Later In The
Season, As The Water Dried Up, They Would Go Elsewhere.
They came in
flocks and were then greatly esteemed as a table-bird, especially by
my father, but we could only have them when one of my elder brothers,
who was the sportsman of the family, went out to shoot them.
As a very
small boy I was not allowed to use a gun, but as I had been taught to
throw the _bolas_ by the little native boys I sometimes associated
with, I thought I might be able to procure a few of the birds with it.
The _bolas_, used for such an object, is a string a couple of yards
long, made from fine threads cut from a colt's hide, twisted or
braided, and a leaden ball at each end, one being the size of a hen's
egg, the other less than half the size. The small ball is held in the
hand, the other swung round three or four times and the _bolas_ then
launched at the animal or bird one wishes to capture.
I spent many hours on several consecutive days following the flocks
about on my pony, hurling the _bolas_ at them without bringing down
more than one bird. My proceedings were no doubt watched with
amusement by the people of the estancia house, who were often sitting
out of doors at the everlasting mate-drinking; and perhaps Don
Anastacio did not like it, as he was, I imagine, something of a St.
Francis with regard to the lower animals. He certainly loved his
abominable pigs. At all events on the last day of my vain efforts to
procure golden plover, a big, bearded gaucho, with hat stuck on the
back of his head, rode forth from the house on a large horse, and was
passing at a distance of about fifty yards when he all at once
stopped, and turning came at a gallop to within a few feet of me and
shouted in a loud voice: "Why do you come here, English boy,
frightening and chasing away God's little birds? Don't you know that
they do no harm to any one, and it is wrong to hurt them?" And with
that he galloped off.
I was angry at being rebuked by an ignorant ruffianly gaucho, who like
most of his kind would tell lies, gamble, cheat, fight, steal, and do
other naughty things without a qualm. Besides, it struck me as funny
to hear the golden plover, which I wanted for the table, called "God's
little birds," just as if they were wrens or swallows or humming-
birds, or the darling little many-coloured kinglet of the bulrush
beds. But I was ashamed, too, and gave up the chase.
The nearest of the moist green low-lying spots I have described as
lying south of us, between our house and Canada Seca, was not more
than twenty minutes' walk from the gate. It was a flat, oval-shaped
area of about fifty acres, and kept its vivid green colour and
freshness when in January the surrounding land was all of a rusty
brown colour. It was to us a delightful spot to run about and play on,
and though the golden plover did not come there it was haunted during
the summer by small flocks of the pretty buff-coloured sandpiper, a
sandpiper with the habits of a plover, one, too, which breeds in the
arctic regions and spends half the year in southern South America.
This green area would become flooded after heavy rains. It was then
like a vast lake to us, although the water was not more than about
three feet deep, and at such times it was infested with the big
venomous toad-like creature called _escuerzo_ in the vernacular, which
simply means toad, but naturalists have placed it in quite a different
family of the batrachians and call it _Ceratophrys ornata_ It is toad-
like in form but more lumpish, with a bigger head; it is big as a
man's fist, of a vivid green with black symmetrical markings on its
back, and primrose-yellow beneath. A dreadful looking creature, a toad
that preys on the real or common toads, swallowing them alive just as
the hamadryad swallows other serpents, venomous or not, and as the
Cribo of Martinique, a big non-venomous serpent, kills and swallows
the deadly fer-de-lance.
In summer we had no fear of this creature, as it buries itself in the
soil and aestivates during the hot, dry season, and comes forth in wet
weather. I never knew any spot where these creatures were more
abundant than in that winter lake of ours, and at night in the flooded
time we used to lie awake listening to their concerts. The
_Ceratophrys_ croaks when angry, and as it is the most truculent
of all batrachians it works itself into a rage if you go near it. Its
first efforts at chanting or singing sounds like the deep, harsh,
anger-croak prolonged, but as the time goes on they gradually acquire,
night by night, a less raucous and a louder, more sustained and far-
reaching sound. There was always very great variety in the tones; and
while some continued deep and harsh - the harshest sound in nature -
others were clearer and not unmusical; and in a large number there
were always a few in the scattered choir that out-soared all the
others in high, long-drawn notes, almost organ-like in quality.
Listening to their varied performance one night as we lay in bed, my
sporting brother proposed that on the following morning we should drag
one of the cattle-troughs to the lake to launch it and go on a voyage
in quest of these dangerous, hateful creatures and slay them with our
javelins. It was not an impossible scheme, since the creatures were to
be seen at this season swimming or floating on the surface, and in our
boat or canoe we should also detect them as they moved about over the
green sward at the bottom.
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