“We always swim our horses across,” said Hinchcliff’s companion; “but if we have cattle with us, it is safer to go a little out of our way to this ford. Why, good Lord! only last year one of our men was killed—cut nearly in halves, if the señor will believe me—through a bull hanging back on the bank after his horse had started to swim. The horse took fright, 322 and backed so that the man got the lasso drawn round him and—Bah!”
Cattle and horses plunged into the water and all landed safely on the other side without more ado, except the horse that carried the two men. Whether it was that he was less used to the water, or was merely restive at the unaccustomed weight, it was impossible to say; but, when he was about a fifth of the way across, he stopped and began to kick; and the Englishman, with the gruesome story of the man who was sawn through by a lasso still in his mind, felt that he was in no enviable position.
“Sit tight, Señor,” shouted the Indian, putting the bridle into his hand and jumping down so suddenly, that Hinchcliff had barely time to clutch at the saddle and steady himself.
“Keep his head straight; don’t let him jib.” Then water began to splash liberally in the face of the disobedient horse, which immediately plunged forward, stopping whenever the splashing ceased. The Englishman could not refrain from throwing an inquiring glance over his shoulder, and then he was very much tempted to burst out laughing; for the Indian, up to his shoulders in water, was grasping the animal’s tail with one hand, and beating the water into his face with the other. And so, with much patience, horse and rider and helmsman landed on the other bank.
The town, its inhabitants and their actions, were very much what Hinchcliff had seen in Brazil and the Argentine; very orderly and simple and not too cleanly. The people refused to take any money for 323 their hospitality, and it was only with difficulty that he persuaded the chief, on bidding him good-bye the next day, to accept a small sum to hold in trust for any one of his subjects who might happen to be in want. The truth is, that where they have not been demoralised by white people, savage tribes are usually simple enough in their habits; none of them is ever in want, and poverty, as understood in civilised countries, is almost unknown. A man works (or, more properly speaking, makes his wife work) not for a fixed sum, but for the necessaries of life merely; and the Indian tribes, whether of North or South, have little of the insatiable cupidity of the Asiatic or the negro.
After a night in the village, Hinchcliff set out to find his way back to the river by a different route, avoiding the woods and endeavouring to follow a faintly-marked horse-track over the grassy hills. This procedure nearly led him into a difficulty far more serious than that of losing his way in a luxuriant forest, for he missed his road and got on to one where there was no sign of a stream, and where the pools had nothing but dry mud to offer him, so that he went all the afternoon and night without tasting a drop of water. He woke before daybreak, almost delirious, and set off at the best pace he could contrive for some low-lying land, which he had failed to notice overnight.
All at once a strongly built Indian started up from the ground fifty yards in front of him, and, after one look at him, began to flee down the hill.
“Stop! I want you; I want water,” shouted Hinchcliff.
The fleeing figure turned its head as though straining to catch the words, but still ran on. Then the thirsting man grew desperate, and, determined to make the man help him to find water, raised his gun and pretended to take aim at him. Immediately the fugitive stopped.