[Illustration: Indians at Azul]
Leaving the town, we now proceeded about two leagues across the Pampas
to Mr. Frer's estancia. He is a farmer, on a very extensive scale, and
possesses about 24,000 sheep and 500 horses, besides goodly herds of
cattle. The locusts have not visited this part of the country, and the
pastures are consequently in fine condition after the late rains,
while the sheep look proportionately well. We passed a large
_grasseria_, or place where sheep are killed at the rate of seven in a
minute, and are skinned, cut up, and boiled down for tallow in an
incredibly short space of time, the residue of the meat being used in
the furnace as fuel. Running about loose, outside, were four or five
curly-horned rams, between two of which a grand combat took place,
apparently conducted in strict accordance with the rules of fighting
etiquette. The two animals began by walking round and round, eyeing
each other carefully, and then retiring backwards a certain distance,
which might have been measured out for them, they stopped so exactly
simultaneously. Then, gazing steadfastly at one another for a few
moments, as if to take aim, they rushed forward with tremendous force,
dashing their foreheads together with a crash that might have been
heard a mile away.
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