they were inclined to shirk work of late, constantly lingering behind and in every way making themselves objectionable. On an expedition where there is naturally plenty of work for every one, it is useless to have men who growl at doing their fair proportion of it. They were also trying to influence the other Gauchos, for this trick of deserting at a critical time, when their services cannot be replaced, is a very old one with peones, who on such occasions can sometimes force their employers into giving them disproportionately high wages. I was, of course, resolved not to yield to their demands but to push forward, even if they left us. I consulted with Burbury, who agreed that we could manage without their help, though it would leave us awkwardly short-handed.

On arriving at the camp I asked the Germans the reason of their late behaviour, but they could give me no satisfactory answer, but burst into a tirade about an inoffensive companion, Barckhausen, which was obviously only an excuse to cover their real designs. I told them they must in future behave properly or else leave my camp next morning. After a certain amount of talk and bluster Fritz said that not only Hollesen and he but the Welsh peones would in that case turn back.

During the course of the evening I spoke to Jones, who informed me that Fritz had persuaded him to desert, but on my pointing out that this would not be a very wise proceeding, he at once threw in his lot with us.

In the morning, finding I was of the same mind, the Germans again informed me of their wish to turn back. I therefore gave them food to last them upon their journey to civilisation, as well as the worst buck-jumper of the troop, and told them to leave the camp as soon as possible. Fritz, after some further talk and after remarking to Hollesen in German that they had better have stayed after all, climbed on to the horse and rode away.

The Germans at the outset had been admirable workers, apart from their cunning, which tinged most of their conduct. Yet perhaps, if they had gone on with us, we might have paid for Hollesen's misdoings with the Indians, by getting into trouble with the tribe who had saved his life and whom he had so scurvily requited. As it happened, a few days later we came upon the very tribe with whom he had had to do.

I will now take some extracts from my diary:

"October 28.—The Germans left us this morning. I think we shall be all the better without them. Immediately on their departure I determined to march to the cañadon or valley of the River Senguerr, giving up the route suggested by the Indian, as it was likely that the horses would stray upon the pampa. It was necessary to decrease the weight of some of our cargo, which we at once set about doing. The reason for this was that, having so few men, each pair of us would have to look after six cargueros, or pack-horses, and we were consequently obliged to lessen their number.

"While we were getting ready a thin rain and a yelling wind came down the cañadon as we started to catch the horses. The salt marsh over which the Germans had gone lay behind us, and ahead were shallow lagoons around which the tussocks whistled in the wind. But I think we none of us noticed the inclemency of the weather, we were soaked to the skin as we worked, and in an hour and a half—a record as to time in cargoing up even with the aid of the men who had gone—we had loaded the last carguero of the twelve, and with extra ropes hanging to the saddles, a brandy bottle protruding from each of the pockets of Barckhausen and with Jones perched high and stirrupless upon a sack of beans, we set off."

Providentially, not a single cargo shifted, although we covered something like fourteen miles. I should have mentioned that one of the reasons which weighed with me in again seeking the cañadon of the River Senguerr was the fact that four of the horses had strayed in the night. It was our intention to camp as soon as we reached a suitable place in the valley and to scour the country for the lost horses. This, however, turned out not to be necessary, as we came right upon the truants grazing in the mouth of a small rift in the cliff of the cañadon. One of them cantered out with a neigh to meet the troop upon the hillside.