Though
Growing To The Length Of Three And Four Feet, It Has Only Rudimentary
Eyes, And Is, In Consequence, Quite Blind; It Is Also Unable To Swim.
The Savage Prods In The Mud With A Long Notched Lance, Sometimes For
Hours, Until He Sticks The Appetizing Fish.
The steamy waters are so covered with aquatic plants that in some
places I have been able to walk across a living bridge.
Once, when
out hunting, I came upon a beautiful forest glade, covered with a
carpet of green. Thinking it a likely place for deer, I entered, when
lo, I sank in a fotid lake of slime. Throwing my gun on to the bank,
I had quite a difficulty to regain dry land.
In my journeyings here and there I employed one or another of the
braves to accompany me. All they could eat and some little present
was the pay. No sooner was the gift in their hand, however, after
supper, than they would put it back in mine and say, "Give me some
more food?" I was at first accompanied by Yantiwau (The Wolf Rider).
Armed with a bow and arrows, he was a good hunter for me, and a
faithful servant, but his custom of spitting on my knife and spoon to
clean them I did not like. When my supplies were getting low, and I
went to the river for a wash, he would say: "There's no
kiltanithliacack (soap) - only clupup (sand)." Yantiwau was
interested in pictures; he would gaze with wondering eyes at photos,
or views of other lands, but he looked at them the wrong side up,
as they all invariably do. While possessed of a profound respect for
me in some ways, he thought me very lacking in common knowledge.
While I was unable to procure game, through not seeing any, he could
call the bird to him in a "ducky, ducky, come and be killed" kind of
way; and my tongue was parched when he would scent water. This was
sometimes very easy to smell, however, for it was almost impossible
to drink out of a waterhole without holding the nose and straining
the liquid through my closed teeth. Chaco water at best is very
brackish, and on drying off the ground a white coat of salt is left.
My Indian's first and last thought was of his stomach. While capable
of passing two or three days without eating, and feeling no pangs of
hunger, yet, when food was to hand, he gorged himself, and could put
away an incredible amount. Truly, his make-up was a constant wonder
to me. Riding through the "hungry belt" I would be famishing, but to
my question: "Are you hungry?" he would answer, "No." After a
toilsome journey, and no supper at the end: "Would you like to eat?"
"No." But let an ostrich or a deer come in sight, and he could not
live another minute without food! Another proof to Yantiwau of my
incapacity was the fact that when my matches were all used I could
not light the fire.
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