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In those far-off days the idle, gay, well-dressed young gambler was always a girl's first and often most successful wooer, but at La Tapera the young lovers had to reckon with one who, incredible as it seemed in a gaucho, hated gambling and kept a hostile and rather terrifying eye on their approaches.
This was the estancia called La Tapera, with whose owner we also had friendly relations during all the years we lived in that district. The owner was Don Gregorio Gandara, a native, and like our nearest English neighbour, Mr. Royd, an enthusiast, and was also like him in being the husband of a fat indolent wife who kept parrots and other pet animals, and the father of two daughters.
The Periplus next passes without the Straits of Babelmandeb: on the African side, four principal marts are mentioned, to all of which the epithet of Tapera, is applied, signifying their position beyond the straits.
My latest recollections of La Tapera are concerned more with Demetria than the piebalds. She was not an elegant figure, as was natural in a daughter of the grotesque Don Gregorio, but her countenance, as I have said, was attractive on account of its colour and gentle wistful expression, and being the daughter of a man rich in horses she did not want for lovers.
La Tapera, a native estancia Don Gregorio Gandara His grotesque appearance and strange laugh Gandara's wife and her habits and pets My dislike of hairless dogs Gandara's daughters A pet ostrich In the peach orchard Gandara's herds of piebald brood mares His masterful temper His own saddle-horses Creating a sensation at gaucho gatherings The younger daughter's lovers Her marriage at our house The priest and the wedding breakfast Demetria forsaken by her husband.
In these circumstances the Gandara family could not go to the priest, but managed to persuade him to come to them, and as La Tapera was not considered a good enough place in which to hold so important a ceremony, my parents invited them to have the marriage in our house.
While in the room we dared not change glances or even smile; but after seeing and hearing the wonderful laugh a few times we would steal off and going to some quiet spot sit in a circle and start imitating it, finding it a very delightful pastime. After I had learnt to ride I used sometimes to go with my mother and sisters for an afternoon's visit to La Tapera.
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