We lay motionless for about half an hour, when I rose to take off my pack, and in so doing perceived a column of smoke, not far, at least to all appearance, from where we were. My shout of joyful surprise brought Guillaume to his feet, and we both examined it for some time, half doubting our own eyes, and fearful lest every moment it should prove a delusion. Nor were our feelings of pleasure wholly unmitigated by certain apprehensions that it might be some old fire that had been lit two or three days ago, and which was now burning up again. Guillaume told me that he had known fires to smoulder on in grassy glens for weeks together. It might be but an hour old, and yet those who had made it were, perhaps, already miles away in some direction, far from the path we must follow; and we could not signal our own whereabouts, as the country we were then crossing was bare of grass and bushes. Our doubts, however, were speedily set at rest. Even as we watched the first column with eager eyes, another rose up not far from it, and another still, and then we knew that the fires were being made by Indians, who were hunting on the plains. A little to the left of the smoke was a place called the 'Campo de Batalla,' where the Indians always camp when in that neighbourhood, and to it we accordingly directed our steps, as we were almost certain to find them there. The vicinity of human beings gave us new strength. All fatigue disappeared as if by magic; the hills, hitherto so formidable, seemed to shrink into pigmy mounds; my pack became light as a feather, and the rags round my feet seemed suddenly to possess the virtues of the famed seven-mile boots. Not only should we be able to get horses from the Indians, but, as they must have recently left the settlement, they would have plenty of tobacco, maté, sugar, and biscuit, with the thought of which I charmed away any relapse into exhaustion, which, as hill followed hill in endless succession, now and again threatened to overcome me. At last, about four o'clock, we descended into a valley, a sudden turn of which brought us in full view of the Indian encampment. My heart bounded at the sight of the tents, amongst which I could descry dark human figures in long robes moving slowly to and fro; hundreds of horses were grazing in the valley, whilst the yelping of the swarms of curs that infest the Indian camps fell on my ears like pleasant music.
The Indians were just returning from the chase, and were pouring down from the plains on all sides. They soon perceived us, and presently fifty or more horsemen came flying towards us at full gallop. In another moment we were surrounded by a chattering, laughing, gesticulating crowd, who escorted us towards the camp in triumph. One of their number, who could speak a little Spanish, asked us a thousand questions, the answers to which he translated for the benefit of the others, to whom every item of information seemed to furnish an excuse for the most unbounded merriment; they would all giggle and laugh, though what I had to say to them did not contain anything extraordinarily funny, at least as far as my perception of the humorous goes.
When we reached the camp, we were surrounded by another crowd of Indians, as eagerly curious as the first comers to know where we came from, what we had done with our horses, and where we were going to—in fact, all particulars as to our situation. As soon as one group left, another arrived; and in this manner we ran the gauntlet of the whole of the camp, everyone apparently deeming it incumbent on him to come and have a good stare and grin at us.
Having satisfied their curiosity, we felt ourselves at liberty to consult our own comfort; and Guillaume having discovered the whereabouts of the tent of a cacique of the name of Orkeke, with whom he was on intimate terms, we directed our steps towards it. Orkeke himself, we found, had not as yet returned from the chase; but his wife, an immensely fat and good-humoured-looking old squaw, accosted us in some friendly gutturals, of which the evident purport was that we were to make ourselves at home—an intimation on which we speedily acted. With a deep sigh of relief, I divested myself of the pack under whose weight I had trudged for so many a weary mile, and, stretching myself out on the ground, I inwardly congratulated myself that the unpleasant episode of our foot-pilgrimage was fortunately a thing of the past.
We had now, for the first time since we had seen the smoke, leisure to muse over our providential delivery from the serious danger that had threatened us—a danger whose full magnitude only became apparent now that we had no longer to fear it. But these thoughts did not occupy us long; very soon Orkeke arrived, heavily laden with the spoils of the chase. He seemed very pleased to see us, and greeted us affably in broken Spanish. To the story of our mishaps he listened with great interest, and when I told him that I had not taken maté or smoked for several weeks, he showed particular concern, and immediately produced a pipe and tobacco, and bade me smoke, at the same time telling his wife to prepare maté, remarking very justly, 'No fumar, no tomar maté; muy malo!' Smokers will feel with me when I say that my hand trembled whilst filling my pipe, and that, having lit it, I sat for a few minutes in a state of semi-ecstasy, enveloped in a fragrant cloud of the long-missed soul-soother. The maté, too, seemed delicious; and as a great treat, from a bag which contained similar treasures, Orkeke brought forth a musty biscuit, which he broke into three pieces, solemnly handing a share to Guillaume and me. The biscuit was coarse and black and hard, no doubt, but it melted away on my lips like a meringue, nor did I allow one crumb of it to be lost.
Orkeke was an admirable specimen of the Tehuelche race. He was tall and well proportioned, and, notwithstanding his great age, extremely vigorous and agile. His long grey hair and the benign expression of his face gave him the look of a venerable patriarch—a character which he rather affected to maintain. He was careful to inform me, at an early stage of our acquaintance, that he never got drunk, like the other Indians; that he never told a lie; and that his father had been converted to Christianity—a circumstance which he evidently considered to reflect in some way meritoriously on himself. On my asking him why he had not followed his father's example and become a Christian too, after a long pause he answered rather vaguely, "Quien sabe." I did not press the question any further, as the Indians who speak Spanish always make use of this expression when puzzled, or when they do not care to give a direct reply, and if once they proffer it as an answer, it is perfectly useless to attempt to elicit anything more explicit from them.
Orkeke told me that he remembered perfectly well having paid a visit to St. Julian, as a boy, when the Spanish colonists of Viedma were yet there. If that were true—and I have no reason to doubt his word—his age was now at least ninety-six or ninety-seven, and, judging by his looks, I thought he might easily live twenty or thirty years longer. His movements were as easy and as free from effort as those of a young man. Indeed, I should imagine few climates are healthier or more favourable to longevity than that of Patagonia; its crisp, dry air has a peculiarly beneficent effect both on mind and body, and under its influence one experiences a buoyancy of spirits, and a general well-being, which are quite astonishing.
Orkeke spoke Spanish with tolerable fluency, and I was able to have a long conversation with him on various topics, during which I gleaned some interesting information about the customs and thoughts of the Indians.
The tribe I was now amongst was more numerous than that of the Northern Tehuelches, but it seemed to me that they were, on the average, slightly inferior in physique to the Northerners, and certainly there were not so many pretty squaws among them as among the latter. Otherwise there was no marked distinction between them. The camp consisted of twelve tents, containing in all from four to five hundred souls. The whole tribe, I found, had just been paying their annual visit to Sandy Point, to receive the rations of sugar, biscuit, maté, and tobacco, which the Chilian Government accords them. These visits generally cost them rather dear, as the inhabitants of the colony, on these occasions, make a rich harvest of furs and feathers, with which, under the influence of aguadiente, the Indians are then extremely prodigal.
I made Orkeke promise to get me two horses the next morning, in order that we might immediately continue our journey, and having eaten a hearty supper, I went to sleep on a couch of furs, which Mrs. Orkeke had prepared for me, and, notwithstanding the incessant squalling of babies in various parts of the tent, I managed to pass a tolerable night.