In an instant the
Indians mounted their horses, and galloped out of sight. Another
attack was still more quickly repulsed. A cool Frenchman managed
the gun; he stopped till the Indians approached close, and then
raked their line with grape-shot: he thus laid thirty-nine of them
on the ground; and, of course, such a blow immediately routed the
whole party.
The town is indifferently called El Carmen or Patagones. It is
built on the face of a cliff which fronts the river, and many of
the houses are excavated even in the sandstone. The river is about
two or three hundred yards wide, and is deep and rapid. The many
islands, with their willow-trees, and the flat headlands, seen one
behind the other on the northern boundary of the broad green
valley, form, by the aid of a bright sun, a view almost
picturesque. The number of inhabitants does not exceed a few
hundreds. These Spanish colonies do not, like our British ones,
carry within themselves the elements of growth. Many Indians of
pure blood reside here: the tribe of the Cacique Lucanee constantly
have their Toldos on the outskirts of the town. (4/2. The hovels of
the Indians are thus called.) The local government partly supplies
them with provisions, by giving them all the old worn-out horses,
and they earn a little by making horse-rugs and other articles of
riding-gear.
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