During the operations with the Brazilian, the horses had been let out of the corral to feed, and now were being held back en pastoreo, as it is called in Uruguay, that is to say, watched at a little distance by mounted men. Nothing remained but to drive out of the corral the horses bought from the Brazilian, and let them join the larger herd. Out they came like a string of wild geese, neighing and looking round, and then instinctively made towards the others that were feeding, and were swallowed up amongst them. Slowly we rode towards the herd, sending on several well-mounted men upon its flanks, and with precaution—for of all living animals tame horses most easily take fright upon the march and separate—we got them into motion, on a well-marked trail that led towards the gate of Bopicuá.
At first they moved a little sullenly, and as if surprised. Then the contagion of emotion that spreads so rapidly amongst animals upon the march seemed to inspire them, and the whole herd broke into a light trot. That is the moment that a stampede may happen, and accordingly we pulled our horses to a walk, whilst the men riding on the flanks forged slowly to the front, ready for anything that might occur. Gradually the trot slowed down, and we saw as it were a sea of manes and tails in front of us, emerging from a cloud of dust, from which shrill neighings and loud snortings rose. They reached a hollow, in which were several pools, and stopped to drink, all crowding into the shallow water, where they stood pawing up the mud and drinking greedily. Time pressed, and as we knew that there was water in the pasture where they were to sleep, we drove them back upon the trail, the water dripping from their muzzles and their tails, and the black mud clinging to the hair upon their fetlocks, and in drops upon their backs. Again they broke into a trot, but this time, as they had got into control, we did not check them, for there was still a mile to reach the gate.
Passing some smaller mud-holes, the body of a horse lay near to one of them, horribly swollen, and with its stiff legs hoisted a little in the air by the distension of its flanks. The passing horses edged away from it in terror, and a young roan snorted and darted like an arrow from the herd. Quick as was the dart he made, quicker still El Correntino wheeled his horse on its hind legs and rushed to turn him back. With his whip whirling round his head he rode to head the truant, who, with tail floating in the air, had got a start of him of about fifty yards. We pressed instinctively upon the horses; but not so closely as to frighten them, though still enough to be able to stop another of them from cutting out. The Correntino on a half-tamed grey, which he rode with a raw-hide thong bound round its lower jaw, for it was still unbitted, swaying with every movement in his saddle, which he hardly seemed to grip, so perfect was his balance, rode at a slight angle to the runaway and gained at every stride. His hat blew back and kept in place by a black ribbon underneath his chin, framed his head like an aureole. The red silk handkerchief tied loosely round his neck fluttered beneath it, and as he dashed along, his lazo coiled upon his horse’s croup, rising and falling with each bound, his eyes fixed on the flying roan, he might have served a sculptor as the model for a centaur, so much did he and the wild colt he rode seem indivisible.
In a few seconds, which to us seemed minutes, for we feared the infection might have spread to the whole “caballada,” the Correntino headed and turned the roan, who came back at three-quarter speed, craning his neck out first to one side, then to the other, as if he still thought that a way lay open for escape.
By this time we had reached the gates of Bopicuá, and still seven miles lay between us and our camping-ground, with a fast-declining sun. As the horses passed the gate we counted them, an operation of some difficulty when time presses and the count is large. Nothing is easier than to miss animals, that is to say, for Europeans, however practised, but the lynx-eyed gauchos never are at fault. “Where is the little brown horse with a white face, and a bit broken out of his near forefoot?” they will say, and ten to one that horse is missing, for what they do not know about the appearance of a horse would not fill many books. Only a drove road lay between Bopicuá and the great pasture, at whose faraway extremity the horses were to sleep. When the last animal had passed and the great gates swung to, the young law student rode up to my side, and, looking at the “great tropilla,” as he called it, said, “Morituri te salutant. This is the last time they will feed in Bopicuá.” We turned a moment, and the falling sun lit up the undulating plain, gilding the cottony tufts of the long grasses, falling upon the dark-green leaves of the low trees around Parodi’s camp, glinting across the belt of wood that fringed the Uruguay, and striking full upon a white estancia house in Entre-Rios, making it appear quite close at hand, although four leagues away.
Two or three hundred yards from the great gateway stood a little native hut, as unsophisticated, but for a telephone, as were the gaucho’s huts in Uruguay, as I remember them full thirty years ago. A wooden barrel on a sledge for bringing water had been left close to the door, at which the occupant sat drinking maté, tapping with a long knife upon his boot. Under a straw-thatched shelter stood a saddled horse, and a small boy upon a pony slowly drove up a flock of sheep. A blue, fine smoke that rose from a few smouldering logs and bones, blended so completely with the air that one was not quite sure if it was really smoke or the reflection of the distant Uruguay against the atmosphere.
Not far off lay the bones of a dead horse, with bits of hide adhering to them, shrivelled into mere parchment by the sun. All this I saw as in a camera-lucida, seated a little sideways on my horse, and thinking sadly that I, too, had looked my last on Bopicuá. It is not given to all men after a break of years to come back to the scenes of youth, and still find in them the same zest as of old. To return again to all the cares of life called civilised, with all its littlenesses, its newspapers all full of nothing, its sordid aims disguised under high-sounding nicknames, its hideous riches and its sordid poverty, its want of human sympathy, and, above all, its barbarous war brought on it by the folly of its rulers, was not just at that moment an alluring thought, as I felt the little “malacara” [201] that I rode twitching his bridle, striving to be off. When I had touched him with the spur he bounded forward and soon overtook the caballada, and the place which for so many months’ had been part of my life sank out of sight, just as an island in the Tropics fades from view as the ship leaves it, as it were, hull down.
When we had passed into the great enclosure of La Pileta, and still four or five miles remained to go, we pressed the caballada into a long trot, certain that the danger of a stampede was past. Wonderful and sad it was to ride behind so many horses, trampling knee-high through the wild grasses of the Camp, snorting and biting at each other, and all unconscious that they would never more career across the plains. Strange and affecting, too, to see how those who had known each other all kept together in the midst of the great herd, resenting all attempts of their companions to separate them.
A “tropilla” [202] that we had bought from a Frenchman called Leon, composed of five brown horses, had ranged itself around its bell mare, a fine chestnut, like a bodyguard. They fought off any of the other horses who came near her, and seemed to look at her both with affection and with pride.
Two little bright bay horses, with white legs and noses, that were brothers, and what in Uruguay are known as “seguidores,” that is, one followed the other wherever it might go, ran on the outskirts of the herd. When either of them stopped to eat, its companion turned its head and neighed to it, when it came galloping up. Arena, our head man, riding beside me on a skewbald, looked at them, and, after dashing forward to turn a runaway, wheeled round his horse almost in the air and stopped it in a bound, so suddenly that for an instant they stood poised like an equestrian statue, looked at the “seguidores,” and remarked, “Patron, I hope one shell will kill them both in the Great War if they have got to die.” I did not answer, except to curse the Boches with all the intensity the Spanish tongue commands. The young law-student added his testimony, and we rode on in silence.