“My meditations and observations were shortly interrupted by preparations for a meal. The chiefs better-half—or rather fifth-part, for he had four wives—superintended the culinary operations, which were as rude and simple as the hut where they were carried on. And now my fancy began to conjure up visions of the beef, fowls, and eggs, the promise of which had lured my men from the boat, had proved stronger than suggestions of prudence, and had made me a prisoner. But these dainties, if they existed anywhere within the chief’s jurisdiction, were just at present reserved.
“The old hag threw down from the top of one of the stakes that supported the tent the quarter of some animal, whether dog or guanaco was past imagining. She slashed right and left with an old copper knife with might and main, till it was divided into several pieces. Then taking a number of crotched sticks about two feet long, and sharpened at the points, she inserted the forked ends into pieces of the meat, and drove the opposite points into the ground near the fire, which, though sufficient to smoke and comfortably warm the mess, was too feeble to roast it. At all events, time was too precious, or their unsophisticated appetites were too craving, to wait for such an operation, and the raw morsels were quickly snatched from the smoke, torn into bits by their dirty hands, and thrown upon the ground before us.
“The Indians seized them with avidity, and tossed a bit to me; but what could I do with it? I should have no appetite for the dinner of an alderman at such a time and place, but as for tasting meat that came in such a questionable shape, there was no bringing my teeth or resolution to it. While eyeing it with ill-suppressed disgust, I observed the savages, like a horde of half-starved dogs, devouring their portions with the greatest relish, seizing the fragment with their fine white teeth, giving every sign of enjoyment, except what one is accustomed to see in human beings.
“The old chief remarked the slight I was putting upon his hospitality. ‘Why don’t you eat, man? This meat very good to eat—very good to eat. Eat, man, eat.’
“Seeing him so much excited, and not knowing what deeds might follow his words if I refused, I thought it expedient to try to ‘eat what was set before me, asking no questions,’—thinking, moreover, that if there were any evil spirit in it that the fire had failed to expel, it could not possibly have resisted the smoke. So, being sorely divided between aversion to the strange flesh and fear of showing it, I forced a morsel into my mouth. Its taste was by no means as offensive as its appearance, and I swallowed it with less disgust than I had feared. This was my first meal with the savages, and a sample of many others, though better viands afterward varied their monotony now and then.”
It is most probable that the meat which was so rapidly cooked and eaten was that of the guanaco. The Patagonians are in no way fastidious as to their diet, and eat almost every animal which they kill, whether it be guanaco, rhea, or cavy. They have a repugnance to the flesh of dogs, though they cannot, like the Fuegians, be accused of eating the flesh of human beings rather than that of dogs.
Their chief dainty is the flesh of a young mare, and it is rather curious that these strange people will not, if they can help themselves, eat that of a horse, unless it be disabled by an accident. They are fond of the fat of mares and rheas, separating it from the flesh by boiling, and pouring it into bladders, much as lard is treated in this country. Yet the fat obtained from the guanaco is not stored like that of the mare and rhea, but is eaten raw. As is the case with the Fuegians, the Patagonians obtain a considerable amount of food from the seashore, great quantities of limpets, mussels, and similar creatures being gathered by the women and children.
Besides animal food, vegetables are consumed, though rather sparingly, by the Patagonians. Two roots form part of their ordinary diet. One is called “tus,” and looks something like a yam or potato. It is bulbous, and when cleaned and properly cooked bears a strong resemblance to a baked potato. The second root is called “chalas,” and is a long, slender root, scarcely so thick as an ordinary pencil.
It is rather remarkable that the Patagonians do not seem to have invented any intoxicating drink. They soon learn to appreciate rum and other spirits, and will intoxicate themselves whenever they can procure the means, but they obtain all fermented and distilled liquors from the white traders, and not from their own manufacture. They have a sort of cooling drink made of the juice of barberries mixed with water, but it is drunk in its natural state, and is not fermented.
The dwellings of the Patagonians are worthy of a brief description, inasmuch as they show the distinction between the Patagonian and Fuegian ideas of architecture. The reader will remember that the principal portion of the Fuegian hut consists of sticks and branches, whereas the Patagonian only uses the sticks and poles by way of a framework whereupon he can spread his tent of skins.