United States or Guam ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Saint Anthony seems to be useful on many occasions of distress. One evening I called at a rancho made of dry thistle-stalks bound together with hide and thatched with reeds, Finding the inmates very hospitable, I stayed there two or three hours to rest. Coming out of the house again, I found to my dismay that during our animated gossip my horse had broken loose and left me.
Numbers of smaller birds, as ducks, hawks, and partridges, were killed. I saw one of the latter with a black mark on its back, as if it had been struck with a paving-stone. A fence of thistle-stalks round the hovel was nearly broken down, and my informer, putting his head out to see what was the matter, received a severe cut, and now wore a bandage.
Numbers of smaller birds, as ducks, hawks, and partridges, were killed. I saw one of the latter with a black mark on its back, as if it had been struck with a paving-stone. A fence of thistle-stalks round the hovel was nearly broken down, and my informer, putting his head out to see what was the matter, received a severe cut, and now wore a bandage.
I call these thistle-stalks for the want of a more correct name. I believe it is a species of Eryngium. Travels in Africa, p. 233. Two species of Tinamus and Eudromia elegans of A. d'Orbigny, which can only be called a partridge with regard to its habits. History of the Abipones, vol. ii. p. 6. Falconer's Patagonia, p. 70. Fauna Boreali-Americana, vol. i. p. 35. See Mr.
Probably it is a long-lived, and certainly it is a very hardy animal. Where it has any green substance to eat it never drinks water; but after a long summer drought, when for months it has subsisted on bits of dried thistle-stalks and old withered grass, if a shower falls it will come out of its burrows even at noonday and drink eagerly from the pools.
The hovel was here remarkably neat, the posts and rafters being made of about a dozen dry thistle-stalks bound together with thongs of hide; and by the support of these Ionic-like columns, the roof and sides were thatched with reeds.
The hovel was here remarkably neat, the posts and rafters being made of about a dozen dry thistle-stalks bound together with thongs of hide; and by the support of these Ionic-like columns, the roof and sides were thatched with reeds.
In grassy plains unoccupied by the larger ruminating quadrupeds, it seems necessary to remove the superfluous vegetation by fire, so as to render the new year's growth serviceable. The rancho at this place did not boast even of a roof, but merely consisted of a ring of thistle-stalks, to break the force of the wind.
With these and grass he will make a fire and cook the meat he carries hanging behind him on the saddle. I have known an animal killed and the meat cooked with its own bones, but this is not usual. Dry bones burn better, and thistle-stalks better still. He will then lie down on mother earth with the horse-cloth under him and the saddle for a pillow.
The whole party here, however, escaped, together with the troop of horses; each one taking a line for himself, and driving with him as many animals as he was able to manage. The little hovel, built of thistle-stalks, in which they slept, neither kept out the wind nor rain; indeed in the latter case the only effect the roof had, was to condense it into larger drops.
Word Of The Day