Her own
tribe on the mother's side; and they formed an exquisite picture as
one often saw them, standing by the Senora's chair with their arms
round each other's necks - the pretty dark-skinned child and the
beautiful white child with shining hair and blue forget-me-not eyes.
Adelina was her father's favourite, but he was fond of all his people,
the black servants included, and they of him, and the life at Casa
Antigua appeared to be an exceedingly happy and harmonious one.
Looking back at this distance of time it strikes me when I come to
think of it, that it was a most extraordinary _menage_, a collection
of the most incongruous beings it would be possible to bring together
- a sort of Happy Family in the zoological sense. It did not seem so
at the time, when in any house on the wide pampas one would meet with
people whose lives and characters would be regarded in civilized
countries as exceedingly odd and almost incredible.
It was a red-letter day to us children when, about once a month, we
were packed into a trap and driven with our parents to spend a day at
Casa Antigua.
