INDIAN TOLDO
CHAPTER VI
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE TEHUELCHES
Indian method of curing measles—Driving out the devil—Magellan—Patagon—Long boots—Reports of travellers—One of the finest races in the world—Nomadic—Hunters—Decreasing in numbers—Introduction of horses—Bolas—No history—Keen bargainers but not progressive—Features—Good teeth—Women—Morality—Young and old women—Half-bloods—Paisanos—Reserved in character—Habits—Infants' heads bandaged—Dance—Wives bought—Price of a wife—Marriage ceremony—White man in toldos—Bad influence—Connections of white men and Tehuelche women—Dress and adornment of women—Work—Lazy race—High wages—Ceremonies and customs—Religion—Gualicho—Fear of Cordillera—Fat hunger—Tehuelche lives on horseback—Esquimaux and Tehuelche—Primitive peoples and their habits—Food—Tobacco—Pipes—Language—Tribal government—Physical strength—Decreasing numbers—Men of silence and men of uproar—Courtesy of a Tehuelche.
Snow lay in the hollows so deep that only the lean crests of the higher bushes could thrust themselves through its surface. The wind, which had driven the snowstorm of the morning away to the east, swept drearily down out of an evening sky where neither sun nor sunset hues were to be seen, nothing but a spread of cold and misty grey, growing slowly overshadowed by the looming promise of more snow.
In the middle of the level white pampa two figures upon galloping horses were visible. As we came nearer we saw that one was that of a man clothed in a chiripa and a capa in which brown was the predominating colour. He was mounted on a heavy-necked powerful cebruno horse, his stirrups were of silver, and his gear of raw-hide seemed smart and good. As he rode he yelled with all his strength, producing a series of the most horrible and piercing shrieks.
But strange as was this wild figure, his companion, victim or quarry, was stranger and more striking still. For on an ancient zaino sat perched a little brown maiden, whose aspect was forlorn and pathetic to the last degree. She rode absolutely naked in the teeth of the bitter cold, her breast, face and limbs blotched and smeared with the rash of some eruptive disease, and her heavy-lidded eyes, strained and open, staring ahead across the leagues of empty snow-patched plain.
Presently the man redoubled his howls, and bearing down upon the zaino flogged and frightened it into yet greater speed. The whole scene might have been mistaken for some ancient barbaric and revolting form of punishment; whereas, in real truth, it was an anxious Indian father trying, according to his lights, to cure his daughter of the measles!
It appeared that the girl had taken the disease in an extremely acute form, and Indian belief and reasoning run something on these lines:
First fact—The child was possessed by a devil of great power and ferocity, who set up such a trouble inside her body that it came forth through her skin in blotches and spots.
Second fact—A devil is known to dislike noise and cold. All devils do. Hence the ride of the unlucky patient without a shred to protect her from the strong west wind snow-fed with bitter cold, and the almost incredible uproar made by the old gentleman upon the dark brown horse.