Part 10 (1/2)

”Go and meet him. He dances and sings as a sign of friends.h.i.+p. You must do the same. Beckon him to me.”

The Captain himself was on a little island.

The scene that followed must have been comical indeed.

The giant danced and sung and sprinkled his head with sand. The sailor did the same, danced and sang, and the two approached each other.

So the giant was made to think that he was among friends. The sailor led him on to the island, where he met the Captain.

But the lively giant now began to be afraid in the presence of a new people. He seemed to wish to ask them who they were and whence they came. Then an answer to this question came to him. He looked up to the sky and pointed upward with one finger, saying by signs:

”Did you come down from Heaven?”

”He was so tall,” says our descriptive Knight, ”that the tallest of us only came up to his waist.” He was probably hardly taller than many of his race. Falkner, in his account of Patagonia (1774), says that he saw men there seven feet and a half high.

Of this dancing giant our historian gives a further description in lively and interesting colors:

”He had a large face painted red all around, and around his eyes were rings of yellow, and he had two hearts painted on his cheeks. He had but little hair on the top of his head, which was painted white.

”When he was brought before the Captain, he had thrown over him the skin of a certain beast, which skin was very carefully sewed.”

[Ill.u.s.tration: The dancing giant.]

The skin was that of a guanaco, a kind of llama.

Our historian thus describes the guanaco:

”This beast has its head and ears of the size of a mule, and the neck and body of the fas.h.i.+on of a camel, the legs of a deer, and the tail of a horse, and it neighs like a horse. There are great numbers of these animals in the same place.”

Patagonia is the land of these strange animals, which are still found there, and are hunted by Indians who lie upon the ground with drawn bows. The animal has great curiosity, and he draws near this living snare and is killed. When tame he is an interesting companion, but if angered he suddenly emits a great quant.i.ty of offensive liquid from his nose, like a half bucket of water, which he throws upon the offender. He is the South American camel.

This giant when he made himself ready to meet the adventurers had shoes of leather or skins, and carried a bow made of the ”gut of a beast” and a bundle of cane arrows feathered, at the end of which were small white stones.

”The Captain caused food and drink to be given to him.

”Then the crew began to show him some of the presents they had brought, among them a looking-gla.s.s.”

When the giant saw himself in the gla.s.s he was filled with wonder. It was as though his own ghost had appeared to him. There were men behind him curious to see how he would be affected. He leaped back with such force as to tumble them over. They were but pigmies to him.

The Captain now gave the giant two bells, a mirror, a comb, and beads, and sent him back to the sh.o.r.e.

One of the giants of the country saw him coming back, ran to the habitation of the giants, and summoned the giant people to the sh.o.r.e to meet him. They came, almost naked, leaping and singing, and pointing upward to Heaven. What a sight it must have been!

The women were laden with goods. The sailors beckoned them to the s.h.i.+ps to trade.

Queerly enough, the women brought with them a baby or little guanaco, which they led by a string. Our historian learned that when these giants wished to capture the old guanacos or camels they fastened one of the little guanacos to a bush, and the old ones came to the bush to play with it, and so became an easy prey.

”Six days afterward, our people going to cut wood,” writes the Knight, ”saw another giant, who raised his hands toward Heaven.